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Updated: May 24, 2025
The chief thereupon concealed the unconscious girl behind a huge fragment of rock and threw himself flat upon the ground, hoping thus to escape observation. As he did so he saw the glare of old Solara's torch. It flashed full in the face of a peasant, a perfect stranger, who had heard Annunziata's cry and come to the rescue.
The concluding portion of old Solara's last speech was a surprise. Massetti drew a long breath of relief. It was scarcely probable that he would be prosecuted by the Roman authorities for fighting a duel with the shepherd under the circumstances, and the wounded man had voluntarily removed every suspicion of foul play from him.
As Massetti lay his eye caught the glimmer of his own knife beyond the shepherd and slipping like a serpent between Solara's legs he seized it, sprang to his feet and, before Pasquale could recover from his surprise at this unlooked-for manoeuvre, buried the glittering blade in his breast. Solara reeled and fell upon the grass, where he lay bathed in blood.
He advanced with his murderous weapon in his outstretched hand, having previously rolled up his sleeve and bared his brown, sinewy arm. Massetti stooped and took up the knife from where it lay. He also bared his arm, nervously grasping the hilt of the weapon. Pasquale Solara's eyes gleamed like those of a tiger seen through the darkness of a Hindoostan jungle.
To be brief, the young men, who were disguised as peasants, soon found themselves in Pasquale Solara's hut and in the presence of the fair Annunziata herself." Peppino paused for an instant and then continued: "These preliminary details, Signor Count, are necessary to enable you to understand the conspiracy which was speedily to be hatched.
A second's thought seemed to satisfy him on this point, for the flower-girl was the only female in the vicinity and the voice was certainly hers; but it sounded from a distance, without the cabin, and this fact bewildered him. Promptly old Solara's conduct returned to his mind, and instinctively he connected the morose shepherd with the cry and whatever was happening.
When he spoke of old Pasquale Solara's infamous sale of his beautiful daughter to Luigi Vampa the male auditors could scarcely restrain their indignation and the women fairly screamed with horror, the utmost efforts of the Court officers being required to force them into anything like quietude.
I have been a great sinner, but I do not desire to go before my angered God with all the weight of my iniquity upon me; therefore, I have resolved to speak, to tell all I know!" The spectators in the body of the hall shuddered. Old Solara's voice did not reach them, but they felt instinctively that some dreadful revelation was either being or about to be made.
Annunziata had also heard and was listening for what should follow with a countenance almost as white as her nun's bonnet. Mme. de Rancogne caught her hands and held them firmly; she too was startled beyond expression by old Solara's words and feared the effect of further revelations upon her protégée.
At last, steadying and controlling himself by a supreme effort, he read the missive from which he had feared such terrible consequences. Pasquale Solara's daughter, Annunziata, was abducted, from her father's peasant-home by Giovanni Massetti, known as the Viscount Massetti, who is, no doubt, the person to whom you allude as now in Paris, for he has disappeared from Rome.
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