. They carried the place by storm
and sacked it. When I left it was burning in several places and turned
into a hell."

"My God!" ejaculated the old man, amid the cries and oaths of his
fierce, infuriated men. "And now tell me about Mercedes."

"Morgan--who met her, you remember, when we stopped at Jamaica on our
return from Madrid?"

"Yes, yes!"

"He is in love with her. He wanted to make her his wife. Therefore he
kept her from the soldiery."

In his eagerness the Viceroy reined in his horse, and the officers and
men, even the soldiers, stopped also and crowded around the narrator.

"Did he--did he--O Holy Mother have pity upon me!" groaned the Viceroy.

"He did her no violence save to kiss her, while I was by."

"And you suffered it!" shouted de Tobar, beside himself with rage.

"What did she then?" asked the old man, waving his hand for silence.

"She struck him in the face again and again with her riding-whip. I was
bound, senors. I broke my bonds, struck down one of the guards, wrested
a sword from another, and sprang to defend her. But they overpowered
me. Indeed, they seized the lady and swore to kill her unless I dropped
my weapon."

"Death," cried de Lara, "would have been perhaps a fitting end for her.
What more?"

"We were conveyed into the city after the sack. He insulted her again
with his compliments and propositions. He sent a slave to fetch her,
but, bound as I was, I sprang upon him and beat him down."

"And then?"

"Then one of his men, an ancient, one-eyed sailor, interfered and bade
him look to the town, else it would be burned over his head, and urged
him to secure the pass. In this exigency the pirate desisted from his
plan against the lady. He sent Donna Mercedes to a dungeon, me to
another."

"How came you here, sir, and alone?" asked de Tobar, again interrupting,
and this time the Viceroy, pitying the agony of the lover, permitted the
question. "Did you, a Spanish officer, leave the lady defenseless amid
those human tigers?"

"There was nothing else to do, Don Felipe. The sailor who interfered, he
set me free. I did refuse to leave without the senorita. He told me I
must go without her or not at all. He promised to protect her honor or
to kill her--at least to furnish her with a weapon. To go, to reach
you, your Excellency, was the only chance for her. Going, I might save
her; staying, I could only die."

"You did rightly. I commend you," answered the veteran. "Go on."