I saw Lilla but once alone, and then the encounter was not of my
seeking. She came up to me, though, with a sweet, sad expression in her
face and a trusting look in her eyes that made my heart bound, as she
laid her hands in mine and thanked me for what she called my gallantry;
and I was so taken up by her words that I hardly noticed the scowl
Garcia gave as he came in. In fact, just then my heart felt so large
that in my joy I could have shaken hands with him so warmly that I
should have made the bones of that fishy fin of his crack again.
But there was no handshaking: Garcia walking to the window and lighting
a cigar, while Lilla hurried from the room, as was now her custom when
Garcia came.
The first flush of joy passed and I was alone with the half-breed, to
feel how impossible any friendly feeling was between us; and seeing that
he was disposed to do nothing but stare at me in a half-sneering,
half-scowling fashion, I strolled out, paying no heed to the burning sun
as I made for the woods, where the trees screened me; and then on and on
I went, mile after mile, through the hot steamy twilight, amidst giants
of vegetation hoary with moss. Beast or reptile, harmless or noxious,
troubled me little now, for I was in pursuit of the golden idol of my
thoughts, winning it from its concealment, and then, with everything
around gilded by its lustre, living in a future that was all happiness
and joy.
But I was not always dreaming. At times I searched eagerly in places
that I thought likely to be the homes of buried Peruvian treasure;
without avail, though, for I had no guide--nothing but tradition and the
misty phantoms of bygone readings.
To the people at the hacienda my wanderings must have seemed absurd, for
though I took my gun I never brought anything back. This day game was
in abundance, but I did not heed it--only wandered on till I came to a
rugged part of the forest far up the mountain-side, and seated myself on
a lump of moss-grown rock in a gloomy, shady spot, tired and discouraged
by the thought that I was pursuing a phantom.
What should I do, then? I asked myself. Go, as my uncle advised, to
Texas? That meant separation; and yet I knew that I could not stay,
and, in spite of all my golden hopes, the future looked very black to
me. I kept putting it off, but it would come. I must look the
difficulty in the face--the end must arrive; and I laughed bitterly as I
thought of my prospect--even if such treasures as I had heard of did
exist--of finding either of them in the vast wilds spread for hundreds
of miles around.
My meditations were interrupted by the sharp crackle made by a dry twig
trampled upon by a foot; there was a rustling noise close behind me, and
as I turned I became aware of a face peering out at me from a dense bank
of creepers, as a voice whispered:
"Is your gun loaded, Mas'r Harry?"
"You here, Tom!" I exclaimed.
"Course I am!" said Tom indignantly. "What else did I come out here for
if it wasn't to take care of you? And a nice game you're carrying on--
playing bo-peep with a fellow! Here you are one minute, and I says to
myself, `He won't go out this morning.' Next moment I look round, and
you're gone! But this here sort of thing won't do, sir! If you're
going on like this I shall give notice to leave, or else I shall never
get back alive."
"Why not?" I said, laughing at his anxious face.
"'Cause of these here rambling ways of yours, sir."
"And if I take care, pray what danger is there in them, Tom?"
"Care--care!" echoed Tom. "Why, that's what you don't take, sir. I'm
`Care,' and you leave me at home. You don't say, `Come and look after
me, Tom,' but go on trusting to yourself, while all the time you're like
some one in a dream."
"But what is there to be afraid of, Tom?"
"Sarpints, sir!"
"Pooh, Tom! We can shoot them, eh?--even if they are a hundred feet
long! Well, what else?"
Tom grinned before he spoke.
"Jaggers, sir!"
"Seldom out except of a night, Tom."
"Fevers, sir!"
"Only in the low river-side parts, Tom. We're hundreds of feet above
the river here."
"Snakes in the grass, sir!"
"Pooh, Tom! They always glide off when they hear one coming."
"Not my sort, Mas'r Harry," said Tom in an anxious whisper. "They're a
dangerous sort, with a kind of captain, and he's a half-breed. If you
will have it, and won't listen to reason, you must. Mas'r Harry,
there's snakes in the grass--Indian-looking chaps who watch your every
step, sir. You haven't thought it; but I've always been on the
look-out, and as they've watched you, I've watched them. But they got
behind me to-day, Mas'r Harry, and saw me; and I don't know what to
think--whether Muster Garcia has sent 'em, or whether they think you are
looking for anything of theirs. You don't think it, Mas'r Harry, but at
this very minute they're busy at work watching us."