I have lost the sweetest wife--" "_Misericordia! Misericordia! Pobre amigo mio!_ Oh, how sorry I am; how much I pity you!" And the dear lady, now a stately and handsome matron, fell a-weeping out of pure tenderness, and I had to tell her the sad story of the quenching of Quipai and Angela's death.

But the telling of it, together with Juanita's sympathy, did me good, and I went away in much better spirits than I had come.

Salvador, she said, would be back in a few days, and she much regretted not being able to offer me quarters; it was contrary to the custom of the place and Spanish etiquette for ladies to entertain gentlemen visitors during their husbands' absence.
After leaving Juanita I walked round by the guard-house in which I had been imprisoned, and through the ruins where Carmen and I had hidden when we were making our escape.

They suggested some stirring memories--Carera (who, as I learned from Juanita, had been dead several years) and his chivalrous friendship; Salvador and his reckless courage; our midnight ride; Gahra and the bivouac by the mountain-tarn (poor Gahra, what had become of him ?); Majia and his guerillas; Griscelli and his blood-hounds (how I hated that man, but surely by this time he had got his deserts); Gondocori and Queen Mamcuna; the man-killer; and Quipai.
My mind was still busied with these memories when I reached the hotel.
There seemed to be much more going on than there had been earlier in the day--horsemen were coming and going, servants hurrying to and fro, people promenading on the _patio_, a group of uniformed officers deep in conversation.

One of them, a tall, rather stout man, with grizzled hair, a pair of big epaulettes, and a coat covered with gold lace, had his back toward me, and as my eye fell on his sword-hilt it struck me that I had seen something like it before.