It was about this time that a party of cabalgadores, riding hard, passed the massive wild olive that stood at the dingle's gateway like a sereno, like a metropolitan night policeman at the corner of a dark and narrow street. Keeping steadily on, they rode through the obscurity of the corridorlike reaches of the barranca, and swiftly drew near the opening among the trees and the camp of the Gypsies.
Soon they glimpsed the red of firelight through the underwood, and caught snatches of the shrill chattering of the women and children. There was an undertone of music from the camp, the soft reedlike notes of an accordion, and suddenly a man's voice began chanting "The Song of Juanito Ralli":
"The false Juanito, day and night,
Had best with caution go,
The Gypsy Cales of Yeira height
Have sworn to lay him low.
"Throughout the night, the dusky night,
I prowl in silence round,
And with my eyes look left and right,
For him, the Spanish hound,
That with my knife I him may smite,
And to the vitals wound.
"I'll wash not in the limpid flood
The shirt which binds my frame;
But in Juanito Ralli's blood
I'll bravely wash the same."
The strangers halted in the concealing underwood, drawing close together. Words passed in whispers; then the group of five separated. Three of the party moved slowly and quietly away through the trees; the other two waited, motionless as rock.
At length, the feat in strategy was successfully accomplished. In each of four sectors of the palisading circle of foliage and shadows which surrounded the opening among the trees, there waited a man, silent and watchful, a carbine ready in his two hands. No one of the four dismounted, but suddenly one rode briskly out into the clearing.
"Who is this?" cried Pepe Flammenca, starting up. "Not another policeman!"
"No, lo quiera Dios!" quietly returned the horseman. "God forbid, no!"
He halted his horse half-way to the groups about the fires. The Gypsy fellow with the open shirt and yellow sash had abruptly quit singing and playing the accordion. The very children were frightened into large-eyed silence.