The courtesan, with features contracted by rage, and clenched teeth, looked on without appearing to see, overwhelmed, confounded by the scene which had so rapidly taken place, and which had, in a few minutes, ravished from her the vengeance which she thought had this time been so certain.
"Without bearing malice, madam," said Don Tadeo in a jeering tone, "this is a match deferred. Your fertile imagination will no doubt soon furnish you with the means of taking your revenge!"
"I hope so," she said with a sardonic smile.
"Seize this woman," the leader of the unknown commanded; "gag her, and bind her securely to the bed."
"Bind me!" she cried in a paroxysm of anger; "me! do you know who I am?"
"Perfectly well, madam," the stranger replied drily. "You are a woman for whom honourable people have no name. Libertines have given you that of the Linda, and your present lover is General Bustamente. You see, madam, that we are not unacquainted with you."
"Beware, sir," she hissed; "I am not to be insulted with impunity."
"We do not insult you, madam; we only wish, for a time, to put it out of your power to do mischief. In a few days," he continued, in a quiet, firm tone, "we will determine what shall be done with you."
"Done with me!—me!—who then are you, with faces you dare not reveal, and who presume to speak to me thus?"
"Who we are,—learn!—We are the Dark-Hearts!" At this terrible announcement, a convulsive trembling shook the limbs of the woman, who, retreating to the wall, a prey to intense terror, exclaimed in a faint voice; "My God! my God! I am lost," and sank down fainting.