HKB
"Colonel Guerra!" exclaimed Ned. "What has brought him all the way from Vera Cruz? Has our army come? Is the city taken?"
Nothing of that kind had yet occurred, but there was a reason for the arrival of the trusted commander of the important fortress on the sea. Ned was very near him when the horse fell, and his rider sprang to the earth, covered with dust and evidently in great excitement. The officers at the gate rushed forward toward him, and one of them loudly demanded:
"Colonel Guerra! What is it? Has he come? All is ready here!"
Guerra himself had not fallen with his horse. Off came his hat and his sword flashed from the sheath, while his voice rang out clearly, fiercely:
"Viva Santa Anna! The entire force at Vera Cruz and the garrison of San Juan de Ulua have pronounced for him. He is now on his way home from Havana. We shall soon have with us the one hero who can save us from the American invaders and from the tyranny of King Paredes!"
Possibly, this had been the day calculated upon for the arrival of precisely such tidings. It might even have been that all these officers and soldiers were gathered there, prepared both to hear and to act, while President Paredes should be temporarily absent from the city. At all events, they were swinging their hats, drawing their swords, and their enthusiastic acclamations for the returning general were at once followed by a rush back into the citadel and a hasty closing of its gates. When that was done, and when the rest of the garrison had joined in "pronouncing" for Santa Anna, the military control of the Mexican capital had passed out of the hands of President Paredes.
It was startling news, therefore, which was brought out to him by a friendly messenger, as he rode so proudly on in front of his shouting soldiery, believing that they were all his own and ready to do his bidding. The grand review ended instantaneously, and he came galloping back in all haste to look out for his tumbling crown. He came with his brilliant staff and a mixed crowd of friends and unfriends, only to discover that crown and throne and scepter had disappeared like the changing figures in a kaleidoscope. He could not even order anybody to be arrested and shot, for the Vice-President, General Bravo, and all the members of the national Congress, then in session, were thoughtfully saying to themselves, if not to each other:
"Santa Anna is coming! The seacoast forces are already his. He will be right here in a few days. We must be careful what we say or do just now. We do not even know what these new troops will say to this thing."
They were not to remain long in ignorance upon that point. As the news went out from regiment to regiment that afternoon, the undisciplined, ragged mobs of raw recruits began to shout for Santa Anna. Perhaps many of them had previously served under the one-legged veteran of the old French and Texan wars and at least half a dozen revolutions.