It was an intensely dark night, when three men, with masks on their faces, (for a guilty countenance would fain hide itself even from the sight of Heaven,) sallied forth from the Quinta of the Duke of Aveiro. They walked some way, when, stopping before the door of a low, solitary building, the principal of the party applied a key to the lock, and, all entering, they found three steeds ready saddled. Without uttering a word, they led forth the horses, the last closing the door; and, mounting, they rode back in the direction they had come. They had not proceeded far when they encountered a fourth horseman, dressed completely in black, with a black mask, and a horse of the same hue.
“Who goes there?” said the principal of the three, in a low voice.
“A friend of religion,” was the answer, in the same low tone.
“’Tis well,” said the first speaker. “This is the friend I expected,” he continued, turning to one of his companions. “Do you, Manoel, accompany him. Fire, when he fires, and keep close to his side. We will all again meet at the stables, where we will leave our horses, and return on foot to the Quinta. Onward, my friends, to our work.”
The stranger, accompanied by him who was addressed as Manoel, now separated from the other two, both parties, however, proceeding by different routes toward the upper part of Lisbon, to the neighbourhood of a house called the Quinta da Cima, which lay directly in the way between the residence of the young Marchioness of Tavora and the royal palace.
Antonio and his companion, who, as our readers may have suspected, was no other than Senhor Policarpio, rode on in silence whenever they passed any houses, the former, who was of a more timid disposition than his fellow-servant, already repenting of the deed he had undertaken to perform.
“Hist!” he said, drawing in his rein as they were passing between some of the high blank walls with which that part of Lisbon abounds. “Are you certain there is no one following us? Methought I heard a horse’s footsteps.”
“On, on,” muttered his companion with an oath. “The more reason for speed.”
They proceeded a few paces further, when the other again stopped.
“I am sure I heard the sounds again,” he whispered.