"Yes, but too late," the Indian chief answered coldly.
By his orders, the gauchos surrounded the commandant, who killed two of them. From this moment the fight in the dark became frightful. Don Antonio, seeing that his life was lost, wished, at least, to die as a soldier should die, and fought desperately.
The sound of the galloping horses constantly drew nearer.
Nocobotha saw that it was time to finish, and with a pistol shot killed the governor's horse. Don Antonio rolled on the sand, but, jumping up suddenly, he dealt his adversary a sabre stroke, which the latter parried by leaping on one side.
"A man such as I am does not surrender to dogs like you," Don Antonio exclaimed, as he blew out his own brains.
This explosion was followed by a sharp discharge of musketry, and a squadron of horsemen rushed like a whirlwind on the gauchos. The contest hardly lasted a moment. At a whistle from Nocobotha the gauchos turned round and fled separately over the dark plain. Eight corpses strewed the ground.
"Too late!" Pedrito said to Major Bloomfield, who had started in pursuit of Don Torribio so soon as the bombero warned him of the peril into which the Indian had led the governor.
"Yes," said the major, sorrowfully, "he was a good soldier; but how are we to catch the traitors up, and know what we have to depend on?"
"They are already in the Indian camp."
Pedrito leapt from his horse, cut with his machete a branch of resinous fir, which he made into a torch, and by its light examined the bodies stretched on the ground.