or was her
attention fixed on the trays of loose pearls, nor on the diamonds--she
had completely forgotten herself and was all ears. Her husband himself,
the great Capitan Toringoy,--a transformation of the name Domingo,--the
happiest man in the district, without other occupation than to dress
well, eat, loaf, and gossip, while his whole family worked and toiled,
had not gone to join his coterie, but was listening between fear and
emotion to the hair-raising news of the lank Chichoy.

Nor was reason for all this lacking. Chichoy had gone to deliver some
work for Don Timoteo Pelaez, a pair of earrings for the bride, at the
very time when they were tearing down the kiosk that on the previous
night had served as a dining-room for the foremost officials. Here
Chichoy turned pale and his hair stood on end.

"_Naku_!" he exclaimed, "sacks and sacks of powder, sacks of powder
under the floor, in the roof, under the table, under the chairs,
everywhere! It's lucky none of the workmen were smoking."

"Who put those sacks of powder there?" asked Capitana Loleng, who was
brave and did not turn pale, as did the enamored Momoy. But Momoy had
attended the wedding, so his posthumous emotion can be appreciated:
he had been near the kiosk.

"That's what no one can explain," replied Chichoy. "Who would have any
interest in breaking up the fiesta? There couldn't have been more than
one, as the celebrated lawyer Senor Pasta who was there on a visit
declared--either an enemy of Don Timoteo's or a rival of Juanito's."

The Orenda girls turned instinctively toward Isagani, who smiled
silently.

"Hide yourself," Capitana Loleng advised him. "They may accuse
you. Hide!"

Again Isagani smiled but said nothing.

"Don Timoteo," continued Chichoy, "did not know to whom to attribute
the deed. He himself superintended the work, he and his friend Simoun,
and nobody else. The house was thrown into an uproar, the lieutenant
of the guard came, and after enjoining secrecy upon everybody, they
sent me away. But--"

"But--but--" stammered the trembling Momoy.

"_Naku!_" ejaculated Sensia, gazing at her fiance and trembling
sympathetically to remember that he had been at the fiesta. "This
young man--If the house had blown up--" She stared at her sweetheart
passionately and admired his courage.

"If it had blown up--"

"No one in the whole of Calle Anloague would have been left alive,"
concluded Capitan Toringoy, feigning valor and indifference