“Sister,” whispered Ruez, “did you hear what those people said?”

“What, brother?”

“Why, that the page saved the life of the lieutenant-governor, Lorenzo Bezan?”

“Yes.”

“He must have been hard by, for the page had only just left us.”

“True.”

“Yet he was not with the rest who entered the house,” continued Ruez.

“No,” answered Isabella, “some one said he hastened away for a surgeon.”

“Hark!”

“Who called you, just now, sister?” asked the brother.

“It was only the groan of that poor boy.  I wish they would bring the surgeon.”

“But he calls your name; go to him, dear Isabella.”

“O, they have found the surgeon, and here he comes,” said his sister.

And thus indeed it was.  Entering the apartment, the surgeon prepared to examine the wound, but in a moment he called to Isabella, saying: 

“Lady, this individual is one of thine own sex! and, I am very sorry to say, is mortally wounded.”

“A woman!”

“Yes, lady; see, she would speak to you; she beckons you near.”

“Lady, I need not ask what that professional man says.  I know too well by my own feelings that I must die, indeed that I am dying!”

“O, say not so; perhaps there may yet be hopes,” said Isabella, tenderly.

“Nay, there is none; indeed it is better, far better as it is.”

“Why, do you wish to die?” asked Isabella, almost shrinking from her.

“Yes.  There is nought left for me to live for, and it is sweet to die, too, for him, for him I have so dearly, so truly loved!”

“Of whom do you speak?”

“General Bezan!”

“You love him?”

“Ay, lady, I believe far better than you can ever do.”

“Me!”

“Yes, for I know your own heart, and his true love for you!”

“Who are you?”

“That matters not.  But where is he?  I thought he followed me here.”

“He went for the surgeon, and I have not seen him,” was the reply.

Isabella trembled, for at that moment General Bezan, hastening back from the surgeon’s, and despatching some matter that occurred by the way, now entered the house, and was greeted most cordially by Don Gonzales and Ruez.  And from them he learned the extent of the injury, and, moreover, that the supposed page was a woman, disguised in a page’s costume.

“Ah, general!” said Don Gonzales, “I fear, this is some little affair of gallantry on your part that will result rather seriously.”

“Be assured, sir,” said the soldier, “that I cannot in any way explain the matter, and that I think there is some decided mistake here.”

“Let us go to her apartment and see what can be done for her injury,” said General Bezan, after a moment’s pause, “be she whom she may.”