Through all the quiet of that divine night the minions of the Messer Simone had slipped hither and thither through the moon-lit streets of Florence, bearing the orders of the captain of the Company of Death to certain of his loyal lieutenants and faithful federates. And the order that each man received was to report himself ready for active service and properly armed at the gate of the city which gave upon the highroad that led in the fulness of time to Arezzo. It was a curious fact, though of course it was not realized until later, that no one of these summonses was delivered to any man other than a man known to be a member of the Red party, and, therefore, by the same token, one that was an opponent of Messer Simone dei Bardi and his friends of the Yellow League. The call to each man told him that at the tryst he would find a horse ready to carry him to his destination.

Each man that received that summons had but a little while before been feasting blithely at the house of Messer Folco. Each man hastened to [Pg 244]obey his summons without a sinister thought, without a fear. Each man hastily armed himself, hurriedly flung his cloak about him, and sped swiftly from his abode or lodging across the night-quiet streets to the appointed meeting-place. Each man, on arrival at the indicated gate, found the warders awake and ready for him, ready on his production of his summons to pass him through the great unbolted doors into the liberty of the open country. The later arrivals found those that had answered earlier to the call waiting for them in the gray vagueness between night and dawn, each man standing by a horse's head, while a number of other horses in the care of a company of varlets waited, whinnying and shivering in the shadow of the walls, to be chosen from by the new-comers. Every man that crossed the threshold of the gateway that night found Maleotti waiting for him on the other hand with a smile of welcome on his crafty face, and whispered instructions on his evil lips.

Those instructions were simple enough. The little company of gallant gentlemen, citizens, for the most part, in the flower of their youth, and certainly the very flower of the Red party, was to fall under the temporary command of Messer Guido Cavalcanti. Messer Guido was to conduct the party, which numbered in all some two hundred souls, to a designated place, a thickly wooded spot some half-way between Arezzo and Florence. Here the adventurers [Pg 245]were to find waiting for them a company of Free Companions, some six hundred lances, under the command of the very illustrious condottiere, Messer Griffo of the Claw, to whom, at the point of conjunction, Messer Guido was instantly to surrender his temporary leadership of the dedicated fellowship. After that it was for Messer Griffo to decide the order of the enterprise and the form in which the attack upon Arezzo was to be made. These were very plain and simple instructions, very simple to follow, very simple to understand, very easy to obey. No man of all the some two hundred men to whom they were confided by Maleotti, or one of Maleotti's comrades, required to be told them a second time or felt the need to ask a single explanatory question.

It was true enough, as Messer Simone had said, that the rogue Ghibellines of Arezzo had a mind to deal Florence an ugly stroke, if ever they could, and that the hope of the Aretines was to trap the Florentines in a snare. As you know, Messer Simone had hatched a double-edged plot, though we young hot-heads of the Company of Death knew of but one-half of its purpose. He had caused information to be sent to Arezzo that there was a traitor within their walls who was prepared on a certain night to let in a certain number of Florentines, who thus would seize and hold one of the gates until reinforcements came from Florence to [Pg 246]secure the weakened city. He schemed all this with the aid of a Guelph that dwelt in Arezzo as a red-hot Ghibelline. Now, it would have been simple enough for him after this to send the little handful of Florentines against a warned Arezzo and have them cut to pieces by an Aretine ambuscade. But his purpose went further than merely demolishing a number of his enemies. He wanted to win Arezzo, if he could, as well. So, by his machinations, he arranged that the forces of Arezzo should be out to meet and overthrow the adventurous Florentines, whereafter they might march on Florence and take the city unawares. But, to counteract this, he made his arrangements with Messer Griffo, who was, in one and the same job, to massacre the Florentines of the Red and give battle to the Aretines unaware of his presence, and so, at a stroke, rid Simone of his enemies, and cover him with patriotic glory.

It will be seen by this that Messer Simone, if treacherous to his enemies within the city, was in nowise treacherous to the city herself. But we were ignorant of his wiles that night, as we gathered together outside the gates.

In an amazingly short space of time we were all a-horseback, and riding quietly through the night on the road toward Arezzo, with Messer Maleotti, on a high-mettled mount, shepherding us as we rode, as if we were so many simple sheep and he [Pg 247]our pastor. I, that had come late to the meeting-place, had sought for and found Messer Dante, after a little seeking hither and thither through the press of eager, generous youths that were bestirring themselves to strike a good stroke for Florence that night. I found him standing quietly alone, with his hand resting in a kindly command upon the neck of the steed that he had chosen, and a look of great happiness softening the native sternness of his regard. I stood by him in silence till we rode, for after our first salutation he chose to be taciturn, and that in no unfriendly seeming, but as one might that had great thoughts to think and counted very certainly upon the acquiescence of a friend. And I was ever a man to respect the humors, grave or merry, of my friends.

So I stood by him and held my peace until the muster-roll of our fellowship was completed, and it seemed good to Maleotti that the signal should be given for our departure upon our business. But while I waited I looked hither and thither through the moon-lit gloom to discern this face and that of familiar youth, and as I noted them and named them to myself, I was dimly conscious of a thought that would not take shape in words, and yet a thought that, all unwittingly, troubled me. I seemed like a child that tries, and tries in vain, to recall some duty that was set upon it, and that has wickedly slipped its memory. Man after man of [Pg 248]the figures that moved about me in the darkness was well known to me. Those faces, those figures, were the faces and figures of intimates whose pleasures I shared daily, companions with whom I had grown up, playfellows in the days when we gambolled in the streets, playfellows now in the pleasant fields of love and revelry. What could there be, I asked myself, almost unconscious that I did so question—what could there be in the presence of so many well-known, so many well-liked, so many well-trusted gentlemen, to make me feel so inexplicably ill at ease? Where can a man stand better, I seemed to ask myself, than in the centre of a throng of men that are all his friends? Thus I puzzled and fumed in the silent minutes ere we started, struggling with my unaccountable misgivings, not realizing that it was the very fact that all about me were my friends which was the cause of my most natural disquiet. It was not until we were all in the saddle and well upon our way to Arezzo, that with a sudden clearness my muffled thought asserted itself, and I must needs make it known at once to Dante, at whose side I rode.

"Friend of mine," I said to him, in a low voice, "I would not willingly seem either suspicious or timorous, and I hope I am neither. But I think I have reason for some unquiet. I have noticed something that seems curious to me in the composition of our company."

[Pg 249]

To my surprise he turned to me a smiling face, as of one that was too well contented with his star to be fretted by wayward chances. "I think I know what you would say," he answered me, cheerfully, "and indeed I have noticed what you have noticed—that we who ride thus to-night are all the partisans of one party in Florence. There is not, so far as I have been able to see, a single man of the other favor among us."

Now this was exactly the fact that I had at last been able to realize, the portentous fact which had thrilled my spirit with significant alarms, the fact to which I wished to call his attention, and, behold, he had anticipated my o............