"Julian," replied the stranger. "I am one of the servitors of the hacienda Del Valle. Colonel Tres-Villas is its proprietor, and I have a message for him of great importance." "Very well," responded the other, "I shall tell the Colonel you are here." So saying, the _assistente_ entered the tent. On that day the besieging army was about to make the fifteenth attack upon the town, defended by Colonel Trujano, and Don Rafael was dressing himself in full uniform to assist at the council of war, called together to deliberate on the plan of assault. At the word "messenger" pronounced by his military servant, a slight trembling was seen to agitate the frame of Colonel Tres-Villas, while his countenance became suddenly overspread with pallor. "Very well," stammered he, after a moment's hesitation, and in a voice that betrayed emotion. "I know the messenger; you may leave him free; I shall answer for him. Presently let him come him in." The _assistente_ stepped out of the tent and delivered this response of the Colonel. The dragoons rode off, leaving the vaquero free to communicate to his master the message of which he was the bearer. It is here necessary for us to detail some portion of the history of Don Rafael, from the time when he took his departure at full gallop from the hacienda Del Valle, up to that hour when we again encounter him in the royalist camp before Huajapam. When the first shock of grief, caused by the murder of his father--when that terrible struggle betwixt love and duty, had passed, and his spirit become a little calmer--the only line of conduct that appeared possible for him, was to repair at once to Oajaca; and, having found its governor, Don Bernardino Bonavia, obtain from him a detachment of troops, with which he might return and punish the insurgent assassins. Unfortunately for Don Rafael, notwithstanding the distinguished reception accorded to him by the governor, the latter could not place at his disposal a single soldier. The province was already in such a state of fermentation, that all the men under his command were required to keep in check the revolt that threatened to break out in the provincial capital itself. Don Rafael therefore could not prevail upon the governor to enfeeble the garrison of Oajaca, by detaching any portion of it on so distant a service as an expedition to the hacienda Del Valle.