"To-night or never," replied Bermudo. "Shortly I shall disclose to you all the particulars of my transaction; and now let us examine on what resources we can depend for a renewal of the insurrection."
"Resources! None," said Cañeri, "Our surviving men are dispersed and worn out by repeated misfortunes; most of our chiefs are dead, or have passed over to Africa, and the only man who had the power of rallying the straggling Moors, he who alone succeeded in imparting confidence to his followers, El Feri de Benastepar, is now no more: fallen by the arm of Aguilar, he shared the fate of those brave men who mingled their own ashes with those of Alhacen."
"El Feri de Benastepar is not dead," cried the renegade.
Cañeri and his men started from the ground with an instinctive impulse of returning courage, and all, with one accord, sent up an exclamation of joyful surprise.
"But where is the chief, then?" demanded Cañeri.
"There!" replied Bermudo, pointing to the stranger.
"Yes," said he, throwing aside his disguise; "yes, Cañeri, in this humble garb, which necessity has compelled me to adopt, do you again behold El Feri; conquered by Alonso de Aguilar, but miraculously rescued from the grasp of death to redeem the tarnished glories of the Moorish name; to close again in combat with the proud Christian chief, and, with the assistance of the holy Prophet, to doom him to that untimely death which he vainly imagines he has inflicted on me."
A simultaneous murmur of approbation ran through the surrounding party; even Cañeri, jealous as he was of the superior power and glory of El Feri, hailed with real satisfaction his unexpected appearance amongst them; for in the imagination of Cañeri were revived those hopes of asserting the station of fancied dignity from which he had been hurled by the late overthrow of the Moors. He again clung to the fond idea that the Moslem cause would ultimately triumph, and then he of necessity must succeed to a conspicuous share of power, to which he conceived himself entitled by his distinguished birth.
Thus the Moors, whom, but a moment before, we have seen in the lowest state of dejection, now flew to the opposite extreme: they pictured to their fancy the wonderful powers of El Feri, and the magic influence which his name would possess in calling again his countrymen to arms, while the desperate nature of such an undertaking, and the obstacles with which it was on every side beset, vanished altogether before their sanguine expectations.
The renegade beheld this general emotion with more signs of discontent than satisfaction; he argued little advantage to be derived from men, who could so easily pass from the depths of despondence to the summit of hope; for to a man like himself, endowed with strong passions, but accustomed to watch progressively their workings, such sudden transitions betrayed a weakness utterly incompatible with desperate enterprises.