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 'Let her speak to me,' he said.

The carabiniers were ill-disposed to obey, but they saw that the crowd was eager and full of pity for Saturnino. They were afraid to irritate, since they had not gagged, him; and, after all, a woman could do no harm.

One of them moved, so as to let her in between his horse and that of the captive. He kept the muzzle of the cocked carbine pointed against her; but she was a brave woman; she did not heed that.

'Drink my wine, Mastarna,' she said to him, and lifted the cup herself.

'Is it you, Joconda?' he said.

But he did not drink.

'It is Joconda,' she said curtly, 'How came you in this plight?'

'I was betrayed,' said the brigand, while his great despairing eyes flashed as a knife that is raised to kill flashes in the light, and he said it more truthfully than many greater conquered conquerors who excuse their own feebleness and lack of forecast by the plea of treachery. He had been betrayed, and seized as he had sat drinking at sunset at the door of his hut in the hills.

'Joconda, I saved your lamb,' he said, after a pause.