"One moment," exclaimed the general, whose features had suddenly become gloomy; "who is the soldier?"
"A dragoon, I fancy."
"A dragoon! Let him come in at once. May heaven bless you, with all your circumlocution! The man, doubtless, brings me news of the arrival of the regiment I am expecting, and which should have been here before."
The captain shrugged his shoulders with an air of doubt.
"What is it now?" the general said, whom this expressive pantomime eminently alarmed; "What are you going to say?"
"Nothing, except that the soldier looks very sad to be the bearer of such good news."
"We shall soon know what we have to depend on. Let him come in."
"That is true," said the captain, as he went off.
During this conversation the general had leaped from his bed, and dressed himself with the promptness peculiar to soldiers. He now anxiously awaited the appearance of the trooper whom Don Lopez had announced to him. In vain he tried to persuade himself that the captain was mistaken, and that the soldier had been sent to tell him of the arrival of the regiment. In spite of himself, he felt in his heart a species of alarm which he could not account for, and yet nothing could dissipate.
A few minutes were thus passed in febrile restlessness. All at once a great noise was heard in the Plaza Major. The general went to a window, pulled aside a curtain, and looked out. A tumultuous and dense crowd was thronging every street leading to the square and uttering sharp cries. This crowd, momentarily increasing, seemed urged on by something terrible, which the general could not perceive.