Before I left Rome to take up my new duties, I invited the patriarch of Chuzara to a brief banquet, and the two of them stood and talked merrily over a simple drink, and the wise old man always covered himself with a cloud of mist, like a towering mountain, and the mere stop of standing there was a deep and mysterious.

"The Magyars are uncivilized savages, whose ancestors harassed Europe on horseback a hundred years ago, and still make many older generations talk about it today."

I persuaded the old bishop with concern, hoping that the venerable old man would change his mind: "The conditions there are too harsh, mosquitoes and flies are rampant in summer, and it is bitterly cold in winter, and you eat fishy cattle and sheep, and drink boiled goat's milk. ”

The old man smiled with satisfaction, every wrinkle at the corner of his eyes was stretched, looking radiant, although we have not been dating for a long time, it is quite close to the New Year's friend:

"What shall I say, Lord Duke? Thank you for your kind reminder, but since the day I put on my robe and decided to dedicate myself to God, I have long put aside my personal honor and disgrace, life and death, and the fate of people is arranged by God, and this road is the only road I must follow, no matter how difficult the process is, isn't the result the same? I will eventually return to God's heavenly kingdom. ”

The old man's words made me awe-inspiring, and I was convinced, but I still insisted: "You will explain yourself there......"

"God is my shepherd, and I will not lack, he has made me lie down on the green pasture, and he has brought me to the waters where I can rest, and he has revived my soul, and led me in the way of righteousness for his name......"

The old bishop no longer answered me, leaning on the railing, gazing at Rome in the setting sun, with a serene expression, as kind as his own kind old grandfather, and muttered a psalm in praise of God from King David, the father of King Solomon in the Bible:

"Everything will be in the past, and when everything will be in the past, what do you get?"

In the comfortable and pleasant voice of the old man, my mind gradually calmed down, and I found the peaceful home that had been wandering my soul for a long time.

On the third pole of the moon, it was midnight when the bad news came, Luo Luo Qi Rong shook me from my sleep in a gloomy way, and his face was quite distorted by the faint moonlight that came through the window, and it was easy to be scared half to death.

"Give me a reason not to beat you, hurry up!" I muttered angrily.

"My lord, something is wrong...... Rollo shuddered as he took out a crumpled piece of parchment and handed it to me, then turned to find the candle and flint.

Something went wrong? My muddy brain instantly came back to my senses, fumbling to tear open the parchment seal, and quickly select the location where something might have happened.

Roman citizen revolt? But it's quiet outside, and it doesn't look like something big is happening.

The Vatican has a situation, and careerists who are not willing to fail to counterattack are counted? Nor is it likely, I craned my neck to look at the orange lantern of St. Peter's Church at the top of the hill, and quickly dismissed the idea.

Vibius's army clashed with the Normans?

I rolled my eyes, pondering the clues that connected the whole thing, and quickly confirmed the suspicion.

Luo Luo covered the flame like a bean with one hand, carefully put the candle on the table, his expression was still like a mournful examination, he didn't say anything and looked entangled, it was really annoying, I glanced at him, I couldn't wait to unfold the letter, and my eyes suddenly fell on one of the lines:

"The castle was under heavy attack by the enemy......"

Going up this line, the paragraph begins with the words:

Nijmegen ......

My world has lost any sense, sight, hearing, smell, touch, pitch black in front of me, and busy in my ears.

"Nijmegen Castle is under fierce attack from the enemy!"

Someone is threatening the lives of my family and my people! My mouth was dry, like a traveler in the desert who had run out of ammunition and food.

"It can't be, it's impossible ......"

I muttered nervously, grabbed Rollo's shoulders and shook him vigorously, as if seeking answers: "There is Jensen's army, and the Count of Baudouin, and the Duke of Hanover, and His Majesty Henry...... It should be foolproof! There is no way that anyone can cross the obstacles to attack the castle, who is this enemy! ”

Rollo blinked innocently, and when I came back to my senses, I hurriedly picked up the slippery letter and continued to read:

"Flender's army deceived the outer city gates, carried out inhumane massacres and looting of the soldiers and civilians in the city, and then set it on fire, and the whole city was plunged into a sea of burning fire, and the corpses of pillows even blocked the moat, and red blood flowed from every ditch...... The Count of Baudouin sent a letter to Madame Serena asking her to order at once the soldiers in the castle to abandon their resistance and to guarantee that they would not invade the residence of the Duke of Nijmegen......"

"Madame righteously rejected the invaders, the father who raised herself, who declared herself the mother of the Duchess and the mother of the people of Nijmegen, whose meaning was more than father-daughter affection, and she would never ask her soldiers to give up their resistance and open the door to the enemies of Nijmegen......"

After two days and two nights of hard fighting, the bribed traitors took advantage of Lady Serena's sleepiness to secretly open the castle gates, and the swarming Flanders soldiers began to slash and kill, and Lady Serena ordered her maids to escort little Martin out along the secret passage, but she chose to end her life in the most loyal way, Fighting silently against her father, who was inferior to herself, she set fire to the dormitory and died......"

"Serena!"

Tears poured out, and I clutched the tear-stained parchment and screamed hysterically, unable to accept the reality of the letter.

My beloved wife, the virtuous helper, the woman who gave my son life, is gone forever......

There was no signature on the letter, but I could recognize the slightly slanted handwriting that had turned to dust, and even Leonardo's fingers trembling because of his age.

The date of the payment was August 27, when I had already led my army from Constance and was on my way over the St. Gart Pass into Lombardy, and it was supposed that with the efficiency of Leonardo's intelligence system, this letter should have been delivered to me at the latest on the day when the army was in Milan, but unfortunately it backfired, and the news came too late, everything was too late.

"What about the messenger?"

I carefully folded the heavy letter and stuffed it into a pocket close to my chest, as if this was the only way to feel the grief-stricken atrium still beating, and the cold fingers touching the warm skin of my chest, and there was a burning pain.

Rollo immediately replied, "He's waiting outside, I know you must have something to ask, so I didn't arrange a meal break, so I told him to come in." ”

I nodded silently, walked to the table with the candlestick and sat down, looking at the messy papers on the table in a daze, this atmosphere is too easy to fall into sadness, I gently wiped the tears from the corners of my eyes and sat down, as a superior, my weakness must not be seen by my subordinates.

The doorkeeper turned, and Rollo led a small beggar in, and before he could see him, the foul smell of his body rushed into his nostrils.

I held my breath and looked intently at the approaching beggar, only to see that his face was dirty and I could not see his true face, and his shoulder-length hair had probably not been washed since birth, and it was sticky like a bird's nest with droppings, and two flies were hovering and flying with the stench, reluctant to leave this paradise.

The rags he wore on his body could barely cover the important parts, his steps were too big to be naked, his bare skin was about the same color as his face, except for the mud was dirt, and his bare cane was the color of grease under the light of the candlelight, which showed how long the dog-beating stick had followed him, and his bare feet were full of thick calluses and scars, leaving a long series of black footprints on the smooth marble floor along the way, which were heavier than the color of the ink......

All in all, this is an ordinary beggar on the street, a small character that no one will ever look at, and it is absolutely suitable to be used as a secret agent to pass on information.

After looking at the person who delivered the letter, I waved my hand to let Rollo go out first, and the latter asked with a slightly worried look, and I signaled him not to make a fuss: "I have something to ask him, you go outside the door and guard, no one can let in." ”

Rollo pushed the door open, and the two of us were the only ones left in the room.

A duke who stands tall in a gorgeous tuning!

One is a filthy and inconspicuous beggar!

The contrast is very strange.

After a long silence, I asked, "What's your name?" ”

"I don't have a name, my lord, I only have a code name."

The beggar replied neither humbly nor arrogantly, and he could not see the slightest timidity that the low-level people should have in the face of the aristocracy struggling on the line of life and death.

"My code name is eighty-eight."

"Eighty-eight?"

Auspicious numbers, but bring unlucky information, God is always so fond of playing tricks on mortals.

"Well, eighty-eight, you answer truthfully, why did this information arrive so late, the date of payment is August 27, a full month ago."

Eighty-eight lowered his eyes, but not self-blame, as if he remembered something sad: "Each of us has an upline, and we only maintain a one-line contact with the upline, one link after another, and there are not too many people involved in accidents, so that our organization can be preserved." ”

He paused and continued: "My upline is fifty-nine, a foot trader with a rosacea and a big belly full of jingling knick-knacks, a salesman with first-class eloquence, and he lies without even blinking an eye, and our partner has never made a mistake in thirteen years, but he is dead. ”

"Dead? Why? I asked.

"I don't know, according to our rules, we will meet at the agreed place every month to exchange information, but when I passed by last month, I found a mark left by him on the road, which was a sign of the cancellation of the meeting."

He rubbed his messy hair, as if recalling something terrible: "On the way back, there have been sneaky followers, but I'm not sure if it's an enemy, a single line of contact can easily cause misunderstandings between peers, fortunately, I am more familiar with the streets of Rome, and finally shook off my tail in the crowded flea street, and the more I thought about it in the next few days, the more I felt that something was wrong, fifty-nine could not disappear without warning like this, maybe the enemy was coming at us!" I secretly went to the house of the fifty-ninth in the middle of the night, but unfortunately it had been burned to the ground, and he didn't even have a corpse left......"

Eighty-eight sniffed and pretended to be calm to hold back tears: "We also have a secret intelligence point, if something is urgent and we can't meet, he will hide the information there to indicate the next move." ”

"I was afraid of being targeted, so I deliberately hid for two days before I made a detour, and finally took out this letter, which was sealed with wax at the time, and there were blood stains on it, which shows that the person who sent the letter was sandwiched with wax pills in the fat of the cut thigh, this way is very secretive, unless the autopsy is generally extremely difficult to find, but it requires the carrier to have an amazing tolerance for pain."

"Wait, you said someone was following?"

I frowned and grabbed the point of the eighty-eight pile of nonsense: "That is to say, someone is blocking the delivery of information, can you determine the identity of the other party?" ”

"I can't, my lord, we haven't even taken a photo of each other, it's not easy to determine our identity."

He shrugged his shoulders and said he couldn't do anything: "Urgent letters can be delivered from Nijmegen to Rome in just a week, and even ordinary intelligence will not take more than twenty days, there are definitely enemies in it, and they are very strong, they are familiar with how we operate, and they have the same intelligence system and counter-intelligence capabilities." ”

Eighty-eight's eyes widened, and his hands poked into the air emptyly, as if there was some reliable grip there: "Fifty-nine is dead, the upper line is broken, I can't get in touch with other people, I have to take the risk to come here to reveal my identity, I am exposed." ”

"I'll take care of the rest, you go out first and wash up and then have a full meal, and wait for it to be delivered."

I nodded at him, who bowed respectfully and walked backwards out of the room, taking with him the stench and buzzing flies that filled the room, and the surroundings were much quieter.

After a moment, Luo Luo came in with another candlestick, and a warm halo enveloped him, blurring the unreal: "My lord, what should you do with that person?" ”

"Settle down for two days, and then find an opportunity to kick him out, there is no time to distinguish between friend and foe during the extraordinary period, he may be a smokescreen set by the enemy."

I pulled back the curtains that blocked the balcony to let in the fresh air outside, and Rome fell asleep in the middle of the night, except for the barking of dogs disturbed by the footsteps of patrolling soldiers, the city was deep and charming, but brave and not as brave as Nijmegen was in my heart, it was beautifully dressed, and Nijmegen was my body.

"This matter must be kept absolutely secret, if it spreads, it is likely to disturb the morale of the army, all the guards who saw this person coming in tonight sent out to send out, try to narrow the scope of knowledge, Rome was decided, and it can't withstand another toss, otherwise it will fall into the hands of the enemy, the enemy is dark and I am clear, everything is careful."

The abrupt appearance of the morning star next to the moon is gradually setting in the west, symbolizing that the long night is coming to an end, and a dawn full of life is coming, but for me, the night has just begun.

"Contact Bishop Bendenik and say that I have something very important to say to my face, that tomorrow he is not going to celebrate Holy Prayer Mass for His Holiness the Pope. Find a time to arrange a meeting between the two of us, be sure to hide people's eyes and ears, arrange some reliable cronies, and don't let irrelevant people know. ”

"Understood!"

Rollo turned to come out, but just two steps abruptly stopped, snorted back and asked me.

"Your Excellency...... Aren't we going back to Nijmegen? ”

(End of chapter)