United States or Malta ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
He recognized you or he would not have let you in; for he is quick with his gun. He shot a man seven years ago one of Perucca's men, of course, who was creeping up through the tamarisk trees. I do not know what he came seeking, but he got more from Jean than he looked for. Jean was a boy when your mother went to France, and he was left in charge of the chateau.
"You have seen me on the road often enough," said the man, "and I have seen you, Monsieur le Colonel, riding over to the Casa Perucca." "Of course." "You know Perucca's agent, Pietro Andrei?" "Yes." "He was shot in the back on the Olmeta road this afternoon." Colonel Gilbert gave a slight start. "Is that so?" he said at length, quietly, after a pause.
There are a thousand men between Cap Corse and Balagna who, if I went outside this door and was recognized, would shoot me like a rat." "But why?" "Because they are of Perucca's clan, my friend," replied the count, with a shrug of the shoulder. "But still I ask why?" persisted Lory. And the count spread out his thin white hands with a gesture of patient indifference.
Mademoiselle gave an odd laugh. "It is the boundary-line between Perucca and Vasselot," she said, "that has fallen into the valley." Denise was thinking the same thought, and made no answer. The footpath from the chateau up to the Casa by which Gilbert had come on the day of Mattei Perucca's death, by which he had also ridden to the chateau one day, was completely obliterated.
Mademoiselle Brun felt relieved by the thought that the end of Corsica, and this impossible Casa Perucca, was in sight. She was gay as a little grey mouse may be gay at some domestic festival. She sent the widow to the cellar, and the occasion was duly celebrated in a bottle of Mattei Perucca's old wine.
No honest man has set his foot across the threshold since the de Vasselots left it thirty years ago only Jean is there, who has the evil eye. But there are plenty of Perucca's people up at Olmeta who would risk Jean's eye, and break down the doors of the chateau at a word from the Casa Perucca. But the girl there who is the head of the clan will not say the word.
He drove their cattle from the fields because they were Perucca's fields, and he was paid to watch his master's interests. But Perucca they dare not touch, because his clan is large, and would hunt the murderer down. If he was caught, the Peruccas would make sure of the jury ay! And of the judge at Bastia but Pietro is not of Corsica; he has no friends and no clan, so justice is not for him."
The next minute there was no head upon Perucca's shoulders." The narrator paused, and relighted his pipe with a foul-smelling sulphur match. "Yes," he said reflectively; "they are fine men, the de Vasselots." He tapped himself on the chest with the stem of his pipe, and made a gesture towards the mountains and the sky, as if calling upon the gods to hear him.
"There is no justice in Corsica! What had Pietro done that he should lie there? Only his duty only that for which he was paid. He was the Perucca's agent, and because he made the idlers pay their rent, they threatened him. Because he put up fences, they raised their guns to him. Because he stopped their thieving and their lawlessness, they shoot him.
His eyes glared at the paper through the glasses placed crookedly upon his nose. "Holy name!" he cried. "Look at this this to me! The dogs!" The colonel looked at the paper with a shrug of the shoulders. "You will have to sell," he suggested lightly; and glancing up at Perucca's face, saw something there that made him leap to his feet. "Hulloa! Here," he said quickly "sit down."
Word Of The Day