The General knocked a second, and a third time with briefer interval and with greater force. No one replied and now nothing was heard. The General knocked for the fourth time and said, in his stentorian voice, though without displaying anger or emotion: “Open, Mercedes, it is I.” “I am coming,” shrilly answered a woman’s voice, “I am dressing; I was ill and had not yet risen.” The General waited with the utmost calm. No escape was possible; from the hall one passed directly into the room, which was the scene of the guilty love and which received light by a grated window, that opened onto the _patio_ of the next house. The General, who knew all the hiding places and the location of the pieces of furniture in the room, was delighted, imagining the little agreeable plight of the student, who had already, tremblingly, hidden himself under the bed. After ten minutes waiting, Mercedes, visibly pale with _chiquedores_[25] on her temples, her head tied up in a handkerchief, and covered with a loose gown, which she was still hooking, finally opened the door, smiled at the General, and attempting to overcome her manifest uneasiness, said: “Ah, sir! what a surprise!” “Good morning, madam,” said the General, abruptly entering the hall and then the inner room, followed by his four men, and paying no attention to Mercedes, who, following them all, exclaimed, each time more afflicted: “What do you wish, sir? What are you looking for? Why have these men come here?” Once in the room, the General stopped near the door, and, as he expected, saw under the bed the coiled up body of the student who would gladly have given his whiskers to be elsewhere. “Drag out that shameless fellow,” said the General to his men, “and beat him for me.” “Señor, for God’s sake!” cried Mercedes. The four men obeyed the order. The unhappy student did not even try to escape. One took him by the feet and dragged him out into the middle of the room; the others began to discharge a hail of blows upon him, distributing them evenly over the shoulders, back, seat, and legs of that unfortunate, who squirmed upon the floor like an epileptic, writhing, screaming, and howling, with a choked voice: “Ay! ay! they are killing me! ay! ay! help! Ay! ay! infamous fellows! assassins!” Meantime the General looked on at that calamitous spectacle, without a word; when the flogging seemed to him sufficient he exclaimed--“Hold!” and then, addressing the man who had been flogged, added: “Be warned by this experience and let the women of other men alone.”