"Yes, I can tell her story and more. She married the noble Musache de Streeses, whose castle once stood near the Skadar."[22]
"Ah! I have heard of his sad fate," replied the general. "Oh, for vengeance on these villains who have despoiled the land! Musache de Streeses was the richest of all the land-owners on the coast of Adria, the soul of honor, a genuine patriot, with whom my father held confidential intercourse. His purse and sword were freely offered for service against the Turk. It was a favorite scheme of my father to some day unite our families. I hear that my nephew, Amesa, has become possessed of those estates, being also nephew to De Streeses, who was slain by the Turks. But my fairy, Mara, you said was married to De Streeses. It was she, then, who, with her infant child, was killed by the Turks during the raid?"
"Noble Castriot! De Streeses and the Lady Mara were murdered, foully, treacherously," said the old man, reining his horse, and speaking with terrible passion.
"Oh, to take vengeance!" exclaimed Scanderbeg. "By the fair face of Mara! this, with the thousand other murders of these years, shall be washed out, if my sword drains a myriad veins of Turkish blood to make sure of his who struck so brutal a blow!"
"Your sword need not search so wide as that," said Kabilovitsch. "The family of De Streeses were murdered by hands we both know but too well."
"How know you, Kabilovitsch?"
The man removed his cap as if inviting the inspection of his face, and, lowering his voice, replied,
"I am not Kabilovitsch, I am Arnaud."
"Arnaud, the forester of De Streeses? Arnaud, whose shoulders I bestrode before I ever mounted a steed?" exclaimed Scanderbeg, turning his horse and stopping, but at his companion's motion indicating caution, lowering his tone, and moving close beside him.
"The same, Sire. And the Turks who murdered the nobleman and his beautiful wife were not such Turks as you have been accustomed to command. Too white of skin and too black of heart were they. I would not say this, but that I give you also my reasons for so grave an accusation. Turks in raiding do not discriminate in their depredations; but these harmed not a leaf beyond the castle of De Streeses. Nor do Turks swear by St. John, as I heard one of them do as he cursed a fellow villain for some slip in the plan. Nor again would Turks, seeking only for plunder, have shown as much eagerness to kill the little babe as they did to slay its father; and this they did, searching even among the ashes for evidence that the tiny bones had been sufficiently charred to prevent their recognition. But the child was not in the castle at the time. My good wife was suckling it—the Lady Mara being of delicate condition—and that night the babe was at the lodge. As soon as the commotion was heard at the castle the child was hidden in the copse."