As he spoke, he raised the rebozo, and gently drew back her long black hair. I saw blood upon her cheeks and shoulders! I looked more closely. It flowed from her ears.
“Her ears! O God! they have been cut off!”
“Ay, ay,” cried L—, hoarsely; and dropping the dark tresses, again threw his arms around the girl, and kissed away the tears that were rolling down her cheeks—while uttering expressions of endearment and consolation.
I turned to the other females; they were all similarly mutilated; some of them even worse, for their foreheads, where the U.S. had been freshly burned upon them, were red and swollen. Excepting Rafaela, they were all of the “poblana” class—the laundresses—the mistresses of the soldiers.
The surgeon was in attendance, and in a short time all was done that could be done for wounds like these.
“Come!” cried L—, addressing those around him, “we are wasting time, and that is precious; it is near midnight. The horses will be ready by this, and the rest will be waiting; come Henry, you will go? You will stand by us?”
“I will, but what do you intend?”
“Do not ask us, my friend, you will see presently.”
“Think, my dear L—,” said I, in a whisper; “do not act rashly.”
“Rashly! there is no rashness about me—you know that. A cowardly act, like this, cannot be revenged too soon. Revenge! what am I talking of? It is not revenge, but justice. The men who could perpetrate this fiendish deed are not fit to live on the earth, and by Heavens! not one of them shall be alive by the morning. Ha, dastards! they thought we were gone; they will find their mistake. Mine be the responsibility,—mine the revenge. Come, friends! come!” And so saying L— led the way, holding his betrothed by the hand. We all followed out of the room, and into the street.