They rode up, and I went forward to meet them.

“Nino mio,” said I, “you have made me pass a terrible time here.  Thank Heaven, you are come; and the contessina, too!  Your most humble servant, signorina.”  I bowed low and Hedwig bent a little forward, but the moon was just behind her, and I could not see her face.

“I did not think we should meet so soon, Signor Grandi.  But I am very glad.”  There was a sweet shyness in the little speech that touched me.  I am sure she was afraid that it was not yet quite right, or at least that there should be some other lady in the party.

“Courage, Messer Cornelio,” said Nino.  “Mount your donkey, and let us be on our way.”

“Is not the contessina tired?” I inquired.  “You might surely rest a little here.”

“Caro mio,” answered Nino, “we must be safe at the top of the pass before we rest.  We were so unfortunate as to wake his excellency the Baron Benoni out of some sweet dream or other, and perhaps he is not far behind us.”

An encounter with the furious Jew was not precisely attractive to me, and I was on my donkey before you could count a score.  I suggested to Nino that it would be wiser if the countryman led the way through the woods, and I followed him.  Then the contessina would be behind me, and Nino would bring up the rear.  It occurred to me that the mules might outstrip my donkey if I went last, and so I might be left to face the attack, if any came; whereas, if I were in front, the others could not go any faster than I.

CHAPTER XXII

The gorge rises steep and precipitous between the lofty mountains on both sides, and it is fortunate that we had some light from the moon, which was still high at two o’clock, being at the full.

It is a ghastly place enough.  In the days of the Papal States the Serra di Sant’ Antonio, as it is called, was the shortest passage to the kingdom of Naples, and the frontier line ran across its summit.  To pass from one dominion to the other it would be necessary to go out of the way some forty or fifty miles, perhaps, unless one took this route; and the natural consequence was that outlaws, smugglers, political fugitives, and all such manner of men, found it a great convenience.  Soldiers were stationed in Fillettino and on the other side, to check illicit traffic and brigandage, and many were the fights that were fought among these giant beeches.

The trees are of primeval dimensions, for no one has yet been enterprising enough to attempt to fell the timber.  The gorge is so steep, and in many places so abruptly precipitous, that the logs could never be removed; and so they have grown undisturbed for hundreds of years, rotting and falling away as they stand.  The beech is a lordly tree, with its great smooth trunk and its spreading branches, and though it never reaches the size of the chestnut, it is far more beautiful and long-lived.