It was a stormy day. The sky was gray and lowering; the birds wheeled screaming around; and the wind, blowing in squalls, roared in the deep defiles of the road, filling the air with clouds of impalpable dust.
The two _peones_ who had brought the news of the Indians' march upon the _presidio_ rode twenty paces in advance, and scanned the country on each side of the road with startled looks, expecting every instant to see the redskins make their appearance, and to hear the dreaded war whoop. Don Fernando and Don Estevan rode side by side, without exchanging a syllable, each sufficiently occupied by his own thoughts.
In the meanwhile, the nearer the travellers got to the river, the more the storm increased in intensity. The rain fell in torrents, the lightning flashed incessantly, and the peals of thunder rolled majestically among the high cliffs, from which enormous crags were constantly detached, and hurled crashing into the river.
The storm had reached such a pitch of fury, that the riders had the greatest difficulty in making progress, and were in constant danger of falling with their horses, which were plunging wildly in their fright at the tempest. The ground, soaked with rain, afforded no foothold for the poor brutes: they slipped and stumbled at every step, snorted violently, and threatened to break down.
"It is impossible to get farther," said the _mayor domo_, picking up his horse from a plunge which had nearly unseated him.
"But what is to be done?" asked Don Fernando, looking about him with great anxiety.
"I think we had better take shelter under this clump of trees for a while: the storm grows worse and worse. It is folly to pursue our journey while it lasts."
"Let us go, if we must," said Don Fernando resignedly.
Accordingly they turned towards a small copse on one side of the road, which seemed to offer some little shelter from the intensity of the storm.
They were only a few paces from it, when four men, their faces covered with black masks, rushed out of the wood, and dashed at the travellers, whom they attacked without uttering a word. The _peones_ fell from their saddles, knocked over by two shots from the masked strangers, and rolled on the ground in convulsive agony, uttering the most piteous cries.