anned to massacre all the Spaniards. His band attacked
the convent and the barracks. They say many of them escaped. The
guards burned Don Crisostomo's house, and if he hadn't been arrested,
they would have burned him, too."

"They burned the house?"

"You can still see the smoke from here," said the narrator.

Everybody looked: a column of smoke was rising against the sky. Then
the comments began, some pitying, some accusing.

"Poor young man!" cried the husband of Sister Puta.

"What!" cried the sister. "You are ready to defend a man that heaven
has so plainly punished? You'll find yourself arrested too. You uphold
a falling house!"

The husband was silent; the argument had told.

"Yes," went on the old woman. "After striking down Father Damaso,
there was nothing left but to kill Father Salvi!"

"But you can't deny he was a good child."

"Yes, he was good," replied the old woman; "but he went to Europe,
and those who go to Europe come back heretics, the curates say."

"Oho!" said the husband, taking his advantage. "And the curate, and
all the curates, and the archbishop, and the pope, aren't they all
Spaniards? What? And are they heretics?"

Happily for Sister Puta, the conversation was cut short. A servant
came running, pale and horror-stricken.

"A man hung--in our neighbor's garden!" she gasped.

A man hung! Nobody stirred.

"Let's come and see," said the old man, rising.

"Don't go near him," cried Sister Puta, "'twill bring us misfortune. If
he's hung, so much the worse for him!"

"Let me see him, woman. You, Juan, go and inform them at the tribunal;
he may not be dead." And the old man went off, the women, even Sister
Puta, following at a distance, full of fear, but also of curiosity.

Hanging from the branch of a sandal tree in the garden a human body
met their gaze. The brave man examined it.

"We must wait for the authorities; he's been dead a long time,"
he said.

Little by little the women drew near.

"It's the new neighbor," they whispered. "See the scar on his face?"

In half an hour the authorities arrived.

"People are in a great hurry to die!" said the directorcillo, cocking
his pen behind his ear, and he began his investigation.

Meanwhile a peasant wearing a great salakat on his head and having
his neck muffled was examining the body and the cord. He noticed
several evidences that the man was dead before he was hung. The
curious countryman noticed also that the clothing se