The man must evidently have raised his arm to strike him, else the
dog would not have thus interposed, and then, had the stranger been
an honest man, he would have paused to explain, instead of
disappearing thus.
"I must be on my guard; there are assassins hereabouts," he said to
himself, and after a moment's fondling of the hound, who had
instantly recognized him, he once more drew nearer to the Plato,
when suddenly the palace bell sounded the alarm of fire. His duty
called him instantly to return, which he was forced to do.
It was past midnight before the fire was quenched, and Lorenzo Bezan
dismissed the guard and extra watch that had been ordered out at the
first alarm, and himself, greatly fatigued by his exertions and care
in subduing the fire, which in Havana is done under the direction
and assistance of the military, always, he threw himself on his
couch, and fell fast asleep.
Early the subsequent morning, he despatched a line to Isabella
Gonzales, saying that on the evening of that day he would answer in
person her dear communication; and that though pressing duty had
kept him from her side, she was never for one moment absent from his
heart. He begged that Ruez might come to him in the meantime, and he
did so at once.
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