sked if Don Gomez Noronja was still at table?

"He has retired to his room, senhor," was the reply.

A few momenta after, Rica entered the chamber of his guest, where he
remained in close conversation till nigh daybreak. As he reached his own
apartment the sound of horses' feet and carriage wheels was heard upon
the gravel, and, throwing up the window, Rica called out,--

"Is that Don Enrique?"

"Yes, senhor, taking French leave, as you would call it. A bad return
for a Spanish welcome; but duty leaves no alternative."

"Are you for the coast, then?"

"With all speed. Our captain received important despatches in the night
We shall be afloat before forty hours. Adios!"

The farewell was cordially re-echoed by Rica, who closed the window,
muttering to himself, "So! all will go well at last."

While Enrique was making all the speed towards the seashore a light
caleche and four horses could accomplish, Roland was pacing with
impatient steps the little plot of grass where so soon he expected to
find himself in deadly conflict with his enemy.

Never was a man's mind more suited to the purpose for which he waited.
Dejected, insulted, and ruined in one night, he had little to live for,
and felt far less eager to be revenged of his adversary, than to rid
himself of a hated existence. It was to no purpose that he could say,
and say truly, that he had never cared for any of these things, of which
he now saw himself stripped. His liking for Maritana had never gone
beyond great admiration for her beauty, and a certain spiteful pleasure
in exciting those bursts of passion over which she exercised not the
slightest control. It was caprice, not love; the delight of a schoolboy
in the power to torment, without the wish to retain. His self-love,
then, it was, was wounded on finding that she, with whose temper he had
sported, could turn so terribly upon himself. The same feeling was
outraged by Enrique, who seemed to know and exult over his defeat. These
sources of bitterness, being all aggravated by the insulting manner of
Don Pedro, made up a mass of indignant and angry feelings which warred
and goaded him almost to madness.

The long-expected dawn broke slowly, and although, a few moments after
sunrise, the whole sky became of a rich rose color, these few moments
seemed like an age to the impatient thoughts of him who thirsted for his
vengeance.

He walked hastily up and down the space, waiting now and again to
listen, and