ait there in that open place. I was
compelled to seek shelter. Troops were running from town and citadel.
I avoided them by a miracle. And my sole concern then was your safety."

"Oh, my safety!" she wailed brokenly. "How does it avail me that my
friends should be slain? Why was I not with them? I would rather have
died as they died than live in the knowledge that I was the cause of
their death."

San Benavides essayed a confidential hand on her shoulder. She shrank
from him; he was not pleased but he purred amiably:

"Mademoiselle is profoundly unhappy. Under such circumstances one says
things that are unmerited, is it not? If anyone is to blame, it is my
wretched country, which cannot settle its political affairs without
bloodshed. Ah, mademoiselle, I weep with you, and tender you my most
respectful homage."

A deluge of tropical rain beat on the hut with a sudden fury.
Conversation at once became difficult, nearly impossible. Iris threw
herself back on the trestle in a passion of grief that rivaled the
outer tempest. San Benavides, by sheer force of habit, dusted his
clothes before sitting on the chair brought by Luisa Gomez. The
woman's frightened gaze had dwelt on Iris and him alternately while
they spoke. She understood no word that was said, but she gathered
that the news brought by this handsome officer was tragic, woeful,
something that would wring the heartstrings.

"Was there fighting, senhor?" she asked, close to his ear, her voice
pitched in a key that conquered the storm.

He nodded. He was very tired, this dandy; now that Iris gave no
further heed to him, he was troubled by the prospects of the coming day.

"Were they soldiers who fought?"

He nodded again.

"No islanders?"

Then he raised a hand in protest, though he laughed softly.

"Your good man is safe, senhora," he said. "Marcel told him to go to
Sueste and tend his cattle. When he comes home it will be his duty to
inform the Governor that we are here. He will be rewarded, not
punished. _Sangue de Deus_! I may be shot at dawn. I pray you, let
me rest a while."

The girl, Manoela, weeping out of sympathy, crept to Iris's side and
gently stroked her hair. Like her mother, she could only guess that
the English lady's friends were captured, perhaps dead. Even her
limited experience of life's vicissitudes had taught her what short
shrift was given to those who defied authority. The Republic of Brazil
does not permi