“Ay! dog of a Gachupino!” screamed the old woman,—“dog of Spanish blood! you may call your cowardly myrmidons! Oh! that my brave son were here, or my husband alive! If they were, you would not carry a drop of your villain blood beyond the threshold you have insulted!—Go!—go to your poblanas—your margaritas! Go—begone!”
“Hell and furies! This dog—take him off! Ho, there! Gomez! your pistols. Here! send a bullet through him! Haste! haste!”
And battling with his sabre, the valiant Comandante at length effected a retreat to his horse.
He was already well torn about the legs, but, covered by the sergeant, he succeeded in getting into the saddle.
The latter fired off both his pistols at the dog, but the bullets did not take effect; and the animal, perceiving that his enemies outnumbered him, turned and ran back into the house.
The dog was now silent, but the Comandante, as he sat in his saddle, heard a derisive laugh within the rancho. In the clear soft tones of that jeering laughter he distinguished the voice of the beautiful güera!
Chagrined beyond measure, he would have besieged the rancho with his troop, and insisted on killing the dog, had he not feared that the cause of his ungraceful retreat might become known to his followers. That would be a mortification he did not desire to experience.
He returned, therefore, to the troop, gave the word to march, and the cavalcade moved off, taking the backward road to the town.
After riding at the head of his men for a short while, Vizcarra—whose heart was filled with anger and mortification—gave some orders to the sergeant, and then rode off in advance, and in full gallop.
The sight of a horseman in blue manga, passing in the direction of the rancho—and whom he recognised as the young ranchero, Don Juan—did not do much towards soothing his angry spirit. He neither halted nor spoke, but, casting on the latter a malignant glance, kept on.