"A curse upon this rotten mist!" he muttered. "I can see nothing. Around and about is a fog from the devil's own caldron, as if it were cooked on purpose to blind me; whilst the stars are twinkling above, as if they squinted down upon my confusion, and laughed me to scorn. However, at all ventures, have at my mark!" With these words, he flung pebble after pebble in the direction of the light. Several of the missiles were heard to rattle against the walls of the house; and a few others rendered a clearer ringing sound, as if they had struck upon glass. After a short space of time, the light disappeared almost entirely; and a window was heard to open. The traveller raised another pebble in his hand, with a smile upon his face, as if inclined to take a last random shot at the head which had probably replaced the light at the open window; but he checked his humour with a short low laugh, and coughed to attract attention. The cough was immediately re-echoed in a hoarse and hollow voice. "That should be the old raven's croak," said the stranger to himself. "Bandini!" he cried, in a low but distinct tone, through his hollowed hands. "Hush!" rejoined the voice from the window. "Not so loud! Is it you?" "_Diavolo!_" replied the traveller, approaching closer to the wall of the town, and speaking as low as possible. "Who should it be, man? But the gate is closed; and I have no mind to expose myself to the investigations of the gatekeeper's lantern, and all the cross-examination and tittle-tattle that may follow." "I waited for you with impatience," pursued his interlocutor; "and when the gate closed for the night, placed my lamp at the window as a beacon." "All right!" replied the other. "But what's to be done now, man?" "Can you climb?" continued the hoarse voice. "Like a cat or a Spanish lover," was the reply. "Perhaps I have no little in me of the first; at all events I have often tried the trade of the latter." "Descend into the moat from the end of the bridge," pursued the personage at the window. "The passage is easy. I will provide for your ascent." Following these short instructions, the stranger returned over the bridge; and catching from stem to stem of the few stunted trees that grew upon the precipitous sides of the descent, he clambered, without much difficulty, to the bottom of the steep. As he crossed the reedy and moist soil of the moat, the noise of a falling object directed his steps towards a part of the wall where a ladder of cords awaited him. Profiting by this aid, and grasping, where he could, the projecting stones of the rude masonry which formed the lower part of the house, the stranger mounted with ready agility to the level of a window. "You have not chosen your quarters upon the town-wall for nothing, I am inclined to suppose, Master Bandini," he said, as he found himself in face of a dark form at the opening to which he had arrived.