Our arrangements occupied us only a few minutes. I had to deal with men, many of whom had “surrounded” buffaloes in a somewhat similar manner; and it did not require much tact to teach them a few modifications in the game. In five minutes we were all in our places, waiting anxiously and in perfect silence.
As yet not a murmur had reached us from below, except the sighing of the wind through the tall trees, and the “sough” of the river as it tumbled away over its pebbly bed. Now and then we heard a stray shot, or the quick, sharp notes of a cavalry bugle; but these were far off, and only told of the wild work that was still going on along the road towards Encerro and Jalapa.
Not a word was spoken by us to each other. The men who were deployed along the hill lay hidden behind the hassocks of the palmettos, and from our position not one of them was to be seen.
I must confess I felt strange emotions at this moment—one of the most anxious of my life; and although I felt no hate towards the enemy—no desire to injure one of them, excepting him of whom I have spoken—there was something so wild, so thrilling, in the excitement of thus entrapping man, the highest of all animals, that I could not have foregone the inhuman sport. I had no intention that it should be inhuman. I well knew what would be their treatment as prisoners of war; and I had given orders that not a shot should be fired nor a blow struck, in case they threw down their arms and yielded without resistance. But for him—humanity had many a score to settle with him; and at the time I did not feel a very strong inclination to resist what would be the Rangers’ desire on that question.
“Is not all our fine ambuscade for nothing?” I said to myself, after a long period of waiting, and no signs of an enemy.
I had begun to fancy as much, and to suspect that the flying Mexicans had kept along the river, when a sound like the humming of bees came up the pass. Presently it grew louder, until I could distinguish the voices of men. Our hearts as yet beat louder than their voices. Now the stones rattled, as, loosened from their sloping beds, they rolled back and downwards.
“Guardaos, hombre!” (Look out, man!) shouted one.
“Carrajo!” cried another; “take care what you’re about! I haven’t escaped the Yankee bullets to-day to have my skull cloven in that fashion. Arriba! arriba!”
“I say, Antonio—you’re sure this road leads out above?”
“Quite sure, camarado.”