Not an Indian moved to do his bidding. The carreta had stopped before the ranch-house now, and two of the soldiers left it to ride toward Lopez, sensing trouble.
“Rojerio Rocha!” Lopez called, but the man he addressed was assisting Señorita Anita from the carreta, and did not answer.
“Are the dogs mutinous?” one of the soldiers asked.
“Uncivil beasts, all of them!” Lopez replied. “Get about your work instantly, animals!”
He rode toward them as if to crush those nearest beneath the hoofs of his horse. Angry mutterings came from the throng, and some of the Indians sprang to their feet menacingly. An old man in the doorway of the building shouted something Lopez did not understand, and the mutterings ceased in an instant and the men scattered, some going toward the fields, others into the buildings.
Lopez turned to call Rojerio Rocha again, and saw him disappearing into the house with Señorita Anita and Señora Vallejo. The other two troopers had dismounted, the carreta was rumbling away toward the stables, and the neophyte servant was standing near his mule looking back along the road, for in the distance Sergeant Cassara sat his horse and contemplated the rancho.
Lopez started to ride slowly toward the house, the two troopers following. Came a scream from a woman’s throat—then another—a man’s voice raised in surprise! The two soldiers near the house ran in at the door. Lopez and the others spurred their mounts and dashed to the building, there to throw themselves from their saddles and rush inside.
They heard the troopers ahead of them running into the patio. A woman was crying hysterically. And then they reached the patio themselves, to stop beneath the arched veranda dumbfounded at the scene confronting them.
Señora Vallejo was standing against the side of the building, her face hidden in her hands, sobbing violently. Señorita Anita Fernandez had fainted in Rojerio Rocha’s arms. And the two troopers stood near the small fountain in the centre of the patio, where there were two bodies stretched on the ground. Lopez gave a cry of consternation as he hurried up to them.
Here were Antonio and José, the two overseers of the rancho, each sprawled on his face with arms outstretched, each with the hilt of a knife showing between his shoulder-blades!