"Did you see him?" she gasped, clinging to Assunta and gazing fearfully where her uncle had stood.
"Yes, yes--a big, red man; but he meant us no harm. When you cried out, he was more frightened than we. He leaped down, like a red fox, into the wood and disappeared. He was not an Italian. A German or Englishman, I think. Perhaps a smuggler planning to fetch tea and cigars and coffee and salt from Switzerland. If he leaves enough for the doganieri, they will wink at him. If he does not, they will shoot him--sons of dogs!"
"Remember what you saw!" said Jenny tremulously: "Remember exactly what he looked like, that you may be able to tell Uncle Albert just how it was, Assunta. He is Uncle Albert's brother--Robert Redmayne!"
Assunta Marzelli knew something of the mystery and understood that her master's brother was being hunted for great crimes.
"Merciful God! The evil man. And so red! Let us fly, signora."
"Straight down through the wood beneath us."
"Did he recognize me, Assunta? Did he seem to know me? I dared not look a second time."
"No. He did not look either. He stared out over the lake and his face was like a lost soul's face. Then you cried out and still he did not look but disappeared. He was not angry."
"Why is he here? How has he come and where from?"
"Who shall say? Perhaps the master will know."
"I am in great fear for the master, Assunta. We must go home as quickly as possible."
"Is there danger to the signor from his brother?"
Jenny helped Assunta with her great basket, lifted it on her shoulders and then set off beside her. But the rate of progress proved too slow for her patience.
"I have a horrible dread," she said. "Something tells me that we ought to be going faster. Would you be frightened if I were to leave you, Assunta, and make greater haste?"
The other managed to understand and declared that she felt no fear.
"I have no quarrel with the red man," she said. "Why should he hurt me? Perhaps he was not a man but a spirit, signora."
"I wish he were," declared Jenny. "But it was not a ghost you heard leap into the wood, Assunta. I will run as fast as I can and take the short cuts."
They parted and Jenny hastened, risked her neck sometimes, and sped forward with the energy of youth and on the wings of fear. Assunta saw her stop and turn and listen once or twice; then the crags and hanging thickets hid her from view.