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For a little while we were afraid he had caught one of our terrible fevers. Luckily he is all right again, as you will observe for yourself, for I fancy you will see him very soon." "Miss Nevil must have been very much alarmed!" "Fortunately she did not become aware of the danger till it was quite gone by. M. della Rebbia, Miss Nevil has talked to me a great deal about you and about your sister."
The father of Orso and Colomba della Rebbia has been treacherously murdered by two of the family of Barracini. Colomba is burning for vengeance, but her brother is an officer in the French army, and has been absent from Corsica for many years. When he returns she finds that his love for Lydia, the daughter of the Count de Nevers, has driven thoughts of revenge from his mind.
At one time he was summoned to pay for the damage his horse had done to the mayor's fences, at another, the latter, under pretence of repairing the floor of the church, ordered the removal of a broken flagstone bearing the della Rebbia arms, which covered the grave of some member of the family. If the village goats ate the colonel's young plants, the mayor always protected their owners.
Now that every one is asleep the beautiful Colomba, the colonel, and his daughter I will seize the opportunity to acquaint my reader with certain details of which he must not be ignorant, if he desires to follow the further course of this veracious history. He is already aware that Colonel della Rebbia, Orso's father, had been assassinated.
"Gentlemen, I've brought some supper. Fall to, if you please, and don't you forget my friend Brusco." "You spoil Brusco, Mademoiselle Colomba. But he's a grateful dog. You shall see. Here, Brusco," and he held out his gun horizontally, "jump for the Barricini!" The dog stood motionless, licking his chops, and staring at his master. "Jump for the della Rebbia!"
A quarter of an hour later she opened her window, and saw the lady in the mezzaro still sitting in the same place and in the same attitude. Not long afterward the colonel and Orso returned from hunting. Then the landlord said a few words to the young lady in mourning, and pointed to della Rebbia with his finger.
This very day I shall charge you before the public prosecutor with forgery and complicity with Bianchi. I may perhaps have a still more terrible accusation to bring against you!" "And I, Signor della Rebbia," replied the mayor, "shall lay my charge against you for conspiracy and complicity with bandits. Meanwhile the prefect will desire the gendarmes to keep an eye upon you."
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.
"I have very little time; but I still have some hope." Then she took a bunch of keys and ran up to a room on the upper story. There he could hear her pulling open drawers, and rummaging in the writing-desk in which Colonel della Rebbia had kept his business papers.
The ballata which had been broken off on Orso's appearance had been composed on the occasion of the death of his father, Colonel della Rebbia, who had been murdered two years previously.
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