"I thank you all," he said with much emotion. "Your wishes do me good: they prove to me that among the Sonorians there are some who comprehend my noble object. Thanks once again."
Doña Angela came up to the count.
"Don Louis," she said to him, "I love you. Do your duty."
The count bent down to her, and imprinted a kiss on her pale forehead.
"Doña Angela, my affianced!" he said with a tenderness impossible to render, "you will see me again either a conqueror or a corpse."
And he made a move as if to depart. At this moment Father Seraphin came to his side.
"What!" he said with surprise, "do you accompany me, my father?"
"I am going where duty calls me, sir," the missionary replied with that angelic simplicity which was so characteristic of him—"where I shall find pain to console, misfortunes to alleviate. Let me follow you."
Louis pressed his hand silently, and after bowing once again to the friends he was leaving, perhaps for ever, he gave the signal for departure, and the cavalcade soon disappeared in the darkness.
Doña Angela remained cold and motionless in the doorway so long as she could hear the horses' hoofs echoing on the road. When every sound had died away in the distance a long-restrained sob burst from her.