Page:Idalia, by 'Ouida' volume 2.djvu/312

Rh "I have done it," he cried, with all a child's exultation. "Here is your answer—written. Stay here, lest the crows yonder should spy on us. Let priests smell gold, and it's all up with him who owns it."

Erceldoune took the paper and read it, lying there under the shelter of the sedges. It was in German; the Baron was from home, but an old lacquey, who had chanced to be the first to greet the Savoyard, seeing an open scroll, and, pressed by the boy's urgency, had read it, had hesitated at first what to do in his master's absence, but, knowing how well Anselm loved the writer, had known he should run no risk by compliance, and might by refusal risk much displeasure. He wrote now in reply, with sagacity and foresight, promising that the horses should be in waiting at nightfall with a lad to hold them, and that as they would be something worn by the transit, another pair should be in readiness at the gates of Ferratino in case Erceldoune's errand should bear him near, which in all likelihood it might, since all things must pass by there to reach the road to the shore.

His hand shook with joy as he read, and scattered the old man*s tremulously-written characters in fragments lest they should tell tales. So far the