The measured tramp was now very close, and the creak of leather and rattle of straps and slings came out of the gloom. Marston thought he could hear the labored breath of men toiling up hill. Then a hoarse challenge rang out and his horse plunged across the road. "Hold him!" said Wyndham sharply, and two or three men with glittering bayonets came into the moonlight that shone between the trees. "A picket, or advance guard!" Wyndham resumed. "Get down, Bob. You mustn't let the brute go!" Marston's horse reared and tried to turn from the shining steel, but he got his foot out of the awkward stirrup and swung himself from the saddle. The others dismounted and the soldiers led them off the road and then stood on guard. "I do not know if we are arrested," Don Luis remarked with a shrug. "One must use patience; but I am not without some influence and expect apologies when the officers arrive." When he had quieted his horse Marston lighted a cigarette and leaned against a tree. For a few yards the moonlight shone upon the road and when the first fours of the leading platoon crossed the illuminated belt he was surprised. The _cazadores_ were short, dark-skinned men. Their sloped rifles wavered at different angles, and their march was slouching, but they carried complete field equipment; pouches, mess-tins, tools and bandoliers. It was the first time he had seen the republican soldiers in regular marching order. "Your government has been extravagant," he said to Don Luis. Don Luis spread out his hands. "It is these Germans! Somebody will have to pay and the country is poor. Perhaps it is well to pay the soldiers, but one need not spend money on equipment until there is risk of war." "Then there is no risk of war just now?" Wyndham interposed. "I know of none. I cannot see why we should quarrel with our neighbors and although the negroes are turbulent in the back country, one leaves them alone. The Germans have led us into extravagance, señor. All must be efficient and worked on a plan! They do not understand us. We are not machines like them!" He stopped, for one of the guards roughly ordered the party farther back into the wood. From their new position they could not see much. Sloped rifles tossed and wavered across the opening in the trees; steel bands and swivels shone in the moon, and one distinguished shadowy figures going by. After a time the measured tramp got fainter and rolled up the hill, and the beat of horses' feet came out of the gloom. The soldier who had driven the party back went to the road and his voice reached the others. Then he ordered them to advance and they saw two or three mounted officers in the moonlight. One sat stiff and motionless and asked a few sharp questions in uncouth Castilian, after which he turned to a companion. "They say they are sportsmen and the fellow in the cloak claims to be well known. The others look like foreigners. I will leave you to talk to them, Don Maccario."