lump of
trees on the edge of the belt as a starting-point; and after a search of
half an hour I succeeded in finding the old man's hiding-place. First I
saw smoke again through an opening in the trees, then a small rude hut
of sticks and palm leaves. Approaching cautiously, I peered through a
crack and discovered old Nuflo engaged in smoking some meat over a fire,
and at the same time grilling some bones on the coals. He had captured
a coatimundi, an animal somewhat larger than a tame tom-cat, with a long
snout and long ringed tail; one of the dogs was gnawing at the animal's
head, and the tail and the feet were also lying on the floor, among
the old bones and rubbish that littered it. Stealing round, I suddenly
presented myself at the opening to his den, when the dogs rose up with a
growl and Nuflo instantly leaped to his feet, knife in hand.

"Aha, old man," I cried, with a laugh, "I have found you at one of your
vegetarian repasts; and your grass-eating dogs as well!"

He was disconcerted and suspicious, but when I explained that I had seen
a smoke while on the hills, where I had gone to search for a curious
blue flower which grew in such places, and had made my way to it to
discover the cause, he recovered confidence and invited me to join him
at his dinner of roast meat.

I was hungry by this time and not sorry to get animal food once more;
nevertheless, I ate this meat with some disgust, as it had a rank taste
and smell, and it was also unpleasant to have those evil-looking dogs
savagely gnawing at the animal's head and feet at the same time.

"You see," said the old hypocrite, wiping the grease from his moustache,
"this is what I am compelled to do in order to avoid giving offence. My
granddaughter is a strange being, sir, as you have perhaps observed--"

"That reminds me," I interrupted, "that I wish you to relate her history
to me. She is, as you say, strange, and has speech and faculties unlike
ours, which shows that she comes of a different race."

"No, no, her faculties are not different from ours. They are sharper,
that is all. It pleases the All-Powerful to give more to some than to
others. Not all the fingers on the hand are alike. You will find a man
who will take up a guitar and make it speak, while I--"

"All that I understand," I broke in again. "But her origin, her
history--that is what I wish to hear."

"And that, sir, is precisely what I am about to relate. Poor child,
she was left on my ha