the stately Antonia looked more mature and infinitely calm; but she would never have known how to reconcile the sudden sinkings of her heart with an amiable mobility of expression.

Mrs Gould smiled a good-bye at Barrios, nodded round to the Europeans (who raised their hats simultaneously) with an engaging invitation, `I hope to see you all presently, at home'; then said nervously to Decoud, `Get in, Don Martin,' and heard him mutter to himself in French, as he opened the carriage door, `Le sort en est jete.' She heard him with a sort of exasperation. Nobody ought to have known better than himself that the first cast of dice had been already thrown long ago in a most desperate game. Distant acclamations, words of command yelled out, and a roll of drums on the jetty greeted the departing general. Something like a slight faintness came over her, and she looked blankly at Antonia's still face, wondering what would happen to Charley if that absurd man failed. `A la casa, Ignacio,' she cried at the motionless broad back of the coachman, who gathered the reins without haste, mumbling to himself under his breath, `Si, la casa. Si, si, nina.'

The carriage rolled noiselessly on the soft track, the shadows fell long on the dusty little plain interspersed with dark bushes, mounds of turned-up earth, low wooden buildings with iron roofs of the Railway Company; the sparse row of telegraph poles strode obliquely clear of the town, bearing a single, almost invisible wire far into the great campo--like a slender, vibrating feeler of that progress waiting outside for a moment of peace to enter and twine itself about the weary heart of the land.

The cafe window of the Albergo d'Italia Una was full of sunburnt, whiskered faces of railway men. But at the other end of the house, the end of the Signori Inglesi, old Giorgio, at the door with one of his girls on each side, bared his bushy head, as white as the snows of Higuerota. Mrs Gould stopped the carriage. She seldom failed to speak to the protege; moreover, the excitement, the heat, and the dust had made her thirsty. She asked for a glass of water. Giorgio sent the children indoors for it, and approached with pleasure expressed in his whole rugged countenance. It was not often that he had occasion to see his benefactress, who was also an Englishwoman--another title to his regard. He offered some excuses for his wife. It was a bad day with her; her oppressions--he tapped his own broad chest. She could not move from her chair that day.

Decoud, ensconced in the corner of his seat, observed gloomily Mrs Gould's old revolutionist, then, offhand:

`Well, and what do you think of it all, Garibaldino?'

Old Giorgio, looking at him with some curiosity, said civilly that the troops had marched very well. One- eyed Barrios and his officers had done wonders with the recruits in a short time. Those indios, only caught the other day, had gone swinging past in double-quick time, like bersaglieri; they looked well fed, too, and had whole uniforms. `Uniforms!' he repeated with a half-smile of pity. A look of grim retrospect stole over his piercing, steady eyes. It had been otherwise in his time when men fought against tyranny, in the forests of Brazil, or on the plains of Uruguay, starving on half-raw beef without salt, half naked, with often only a knife tied to a stick for a weapon. `And yet we used to prevail against the oppressor,' he concluded, proudly.

His animation fell; the slight gesture of his hand expressed discouragement; but he added that he had asked one of the sergeants to show him the new rifle. There was no such weapon in his fighting days; and if Barrios could not--

`Yes, yes,' broke in Don Jose, almost trembling with eagerness. `We are safe. The good Senor Viola is a man of experience. Extremely deadly--is it not so? You have accomplished your mission admirably, my dear Martin.'

Decoud, lolling back moodily, contemplated old Viola.

`Ah! Yes. A man of experience. But who are you for, really, in your heart?'


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