“Now then, Ors’ Anton’,” said the bandit, when he had finished binding up the wound.  “Chilina, here, has caught your horse.  You must get on his back, and come with me to the Stazzona maquis.  It would be a sly fellow who’d lay his hand on you there.  When we get to the Cross of Santa Christina, you’ll have to dismount.  You’ll give over your horse to Chilina, who’ll go off and warn the signorina.  You can say anything to the child, Ors’ Anton’.  She would let herself be cut in pieces rather than betray her friends,” and then, fondly, he turned to the little girl, “That’s it, you little hussy; a ban on you, a curse on you—­you jade!” For Brandolaccio, who was superstitious, like most bandits, feared he might cast a spell on a child if he blessed it or praised it, seeing it is a well-known fact that the mysterious powers that rule the Annocchiatura[*] have a vile habit of fulfilling our wishes in the very opposite sense to that we give them.

     [*] Annocchiatura, an involuntary spell cast either by the
     eye or by spoken words.

“Where am I to go, Brando?” queried Orso in a faint voice.

“Faith! you must choose; either to jail or to the maquis.  But no della Rebbia knows the path that leads him to the jail.  To the maquis, Ors’ Anton’.”

“Farewell, then, to all my hopes!” exclaimed the wounded man, sadly.

“Your hopes?  Deuce take it!  Did you hope to do any better with a double-barrelled gun?  How on earth did the fellows contrive to hit you?  The rascals must have been as hard to kill as cats.”

“They fired first,” said Orso.

“True, true; I’d forgotten that!—­piff, piff—­boum, boum!  A right and left, and only one hand!  If any man can do better, I’ll go hang myself.  Come! now you’re safely mounted!  Before we start, just give a glance at your work.  It isn’t civil to leave one’s company without saying good-bye.”

Orso spurred his horse.  He would not have looked at the two poor wretches he had just destroyed, for anything on earth.

“Hark ye, Ors’ Anton’,” quoth the bandit, as he caught hold of the horse’s bridle, “shall I tell you the truth?  Well, no offence to you!  I’m sorry for those poor young fellows!  You’ll pardon me, I hope; so good-looking, so strong, so young.  Orlanduccio, I’ve shot with him so often!  Only four days ago he gave me a bundle of cigars, and Vincentello—­he was always so cheery.  Of course you’ve only done what you had to do, and indeed the shot was such a splendid one, nobody could regret it.  But I, you see, had nothing to do with your vengeance.  I know you’re perfectly in the right.  When one has an enemy one must get rid of him.  But the Barricini were an old family.  Here’s another of them wiped out, and by a right and left too!  It’s striking.”

As he thus spoke his funeral oration over the Barricini, Brandolaccio hastily guided Orso, Chilina, and Brusco, the dog, toward the Stazzona maquis.