Doña Hermosa herself, notwithstanding the respect with which she had been treated, and the extreme care she took never to leave the toldo, was in great danger of falling a victim to the fury of the Indians. Chance alone saved her.
The great chief resolved to finish the war at once. He despatched El Zopilote to order all the sachems to assemble in his toldo. As soon as they arrived, he announced to them that at the endic'ha (daybreak) on the morrow the presidio would be attacked on all sides at once.
Don Torribio, in his quality of chief, was present at the council. As soon as it was over he hastened to Doña Hermosa's toldo, and demanded an interview.
Since her arrival in the camp, although the Tigercat was perfectly aware of all that was going on between her and Don Torribio, he had purposely avoided meeting her, contenting himself with congratulating the latter on the affection the girl manifested for him. Nevertheless, an acute observer might have easily perceived that the Tigercat harboured some sinister purpose in his mind. Don Torribio, on the contrary, was too much blinded by his passion to attempt to read the countenance of the old bandit.
The intensity of his love, and the zest with which he gave himself up to it, diverted his thoughts from the shame and remorse which stung him when he thought of the infamy attached to his name by his treacherous desertion of his own people to become a member of the ferocious and sanguinary tribes of the Apaches.
Doña Hermosa, on hearing that Don Torribio wished to see her, gave orders for his instant admittance. She was talking at the time with her father. Don Pedro de Luna had hastened to join his daughter the instant he received her letter, and had already been some days in the camp.
The interior of the toldo was greatly changed. Don Torribio had ordered it to be embellished with divers pieces of elegant furniture, stolen by the Indians from different haciendas. Partitions had been constructed, closets contrived, so that the metamorphosis was complete; and, although the exterior remained as it had been before, the inside, in consequence of the alterations, assumed the appearance of a European residence.
Manuela, Doña Hermosa's nurse, had also returned with Don Pedro—a circumstance extremely agreeable to the girl; first, on account of the great confidence she reposed in her; and again, because Manuela was indispensable for all those little services and attentions to which women of rank are accustomed. Besides, the presence of the nurse, who never left Doña Hermosa's side in her interviews with Don Torribio, prevented any exuberant outbreak of passion on his part, and confined him to the limits of a respectful decorum.
Whatever astonishment the redskins might have felt at the alterations in the toldo undertaken by Don Torribio, the veneration and devotion they professed for the Tigercat were so great, that, with the delicacy which seems innate in their race, they pretended to see none of them, especially as the latter had taken no offence at the conduct of the paleface chief. Moreover, as, under all circumstances, the latter rendered them energetic cooperation, being always the foremost in battle and the last to retreat, they thought it right to leave him to arrange his own affairs as he judged best, without any attempt to oppose him.
"Well," said Doña Hermosa, when he entered, "has the Tigercat succeeded in subduing the exasperation of the tribes?"