At half-past two that same night Franco, Lawyer V., and their friend Pedraglio were sitting in the loggia in the dark, and in silence. Suddenly Pedraglio started up exclaiming: "What can that fool be about?" Going out to the terrace he listened a moment and then returned to the room. "No sign of him," said he. "Oh, I say! Are we to sit here like idiots and wait for them to come and take us, and all on account of that silly ass, who has probably fallen asleep? Maironi, you are fairly well acquainted with the road, and we all three have plenty of courage. If it should be necessary to pitch into anybody we should be quite equal to the occasion. Don't you think so, V.?"

The night before, between seven and eight o'clock, Pedraglio had happened to be on the road between Loveno and Menaggio. At the spot that goes by the name of "Bertin's Cove" a man had begged of him, had pressed a note into his hand, and had then walked rapidly away. The note ran as follows: "Why does Carlino Pedraglio not go to Oria at once, to see Signor Maironi and the lawyer from Varenna, and take a nice little walk with his dear friends over beyond the stake?"

Ever since the arrest of his friend the doctor at Pellio, Pedraglio had been expecting some sign from the police, and this note was not the first timely and ungrammatical warning which had reached a patriot. The note spoke plainly; he must pass the stake that marked the frontier without delay. Pedraglio knew nothing of Franco's misfortune and return, nor was he aware of the lawyer's presence in Oria. He did not stop to speculate, however, but hastened to Loveno, provided himself with money, and started off on foot. He would not risk going to Porlezza, but took the path that from a spot near Tavordo rises upwards through a lonely ravine to the Passo Stretto. As nimble as a chamois, he reached Oria in four hours, and found Franco and the lawyer preparing to start, another mysterious warning having reached them through the curate of Castello, who had been to Porlezza, and had there been charged with the message, in the confessional. Ismaele was to guide them across the frontier. The passes of Boglia were very carefully guarded, and Ismaele proposed passing between Monte della Neve and Castello; then they would drop down into the valley, making straight for the Alpe di Castello below the Sasso Grande, and from there descend to Cadro, an hour above Lugano.

But Ismaele was to have been there at two o'clock, and at half-past two he had not yet appeared.

Luisa was also up. She was in the alcove-room mending a pair of Maria's stockings, which she intended to place on the little bed, where she had arranged all of the child's little garments with the same care as when the little one was alive. She had not wished to see either the lawyer or Pedraglio. After her intense excitement at the funeral her grief had once more assumed that gloomy aspect which caused Dr. Aliprandi still greater anxiety. She was no longer excited; she did not even speak, and she had never yet wept. Her manner towards Franco exhibited nothing but pity for this man who loved her, and whose affection and presence were, in spite of herself, perfectly indifferent to her. Franco, relying upon obtaining the position his director had talked so much about, had proposed taking the whole family back to Turin with him. Uncle Piero, poor old man, was quite ready to make this new sacrifice, but Luisa had stated explicitly that rather than leave her little daughter, she would end her days in the lake.

Upon hearing the proposal to start without Ismaele, Franco rose and said he would go and take leave of his wife. Just at that moment the lawyer heard a step in the street below. "Silence!" said he. "Here he is." Franco went out to the terrace. Some one was, indeed, coming from the direction of Albogasio. Franco waited until the wayfarer had reached the church-place, and then called out in a low voice:

"Ismaele?"

"It is I," a voice answered that was not Ismaele's. "It is the prefect. I am coming up-stairs."

The prefect at that hour? What could have happened? Franco went to the kitchen, lighted a candle, and then hastened downstairs.

Five minutes passed and he had not returned to his friends. But meanwhile Ismaele's wife had appeared to say that her husband was feeling very ill, and could not stir. She stood in the square, and spoke to Pedraglio, who was on the terrace. He hastened to summon Franco, and found him on the stairs, coming up with the prefect. "The guide is ill," said he, knowing the priest to be an honest man. "Let us start at once, and not waste any more time." Franco replied that he could not start immediately, and that they must go on ahead. How was this? Why could he not start? No, he could not. He ushered the prefect into the hall, called the lawyer, and tried to persuade both Pedraglio and him to start at once. Something extraordinary had happened, about which he must consult his wife, and he could not say what he might decide to do. His friends protested that they would not forsake him. The jovial Pedraglio, who was in the habit of spending more money than his father approved of, observed that if the worst came to the worst, they would be able to live more economically and more virtuously at Josephstadt or Kufstein than in Turin, and that this would be a consolation to his "governor." "No, no!" exclaimed Franco. "You must go! Prefect, you persuade them!" And he went towards the alcove-room.

"Are you ready to start?" said Luisa, in that voice which seemed to come from a far-away world. "Good-bye."

He came to her side, and stooped to kiss the little stocking she held. "Luisa," he whispered, "the Prefect of Caravina is here." She did not express the slightest astonishment. "Grandmother sent for him an hour or two ago," Franco continued. "She told him she had seen our Maria, shining like an angel."

"Oh, what a lie!" Luisa exclaimed, in a tone full of contempt, but not angrily. "As if it were possible she would go to her and not come to me!"

"Maria has touched her heart," Franco went on. "She begs us to pardon her. She fears she is dying, and entreats me to come to her, to bring her a word of peace from you also."

Franco himself did not believe in the apparition, being profoundly sceptical of everything that was supernatural outside of religion, but he did believe that Maria, in her higher state, had already been able to work a miracle, and touch his grandmother's heart, and the thought caused him indescribable emotion. Luisa remained like ice. She was not even irritated, as Franco had feared she would be, by the proposal to send a friendly message. "Your grandmother fears hell," she observed with her mortal coldness. "Hell does not exist, and so all this amounts to nothing more than a fright. The suffering is not great. Let her bear it, and then die as we all must, and so, 'Amen.'" Franco saw it would be useless to insist. "Then I will go," said he. She was silent.

"I don't think I shall be able to come back this way," Franco added. "I shall have to take to the hills."

Still no answer.

"Luisa!" the young man said softly. Reproach, grief, passion, all these were in his appeal. Luisa's hands, that had never once paused in their work, now became still. She murmured:

"I no longer feel anything. I am like a stone."

Franco turned faint. He kissed his wife on her hair, said good-bye, and then entered the alcove, where, kneeling beside the little bed, he threw his arms across it, recalling his treasure's little voice: "One kiss more, papa!" A paroxysm of weeping assailed him, but he controlled himself, and hurriedly left the room.

In the hall his friends were impatiently awaiting his return. How could they start? They did not know the way. The lawyer was, indeed, acquainted with the Boglia road, but was that the best way to go if they wished to avoid the guards? On hearing that Franco was going to Cressogno they were filled with amazement, and Pedraglio gave vent to his indignation, saying it was shameful to forsake his friends in this fashion, when they were in trouble. When the prefect realised how matters stood he took Pedraglio's part, and offered to explain Franco's absence to his grandmother, and proposed that Franco should write a line or two, which he himself would carry to Cressogno. But Franco was convinced that his Maria wished him to take this step, and he would not yield. He suddenly remembered that the prefect was as familiar as a hare with all the mountain paths. "You go!" said he, addressing the priest. "You accompany them!" The prefect was about to reply that perhaps the Signora Marchesa might need him, when the lawyer exclaimed: "Hush! Look there!"

Directly in front of the house, where the shadow of Monte Bisgnago lay obliquely upon the rippling water, a boat had stopped. Franco recognised the customs-guards' launch.

"I am willing to wager those hogs are watching for us," Pedraglio murmured. "They are afraid we shall escape by boat. Anyway, they are on the lookout."

"Hush!" the lawyer repeated, approaching the window that overlooked the church-place.

All held their breath in silence.

"Children," said V., turning quickly from the window, "we are done for!" Franco went to the window, and saw a solitary figure running towards the house. He concluded the lawyer had given a false alarm, but the man—it was he who went by the nickname of "the hunted hare," and who knew and saw everything—flung two words upwards as he passed beneath the window: "The police!" At the same moment they heard the noise of many feet. "Come with me! You also, Prefect!" cried Franco, and the others following, he made for the little courtyard between the house and the hillside, and, passing through a woodshed, reached the short cut that leads to Albogasio Superiore. It was so dark that no one noticed a customs-guard, standing, carbine in hand, not two steps from the door of the wood-shed. Fortunately this guard, a certain Filippini, from Busto, was an honest fellow, who ate the bread of Austria unwillingly, and simply because he could find no other. "Be quick!" said he in an undertone. "Cut across the fields, and then take the Boglia road! The path below the Madonnina on the left." Franco thanked the man, and, with his companions, started up the steep path that comes out on the narrow communal road of Albogasio Superiore. Half-way up they all jumped into a field of maize on the right, and stopped to listen. They heard steps on the stairs leading upwards from the church-place, and then on the path where the guard was posted. Evidently the police wished to make sure that all the exits were well guarded. The four crawled swiftly away through the maize, and on reaching the spot below a great boulder called "Lori's Rock," they stopped to hold a consultation. They might take the path that comes out on the Albogasio road at the very door of Pasotti's garden, and then climb up from field to field, as far as the Boglia road. But the path would be hard to find at this hour, and fearing to lose too much time, they determined to make for the stairway that leads up from Albogasio Inferiore to Puttini's house, then, leaving Casa Puttini on the right, they could reach the Boglia road in no time. It was already less dark. In one way this was a disadvantage, but at least it would enable them to find their way through that labyrinth of small fields and low walls. All were silent. Only Pedraglio would utter an oath in Milanese from time to time, as he stumbled over a stone or scratched his hands on a hedge. Then the others would hush him. They reached the narrow stairway preceded by the prefect, who jumped walls and hedges like a squirrel. When they were all together on the stairs Franco withdrew from the group. On the Boglia road they would not need him; he was going to Cressogno. In vain Pedraglio seized him by the arm, in vain the prefect implored him not to expose himself to certain arrest, and probable imprisonment. He believed he was obeying Maria's voice, and felt that he was acting according to the dictates of conscience. He tore himself from Pedraglio, and disappeared up the stairs, for he did not wish to go to Cressogno by way of S. Mamette—that would be too dangerous.

"Follow me!" said the prefect. "The man is mad, and we have ourselves to think of."

As they were about to turn the corner of Puttini's house, they heard people approaching who were probably going down the stairs. The door of Puttini's house was open. The friends slipped inside. The people passed, talking. They were peasants, and one was saying: "Where the deuce can he be going at this hour?" Alas, they had met and recognised Franco! If the gendarmes and the guards should start out to hunt for the fugitives and come across these people, they would discover a trace at once. Towards dawn one is always sure of meeting people. This time they had been able to avoid being seen, but a second time they might be less fortunate, and a meeting might prove as fatal to Pedraglio and the lawyer as this one would probably prove to Franco. "If you could only disguise yourselves as peasants!" said the priest. A happy thought struck the lawyer, who had something both of the poet and the artist, and who was well acquainted with Puttini. He would take Scior Zacomo's clothes for Pedraglio, who was also short, and the big, fat servant's clothes for himself; stuff their own things into a gerla, [Q] fasten it upon his back, and start for Boglia. The "first political deputy" of Albogasio might have a hundred reasons for visiting the forest belonging to the commune. No sooner said than done! They proceeded upstairs, and the prefect, who was familiar with the house, went straight to call Marianna. She did not answer, and her room was empty. The prefect guessed at once that the unfaithful servant had gone to S. Mamette for some secret business transaction, like that of the oil. That was why they had found the door open. They went to the kitchen and lighted two candles. The lawyer took one and the prefect pointed out Scior Zacomo's room to him. Meanwhile Pedraglio explored the kitchen by the light of the other candle, in search of "something wet, something to brace him up."

Scior Zacomo slept in a corner room beyond the hall which the lawyer crossed on tiptoe, picking his way between piles of chestnuts, walnuts, filberts, and pears. He approached the door—it was closed. He listened—silence. Very slowly he turned the handle and pushed. The beastly door squeaked—he heard a formidable snort, and Scior Zacomo cried out angrily: "Go away! Let me alone! Go away!" The lawyer entered without further parley. "Away with you, you accursed woman! Go away, I tell you!" cried Scior Zacomo, the point of his white night-cap rising out of the pillows. On catching sight of the lawyer he began to groan: "Oh, Lord! Oh, Lord! Oh, dear me! For pity's sake, forgive me! I thought it was my servant. Most distinguished Advocate, for the love of Heaven, tell me what has happened."

"Nothing, nothing, Scior Zacomo!" said the lawyer. "Only the Commissary of Porlezza is here——"

"Oh, good Lord!" and Scior Zacomo started to stick his legs out of bed.

"It is nothing, nothing! Be calm, be calm! Cover yourself up; cover yourself up again! We are going up to Boglia on account of that accursed bull, you know."

"Oh, Lord! What are you talking about? There is no bull at Boglia at this time of the year. Oh! I am all bathed in sweat!"

"Never mind. I tell you we are going to see the place, to see where he used to be. But the Commissary has very good reasons for strictly forbidding you to accompany us; he forbids you, moreover, to go out until we return, and he has even ordered me to remove your clothes."

Then he began rapidly collecting Puttini's garments, commanding him in the name of the Commissary to be silent. He took possession of the tall hat, seized the bamboo walking-stick, ordered the wretched man to bolt the door as soon as he should have left the room, and to open it to no one, to speak to no one, until the Commissary's return; all this in the name of that dreaded functionary. Then, leaving the poor man more dead than alive, he once more joined his companions, who, by dint of much searching, had found a filthy dress of Marianna's, a big, red kerchief for the head, a gerla, and a bottle of Anesone triduo. [R] "The deuce!" swore the lawyer, on examining the loathsome garments he must don. His disguise was indeed most unsatisfactory. The skirt was too short, and the kerchief did not hide his face sufficiently. However there was no time to look for anything better. But Pedraglio, in the tall hat, with the bamboo walking-stick in his hand, was a perfect Scior Zacomo. The lawyer thrust an old manuscript pamphlet he found in the kitchen under his friend's arm, and showed him how to walk and puff. Finally he took the keys to the wine-cellar, two enormous keys, gave one to Pedraglio and put the other in his own pocket. These would prove valuable weapons in case of need; one, he said, would strike in the treble key, the other in the bass. And so they went out, the prefect first, followed by the false Scior Zacomo puffing like a steam-engine, and then the false Marianna and her gerla bringing up the rear. Hardly had they reached the street when the real Marianna appeared, returning from S. Mamette with an empty flask. Catching sight of her master's tall hat looming in the uncertain light, she faced about and made off as fast as her legs would carry her. "Miserable thief!" the prefect exclaimed. "Excellent! Your disguise is splendid!" In five minutes they had reached the Boglia road. Then the prefect turned homewards, and presently, hearing people coming up from Albogasio Superiore talking of gendarmes and guards, he went to meet them and inquired what had happened. Oh, nothing very important; only the gendarmes and soldiers had been to Casa Ribera to arrest Don Franco Maironi, and, it would appear, lawyer V. also, for they were sure he must have been there, and they had been asking every one about him. However, they had found neither one nor the other of the friends, although the customs-guards had been watching the house since midnight. Now the police were searching all the houses in Oria, in the belief that the two men must have escaped by the roof. While the prefect was listening to this news a boy came running towards them from the direction of Albogasio Superiore. They stopped him. "The guards!" he gasped; "the gendarmes!" He was as white as a sheet; why he was running away he himself could not tell, and they found it impossible to gather from him where the gendarmes were. A woman appeared on the scene who was able to give them more information. Four customs-guards and four gendarmes had just now crossed the square in Albogasio Superiore. It was rumoured that Don Franco had been seen on the road to Castello, and two gendarmes with two guards had started towards the Boglia. The priest shuddered. "Of course," some one said, "they will cut him off on the Boglia road." The prefect took some comfort in the thought that both gendarmes and guards were now searching for Franco only. He was so tall, so slender, that neither the false Puttini nor the false Marianna could possibly be suspected of being him. Their fate was now beyond his control, but for Franco he could still do much. He started for Cressogno, confident that Franco would reach that place in safety, if the gendarmes did not discover any fresh traces, for they would search for him on all the paths leading from Castello to the frontier, but not on the road to Cressogno.

Pedraglio and the lawyer accomplished the first part of the journey from Albogasio to the stables of PÜs, creeping up the precipitous slope like cats, with long and cautious steps. The lawyer advanced in silence, but the other was continually cursing his garments in an undertone. That "beastly hat," that made his forehead slippery with grease, that "infernal tail-coat," that smelt strong of the sweat of ages. They reached PÜs without having met a living being. At PÜs an old woman came out from between the stables just after they had passed, and exclaimed in amazement: "You up here, Scior Giacomo? At this hour?" "Puff!" murmured the lawyer, and Pedraglio began to blow, "Apff! Apff!" like a pair of bellows. "Such paths as these take the breath away, my good sir," said the old woman. They met no one else until they reached Sostra.

Sostra, a stable about half-way up the mountain, with a barn, a shed, and a cistern, lies some distance back from the path. That path is the very worst in the whole of Valsolda. It would make even a wild goat hang its tongue out. Pedraglio and the lawyer, panting and wet through with perspiration, turned into the Sostra for a moment's rest. There all was silence and solitude. At that height they already breathed a different air. And how much lower the mountain-tops had become! And the lake down there in the depths looked like a river! The lawyer cast anxious glances upwards towards the first crest of the Boglia, where the great beech forest begins. Only half an hour more of climbing! "Come along!" said he. But Pedraglio, in whose legs there still lingered the memory of that other long walk from Loveno to Oria by way of the Passo Stretto, wanted to rest a little longer, and began calmly turning over the leaves of Puttini's old manuscript. It was a monkish poem by some unknown Cremonese of the seventeenth century. "Come along," his companion repeated after a minute or two, and was already preparing to rise when he heard some one approaching. He had barely time to whisper, "Look out!" and turn his back that his face might not be seen. Pedraglio, though he kept his manuscript close to his nose, saw first two customs-guards and then two gendarmes appear upon the path. He warned his friend of this in a low tone, and without turning his head. The two guards halted. One of them saluted: "My respects, Signor Puttini." Turning to the gendarmes, he said: "This gentleman is the first political deputy of Albogasio." The gendarmes saluted also, and Pedraglio raised his hat, and held the manuscript a little higher. The guards wished to rest awhile, but one of the gendarmes ordered them to move on, and when the rest of the company had started forward, he himself approached the Sostra. He was from Ampezzo, and spoke Italian very fluently. "You dog! I hope you don't know me!" thought Pedraglio, vaguely conscious of his dual personality. "We are in for it, anyway!"

"Signor Deputato Politico," said the man, "did you happen to see Signor Maironi at Oria this morning?"

"I? No, indeed. Signor Maironi is in bed and asleep at this hour."

"And you yourself——where are you going?"

"I am going up that mountain, up that accursed Boglia, to see about the communal bull."

"Idiot!" groaned the lawyer inwardly. "He is making it communal now!" But the "communal" was allowed to pass unchallenged. The gendarme, who had a face like a bull-dog, stared hard at his interlocutor. "You are a political deputy," said he insolently, "and you wear that thing on your chin?" Instinctively Pedraglio's hand went to his thin, black, pointed beard, the abhorred beard of the liberals. "I will cut it off," said he, with mock seriousness. "Most certainly, my dear sir! Are you also going up the Boglia!" Very stiffly the gendarme moved away, without answering, and all unconscious of the shameful gibbet to which the political deputy was consigning him.

The two friends congratulated themselves on their narrow escape, but they recognised that the game had become very serious. Now they had the guards to reckon with, who knew Puttini well, and they must find a means of avoiding them. And what if that bull-dog of a gendarme should blab about the beard? "Come on! Come on!" said the lawyer. "Let us follow them, and if we see or hear them turn back we must take to our heels and make off to the left, towards the frontier." This would have been a desperate move, for they were unacquainted with the ground, with which the guards were undoubtedly familiar.

But in order to catch up with his companions the bull-dog had to sweat and pant so hard that when he reached them he had no desire left to speak of beards. Pedraglio and the lawyer climbed slowly upwards, and saw the enemy reach the crest of the hill at the Madonnina beech-tree. There they halted for some time and then disappeared. The venerable beech-tree, which had the honour of bearing upon its trunk an image of the Madonna, which, on its death, it bequeathed to a small chapel, stood like a sentinel before the great forest of Boglia, like a soldier posted in this dip of the crest, to keep watch over the precipitous hillside, the lake, and the sloping ground of Valsolda. The venerable army of colossal beeches stood marshalled in another silent hollow between the slope of Colmaregia, the easily climbed Dorsi della Nave, the rocky base of the Denti di Vecchia or Canne d'Organo, and that other saddle of the Pian Biscagno, between Colmaregia and the Sasso Grande, and faced the depths of Val Colla from Lugano to Cadro. An open, grass-grown strip of ground stretched along the edge of the crest, between the Madonnina beech-tree and the forest. The two fugitives stopped to consider their position. Which way should they go? Should they look for the little path below the beech-tree, of which the guard who had saved them had spoken, or should they enter the forest? No, it would be unwise to take to the woods, in the wake of the game they had just seen enter them. In the forest they were sure to find the dead leaves lying ankle-deep, and it would be impossible to pass through without attracting the attention of the blood-hounds that were roaming there, and their disguise would not bear close inspection. The path? There were more paths than one beneath the beech-tree. Which was the right one? Pedraglio swore at the absent Franco for not having accompanied them, but the lawyer was studying the Colmaregia, which could be climbed without entering the forest. He had twice made the ascent of the Colmaregia, that superb, slender, grass-grown peak of the Boglia, which the line of the frontier cuts in halves. He knew that from there they would be able to descend to the Swiss village of BrÈ, and he resolved to try that route. No one was visible on the crest that rises from the Madonnina beech towards the Colmaregia, and the summit was enveloped in clouds.

Just below the beech-tree they were overtaken by a wave of mist which had rolled up one side of the mountain and was rapidly pouring down the other; a cold, thick mist, a mist "as bad as they make them," so V. said. They could not see five steps ahead, and thus it happened that near the beech-tree Pedraglio ran almost into the arms of a customs-guard.

He was one of the four, and had been told off to guard the open space between the brow of the hill and the forest. Catching sight of the little man in the top-hat, he exclaimed: "On the Boglia, Sig——" The lawyer quickly cast aside his gerla, and the guard did not finish his sentence, but stared a moment, open-mouthed, and then exclaimed: "How is this?"

The lawyer did not wait for further explanations.

"This is how it is," said he calmly, and drawing his fists into position on his breast, he hit out suddenly, and dealt the guard a tremendous blow in the stomach that sent him rolling on the grass, his heels in the air. In a flash Pedraglio was upon him, and snatched his carbine from him.

"If you yell, you dog, I shall do for you!" said he. But how could he possibly yell? With a blow like that in the stomach, it was all he could do to breathe for at least fifteen minutes. In fact the man lay like one dead, and it was some time before they could even make him groan faintly: "Oh, Lord! Oh, Lord!"

"It's nothing, nothing at all," V. told him with his usual, mocking calm. "Shocks like that are good for the health. You will see. Now, my friend, you are just going to pick yourself up and stand nice and firm on your legs, and accompany us to Colmaregia. You will see how well you will be able to walk. I was careful not to use this." And he showed him the key.

"Oh, what a blow!" groaned the guard. "Oh, what a terrible blow!"

"It is indeed a rather stiff climb," the lawyer went on, taking the carbine from Pedraglio, "but with your permission we will help you up from behind with the point of this instrument. Thus climbing will become a delight. Then you must bear us company down to BrÈ. We will carry your carbine for you, but you, in return, must carry this little gerla. Is my meaning quite clear to you? Now, march!" But the wretched man could not get to his feet and they certainly could not leave him there and run the risk of his calling out for help.

"Poor fellow!" said Pedraglio. "You hit him too hard."

V. replied that he had touched him with the gentleness of a woman, and passing the carbine to Pedraglio, he seized the guard by the collar of his uniform, pulled him to his feet, and made him run his arms through the straps of the gerla.

"Go ahead, you fraud!" said he. "March, lazy-bones!"

Up, up, ever upwards they climbed through the thick mist. The hillside was extremely steep, and it was all they could do to find foothold between the clumps of soft grass. They slipped, they laboured with hands and feet, but they heeded naught, struggling ever upwards for freedom's sake. Up, up, ever upwards, through the thick mist, invisible as spirits, first the false Marianna, then the guard puffing and groaning under the heavy gerla, then the false Scior Zacomo promising him a fine view from the top, and from time to time encouraging him with the point of the carbine. The carbine worked miracles. In half an hour the three had reached the crest, from whence the hill slopes down towards BrÈ, lying only a short distance below the summit. Then, sitting upon the grass, they let themselves slide rapidly downwards. Presently it began to rain, and the mist grew thinner, and below them, at their feet, they could see the red of the woodlands. Scior Zacomo's venerable top-hat was the first to reach the spot, hurled from above by Pedraglio with a joyful "Hurrah for Italy!" as he himself slid onwards, arm in arm with the guard. At BrÈ Pedraglio called the whole town together by firing off the carbine in sign of exultation, and then he distributed anesone triduo among the men, and administered it in smaller doses to the girls. He begged the curate to allow him to hang the tail-coat in the church as a votive offering, sat down to eat with the guard, got the priest to preach him a sermon on the duty of pardoning blows in the stomach, and read a verse of the monkish poem to him, which ended thus:

After this he had no difficulty in demonstrating to him that if this Padre Lanternone had suddenly changed his opinions, he, the guard, would be fully justified in changing his, and he finally persuaded him to desert. The guard ended by casting aside his uniform and donning the tail-coat, amidst the laughter and applause of all present. The only one who did not join in the laughter was the lawyer. "What may not have happened to poor Maironi?" said he.

Franco did not cross Castello. Upon reaching the little RovajÀ chapel he hastened downwards by the path that leads to the fountain at Caslano, reached the narrow lane that goes to Casarico and followed it upwards as far as the last turning just below Castello, where the church of Puria becomes visible beneath its amphitheatre of crags; then he turned into the valley on the right, hastening along a path fit for goats only, climbed upwards once more below the church of Loggio, and reached Villa Maironi without having met any one.

Carlo, the old servant who opened the door for him, nearly fainted with emotion as he kissed Franco's hands. At that moment the doctor was in the sick room. Franco decided to wait until he should come out, and meanwhile took the faithful old man into his confidence, telling that the gendarmes were at his heels. Dr. Aliprandi soon came out, and Franco, who knew him to be a patriot, confided in him also, for he must show himself, and make inquiries about his grandmother. Aliprandi had been called in the night, after the prefect had left for Oria. He had found the Marchesa in a state of nervous excitement, tormented by a terrible fear of death, but exhibiting no symptoms of illness. At present she seemed quite calm. Franco had her informed of his arrival, and was ushered into the room by the maid, who looked at him with obsequious curiosity, and then withdrew.

The half-open shutters of the room where the Marchesa lay, admitted only two slanting streaks of grey light, which did not reach the face, thrown back upon the pillow. On entering Franco could not see that face, but he heard the familiar, sleepy voice saying:

"Is that you, Franco?"

"Yes, grandmother. Good-morning," and he stooped to kiss her. The waxen mask was unruffled, but there was a vague and gloomy expression about the eyes that seemed at once desire and terror. "I am dying, you know, Franco," said the Marchesa. Franco protested, and repeated what the doctor had said to him. His grandmother listened, gazing eagerly at him, trying to read in his eyes if the doctor had really spoken thus. Then she answered:

"It makes no difference. I am quite ready."

From the changed expression on her face and in her voice Franco understood perfectly that she was quite ready to live twenty years longer. "I am sorry for your bereavement," said she, "and I forgive you."

Franco had not expected words of pardon from her. He had believed it was for him to bring forgiveness, not to receive it. Comforted and reassured, the Marchesa of every day was gradually reappearing beneath the Marchesa of an hour. She was willing to purchase peace of mind, but she was like the sordid miser who, having yielded to the temptation of gratifying some desire, allowed the price of his enjoyment to escape painfully from between his tightly-clasped fingers, trying the while to keep back as much as possible behind his nails. At another time Franco's wrath would have burst forth, he would have rejected that forgiveness angrily, but now, with his sweet Maria in his heart, he could not feel thus. He had however noticed that his grandmother had proffered her forgiveness to him alone. This was too much; he could not pass this over.

"My wife, my wife's uncle, and I myself have suffered much beside this last bereavement," said he, "and now we have lost our only comfort. Uncle Ribera I leave out of the question; you, I myself, all must bow before him, but if my wife and I have sinned against you, let us make forgiveness mutual."

This was a bitter pill, but the Marchesa swallowed it in silence. Although she no longer saw death at her bedside, her heart still trembled with the terror inspired by the apparition, and by certain words the prefect had spoken on hearing her confession. "I shall make a will," she said, "and I wish you to know that the whole Maironi property will go to you."

Ah, Marchesa, Marchesa! Poor, icy creature! Did she believe she could purchase peace at this price? In this the prefect also had blundered, for it was he who had advised her to make this declaration to her grandson, kind, honest man that he was, but entirely without tact, and incapable of understanding Franco's lofty soul. The idea that she might think he had been prompted by sordid motives to come to her, was intolerable to Franco. "No, no!" he exclaimed, quivering, and fearing his hot temper would get the better of him after all. "No, no! Don't leave me anything. It will be quite enough if you will allow the interest on my own money to be paid at Oria. Grandmother, you must leave the Maironi property to the Ospitale Maggiore. I fear my ancestors did very wrong to keep it."

His grandmother had not time to answer, for there came a knock at the door. The prefect entered, and offering as an excuse that he would tire the invalid, persuaded Franco to say good-bye. "You must make haste," said he, when they were outside. "You have done more than your duty here. Too many people are now aware of your presence, and the gendarmes may appear at any moment. I have arranged everything with Aliprandi. He considers a consultation necessary for the Marchesa, and will take the Villa Maironi gondola and go to Lugano for a doctor. The two boatmen will be Carlo and yourself. There are those oil-cloth cloaks with hoods. Put on one of those and remain in the stern. Now we must shave off that pointed beard of yours, and then with the hood drawn over your head, no one will possibly be able to recognise you. You will be perfectly safe. Perhaps you may not even be obliged to put in at the customs-house. At any rate, they will not recognise you. If there is any talking to be done, Carlo can do it."

The idea was good. The Marchesa's gondola was always looked upon by the agents of Austria with the greatest respect; as if it were carrying an egg of the double-headed eagle. Even when returning from Lugano it was made to stop at the customs-house simply pro forma.

It was past eight o'clock when the gondola left the boathouse. From the lofty summits the mist had descended upon the lake, and it was raining. Sad, sad day! Sad, sad journey! Neither Franco, the servant, nor Aliprandi spoke a word. They passed S. Mamette and Casarico, and then, amidst the mist beyond the olives of MainÈ, the white walls of Maria's resting-place appeared. Franco's eyes filled with tears. "No, dear," he thought; "no, love; no, my life, you are not there; and I thank my God, who tells me not to believe this horrid thing!" A few strokes more and there was the little house of happy days, of bitter hours, of misfortune; there was the window of the room where Luisa was giving herself up to black grief, the loggia where, henceforth, poor old Uncle Piero would spend his days alone, that just man who was going down to the grave in silence, in tribulation, in weariness. Franco longed to know what had happened after his departure; if the police had worried Uncle Piero and Luisa. In vain he strained his eyes: no living being was to be seen either on the terrace, in the little garden, or at the windows of the loggia. All was silent, all was calm. He stopped rowing, searching for some sign of life. Dr. Aliprandi opened the door of the felze [S] and begged him to resume his rowing, begged him not betray himself. At that moment Leu came to the parapet of the little garden, with a jug in her hand; she glanced at the gondola and then entered the loggia. Uncle Piero must be in the loggia, and they were taking him the customary glass of milk, so probably nothing had happened. Franco once more began to row, and Dr. Aliprandi closed the door. They glided past the little garden, past the other houses of Oria, and the gondola turned towards the landing-stage of the customs-house.

Bianconi, sitting under an umbrella and fishing for tench, spied the gondola, and, dropping his pole, came forward to pay his respects to the Marchesa. But he found Dr. Aliprandi instead, who so upset him by his alarming account of the lady that he felt called upon to summon his Peppina and impart the news to her; and Peppina, poor woman, was obliged to act a little comedy of affliction under her Carlascia's umbrella. Both husband and wife exhorted Aliprandi to make haste, to return quickly. The big mastiff gave him permission to cross directly from Gandria to Cressogno on the way back. Then the doctor turned to Franco, and gave the order to proceed. Franco had listened to the conversation standing motionless, his hands clasping his oar, and hoping to hear something about his friends or his family. But no word was breathed concerning either police, arrests, or flights, and Casa Ribera might have been in China. The gondola backed slowly away from the landing-stage, turned its prow towards Gandria, gliding ever further and further away until it had slipped across the frontier, and vanished in the mist.

On reaching the Lugano shore, Dr. Aliprandi opened the door, and called Franco into the little cabin. Their acquaintance was only slight, but they embraced like brothers. "When the cannonading begins I shall be there also," Aliprandi said.

They must say good-bye here, and Franco must go ashore first and alone, for Lugano was full of spies and the doctor must also be cautious. Besides, Aliprandi was in no hurry. He was more anxious to find a boatman than a physician. Franco drew his hood over his eyes, stepped ashore and went directly to the Albergo della Corona.

Some hours later, when the gondola had started homewards, he went out in search of some one from Valsolda who might give him news, and directed his steps towards the Fontana pharmacy. Under the arcades he met his two friends, who had just left the pharmacy. They fell upon his neck, and wept with emotion. They also had been in search of news, and at the pharmacy they had heard that Franco had been arrested. What joy to find him here, and to feel they were standing on free soil!

Part III