The Children of the King | Page 7

of Goth-land.
They were but twelve and ten years old, but they could fight already, in their small way, and had tried it many a time with shepherd lads on the hill-side. But Don Pietro despised children and aimed a blow at Ruggiero's right shoulder. The blow did not take effect, but a moment had not passed before the old peasant lay sprawling on his back with both the boys on top of him.
"You cannot hurt the mother now," said Ruggiero. "Hit him as I do, Bastianello!"
And the four bony boyish fists fell in a storm of savage blows upon Don Pietro Casale's leathern face and eyes and head and thin grey lips.
"That is for the mother," said Ruggiero. "Another fifty a-piece for ourselves."
The wiry old peasant struggled desperately, and at last threw himself free of them and staggered to his feet.
"Quick, Bastianello!" shouted Ruggiero.
In the twinkling of an eye they were over the fence and running at full speed for the valley. Don Pietro bruised, dazed and half-blinded, struggled after them, crashing through hedges and stumbling into ditches while he shouted for help in his pursuit. But his heavy shoes hampered him, and at best he was no match for them in speed. His face was covered with purple blotches and his eyelids were swelling at a terrible rate. Out of breath and utterly worn out he stood still and steadied himself against a crooked olive-tree. He could no longer hear even the footsteps of the lads before him.
They were beyond his reach now. The last of the Children of the King had left Verbicaro, where their fathers had lived and died since darker ages than Calabrian history has accurately recorded.

CHAPTER II.
"We shall never see him again," said Ruggiero, stopping at last and looking back over the stone wall he had just cleared.
Sebastiano listened intently. He was not tall enough to see over, but his ears were sharp.
"I do not hear him any more," he answered. "I hurt my hands on his nose," he added, thoughtfully, as he glanced at his bruised knuckles.
"So did I," returned his brother. "He will remember us. Come along--it is far to Scalea."
"To Scalea? Are we going to Scalea?"
"Eh! If not, where? And where else can we eat? Don Antonino will give us a piece of bread."
"There are figs here," suggested Sebastiano, looking up into the trees around them.
"It has not rained yet, and if you eat figs from the tree before it has rained you will have pain. But if we are very hungry we will eat them, all the same."
Little Sebastiano yielded rather reluctantly before his brother's superior wisdom. Besides, Padre Michele had given them a little cold bean porridge at the monastery early in the morning. So they went on their way cautiously, and looking about them at every step now that there was no more need of haste. For they had got amongst the vineyards and orchards where they had no business, and if the peasants saw them, the stones would begin to fly. They knew their way about, however, and reached an open footpath without any adventure, so that in half an hour they were on the mule track to Scalea. They walked much faster than a grown peasant would have done, and they knew the road. Instead of turning to the left after going down the hill beyond the tower, they took the right hand path to the Scalea river, and as it had not rained they got across without getting very wet. But that road is not so good as the one to Diamante, because the river is sometimes swollen, and people with laden mules have to wait even as much as three days before they can try the ford, and moreover there is bad air there, which brings fever.
At last they struck the long beach and began to trudge through the sand.
"And what shall we do to-morrow?" asked Sebastiano.
Ruggiero was whistling loudly to show his younger brother that he was not tired nor afraid of anything. At the question he stopped suddenly, and faced the blazing blue sea.
"We can go to America," he said, after a moment's reflection.
Little Sebastiano did not seem at all surprised by the proposition, but he remained in deep thought for some moments, stamping up a little hillock of sand between his bare feet.
"We are not old enough to be married yet," he remarked at last.
"That is true," admitted Ruggiero, reluctantly.
Possibly, the close connection between going to America and being married may not be apparent to the poor untutored foreign mind. It would certainly not have been understood a hundred miles north of Sebastiano's heap of sand. And yet it is very simple. In Calabria any strong young fellow with a decently good character can find a wife with a small dowry, though