y hesitated for two or three seconds before turning to run, the
Bravo made a spring like a wild cat, struck the corporal violently on
the nose with the iron guard of his rapier, jumped back one step, and
then, lunging an almost incredible distance as the corporal staggered
against the wall, ran the man behind him through the fleshy part of the
shoulder. On his side, Trombin advanced too, pretended to lunge and
then suddenly struck the man before him such a stinging blow with the
flat of his rapier that the fellow howled and fled, whereupon Trombin
encouraged his speed by prodding him sharply in the rear. In a moment
the confusion was complete, and the watchmen were tumbling over each
other in their hurry to escape. Then the lantern was suddenly shut, and
the two Bravi faced about and ran like deer in the opposite direction.

CHAPTER XV

Don Alberto did not care to tell how he had been wounded, and kept the
matter between himself, his doctor, and his own man, giving out that he
had been thrown from his horse and had broken one of the bones of his
forearm, a story which quite accounted for his wearing his arm in a
sling when he appeared after keeping his room during five days. It was
natural, too, that Stradella and Ortensia, who had recognised him by the
light of the lantern, should say nothing about the matter, and the Bravi
did not know who the young man was; so there was a possibility that the
whole affair might remain a secret.

Trombin, however, was anxious to discover the name of the adversary he
had wounded, and Gambardella was not unwilling to help him, though he
considered him quite mad where Ortensia was concerned.

'You have no imagination,' Trombin objected, in answer to this charge.
'Can you not understand the peculiar charm of being in love with a lady
of whom I have agreed to make an angel at the first convenient
opportunity, and whom I have further promised to deliver safe, sound,
and alive to her uncle in Venice?'

'I wish you joy of your puzzles,' answered Gambardella discontentedly.

'I derive much solace from the pleasures of imagination,' Trombin
observed, following his own train of thought. 'In me a great romancer
has been lost to our age, another Bandello, perhaps a second Boccaccio!
An English gentleman of taste once told me that my features resemble
those of a dramatist of his country, whose first name was William--I
forget the second, which I could not learn to pronounce--but that m