After a toilsome descent, in which their horses often stumbled, they approached the river with its limestone cliffs, and emerged on an open green. Here Leonora dismounted, and motioned to the Earl to do the same. She again blew the ivory whistle, a similarly-costumed bandit appeared, received the horses, and decamped as mysteriously as he came.
"Signore," said the girl, "you have promised to trust me; will you submit to be blindfolded, for you must no longer see the path you go?"
"Upon my soul, you are determined to give me cause to place my confidence in you: I suppose you will ask me next if I have any objection to be thrown in yonder river? However, have your way, I submit myself entirely to your honour."
Untying a gay scarf that bound her waist, she bandaged the Earl's eyes; then taking his hand led him forward.
The path down which she led him was rough, stony, and seemed extremely steep. By-and-by he was aware he was crossing a bridge, and heard the river swirl and roar beneath him; it seemed far below, as near as he could judge by his ear. His route then lay upward, and ere long he was aware he had bade adieu to the moonlight and open air. An involuntary shudder ran through him as he perceived he must now be in a cave, from the hollow sound, and the echoes of his clanking strides. His guide felt the thrill, at least he fancied she must have perceived it, from her almost immediately afterwards bidding him not to fear. For more than a hundred yards, as he judged, she led him on through this vault; then he began to distinguish sounds, which soon resolved themselves into voices and laughter: they grew more and more distinct, till he could almost catch the individual words; then a sudden turn in the passage seemed to lead him away from them, and they grew more and more distant, till he lost the power of catching them any more.
He heard a footstep next, approaching, nearer and nearer, till it seemed beside him. His guide stopped, and spoke to the man in a language he did not understand. A gruff voice answered her. Another shudder ran through him as he thought he must now be in a den of robbers, and his life depended on the frail thread of a woman's word. Still he did not fear for himself; and he was determined that if, after all, he had been duped, he would try and sell his life dearly.
The thought of Ellen, too, oppressed him, and he bitterly cursed his folly in trusting himself to such chances. Another turn in the passage, and suddenly, a red glare told him he was again in light. There was something at least reinspiriting in being in light;—the thought of an assassin's dagger in the dark is horrible!
Almost immediately after, he felt his guide's fingers untying the scarf that bound his eyes. She slowly unknotted it, and then, as she left her hold, it dropped on the ground.
The lights dazzled his eyes, long accustomed to the dark, so much, that for an instant he could see nothing. When he recovered his sight, the first thing he looked for was his guide. She was gone!—the scarf lay at his feet, but she was gone! Had she been only a wraith to lead him so far, and then forsake him?
"Hath she sunk in the earth, or melted in air?
He saw not—he knew not—but nothing was there!"