Bullets were exchanged on both sides, and a fierce combat, silent and unequal, began; one of the assailants fell with his skull cleft to the teeth; and Don Sylvio passed his sword through the chest of another.
"Well, my masters," he shouted to them, "have you had enough? Or does another of you wish to form the acquaintance of my blade? You are fools, ten of you should have come to assassinate us."
"What!" the capataz added, "Are you going to give in already? You are clumsy fellows for cut-throats, and the man who pays you ought to have made a better choice."
In fact, the two masked men had fallen back; but immediately four other men, also masked, appeared, and all six rushed at the Spaniards, who firmly awaited their attack.
"Hang it! Pardon our having calumniated you; you know your trade," said Don Blas, as he fired a pistol into the thick of his adversaries.
The latter, still silent, returned the fire, and the fight began again with fresh fury. But the two brave Spaniards, whose strength was exhausted, and whose blood was flowing, fell in their turn on the corpses of two other assailants, whom they sacrificed to their rage before succumbing.
So soon as the strangers saw Don Sylvio and Blas were motionless, they uttered a cry of triumph. Paying no heed to the capataz, they raised Don Sylvio d'Arenal's body, laid it across one of their horses, and fled away at full speed along the devious path.
Seven corpses strewed the ground. After the assailants the vultures arrived, which hovered and circled above the victims, and mingled their hoarse croaks of triumph with the sound of the hurricane.