s
followers at the _cerro_ of Chacahua, where the ex-vaquero had
entrenched himself. An action was fought, which resulted in Valdez
being driven from his entrenchments, but without Don Rafael being able
to possess himself of his person, a thing he desired even more than a
victory over his band.

A fortnight was spent in vain searches, and still the guerilla chief
continued to escape the vengeance of his unrelenting pursuer. At the
end of that period, however, the insurgents were once more tempted to
try a battle with the followers of Don Rafael and Caldelas. It proved a
sanguinary action, in which the royalists were victorious. The
scattered followers of Valdez, when reunited at the rendezvous agreed
upon in the event of their being defeated, perceived that their leader
was missing from among them.

Alive they never saw him again. His dead body was found some distance
from the field of battle, and around it the traces of a struggle which
had ended in his death. The body was headless, but the head was
afterwards discovered, nailed to the gate of the hacienda Del Valle,
with the features so disfigured that his most devoted adherents would
not have recognised them but for an inscription underneath. It was the
name of the insurgent, with that of the man who had beheaded him, Don
Rafael Tres-Villas.

Valdez had fled from the field after the defeat of his followers.
Before proceeding far, he heard behind him the hoarse snorting of a
steed. It was the bay-brown of Don Rafael.

In a few bounds the insurgent was overtaken. A short struggle took
place between the two horsemen; but the ex-vaquero, notwithstanding his
equestrian skill, was seized in the powerful grasp of the dragoon
officer, lifted clear out of his saddle, and dashed with violence to the
earth. Before he could recover himself, the lasso of Don Rafael--
equally skilled in the use of this singular weapon--was coiled around
him; and his body, after being dragged for some distance at the tail of
the officer's horse, lay lifeless and mutilated along the ground. Such
was the end of Antonio Valdez.

CHAPTER FORTY.

FATAL MISUNDERSTANDINGS.

The death of this first victim, offered to the manes of his murdered
father, had to some extent the effect of appeasing the vengeful passion
of Don Rafael. At all events his spirit became calmer; and other
sentiments long slumbering at the bottom of his heart began to usurp
their sway. He perceived the necess