At the same moment, and long before the vibration had touched
the less-experienced English ears, Montano the brigand ran up
the bank above them and stood in the broken hedge, steadying himself
against a tree and peering down the road. He was a strange figure
as he stood there, for he had assumed a flapped fantastic hat and
swinging baldric and cutlass in his capacity of bandit king,
but the bright prosaic tweed of the courier showed through in patches
all over him.

The next moment he turned his olive, sneering face and made
a movement with his hand. The brigands scattered at the signal,
not in confusion, but in what was evidently a kind of guerrilla discipline.
Instead of occupying the road along the ridge, they sprinkled themselves
along the side of it behind the trees and the hedge, as if watching unseen
for an enemy. The noise beyond grew stronger, beginning to shake
the mountain road, and a voice could be clearly heard calling out orders.
The brigands swayed and huddled, cursing and whispering,
and the evening air was full of little metallic noises as they
cocked their pistols, or loosened their knives, or trailed their scabbards
over the stones. Then the noises from both quarters seemed to meet
on the road above; branches broke, horses neighed, men cried out.

"A rescue!" cried Muscari, springing to his feet and waving his hat;
"the gendarmes are on them! Now for freedom and a blow for it!
Now to be rebels against robbers! Come, don't let us leave everything
to the police; that is so dreadfully modern. Fall on the rear
of these ruffians. The gendarmes are rescuing us; come, friends,
let us rescue the gendarmes!"

And throwing his hat over the trees, he drew his cutlass once more