"By Jove," the Frenchman answered cautiously, "it means that in spite of our precautions, or perhaps on account of them, for in these confounded affairs a man never knows how to act in order to deceive the persons he fears, we are discovered, and probably have spies at our heels."
"Caray! and what will become of the young ladies in the event of a dispute?"
"In the event of a fight you mean, for there will be an obstinate one, I foretell. Well, we will defend them as well as we can."
"I know that; but suppose we are killed?"
"Ah! there is that chance; but I never think of that till after the event."
"Oh heaven!" Doña Anita murmured, as she hid her head in her friend's bosom.
"Re-assure yourself, señorita," the Frenchman continued, "and, above all, be silent, for the sound of your voice might be recognized, and change into certainty what may still be only a suspicion. Besides, remember that if you have enemies, you have also friends, since they took the precaution to warn us. Now, in all probability, this unknown offerer of advice will not have stopped there, but thought of the means to come to our assistance in the most effectual manner."
The carriage went along in the meanwhile at a breakneck pace, and had nearly reached the city gates. We will now tell what had happened, and how the Frenchman was warned of the danger that threatened him.
General Don Sebastian Guerrero had organized a band of spies composed of leperos and scoundrels, who, however, possessed acknowledged cleverness and skill, and if Valentine had escaped their surveillance and foiled their machinations, it was solely through the habits which he had contracted during a lengthened life in the prairies, and which had become an intuition with him, so far did he carry the quality of scenting and unmasking an enemy, whatever might be the countenance he borrowed. But if he had not been recognized, it was not the same with his friends, and the latter had not been able long to escape the lynx eyes of the general's spies.
The Convent of the Bernardines had naturally become for some days past the centre of the surveillance, as it were the spying headquarters, of Don Sebastian's agents. The arrival of a carriage with closed blinds at the convent at once gave the alarm; and though Mr. Rallier was not personally known, the fact of his being a Frenchman was sufficient to rouse suspicions.