permitting so much wealth to be given to the crackling flames.

"Yes, it was very well," they said; "doubtless the Fernandez family were
vermin to be burned up--smoked out. But they possessed much good gear,
the gathering of many years. These things have committed no treason
against either Don Carlos or the Regent Cristina. Why then are we not
permitted to enter and remove the valuables? It is monstrous. We will
represent the matter to General Cabrera--to Don Carlos himself!"

But one glance at the former, as he sat his horse, nervously twisting
the reins and watching the destruction from under his black brows, made
their hearts as water within them. Their pet Valiant, old Gaspar Perico,
too, had judiciously hidden himself. Esteban the supple had accompanied
him, and the venta of Sarria was in the hands of the silent,
swift-footed, but exceedingly capable maid-servant who had played the
trick upon Etienne.

The Sarrians therefore watched the mill-house blaze up, and thanked God
that it stood some way from the other dwellings of the place.

Suddenly Cabrera turned upon them.

"Hearken ye, villagers of Sarria," he cried, "I have burned the home of
a traitor. If I hear of any shelter being granted to Luis Fernandez or
his brother within your bounds, I swear by the martyred honour of my
mother that on my return I will burn every house within your walls and
shoot every man of you capable of bearing arms. You have heard of Ramon
Cabrera. Let that be enough."

The villagers got apprehensively behind each other, and none answered,
each waiting for the other, till with mighty bass thunder the voice rang
out again:

"Have you no answer?" he cried, "no promise? Must I set a dozen of you
with your backs against the wall, as I did at Espluga in Francoli, to
stimulate those dull country wits of yours?"

Then a young man gaily dressed was thrust to the front. Very unwilling
he was to show himself, and at his appearance, with his knees knocking
together, a merry laugh rang out from behind Cabrera.

That chieftain turned quickly with wrath in his eye. For it was a sound
of a woman's mirth that was heard, and all such were strictly forbidden
within his lines.

But at the sight of little Concha, her dark eyes full of light, her
hands clapping together in innocent delight, her white teeth disclosed
in gay and dainty laughter, a certain _maja_ note of daring unconvention
in her costume, she was so exactly all that would have sent