"My good fellows," said I, "remember I am a British officer!"
"Base vagabonds!" thundered Castelermo, while his pale lips quivered with rage, "at least respect the garb I wear! You may keep my sword now, for to me it is useless, after being sullied by such dishonourable hands; but bear in mind that this night you have committed a most horrid sacrilege!"
"We will bear the weight of that easily, cavaliere," said one fellow, "and pay our blessed Mother Church a moiety out of your ransom. We must obey our orders; and if Ferdinand IV., or even the grand bailiff of the province passed this way, they would be required to yield both cloak-bag and sword to the king of St. Eufemio."
"Take the matter quietly, signor," said another, striking me on the shoulder with insolent familiarity; "remember you might have fallen into rougher hands than Francatripa's free companions."
"Bring a horse-halter, ho! ho! and bind them!" cried a shrill voice, which I immediately recognised. I turned towards the speaker, who had just dropped down from the rocks; but could not distinguish his figure: the blaze of the red light having now expired.
"By Heaven! I would not have surrendered without fighting to the last, could I have suspected this foul indignity!" exclaimed Marco bitterly, while I bit my lips in silence; and Gaspare Truffi, by whose orders we were bound, rolled on the turf yelling and grinning like a fiend with malicious delight and exultation.
"Forward!" he commanded. "Where did you say we were to meet the capitano?"
"Where the Maida road intersects the ancient way to the town of Cosenza," replied one of the band. "He awaits us among the old ruins of those pagan Greeks."
"On then," replied the little man of authority. "On: but, povero voi! keep well together when crossing the hills, or I will blow to the night wind the brains of the first man who straggles!"
I was surprised to find these fierce desperadoes submitting to the incessant hectoring of a pitiful hunchback: but after a time I observed that his commands, although strictly obeyed, were a source of secret merriment to the band. I also discovered amongst them many young men of superior birth, address, and education; who had been reduced to such ignoble fellowship by their own excesses, or by preferring a state of free brigandage on their native mountains, to bowing beneath the yoke of France, and submitting to its military conscription.