ng to be
shown the way out of the damned house. Pitichinaccio squeezed himself
close to the wall, and entreated Capuzzi, in the name of all the
saints, to go on first. But before Capuzzi had ascended two steps, the
fellow who was up above came tumbling headlong downstairs, caught hold
of the old man, and whisked him away like a whirlwind out through
the open door below into the middle of the street. There they both
lay,--Capuzzi at bottom and the drunken brute like a heavy sack on top
of him. The old gentleman screamed piteously for help; two men came up
at once and with considerable difficulty freed him from the heavy
weight lying upon him; the other fellow, as soon as he was lifted up,
reeled away cursing.

"Good God! what's happened to you, Signor Pasquale? What are you doing
here at this time of night? What big quarrel have you been getting
mixed up in in that house there?" thus asked Salvator and Antonio, for
that is who the two men were.

"Oh, I shall die!" groaned Capuzzi; "that son of the devil has crushed
all my limbs; I can't move."

"Let me look," said Antonio, feeling all over the old gentleman's body,
and suddenly he pinched his right leg so sharply that Capuzzi screamed
out aloud.

"By all the saints!" cried Antonio in consternation, "by all the
saints! my dear Signer Pasquale, you've broken your right leg in the
most dangerous place. If you don't get speedy help you will within a
short time be a dead man, or at any rate be lame all your life long."

A terrible scream escaped the old man's breast. "Calm yourself, my dear
sir," continued Antonio, "although I'm now a painter, I haven't
altogether forgotten my surgical practice. We will carry you to
Salvator's house and I will at once bind up"----

"My dear Signor Antonio," whined Capuzzi, "you nourish hostile feelings
towards me, I know." "But," broke in Salvator, "this is now no longer
the time to talk about enmity; you are in danger, and that is enough
for honest Antonio to exert all his skill on your behalf. Lay hold,
friend Antonio."

Gently and cautiously they lifted up the old man between them, him
screaming with the unspeakable pain caused by his broken leg, and
carried him to Salvator's dwelling.

Dame Caterina said that she had had a foreboding that something was
going to happen, and so she had not gone to bed. As soon as she caught
sight of the old gentleman and heard what had befallen him, she began
to heap reproaches upon him for his b