"Cospetto! let this baby-faced teniente beware," continued Giosué; "or, by the blessed Trinity! I will put a brace of bullets through his brain."
"Wretch!" exclaimed the trembling Dianora, "begone, lest I spit upon you! O Giosué! are you indeed become so ruffianly? Have brigandism and outrage hardened you thus?"
He laughed sternly, and said, "You do expect him to-night, then?"
"What is that to you?" she replied, pettishly. "Cousin, I will love whom I please."
"You shall not love him."
Dianora, who was now angry in downright earnest, began to sing, and thrum the strings of her mandolin.
"Me non segni il biondo Dio,
Me con Fille unisca amore—"
"Dianora!" exclaimed the young man, in a voice half mournful and half ferocious. "By the memory of other days, I conjure you to hear me! Think how, as children—as orphans—we lived, and played, and grew together—hear me!" His voice grew thick; but the irritated girl continued her song.
"E poi sfoghi il suo rigore
Fato rio, nemico ciel."
"Cruel that thou art: thy wish will never be realized!" he exclaimed, fiercely. Still she continued:—