After several consultations between the Cenci family, the abbe and the
sbirri, the following plan of action was decided upon.

The period when Francesco Cenci was accustomed to go to Rocco Petrella
was approaching: it was arranged that Olympio, conversant with the
district and its inhabitants, should collect a party of a dozen
Neapolitan bandits, and conceal them in a forest through which the
travellers would have to pass. Upon a given signal, the whole family
were to be seized and carried off. A heavy ransom was to be demanded,
and the sons were to be sent back to Rome to raise the sum; but, under
pretext of inability to do so, they were to allow the time fixed by
the bandits to lapse, when Francesco was to be put to death. Thus all
suspicions of a plot would be avoided, and the real assassins would
escape justice.

This well-devised scheme was nevertheless unsuccessful. When Francesco
left Rome, the scout sent in advance by the conspirators could not find
the bandits; the latter, not being warned beforehand, failed to come
down before the passage of the travellers, who arrived safe and sound
at Rocco Petrella. The bandits, after having patrolled the road in vain,
came to the conclusion that their prey had escaped, and, unwilling to
stay any longer in a place where they had already spent a week, went off
in quest of better luck elsewhere.

Francesco had in the meantime settled down in the fortress, and, to be
more free to tyrannise over Lucrezia and Beatrice, sent back to Rome
Giacomo and his two other sons. He then recommenced his infamous
attempts upon Beatrice, and with such persistence, that she resolved
herself to accomplish the deed which at first she desired to entrust to
other hands.