his place, and at that movement sprang also to their
feet his ten cavaliers. At once arose a tumult that might have resulted
in the severance of the truce with sharp steel had not the leaders of
the several parties stayed with lifted arm and stern command that
threatened disgrace. At last was compelled a stillness sinister as that
of the air before a storm.

"I bid our guests good night," said the Admiral. "Our enemies we shall
meet again. I think that so slight a ransom will not now content us. As
you ride through the streets of Nueva Cordoba look your last, senors,
upon her goodly houses and pleasant places."

"Do thy worst!" answered De Guardiola, grinning like a death's-head.

Mexia wiped the sweat from his brow.

"Let us go--let us go, Don Luiz! I stifle here. There's a strangeness in
the air--my heart beats to bursting! Holy Teresa, give that the wine was
not poisoned!"

Back to their fortress rode the Spaniards, up the bare, steep, pallid
hillside, through the tunal, past their strong battery; back to the town
rode the English, who with the punctilio of the occasion had accompanied
their foes to the base of the hill. They rode through the streets which
that morning they had laid waste, and through those that the stern
Admiral had sworn to destroy. There black ruin faced them starkly; here
doomed things awaited mutely. The town was little, and it seemed to
cower before them like a child. Almost in silence did they ride, lifted
and restless in mind, thought straining at the leash, but finding no
words that should free it.

"How hot is the night!" spoke Baldry at last. "Hast noticed the smell of
the earth? We killed a great serpent coming across the plain to-day."

"How the sea burns!" said Henry Sedley. "There is a will-o'-the-wisp
upon the marsh yonder."

"Here they call it the soul of the tyrant Aguirre," answered Ferne. "A
lost soul."

A little longer and they parted for the night to meet early next morning
in the council with the Admiral. If to Nueva Cordoba, stripped and
beaten, trembling beneath the fear of worse things to come, an army with
banners held the land, so, in no lesser light, did the English see
themselves, and they meant to have the treasure and to humble that white
fortress. But it must be done quickly, quickly! Pampatar in Margarita,
the castle of Paria or Berreo's settlement in Trinidad, could send no
ships that might contend with the four swinging yonder in the river's
mouth, but f