But we must leave the sick man with himself for a while, and go elsewhere.
Lorenzo Bezan had been pressed with the business incident to his new position, and this, too, so urgently, that he had not yet answered the note he had received from her he had loved so dearly. He had placed it next his heart, however, and would seize upon the first moment to answer it, not by the pen, but in person. It was for this purpose, that, on the same evening we have referred to, he had taken his guitar, and was strolling at a late hour towards the Plato. It was the first moment that he could leave the palace without serious trouble, and thinking Isabella might have retired for the night, he resolved at least to serenade her once more, as he had so lately done.
It would be impossible to justly describe the feelings that actuated the spirit of the lieutenant-governor. His soul was once more buoyant with hope; he loved deeply, ay, more dearly than ever before, and he believed that he was now indeed loved in return. How light was his heart, how brilliant the expression of his face, as he turned his steps towards the spot where his heart had so often returned when the expanse of ocean rolled between him and the spot so dear to him from association. He hurried forward to the steps that ascended from near the end of the Calle de Mercaderes, on to the Plato, but before he had reached it, there came bounding towards him a large dog, which he instantly recognized to be the hound that had so materially aided him in saving the life of Ruez Gonzales, long before.
At the same moment a hand was laid roughly upon his shoulder, but was instantly removed and on turning to see what was the meaning of this rude salutation, the young general discovered a large, dark figure struggling with the hound, who, upon his calling to him, seemed to relinquish the hold he had of the man's throat, and sprang to his side, while the person whom the dog had thus attacked, disappeared suddenly round an angle of the Cathedral, and left Lorenzo Bezan vastly puzzled to understand the meaning of all this. The man must evidently have raised his arm to strike him, else the dog would not have thus interposed, and then, had the stranger been an honest man, he would have paused to explain, instead of disappearing thus.
"I must be on my guard; there are assassins hereabouts," he said to himself, and after a moment's fondling of the hound, who had instantly recognized him, he once more drew nearer to the Plato, when suddenly the palace bell sounded the alarm of fire. His duty called him instantly to return, which he was forced to do.
It was past midnight before the fire was quenched, and Lorenzo Bezan dismissed the guard and extra watch that had been ordered out at the first alarm, and himself, greatly fatigued by his exertions and care in subduing the fire, which in Havana is done under the direction and assistance of the military, always, he threw himself on his couch, and fell fast asleep.
Early the subsequent morning, he despatched a line to Isabella Gonzales, saying that on the evening of that day he would answer in person her dear communication; and that though pressing duty had kept him from her side, she was never for one moment absent from his heart. He begged that Ruez might come to him in the meantime, and he did so at once. The meeting between them was such as the reader might anticipate. The officer told the boy many of his adventures, asked a thousand questions of his home, about his kind old father, Isabella, the hound, and all. While Ruez could find no words to express the delight he felt that the same friend existed in General Bezan, that he had loved and cherished as the captain of infantry.
"How strange the fortune that has brought you back again, and so high, too, in office. I'm sure we are all delighted. Father says you richly deserve all the honor you enjoy, and he does not very often compliment any one," said the boy.
The twilight had scarcely faded into the deeper shades of night, on the following evening, when Lorenzo Bezan once more hastened towards the Plato, to greet her whom he loved so tenderly and so truly-she who had been the star of his destiny for years, who had been his sole incentive to duty, his sole prompter in the desire for fame and fortune.
In the meantime there was a scene enacting on the Plato that should be known to the reader. Near the door of the house of Don Gonzales, stood Isabella and Ruez, and before them a young person, whose dress and appearance betokened the occupation of a page, though his garments were soiled and somewhat torn in places. Isabella was addressing the youth kindly, and urged him to come in and rest himself, for he showed evident tokens of fatigue.