"You are right. Things have gone badly. Instead of the simultaneous risings, the Government have got their hands in first, and have dealt us a heavy blow," he answered, rather dismally. "How came you to let the young Pretender escape? I saw you carry him off, with rare cleverness; and when you drove away with him I believed the day was won for Spain." "In the devil’s name I don’t know how it was done," he answered, with genuine feeling. "For my part, I am shamed. I know only that once, when the carriage stopped, I saw a horseman and a riderless horse closing in on us, and got down to learn the cause, fearing trouble. It must have been the devil himself, I think, in the flesh, and hell organised a miracle to save the Pretender. The horseman rode me down—me, Juan Cabrera—and stretched me senseless on the road before I had a thought of his intention, and when I came to, the thing had happened. How many men there were with him, I know not—Garcia, who came running up at the close, swears that there was never more than one—but it can’t be true. If ever we meet—and I should know him again in twenty thousand men—and there is an ounce of strength left in my arm, I’ll use it to plunge a knife into the heart of the man who dealt that blow at me and Spain." "Good. You were ever a man prompt to action, Cabrera; and you must have been bewitched." This touched his superstition, however. "The Holy Saints forefend," he said, hurriedly, crossing himself. "But I believe it truth that he was no man, but the devil in the shape of a man. And, mark you, senor," he cried, eagerly, "what else could it be but wizards’ work? Didn’t Correja’s horse fall and stun him at the very moment of all others when this could have happened? Aye, and what but the devil could send Garcia’s horse galloping off at the same moment? But I’ll never cease to search for him, and if I don’t find him on earth I’ll wait till I get to purgatory, and bribe the devil with gift of my soul to point him out to me. The curse of all hell upon him!" And then, somewhat incongruously, he crossed himself again, as though to give additional power to his curse. "Aye, the Fates have been against us," said I: and not caring to push the subject further, and feeling profoundly thankful that his power to recognise me had fallen so far short of his most vindictive desire, I urged my horse to a canter, and we rode on in silence. But his talk made me feel how peril was here always close at my very elbow. Presently the moon rose, and the brilliant, streaming light flooded the whole landscape until it was as bright as day. The road was fast getting rougher and more hilly; the country wilder and more rugged; and the mountains lay to our left, the peaks towering up to great heights, majestic and grand in the bathing moonlight. The air was solemnly still; only the sounds of our horses’ feet, the creaking of the saddle leather, and the musical jingle jangle of the bits breaking the silence.