Colomba Part 16

"Patience!" answered Colomba, with a sigh.

"Remember this, sister," continued Orso; "if I find, when I come back, that any demonstration whatever has been made against the Barricini I shall never forgive you." Then, in a gentler tone, he added, "Very possibly--very probably--I shall bring the colonel and his daughter back with me. See that their rooms are well prepared, and that the breakfast is good. In fact, let us make our guests as comfortable as we can. It's a very good thing to be brave, Colomba, but a woman must know how to manage her household, as well. Come, kiss me, and be good! Here's the gray, ready saddled."

"Orso," said Colomba, "you mustn't go alone."

"I don't need anybody," replied Orso; "and I'll promise you n.o.body shall slit my ear."

"Oh, I'll never consent to your going alone, while there is a feud.

Here! Polo Griffo! Gian' Franco! Memmo! Take your guns; you must go with my brother."

After a somewhat lively argument, Orso had to give in, and accept an escort. From the most excited of the herdsmen he chose out those who had been loudest in their desire to commence hostilities; then, after laying fresh injunctions on his sister and the men he was leaving behind, he started, making a detour, this time, so as to avoid the Barricinis'

dwelling.

They were a long way from Pietranera, and were travelling along at a great pace, when, as they crossed a streamlet that ran into a marsh, Polo Griffo noticed several porkers wallowing comfortably in the mud, in full enjoyment at once of the warmth of the sun and the coolness of the water. Instantly he took aim at the biggest, fired at its head, and shot it dead. The dead creature's comrades rose and fled with astonishing swiftness, and though another herdsman fired at them they reached a thicket and disappeared into it, safe and sound.

"Idiots!" cried Orso. "You've been taking pigs for wild boars!"

"Not a bit, Ors' Anton'," replied Polo Griffo. "But that herd belongs to the lawyer, and I've taught him, now, to mutilate our horses."

"What! you rascal!" shouted Orso, in a perfect fury. "You ape the vile behaviour of our enemies! Be off, villains! I don't want you! You're only fit to fight with pigs. I swear to G.o.d that if you dare follow me I'll blow your brains out!"

The herdsmen stared at each other, struck quite dumb. Orso spurred his horse, galloped off, and was soon out of sight.

"Well, well!" said Polo Griffo. "Here's a pretty thing. You devote yourself to people, and then this is how they treat you. His father, the colonel, was angry with you long ago, because you levelled your gun at the lawyer. Great idiot you were, not to shoot. And now here is his son.

You saw what I did for him. And he talks about cracking my skull, just as he would crack a gourd that lets the wine leak out. That's what people learn on the mainland, Memmo!"

"Yes, and if any one finds out it was you who killed that pig there'll be a suit against you, and Ors' Anton' won't speak to the judges, nor buy off the lawyer for you. Luckily n.o.body saw, and you have Saint Nega to help you out."

After a hasty conclave, the two herdsmen concluded their wisest plan was to throw the dead pig into a bog, and this project they carefully executed, after each had duly carved himself several slices out of the body of this innocent victim of the feud between the Barricini and the della Rebbia.

CHAPTER XVII

Once rid of his unruly escort, Orso proceeded calmly on his way, far more absorbed by the prospective pleasure of seeing Miss Nevil than stirred by any fear of coming across his enemies.

"The lawsuit I must bring against these Barricini villains," he mused, "will necessitate my going down to Bastia. Why should I not go there with Miss Nevil? And once at Bastia, why shouldn't we all go together to the springs of Orezza?"

Suddenly his childish recollections of that picturesque spot rose up before him. He fancied himself on the verdant lawn that spreads beneath the ancient chestnut-trees. On the l.u.s.trous green sward, studded with blue flowers like eyes that smiled upon him, he saw Miss Lydia seated at his side. She had taken off her hat, and her fair hair, softer and finer than any silk, shone like gold in the sunlight that glinted through the foliage. Her clear blue eyes looked to him bluer than the sky itself.

With her cheek resting on one hand, she was listening thoughtfully to the words of love he poured tremblingly into her ear. She wore the muslin gown in which she had been dressed that last day at Ajaccio. From beneath its folds peeped out a tiny foot, shod with black satin. Orso told himself that he would be happy indeed if he might dare to kiss that little foot--but one of Miss Lydia's hands was bare and held a daisy.

He took the daisy from her, and Lydia's hand pressed his, and then he kissed the daisy, and then he kissed her hand, and yet she did not chide him . . . and all these thoughts prevented him from paying any attention to the road he was travelling, and meanwhile he trotted steadily onward. For the second time, in his fancy, he was about to kiss Miss Nevil's snow-white hand, when, as his horse stopped short, he very nearly kissed its head, in stern reality. Little Chilina had barred his way, and seized his bridle.

"Where are you going to, Ors' Anton'?" she said. "Don't you know your enemy is close by?"

"My enemy!" cried Orso, furious at being interrupted at such a delightful moment. "Where is he?"

"Orlanduccio is close by, he's waiting for you! Go back, go back!"

"Ho! Ho! So he's waiting for me! Did you see him?"

"Yes, Ors' Anton'! I was lying down in the heather when he pa.s.sed by. He was looking round everywhere through his gla.s.s."

"And which way did he go?"

"He went down there. Just where you were going!"

"Thank you!"

"Ors' Anton', hadn't you better wait for my uncle? He must be here soon--and with him you would be safe."

"Don't be frightened, Chili. I don't need your uncle."

"If you would let me, I would go in front of you."

"No, thanks! No, thanks!"

And Orso, spurring his horse, rode rapidly in the direction to which the little girl had pointed.

His first impulse had been one of blind fury, and he had told himself that fortune was offering him an excellent opportunity of punishing the coward who had avenged the blow he had received by mutilating a horse.

But as he moved onward the thought of his promise to the prefect, and, above all, his fear of missing Miss Nevil's visit, altered his feelings, and made him almost wish he might not come upon Orlanduccio. Soon, however, the memory of his father, the indignity offered to his own horse, and the threats of the Barricini, stirred his rage afresh, and incited him to seek his foe, and to provoke and force him to a fight.

Thus tossed by conflicting feelings, he continued his progress, though now he carefully scrutinized every thicket and hedge, and sometimes even pulled up his horse to listen to the vague sounds to be heard in any open country. Ten minutes after he had left little Chilina (it was then about nine o'clock in the morning) he found himself on the edge of an exceedingly steep declivity. The road, or rather the very slight path, which he was following, ran through a _maquis_ that had been lately burned. The ground was covered with whitish ashes, and here and there some shrubs, and a few big trees, blackened by the flames, and entirely stripped of their leaves, still stood erect--though life had long since departed out of them. The sight of a burned _maquis_ is enough to make a man fancy he has been transported into midwinter in some northern clime, and the contrast between the barrenness of the ground over which the flames have pa.s.sed, with the luxuriant vegetation round about it, heightens this appearance of sadness and desolation. But at that moment the only thing that struck Orso in this particular landscape was one point--an important one, it is true, in his present circ.u.mstances. The bareness of the ground rendered any kind of ambush impossible, and the man who has reason to fear that at any moment he may see a gun-barrel thrust out of a thicket straight at his own chest, looks on a stretch of smooth ground, with nothing on it to intercept his view, as a kind of oasis. After this burned _maquis_ came a number of cultivated fields, inclosed, according to the fashion of that country, with breast-high walls, built of dry stones. The path ran between these fields, producing, from a distance, the effect of a thick wood.

The steepness of the declivity made it necessary for Orso to dismount.

He was walking quickly down the hill, which was slippery with ashes (he had thrown the bridle on his horse's neck), and was hardly five-and-twenty paces from one of these stone fences, when, just in front of him, on the right-hand side of the road, he perceived first of all the barrel of a gun, and then a head, rising over the top of the wall. The gun was levelled, and he recognised Orlanduccio, just ready to fire. Orso swiftly prepared for self-defence, and the two men, taking deliberate aim, stared at each other for several seconds, with that thrill of emotion which the bravest must feel when he knows he must either deal death or endure it.

"Vile coward!" shouted Orso.

The words were hardly out of his mouth when he saw the flash of Orlanduccio's gun, and almost at the same instant a second shot rang out on his left from the other side of the path, fired by a man whom he had not noticed, and who was aiming at him from behind another wall. Both bullets struck him. The first, Orlanduccio's, pa.s.sed through his left arm, which Orso had turned toward him as he aimed. The second shot struck him in the chest, and tore his coat, but coming in contact with the blade of his dagger, it luckily flattened against it, and only inflicted a trifling bruise. Orso's left arm fell helpless at his side, and the barrel of his gun dropped for a moment, but he raised it at once, and aiming his weapon with his right hand only, he fired at Orlanduccio. His enemy's head, which was only exposed to the level of the eyes, disappeared behind the wall. Then Orso, swinging round to the left, fired the second barrel at a man in a cloud of smoke whom he could hardly see. This face likewise disappeared. The four shots had followed each other with incredible swiftness; no trained soldiers ever fired their volleys in quicker succession. After Orso's last shot a great silence fell. The smoke from his weapon rose slowly up into the sky.

There was not a movement, not the slightest sound from behind the wall.

But for the pain in his arm, he could have fancied the men on whom he had just fired had been phantoms of his own imagination.

Fully expecting a second volley, Orso moved a few steps, to place himself behind one of the burned trees that still stood upright in the _maquis_. Thus sheltered, he put his gun between his knees, and hurriedly reloaded it. Meanwhile his left arm began to hurt him horribly, and felt as if it were being dragged down by a huge weight.

What had become of his adversaries? He could not understand. If they had taken to flight, if they had been wounded, he would certainly have heard some noise, some stir among the leaves. Were they dead, then? Or, what was far more likely, were they not waiting behind their wall for a chance of shooting at him again. In his uncertainty, and feeling his strength fast failing him, he knelt down on his right knee, rested his wounded arm upon the other, and took advantage of a branch that protruded from the trunk of the burned tree to support his gun. With his finger on the trigger, his eye fixed on the wall, and his ear strained to catch the slightest sound, he knelt there, motionless, for several minutes, which seemed to him a century. At last, behind him, in the far distance, he heard a faint shout, and very soon a dog flew like an arrow down the slope, and stopped short, close to him, wagging its tail.

It was Brusco, the comrade and follower of the bandits--the herald, doubtless, of his master's approach. Never was any honest man more impatiently awaited. With his muzzle in the air, and turned toward the nearest fence, the dog sniffed anxiously. Suddenly he gave vent to a low growl, sprang at a bound over the wall, and almost instantly reappeared upon its crest, whence he gazed steadily at Orso with eyes that spoke surprise as clearly as a dog's may do it. Then he sniffed again, this time toward the other inclosure, the wall of which he also crossed.

Within a second he was back on the top of that, with the same air of astonishment and alarm, and straightway he bounded into the thicket with his tail between his legs, still gazing at Orso, and retiring from him slowly, and sideways, until he had put some distance between them. Then off he started again, tearing up the slope almost as fast as he had come down it, to meet a man, who, in spite of its steepness, was rapidly descending.

"Help, Brando!" shouted Orso, as soon as he thought he was within hearing.

"Hallo! Ors' Anton'! are you wounded?" inquired Brandolaccio, as he ran up panting. "Is it in your body or your limbs?"

"In the arm."

"The arm--oh, that's nothing! And the other fellow?"

"I think I hit him."

Brandolaccio ran after the dog to the nearest field and leaned over to look at the other side of the wall, then pulling off his cap--