’On the road?  Good; we will pick up the maid on the road.  We have not a minute to spare.  Lady, I am your obsequious servant.  Hasten out, I beg of you.  I was taught at my school that minutes are not to be wasted.  Those Croats have been drinking and what not on the way, or they would have been here before this.  You can’t rely on Italian innkeepers to conceal you.’

‘Signore, are you a man of honour?’

‘Illustrious lady, I am.’

She listened simply to the response without giving heed to the prodigality of gesture.  The necessity for flight now that Milan was announced as lying quiet, had become her sole thought.  Angelo was standing by the carriage.

‘What man is this?’ said Herr Johannes, frowning.

‘He is my servant,’ said Vittoria.

’My dear good lady, you told me your servant was a maid.  This will never do.  We can’t have him.’

‘Excuse me, signore, I never travel without him.’

’Travel!  This is not a case of travelling, but running; and when you run, if you are in earnest about it, you must fling away your baggage and arms.’

Herr Johannes tossed out his moustache to right and left, and stamped his foot.  He insisted that the man should be left behind.

‘Off, sir! back to Milan, or elsewhere,’ he cried.

‘Beppo, mount on the box,’ said Vittoria.

Her command was instantly obeyed.  Herr Johannes looked her in the face.  ‘You are very decided, my dear lady.’  He seemed to have lost his own decision, but handing Vittoria in, he drew a long cigar from his breastpocket, lit it, and mounted beside the coachman.  The chasseur had disappeared.

Vittoria entreated that a general look-out should be kept for Giacinta.  The road was straight up an ascent, and she had no fear that her maid would not be seen.  Presently there was a view of the violet domes of a city.  ‘Is it Bergamo?—­is it Brescia?’ she longed to ask, thinking of her Bergamasc and Brescian friends, and of those two places famous for the bravery of their sons:  one being especially dear to her, as the birthplace of a genius of melody, whose blood was in her veins.  ’Did he look on these mulberry trees?—­did he look on these green-grassed valleys?—­did he hear these falling waters?’ she asked herself, and closed her spirit with reverential thoughts of him and with his music.  She saw sadly that they were turning from the city.  A little ball of paper was shot into her lap.  She opened it and read:  ’An officer of the cavalry.—­Beppo.’  She put her hand out of the window to signify that she was awake to the situation.  Her anxiety, however, began to fret.  No sight of Giacinta was to be had in any direction.  Her mistress commenced chiding the absent garrulous creature, and did so until she pitied her, when she accused herself of cowardice, for she was incapable of calling out to the coachman to stop.  The rapid motion subdued