Chapter 12 - Page 2

captain-general, a man of blood and iron, a man after his own heart. This Weyler, he predicted, would put an end to the insurrection; there would be no more of Campos's weak, merciful methods, which were, in reality, nothing less than encouragement to revolt. Cueto, of course, agreed.

"We're sweeping the country as with a broom, and already Matanzas is bulging with refugees," the officer told him. "They call themselves pacificos, but they carry information and aid our enemies. We'll have no more of that."

"Will it not be a great expense to feed so many people?" Cueto ventured.

"Let them feed themselves. Is it our fault that they make such measures necessary? By no means. Once we have them safe, we shall exterminate all whom we encounter in the country." The speaker drank deeply of Cueto's good wine and smacked his lips. "It's the kind of work I like. Extermination! They have had their warning. From now on we shall spare neither man, woman, nor child. The men are traitors, the women breed, and the children grow up."

Cueto nodded his complete approval of this program. "Oh, decidedly," said he. "This spirit of violence must be stamped out or none of us will be safe. Let me tell you I myself live in constant dread of that young villain, Varona. I--hope you haven't forgotten him."

"Forgotten him?" Colonel Cobo fingered a lately healed scar which further disfigured his ugly face, then he cursed frightfully. "It's by God's mercy alone that I'm alive to-night. And I haven't forgotten the girl, either. She'll have to come in, along with the others. The boy may stay out, but she can't." He licked his lips. "Wait until I have finished with this valley. I'll drive the Yumuri next, as a hunter drives a thicket for his game, and nothing will slip through."

His thoughts once turned upon Rosa, the colonel could talk of little else, and Cueto realized that the girl had indeed made a deep impression upon him. The overseer was well pleased, and when Cobo finally took himself off to bed he followed in better spirits than he had enjoyed for some time. For one thing, it was agreeable to look forward to a night of undisturbed repose. Pancho's apprehensions had fattened upon themselves, and he had been living of late in a nightmare of terror.

But it seemed to him that he had barely closed his eyes when he was awakened by a tremendous vibration and found himself in the center of the floor, undecided whether he had been hurled from his bed or whether he had leaped thither. Still in a daze, he heard a shout from the direction of Cobo's room, then a din of other voices, followed by a rush of feet; the next instant his door was flung back and he saw, by the light of high-held torches, Esteban Varona and a ragged rabble of black men. Cueto knew that he faced death. He uttered a shrill scream of terror,