“One of my men saved me.  He had a little learning, and could pass for a monk when he could get a cowl.  He went out before it was daylight that morning, and exchanged clothes with a burly friar whom he met in a quiet place.”

“But how did the friar agree to that?” asked Arisa in surprise.

“He had nothing to say.  He was dead,” answered Aristarchi.

“Do you mean to say that he chanced to find a dead friar lying in the road?” asked the Georgian.

“How should I know?  I daresay the monk was alive when he met my man, and happened to die a few minutes afterwards—­by mere chance.  It was very fortunate, was it not?”

“Yes!” Arisa laughed softly.  “But what did he do?  Why did he take the trouble to dress the monk in his clothes?”

“In order to receive his dying confession, of course.  I thought you would understand!  And his dying confession was that he, Michael Pandos, a Greek robber, had killed the man for whose murder I was being hanged that morning.  My man came just in time, for as the friar’s head was half shaved, as monks’ heads are, he had to shave the rest, as they do for coolness in the south, and he had only his knife with which to do it.  But no one found that out, for he had been a barber, as he had been a monk and most other things.  He looked very well in a cowl, and spoke Neapolitan.  I did not know him when he came to the foot of the gallows, howling out that I was innocent.”

“Were you?” asked Arisa.

“Of course I was,” answered Aristarchi with conviction.

“Who was the man that had been killed?”

“I forget his name,” said the Greek.  “He was a Neapolitan gentleman of great family, I believe.  I forget the name.  He had red hair.”

Arisa laughed and stroked Aristarchi’s big head.  She thought she had made him betray himself.

“You had seen him then?” she said, with a question.  “I suppose you happened to see him just before he died, as your man saw the monk.”

“Oh no!” answered Aristarchi, who was not to be so easily caught.  “It was part of the dying confession.  It was necessary to identify the murdered person.  How should Michael Parados, the Greek robber, know the name of the gentleman he had killed?  He gave a minute description of him.  He said he had red hair.”

“You are not a Greek for nothing,” laughed Arisa.

“Did you ever hear of Odysseus?” asked Aristarchi.

“No.  What should I know of your Greek gods?  If you were a good Christian, you would not speak of them.”

“Odysseus was not a god,” answered Aristarchi, with a grin.  “He was a good Christian.  I have often thought that he must have been very like me.  He was a great traveller and a tolerable sailor.”

“A pirate?” inquired Arisa.

“Oh no!  He was a man of the most noble and upright character, incapable of deception!  In fact he was very like me, and had nearly as many adventures.  If you understood Greek, I would repeat some verses I know about him.”