ivid against yellow, across
the upper lip. He had a large mouth, high cheek-bones, and swarthy skin
with a copperish tinge. He was a pure-blooded Indian. At twelve he did
not know a word of Spanish. His race, the Zapotecas of Oaxaca, had all
but been extinguished by the Conquest. Except for the ungainly black he
wore--excepting, too, his character--he might have been a peon, or still
the servant he once had been. But the homely, heavy features of his
round head did not, in any sense, repel. On the contrary, the
countenance was frank, though yet inscrutable. The piercing black eyes
were good eyes, and indomitable, like his muscled jaw. The flat, square
forehead made one aware of intellect, and of force. So short and thick,
he looked a sluggish man, but it was the phlegm of a rock, the calm of
strength, and whatever the peril, almost inanimate. His country called
him Benemerito de America, a title the noblest and rarest in its Spartan
hint of civic virtue.

The Indian's desk was littered with messages from the princes of the
earth. Like his expiring race, he had fought their order, and they had
made of him a wandering fugitive. But now they were imploring him for
one of their number, whose surrendered sword that moment lay across
their petitions. Two of the letters, but not from princes, he had read
with deep consideration. One was from the President of the United
States, the other from Victor Hugo. But these also he shoved from him,
though regretfully, and now he was gazing out over the Plaza, the line
of his jaw as inflexible as ever.

But they were not many, the moments this man had to himself, and it was
not long before a gendarme in coarse blue, serving as an orderly,
disturbed him.

"Well, show her in then," he said, frowning at the card laid on his
desk, nor did he rise when an unusually beautiful but very grave young
woman entered the room.

"At your orders, Senorita de--d'Aumerle. You come, I suppose, to save
him?--But," he added with the austerity of a parent, "it is not
difficult to imagine why _you_ are interested."

"No, Senor Presidente," he heard himself quietly contradicted, "Your
Excellency can not imagine."

He looked up, into a pair of honest gray eyes. But her tone had already
told him enough. He rose to his feet in rugged courtesy. The Indian was
a wise man, and he knew now that other men had whispered falsely about
one exquisite Parisienne.

"Pardon me, child," he said gently. "No, I cannot