To follow Martin was perhaps the most unpleasant part that I had yet acted; for I had to grope my way after him along a dark passage, about forty feet long, at the end of which he ushered me into a room, where there was no other light than that given by the moon, which shone through a small window glazed with little panes of coarse glass. Here he bade me "Bueno noche;" and, after many apologies for my miserable accommodation, left me. The apartment was small. In one corner stood a French bed, having light-coloured curtains; this, with a basin-stand, two chairs and a mirror, made up the furniture. Like a true soldier, I turned to secure the door. Destitute of lock or bolt: it had only a small thumb-latch! Dismounting the ewer and basin, I placed the stand end-wise between the bed and the door, firmly fixing it, and thus forming a barricade, which none could force without awaking me. To make all sure, I again dropped the ramrod into each barrel of my rifle, passed a finger over the caps, unbuckled the belt at which my dirk dangled; and, without undressing, for every moment I expected to hear Jack Hall hallooing outside the house; in short, to be prepared for anything, I threw myself down on the coverlet, and weary and worn by a long day's ramble among the mountains, prepared to sleep. For a long time a species of painful wakefulness possessed me; the moans of the passing wind, the flapping of a loose board in the external gallery, the wavering shadows thrown by the moonlight on the damp and discoloured walls; even the ticking of my watch disturbed me, and kept me constantly thinking of poor Hall's unaccountable absence, with many a fear that he might have fallen into the hands of Juan of Antequera, and not a few reproaches for my having perhaps too easily relinquished my search for him. These thoughts completely obliterated any sense of my own immediate danger; but I was about to drop asleep when something moist that oozed over my neck and face aroused me. I started, fully awake in a moment; and, passing a hand across my cheek, looked at it in the moonlight. "Blood!" said I, springing off the bed, while a thrill ran through me. I had not been wounded or cut by my fall; then from whence came this terrible moisture? I examined the pillow, and found the lower part of it quite wet; I turned it, and lo! it was saturated with blood! This was the reason, that Martin Secco had declined to give me a candle. My heart beat thick and fast; apprehension of something horrible came over me, and I remembered the stories of Pedrillo. I also recollected that I had some excellent Spanish cigar fusees, and tearing three or four blank leaves from my note book, I twisted them together, lit them, and surveyed the dingy chamber. The boards in front of the bed were marked by recent spots of blood; I raised the little fringe or curtain, and, guided by some terrible instinct, looked below, and saw--what?