which Valencians embrace under the general
and rather vague designation of _La Ribera_, there was no one unfamiliar
with the name of Brull and the political power it stood for.

As if national unity had not yet been effected and the country were
still divided into _taifas_ and _waliatos_ as in the days when one
Moorish King reigned over Carlet, another over Denia, and a third over
Jativa, the election system maintained a sort of inviolable rulership in
every district; and when the Administration people came to Alcira in
forecasting their political prospects, they always said the same thing:

"We're all right there. We can rely on Brull."

The Brull dynasty had been bossing the district for thirty years, with
ever-increasing power.

The founder of this sovereign house had been Rafael's grandfather, the
shrewd don Jaime, who had established the family fortune by fifty years
of slow exploitation of ignorance and poverty. He began life as a clerk
in the _Ayuntamiento_ of Alcira; then he became secretary to the
municipal judge, then assistant to the city clerk, then
assistant-registrar of deeds. There was not a subordinate position in
those offices where the poor come in contact with the law that he did
not get his hands on; and from such points of vantage, by selling
justice as a favor and using power or adroitness to subdue the
refractory, he felt his way along, appropriating parcel after parcel of
that fertile soil which he adored with a miser's covetousness.

A brazen charlatan he was, every moment talking of "Article Number
So-and-So" of the law that applied to the case. The poor orchard workers
came to have as much awe for his learning as fear of his malice, and in
all their controversies they sought his advice and paid for it, as if he
were a lawyer.

When he had gotten a small fortune together, he continued holding his
menial posts in the city administration to retain the superstitious
respect which is inspired in peasant-folk by all who are on good terms
with the law; but not content with playing the eternal beggar, dependent
on the humble gratuities of the poor, he took to pulling them out of
their financial difficulties, lending them money on the collateral of
their future harvests.

But six per cent seemed too petty a profit for him. The real plight of
these folk came when a horse died and they had to buy another. Don Jaime
became a dealer in dray horses, buying more or less defective animals
from gypsie