These salts were not long in producing their effect; she breathed a deep sigh, and opened her eyes, casting round vague and languid looks. But suddenly her eye fell upon the woman who was lavishing her cares upon her; a fresh pallor covered the features, which had begun to be slightly tinged with red, she closed her eyes, and was on the point of fainting again. The Linda shrugged her shoulders, took a second phial from her bosom, and opening the poor girls mouth introduced a few drops of cordial between her livid lips. At that moment Antinahuel returned.
"Everything is ready," he said; "we can depart immediately."
"When you please," Doña Maria replied.
"What is to be done with this girl?"
"She will remain here: I have arranged everything."
"Let us be gone, then!" and turning towards Rosario, she said, with a malignant smile. "Farewell, till we meet again, señorita!"
Doña Rosario rose, and said in an earnest tone, "I do not curse you; but God grant, if you ever have children, that they may never be exposed to the tortures you have condemned me to endure."
On hearing this speech, which seared her heart like a red-hot iron, the Linda uttered a cry of terror; a cold perspiration beaded on her pale forehead, and she staggered out of the apartment.
"My mother! my mother!" cried Rosario; "if you still live, where are you? Why do you not come to the help of your daughter?"
CHAPTER VI.
PREPARATIONS FOR DELIVERANCE
The little troop of cavalry, at the head of which Antinahuel and the Linda rode, advanced rapidly and silently along the road from San Miguel towards the valley in which, the day before, the renewal of the treaties had been accomplished. At sunrise they debouched into the plain. They had scarcely advanced fifty paces when they saw a horseman coming at full speed towards them. This horseman was Black Stag: Antinahuel halted his escort.
"What is the use of this halt?" Doña Maria observed.
"Is my sister a soldier?" Antinahuel asked.
Doña Maria, mortified at this rude speech, reined in her horse and remained a few paces in the rear, so that Antinahuel was left alone at the head of his troop. At the expiration of five minutes Black Stag pulled up his horse.
"Has my father returned among his children?" he said, bowing his head as a salutation to the chief.
"Yes!" Antinahuel replied. "What has my son done during my absence?"
"I have executed the orders of my father."
"All of them?"
"All!"
"Good! Has my son received any news of the palefaces?"
"A strong body of the Chiaplos is preparing to quit Valdivia to repair to Santiago."
"Good! With what purpose?"
"They are taking to Santiago the prisoner named General Bustamente."
Antinahuel turned towards the Linda, and exchanged a glance of intelligence with her.
"For what day have the Huincas fixed their departure?"
"They are to set out the day after tomorrow."
Antinahuel reflected for a few minutes.
"This is what my son will do," he said. "In two hours he will strike his camp, and direct his course toward the Canyon del Rio Seco, where I will go and wait for him."
"I will obey!" said the Black Stag, bowing his head affirmatively.
"Good! My son is an experienced warrior; he will execute my orders with intelligence."
The man smiled with pleasure at receiving this praise from his chief; after bowing respectfully before him, he made his horse curvet gracefully, and set off with his followers.
Antinahuel took the road towards the mountains at a sharp trot. After riding silently for some time by the side of Doña Maria, he turned towards her graciously, and said —
"Does my sister understand the tenor of the order I have just given?"
"No!" she replied, with a slight tinge of irony; "as my brother has well remarked, I am not a soldier."
"My intentions are very simple," he replied; "the Canyon del Rio Seco is in a narrow defile which the palefaces are obliged to cross. Fifty chosen warriors can here contend with advantage against twenty times their number. It is in that place I am determined to wait for the Huincas. The Moluchos will take possession of the heights; and when the palefaces have entered that passage without suspicion, I will attack them on all sides."
"Does there, then, exist no other road to Santiago?"
"None; they must go that way."
"Then they are doomed!" she joyfully exclaimed.
"Without doubt!" he said proudly; "the Canyon del Rio Seco is celebrated in our history."
"Then my brother can answer for saving Don Pancho Bustamente?"
"Yes, unless the sky falls!" he said, with a smile.
CHAPTER VII.
A COUNTERMINE
As Trangoil-Lanec had predicted, Louis recovered from the effects of his wounds with surprising rapidity. Whether it was owing to his ardent desire to commence his researches, or to the goodness of his condition, we will not say; but on the eve of the day fixed for the departure he was quite on the alert, and told Don Tadeo he was ready to start whenever he pleased.
He was the more anxious to depart in that Valentine, his dog Cæsar, and Trangoil-Lanec had been absent three days, and no tidings had been received. Curumilla had not come back. All these circumstances augmented in an enormous degree the impatience of the count; whilst, on his part, Don Tadeo was not much more easy. The poor father shuddered at the idea of the suffering to which his child was exposed.
And yet there was mingled an undefinable joy at thinking of the tortures he should inflict, in his turn, upon Doña Maria, when revealing to her that the person she had taken so much delight in martyrizing was her own daughter. Don Tadeo, a man of elevated mind, endeavoured to shake off this unworthy thought, but it persisted in recurring with tenacity.
Don Gregorio, in whose hands Don Tadeo had placed his power and authority, urged on by Louis, hastened the preparations for the departure on the morrow. At about eight o'clock in the evening. Don Gregorio, after giving certain instructions in one of the private apartments of the cabildo to General Cornejo and the senator Sandias, who were to conduct Don Pancho to Santiago, had dismissed them, and was conversing with Don Tadeo, when the door was thrown open, and a man entered. On seeing him, they uttered a general cry of joy and astonishment. It was Curumilla!
"At last!" Louis and Don Tadeo exclaimed.
"I am here!" the Ulmen replied, sorrowfully.
As the poor Indian seemed quite exhausted with fatigue and want of food, they made him sit down. In spite of all his Indian stoicism, Curumilla literally seized the food as soon as it appeared, and devoured it greedily.
As soon as the keenness of his appetite was a little abated, Curumilla related the full details of all that had happened since his departure from the camp, the manner in which he had delivered the young lady, and how, an hour after, she had been recaptured by her enemies. When he quitted Doña Rosario the brave Indian had only kept at a sufficient distance from her to avoid being himself taken by her ravishers.
Don Tadeo and the count warmly thanked him.
"I have done nothing yet," he said, "since all must be begun again; and now," he added, "it will be more difficult, for they will be on their guard."
"Tomorrow," Don Tadeo replied, warmly, "we will set out all together on the track."
"Yes," the chief said, "I am aware you are to depart tomorrow."
The three