om all
concern? or, if she could persuade her, how could she accomplish her
desire? She would at once be pursued and surrounded, while, even if
she did manage to escape, how could she ever find her way to any place
of refuge? Every minute, also, drew them deeper and deeper into the
woods, and the path was a winding one, in which she soon became
bewildered, until at last all sense of her whereabouts was utterly
gone. At last even the idea of escaping ceased to suggest itself, and
there remained only a dull despair, a sense of utter helplessness and
hopelessness--the sense of one who is going to his doom.

Girasole said nothing whatever, but led the way in silence, walking
slowly enough to accommodate the ladies, and sometimes holding an
overhanging branch to prevent it from springing back in their faces.
Minnie walked on lightly, and with an elastic step, looking around
with evident interest upon the forest. Once a passing lizard drew from
her a pretty little shriek of alarm, thus showing that while she was
so calm in the face of real and frightful danger, she could be alarmed
by even the most innocent object that affected her fancy. Mrs.
Willoughby thought that she understood Minnie before, but this little
shriek at a lizard, from one who smiled at the brigands, struck her as
a problem quite beyond her power to solve.

The woods now began to grow thinner. The trees were larger and farther
apart, and rose all around in columnar array, so that it was possible
to see between them to a greater distance. At length there appeared
before them, through the trunks of the trees, the gleam of water. Mrs.
Willoughby noticed this, and wondered what it might be. At first she
thought it was a harbor on the coast; then she thought it was some
river; but finally, on coming nearer, she saw that it was a lake. In a
few minutes after they first caught sight of it they had reached its
banks.

It was a most beautiful and sequestered spot. All around were high
wooded eminences, beyond whose undulating summits arose the towering
forms of the Apennine heights. Among these hills lay a little lake
about a mile in length and breadth, whose surface was as smooth as
glass, and reflected the surrounding shores. On their right, as they
descended, they saw some figures moving, and knew them to be the
brigands, while on their left they saw a ruined house. Toward this
Girasole led them.

The house stood on the shore of the lake. It was of stone, and