"Excellency, yes," said General Harero, hastening away with secret delight, and at once taking such measures as should carry out his own wishes and purposes.
The result of the matter was, that before ten o'clock that morning the note conveying the challenge was answered by an aid-de-camp and a file of soldiers, who arrested Captain Bezan for insubordination, and quietly conducted him to the damp underground cells of the military prison, where he was left to consider the new position in which he found himself, solitary and alone, with a straw bed, and no convenience or comfort about him. And it is not surprising that such a situation should have been particularly suggestive to a mind so active as that of Lorenzo Bezan.
CHAPTER VII.—THE PRISONER.
TO know and fully realize the bitter severity exercised in the Spanish prisons, both at Madrid and in Havana, one must have witnessed it. Cold, dark and dreary cells, fit only to act as supports to the upper and better lighted portions of the dismal structure, are filled by those persons who have incurred in any way the displeasure of the military board of commission. Here, in one of the dampest and most dreary cells, immured with lizards, tarantulas, and other vile and unwholesome reptiles, Captain Bezan, but so very recently-risen from a sick bed, and yet smarting under his wounds, found himself. He could now easily see the great mistake he had made in thus addressing General Harero as he had done, and also, as he knew very well the rigor of the service to which he was attached when he considered for a moment, he had not the least possible doubt that his sentence would be death.
As a soldier he feared not death; his profession and experience, which had already made him familiar with the fell destroyer in every possible form and shape, had taught him a fearlessness in this matter; but to leave the air that Isabella Gonzales breathed, to be thus torn away from the bright hopes that she had given rise to in his breast, was indeed agony of soul to him now. In the horizon of his love, for the first time since his heart had known the passion, the sun had risen, and the genial rays of hope, like young spring, had commended to warm and vivify his soul.
Until within a very short time she whom he loved was to him as some distant star, that might be worshipped in silence, but not approached; but now, by a series of circumstances that looked like providential interference in his behalf, immense barriers had been removed. Thinking over these matters, he doubly realized the misstep he had taken, and the heart of the lone prisoner was sad in the depths of his dreary dungeon.
Many days passed on, and Lorenzo Bezan counted each hour as one less that he should have to live upon the earth. At first all intercourse was strictly denied him with any person outside the prison walls, but one afternoon he was delighted as the door of his cell was thrown open, and in the next moment Ruez sprang into his arms.
"My dear, dear friend!" said the boy, with big tears starting from his eyes, and his voice trembling with mingled emotions of pleasure and of grief.