"You will be burnt."
"Demonios! the prospect is not an agreeable one."
[CHAPTER XVIII.]
THE CAPITULATION.
Let us return to the hut of council, into which the count had been introduced by the general. Don Bustamente had too much personal courage not to like and appreciate that quality in another. Bowing he said, "Your observation is perfectly just, señor——"
"Count de Prébois-Crancé;" the Frenchman finished the sentence with a bow.
"Before any other question," said Don Pancho, "permit me, count, to ask you how you have become personally mixed up with the men we are besieging?"
"In the simplest way possible, señor," Louis replied, with an arch smile, "I am travelling with some friends and servants; yesterday the noise of a battle reached our ears; I naturally inquired what was going on; after this, several Spanish soldiers, running away along the crest or the mountains, intrenched themselves on the rock where I had myself sought refuge. The battle begun in the defile was continued on the plain; the soldiers, listening to nothing but their courage, fired upon their enemy."
The general and the senator knew perfectly what degree of faith to place in the veracity of this narration, in which, nevertheless, as men of the world, they had the appearance of placing the utmost alliance.