“You knew Santa Coloma, then?” I said. “But you are mistaken, he was not killed at San Paulo, he made his escape.”
“So they say—the ignorant ones,” he returned. “But he is dead, for he loved his country, and all who are of that mind are slain. How should he escape?”
“I tell you he is not dead,” I repeated, vexed at his stubborn persistence. “I also knew him, old man, and was with him at San Paulo.”
He looked at me for a long time, and then took another swig from his bottle.
“Señor, this is not a thing I love joking about,” said he. “Let us talk of other things. What I want to know is, what is Calixto’s sister doing here? Why has she left her country?”
Receiving no reply to this question, he went on: “Has she not got property? Yes, a large estancia, impoverished, ruined, if you like, but still a very large tract of land. When your enemies do not fear you, then they cease to persecute. A broken old man, bereft of reason—surely they would not trouble him! No, no, she is leaving her country for other reasons. Yes, there is some private plot against her; some design, perhaps, to carry her off, or even to destroy her and get possession of her property. Naturally, in such a case, she would fly for protection to Buenos Aires, where there is one with some of her blood in his veins able to protect her person and her property.”
I was astonished to hear him, but his last words were a mystery to me.
“There is no one in Buenos Aires to protect her,” I said; “I only will be there as I am here to shield her, and if, as you think, she has an enemy, he must reckon with me—one who, like that Calixto you speak of, has a hand quick to strike.”
“There spoke the heart of a Blanco!” he exclaimed, clutching my arm, and then, the boat giving a lurch at that moment, almost dragging me down in his efforts to steady himself. After another sip of rum he went on: “But who are you, young sir, if that is not an impertinent question? Do you possess money, influence, powerful friends, that you take upon yourself the care of this woman? Is it in your power to baffle and crush her enemy or enemies, to protect not only her person, but her property, which, in her absence, will become the prey of robbers?”
“And who are you, old man?” I returned, unable to give a satisfactory answer to one of his searching questions, “and why do you ask me these things? And who is this powerful person you speak of in Buenos Aires with some of her blood in his veins, but of whose existence she is ignorant?”
He shook his head silently, then deliberately proceeded to take out and light a cigarette. He smoked with a placid enjoyment which made me think that his refusal of my cigar and his bitter complaints about the effects of the ship’s tossing on him had merely been to get the bottle of rum out of me. He was evidently a veteran in more senses than one, and now, finding that I would tell him no more secrets, he refused to answer any questions. Fearing that I had imprudently told him too much already, I finally left him and retired to my bunk.
Next morning we arrived at Buenos Aires, and cast anchor about two miles from shore, for that was as near the land as we could get. Presently we were boarded by a Custom House officer, and for some time longer I was engaged in getting out our luggage and in bargaining with the captain to put us on shore. When I had completed these arrangements I was very much surprised to see the cunning old soldier I had talked with the evening before sitting in the Custom House boat, which was just putting off from the side. Demetria had been looking on when the old fellow had left the ship, and she now came to me looking very excited.
“Richard,” she said, “did you notice that man who was a passenger with us and who has just gone off in the boat? It is Santa Coloma.”
“Oh, absurd!” I exclaimed. “I talked with that old man last night for an hour—an old grey-bearded gaucho, and no more like Santa Coloma than that sailor.”
“I know I am right,” she returned. “The General has visited my father at the estancia and I know him well. He is disguised now and has made himself look like a peasant, but when he went over the side into the boat he looked full into my face; I knew him and started, then he smiled, for he saw that I had recognised him.”
The very fact that this common-looking old man had gone on shore in the Custom House boat proved that he was a person of consequence in disguise, and I could not doubt that Demetria was right. I felt excessively annoyed at myself for having failed to penetrate his disguise; for something of the old Marcos Marcó style of speaking might very well have revealed his identity if I had only had my wits about me. I was also very much concerned on Demetria’s account, for it seemed that I had missed finding out something for her which would have been to her advantage to know. I was ashamed to tell her of that conversation about a relation in Buenos Aires, but secretly determined to try and find Santa Coloma to get him to tell me what he knew.
After landing we put our small luggage into a fly and were driven to an hotel in Calle Lima, an out-of-the-way place kept by a German; but I knew the house to be a quiet, respectable one and very moderate in its charges.
About five o’clock in the afternoon we were together in the sitting-room on the
