A
plump purse lay on the coverlet, and her countenance wore an air of
kindness and animation which, together with the prospect of wearing a
court dress and travelling to his grandfather's castle in the mountains,
so worked on Odo's spirits that, forgetting the abate's instructions, he
sprang to her with an eager caress.
"Child, child," was her only rebuke; and she added, with a tap on his
cheek: "It is lucky I shall have a sword to protect me."
Long before the hour Odo was buttoned into his embroidered coat and
waistcoat. He would have on the sword at once, and when they sat down to
dinner, though his mother pressed him to eat with more concern than she
had before shown, it went hard with him to put his weapon aside, and he
cast longing eyes at the corner where it lay. At length a chamberlain
summoned them and they set out down the corridors, attended by two
servants. Odo held his head high, with one hand leading Donna Laura (for
he would not appear to be led by her) while the other fingered his
sword. The deformed beggars who always lurked about the great staircase
fawned on them as they passed, and on a landing they crossed the
humpbacked boy, who grinned mockingly at Odo; but the latter, with his
chin up, would not so much as glance at him.
A master of ceremonies in short black cloak and gold chain received them
in the antechamber of the Duchess's apartments, where the court played
lansquenet after dinner; the doors of her Highness's closet were thrown
open, and Odo, now glad enough to cling to his mother's hand, found
himself in a tall room, with gods and goddesses in the clouds overhead
and personages as supra-terrestrial seated in gilt armchairs about a
smoking brazier.
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