"And you could not, would not prevent it. I thought we should drag her with us, perhaps, still in her beautiful clothes, in her satin shoes over the sharp stones, so that the blood would flow over her delicate little feet! Why, you said you would torture her, bind her firmly if she resisted, oh, I had bandages ready that she could not have torn. We should have stowed her away in the boat like a little mass of misery and had she become unruly, I might have struck her with a dripping oar. You said this, and what have you done? Nothing--she will be happy, the proud creature--and he, he!"
"Come before dawn breaks," said Baluzzi, urging her to start.
"I must think it over," Kätchen muttered to herself.
A gust of wind sweeping through the loopholes of the Dantziger, extinguished the lantern.
"Follow me," said Kätchen, "I have cat's eyes, and can see in the dark. Here is the passage to the shore. Stoop, you know it is low, but we can feel and grope our way through."
"Horrible darkness, corpo di bacco," muttered Baluzzi, while he measured the height of the grotto passage with one hand.
"To-morrow it will be brighter here," Kätchen hummed, "but come on, thorns and thistles will not sting you now. I have beheaded and cut them down, I understand how to clear things away, away with the weeds!"
CHAPTER X.
[THE WEDDING DAY.]
Brightly dawned the day, but the morning sun disappeared early beneath the glowing clouds, with which the whole sky was soon overcast.