[CHAPTER IV.]
GILBERT.
The alarmed traveler closed the coach door behind him carefully, and looked wistfully round. First he saw the young man, frightened. A flash of lighting enabled him to examine him from head to foot, an operation habitual to him on seeing any new person or thing. This was a springald of sixteen, small, thin and agile; his bold black eyes lacked sweetness but not charm: shrewdness and observation were revealed in his thin, hooked nose, fine lip and projecting cheek bones, while the rounded chin stuck out in token of resolution.
"Was that you screamed just now,—what for?" queried the gentleman.
"The lady from the cab there rode off on the led horse."
The traveler did not make any remark at this hesitating reply; not a word; he rushed to the fore part and saw by the lightning that it was empty.
"Sblood!" he roared in Italian, almost like the thunder peal accompanying the oath.
He looked round for means of pursuit, but one of the coach-horses in chase of Djerid would be a tortoise after a gazelle.
"Still I can find out where she is," he muttered, "unless——"
Quickly and anxiously he drew a small book from his vest pocket, and in a folded paper found a tress of raven hair.
His features became serene, and apparently he was calmed.