gnacio, resigned now to driving all night (and to having
perhaps his throat cut before daylight) looked back surlily over his
shoulder.

"Drive carefully," cried Mrs. Gould in a tremulous voice.

"Si, carefully; si nina," he mumbled, chewing his lips, his round
leathery cheeks quivering. And the landau rolled slowly out of the
light.

"I will see them as far as the ford," said Charles Gould to his wife.
She stood on the edge of the sidewalk with her hands clasped lightly,
and nodded to him as he followed after the carriage. And now the windows
of the Amarilla Club were dark. The last spark of resistance had died
out. Turning his head at the corner, Charles Gould saw his wife crossing
over to their own gate in the lighted patch of the street. One of
their neighbours, a well-known merchant and landowner of the province,
followed at her elbow, talking with great gestures. As she passed in all
the lights went out in the street, which remained dark and empty from
end to end.

The houses of the vast Plaza were lost in the night. High up, like a
star, there was a small gleam in one of the towers of the cathedral;
and the equestrian statue gleamed pale against the black trees of the
Alameda, like a ghost of royalty haunting the scenes of revolution. The
rare prowlers they met ranged themselves against the wall. Beyond the
last houses the carriage rolled noiselessly on the soft cushion of dust,
and with a greater obscurity a feeling of freshness seemed to fall from
the foliage of the trees bordering the country road. The emissary from
Hernandez's camp pushed his horse close to Charles Gould.

"Caballero," he said in an interested voice, "you are he whom they call
the King of Sulaco, the master of the mine? Is it not so?"

"Yes, I am the master of the mine," answered Charles Gould.

The man cantered for a time in silence, then said, "I have a brother, a
sereno in your service in the San Tome valley. You have proved yourself
a just man. There has been no wrong done to any one since you called
upon the people to work in the mountains. My brother says that no
official of the Government, no oppressor of the Campo, has been seen on
your side of the stream. Your own officials do not oppress the people
in the gorge. Doubtless they are afraid of your severity. You are a just
man and a powerful one," he added.

He spoke in an abrupt, independent tone, but evidently he was
communicative with a purpose. He told Charles Gould that h