"What is the matter, Sánchez?" the traveller asked. "I fancy we are not going so fast as before."
"That is true, señor amo," Sánchez answered, "since we left the plain, we have not been advancing so rapidly, though I do not know the reason: the soldiers of our escort appear alarmed, and are talking together in a low voice, while incessantly looking round them: it is evident that they fear some danger."
"Could the salteadores or guerillas who infest the roads think of attacking us?" the old gentleman said with ill-disguised anxiety, "Pray inquire, Sánchez—Hem! The spot would be capitally chosen for a surprise, still, our escort is numerous, and unless they have an understanding with the bandits, I doubt whether the latter would venture to bar our way. Come, Sánchez, cross-question the soldiers adroitly, and report to me what you learn."
The servant bowed, checked his horse to let the carriage pass him, and then prepared to carry out the commission with which his master had intrusted him.
But Sánchez caught up the berlin again almost immediately: his features were distorted, his panting voice hissed between his teeth which were clenched by terror, and a cadaverous pallor covered his face.
"We are lost, señor amo," he muttered, as he bent down to the carriage window.
"Lost!" the old gentleman exclaimed with a nervous tremor, and giving his daughter, who was dumb with terror, a glance charged with the most impassioned paternal love: "Lost! You must be mad, Sánchez, explain yourself, in Heaven's name."
"It is unnecessary, mi amo," the poor fellow stammered. "Here is señor don Jesús Domínguez, the chief of the escort, coming up: without doubt he will inform you of what is taking place."
"What is it? Better, on my soul, a certainty however terrible its nature, than such anxiety."
The carriage had halted on a species of platform, about one hundred yards square: the old gentleman looked out: the escort still surrounded, the berlin, but seemed to be doubled: instead of twenty horsemen there were forty.