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The singing is instantly brought to an end; while Don Valerian and the doctor rise hastily from their chairs.

The bark of watch-dog outside some quiet farmhouse, amidst the homes of civilisation, can give no idea of the startling effect which the same sound calls forth on the far Indian frontier -- nothing like the alarm felt by the dwellers in that lone ranche. To add to it, they hear a hoof striking on the stones outside -- that of either horse or mule. It cannot be Lolita's; the mustang mare is securely stalled, and the hoof-stroke comes not from the stable. There are no other animals. Their late guests have taken away the two saddle mules, while the mulas de carga are with the messenger, Manuel.

"It's he come back!" exclaims the doctor. "We ought to be rejoiced instead of scared. Come, Don Valerian! we shall have our smoke yet before going to bed."

"It's not Manuel," answers Miranda. "The dogs would have known him before this. Hear how they keep on baying! Ha! what's that? Chico's voice! Somebody has caught hold of him!"

A cry from the peon outside, succeeded by expostulations, as if he was struggling to escape -- his voice commingled with shrill screams from Conchita -- are sounds almost simultaneous.

Don Valerian strides back into the room and lays hold of his sword, the doctor clutching at the first weapon that presents itself.

But weapons are of no avail where there are not enough hands to wield them.

Into the cabin lead two entrance doors -- one front, the other back -- and into both is seen pouring a stream of armed men, soldiers in uniform.

Before Miranda can disengage his sword from its scabbard, a perfect chevaux-de-frise of lance-points are within six inches of his breast, while the doctor is similarly menaced.

Both perceive that resistance will be idle. It can only end in their instant impalement.

"Surrender, rebels!" cries a voice rising above the din.

"Drop your weapons, and at once, if you wish your lives spared! Soldiers, disarm them!"

Miranda recognises the voice. Perhaps, had he done so sooner, he would have held on to his sword, and taken the chances of a more protracted and desperate resistance.

It is too late. As the weapon is wrested from his grasp, he sees standing before him the man of all others he has most reason to fear -- Gil Uraga!

Chapter Fifty Three.

A Sleepless Night.

All night long Hamersley and the hunter remain upon the summit of the mound. It is a night of dread anxiety, seeming to them an age.

They think not of taking sleep -- they could not. There is that in their minds that would keep them wakeful if they had not slept for a week. Time passing does not lessen their suspense. On the contrary, it grows keener, becoming an agony almost unendurable.

To escape from it, Hamersley half forms the resolution to descend the hill and endeavour to steal past the sentinels. If discovered, to attack them boldly, and attempt cutting a way through; then on into the valley, and take such chances as may turn up for the rescue of the refugees.

Putting it to his companion, the latter at once offers opposing counsel. It would be more than rashness -- sheer madness. At least a dozen soldiers have been left on picket at the summit of the pass. Standing or sitting, they are scattered all over the ground. It would be impossible for anyone going down the gorge to get past them unperceived; and for two men to attack twelve, however courageous the former and cowardly the latter, the odds would be too great.

"I wouldn't mind it for all that," says Walt, concluding his response to the rash proposal, "ef thar war nothin' more to be did beyont. But thar is. Even war we to cut clar through, kill every skunk o' 'em, our work 'ud be only begun. Thar's two score to meet us below. What ked we do wi' 'em? No, Frank; we mout tackle these twelve wi' some sort o' chance, but two agin forty! It's too ugly a odds. No doubt we ked drop a good grist o' 'em afore goin' under, but in the eend they'd git the better o' us -- kill us to a sartinty."

"It's killing me to stay here. Only to think what the ruffians may be doing at this moment! Adela -- "

"Don't gie yur mind to thinkin' o' things now. Keep your thoughts for what we may do arterward. Yur Adela ain't goin' to be ate up that quick, nor yet my Concheeter. They'll be tuk away 'long wi' t'others as prisoners. We kin foller, and trust to some chance o' bein' able to git 'em out o' the clutches o' the scoundrels."

Swayed by his comrade's counsel, somewhat tranquillised by it, Hamersley resigns himself to stay as they are. Calmer reflection convinces him there is no help for it. The alternative, for an instant entertained, would be to rush recklessly on death, going into its very jaws.

They lie along the ground listening, now and then standing up and peering through the branches at the sentries below. For a long while they hear nothing save the calls of the card-players, thickly interlarded with carajoz, chingaras, and other blasphemous expressions. But just after the hour of midnight other sounds reach their ears, which absorb all their attention, taking it away from the gamesters.

Up out of the valley, borne upon the buoyant atmosphere, comes the baying of bloodhounds. In echo it reverberates along the facade of the cliff, for a time keeping continuous. Soon after a human voice, quickly followed by a second; these not echoes or repetitions of the same; for one is the coarse guttural cry of a man, the other a scream in the shrill treble of of a woman. The first is the shout of surprise uttered by Chico, the second the shriek of alarm sent forth by Conchita.

With hearts audibly beating, the listeners bend their ears to catch what may come next, both conjecturing the import of the sounds that have already reached them, and this with instinctive correctness. Walt is the first to give speech to his interpretation of it.

"They're at the shanty now," he says, in a whisper. "The two houn's guv tongue on hearin' 'em approach. That fust shout war from the Injun Cheeko; and the t'other air hern -- my gurl's. Durnation! if they hurt but a he'r o' her head -- Wagh! what's the use o' my threetenin'?"

As if seeing his impotence, the hunter suddenly ceases speech, again setting himself to listen. Hamersley, without heeding him, is already in this attitude.

And now out of the valley arise other sounds, not all of them loud. The stream, here and there falling in cataracts, does something to deaden them. Only now and then there is the neigh of a horse, and intermittently the bark of one of the bloodhounds, as if these animals had yielded, but yet remain hostile to the intruders. They hear human voices, too, but no shout following that of Chico, and no scream save the one sent up by Conchita.

There is loud talk, a confusion of speakers, but no report of firearms. This last is tranquillising. A shot at that moment heard by Hamersley would give him more uneasiness than if the gun were aimed at himself.

"Thank God!" he gasps out, after a long spell of listening, "Miranda has made no resistance. He's seen it would be no use, and has quietly surrendered. I suppose it's all over now, and they are captives."

"Wal, better thet than they shed be corpses," is the consolatory reflection of the hunter. "So long as thar's breath left in thar bodies we kin hev hope, as I sayed arready. Let's keep up our hearts by thinkin' o' the fix we war in atween the wagguns, an' arterwards thet scrape in the cave. We kim clar out o' both in a way we mout call mirakelous, an' we may yit git them clar in someat the same fashion. 'Slong's I've got my claws roun' the stock o' a good gun, wi' plenty o' powder and lead, I ain't a-goin' to deespar. We've both got that, tharfor niver say die!"

The hunter's quaint speech is encouraging; but for all, it does not hinder him and his comrade from soon after returning to a condition of despondency, if not actual despair.

A feeling which holds possession of them till the rising of the sun, and on till it reaches meridian.

When the day breaks, with eyes anxiously scrutinising, they look down into the valley. A mist hangs over the stream, caused by the spray of its cataracts.

Lifting at length, there is displayed a scene not very different from what they have been expecting.

Around the ranche they see horses picketed and soldiers moving among them or standing in groups apart; in short, a picture of military life in "country quarters."

Their point of view is too far off to identify individual forms or note the exact action carried on. This last, left to conjecture, is filled up by fancies of the most painful kind.

For long hours are they constrained to endure them -- up to that of noon. Then, the notes of a bugle, rising clear above the hissing of the cascades, foretell a change in the spectacle. It is the call, "Boots and saddles!" The soldiers are seen caparisoning their horses and standing by the stirrup.

Another blast gives the order to "Mount!" Soon after, the "Forward!" Then the troop files off from the front of the jacal, disappearing under the trees like a gigantic glittering serpent. The white drapery of a woman's dress is seen fluttering at its head, as if the reptile had seized upon some tender prey -- a dove from the cote -- and was bearing it off to its slimy lair.

For another half-hour the two men on the mound wait with nervous impatience. It requires this time to make the ascent from the centre of the valley to the upper plain. After entering among the trees, the soldiers and their captives are out of sight; but the clattering of their horses' hoofs can be heard as they strike upon the rock-strewn path. Once or twice a trumpet sound proclaims their movements upon the march.

At length the head of the troop appears, the leading files following one after the other along the narrow ledge. As they approach the summit of the pass the track widens, admitting a formation "by twos." At the trumpet call they change to this, a single horseman riding at their head.

He is now near enough for his features to be distinguished, and Hamersley's heart strikes fiercely against his ribs as he recognises them. If he had any doubt before, it is set at rest now. He sees Gil Uraga, certain of his being the man who caused the destruction of his caravan. His own horse, ridden by the robber, is proof conclusive of the crime.

He takes note that the lancer colonel is dressed in splendid style, very different from the dust-stained cavalier who the day before passed over the desert plain. Now he appears in a gorgeous laced uniform, with lancer cap and plume, gold cords and aiguillettes dangling adown his breast; for he has this morning made his toilet with care, in consideration of the company in which he intends travelling.

Neither Hamersley nor the hunter hold their eyes long upon him; they are both looking for another individual -- each his own. These soon make their appearance, their white dresses distinguishable amid the darker uniforms. During the march their position has been changed. They are now near the centre of the troop, the young lady upon her own mare Lolita, while the Indian damsel is mounted on a mule. They are free, both hand and limb, but a file in front, with another behind, have charge of them. Farther rearward is another group, more resembling captives. This is composed of three men upon mules, fast bound to saddle and stirrup, two of them having their arms pinioned behind their backs. Their animals are led each by a trooper who rides before. The two about whose security such precaution has been taken are Don Valerian and the doctor, the third, with his arms free, is Chico. His fellow-servant Manuel, also on mule-back, is following not far behind, but in his attitude or demeanour there is nothing to tell of the captive. If at times he looks gloomy, it is when he reflects upon his black treason and infamous ingratitude. Perhaps he has repented, or deems the prospect not so cheerful as expected. After all, what will be his reward? He has ruined his master and many others beside, but this will not win him the love of Conchita.

The spectators feel somewhat relieved as Colonel Miranda comes in sight. Still more as the march brings him nearer, and it can be seen that he sits his horse with no sign of having received any injury; and neither has Don Prospero. The elaborate fastenings are of themselves evidences that no hurt has happened to them. It has been a capture without resistance, as their friends hoped it would, their fears having been of a conflict to end in the death of the exiles.

One by one, and two by two, the troops come filing on, till the leader is opposite the spot where the two spectators stand crouching among the trees. These are dwarf cedars, and give the best cover for concealment. Thoroughly screened by their thickly-set boughs and dense dark foliage, Hamersley and the hunter command a clear view of everything below. The distance to the summit of the pass is about two hundred yards in a slanting direction.

As the lancer colonel approaches the spot where the picket is posted, he halts and gives an order. It is for the guard to fall in along with the rest of the troop.