round a fire, eating and quarrelling. It was easy to see what they were
quarrelling about. An old gentleman and a lovely young girl were bound
to a tree close by, and by the tree stood a fine carriage.

"They are brigands," said Alfonso, when he returned, "who have captured
a nobleman and his daughter, I think. Let us attack them. In order, no
doubt, to prevent their quarrelling turning into a deadly affray, they
have piled all their arms in a heap some yards away from the fire. So
they cannot make much of a fight."

And they did not. We quietly surrounded them, and shot them down before
they were able to move. Don Alfonso and I then set free the captives,
while Raphael and Lamela rifled the pockets of the dead robbers.

"I am the Count of Polan, and this is my daughter Seraphina," said the
old gentleman. "If you will help me to get my carriage ready, I will
drive back to an inn which we passed before entering the forest."

When we came to the inn, the count begged us all to stay with him.
Raphael and Lamela, however, were afraid that the police would track
them out; Don Alfonso, who had been talking very earnestly to Seraphina,
was, for some strange reason, also unwilling to remain; so I fell in
with their views.

"Why didn't you stay?" I said to Don Alfonso.

"I was afraid the count would recognise me, as Seraphina has done," he
said. "I killed his son in a duel, just when I was trying to win
Seraphina's love. Heaven grant that the service I have now rendered will
make him inclined to forgive me."