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 eral Garvanza knew him and despised him. If curses could have blasted a man, poor Felipe must have fallen there.

A man out of the crowd stripped the harness from the saddled artillery horse, and put the bridle reins in Henderson's hand as he came up with Helena. A moment; Gabriel was in the saddle, Helena lifted to his arms by hands that touched her tenderly as if to soothe the hurt of the brutal usage that had bruised her heart.

It was a glad shout that bounded from the façade of the low brown garrison, fuel to the fury of Roberto's breast. He snatched a gun from a reluctant soldier, and shot him dead; from another, who fell to his knees in supplication at the general's feet.

"Charge!" Roberto shouted.

His fury descended to the soldiers, slow as they were to shake off their terror. They saw that no greater force was coming against them; that they had been shamed and defeated, their comrades slain, their general humiliated and defied, by two common men who were not even soldiers.

Now the people were against them, they were threatened with drawn pistols, with cobble-stones snatched from the top of the padres' wall. The soldiers crouched to the charge, bayonets fixed to tear out these treacherous people's hearts.

"Here—help me with this cannon!" Felipe shouted. "So! there now, back with you, my friends!"