Cheered to fancy that some other traveller might chance to be on the same road with himself, he now hastened his steps. The way, however, was longer than he had supposed, and on gaining the promontory he descried the mule fully two miles away, stealing carefully along over the rugged bridle-path on the mountain. The object became now a pursuit, and he strained his eyes to see if by some by-path he could not succeed in gaining on the chase. While thus looking he saw that two figures followed the mule at a little distance, but what they were he could not ascertain.
It was very unlikely that any of the “Pasture’s” followers would have adopted a gear so striking and so easily seen as this bright trapping, and so Gerald at once set the travellers down as some peasants returning to their homes in the Maremma, or on a pilgrimage to some religious shrine.
With no small exertion he so far gained upon them as to be able to note their appearance, and discover that one was a friar in the dusky olive-coloured frock of the Franciscan, and the other a woman, dressed in some conventual costume which he did not recognise. He could also see that the mule carried a somewhat cumbrous pack, and an amount of baggage rarely the accompaniment of a travelling friar.
Who has not felt his curiosity stimulated by some mere trifling circumstance when occurring in a remote spot, which had it happened on the world’s crowded highway would have passed unnoticed. It was this strange attendant on these wayfarers that urged Gerald to press on to overtake them. Forgetting the peasant costume which he wore and the part it thus behoved him to pursue, he called out in a tone of half command for them to stop till he came up.
‘Halt,’ cried he, ‘and tell me if this be the way to the Capri Pass!’
The friar turned hastily, and stood until Gerald approached.
‘You speak like one accustomed to give his orders on these mountains, my son,’ said he, in a tone of stern reproof; ‘so that even a poor follower of St. Francis is surprised to be thus accosted.’
By this time Gerald had so far recovered his self-possession as to see how he had compromised his assumed character, and in a voice of deep submission, and with a peasant accent he answered—
I ask pardon, worthy Fra, but travelling all alone in this wild region has so overcome me that I scarcely know what I say, or understand what I hear.’
‘Whence do you come?’ asked the friar rudely. ‘From the Mill at Orto-Molino.’