She would like that, she thought, as she clambered up the steep paths;
and perhaps she would meet these American girls again, or others like
them, and make them her friends. She had never known a girl friend, as
yet.
These ambitions would yesterday have seemed far in the dim future; but
now that her stern old grandmother was gone it was possible her father
would soon fulfill his promises. While the Duchessa lived she ruled them
all, and she was a brigand to the backbone. Now her father's will
prevailed, and he could refuse his child nothing.
Kenneth was not an expert detective, but he had managed to keep Tato in
sight without being suspected by her. He had concealed himself near the
Catania Gate, through which he knew she must pass, and by good luck she
had never looked around once, so intent were her musings.
When she came to the end of the path and leaned against the rock to sing
the broken refrain which was the "open sesame" to the valley, the boy
was hidden snug behind a boulder where he could watch her every
movement.
Then the rock opened; Tato passed in, and the opening closed behind her.
Kenneth found a foothold and climbed up the wall of rock, higher and
higher, until at last he crept upon a high ridge and looked over.
The hidden valley lay spread before him in all its beauty, but the
precipice at his feet formed a sheer drop of a hundred feet or more, and
he drew back with a shudder.
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