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Updated: May 25, 2025
Stefano, where the Bastia road comes through the Lancone defile the road by which Colonel Gilbert had ridden to the Casa Perucca not so very long before. At the base of the fan runs the Aliso, without haste, bordered on either bank by oleanders growing like rushes.
"And I must get back there," said the colonel, holding out his hand. He rode thoughtfully back by the shortest route through the Lancone Defile, and, as he approached Bastia, from the heights behind the town he saw the steamer that would convey Lory to France coming northward from Bonifacio.
He is travelling with a man called Jean, who has the evil eye." "The Count de Vasselot," said the outlaw, quietly. He touched his forehead with one finger and made a vague wandering gesture of the hand. "I have seen him. You go the wrong way. He is down there, near the entrance to the Lancone Defile with others."
Perhaps he had known it so well during his sojourn in this island of silence and loneliness, that he had fallen a victim to its dangerous charms, and being indolent by nature, had discovered that it is less trouble to be alone than to cultivate the society of man. The Lancone Defile has to this day an evil name.
He went to Perucca, where all seemed quiet, though he did not actually ring the great bell and speak to the widow Andrei. A few hours later, after nightfall, he set off on foot by the road that leads to the Lancone Defile. But he did not turn to the left at the cross-roads.
The road mounts steadily, and this February morning had broken grey and cloudy, so that the colonel found himself in the mists that hang over these mountains during the spring months, long before he reached the narrow entrance to the grim and soundless Lancone Defile. The heavy clouds had nestled down the mountains, covering them like a huge thickness of wet cotton-wool.
The abbe walked until midnight, and then being tired he found a quiet spot between two great rocks, and lying down slept there until morning. In the leather saddle-bag which formed his pillow he had bread and some meat, which he ate as he walked on towards the Lancone Defile. Once, soon after daylight, he paused to listen, and the sound that had faintly reached him was repeated.
And he tore open the envelope which Colonel Gilbert had handed to the peasant a couple of hours earlier in the Lancone Defile. He fixed his eye-glasses upon his nose, clumsily, with one hand, and then unfolded the letter. It was merely a sheet of blank paper, with a cross drawn upon it. His face suddenly blazed red with anger.
They were, it is true, not numerous at this time, but those who had escaped the clutch of the imperial law were necessarily the most cunning and desperate. "Buon," he said, turning to retrace his steps. "I shall go down to the Lancone Defile. God be with you, my friend." The man gave a queer laugh. He evidently thought that the abbe expected too much.
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