An
ungovernable temper was the girl's worst failing; the abductors of her
uncle were arousing in her the most violent passions of which she was
capable, and might lead her to adopt desperate measures. She was only a
country girl, and little experienced in life, yet Beth might be expected
to undertake extraordinary things if, as she expressed it, if she "got
good and mad!"
No sound was heard during the night from the room occupied by Louise,
but the morning disclosed a white, drawn face and reddened eyelids as
proof that she had rested as little as her cousins.
Yet, singularly enough, Louise was the most composed of the three when
they gathered in the little sitting room at daybreak, and tried
earnestly to cheer the spirits of her cousins. Louise never conveyed the
impression of being especially sincere, but the pleasant words and
manners she habitually assumed rendered her an agreeable companion, and
this faculty of masking her real feelings now stood her in good stead
and served to relieve the weight of anxiety that oppressed them all.
Frascatti came limping back with his tired followers in the early dawn,
and reported that no trace of the missing man had been observed. There
were no brigands and no Mafia; on that point all his fellow townsmen
agreed with him fully. But it was barely possible some lawless ones who
were all unknown to the honest Taorminians had made the rich American a
prisoner.
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