The first thing he did for this object was to grant Leon what the latter had demanded so pressingly, the liberation of Don Juan, the old general's son. He knew that he must not dream of thwarting his friend's love for Maria, and awaited the end of this love in order to act, thinking that the captain, at the moment when he saw himself on the point of being separated from her whom he loved, would not recoil from the idea of carrying her off. When he afterwards came across him in the half-burned hacienda, and delivered him from the false position in which he was placed, Diego did not at all suspect that one of the females with him was no other than Maria; and great was his surprise when the result of his enquiries told him that Leon had himself conducted the young lady back to the Convent of the Purísima Concepción.
Certain that Delbès had only acted thus in obedience to the chivalrous promptings of his heart, and not wishing him to be the dupe of the honourable feelings which had dictated his conduct by losing Maria for ever, the half-breed resolved to restore her to him in spite of himself by simply carrying her off; and he calculated that the rumours and scandal produced by such an event, would prevent the Soto-Mayor family from offering any opposition to the marriage. We see that although this reasoning was brutal, it was to a certain extent logical.
Now, in order to carry off Maria, she must be found, and it was this that embarrassed Diego and his men, once that they had entered the convent by stratagem. At the moment, however, when they were beginning to lose all hope, an incident produced by their inopportune presence came to their assistance. The smugglers had spread through the courtyards and cloisters, careless of the consequences which their invasion might produce, and with shouts and oaths seemed desirous of searching the convent from cellar to garret.
The nuns, habituated to silence and calmness, were soon aroused to this disturbance, and believing that the fiend was the author of it, they hurriedly leaped from their beds, and, scarce clothed, ran to seek shelter in the cell of the abbess, while uttering heart-rending cries of terror. The latter lady, sharing the error of her sisters, had hurriedly dressed herself, and assembling her flock around her, advanced resolutely toward the spot whence the noise proceeded, holding in the one hand a holy water brush, and in the other her pastoral staff, with the intention of exorcising the demon. Suddenly she perceived the smugglers, but ere she could utter a cry Diego rushed toward her.
"Silence!" he said; "we do not intend you any harm; leave us alone."
Dumb with terror at the sight of so many armed men, the women stood as if petrified. All at once, Diego noticed a novice who was clinging convulsively to her companions.
"That is the girl!" he said to his men; "it is she whom I want!"
And joining actions to words, he seized Maria, while the other smugglers kept back the abbess and the other sisters, who were more dead than alive. Two men gagged the young lady, and prepared to carry her off.
"Let us begone!" said Diego.
"Villain!" the abbess at length exclaimed, thinking of the terrible account which she would have to render to General Soto-Mayor, "if you have the slightest fear of heaven, restore me that young lady!"