"Has disappeared," Pedrito said.
She fell back, half dead; her father caught her in his arms, and carried her back to the drawing room.
This is what had happened. Pedrito, when he had got a short distance from the estancia, was all but unsaddled, by his horse suddenly shying. Aroused from his reverie by the animal's terror, the horseman looked around, to discover the cause of it. Judge of his surprise! At a spot which appeared to have been the scene of a desperate struggle, the damp earth retained the marks of several horses' hoofs; weapons had been thrown away there, and seven corpses lay pell-mell in pools of blood and muddy water.
"What!" Pedrito thought, "Have the Indians come this way already?" and he added, "Why is it they have not stripped their victims?"
He dismounted, and walked to the bodies, which he examined attentively, and felt and raised one after the other.
"Something that is not natural has taken place here," the bombero said; "two Negroes! Oh! he said, on coming to the gauchos, Who are these men wearing masks? Oh! Oh! Has it been a crime instead of an ambuscade, and a bit of Spanish vengeance, instead of an Indian attack? I will have a look at them."
He tore from the faces of the four gauchos the strips of wool they had employed to conceal themselves.
"On my word, I do not know them; who can these scoundrels be?"
At the same moment, his eyes rested on another corpse, hidden by a thickly growing bush, beneath which it lay stretched out.
"This man is not dressed in the same manner, so he must be one of the caballeros attacked by these villains; I will have a look at him, and perhaps he will give me the clue to this adventure."