ble. By threading our way between the
smoking sulphur heaps and carefully avoiding the boiling springs we found
it possible to get on, yet slowly and with great difficulty; and it soon
became evident that, long before we gain the forest the hounds will be on
the moor. Their deep-throated baying and the shouts of the field grow
every moment louder and more distinct. If we are viewed we shall be lost;
for if the blood-hounds catch sight of us not even the terrors of the
_azuferales_ will balk them of their prey. And to our dismay the fire does
not seem to be taking hold. We can see nothing of it but a few faint
sparks gleaming through the bushes.

But where can we hide? The moor is flat and treeless, the forest two or
three miles away in a straight line, and we can go neither straight nor
fast. If we cower behind one of the smoking brimstone mounds we shall be
stifled; if we jump into one of the boiling springs we shall be scalded.

"Where can we hide?" I ask.

"Where can we hide?" repeated Carmen.

"That pool! Don't you see that, a little farther on, the brook forms a
pool, and, though it smokes, I don't think it is very hot."

"It is just the place," and with that Carmen runs forward and plunges in.

I follow him, first taking the precaution to lay my pistol and knife on
the edge. The water, though warm, is not uncomfortably hot, and when we
sit down our heads are just out of the water.

We are only just in time. Two minutes later the hounds, with a great
crash, burst out of the forest, followed at a short interval by half a
dozen horsemen.

"Curse this brimstone! It has ruined the scent," I heard Griscelli say, as
the hounds threw up their heads and came to a dead stop. "If I had thought
those _ladrones_ would run hither I would not have given them twenty
minutes, much less forty. But they cannot be far off; depend upon it, they
are hiding somewhere.--_Por Dios_, Sheba has it! Good dog! Hark to Sheba!
Forward, forward!"

It was true. One of the hounds had hit off the line, then followed another
and another, and soon the entire pack was once more in full cry. But the
scent was very bad, and seemed to grow worse; there was a check every few
yards, and when they got to the brook (which had as many turns and twists
as a coiled rope), they were completely at fault. Nevertheless, they
persevered, questing about all over the moor, except in the neighborhood
of the sulphur mounds and the springs.

While this was goi