ola walked out of a dark corner, and, without a word, emptied upon
the table out of his hollowed palms a few dry crusts of bread and half a
raw onion.

While the Capataz began to devour this beggar's fare, taking up with
stony-eyed voracity piece after piece lying by his side, the Garibaldino
went off, and squatting down in another corner filled an earthenware mug
with red wine out of a wicker-covered demijohn. With a familiar gesture,
as when serving customers in the cafe, he had thrust his pipe between
his teeth to have his hands free.

The Capataz drank greedily. A slight flush deepened the bronze of his
cheek. Before him, Viola, with a turn of his white and massive head
towards the staircase, took his empty pipe out of his mouth, and
pronounced slowly--

"After the shot was fired down here, which killed her as surely as if
the bullet had struck her oppressed heart, she called upon you to save
the children. Upon you, Gian' Battista."

The Capataz looked up.

"Did she do that, Padrone? To save the children! They are with the
English senora, their rich benefactress. Hey! old man of the people. Thy
benefactress. . . ."

"I am old," muttered Giorgio Viola. "An Englishwoman was allowed to give
a bed to Garibaldi lying wounded in prison. The greatest man that ever
lived. A man of the people, too--a sailor. I may let another keep a
roof over my head. Si . . . I am old. I may let her. Life lasts too long
sometimes."

"And she herself may not have a roof over her head before many days are
out, unless I . . . What do you say? Am I to keep a roof over her head?
Am I to try--and save all the Blancos together with her?"

"You shall do it," said old Viola in a strong voice. "You shall do it as
my son would have. . . ."

"Thy son, viejo! .. .. There never has been a man like thy son. Ha, I
must try. . . . But what if it were only a part of the curse to lure me
on? . . . And so she called upon me to save--and then----?"

"She spoke no more." The heroic follower of Garibaldi, at the thought
of the eternal stillness and silence fallen upon the shrouded form
stretched out on the bed upstairs, averted his face and raised his hand
to his furrowed brow. "She was dead before I could seize her hands," he
stammered out, pitifully.

Before the wide eyes of the Capataz, staring at the doorway of the dark
staircase, floated the shape of the Great Isabel, like a strange ship in
distress, freighted with enormous wealth and the solit