The horse, suddenly arrested in its stride, uttered a snort of pain, and remained motionless, at the same instant the galloping of the invisible steed ceased to be heard. "Hilloah!" the half-breed muttered, "This is beginning to look ugly." And drawing a pistol from his belt, he set the hammer. He immediately heard, like a funeral echo, the sharp sound of another hammer being set by his adversary. Still, this sound, instead of increasing the half-breed's apprehensions, seemed, on the contrary, to calm them. "What is the meaning of that?" he asked himself, mentally, as he shook his head, "Can I be mistaken? have I not to deal with an Apache?" After this aside, during which Lanzi sought in vain to distinguish his unknown foe, he shouted in a loud voice:-- "Hilloah, who are you?" "Who are you?" a masculine voice replied, emerging from the darkness, in a tone quite as resolute as that of the half-breed. "That's a singular answer," Lanzi went on. "Not more singular than the question." These words were exchanged in excellent Spanish. The half-breed, now certain that he had to deal with a white man, banished all fear, and uncocking his pistol returned it to his girdle, as he said good-humouredly:-- "You must feel like myself, Caballero, inclined to draw breath after so long a ride; shall we rest together?" "I wish for nothing better," the other answered. "Why," a voice exclaimed, which the half-breed at once recognised, "it is Lanzi." "Certainly," the latter shouted, joyfully, "_Voto à brios_, Doña Carmela, I did not hope to meet you here." The three persons joined, and the explanations were short. Fear does not calculate or reflect. Doña Carmela on one side, Lanzi on the other, filled with a vague terror, fled without attempting to account for the feeling that impelled them, exerted only by the instinct of self-preservation, that supreme weapon given by God to man with which to escape danger in extremities. The only difference was, that the half-breed believed himself pursued by the Apaches, while Doña Carmela supposed them a-head of her. When the young lady, on Lanzi's recommendation, left the venta, she rode blindly along the first path that presented itself. Heaven willed it for her happiness that at the moment the house blew up with a terrible crash, Doña Carmela, half dead with fear and thrown from her horse, was found by a white hunter, who, moved with pity at the recital of the dangers that menaced her, generously offered to escort her to the Larch-tree hacienda, where she desired to proceed, in order to place herself under Tranquil's immediate protection. Doña Carmela, after taking a scrutinizing glance at the hunter, whose honest look and open face were proofs of his loyalty, gratefully accepted his offer, fearing, as she did, that she might fall, in the darkness, among the Indian bands which were doubtless infesting the roads, and to which her ignorance of localities would have inevitably made her a prey.