Part 19

"Who was it then, son of a pig? Who was it?"

"Mercy, mercy, my lord! I will tell the truth!" he whined as he twisted.

"Gesu morto! Tell anything else and I cut thy liver out, hound!" swore the man who held him.

"Ah, Dio! I will! I will! It was Silvestro who killed the Jew!"

"You shall come with me to the Signor Sotto-Prefetto," said his holder. "There's a ducat for me in this affair." The poor little company were driven into the gatehouse and there pent; but Andrea went off between two archers to be examined at greater length by Messer Alessandro, and to give blubbering confirmation of the fact. All the unfortunate particulars wrung out of Silvestro on his first night of Monte Ortone--the stab under the ribs, the Jew's beard, his black blood, etc., etc.--were now screwed out of Andrea and went to prove his story.

"By the twenty-four ears of the Twelve Apostles," swore the Corporal, "we've got him at last, Messere."

The Sub-Prefect felt that he must act upon this news. So much insistence had been laid upon the affair by his chief, he dared not send his lieutenant: he must go himself. This is what comes of neglecting new-killed Jews! he might have thought. He little knew what was to come of it.

Two mounted men, Andrea with a rope round his neck, himself very splendidly booted and cuirassed, made up a sufficient cavalcade to fetch home one snivelling goatherd. It was four by the time they were off, seven before they were at Abano, eight when they reached the foot of Monte Ortone and faced the deep chestnut woods in which that precipice dips his flanks. But though it was getting dusk there were eyes sharp enough on the top of the mountain to watch for what sharp ears had heard--a most unaccustomed sound in those leafy solitudes--trotting horses and jingling steel. Castracane from the summit saw it all; and what is more, guessed at once what Andrea in a halter meant.

PYLADES FINDS HIS ORESTES

"Silvestro," he called softly, without moving from his ambush or turning his eyes from those he watched, "Silvestro, come here!"

The obedient stripling came eagerly, and knelt as close to his master as he dared--just so as to touch him.

"Eccomi, Pilade," says he.

"Get back over the brow as fast as you can," said his friend, "and hide in the cave. Wait there till I come. Go now; do as I bid you."

Silvestro went at once.

Castracane squared his jaw and waited. Every now and then he muttered to himself, with lazy lifted eyebrows. It was too much trouble to shrug. "Poor little devil--it would be a shame! And I knocked him down for nothing. And he loves me, per Bacco! Certainly, I have never been loved before--by a man, I mean--except by my big old mother out yonder, and she is a woman. She'll be sorry--she's old--eh, she's horribly old! Accursed, most rotten ass, Andrea! The whole story out of him--and a lie at that. Cospetto! I can't let the poor lad swing. And I did knock him down--and he cried like a girl; but not because I grassed him. By my soul, I'll do it--there, then!" Then he mortised his chin in his brown hands and blinked while he waited.

He had not so very long; but you might have given him an hour, it would have made no difference to Castracane then. The guard came reeking to the brow of the hill; Andrea, haltered, was with them. Alessandro, mopping his head and cursing the flies, came last.

"Look yonder, Marco," said one. The other said "Ha!" and pounced upon his treasure. He had him by the ear and was pricking him with his sabre in the fleshy parts.

"Easy, friend," said Castracane; "I'm not running away."

He went like a sheep to the Sub-Prefect. Andrea watched him twittering.

"What is your name, fellow?" said that heated officer.

Andrea's eyes yearned for his mate's. Castracane gave him a terrible look.

"Silvestro is my name, Signore," says he; and Andrea knew his game.

"We have found our bird, I think," said Alessandro, turning to his men.

"Yes, Excellency, this is the lad we want. There was another of them--Castracane they call him."

"Ah, yes. Where is Castracane, fellow?"

"He is over Venda. Gone to Noventa, to his mother," replied Castracane.

"Well, we don't want him so far as I know. Now, attend to me. You are suspected of that business in the Via della Gatta."

Castracane shrugged. "Chi lo sa?" says he.