He slipped his arm under Appleby’s shoulder, and they shuffled on alone down the dim white road. There was silence all about them, and the tramp of the Sin Verguenza came back more and more faintly out of the distance until it ceased altogether. X — AN UNEXPECTED MEETING IT was almost cold and very still when Appleby looked out from his lair among the cane. Morning had not come but the clump of trees that had been a mere blur of shadow when he last awakened had grown into definite form, and rose black and solemn against the eastern sky. This was no longer dusky indigo, but of a softer color tinged with a faint pearly gray, while detached stalks of cane seemed to be growing into visibility. Then he stood up with a little shiver, his torn garments clinging about him wet with the dew, and became vaguely conscious that he was very uncomfortable. His limbs ached with weariness, and there was a distressful stiffness in his hip‐joint which those who have slept on damp ground are acquainted with, while his foot throbbed painfully. These sensations, however, vanished, and left him intent and alert, for a sound he recognized came quivering through the still, cool air. It was evident that Harper heard it also, for he rose stiffly, and his face showed faintly white as he turned in the direction of the carretera which ran through the cane some fifty yards away. “Troops! It’s kind of fortunate we crawled in here,” he said. Appleby nodded, for he had passed the greater part of six months hiding from the troops of Spain, and the tramp of marching men was unpleasantly familiar to him, while now, as it grew louder in a dull staccato, it seemed unusually portentous and sinister. The earth lay still and peaceful, wrapped in shadow, while the pearly grayness changed to a pale ruby gleam in the eastern sky; but that beat of human feet jarred dissonantly through nature’s harmonies. It swelled in slow crescendo, a rhythm of desecration, while the thin jingle of steel and a confused rattling that had still a measured cadence also became audible. The two men who heard it sat very still among the cane, until Appleby, who was not usually a prey to apprehensive fancies, started at the clack of Harper’s rifle as he snapped down the lever and closed the breach again. The sound seemed to ring about them with a horrible distinctness. “They seem in a hurry, and that’s quite fortunate for us,” said Harper. “Anyway, if they see us they’re not going to get me while there’s anything in the magazine. I’ve no use for being stood up with my hands tied against a wall.”