"I am alive, and they do not kill me," said Evaña. "Don't be a fool; the fight is over now, get up and help me with these wounded."
Then taking up a lance-shalt which lay by, Evaña pushed it under the body of the fallen horse, and using it as a lever raised the dead animal sufficiently to let the man draw his leg out from underneath. He staggered to his feet, and limped about, his leg was bruised but he was otherwise unhurt.
"Ah! I am lost! Here come the heretics," he exclaimed, as Evaña chafed his leg for him to restore the circulation; then he threw himself again flat on the ground, saying, "Mount your horse and fly while you can."
Evaña looked round and saw a party of Highlanders headed by an officer, and carrying stretchers, coming towards him from the quinta. As they drew near he saw with pleasure that the officer was one he knew, Lieutenant Gordon; he had met him more than once at the house of Don Roderigo Ponce de Leon.
"Señor Evaña, good-morning; you are well employed," said the lieutenant. "I have come to help you. Most of them appear to be killed, if there are any wounded we will carry them inside."
"There are few," answered Evaña sadly; then giving him a kick in the ribs, he said to the man lying at his feet, "Get up, you fool, and help us."
The man rose at once to his feet, glaring savagely at the new-comers, but when he saw that they only smiled and looked curiously at him, he set to work very willingly with the rest, and in a short time such wounded as there remained any hope for were removed to the quinta. All the beds in the house were brought into requisition for them, and they were placed in the care of the women and a few men belonging to the quinta who had taken no part in the fighting and had not fled with the rest.
When the wounded were all sent off, Evaña commenced a search among the dead; they were all swarthy, roughly dressed paisanos. The man whom he had rescued from the fallen horse knew several of them and told him their names, which Evaña at once took down in his pocket-book, and then inquired of him if he knew anything of Don Marcelino Ponce de Leon, or had seen anything of him that day.
"Is he a tall young man with black hair and a short black beard?"