A strange longing arises within them to make use of their weapon.

Once or twice Makkabesku raised his gun to his cheek and made a target of a fly on the wall.

At the end of the vestibule facing him was an old Roman image, the head and bust of an Emperor, which had been unearthed in the neighbourhood of the house when the foundations had been laid, and had been adopted forthwith as a family relic.

If this old imperial figurehead had been an enemy, let us say the famous robber of the district, our marksman felt that he could easily have shattered his skull for him.
The sun was now slowly descending from the sky, and the lower it sank, the less golden and the more purple grew the light which it threw upon the ancient monument opposite, till the shadow of an adjacent column fell softly across it and hid it half from view.
Suddenly it seemed to Makkabesku as if he saw the shadow of a human head moving beside the shadow of the column.
The breath died away on his lips--someone was lurking there! "Who is there ?" he cried, in a voice half choked with terror.

The same instant there stood before him at the opposite end of the corridor--Fatia Negra! Yes, there the figure was just as it had been described to him, enfolded in a black atlas mantle, with a black mask across its face.
"Stay where you are, don't come here!" cried the armed Makkabesku, in an agony of terror, "or I'll shoot you through," and as the mask continued to advance, he hurriedly fired off the left barrel of the gun.
The smoke of the powder cleared away, Fatia Negra stood there unwounded, he was coming nearer and nearer! Ah, those little shots could not hurt him, of course--but now he shall have the bullet with the steel point.
As the first shot was fired, Makkabesku's wife came running out of the kitchen and came face to face with the robber.