rk skin from loss of blood. One arm was bandaged tightly
against his side.

"Unless we can hold them for a time, and get word to the diplomatic
corps to arbitrate. A delay would give us a bit of time to pull
ourselves together."

Martinez, shrugged his shoulders.

"Impossible," he said, drearily.

"Wait. Pendleton, the American minister, is dean of the corps. Carter
here is practically a stranger in town these days, and he's got nerve.
I know him. As an American, he might possibly make it to the legation.
Carter, will you try to get through the streets to the American
Legation? Will you?"

Saxon had leaped forward. He liked the direct manner of this man, and
the legation was his destination.

"It's a hundred to one shot, Carter, that ye can't do it." Murphy's
voice, in its excitement, dropped into brogue. "Will ye try? Will ye
tell him to git th' diplomats togither, and ask an armistice? Ye know
our countersign, '_Vegas y Libertad_.'"

But Saxon had already started off in the general direction of the main
plaza. For two squares, he met no interference. For two more, he
needed no other passport than the countersign, then, as he turned a
corner, it seemed to him that he plunged at a step into a reek of
burnt powder and burning houses. There was a confused vista of men in
retreat, a roar that deafened him, and a sudden numbness. He dropped
to his knees, attempted to rise to his feet, then seemed to sink into
a welcome sleep, as he stretched comfortably at length on the pavement
close to a wall, a detachment of routed _insurrectos_ sweeping by him
in full flight.

CHAPTER XIII

The passing of the fugitive _insurrectos_; their mad turning at bay
for one savage rally; their wavering and breaking; their disorganized
stampede spurred on by a decimating fire and the bayonet's point:
these were all incidents of a sudden squall that swept violently
through the narrow street, to leave it again empty and quiet. It was
empty except for the grotesque shapes that stretched in all the
undignified awkwardness of violent death and helplessness, feeding
thin lines of red that trickled between the cobblestones. It was
silent except for echoes of the stubborn fighting coming from the
freer spaces of the plazas and _alamedas_, where the remnants of the
invading force clung to their positions behind improvised barricades
with the doggedness of men for whom surrender holds no element of hope
or mercy.

Into the canyon-lik