"Nothing can separate us, Elvira," answered Ventura; "I defy the whole world to do it. Go without fear. We are going to prepare ourselves, and shall overtake you on the road."
Ventura saw them depart under the protection of Perico, and watched them until they were out of sight.
But now was heard at the entrance of the village the fatal sound of drums, which announced the arrival of the terrible phalanx that threw itself upon that poor unarmed people, taken by surprise, and treated without mercy.
It came in the name of an iniquitous usurpation of which the precedents belong to barbarous times, as the resistance it met with belongs to the days of heroism--a resistance against which it dashed and was broken, fighting without glory and yielding without shame.
"Follow me, father," said Ventura. "Sister, come; we must fly!"
"It is too late," replied Pedro, "they are already here. Ventura, hide your sister; when night comes we will escape, but now hide yourselves."
"And you, father?" said Ventura, hesitating between necessity and the repugnance he felt to being obliged to hide himself.
"I," answered Pedro, "remain here. What can they do to a poor old man like me? Go, I tell you! Hide yourselves! Marcela, what are you doing there, poor child, as cold and fixed as a statue? Ventura, what are you thinking of that you do not move? Do you wish to be lost? Do you wish to lose your sister? Ventura! dear son, do you wish to kill me?"
His father's cry of anguish roused Ventura from the stupor into which he had been thrown by fear, uncertainty, and rage.