"God be thanked! oh, triumph!" burst in a whisper from my lips: my heart expanded, and I could have laughed aloud, while stretching my stiffened hands. But there was no time to be lost: the fall of the broken padlock might have alarmed the escort, and I prepared for instant flight. Thrusting some of the iron pieces under the door bolts, to prevent it being readily opened, I turned to the window, and found, with joy, that there was space enough between the cross-bar and the wall for egress: but the ground was fifteen feet below. With great pain and exertion I pressed through, and, half suffocated, nearly stuck midway between the rusty bar and stone rybate. At that moment of misery and hope, the corporal thundered at the door; I burst through, fell heavily to the ground, and for a moment was stunned by the fall: but the danger of delay, and the risk of being instantly shot if retaken, compelled me to be off double-quick. I rushed up the banquette of the gun-battery, cleared the parapet at a bound, and scrambled over the stockade like a squirrel.
"Villan, hola! halte!" cried Crapaud, firing his musket: the ball whistled through my hair, and next moment I was flying like a deer with the hounds in full chase. I was closely pursued: but, after three narrow escapes from the bullets of my escort, I baffled them, and gained in safety the cork wood of Bivona.
CHAPTER XIX.
THE ALBERGO.—THE BANDIT'S REVENGE.
Seeking a thick and gloomy dingle, I flung myself under its shadow to rest; breathless with my recent exertion, the long day's march, and the excitement of the last hour. My plan was soon decided: to approach Scylla, from which I was then nearly thirty miles distant, was my principal object; but many dangerous obstacles were to be encountered and overcome, before I stood in the hall of Ruffo Sciglio. The snow melting among the Apennines had swollen the Metramo and other rivers which I had to pass; the towns, villages, and all the level country swarmed with French troops and Buonapartist sbirri or gendarmes, all closing up towards the point of attack; while the woods and mountains were infested by banditti, the most ferocious and lawless in Europe. To lie concealed in thickets by day and to travel by night, was the plan I proposed adopting; and anxious to find myself as far as possible from the place of my imprisonment, after a brief rest I set forward on my dubious and difficult journey; thinking more of the joy of embracing Bianca, than the triumph of meeting Regnier in the breach.
Many of the mountains being yet capped with snow rendered the air cold and chilly; my head was without covering, and I was destitute of every means of defence against either robbers or wolves: the last were numerous in these wilds, and I often heard their cries rising up from the depths of the moonlit forest, through which I toiled southward. So wearying, difficult and uncertain was the path, that I had only proceeded seven or eight miles when day broke, and found me in an open and desert place near Nicotera. The appearance of a body of the enemy marching down the hills was sufficient to scare me, and seeking shelter in an orange wood, I lay concealed in it for hours; not daring to venture forth, although I felt the effects of an appetite sharpened by the keen mountain air. I had heard much of the manna said to be found in the morning on the leaves of the mulberry and other trees in Calabria; but not a drop was to be seen, although I searched anxiously enough. The day seemed interminably long, and joyfully I hailed eve closing as the sun sank once more behind Sicily, and the long shadows of Nicotera fell across the plain.
Armed with a stout club, torn from a tree, I once more set forward, favoured by the dusk and refreshed by my long halt, though hungry as a hawk.
At the hut of a poor charcoal-burner I received some refreshments and ascertained the right (or rather safest) path; the honest peasant, on partly learning the circumstances of my escape, shouldered his rifle, stuck a poniard in his girdle, and accompanied me as far as Gioja; where, after shewing me from the heights the French watch-fires at Seminara, he left me. I was pleased when he did so, for then only I became convinced that his intentions were honest. While travelling with him unarmed I was somewhat suspicious of his kindness: but I did him wrong; he was a hardy and loyal Calabrian, and my fears were groundless. Regretting having brought him so far from his hut, I gave him three crowns, nearly all the money in my possession: at first he refused it; but the temptation was too great for the poor peasant, whose only attire was a jacket of rough skin, a pair of tattered breeches, the net which confined his ample masses of hair, and the buff belt sustaining his dagger and powder-horn. Muttering something about his little ones at home, he took the reward, with many bows and protestations, and we parted.
Rejoicing in my progress, I struck into a path up the hills towards Oppido. The utmost circumspection was now necessary: every avenue to Scylla being closely guarded by Regnier's picquets and chain of advanced sentries. About midnight I lost my way among the woods and defiles. I was drenched by falling into a swampy rice plantation, and severely cut and bruised by the rocks and roots of trees: the night being so dark that I could scarcely see my hand outstretched before me. A sudden storm of rain and wind, which swept down from the hills, completed my discomfiture; and I hailed with joy a light which twinkled at the bottom of a deep and savage dell: seeming, from the eminence on which I stood, like a lantern at the bottom of a pit.
It proved to be an albergo, or lonely mountain inn; but of the most wretched description. Exhausted and weather-beaten as I was, the many unpleasant stories I had heard of those suspicious places, and the close connection of their owners with the banditti occurred to me; but this did not discourage me from knocking at the door. Close to it stood a lumbering old-fashioned Sicilian carriage; which announced a visitor of some importance; and the moment I knocked, a violent altercation ensued as to whether or not the door should be opened.