At length, grown impatient, Valentina urged him with a question.
"What I counsel, Madonna," he answered her, "is open defiance." "Such a course I am already pursuing.

But whither will it lead me ?" "I do not mean the mere defiance of words--mere protestations that you will not wed Gian Maria.

Listen, Madonna! The Castle of Roccaleone is your property.

It is perhaps the stoutest fortress in all Italy, to-day.
Lightly garrisoned and well-provisioned it might withstand a year's siege." She turned to him, having guessed already the proposal in his mind, and for all that at first her eyes looked startled, yet presently they kindled to a light of daring that augured well for a very stout adventure.

It was a wildly romantic notion, this of Gonzaga's, worthy of a poet's perfervid brain, and yet it attracted her by its unprecedented flavour.
"Could it be done ?" she wondered, her eyes sparkling at the anticipation of such a deed.
"It could, indeed it could," he answered, with an eagerness no whit less than her own.