de a bound forward, and clutching his throat,
placed the point of his knife against his breast.

"One word," said he, "and I strike!"

"At the heart of your best friend," replied the soldier, in a voice of
which the well-known accents thrilled Hererra's blood.

"Mariano!" he exclaimed.

"Himself," replied Mariano Torres.

Just then the gipsy, who had reached the ground, sprang upon the
disguised Christino, and made a furious blow at him with his knife.
Torres raised his arm, and the blade passed through the loose sleeve of
his capote. Herrera hastened to interfere.

"'Tis a friend," said he.

The gipsy made a step backwards, in distrust and uncertainty.

"I tell you it is a friend," repeated Herrera--"a comrade of my own, who
has come to aid my escape. And now that you have rescued me, act as our
guide to the nearest Christino post, and your reward shall be ample."

The mention of reward seemed at once to remove the doubts and suspicions
of the esquilador. Returning to the rope which dangled from the window,
he cut it as high up as he could reach.

"They may perhaps miss the sentry and not the prisoner," said he.

At that moment a dark form turned the corner of the house.

"Who goes there?" exclaimed a voice.

"This way," cried the gipsy, and springing across the road, he dashed
down a bank, and with long and rapid strides hurried across the fields.

"Who goes there?" repeated the deep hoarse tones of Major Villabuena
"Sentry, where are you? Guard, turn out!"

The flash and report of Mariano's musket, which he had left leaning
against the wall, and which Don Baltasar found and fired, followed the
words of alarm. The bullet whistled over the heads of the fugitives. In
another instant all was noise and confusion in the village. The rattle
of the drum was heard, lights appeared at the windows, and the clatter
of arms and tramp of man and horse reached the ears of Herrera and his
companions. Soon they heard a small party of cavalry gallop down a road
which ran parallel to the course they were taking. But in the darkness,
and in that wild and mountainous region, pursuit was vain, especially
when one so well skilled as the gipsy in the various paths and passes
directed the flight. In less than half an hour, the three fugitives were
out of sight and sound of the village and their pursuers.

After six hours' march, kept up without a moment's halt, over hill and
dale, through forest and ravine, the intricacies