of the alferez dominating everything: "To the stocks! Handcuff
them! Shoot any one who moves! Sergeant, mount the guard! Today no
one shall walk about, not even God! Captain, this is no time to go
to sleep!"

Ibarra hastened his steps toward home, where his servants were
anxiously awaiting him. "Saddle the best horse and go to bed!" he
ordered them.

Going into his study, he hastily packed a traveling-bag, opened an
iron safe, took out what money he found there and put it into some
sacks. Then he collected his jewels, took clown a portrait of Maria
Clara, armed himself with a dagger and two revolvers, and turned
toward a closet where he kept his instruments.

At that moment three heavy knocks sounded on the door. "Who's
there?" asked Ibarra in a gloomy tone.

"Open, in the King's name, open at once, or we'll break the door down,"
answered an imperious voice in Spanish.

Ibarra looked toward the window, his eyes gleamed, and he cocked his
revolver. Then changing his mind, he put the weapons down and went
to open the door just as the servant appeared. Three guards instantly
seized him.

"Consider yourself a prisoner in the King's name," said the sergeant.

"For what?"

"They'll tell you over there. We're forbidden to say." The youth
reflected a moment and then, perhaps not wishing that the soldiers
should discover his preparations for flight, picked up his hat, saying,
"I'm at your service. I suppose that it will only be for a few hours."

"If you promise not to try to escape, we won't tie you the alferez
grants this favor--but if you run--"

Ibarra went with them, leaving his servants in consternation.

Meanwhile, what had become of Elias? Leaving the house of Crisostomo,
he had run like one crazed, without heeding where he was going. He
crossed the fields in violent agitation, he reached the woods; he fled
from the town, from the light--even the moon so troubled him that he
plunged into the mysterious shadows of the trees. There, sometimes
pausing, sometimes moving along unfrequented paths, supporting himself
on the hoary trunks or being entangled in the undergrowth, he gazed
toward the town, which, bathed in the light of the moon, spread out
before him on the plain along the shore of the lake. Birds awakened
from their sleep flew about, huge bats and owls moved from branch to
branch with strident cries and gazed at him with their round eyes, but
Elias neither heard nor heeded them. In his fancy he was fo