Note use of suspense throughout. The story is one long crisis.
47. “Good-for-nothing!” cried the adjutant Gamba, taking him by the ear, “do you know that I am able to make you change your tune? Perhaps when I have given you a score or more thwacks with the flat of a sword, you will speak at last!”
48. But Fortunato still laughed derisively.
49. “My father is Mateo Falcone!” he said with energy.
50. “Do you know, you little rogue, that I can carry you off to Corte, or to Bastia? I’ll make you sleep in a dungeon, on a pallet of straw, your feet in irons, and I’ll have you guillotined, if you don’t tell me where Gianetto Sanpiero is.”
51. The child burst out laughing at this foolish threat. He only repeated:
52. “My father is Mateo Falcone!”
53. “Adjutant,” whispered one of the voltigeurs, “we’d better not embroil ourselves with Mateo.”
Setting is thus interwoven with the story, though slightly.