Rodriguez missed as much of that flash of her eyes, shot from below the darkness of her hair, as youth in its first glory and freedom misses.  For at the point on the road called life at which Rodriguez was then, one is high on a crag above the promontories of watchmen, lower only than the peaks of the prophets, from which to see such things.  Yet it did not need youth to notice Serafina.  Beggars had blessed her for the poise of her head.

She turned that head a little as she went between the windows, till Rodriguez gazing up to her saw the fair shape of her neck:  and almost in that moment the last of the daylight died.  The windows shut; and Rodriguez rode on with Morano to find the forge that was kept by Fernandez the smith.  And presently they came to the village forge, a cottage with huge, high roof whose beams were safe from sparks; and its fire was glowing redly into the moonlight through the wide door made for horses, although there seemed no work to be done, and a man with a swart moustache was piling more logs on.  Over the door was burned on oak in ungainly great letters—­

“Fernandez”

“For whom do you seek, senor?” he said to Rodriguez, who had halted before him with his horse’s nose inside the doorway sniffing.

“I look,” he said, “for him who is not Fernandez.”

“I am he,” said the man by the fire.

Rodriguez questioned no further but dismounted, and bade Morano lead the horses in.  And then he saw in the dark at the back of the forge the other two horses that he had seen in the wood.  And they were shod as he had never seen horses shod before.  For the front pair of shoes were joined by a chain riveted stoutly to each, and the hind pair also; and both horses were shod alike.  The method was equally new to Morano.  And now the man with the swart moustache picked up another bunch of horseshoes hanging in pairs on chains.  And Rodriguez was not far out when he guessed that whenever la Garda overtook their horses they would find that Fernandez was far away making holiday, while he who shod them now would be gone upon other business.  And all this work seemed to Rodriguez not to be his affair.

“Farewell,” he said to the smith that was not Fernandez; and with a pat for his horse he left it, having obtained a promise of oats.  And so Rodriguez and Morano went on foot again, Morano elated in spite of fatigue and pain, rejoicing to feel the earth once more, flat under the soles of his feet; Rodriguez a little humbled.  The

THE SIXTH CHRONICLE

HOW HE SANG TO HIS MANDOLIN AND WHAT CAME OF HIS SINGING

They walked back slowly in silence up the street down which they had ridden.  Earth darkened, the moon grew brighter:  and Rodriguez gazing at the pale golden disk began to wonder who dwelt in the lunar valleys; and what message, if folk were there, they had for our peoples; and in what language such message could ever be, and how it could fare across that limpid remoteness that wafted light on to the coasts of Earth and lapped in silence on the lunar shores.  And as he wondered he thought of his mandolin.