by it." I assured him that I knew nothing about the
road to B., and said that I would ask in the inn, or would conduct
them to the village. But the man would not listen to reason; he
drew from his girdle a pistol, the barrel of which glittered in the
moonlight. "My dear fellow," he said in a very friendly tone, as he
wiped off the glittering barrel and then ran his eye along it--"my
dear fellow, you will have the kindness to go yourself before us to
B."

Verily, I was in a scrape. If I chanced to hit the right road, I
should certainly get into the midst of the robber band and be beaten
because I had no money; if I did not find the road, I should be beaten
of course. I wasted very little thought upon the matter, but took
the first road at hand, the one past the inn which led away from
the village. The horseman galloped back to his companion, and both
followed me slowly at some distance. Thus we wandered on foolishly
enough at hap-hazard through the moonlit night. The road led through
forests on the side of a mountain. Sometimes we could see, above the
tops of the pines stirring darkly beneath us, far abroad into the
deep, silent valleys; now and then a nightingale burst into song; the
dogs bayed in the distant villages. A brook babbled ceaselessly from
the depths below us, and here and there glistened in the moonlight.
The hush was disturbed by the monotonous tramp of the horses and by
the stir and movement of their riders, who talked together incessantly
in a foreign tongue, and the bright moonlight contrasted sharply with
the long shadows of the trees, which swept across the figures of the
horsemen, making them appear now black, now light, now dwarfish, and
anon gigantic. My thoughts grew strangely confused, as though in a
dream from which I could not waken, but I marched straight ahead. We
certainly must reach the end of the forest and of the night too, I
thought.

At last long, rosy streaks flushed the horizon here and there but
faintly, as when one breathes upon a mirror, and a lark began to sing
high up above the peaceful valley. My heart at once grew perfectly
light at the approach of dawn, and all fear left me. The two horsemen
stretched themselves, looked around, and seemed for the first time
to suspect that we might not have taken the right road. They chatted
much, and I could perceive that they were talking of me; it even
seemed to me that one of them began to mistrust me, as though I were
a rogue trying t