“With all my heart,” replied Paolo, “for I have come eight leagues in three hours, and I am dying with hunger and thirst.”
“Well,” said Bruno, “since you are so well inclined, and as we have but one night to spend in each other’s company, let us pass it merrily. Ali, go and fetch the ladies out of the cellar, if they have not been frightened to death.”
Ali performed his mission, and the party enjoyed themselves as best they could. In the morning, the brigadier and his prisoner set out for Messina.
Five days after the events we have just related, the Prince of Carini was informed, in the presence of the beautiful Gemma, who had just ended her penance at the Convent of the Visitation, and who had only eight days previously returned to the world, that at length his orders had been executed, and that Pascal Bruno was taken and placed in one of the prisons of Messina.
“In that case, the Prince of Goto will pay the three thousand ducats promised for his capture; see that the brigand is tried and afterwards executed.”
“Dear prince,” said Gemma, in that gentle voice to whose appeal the count could refuse nothing, “I have always been curious to see this man of whom I have heard so much.”
“Your wish shall be gratified, my dear angel; he shall be hanged at Palermo.”