was really alone. But the moon shone brightly on every tree, and
nothing was to be seen but his own shadow; nothing was to be heard but
the sound of the rippling stream.

He threw off his clothes, and was just about to dive in headlong, when
something--he did not know what--suddenly caused him to look round. At
the same instant the moon passed from behind a cloud, and its rays fell
on a beautiful golden-haired woman standing half hidden by the ferns.

With one bound he caught up his mantle, and rushed headlong down the
path he had come, fearing at each step to feel a hand laid on his
shoulder. It was not till he had left the last trees behind him, and
was standing in the open plain, that he dared to look round, and then
he thought a figure in white was still standing there waving her arms
to and fro. This was enough; he ran along the road harder than ever, and
never paused till he was save in his own room.

With the earliest rays of dawn he went back to the forest to see whether
he could find any traces of the Yara, but though he searched every clump
of bushes, and looked up every tree, everything was empty, and the only
voices he heard were those of parrots, which are so ugly that they only
drive people away.

'I think I must be mad,' he said to himself, 'and have dreamt all that
folly'; and going back to the city he began his daily work. But either
that was harder than usual, or he must be ill, for he could not fix his
mind upon it, and everybody he came across during the day inquired if
anything had happened to give him that white, frightened look.

'I must be feverish,' he said to himself; 'after all, it is rather
dangerous to take a cold bath when one is feeling so hot.' Yet he knew,
while he said it, that he was counting the hours for night to come, that
he might return to the forest.

In the evening he went as usual to the creeper-covered house. But he
had better have stayed away, as his face was so pale and his manner so
strange, that the poor girl saw that something terrible had occurred.
Alonzo, however, refused to answer any of her questions, and all she
could get was a promise to hear everything the next day.

On pretence of a violent headache, he left Julia much earlier than usual
and hurried quickly home. Taking down a pistol, he loaded it and put it
in his belt, and a little before midnight he stole out on the tips of
his toes, so as to disturb nobody. Once outside he hastened down the
road which l