“I presume,” he said, and he seemed to Ned to bite each word, “that you meant to go to the Texans with the lying message that the word of the most illustrious General Santa Anna was not to be believed?”

“I meant to go with such a message,” said Ned proudly, “but it would not be a lying one.”

Knowing that he was already condemned he resolved to seek no subterfuge.

“The President cannot be insulted in my presence,” said Cos ominously.

“He is only a boy, General,” said Almonte appealingly.

“Boys can do mischief,” said Cos, “and this seems to be an unusually cunning and wicked one.  You are zealous, Colonel Almonte, I will give you that much credit, but you do not hate the Gringos enough.”

Almonte flushed, but he bowed and said nothing.  Cos turned again to Ned.

“You will bear no message to the Texans,” he said.  “I think that instead you will stay a long time in this hospitable Mexico of ours.”

Ned paled a little.  The words were full of menace, and he knew that they came straight from the cruel heart of Cos.  But his pride would not permit him to reply.

“You will be kept under close guard,” said the General.  “I will give that duty to the men of Tlascala.  They are infantry and to-morrow you march on foot with them.  Colonel Almonte, you did well to take the prisoner, but you need trouble yourself no longer about him.”

Two men of the Tlascalan company were summoned and they took Ned with them.  The name “Tlascala” had appealed to Ned at first.  It was the brave Tlascalan mountaineers who had helped Cortez and who had made possible his conquest of the great Mexican empire.  But these were not the Tlascalans of that day.  They were a mongrel breed, short, dirty and barefooted.  He ate of the food they gave him, said nothing, and lay down on his serape to seek sleep.  Almonte came to him there.

“I feared this,” he said.  “I would have saved you from General Cos had I been able.”

“I know it,” said Ned warmly, “and I want to thank you, Colonel Almonte.”

Almonte held out his hand and Ned grasped it.  Then the Mexican strode away.  Ned lay back again and watched the darkness thin as the moon and stars came out.  Far off the silver cone of Orizaba appeared like a spear point against the sky.  It towered there in awful solemnity above the strife and passion of the world.  Ned looked at it long, and gradually it became a beacon of light to him, his “pillar of flame” by night.  It was the last thing he saw as he fell asleep, and there was no thought then in his mind of the swart and menacing Cos.

They resumed the march early in the morning.  Ned no longer had his patient burro, but walked on foot among the Tlascalans.  Often he saw General Cos riding ahead on a magnificent white horse.  Sometimes the peons stood on the slopes and looked at them but generally they kept far from the marching army.  Ned surmised that they had no love of military service.