The Bee Hunters: A Tale of Adventure. Gustave Aimard

her would have been to commit a grave imprudence, seriously compromising her health. In accordance with orders delivered in a dry tone by the unknown, the peones of Don Pedro, and the hacendero himself, hastened to cut down some branches, in order to fashion a litter, which they covered with dry leaves. Over these they spread their zarapés, of which they deprived themselves in order to make a softer couch for their young mistress.

      These preparations finished, the girl was raised with great precaution, and gently placed upon the litter.

      Of the three men who accompanied Don Pedro, two were peones, or domestic Indians; the third was the capataz (bailiff) of the hacendero.

      The capataz was an individual of about five feet eight, with broad shoulders, and legs bowed by the constant habit of riding. He was extraordinarily thin; but one could truly say of him, he was nothing but muscle and sinew. His strength was wonderful. This man, called Luciano Pedralva, was devoted, body and soul, to his master, whom, and his family, he and his had served for nearly two centuries.

      His features, bronzed by the vicissitudes of the weather, although not striking, had an expression of intelligence and astuteness, to which his eyes, black and well opened, added an appearance of energy and courage beyond the common. Don Pedro de Luna had the greatest confidence in this man, whom he considered more in the light of a friend than a servitor.

      When the girl had been placed upon the litter, the peones lifted it; while Don Pedro and the capataz placed themselves one on the right, the other on the left of the patient, in order to guard her from the branches of trees and creepers.

      At a mute sign from the unknown, who had remounted, the little troop leisurely began its march.

      Instead of reentering the forest, the unknown continued to advance towards the hillock, the base of which was speedily attained. A narrow pathway serpentined along its side in an incline sufficiently gentle. The little troop entered upon it without hesitation.

      They ascended in this manner fur some minutes, following ten or a dozen yards behind the unknown, who rode on in front by himself. Suddenly, on arriving at an angle of the road, round which their guide had already disappeared, a whistle rent the air, so sharp that the Mexicans halted involuntarily, not knowing whether to advance or retreat.

      "What is the meaning of this?" murmured Don Pedro anxiously.

      "Treachery, without a doubt," said the capataz casting his eyes searchingly around.

      But all remained quiet about them; no change was perceptible in the landscape, which looked as lonely as ever.

      Nevertheless, in a few minutes, more whistling, similar to the first they had heard, was audible in different directions at the same lime, answering evidently to a signal which had been made.

      At that moment the unknown reappeared; his face pale, his gestures constrained, and a prey to the most vivid emotion.

      "It is you who have willed this," said he; "I wash my hands of what may happen."

      "Tell us, at all events, what peril threatens us," replied Don Pedro, in agitation.

      "Ah!" said the other, in a voice of subdued passion,

      "Do I know it myself? And what would it aid you to know? Would you be the less lost for that? You refused to believe me. Now, pray to God to help you; for never danger threatened you more terrible than that which hangs over your head!"

      "But why these perpetual reservations? Be frank; we are men, vive Dios, and, great as the peril may be, we shall know how to meet it bravely."

      "You are mad! Can one man oppose a hundred? You will fall, I tell you; but it is to yourself alone you must address your reproaches; it is yourself who have persisted in braving the Tigercat in his lair."

      "Alas," cried the hacendero in accents of horror, "what name is that you have uttered?"

      "The name of the man in whose clutches you are at this very moment."

      "What! the Tigercat? That redoubtable bandit, whose numberless crimes have shocked the land for so long; that man who seems endowed with a diabolical power to accomplish the atrocious deeds with which he incessantly sullies himself;—is that monster near us?"

      "He is; and I warn you to be prudent, for perhaps he hears you at this moment, although invisible to your eyes and mine."

      "What do I care?" energetically exclaimed Don Pedro. "Away with caution, since we are once in the power of this demon; he is a man devoid of pity, and my life is no longer my own."

      "What do you know about it, Señor Don Pedro de Luna?" answered a mocking voice.

      The hacendero trembled, and recoiled a step, uttering a stifled cry.

      The Tigercat, bounding with the agility of the animal from which he took his name, had leaped upon the summit of an elevated rock which overhung the pathway some distance off, and now dropped lightly on the ground two paces from Don Pedro.

      There was an instant of terrible silence. The two men, thus placed face to face, their eyes flashing, their lips compressed with rage, examined each other with ardent curiosity. It was the first time the hacendero had seen the terrible partisan, the fame of whose thirst for blood had reached the most ignorant villagers in the land, and who for thirty years had spread terror over the Mexican frontiers.

      We will give, in a few words, the portrait of this man, who is destined to play an important part in our history.

      The Tigercat was a species of Colossus, six feet high; his broad shoulders and limbs, from which the muscles stood out in marble rigidity, showed that, though long past the prime of life, his strength still existed in all its integrity; his long locks, white as the snows on Coatepec, fell in disorder on his shoulders, and mingled with the grizzly beard that covered his breast. His forehead was broad and open; he had the eye of the eagle, under the brows of the lion; his whole person offered, in a word, a complete type of the man of the desert—grand, strong, majestic, and implacable. Although his skin was stained by every inclemency of weather till it had almost acquired the colour of brick, it was nevertheless easy to recognise, in the clearly defined lines of his face, that this man belonged to the race of whites.

      His dress lay midway between that of the Mexican and of the redskin; for although he wore the zarapé, his mitasses, in two pieces, worked with hairs attached here and there, and his moccasins of different colours, embroidered with porcupine quills and ornamented with glass beads and hawks' bells, showed his preference for the Indians, to whose customs, by the by, he seemed to have entirely adapted his mode of life.

      A large scalping knife, a hatchet, a bullet bag, and powder horn, were slung from a girdle of wild beast's skin, drawn tightly above his hips.