s. True, she had run up
the _escalera_--a stair of four flights--without pause or rest; and that
might account for her laboured breathing. But not for the flush on her
cheek, and the sparkle in her eyes. These came from a different cause,
though the same one which had carried her up the long stairway without
pausing to take breath.

She had not enough now left to declare it; but stood panting and
speechless.

"_Madre de Dios_!" exclaimed her friend in an accent of alarm. "What is
it, Ysabel?"

"_Madre de Dios_! I say too," gasped the Condesa. "Oh, Luisita! what
do you think?"

"What?"

"They've taken him--they have him in prison!"

"He lives then--still lives! Blessed be the Virgin!"

Saying which Luisa Valverde crossed her arms over her breast, and with
eyes raised devotionally towards heaven, seemed to offer up a mute, but
fervent thanksgiving.

"Still lives!" echoed the Condesa, with a look of mingled surprise and
perplexity.

"Of course he does; surely you did not think he was dead!"

"Indeed I knew not what to think--so long since I saw or heard of him.
Oh, I'm so glad he's here, even though in a prison; for while there's
life there's hope."

By this the Condesa had recovered breath, though not composure of
countenance. Its expression alone was changed from the look of trouble
to one of blank astonishment. What could her friend mean? Why glad of
his being in a prison? For all the while she was thinking of a _him_.

"Hope!" she ejaculated again as an echo, then remaining silent, and
looking dazed-like.

"Yes, Ysabel; I had almost despaired of him. But are you sure they have
him here in prison? I was in fear that he had been killed in battle, or
died upon the march, somewhere in those great prairies of Texas--"

"_Carramba_!" interrupted the young Countess, who, free of speech, was
accustomed to interlarding it with her country forms of exclamation.
"What's all this about prairies and Texas? So far as I know, Ruperto
was never there in his life."

"Ruperto!" echoed the other, the joy which had so suddenly lit up her
features as suddenly returning to shadow. "I thought you were speaking
of Florencio."

They understood each other now. Long since had their love secrets been
mutually confessed; and Luisa Valverde needed no telling who Ruperto
was. Independent of what she had lately learned from the Condesa, she
knew him to be a gentleman of good family, a soldier of some reputation;