"Only partly do I understand you, Baron."
"You Northmen, in spite of your many virtues, are slower to understand than we Southerners are. Would you have me pluck the fruit for you as well as show you the tree? Sturatzberg may be in open rebellion before a week is out, and Frina Mavrodin may have to leave it. I will say no more. Even my generosity has a limit."
Ellerey could not fail to understand his meaning.
"You had better read that, Baron," he said, handing him Maritza's letter.
Petrescu took the scrap of paper and read it carefully.
"I met Maritza long ago in England," he said as Petrescu looked at him. "She has remembered it, you see, and I—I came to Sturatzberg."
"Then the Countess is—"
"My friend, but Maritza—-We waste precious time, Baron; I must follow
Maritza."
"I understand. Come and eat. We must lose no time."
It was arranged to leave some of the men in charge of the tower and of the horses. They were to wait there six days, and if by that time Baron Petrescu and his party had not returned, they were to go back to Sturatzberg, taking a circuitous road to avoid the soldiers encamped in the plain. Stefan was left in command of these men, since he had had experience how the plateau could best be defended in case of need. That the brigands would attack them, however, seemed unlikely, for they had evidently fled in the belief that the men they had seen were only an advance guard.