"Enrico lost his last carlino at play yesterday!" shouted Beppo. "But he will return with a heavy bag of ducats with which to line my purse. He puts one hand into a cavalier's pocket, and with the other makes the contents of it over to me. I call him the lion's provider."
"A lion more given to roaring than to fighting," laughed Enrico; but the laugh was suddenly cut short as he caught the eye of his brother.
Raphael approached Enrico, and though Horace could not distinguish what he said to him in his low, earnest tone, the robber's reply was more audible:
"I must go—I have no choice—I may prevent bloodshed."
Enrico had the same uneasy, vacillating manner which Horace had before remarked, and the nerve of his lip twitched violently.
"Enrico, keep at my side!" called out Matteo, turning upon the Rossignol a scowl of dark suspicion and dislike.
Horace and Raphael watched the departure of the banditti. The latter stood for some time with folded arms, his eyes fixed upon the spot where Enrico had disappeared from view, and with an expression of such anxious care on his face, that Horace did not venture to disturb him. Presently, however, the pale features resumed their usual calmness, and Raphael, turning towards the captive, proposed that they should renew their study of the Scriptures.
Some time was spent in this occupation. Horace was beginning to regard his seat under the oak much as regarded his place in the old village church. The presence of earnest piety had seemed to isolate that one little spot from all the rocks around, and the green boughs above were as the roof of a temple consecrated to God. There were portions of Scripture which Horace felt that he should always connect with that oak and with him who now sat by his side beneath it—verses that he could never hear again without recalling the musical tones of the Rossignol's voice.
When the reading was concluded, Horace asked Raphael to tell him something of the circumstances attending his capture and imprisonment. "For I have understood, both from yourself and from others," said the youth, "that you, like myself, know something of captivity. How did you fall into your enemy's hand?"
"Simply thus," replied Raphael; "I was wandering slowly through the woods one evening, when I heard a rapid step behind me, and on turning, beheld Matteo wounded, bleeding, gasping, like a stag whom the hunters have pursued till his strength is exhausted, and he can but turn, face them, and die. I saw by his staggering, uncertain step that he could not fly much further.