Uncle Adan had been taken ill. He was suffering from the exhalations of
the swamp land through which he must travel to clear the river field. He
had that and the cacao patch both on his mind. There was a general air
of carelessness about the plantation of San Isidro which had never
obtained before since Agueda's memory of the place. The peons and
workmen lounged about the outhouses and stables, lazily doing the work
that was absolutely needed, but there was no one to give orders, and
there was no one who seemed to long for them. It appeared to be a
general holiday.
Uncle Adan lay and groaned in his bed at the further end of the veranda,
and wondered if the cacao seed had spoiled, or if it would hold good for
another day. When Agueda begged him to get some sleep, or to take his
quinine in preparation for the chill that must come, he only turned his
face to the wall and groaned that the place was going to rack and ruin
since those northerners had come down to the island. "I have seen the
Señor plant the cacao," said Agueda. "He had the Palandrez and the
Troncha and the Garcia-Garcito with him. He ordered, and they worked. I
went with them sometimes." Agueda sighed as she remembered those happy
days.
Uncle Adan turned his aching bones over, so that he could raise his
weary eyes to Agueda's.
"That is all true," he said. "The Señor can plant, no Colono better. But
one cannot plant the cacao and play the guitar at one and the same
time."
Agueda hung her head as if the blame of right belonged to her.
"You act as if I blamed you, and I do," said Uncle Adan, shivering in
the preliminary throes of his hourly chill. "You who have influence over
the Señor! You should exert it at once. The place is going to rack and
ruin, I tell you!"
Agueda turned and went out of the door. She was tired of the subject.
There was no use in arguing with Uncle Adan, either with regard to the
quinine or the visitors. She went to her own room, and took her hat from
the peg. When again she came out upon the veranda, she had a long stick
in one hand and a pail in the other. Then she visited the kitchen.
"Juana," she said, "fill this pail with water and tell Pablo and Eduardo
Juan that I need them at once."
She waited while this message was sent to the recalcitrant peons, who
lounged lazily toward the House at her summons.
"De Señorit' send fo' me?" asked Pablo.
"I sent for both of you," said Agueda. "Why have you done no cacao
planting to-day?"
"Ain' got no messages," replied Pablo, who seemed to have taken upon
himself the rôle of general responder.
"You know very well that it is the messages that make no difference.
Bring your machetes, both of you," ordered Agueda, "and come with me to
the hill patch."
For answer the peons drew their machetes lazily from their sheaths.
"I knew that you had them, of course. Come, then! I am going to the
field. Where is the cacao, Pablo?"
"Wheah Ah leff 'em," answered Pablo.
"And where is that?"
"In de hill patch, Seño'it'."
"And did some one, perhaps, mix the wood ashes with them?"