“For herself what had she not to fear! and for the child that he might be slain or reserved for a fate esteemed by the Vaudois worse than death, in being carried off to Pignerol and brought up in an idolatrous faith.

“The men pursued, calling to her with oaths, curses, obscene words, and jeering laughter.

“These but quickened her flight; she gained the bridge over the Angrogna, sped across it, over the intervening ground, and through the gate into the town; the footsteps of her pursuers echoing close behind.

“’Ah ha! escaped my embraces for the present, have you, my pretty barbet?’ cried one of the miscreants, following her with gloating, cruel eyes as she sped onward up the street, feeling only comparatively safe even there.  ’Ah well, it but delays my pleasure a few hours.  I know where to find ye and shall pay my respects to-night.’

“‘And I,’ added his companion with a fierce laugh; ’to ye and many another like ye.  It’s work quite to my taste Holy Mother Church has laid out for us to-night, Andrea.’

“’Yes, yes, Giuseppe, we’ll not quarrel with the work or the wages; all the plunder we can lay hands on; to say naught of the pretty maids such as yon, or the escape from the fires of purgatory.’

“They were wending their way to the convent of the Recollets as they talked.  Arrived at its gates they were immediately admitted, to find it filled with cut-throats such as themselves, and soon learned that the church also and the house of the cure were in like condition.

“‘Good!’ they cried, ‘how many names in all?’

“‘Seven hundred,’ said one.

“‘Eight hundred,’ asserted another.

“’Well, well, be it which it may, we’re strong enough for the work, all the able-bodied barbetti being on the frontier,’ cried Andrea, exultingly, ’we’ll make short shrift with the old men, women and children.’

“’Yes; long live the holy Roman Church!  Hurrah for the holy faith!  Down with the barbetti!’ cried a chorus of voices.  ’We’ll have a second St. Bartholomew in these valleys and rid them of the hated presence of the cursed heretics.’

“‘That we will,’ responded Giuseppe.  ’But what’s the order of proceedings?’

“’All the faithful to meet at Luserna at sunset; the vesper bell of the convent gives the signal shortly after, and we immediately spread ourselves over the valley on a heretic hunt that from San Giovanni to Bobbi shall leave not a soul alive to tell the tale.’

“While Magdalen and Lucia conversed in the cottage of the former, M. Brianza, cure of Luserna, seated in the confessional, listened with horror and indignation to a tale of intended wholesale rapine, murder, and arson, which his penitent was unfolding.

“‘I will have neither part nor lot in this thing,’ said the priest to himself, as he left the church a moment later; ’nay more, I shall warn the intended victims of their danger.’