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Title: Marivosa
Author: Baroness Orczy [Orczy, Emmuska] (1865-1947)
Date of first publication: 1930
Edition used as base for this ebook:
   London: Cassell, 1955
Date first posted: 15 October 2012
Date last updated: 15 October 2012
Project Gutenberg Canada ebook #1001

This ebook was produced by Al Haines






MARIVOSA


By

BARONESS ORCZY




CASSELL AND COMPANY LTD

LONDON




  CASSELL & CO. LTD.

  37/38 St. Andrew's Hill, Queen Victoria Street, London, E.C.4

  and at

  31/34 George IV Bridge, Edinburgh
  210 Queen Street, Melbourne
  26/30 Clarence Street, Sydney
  Uhlmann Road, Hawthorne, Brisbane
  C.P.O. 3031, Auckland, N.Z.
  1068 Broadview Avenue, Toronto 6
  P.O. Box 275, Cape Town
  P.O. Box 1386, Salisbury, S. Rhodesia
  Munsoor Building, Main Street, Colombo 11
  Haroon Chambers, South Napier Road, Karachi
  13/14 Ajmeri Gate Extension, New Delhi 1
  15 Graham Road, Ballard Estate, Bombay 1
  17 Chittaranjan Avenue, Calcutta 13
  Avenida 9 de Julho 1138, So Paulo
  Galeria Gemes, Escritorio 518/520 Florida 165, Buenos Aires
  P.O. Box 595, Accra, Gold Coast
  25 rue Henri Barbusse, Paris 56
  Islands Brygge 5, Copenhagen




  _First published 1930
  This edition 1955_




  PRINTED IN GREAT BRITAIN BY
  NORTHUMBERLAND PRESS LIMITED
  CATESHEAD ON TYNE
  555




_To_

ROBERT CUNNINGHAME GRAHAM


In token of admiration of that marvellous book _A Brazilian Mystic_,
without which this romance would never have been written.

EMMUSKA ORCZY

_La Padula,_
  _Lerici, Italy._




CONTENTS


_Book One_

THE PRELUDE TO THE ADVENTURE


_Book Two_

THE ODYSSEY


_Book Three_

THE GREAT ADVENTURE




_Book One_

THE PRELUDE TO THE ADVENTURE




I

In the closing years of the last century there arose in the wooded
highlands of Brazil a prophet whose name was Antonio Maciel.  Of mixed
Portuguese and Indian blood, this Maciel had been a store-keeper in his
father's business, had totted up accounts of black beans, tobacco and
coffee, and had made entries for so many milreis in his ledger.  Had it
not been for matrimonial troubles Antonio would probably have ended his
days peaceably and monotonously in the small provincial town of
Quisceramobim, with no excitement to disturb the even tenor of his
ways, save an occasional cock-fight on a Sunday, or a mock combat in
the market-place.

Unfortunately, in the backwoods of Brazil, as everywhere else, love has
its comedies and its tragedies; and even in the Sertao, surely the most
desolate, the most isolated, the most abandoned corner of God's earth,
the same dramas of love, jealousy and hate are enacted as in the
stately homes of England, or the boudoirs of Paris.  It is only the
_mise-en-scne_ that is different.  Antonio Maciel had the misfortune
to marry a woman of no morality and an ungovernable temper, who
indirectly became the cause of the most sanguinary religious conflict
of modern times.  Her intrigue with a police official of Bahia, a
friend of her husband's, became the turning-point in the career of the
peaceable store-keeper.  It roused the hot Portuguese blood in his
veins.  He came of a stock that had always held human life very
cheap--especially that of an enemy--and coming upon the treacherous
police official at a moment when his embittered soul was thirsting for
revenge, he fell upon the betrayer of his honour with holy fury, and
though he did not succeed in killing him, he inflicted grave bodily
injury upon the traitor.

For this he was imprisoned, and from prison he escaped.  Whither?  No
one knew.  For ten years he disappeared and was duly forgotten.  But
ten years later he reappeared, no longer however as a simple-minded,
hard-working storekeeper, but as a visionary and a prophet, preaching
the Word of God, the Second Advent of the Lord, the Antichrist and the
coming Day of Judgment.

Now the _vaqueiros_ of the Sertao, cattle-raisers most of them,
primitive, illiterate and wild, have a strong vein of mysticism and
superstitious religious fervour in their veins.  Catholics nominally,
but in reality professing what amounts to the simplest form of theism,
they know nothing and care less for the hierarchy of their Church.
They are intensely devout, and religion plays a very important part in
their lives; but as far as sacerdotalism is concerned, all they trouble
about is the one cur of their district, who will absolve them of their
sins, baptize them, marry and bury them; of Pope, hierarchy, and
articles of faith they have only vaguely heard.  Side by side, however,
with their outward acceptance of the cur's teachings, they keep up all
the old beliefs of their mixed ancestry--the power of the
snake-charmers, the Gri-gri men and devil-dancers from Africa, some
Moorish practices, and Indian fetishes and totems, any superstition in
fact that appeals to their imagination and to their mystic tendencies.

Suddenly then, in the midst of these primitive men, there
appeared--coming God knows whence--this tall, emaciated, unkempt
creature, clad in a loose robe, with prematurely grey hair and beard
fluttering around his parchment-coloured face, loudly proclaiming the
imminent destruction of the world by the sword of the Antichrist, and
the coming of the Kingdom of God, to which only the elect would
presently be called.  The appeal was immediate.  Men flocked around the
prophet like flies around a honeypot.  Casting aside their lassoes and
their goads, they followed him in their hundreds and their thousands
with their wives and their children; they looked upon him as a new John
the Baptist, of whom they had only vaguely heard, but who, they
believed, must have looked just like this prophet with the flashing
eyes and the tall pastoral staff.  They followed him; they obeyed him;
they echoed his prophecies that the world was now coming to an end, and
that therefore, deeds--whatever they were, good or evil--no longer
mattered; only prayer mattered, incessant prayer and abstinence which
would help to open the portals of the Kingdom of God to His elect.

Led by the erstwhile store-keeper, whom they now called Antonio
Conselheiro--Antonio the Counsellor--they trekked as far as the shores
of the Vasa Barris River; here they settled, and on a height
overlooking the valley they started building an immense church, with
their own homes and huts clustering on the surrounding slopes.  They
did no manner of harm to anyone, beyond consigning in their minds to
everlasting damnation all those who did not hold the same beliefs as
themselves.  They spent their time in chanting hymns, listening to the
prophet and building their church.

Why the Brazilian Government should have looked upon them as rebels and
revolutionaries, why it should have decreed the death of the prophet
and the destruction of his followers, it is impossible to say.  Antonio
Conselheiro was a religious fanatic, as misguided as you like, probably
with mind unhinged, but he was not out to make political trouble.  He
firmly believed that the world was shortly coming to an end, and that
therefore it mattered not what men did, so long as they 'kept in
communion with God.'  This meant fasting and praying and chanting
hymns.  There was no occasion to give alms to the poor, to love your
neighbour as yourself, to be faithful to your wife and provide for your
children, because there was really no time to bother about such things.
The world was coming to an end, and naturally the Almighty was only
going to trouble about people who were in constant communication with
Him--who never, as it were, allowed Him to forget them.

Well! there might have been a good deal of harm in such a theory if
preached in London, say, or New York, or Monte Carlo, but out there,
where never foot of stranger treads, where never a word from the
outside penetrates, where men live on horseback and have no thought of
other occupations save cattle-rearing, what in the world did it matter
what further superstitions made happier the lives of a few thousand
ignorant __vaqueiros__?  It must have been obvious to any sane official
that these men knew nothing about politics, that the words 'Republic'
and 'Empire' had no meaning whatever for them, and that 'Dom Pedro' or
'President X.Y.Z.' were all the same in their sight.  But, of course,
when the Government sent a military expedition against them, with Krupp
guns and other engines of war, they fought stubbornly, violently,
cruelly.  Some of their deeds rivalled the worst atrocities committed
during the religious wars in medival times, but had they been left
alone they would not have interfered with anyone; they would have
remained content to chant their hymns and to build their church, a law
unto themselves perhaps, but as they were so far away from anywhere and
had little, if any, intercourse with the rest of the world, the State
could not possibly have suffered at their hands.

No fewer than four military expeditions--each one of vastly-increased
strength--were sent out against these so-called rebels before they were
finally subdued ... annihilated would be the more correct word ... and
even then they were not subdued by force of arms, but by hunger and
disease.  They fought relentlessly to the last, giving no quarter,
asking for none.  Their women, wrapped in their blankets, starved to
death with Indian stoicism.  Their leaders were killed to a man.  At
last the prophet himself succumbed.  He was found one morning, at early
dawn, within the crumbling walls of the half-finished church, lying on
the floor face downwards, a crucifix gripped tightly in his hand.

To the last they chanted their hymns; and when the last of the walls of
the church fell crashing over the prostrate body of their prophet, when
their homes were nothing but a handful of smouldering ashes, the
soldiers of the Government encamped upon the heights could still hear
through the stillness of the night a murmur rising from the valley
below--long, mournful cadences that rose and fell like the soughing of
the wind through the scrub.  It was the song of the dying warriors,
still trusting in their God, still waiting to enter into His Kingdom,
and content in the belief that those who had brought them down were
speeding to eternal damnation.


The author is indebted to R. Cunninghame Graham's _A Brazilian Mystic_
for all the facts relating to the life and death of Antonio Conselheiro.




II

All this occurred little more than fifty years ago.  Nothing for years
was heard of the little band of fanatics who had given the Republican
Government so much trouble at the time; only a very few of them could
have survived the final suppression of that so-called rebellion, and
they presumably went back to their hard life and their peaceful
avocation of cattle-rearing.

But, strangely enough, some twenty-five years later, a new turbulent
element had sprung up in the Sertao.  It seemed all of a sudden as if
the strange events of the late 'nineties were being repeated, though in
a different form.  Again there arose a mystic leader with power to
gather round him a band of enthusiastic and devoted followers recruited
from among the half-civilized dwellers of these rocky fastnesses.
Unlike Antonio Conselheiro, however, this new prophet--or whatever one
chooses to call him--was not a religious enthusiast.  He preached
neither the coming of the Kingdom of God nor the end of the World and
the Advent of Christ.  In fact, he did not preach anything at all.  He
left this part of the business to his enthusiastic lieutenants.  Nor
was his life as ascetic or his aims as disinterested as those of the
great Antonio.  Who he was, or whence he came, no one knew.  Everything
was mere conjecture.  But those of his followers whom the exigencies of
business or labour brought into contact with the outside world spoke
with bated breath of the man whom they called the Great Unknown.

_Vaqueiros_, farmers, herdsmen, as well as outcasts of every sort,
Negroes, Indians, half-breeds, and a few gaol-birds, made up the sum
total of the followers of this new prophet.  The illiterate,
uneducated, primitive, declared that he was Antonio Conselheiro come to
life again: whilst those who were more enlightened, those who
occasionally consorted with their fellow-men and who came from time to
time to Bonfim or Joazeiro to sell their cattle or their hides, averred
that the Great Unknown was the grandson of Dom Pedro II, the last
Emperor of Brazil, come to claim the throne of his forebears.  How they
worked that out nobody could quite make out: certain it is that a
political atmosphere as well as a religious one hung over this new
version of an old story.  The Sertao appeared now like a second Vende
where men loyal to the old dynasty rallied round the person of their
dispossessed sovereign and were apparently prepared to fight and die in
his cause.  The fact that the grandsons of the late Emperor over in
France cared nothing about these fanatical upholders of their cause,
nor for the throne of Brazil for that matter, would not have obtained
credence in the Sertao for one moment.  Nor did these new Vendans
worry their heads as to the exact genealogy of the man they had decided
to champion.  They stood for a principle and a dynasty, not for an
individual, and they believed in the Great Unknown.  Heroes like
Lescure and La Rochejaquelin were to find their counterpart in men like
Gamalleria and Ouvidor, the fierce and fearsome lieutenants of the
Great Unknown.

At first nothing very serious happened to throw disquiet into the minds
of the Government up at Rio.  The only fact that could be called
disquieting was that the number of recruits to the banner of the
mysterious leader was growing with amazing rapidity.  The two men,
Gamalleria and Ouvidor, well known to the police as lawless marauders,
escaped gaol-birds in fact, were daily pushing their way to outlying
villages, farms, and even small towns, loudly heralding the Second
Advent of the Lord and the last Day of Judgment, whilst proclaiming the
Great Unknown as the prophet Antonio Conselheiro resurrected from the
dead or, alternatively, as Dom Pedro III of Bragana, rightful Emperor
of Brazil.

It was a clever way of rousing superstitious enthusiasm and allying it
with supposed loyalty to the dispossessed dynasty.  The more ignorant
crowd took up with fervour the idea of the mysterious leader being the
resurrected prophet, whilst to the more educated amongst them the
thought of overthrowing the present Government, which insisted on
levying and collecting taxes, made a strong appeal.

And, generally speaking, the personality of the Great Unknown made an
appeal stronger still to the mystically inclined minds of the
Sertanejos.  His band soon rose to a horde.  He collected them about
him and presently established his headquarters at Canudos, the spot
where Antonio Conselheiro had built his mammoth church.  Here he built
himself a dwelling-house, using for the purpose the very stones which
for over twenty years had stood, a crumbling mass, as a mausoleum over
the body of the sacred Counsellor; and here he had dwelt for the past
four or five years in barbaric splendour, with half a hundred women to
serve him and half a thousand men to scour the country round, robbing,
looting, stealing from peaceable farmers and town dwellers the food
which he needed for his table and the luxuries which he required for
his house.

His face was never seen save by an intimate few--a dozen lieutenants,
his body-guard--wild, marauding outlaws and escaped convicts with
tempers more fierce than the rest, voices more authoritative and powers
to compel obedience through ruthlessness and cruelty.  They alone were
privileged to see the face of the Great Unknown who, when he walked
abroad, kept his head wrapped in a veil.  He wore a long flowing robe
which reached to his ankles; his feet were encased in sandals; his hand
was often stretched out for greeting or benediction.  Half a dozen
Negroes walked before him to beat down the scrub and thorns in his path.

Within the past year or two bitter complaints had reached Bahia of
numberless depredations carried on with savage impudence on outlying
farms and cattle ranches, of hold-ups--not only on the roads, but even
on the railway north of Queimadas--of petty larceny and highway
robbery.  The police of the province, not being numerous, were
powerless, and Bahia sent the complaints up to Rio.  The Government,
after saying 'Damn!' once or twice through the mouth of its officials,
found itself compelled to give the matter more or less serious
consideration.

'We must do something about it, I suppose,' one important gentleman
said between two yawns.

'Must we?' said another.

It was very, very hot--even in Rio.  Great Lord! what must it be like
in that God-forsaken hole, the Sertao?  And on the road between the
railhead and Canudos, where there is not a single tree to afford shade
to panting mule or man, where every drop of water has to be carried for
miles and invariably falls short of the needs of the moment, where ...
but what is the good of talking about it all when it is so hot?

'Must we?'

'Really!  Must we?'

Which is just what English Government officials would say in similar
circumstances.  Some there were here who had grown hoary in the service
of their country and who remembered the many ill-fated expeditions that
were sent out in the far-back 'nineties against Antonio Conselheiro.

'We must not underestimate,' they said, 'the strength of these fellows.
They are tough.  They know every inch of their God-forsaken country,
and they have stolen enough arms to equip three regiments.  Do not let
us repeat,' they said, 'the mistakes of the past.'

They swore that they would not--but they did.

They sent a couple of hundred men who, after indescribable sufferings,
parched with thirst, half-dead with fatigue, their skin ravaged by
insects, their clothing torn to shreds in the scrub, finally reached
one of the outlying townships some forty kilometres from Canudos, in a
condition that left them quite unfit to meet even the most despicable
enemy, let alone a lot of wild men from the bush, well equipped with
stolen rifles and other weapons, inured to every kind of hardship,
burning with enthusiasm, and to whom a kind of guerrilla warfare was as
easy as drawing breath.

Disaster, complete and hopeless, overtook the first expedition.
Disaster, even more complete and even more hopeless, overtook the
second--one composed this time of five hundred men under the command of
a colonel of Teuton descent, who was believed to be a genius in
military tactics.

The Great Unknown and his followers were unconquered still, and the two
victories had enhanced their prestige and fanned their impudence.

'They are invincible,' said the ignorant and the superstitious; and
while the Government busied itself in a desultory way with organizing
yet another expedition against the brigands, recruits to the banner of
the mysterious leader came in in shoals.  The Sertao had become a La
Vende in very truth, and an unconquered one at that.  And as,
previously, Antonio Conselheiro had preached the Second Advent of
Christ, the Kingdom of God, and the destruction of the World, so now
the followers of the Great Unknown prophesied the return of Dom Pedro
III to the throne of his forebears, the fall of the Republic, and the
re-establishment of the Empire of Brazil.

It was time the Government up at Rio got a serious move on, or some of
these prophecies might be coming true.

There was a talk of sending out Colonel Perraz with two thousand men.
Two thousand well-armed, well-trained, disciplined Government troops
against a handful of uneducated, semi-savage cattle-raisers!  It had to
be done, of course, but in secrecy--or the rest of the world would
laugh.

No laughing matter, this Great Unknown and his fanatical hordes!




Book Two

THE ODYSSEY




I

Timothy O'Clerigh, known to all his pals and his messmates as Tim
O'Clee, stood by the open window polishing his boots, and he sang--sang
in a full-throated baritone, gloriously out of tune--a song of the old
country:

  I know not, I ask not
    If guilt's in thy heart...
  Tum, tum, tiddlee tum tum...

Then a long pause while the note, a full half-tone flat, rose in an
ascending _vibrato_:

  Whatever thou art...

And this last phrase he gave forth so lustily that the full-throated
baritone seemed like a detonation out of a gun which went echoing and
reverberating across the port and the bay from horn to horn, and away
over the purple sea.

'Listen to him!' the little barefooted urchins said down below; and
they looked up, gaping and wide-eyed, at the open window where a
massive torso appeared above the sill, white and glistening from recent
ablutions, with two powerful arms, one hand wielding a brush, the other
buried inside a boot that had obviously seen many a better day.

  Come rest in this boo-zum my own stricken deer....


'The Englishman,' was the dry comment made by a dark-skinned
shock-headed youth who until this moment had been the centre of
admiration of the crowd of street urchins.  'They are so white--pah!
... always washing themselves ... and they are mad.'

Leaning against the railings, he was busy with a pocket-knife scooping
out the inside of a luscious pomegranate, which he then transferred to
his mouth.  His star performance consisted in spitting out the many
pips, some to an incredible distance, by an indrawing and outpouring of
the breath: a skill which could obviously only be attained by the
elect, and then only after considerable practice.

'Measure that one,' he commanded.  'No, not that one ... the last.'

And obediently one of the young scamps grovelled on the road and with a
long stick carefully measured out the distance that lay between the toe
of the star performer and the last expectorated pip.

'Three and a half!' he gasped, awestruck with the magnitude of the feat.

'I have done five,' the star said negligently, and prepared for a
repetition of the unheard-of feat.

But somehow the attention of the public had wandered.  That mad, shiny,
white fellow up there, whose voice rose above the rattle and the
squeaking of the tramcar up the street, and who took the trouble on
this hot afternoon to do something to his boots with a brush, was a
greater, because a more novel attraction.

And now he put down boot and brush, and disappeared within the room,
whence repeated sounds of splashing water and indeterminate snatches of
song further roused the contempt of the local idol.

'They must be dirty,' he said, 'or they would not wash so often.  I
don't like those English.'

One of the urchins, a knowing-looking little chap with small round eyes
like a ferret and a sharp uptilted nose, ventured on contradiction.

'He is not English,' he said.

'Not English.  I tell you...'

'Fra Martino says he is Irish.'

'Irish?  What's that?'

And this time, to mark contempt still more complete and more withering,
the star performer expectorated lustily.  The next moment a basinful of
soapy water drenched his tousled head and soaked through his
dun-coloured shirt.

'I'll have you know, my young friend,' came, with a stentorian laugh,
from up above in somewhat halting Portuguese, 'that an Irishman--a
real, fine, none-o'-your-mongrel Irishman--is the most magnificent
product of God's creation; and if you don't believe me, you just come
up here and we'll have an argument about it, which will leave you with
eyes so black that your own mother won't know you.'

Timothy O'Clerigh, with the empty basin in his hands, his face and body
glistening with moisture, his brown hair an unruly shock above his
laughing face, waited at the window for a moment or two, not really in
order to see whether his challenge would be accepted--for he knew it
would not--but because he liked to watch the keen, fox-like faces of
those little urchins grinning, yet hardly daring to grin, at the
discomfiture of their idol.

'So much for the loyalty of the public,' he murmured to himself, put
the basin down again and proceeded with his toilet.




II

The very first event in the thirty-two years of Timothy O'Clerigh's
life that left a lasting impression on him--in more ways than one--was
when at the age of three he chanced to toddle as far as the stable
yard, unattended by his nurse, and caught Pat Mulvaney in the act of
thrashing Sheilagh, the lovely Samoyed, who was one of Tim's most
adored playmates.  Pat had fastened a rope to Sheilagh's collar and
tied this to a big hook in the wall, and he was lamming into her with a
big stick.  And, oh, horrors!--there was a dead chicken tied to
Sheilagh's collar and another to her tail--at least Tim supposed that
these chickens were dead.

Sheilagh was making no sound as blow upon blow rained upon her poor
back, but the look in her eyes crouching there, with those dead
chickens tied to her, was more than Tim could stand.  He was very, very
small and he was only three, whilst Pat was old--at least twenty--and
very, very big, but Tim's blood boiled at the sight.  For the first
second or two he had stood as if transfixed with horror, then head down
he charged into Pat's legs.  Now Pat had neither seen nor heard him; he
was not prepared for the assault, being intent upon punishing Sheilagh.
Anyway, he lost his balance, tripped and fell on the cobblestones of
the yard, and of course Tim fell on the top of him.

What happened after that was in Tim's recollection rather more
vague--he was picked up by his nurse and carried, dumb and terrified,
into the house.  His misdeed was duly reported to Uncle Justin, who
gave him a severe thrashing, and he was put to bed and deprived of his
rice pudding.  The next day Uncle Justin explained to him that Sheilagh
had well deserved her punishment, because she had dug her way into the
chicken-run when nobody was about, and had deliberately killed
thirty-six young pullets; and this was a misdeed which had to be
punished in a stern and exemplary way, lest it should occur again.  On
the other hand, Pat Mulvaney, the stud-groom, who had only done his
duty in this painful matter, was now very, very ill, in consequence of
Tim's assault upon him, and as soon as he was a little better Tim would
have to go and see him and apologize to him for what he had done.
Several days went by, and both Sheilagh and Tim had completely
recovered from the effects of the chastisement which they had
respectively endured, for they were having a glorious romp with a ball
on the lawn, when Uncle Justin came and fetched Tim away and took him
to a place in which there was a bed, and in this bed there was Pat
Mulvaney, who had something white tied round the top of his head, and
whose cheeks and nose were no longer of that nice, bright red colour
with which Tim had been familiar--in fact they were almost as white as
the pillow and sheet on the bed.

'Here, Mulvaney,' Uncle Justin said in his big, big voice, 'I have
brought Master Tim to see you.  He wishes to tell you how sorry he is
for what he did the other day.  He acted like a thoughtless little boy
and had no idea that he would hurt you----' or words to that effect.
Tim didn't cry, though he was very sorry indeed, for he liked Pat very
much, almost as much as Sheilagh.  He shook hands with Pat, and was
very glad when Uncle Justin took him home again.

Uncle Justin was never lenient to Tim's misdeeds, certainly not to
those which, as he said, were unbecoming to an Irish gentleman; so
faults were never condoned, and punishments as Tim grew older were apt
to be severe.  But Tim nevertheless adored Uncle Justin.  A very little
time after the painful incident of Sheilagh and Pat, Uncle Justin
bought a little tubby white horse and gave it to Tim for his fourth
birthday, and it was Pat and Uncle Justin who taught Tim to ride--it
was on his fifth birthday that he was first allowed to ride to hounds
on his pony without her being on the lead, and on his ninth that he
first rode a real Irish hunter.

'Elbows closer, Tim, look at your feet--damn it, boy, you look like a
blasted dago on that horse.'

And Tim would grip the saddle with his little thighs, and square his
young shoulders, trying to look as magnificent on a horse as Uncle
Justin himself; and if at the end of a hard day's hunting Uncle Justin
would say to him: 'You took that fence well, Tim, my boy!' or 'I liked
the way you picked yourself up after that fall,' Tim's little heart
would swell with pride and determination to do better still.

For twenty-six years Tim had adored Uncle Justin.  Born a posthumous
child, his mother, too, had died before he ever knew he had one.  But
Uncle Justin had been for him father, mother, brother, friend--in
childhood, in school days, during those terrible years of the war.
When Tim lay wounded, almost dying in hospital in France, it was Uncle
Justin who watched at his bedside more devotedly than any mother could
have done, who cared for him when he was convalescent, who lavished all
that money and thought could provide to hasten his complete recovery to
health.

Uncle Justin was for Tim the embodiment of everything that a gentleman
should be--generous to a fault, and if quick-tempered, always just and
kind; a magnificent horseman, a hard rider; a splendid all-round
sportsman; a great admirer of the fair sex; fond of his glass and of
good cheer.  And of all the places in the wide, wide world, there was
none in Tim's eyes to equal Castle Traskmoore, the stately Irish home
on the hills above the lake, with the age-old elms and oaks mounting
guard over the majestic grey pile, the crenellated towers and
ivy-covered battlements that had seen the whole history of the country
unfolded beneath their walls.

'It will all be yours some day, my lad,' Uncle Justin would say, with
that cheery laugh of his which masked a deep emotion, whenever Tim
'enthused' more than ordinarily over the beauties of Traskmoore.

'I love it because you are here, Uncle,' Tim replied.  After which
nothing more was said, because these two understood one another as no
other friends in the world had ever done.

Tim had sent in his papers after the Armistice, and since then had
become his Uncle's right-hand man on the estate, in the stables, the
stud-farm, the kennels.  A busy life and a cloudless one.  And then
there were the equally happy, if somewhat more hectic days in London.
Lord Traskmoore had a fine house in Grosvenor Square and he always went
up to town for the season; this meant Epsom and Newmarket, Ascot and
Goodwood; it meant Lord's and Henley.  Tim joined him when he could,
spent a few joyous days in London with Uncle Justin, and returned to
Traskmoore to carry on the work on the estate.

But Tim had one great weakness, one grave disappointment in life; he
was under the impression that he had a fine voice, and that, given good
tuition, he would become a great singer--not a professional singer of
course, but one who could give his friends an infinity of pleasure.
The trouble was that he had no ear, and not one true note came out of
his lusty throat.  A great teacher of singing in London, consulted on
the subject, declared that nothing could be done for Major O'Clerigh.
An ear for tune was a gift of God which had been denied him.

Tim was offended with the great musician, called him 'a blighter,' took
a few lessons from a more accommodating personage and continued to
delight Uncle Justin--who had no more ear than he had--by singing Irish
ballads to him gloriously out of tune, to the accompaniment of the
gramophone.




III

It had indeed been a happy life for Tim O'Clee until that spring of
1924, when the crash came.  It was a catastrophe such as Tim, even in
the wildest possible nightmare, could never have conceived.

He ran up to town at the end of May, hoping to spend a month with Uncle
Justin in Grosvenor Square for the Derby, Ascot, and so on.  The very
first day had not yet gone by before he realized that an extraordinary
change had come over the old man.  Something of his cheeriness had
gone; he seemed at tunes strangely absent-minded and, when called to
himself, equally strangely embarrassed.  With Tim he appeared
constrained, with occasional outbursts of devil-may-care joviality
which were obviously forced.  Tim, vaguely disturbed by what he felt
was a presage of evil, groped in vain at first for the key to the
mystery; but friends soon put him in possession of it.  A man always
has enough friends to do that job for him.  Hadn't he heard?  Didn't he
know?  Why, it was the talk of the town!

'Great God!  What?' Tim exclaimed.

'Hold-Hands Juliana!  A positive infatuation, my dear fellow!  Didn't
you know?'

If Tim had been told that the heavens had fallen into the middle of
Hyde Park, he could not have been more dumb-founded than he was at this
moment.  Hold-Hands Juliana!  Heavens above!  And it was the talk of
the town that old Traskmoore was infatuated with her!  Oh!  Tim knew
the woman well enough.  A Roumanian (or something of the sort) by
birth, she was the widow of that eccentric fellow Dudley Stone, who
before the war had been a good deal in the public eye through a series
of wild and foolhardy adventures in which he had embarked at different
times.  He had flown from London to Vladivostok, had spent three months
in Tibet disguised as a wandering fakir; at one time he fitted out an
Antarctic expedition, at another he commanded a division of Bulgarian
_comitadjis_ during the Balkan War.  It was said that he had seen the
inside of eighteen different foreign prisons, including one in Siberia,
all on a charge of spying.  His great idea was the search for hidden
treasure: he fitted out various expeditions for that purpose and went
off to find the buried treasures of the Armada, of Captain Kidd, of the
cities of Arabia.  The ambition of his life was to find one day the
land of El Dorado in the wastes of Brazil, where lay hidden the
priceless treasures of the Incas of Peru.

Of Dudley Stone himself the public had heard quite a good deal in those
pre-war days, but of his wife--nothing.  She was not Hold-Hands Juliana
then, and but few people had ever seen the pale-faced, wide-eyed young
girl whom that 'lunatic, Stone,' had married somewhere out in the
Balkans.  He was in Bulgaria when the war broke out, and after that
there were some very ugly stories current about him in connection with
the rout of the Serbian army, due, it was said, to the machinations of
an English spy.  Be that as it may, Stone was never again seen in
England.  What became of him nobody knew and certainly nobody cared.

And then one fine day Hold-Hands Juliana appeared upon the scene--no
longer pale, no longer thin--with pearls round her neck and diamonds in
her ears.  She gave it out that her husband had gone out to Brazil
after the Armistice to find the treasure of the Incas.  He had
succeeded apparently, though Juliana didn't actually say so, but she
threw money about with a lavish hand in London, Deauville or Monte
Carlo.  Hardly a day had gone by during the last season or two without
some mention of her in the Society columns of the _Continental Herald_.
Tim had often heard her referred to by men of a certain set as
'Hold-Hands Juliana.'  She was no longer young: she was coarse, and
loud and common.  She had huge, goggled dark eyes, strongly-marked
eyebrows and long, curved black lashes.  Her mouth was very full and
her teeth very white, like a row of marble tombstones.  Her hair was
black and glossy; she wore it parted very much on one side with a big,
unnatural-looking wave falling over her left eye.  Her dresses always
looked too short, and her corsets too tight.  Her fingers, short and
thick, were smothered in rings.  When Timothy first met her--somewhere
or other in London--she had appeared to him like the true presentment
of a cinema vamp.

Oh, yes!  Tim knew all about her.  But that Uncle Justin should----

The old man had met her, apparently, somewhere this season--it didn't
much matter where--and, according to Club gossip, had at once fallen a
victim to her wiles in the way that old men do when a clever
adventuress sets a trap for them.  Unfortunately, there was no doubt
about it.  Club gossip had not even exaggerated.  With a sinking of the
heart, which at times made him almost physically sick, Tim stood by and
watched the growth of this fateful senile passion.  He could note its
every phase, whilst he himself was powerless in face of the coming
catastrophe, which he would have given the best years of his life to
avert.

It came even sooner than he expected.  By the end of June, Hold-Hands
Juliana gave it out that her husband had died of malarial fever at
Monsataz in Brazil, the small seaport town south of Pernambuco from
whence he had been on the point of starting for the land of El Dorado,
where lay buried the most marvellous treasures of the earth.  She was
seen shopping in Bond Street clad in deepest mourning.  Later on, the
Society columns of the daily Press announced that Mrs. Stone would sail
from Cherbourg on the French steamer _Duguay-Trouin_ for Pernambuco,
and would not be back in London before the autumn.  Tim was at
Traskmoore when he read of these various social events in the London
papers; his hopes rose at a bound.  Absence, he argued with himself,
might work wonders with Uncle Justin's infatuation for that blatant
adventuress.  Pity, he thought, that the hunting season was not yet on,
but there was the fishing--Uncle Justin might try Norway this year--and
the 12th was not so very far off now.

Tim went to bed that evening happier than he had been for weeks.  He
had already made up his mind to go up to London at once.  But the next
morning he had a letter from Uncle Justin telling him that his beloved
friend Juliana, the widow of Dudley Stone, had made him the happiest of
men by promising to become his wife as soon as the period of mourning
was over and she could return to England from her pilgrimage to the
grave of her late husband.

Well!  The conventional period of mourning was apparently over the
following October, for on the tenth of that month the Earl of
Traskmoore was married at the registry office of St. George's to
Juliana, relict of Dudley Stone, Esquire, and daughter of Dr. Brailescu
of Bucharest.  Hold-Hands Juliana was now Countess of Traskmoore.
Heavens above!

To Tim O'Clee the catastrophe meant the loss of that friendship which
for twenty-six years had been the light of his life.  For even during
the three or four months preceding his marriage to Juliana, Uncle
Justin had been a changed man; but at first, especially while the woman
was still in Brazil, the change had been very subtle.  No one would
have noticed it except Tim.  But Tim knew.  Lord Traskmoore was no
longer Uncle Justin to him.

It was after the marriage--and when the bridal pair returned to
London--that the change appeared devastating.  Uncle Justin, who had
been Tim's beau-ideal of a sportsman and a gentleman, was a very
different man now.  For one thing, he drank harder than he used to, and
when in his cups was morose and irritable.  Tim would hearken in vain
for that cheery laugh which was wont to raise the echo of the old grey
walls of Traskmoore.

Juliana, of course, hated Traskmoore.  It was dull, she said, and gave
her the creeps.  Hunting did not appeal to her--she did not know how to
ride, so it was London all the time now--theatres, dinner-parties,
night-clubs.  Tim carried on at the old place for a time for Uncle
Justin's sake, but presently the hunters were sold, then several of the
farms.  What was the good of carrying on?  It was London--London all
the time, or else Deauville or Monte Carlo.

Never again the meets on a cold frosty morning, with the keen air
whipping your face, and a satin-skinned, iron-sinewed Irish hunter
between your knees; never again the horn of the huntsman or the cry of
hounds, the tramping of hoofs on the ploughed fields, the five-barred
gates, the smell of earth and stables and woodland!  Never again the
cheery 'Well done, lad!' which had thrilled so that it almost hurt!
Never again the Irish ballads sung out of tune to the accompaniment of
a gramophone!  Uncle Justin had taken to tennis and even to dancing!
The gramophone these days only turned out the newest jazz tunes.




IV

When it was that Tim first had the conviction that the woman had told a
lie about her widowhood and the death of Dudley Stone, he could not
have told you.  But the Gaelic temperament is always more or less
psychic, and resentment had sharpened Tim's perceptions.

His first meeting with Uncle Justin after the return of the bridal pair
from their honeymoon was, perhaps, the most miserable moment in the
whole of the miserable affair.  Tim longed to take that vile
adventuress by the throat and force her to confess to the trickeries
and the sortilege wherewith she had brought the noblest Irish gentleman
that God ever put on the map down to a state bordering on degradation.
Far, far sooner would he have thought of that fine sportsman meeting
his death on the hunting-field than of seeing him as he now was, the
wreck of his former self, both mentally and physically, with eyes
bleared, and unsteady hand, and that furtive look which so pathetically
avoided meeting Tim's glance.  Whenever Tim caught that look he felt
just as he had done when, at three years old, he caught Pat Mulvaney
lamming into Sheilagh.  He wanted to charge into Hold-Hands Juliana and
trip her up, morally and physically, as he had done to Pat then.  And
gradually he realized what a shameless liar the woman was.  From the
first she told him lies--trifling ones for the most part, her age, the
provenance of this or that jewel, an obviously false account of Dudley
Stone's adventure--and when Tim taunted her, she only laughed, shrugged
her fat shoulders and showed her large white teeth.  And, as she lied
over this or that, Tim became more and more convinced that she had lied
when she gave him a circumstantial account of the death of Dudley Stone
over at Monsataz, on the Brazilian coast, of malarial fever, in May,
1924.

'I don't believe a word of it,' Tim said boldly, when she had finished
her story.  And again she just laughed and showed her big white teeth.

The following year a boy was born of the marriage--quite a fine child,
so people said.  And thus was Tim O'Clee robbed of title and
inheritance in addition to the great loss of Uncle Justin's affection.
And he could do nothing save grind his teeth in an agony of resentment.
The conviction had now taken deep root in his mind that some mystery
hung over the supposed death of Dudley Stone, but while Uncle Justin
was alive nothing could be done.  To break the old man's heart by
unmasking the adventuress who had cast her spells over him was not to
be thought of, especially as obviously, alas!--he had not many more
years to live.

Indeed, he died very soon after that at Traskmoore, whither he had
begged to be moved as soon as he felt that his end was nigh.  Juliana
fortunately refused to go with him, declaring with her accustomed
flippancy that he had nothing serious the matter with him; she,
herself, she said, was much more ill and could not leave London or the
doctor who attended her.  So Tim was alone with Uncle Justin when he
died, and alone he walked behind the farm wagon which conveyed the
grand old sportsman to his last resting-place beside his forebears in
the sanctuary of Traskmoore church.

Tim's grief for many weeks and months transcended other emotions, so
that for the time being he even ceased to think of the adventuress who
had exercised such a baneful influence over his life.  Only a year
later did the reaction set in.  The baby son of Hold-Hands Juliana had,
in the natural course of events, slipped into the title, estates and
immense wealth of the O'Clerighs.  She herself slipped equally
naturally into her position as sole executrix under the will, and as
guardian of her boy, with the magnificent jointure bestowed on 'my
adored wife, Juliana,' by the over-fond, over-trusting old man.  Tim's
name was not even mentioned in the will.  This neither surprised nor
upset him; he knew that Hold-Hands Juliana would have seen to that.
And in a way he was glad.  The greater the wrong that she did him, the
more relentless would he be when the hour of retribution struck at last.

For he never doubted for a moment that that hour would come one day,
and for this reason: the day before Uncle Justin died he placed a set
of old diaries, which he had kept regularly for years, in Tim's hands.
Why he did it Tim could not say, but anyway, Uncle Justin had then
said, with a wan smile:

'You'll find many entries that will amuse you, my lad.  You remember
the day fat Mrs. Benham came out in a pink coat and brass buttons and
then the rain came down ... and ... and ... You can read the things
right through ... they'll remind you of some jolly runs we had, you and
I ... together....'

He rambled on for a time--already he was very weak; the immediate past
seemed to have slipped out of his enfeebled brain; only the happy past
came back with its pictures of huntsmen and hounds, of his favourite
hunters, and Tim's first pony.

'You may read every word, my lad,' he murmured feebly, 'there never
were any secrets between us until...'

The sentence was never completed, and it was nearly a year later when,
in an idle and melancholy mood, Tim turned over the pages of the old
diaries, intending to consign them after that to the flames.  They were
mere records of a simple, uneventful, straight and clean life.  A
phrase here and there brought a smile to Tim's lips and a tear to his
eyes, for the entries so often concerned him:

'Tim rode out on Wibbles.  The boy has already a fine seat....'

Or:

'Had a grand run to-day.  Killed twice.  Tim took Farmer McBride's
fence in fine style....'

Or again:

'I don't know what that blighted piano-thumper can mean by saying that
Tim can't be taught to sing.  The boy has a splendid voice....'


It was in the fateful year 1924 that Juliana's name first cropped up in
the diary:

'Sat next Mrs. Stone at dinner.  A charming woman.'


And again:

'With Mrs. Stone to dinner at the Berkeley, afterwards to see the new
play at Drury Lane....'


Or:

'I have never in my life met a more beautiful or more intelligent
woman.  If I were not so old...'


A few references to her past history, violent abuse of the unknown
husband, Dudley Stone, ever-growing admiration for Juliana's beauty,
charm and fascination, together with expressions of passionate
adoration, made up the entries for April and part of May.  And then
came the fateful words:

'My beloved is free.  That blackguard, Stone, is dead.  Thank God....'


Followed soon after by:

'My beloved tells me she must go to that outlandish place to see that
the blackguard's grave is properly tended....'


But there was one entry which set Tim's blood on fire and caused him to
break into stentorian song:

'I have made a free gift to my beloved of the 50,000 she wanted.  I
have asked no questions.  Why should I?  She knows that I would lay my
entire fortune at her feet....'


A free gift of 50,000 in the year 1924--just before Hold-Hands Juliana
started for Brazil, having given it out that Dudley Stone had died
there of malarial fever!  That 50,000 had been used--for what?  She
went to Brazil ostensibly to visit her husband's grave; she did not
require 50,000 for mere travelling expenses.  Already she had tricked

Traskmoore into a formal promise of marriage....  What was 50,000 to
her, then, when the whole of the O'Clerigh fortune was already as good
as hers?

Armed with Uncle Justin's diaries, Tim went to consult one of the
foremost lawyers in London and laid the whole case before him.  He
declared his belief that when the Roumanian woman went through the
formality of marriage with the late Earl of Traskmoore she had
furnished no proof of the death of her lawful husband, Dudley Stone;
that, presumably, that same Dudley Stone was still alive when the
second marriage was contracted, and that therefore this second marriage
was illegal, the child born of it illegitimate and he, Timothy
O'Clerigh, the rightful Earl of Traskmoore.  Immense sums were then
paid out in fees for the opinion of the most eminent Counsel at the
Bar, and subsequently an action was entered in the High Court.

But discoveries revealed the existence of affidavits proving the death
of Dudley Stone at Monsataz, in Brazil, of malarial fever in May, 1924,
five months before Juliana's marriage to Lord Traskmoore.  These
affidavits had been sworn to before the British Consul at Pernambuco by
persons of unimpeachable reputation, all of whom were ready to attest
in the English courts of law that they had known Dudley Stone, and
either been present at his death or otherwise known about it.  There
was the priest who had heard his last confession and conducted the
burial service; there was the doctor who had attended him; and there
was his intimate friend out there, Dom Manol da Lisbao, a gentleman of
high social position, formerly an officer in the Brazilian army and at
one time military attach at the Brazilian Ministry in Paris.

Of course, in such circumstances the action was bound to fail: the
lawyer advised its immediate withdrawal before further expense was
incurred.  But Tim was unconvinced, and even while he took his lawyer's
advice, he swore to himself that this would not be the end of this
monstrous conspiracy.  There was something in Juliana's blatant show of
triumph that proclaimed not virtue victorious, but anxiety happily
overcome.  The lawyers did not see that, but Tim did.  He knew.

Fifty thousand pounds!  What did Hold-Hands Juliana want with 50,000
save to bribe three dagoes out there to swear the affidavits that
enabled her to become Countess of Traskmoore?  The lawyers had
pooh-poohed the idea.  The whole thing was fantastic, they said; and,
in view of the affidavits, could not possibly be proved; but Tim was
not an Irishman for nothing....  He had registered a vow that he would
carry on the fight; and carry it on he did from that hour--not dreaming
then of the amazing series of adventures which caught him up, as in a
whirlwind, and tossed him hither and thither like a leaf in a tornado.

His father had left him a few thousands.  He had no one to consider but
himself.  Half his small fortune had gone in futile legal expenses: he
put the other half in his pocket and started out for Brazil.




V

And now here he was, actually and indubitably in Monsataz, standing at
the window of a respectable hotel which had been recommended to him by
the captain of the small coasting steamer which had brought him north
from Rio.  The hotel overlooked the wide bay and the beautiful harbour
with the huge rocks that guard its entrance like giant sentinels,
rising a hundred feet and more out of the water.  Beyond the bay the
ocean glistened smooth as a purple mirror, with the haze of the setting
sun slowly spreading over the still, calm waters like a veil that held
within its folds all the secrets and all the mysteries which Tim O'Clee
had come all this way to probe.

Brazil!  Monsataz!  Those two names had been eating into his brain ever
since the day when he swore to himself that, in spite of what the
lawyers said, he would prove them wrong and Hold-Hands Juliana a liar
and a thief.  So here he was.

A strange coincidence, which Tim at once put down to luck, had come to
pass already.  He had been shown into his room by one of the hotel
servants.  His luggage had been disposed about the room, and the
coffee-coloured servant busied himself with undoing the straps of the
valise.  Tim had been studying Portuguese steadily for the past year.
Already on the coasting steamer he had taken every opportunity of
talking to the captain and exchanging words with the petty officers and
the crew.  He did not speak very correctly perhaps, but he made himself
readily understood.  His mind intent upon the one all-important
subject, he remarked casually to the coffee-coloured valet:

'It is not often, I suppose, that you have foreign visitors here?'

'But yes, senhor,' the man replied, 'many Americanos.'

'Oh, I don't mean them.  I mean Europeans--English, for instance.'

The man shook his head.

'No, senhor,' he said, 'not many English, they mostly go to the Hotel
Americano.  But there have been some who stayed here for a day or two,
reverend gentlemen--mostly Protestants.'

'Seen any lately?'

'Yes, senhor, last year.  A reverend gentleman, he came with a lady who
said she was his wife, but as he also called himself a priest, we could
not understand how he could have a wife.'

Tim did not happen to hold any views one way or the other on the
subject of the celibacy of the clergy, but he allowed the man's tongue
to run away with him and listened with half an ear to his dark-skinned
friend's opinion of reverend gentlemen who travelled about in the
company of ladies.  It seems that all the reverend gentlemen, both
English and Americanos, who had ever come to Monsataz had a lady with
them, but what was very strange was that the lady never was beautiful,
which perhaps made the matter all right from a moral point of view.

It was all the more astonishing, was the man's final comment on the
situation, that the two English gentlemen who had come to this
hotel--and who were _not_ reverends--did travel alone.

'The two English gentlemen?' Tim asked; 'who were they?'

'Well, there is yourself, senhor.'

'Yes.  Who was the other?'

'A nice tall English gentleman like yourself, senhor.  His name was
Stone.'

Of course Tim had expected this answer, and yet when it came it seemed
to be like a hammer-blow hitting at his brain.  Dudley Stone had
actually stayed in this hotel, perhaps slept in this very room.  If
that was not a piece of the most stupendous luck, then he, Tim O'Clee,
didn't know what luck was!

Dudley Stone here--in this very room, probably!  The man whose life, or
the date of whose death, might mean home, title, riches, everything
that a man could possibly wish for in this world, to impecunious
Timothy O'Clerigh!

And Tim, brandishing a button-hook in the fashion of a shillelagh,
executed a jig to the tune of the one and only Irish ballad which he
knew:

'Come rest in this boo-zum--tiddly hi, tiddly hi--tum ti----'

Nor did he desist when he caught the great black eyes of his friend
fixed in a kind of wondering awe upon him.

'I am so glad you think I'm English, my friend,' he said, solemnly,
'because otherwise you might go about saying that Irish gentlemen are
mad.'

But undoubtedly the adventure had begun well; the thing to do now was
not to waste time, tropical grass must not be left to grow under the
feet of Tim O'Clee.

Knowing well that in every country, in every town and in every village
throughout the world, the local clergy are the great channel for social
intercourse, Timothy, in further conversation with another
coffee-coloured employee of the hotel--the waiter this time who served
him at dinner--inquired which was the principal church of Monsataz, and
who was its incumbent.  He learned that there were no fewer than two
hundred churches in the city, but that of these the most important one
was undoubtedly the church of Sao Felice, of which Fra Martino, a
reverend gentleman of great eminence, was the incumbent.

Unfortunately, when Tim further inquired of his informant whether the
latter knew anything of the church of Santa F and its vicar, Fra
Bartolomeo, he was told that that venerable priest had died some four
years previously, leaving a comfortable fortune which he had amassed to
his devoted friend and confessor, Fra Martino.  Now Fra Bartolomeo was
the man who had sworn an affidavit that he had heard the last
confession of Dudley Stone and had subsequently buried him in the
_cemiterio_ of Santa F, and the worthy priest must have died less than
a year after that affidavit which had helped to shatter O'Clerigh's
hopes of regaining his inheritance.

Thus did Tim stand on the very first day after his arrival in Monsataz,
with two tricks to the good.  Fra Martino he had already put down as
his trump card.  Fra Bartolomeo was dead; but here was his friend and
confessor, the man to whom he had bequeathed a comfortable fortune, the
provenance of which must have been known to its recipient, the
incumbent of the fashionable church frequented by the _lite_ of the
city, who must, of course, have been in touch at one time with the
English gentleman, Dudley Stone.

A trump card, indeed!

Besides him, and of equal importance for Tim's purpose, there was the
doctor who had sworn that he attended Dudley Stone in his last illness,
and who had signed the death certificate which Hold-Hands Juliana had
triumphantly produced.

The waiter knew the senhor doctor very well by name; he was, according
to him, a very distinguished gentleman indeed, a member of the
aristocratic Club Nacional and an intimate friend of Dom Manol da
Lisbao who was, as everyone knew, the President of the Club and the
acknowledged leader of the fashionable world of the city.

Those three men, then, formed the pivot round which Tim's adventure in
search of Dudley Stone must revolve.  He wished to God he had been
endowed with diplomatic skill, with the art of gleaning information
without seeming to ask a single question.  All he had to rely on was
just mother wit, which, as it came from Old Oireland, should give a
good account of itself even when measured against the subtle brains of
these dagoes.

Seven days had gone by since Tim had landed at Monsataz--seven days
spent in running the Reverend Fra Martino to earth.  The worthy abb
was from home when he called; regretted most ardently that the
exigencies of his parish work prevented his hastening at once to return
the gracious visit of the distinguished Major O'Clerigh, but the very
first minute of leisure that the good God would grant him, he would
give himself the infinite pleasure of coming to pay his respects at the
hotel.  And thus a week went by.

Then, this afternoon, had come a note, couched in florid language, in
which Fra Martino conveyed to the most distinguished Major an
invitation from the President and prominent members of the Club
Nacional to dine with them at the Club that evening.  Being Thursday,
it was a ladies' night at the Club, Fra Martino went on to explain, and
some of the most beautiful and most distinguished ladies of the city
would grace the dinner with their presence.  He, Fra Martino, would,
moreover, give himself the pleasure of calling for the distinguished
Major and taking him round to the Club.

Tim's excitement had found vent in various ways, chief among which
being his natural aptitude to break into song, despite his total
inability to produce a single note that was not out of tune.  But Tom
Moore's ballad, set to music by the immortal Patrick McDougall, had the
effect of steadying his nerves.

Leaning out of the window, he looked down the length of the promenade
with its row of tall, crested palm-trees and its sun-baked pavement.
The star performer of a while ago had taken his pomegranate and other
appurtenances of his star turn elsewhere, and one by one the crowd of
admiring urchins had followed him.  And now, stumping along on the
cobbled road, on short, somewhat bandy legs, came Fra Martino
himself--very much in the flesh, a figure such as an artist like the
late Stacy Marks would have loved to depict.

Tim watched his coming with ill-controlled delight.  The old priest
wore a black straw Trilby hat, very much the worse for constant baking
in the sun, tilted far back above his domed, perspiring forehead.  His
soutane of black alpaca was hitched up around his waist, allowing for a
generous display of two fat legs in black cloth trousers which he had
tucked into a pair of stout, short Wellington boots.  He carried a
thick, gnarled stick which he brandished with much effect whenever a
street urchin poked an impudent nose in his way.

A real figure of fun--almost a caricature--yes, but that obese creature
over there held, perhaps, in his fat, podgy hands the destiny of the
last of the O'Clerighs.

Ye gods and little fishes, do not desert Tim O'Clee now!




VI

While Fra Martino came stumping up the short flight of stone steps
which led to the front entrance of the Hotel d'Angola, Tim suddenly
remembered that he had not finished dressing.  He turned to the mirror
and busied himself with a recalcitrant collar-stud.

'Come in, my holy friend,' he called, in response to a knock at his
door; 'one more struggle with this d---- save your reverence!--stud,
and I am entirely at your service.'

Tim was airing his best Portuguese, but Fra Martino, it seemed, spoke
English fluently, with a throaty accent which would have been
unpleasant had it not been so comical.  He loved to hear it and, above
all, to air his knowledge of it.  It reminded him of the days of his
youth, when in the seminary he had made friends with two young Irish
students.  He pushed open the door and halted for a moment under the
lintel.  The room felt almost cool as it faced east, and outside the
heat had been unbearable.  Fra Martino mopped his damp, expansive
forehead with a gaudy red-and-yellow handkerchief.  Then he came
forward and extended a large and very sticky hand to Tim, who shook it
cordially.

'Good of you to come, Padre,' he said.

'A pleasure, Major O'Clerigh, I assure you,' the old priest responded
pleasantly.  He had put down his amazing hat, and his stiff white hair
under the action of the cooler air slowly rose from his cranium until
it stood up like a round mop encircling a pink bald place which was all
that was left of his tonsure.

'Sit down, Padre, while I finish dressing,' Tim went on; 'and let me
get you a drink and a cigarette--or would you prefer a cigar?'

Fra Martino preferred a cigarette.  He sat down and beamed on the
whisky and soda which Tim carefully mixed for him.

'Your very good health, my friend,' he said jovially, raising his
glass, 'and may your stay in our city be a long and happy one.'

He insisted on Timothy drinking too, and on the clicking of glasses:

'Wish me luck, Padre,' Tim said with a slight touch of earnestness in
his cheery voice.

'But of course I wish you luck,' the old priest responded, after he had
taken a long drink, and wiped his mouth with the back of his hand.
'You cannot want much more,' he said, with a short sigh, 'neither here
nor elsewhere; you have all the best luck in the world, I'm sure.  You
are young.  You are very handsome.  The ladies will always be on your
side.'

No man dislikes being told that he is handsome, and Tim O'Clee was no
exception to the rule.  But as he was not lacking in humour he was
without personal vanity; nevertheless the frank admiration of the old
priest pleased him.  Amiability--the power to please--was going to be
one of his most important assets in the adventure.

'You look splendid in that black coat,' Fra Martino continued with that
nave flattery which passes for courtesy among several Latin races,
'and what a lovely white shirt!  You will not see another like it in
Monsataz, not even at the Club Nacional.'

Tim looked politely incredulous.

'Ah, no!' the old priest continued with a sigh.  'What would you?  The
people here--what do they know of style or fashion?  Even the young
men----  The officers perhaps, sometimes.  But these others----
Municipality?  Government?'  And Fra Martino shrugged his shoulders and
sniffed.  Sniffed again and said with solemn emphasis, as if stating an
indisputable and all-important fact: 'Plebeians, my friend.  That's
what they are.  All of them.  You will see.  No manners.  No style.  No
what the French call _tenue_.'  (He pronounced it _tenoo_.)

Timothy was intent on tying his tie.  A black one, new from Bond
Street, as was the soft-fronted exquisitely pleated and laundered
shirt, the high collar slightly winged, not to mention the
perfectly-cut smoking suit--fourteen guineas, and cheap at that--made
in Savile Row.

In the glass he could see the pot-bellied figure of the old priest,
sipping whisky, his short fat legs, the huge feet encased in those
awful Wellington boots, and his round forehead exuding moisture.

'No _tenoo_!' Tim murmured.  'Oh, my God!' and turned to look
elsewhere.  The sight of Fra Martino perspiring copiously, and
sniffing, was certainly not encouraging.  Tim hoped that it was not
customary in Brazil--as it is in some outlandish countries--for men to
salute one another with a kiss.  But now he stood up, ready, as
straight and clean a figure of a man as ever came out of the Creator's
hands.  Irish eyes, blue, grey, sometimes green as the varying moods of
a mercurial temperament swayed him.  Crisp, brown hair inclined to be
unruly.  A clear skin, splendid teeth.  No features to speak of, for
the nose too was Irish, as was the upper lip, distinctly too long for
classical taste, effectually disguised, however, by a small tooth-brush
moustache.  But the mouth below it redeemed every defect of the face,
for it appeared always ready for a smile.  Fra Martino looked at him
with approval, and then drew a short sigh.  Of regret?  Perhaps.  He,
too, had been young once--and handsome--at any rate in some women's
eyes.

'Senhor da Lisbao,' he said presently, 'is sending his car round.  As I
already had the honour to tell you, he hopes that you will do him the
honour, Major O'Clerigh, of dining with him at our Club Nacional.'

'That is more than kind.  I had thought of getting some dinner at the
Hotel Americano and then----'

'No, no.  We will dine with Senhor da Lisbao.  He is the president of
our club.  An influential man in the social world of Monsataz.  You
would like to know him.  Not?'

'Of course I should.  I do not intend to lead the life of a hermit.'

'You will stay here long, my dear Major?'

'Some considerable time.  Yes!  Unless----'

'Unless?'

'I have come here on business, Padre,' Tim said, 'private business.  If
I get through with it quickly, I should not be here long.'

'Ah, you have business here, my friend?'

He spoke quite lightly as if the matter did not greatly concern him;
but to Tim's perceptions, which just now were so very much on the _qui
vive_, it seemed as if an invisible hand had, in the last moment or
two, passed over the old priest's face, blotting out every expression.
In its way, and so it had appeared to Tim when first Fra Martino had
entered the room, that face was an intriguing one, full of
contradictions.  The small beady eyes revealed keen intelligence; but
the mouth, loose and fleshy with heavy lines drawn down from the
corners of nose and lips, the flaccid cheeks and cleft chin, betrayed
venality, indolence and sensuality.  But in spite of all these defects,
there was a distinct trait of kindliness lurking somewhere in the
florid face: kindliness born probably of weakness of character, and of
indolence--the line of least resistance; nevertheless the old priest
gave one the impression that in most circumstances of life he would try
and help a lame dog over the stile.

For the moment, then, all these traits had vanished.  The lines of
intelligence as well as of kindliness had all been merged in a smooth
aspect of complete vagueness.  Fra Martino did not wait for a reply to
his last question; he said nothing for a minute or so, and then
gradually his former expression of urbanity and friendly courtesy
spread once more over his face.  Once more he became suave and voluble,
full of protests of unbounded hospitality.  He and his presbytery, his
servants, his friends and his parishioners were all at the disposal of
the most distinguished Major O'Clerigh, and all the while he spoke he
did not ask another question that might seem indiscreet.  It was a
pleasure and an honour, he kept repeating, to have so distinguished an
English gentleman in Monsataz.

'Not English, Padre,' Tim put in whenever the volubility of the old man
allowed; 'Irish.'

But the difference held no meaning for Fra Martino.  He certainly
paused a moment as if to recapture the lost threads of his eloquence
and then went on placidly, dolefully shaking his head:

'We see very few English gentlemen out here.  Rio?  Yes!  Pernambuco,
even Bahia, but not in Monsataz.'

'You like to see them, when they come?'

'Ah!  But yes!  The great world--you understand--one is so shut away in
this poor hole----'

'A beautiful city, Padre.'

'Yes!'

'And the port seems very active----'

The priest gave a slight shrug.  'All Americanos.  The English who come
here are all reverends--Protestants, alas!  It is so sad that that
beautiful country should still be blind to the truth.'

'Englishmen who come here are not all missonaries, Padre--for I suppose
that is what you mean by "reverend".  Many have come here on business
and some in search of adventure.'

Fra Martino puffed away for a time at his cigarette; then he had a long
drink, wiped his mouth with the back of his hand, and said finally:
'Maybe; I don't know.'

'I was thinking of a man I knew something about, who came out here
quite a good deal,' Tim said, with well-assumed carelessness; 'a man
named Dudley Stone.'

Tim, being the creature of impulse that he was, had suddenly made up
his mind that he would fire off the name abruptly to see what effect it
would have on the old priest.  He tried his hardest not to appear to be
watching the other's face.  But Fra Martino did not flinch.  His fleshy
eyelids never quivered.  He was holding the glass of whisky and soda up
to the light, watching its sparkle with unconcealed delight.  There was
a lump of ice in the glass: it did not so much as click once.  But that
very indifference sent Tim's fancy wondering in the land of conjecture:
'You are playing a part, my friend,' he said to himself, 'no one could
be as unconcerned as you now look.'

Fra Martino took another long drink, put down his glass, smacked his
lips, and then said lightly: 'Ah! you knew Mr. Stone?'

'Only by reputation,' Tim replied.  'Didn't you, Padre?'

'No, my dear Major,' the priest rejoined lightly.  'No; I cannot
exactly say that I did know Mr.--er--Stone--only like yourself, by
reputation.'

'Now, isn't that funny?' was Tim's dry comment on this; 'I should have
thought that you'd know every stranger who comes to Monsataz.'

Said Fra Martino: 'I do, mostly; but Mr. Stone didn't happen to come my
way.'

And Timothy decided within himself that this was a lie.  A puzzling
lie.  Seemingly a useless lie, but a lie nevertheless.

However, he left it at that, only said casually: 'How funny; now, as I
say, I should have thought----'

It was at this point that the honk-honk of a motor-car in the road
below sounded a second time.  Fra Martino struggled to his feet with
marvellous alacrity, drained his glass to the bottom, and flung away
the stump of his cigarette.  He was not a very good actor, this obese
old man, and though his florid, round face looked for the moment more
like a bladder of lard than a human countenance, there was something in
his manner as he picked up his hat and stick and said: 'There is the
car, my dear Major,' which more than suggested relief.

'We must not be late for dinner,' he went on jovially.  'You will find
our _cuisine_ at the club excellent, I may tell you.  Our _Papa 
Bahiana_ is succulent.  You will see ... you will see!  We are not so
behindhand in luxury and civilization as you Europeans imagine.  And
then, the ladies, my dear Major!  The ladies...!'  He kissed the tips
of his podgy fingers and made a gesture as of a butterfly on the wing.
But his joviality now appeared forced, and his haste to get away
evident.  He gathered up his amazing hat and stick and turned to the
door.  A few more florid compliments and gestures, and he led the way
out of the room.  Timothy followed him downstairs.




VII

A high-powered American car was outside, with a dark-skinned chauffeur
in immaculate livery.  Timothy, as soon as he landed in Monsataz and
caught the first glimpse of the fine city with its magnificent
custom-house, post-office, railway station and so on, buildings which
would have put the London or Paris ones to shame, had already made up
his mind that nothing here would astonish him.  Monsataz, except for
its cobble stones and the narrow streets of the old town, was just as
much an up-to-date seaport city as Marseilles or Genoa.  Neither the
latest model Chrysler, therefore, nor the chauffeur's perfectly
tailored livery caused him so much as to lift an eyebrow.

He entered the car on the heels of Fra Martino, and the Chrysler went
bumping along the cobbles until it turned into the beautiful wide
Avenida, bordered with fine trees, with private houses on either side,
and the handsome Hotel Americano with its outdoor caf occupying a
large portion of the sidewalk.

Fra Martino's talk was chiefly of the people whom Timothy was to meet
this evening; their host, Dom Manol da Lisbao, one of the most popular
as he was one of the richest members of the fashionable set in
Monsataz; 'and kind and generous, my dear Major!  You haven't an idea!
Speaks English like a native, better than I do, and French or
German--anything you like.  And a great favourite with the ladies--a
wealthy bachelor, you see, so the mammas with marriageable daughters
are all after him--but, so far, nothing--although there is talk that
his engagement to Teresa da Pinto, the daughter of the senhor _doutor
cavalheiro_, will shortly be announced.  Oh! a lovely girl, the
reigning beauty of Monsataz, and none of your modern young women who
think they know everything.  She has no mother, poor dear!  And her
father--well! well!  He has led a rough life, in a remote
province--only __vaqueiros__ and peasants and half-breeds for company.
But Teresa was educated in the Convent of the Visitation in Sao Paolo.
And then the doctor had a great piece of luck ... Dom Manol da Lisbao
got to know him, took a liking to him and brought him to Monsataz,
where he soon became the fashionable practitioner--still very rough in
his ways, but some people like that in a doctor, the brusque manner,
don't you know?'

And while Fra Martino's talk meandered on and on in mellifluous tones
Timothy's thoughts harked back on the business that had brought him to
this far-away corner of the civilized world, where everything was
strange, every man and woman a foreigner to him; their views of things,
their ideas, their political and religious ideals as far removed from
him as these tropical shoes from the mist-bound coasts of his beloved
Ireland.

What chance would he have to get to the bottom of things?  To the
bottom of this amazing conspiracy which had deprived him of wealth and
of home?  That it was a conspiracy he felt somehow more convinced than
ever before.  He had not met anyone yet who had been directly connected
with it, had spoken to no one on the subject, and yet he felt it in his
bones that there was something--Fra Martino's name had never been mixed
up with the affair; nevertheless, Tim O'Clee was absolutely certain
that the old priest knew something about the mysterious life or death
of Dudley Stone.  And as the car sped along from the old city to the
new, from cobbled pavements to smooth tarred roads, Timothy seemed to
see the enigmatical figure of Dudley Stone mocking him with its fancied
appearances and swift evanescence at every street corner, under the
awnings of the cafs, in crowded tramcars or elegant motors.  And,
through the dust of the streets and the fast-gathering twilight, he saw
the no less elusive and still more provocative face of Hold-Hands
Juliana, grinning at him through the windows of the car, and taunting
him with full, red lips that laughed, and gleaming white teeth ready to
bite.  'Trace Dudley Stone?' she jeered.  'Find out when he died?  Bah!
You are a fool, Timothy O'Clerigh.  Six years is a long time, and those
who swore affidavits then are ready to swear again.  Their wits are
sharper than yours, my friend, and they are not likely to give
themselves away for any Irish blandishments you may try upon them.  The
motive, my friend, was a strong one, remember.'

The motive?  Yes!  That was it.  The entry in Uncle Justin's diary: 'I
gave my beloved the fifty thousand pounds she wanted.'  Uncle Justin's
money had bought those perjurers, and there was nothing in the balance,
save Irish wit, to force them to disgorge.




VIII

The impression which Timothy retained of that evening at the Club
Nacional always remained rather vague.  He remembered the smart club
servant, who took his hat and stick when he arrived.  He remembered
being ushered into the lounge, a room level with the busy street and
with great windows--something like Harrods' or Whiteley's--right down
to the ground.  He had a swift impression of large arm-chairs, small
tables, ash-trays and cuspidors, of a bar groaning under an army of
bottles of every colour, shape and size, and adorned with small flags
of all nations, and large dolls fantastically dressed, such as he had
seen and cordially detested in all the fashionable resorts in Europe;
of a room full of people, terribly hot and airless, the atmosphere
heavy with the scent of powder and perfume; of a crowd of men and
women, of white-coated barmen flitting in and out amongst them, of the
glitter of diamonds, the buzz of conversation interspersed with shrill
ejaculations and ear-piercing bursts of laughter.

It was the same impression that one invariably receives when entering
the parrot-house at the Zoo, with the gay macaws and parakeets
chattering and shrieking.

Of the dinner itself, Tim's impressions were equally elusive and dim.
The host, Dom Manol da Lisbao, was cordiality and hospitality
personified.  He introduced Timothy to all his friends.  There was the
Senhor This and the Conde That; there was Fra Martino, whom the dear
Major already knew, and above all, there were the ladies: the dowager
Marqueza Guimares, a bony image--smothered in diamonds which appeared
too heavy for her meagre shoulders--but obviously the greatest power in
this tiny social world.  Whenever she raised her shrill high-pitched
voice the younger people stopped talking and listened with deference to
what she had to say.  Her husband, the Marquez, was there; an
insignificant, silent old man, whose most conspicuous characteristic
was a huge blond beard, and a single stone diamond the size of a
thrush's egg on his little finger.

Two other ladies flashed dark eyes at Timothy as he was introduced to
them; handsome, both of them, with perfectly shingled and water-waved
hair, and the latest Paris creations that accentuated rather than
veiled the somewhat full curves beneath.  They were very cordial, very
engaging, rattled off a whole series of questions at Timothy about the
latest social events in Europe--Paris, London, Deauville, and
especially Monte Carlo which they had both visited and liked extremely.
They each had a husband--nice, gentlemanly-looking men, in
well-tailored dress-suits, very amiable; and one had a son who had been
up at Oxford and spoke English with a perfect Oxford drawl.

But all these impressions remained vague, blurred; the people
themselves like characters in a dream or in a play.  Only four of those
who were there that night left the impress of their personality on
Tim's consciousness.  There was the host, of course, pleasant,
convivial, hospitable, speaking perfect English with just enough hint
of foreign intonation to make it attractive.  Well read and well
informed too.  Had travelled a great deal.  Knew England well and had
hunted in Ireland.  Seemingly not a complicated character, with nothing
sinister about the pleasant, rather prominent dark eyes, the sensuous
mouth and somewhat fleshy jaw.  Everyone at the table, even the ladies,
drank freely and so did he; but obviously, he held his liquor well, for
though he, like all the rest, became very hilarious towards the end of
dinner, he never forgot his good manners, and his conversation as well
as his gestures remained well within the bounds of propriety.

An altogether different personage was the senhor _doutor_ da Pinto, the
man who, according to Fra Martino, had been an obscure practitioner in
an outlying provincial city, and then had the good fortune to attract
the attention and gain the friendship of Dom Manol da Lisbao, and
forthwith became a fashionable consultant among the _lite_ of
Monsataz.  Da Pinto was in every respect the antithesis of his friend
and patron.  In appearance he was more like one of his former
patients--a _vaqueiro_ rather than a doctor.  His evening suit had very
obviously not been cut by a London tailor, and sat ill upon his large,
stocky figure.  His shirt was already creased when he first entered the
room; it was adorned with three large diamond studs.  He wore a soft
collar of Byronic shape, which gave free play to his thick neck, and
displayed the powerful throat with its prominent Adam's apple.  He wore
patent-leather Oxford shoes of which the laces had turned green with
age, red cotton socks and a voluminous black tie.

His hair, once coal-black, now of a pepper-and-salt mixture, was
cropped quite short and stood up like a stiff brush above his large,
florid face.  He had very small, deep-set black eyes, a nose shaped
like the ace of spades, a stubbly beard, no moustache, and an immense
square jaw.

Certainly an ugly customer to have to deal with, thought Timothy, say
in a street fight, or a quarrel over a card table.  As for having him
by your bedside when you were sick, he, Tim, was quite sure that for
his part he would far sooner die.  It was difficult to associate him in
a parental capacity with the lovely Teresa.  Of her, Timothy retained a
very vivid impression, even on that first night, when everything was so
blurred.  She came into the lounge rather late, when the little party
had already assembled round one of the tables and was drinking
cocktails.  She had had an accident with her dress, she explained, and
had to run into the cloak-room to have a stitch put to the damage.  She
was small and thin and exquisite, with a perfect oval of a face,
delicate features, and glossy dark hair which she wore in the
old-fashioned mode in a loose knot at the nape of her neck.  But it was
her eyes that were arresting, for they expressed so many emotions all
at one and the same time.  All through dinner Timothy could not make up
his mind whether those eyes were tender and feminine and appealing, or
whether they were masterful and passionate.  She had a trick of veiling
her eyes without closing them, drawing an invisible veil over them so
that all expression vanished from them and only a kind of mysterious
light remained.

She had adorable manners, girlish and graceful, without any shyness or
self-consciousness.  Though she entered the crowded room all alone and
must have felt a whole battery of eyes turned upon her, she walked
across to her host without any affectation or swagger.  She kissed the
hand of the old Marqueza, bobbed a little curtsy to Fra Martino,
greeted the others with smile, nod or handshake, and paid very little
heed to the newcomer; but to Dom Manol she just gave a glance, which
revealed a whole romance to the observant Irishman.  He recollected
what Fra Martino had told him in the car--the engagement between Dom
Manol and the pretty girl soon to be announced--but, in that one
glance, Timothy had guessed which of the two it was who was still
holding aloof--and put Dom Manol down for a fool.

The dinner went off splendidly; it was excellently cooked and
excellently served.  There was plenty of champagne and liqueurs, and
the coffee was beyond praise.

Throughout the dinner there was no mention of Dudley Stone.




IX

After dinner most of the company, including the ladies, went off to the
Hotel Americano, where it seemed there was a good floor and a good
band.  Timothy managed to refuse the many invitations that were
showered upon him to join one party or the other.  He wanted to be
alone and sort out his confused impressions.  Fra Martino had gone some
time ago, pleading parochial duties; but some of the men had remained
behind, sitting in groups of twos or threes about the table, still
sipping brandy.  Timothy rose and took leave of his host.

'I have to thank you...' he began.

'For nothing, my dear fellow.  We are only too delighted to welcome
you.  The advent of a stranger in Monsataz is quite an event for us
poor provincials.'

Timothy made a second attempt at taking his leave.

Said Dom Manol casually: 'By the way, my dear Major, Fra Martino tells
me that you knew my old friend, Dudley Stone.'

'Only by reputation,' Tim replied.

'He was an interesting personality.'

'Very.'

'But terribly reckless ... that last illness of his ... you know...?'

'Yes?'

'He would go shooting up the river and stayed out too late in the
evenings.  Doctor da Pinto often warned him, but he would not listen.
It was a certain way of catching malarial fever.  He didn't believe, I
suppose, what the doctor said.  Many of us are like that.  It was such
a pity.  I liked Stone very much.'

'Yes?'

'And he was genuinely fond of me.  I was with him when he died.'

'Were you?'

'He had been staying, funnily enough, at the hotel you are at--the
Angola.'

'So I understand!'

'But about a month before he died he came and stayed at my house.  I
was very glad afterwards that he did.  It would have been terrible for
him, poor fellow, to have had the discomfort--the misery, really, of a
long illness in an hotel.'

'It would, indeed.'

Dom Manol did not appear to be disconcerted by Tim's laconic comments.
It seemed as if, having embarked on the subject of Dudley Stone, he
could not again tear himself away from it.  He talked and talked about
the Englishman--his dear friend, as he called him--and seemed as if he
could not say enough about his charm, his courage, his interesting
personality.'

'I first knew him in London,' he said, at one time.  'I was a young
attach there for a few months, the year before the war.  Stone had
just returned from Bulgaria, where he had fought like the devil against
the Turks.  He must have been a wonderful fighter, I imagine, for he
knew no fear.

'Of course,' Dom Manol went on, after a slight pause, during which he
puffed away dreamily at his cigar, 'I don't know what happened during
the war.  I understand that poor old Stone fell very much into
disfavour, but I never knew why.'

'I never knew, either,' Tim put in simply.  'I was only a schoolboy at
the outbreak of the war.  Something occurred then--but I only knew it
from hearsay, some time afterwards.'

'Poor old Stone!  I am confident, O'Clerigh, that he never did anything
shabby in his life.  Isn't that so, doctor?' he went on, half turning
to da Pinto, in order to draw him into the conversation.

But the senhor _doutor_ was by now midway to the land of Nod.  He had
drunk copiously and talked a great deal; sipping cognac and smoking an
excellent cigar, he had gradually become silent and detached.  Dom
Manol's mellow but authoritative voice called him back to the
realities of life for a moment or two.  He looked round, somewhat
bleary-eyed, and passed his hand through his grey thatch.

'Eh?' he queried vaguely.  'What?'

'You knew Dudley Stone?  Do you think that he was capable of doing
anything so mean as to be a traitor during the war?'

The doctor shook his big head with much energy.

'No, no!' he said, thickly.  'Fine fellow, Stone--knew him
intimately--attended him when he had malaria....'

'You were with him to the end, weren't you?'

'Eh--what?'

'You were with Stone when he died?' the other insisted; and to Tim's
sensitive ear, strained to note every inflection in the man's voice,
the words, that had been obviously intended as a query, sounded more
like an emphatic statement of fact, not to say a command.

'Yes, yes, of course,' the doctor said, roused for a moment out of his
fuddled condition; 'when Stone died ... I was with him ... I said so
... I swore on my oath ... Yes! yes! of course....'

Dom Manol gave a contemptuous shrug.

'Pity, isn't it?' he said, turning again to O'Clerigh and indicating
the doctor, who had once more lapsed into semi-somnolence.  'He had a
splendid practice and a fine position here until he took to drink.
But, as you were saying, my dear Major...'

'I didn't say anything, but I was thinking that it is fully time I took
my leave....'

'Oh! but not yet ... I really cannot allow...'

'I must thank you and all the other members of the club for your
marvellous kindness to me.  I had heard something of Brazilian
hospitality before, but had no idea...'

'My dear fellow, the pleasure was ours, you may be sure.  But won't you
change your mind and come along with me?  I'd like to show you some of
our night-life over here--and I can promise you that you won't be dull.
Come and have supper with me at the Americano--I can introduce you to
one or two more charming ladies, and I am sure you are fond of
dancing....'

'That's awfully good of you, but not to-night, if you don't mind.  I've
a lot of letters to write, and if I don't get through some of them
to-night, when it's cool, I shall never do them at all.'

It would have been bad form to insist and Dom Manol never did or said
anything that was bad form.  Timothy took his leave of those who had
remained to the last, including the doctor, who by this time didn't
know who it was who was bidding him good night and thanking him for a
most pleasant evening.  All the others were apparently intent on going
on to some more lively form of entertainment.  Night-life in the cities
of Brazil is always of the gayest, and dancing goes on in every hotel,
restaurant or caf, big or small.  Tim had all a young, healthy
animal's love of exercise and jumping about, but he already felt rather
ashamed of having accepted hospitality from these men, among whom there
were at least three whom he looked upon as perjurers, forgers and
thieves, and whom he had every intention of unmasking and bringing to
book.  This evening's affair had been necessary, of course, for the
success of his venture, but by no possible standard of morality or
honour could the acceptance of further hospitality from Dom Manol be
condoned.




X

In the days and weeks that followed, Timothy, strolling about the quay,
the cafs and places of amusement of the city, had entered into
conversation with scores of men in every station of life; with soldiers
and sailors, with stevedores and barmen, with half-breeds and
_vaqueiros_, shop-girls and women in the streets.  Discreetly,
tactfully, always leading up by easy stages to the subject of past and
present foreign visitors in Monsataz, he would put in a question
presently about an Englishman--Dudley Stone.  Quite a number of people
knew about him, but more or less vaguely; he had not remained in
Monsataz very long; an English senhor, who was not a reverend, had, it
was admitted, visited Monsataz some six years ago, but he had not
apparently remained long enough to leave his mark on the minds of those
with whom he had not come into personal contact.  But there were some
here and there who had known him, spoken to him.  At the bar of the
Hotel Americano he had often been served with drink.  A dancer at the
Conquistador music-hall had lived with him for a month or two.  He had
hired a car at one of the garages and driven himself about all over the
neighbouring country.  These and various other traces of Stone's
passage through Monsataz had been easy to pick up.  But his stay here
had only been a passage: coming one day by steamer from Pernambuco, he
went off again some few months later--no one knew whither or how.

When Timothy suggested that this Mr. Stone had died of malaria some
time in May, 1924, they shrugged their shoulders and said that that was
very likely--many people died of fever in Monsataz, especially in the
old town, every year.  There was a mound in a corner of the _cemiterio_
of Santa Fe, with a broken wooden cross stuck at the head of it.  The
cross had once had a coat of white paint on it, with a name painted on
in black, but both white and black paint had long since been washed off
by the tropical rains.  The girl from the Conquistador music-hall took
Timothy thither one day and told him that she had been made to
understand that her English lover was buried there.  But there was
nothing to prove that.  Tim ran Fra Martino to earth and plied him with
questions, but, as usual, the old priest had extraordinarily little to
say on the subject.  It might be; he did not know; he himself was away
from Monsataz in the spring of 1924, and he had never taken any special
interest in this Mr. Stone.  On the other hand, the old verger at the
church of Santa F shook his head most emphatically at the suggestion
that a foreign senhor had been buried in the _cemiterio_, either six
years ago or at any time--and he had been verger of the church for the
last forty years.  The mound beneath which the foreign senhor was
supposed to be buried was one of a number in which rested the bones of
the many victims of a severe epidemic of yellow fever, which had
carried away no end of people in the spring of 1924.  A corner of the
_cemiterio_ had been set apart for the purpose, because burials had to
be done very quickly by order of the Government.  But a foreign senhor?
No! no!  Old Hermanos was quite sure about that--no foreign senhor lay
buried in the _cemiterio_ of Santa F.  All this, then, left the puzzle
more acute than ever; for if Dudley Stone did not die of malarial fever
in May, 1924, what then had become of him?

The general opinion was that the English senhor, Mr. Stone, had gone
up-country either on a shooting expedition or in search of adventure,
and that in either case he had been killed and eaten by a jaguar.




XI

There was a caf on the confine between the old and modern city called
the Caf Bom Genio; a promising sign.  It was frequented mostly by
commercial travellers and dealers of all sorts, men who traded with
cattle-drovers and farmers up-country, who were pleasant and
loose-tongued, and over a bottle of white rum discussed politics and
the incidents of their trade.

The girl, Inez, she who had lived for a time with Dudley Stone and was
a dancer at the Conquistador music-hall, took Tim there one evening.
'There are a lot of foreigners always there,' she said, 'who go about
all over the country.  They may have heard something; one never knows.
Their tongues are loose for they drink a lot of rum.  They are not like
us Brasilheiros, for we are silent people; we only talk to friends,
because we are cautious--but they...'  She shrugged her pretty
shoulders in very obvious contempt of the foreigner.

The place was gaily enough lighted.  There was nothing sinister about
it.  True, the atmosphere was so rank that it was almost solid; it
reeked of spirits and stale food, of garlic and humanity and black
tobacco.  There were seats all round the room which had once been
covered with leather; there were trestle tables and a few benches.  The
room was crowded and the sounds were deafening.  Men were sitting at
the tables, drinking and smoking, some were playing cards, others
dominoes; there were only a very few women, four or five at most.  They
all greeted Inez with a cheery 'Allo!' as she entered, and eyed Tim
with blatant curiosity.

To Tim it seemed as if everyone in the room talked at once, while
nobody listened.  All the voices appeared jumbled, and that first
evening he heard and saw nothing of interest.  But he remembered what
Inez had said: 'They go about all over the country and they may have
heard something; one never knows'; and he went again and again to the
Caf Bom Genio.  He got to know all its regular customers: rascals,
most of them, so he soon found out.  Unblushing rogues, too, for one
tale capped another of how the _vaqueiros_ up in the Sertao district
were induced to sell hides from which the branding mark had been
carefully cut out, or cattle which had obviously been stolen.

Nevertheless, Tim made friends with them all, got them to talk to him
about their affairs, their business; they were certainly loose-tongued,
as Inez had told him, and an extra glass or two of rum would render
most men there loquacious.  There was a Dutchman who came regularly to
the Bom Genio.  His name was Van Smeet.  He was a large, fat, florid
rascal, whose clothes would have been a joy to a caricaturist.  He
seemed to be dressed just in what he happened to have; breeches or
trousers, more or less patched, a khaki shirt which allowed of a
generous display of a pink blond chest, a coloured handkerchief loosely
knotted below a collar of Byronic amplitude, and a belt which seemed to
wage constant warfare on his bulging waistline.  Then there was a
Portuguese cattle dealer, rather morose and taciturn, with fingers
thickly stained with tobacco juice, hair and beard as black and shiny
as anthracite coal, and eyes very close together over a beaky nose
which gave him the appearance of a condor sitting pondering in his cage
at the London Zoo.  There were a couple of Germans who dealt in
precious stones--illicit diamond buying, most probably--but were
careful to avoid conflict with the law; and a few more of doubtful
nationality and origin, touched more or less with the tar-brush, some
gay, some taciturn, but all apparently engaged in the agreeable
business of cheating with equal impartiality the man from whom they
bought and the customer to whom they sold.

But it was Van Smeet, the Dutchman, whom Tim liked best.  He was so
comfortable in his rascality.  'Why not make use of rogues if they are
willing to take risks?' he would say, beaming at his friends whom he
had just treated to real Jamaica all round.  'I buy my hides cheap,
not? ... then what do I care where they come from?'

One of the friends demurred: 'If you get found out?'

'Well!  I am covered.  I buy the hides in good faith, not?'

'I suppose you know where they come from?'

'Of course I do--but it's no business of mine.'

Such was invariably the commencement of a conversation which then,
equally invariably, drifted into one of two channels--either politics
and a general damning and cursing of the Government, taxes and so on,
or the mysterious doings up in the Sertao.

'There is bound to be a row about it soon,' the Portuguese would remark
sententiously, and this remark made regularly every evening in a
gloomy, sepulchral voice would then start the favourite topic of
conversation.

'The Great Unknown!' one of them would say in the same tone of voice as
if he were referring to a terrible and awesome god.  After which there
would be a silence for a moment or two until someone--a newcomer, like
Tim, to these parts--would ask the inevitable question: 'Who is he,
exactly?'

Opinions varied as to that.  It seemed that some thirty odd years ago
there had arisen in the desert land of the Sertao a prophet, a seer,
call him what you will, whom the _vaqueiros_ and their like had named
Antonio Conselheiro, and had looked upon as a second John the Baptist;
and some would have it that this prophet had now come to life again,
and that in the desert he was called the Great Unknown.

'Funny for a resurrected prophet to become the greatest cattle thief in
Brazil,' the Dutchman then remarked dryly, but with a humorous twinkle
in his eye and a wink at his friend Tim.

But this did not upset the faith of those who chose to look on the
Great Unknown with awe.  Tim soon noticed that the foreigners and even
the Brasilheiros were inclined to treat the story of the risen prophet
with contempt, but that those of mixed blood--and there were many of
those among the frequenters of the Bom Genio--appeared seized with a
kind of religious fervour whenever there was mention of the Great
Unknown.

The Portuguese dealer put in a sententious word or two as a rebuke to
the Dutchman's flippancy.

'He is no cattle thief.  It is his army who scour the country--and they
do it, too.  Why, the other week...'

Whereupon would follow endless stories of the depredations carried on
by this army of bandits, who owned no allegiance save to the mysterious
prophet, and in his name descended on the villages around, robbed,
stole anything they could lay their hands on.  And latterly, it seemed
they had become insolent in their daring and their defiance of the law.
Ranch owners on the fringe of the Sertao were no longer safe, their
cattle and their horses were driven off; their stores stolen, their
tills robbed.  And with it all the army grew in numbers week by
week--almost day by day.  The mysticism which surrounded the
personality of the Great Unknown, as well as the free life of looting
and pirating, appealed to these semi-savage dwellers of the Sertao, and
the fair-haired Sertanejos, the dark Mesticos, the coffee-coloured
Mamalucos, the innumerable mixtures of Indian, Negro and white blood in
the desert all went to swell this horde who knew no law, save its
desires and the word of the Great Unknown.

'It is his army--not himself....'

'Well,' the Dutchman would argue, 'he benefits, doesn't he?'

'Of course he does,' remarked one of the Germans; 'they say he is
richer than any New York millionaire.'

'But what is he going to do with all that money?  He can't spend it out
there in the desert....'

'Overthrow this d----d Government.  He has an army of ten thousand men,
armed and equipped....'

'Bah!  A lot of half-breeds....'

'Determined men ... I remember thirty years ago that Antonio
Conselheiro held out in the desert against four military expeditions
sent out by the Government....'

'What became of him?'

'Killed.  And every man in his army with him.'

'But then this new man...'

The conversation would then become general.  All the same ground gone
over every night.  Some had one theory, some another; and while the
foreigners jeered and made fun of the resurrected prophet, there were
those who put their heads together and whispered.  Tim caught snatches.
A word here and there.  It seems that this story of the mysterious
Great Unknown had a good deal of political significance.  The
Portuguese trader who had business dealings direct with the _vaqueiros_
on the Sertao insisted on the fact that the Great Unknown was a direct
descendant of the last Emperor of Brazil, and that he was collecting
all the money he could, and having his army trained by European
officers with a view to marching presently on Pernambuco and there
proclaiming the re-establishment of the Empire with himself as Emperor.

And this turned the conversation at once into its political channel.

'Good luck to him, I say!'

'What has this d----d Government ever done...?'

'Except taxes--and more taxes--and nothing but taxes.'

'And officials poking their noses in everybody's business.'

Everyone had a grievance, and there were always the secret foreign
agents ready to stir up trouble.  Tim ceased to be interested.  His
thoughts had gone roaming to the unknown desert land of the Sertao; he
fell to wondering whether by any chance Dudley Stone, the adventurer,
had drifted into the army of the Great Unknown.  It would be just like
him to embark on a career of instructor to a lot of _vaqueiros_ and
half-breeds, who were destined to upset the existing Government of the
country and to restore the Empire of Brazil on the ashes of its young
Republic.  He had played that sort of rle in Bulgaria, where he had
commanded a troupe of comitadjis during the Balkan War--so why not here
and now?  It was just the sort of adventure that would commend itself
to Dudley Stone.

The fact that his new friend Van Smeet let fall the remark once that he
had some business dealings with Dom Manol da Lisbao, seemed like a
link in a new chain of evidence which Tim had begun to forge.  'I take
off my hat to Dom Manol,' the Dutchman had said, with a thick laugh
and a jovial smacking of the lips.  'I am only a babe in business
compared with him.'

And when Tim asked him how and where this business was transacted, he
replied: 'Oh!  Up in that God-forsaken district, the Sertao--Dom Manol
has his ranch there--you didn't know?  Oh!  A magnificent ranch.  I buy
cattle and hides from him--hides that have no branding mark
sometimes--and diamonds which ... But we won't talk about that.  Our
friend Dom Manol has very long ears....'




XII

But there was yet another important personality in this drama of
mystery and adventure--and a more than intriguing one at that.  This
was Teresa da Pinto, the doctor's daughter, whose engagement to Dom
Manol da Lisbao was said to be pending, but had not yet been
officially announced.

It was generally understood that the marriage would take place some
time before the New Year.  Dom Manol, when twitted on the subject,
neither denied nor admitted the impeachment.  Teresa was reticence
personified.  On the other hand, the doctor, when he was sober, talked
often and freely about his daughter's forthcoming marriage.  'Such a
comfort it will be to me,' he would say, 'to see her happily settled.
It was her mother's dying wish that she should marry her old playmate
... she and Manol were children together....'  Which everyone knew to
be a lie, but no one took the trouble to contradict.  Timothy could not
understand why Dom Manol hung back, for Teresa was very beautiful; she
was the only child of a very rich man, who was Manol's friend--his
partner in felony--and, very obviously, she was deeply in love with
him.  No one could mistake the meaning of her glance when it rested on
Manol da Lisbao; those lovely dark eyes of hers would soften in an
exquisite look of tenderness.  But equally unmistakable was the
indifference--sometimes the good-humoured mockery--with which he
responded; and whenever she saw that smile of his--so pleasant and so
cool--the look of tenderness vanished, engulfed at times in a spasm of
intense pain, at others in passionate resentment which was almost hate.
And Timothy would then wonder just how much she knew.

She was very sweet and kind to Tim; prattled away in excellent English,
danced a great deal with him, and accepted his obvious admiration as a
homage due to her beauty.  She had never been in Europe, and liked
apparently to hear him talk of Paris, or Rome, or London.  She was
interested in many things: pictures, theatres, cinemas, or frocks, the
gambling at Monte Carlo or the racing at Ascot.  Tim even caught
himself one day telling her about his beautiful home in Ireland: the
old battlemented towers which had seen eight centuries flit by; he told
her about the silvery lake and the mist-laden horizon above which
peeped the green-sunbathed Irish hills; and about the age-old trees,
and the woods that were carpeted with anemones in the spring, or ablaze
in the autumn with a glory of russet and gold.

'How you must love it!' she said.

It was at a _th dansant_ at the Americano.  Dom Manol was expected
but had not yet arrived; so they danced together a good deal, Tim and
she, and then sat down at a small table away from the rest of the crowd
and were served with tea.

She had listened to him with her great dark eyes fixed upon him while
he talked--eyes, whose expression he tried in vain to fathom.  And
again he wondered how much she knew.  And then Dom Manol arrived.  He
strode up to their table, good-humoured, pleasant, full of apologies to
Teresa for being late.  'But you have been in such excellent company,'
he said graciously.  Then, with a polite: 'May I join you?' he sat down
at the table and ordered tea.

'I am sure,' he said, in the interval of munching a chocolate clair,
'that our dear Major has been entertaining you with tales of his lost
friend, Dudley Stone.  I never saw a man so obsessed with a fixed idea,
and as I tell him...'  He helped himself to another clair and
continued to prattle on in his pleasant, jovial way, chaffing Tim about
his persistent inquiries after Dudley Stone.  'Our dear Major,' he
said, 'must be contemplating writing the biography of my late lamented
friend.  I have told him all there was to know, as I knew Stone
intimately.  But still he is not satisfied--he must needs go into every
disreputable tavern in the old city and enter into conversation with
every bad character he comes across.  And for what object, I ask
you...?'

Tim took up the challenge with equal good humour.

'Perhaps, as you say, I may want to write a life of Stone.  He was an
extraordinary character, you know....'

Teresa had become unaccountably silent.  She appeared chiefly
interested in watching Manol polishing off his third clair.

Said Dom Manol: 'You are right there--Stone was an extraordinary
character.  A trifle _toqu_ is, I believe, the correct expression to
describe the borderland between sanity and madness.  He must, during
his lifetime, have often spoken about me to his friends in England,
because when a few years ago his widow wished to prove his death, I was
approached, along with Teresa's father and the priest, who were with
him when he died, with a view to certain affidavits which were required
by the law of your country....  Naturally we all complied--it was a
simple request....  You may have heard something of the whole affair?'

'I did,' Tim replied curtly; 'Mrs. Stone subsequently married my uncle.'

'But how interesting! ... Do you hear that, Teresa? ... You remember
Mr. Stone? ... But, of course, you were just a child when he died ... I
thought the lady had married an English nobleman ... Lord ... Lord ...
I forget....'

'Lord Traskmoore was my uncle--he was Irish, not English.'

'Irish ... Irish, of course ... how stupid of me....  We are all so
stupid about that, we poor foreigners, not? ... And it is so difficult,
too, with your peerage ... the title, and then the family name....  And
so Mrs. Stone became your aunt? ... But how interesting!'

'My aunt....  Great God!'  Tim had very nearly uttered this exclamation
aloud.

The band struck up the opening bars of a tango.  Manol hastily gulped
down his tea and, without saying 'by your leave,' carried Teresa off to
dance.  Timothy watched them with delight.  Never had he seen more
perfect, more rhythmical dancing.  The sensuous movements of the tango
suited Teresa's lissom figure to perfection.  Manol held her tightly
to him and she looked as if she were gliding along in his arms, her
beautiful body seeming at one with his.  At times Tim caught sight of
her face: her eyes were half-closed, the long lashes throwing a
softening shadow over her cheeks.  But Manol was just the male,
holding that which was his by right of conquest.  He held her so close
that her spine was nearly doubled back over his arm; from time to time
he touched her hair with his lips.  The touch was as subtle, as
delicate as that of a butterfly's wing on the petal of a flower, but it
reached her consciousness nevertheless: a tremor would go through her
body, the blue-veined lids fell over the eyes, veiling them completely,
while the moist red lips were parted in an ecstasy of delight.

'What a fool that man is,' Timothy thought; 'and how she loves him!'

This started a new train of thought, and for the first time since the
outset of his great adventure, he asked himself if it was all worth
while.  Was he grasping at a shadow while losing hold of the beautiful
realities of life?  With the money which his father had left him he
might have settled down in the old country to farm his own bit of land.
He might have had a simple home, a wife ... children.  Life would have
been easy....

'It would not, Tim, my lad,' he said to himself.  'Easy?  Rather not!
... You would have burst your guts with rage every time Hold-Hands
Juliana passed you by in her Rolls-Royce, or you read of the marvellous
gown she wore at Ascot....  No, my son! as you've made your bed, so
must you lie on it....  But I wish that lovely Teresa had not fallen in
love with one of the greatest rascals unhung....'




XIII

After the tango Dom Manol was obliged to pay his respects to other
ladies present.  The old Marqueza detained him in conversation, and
once more Tim found himself with Teresa, slightly isolated from the
rest of the crowd.  She was flushed and breathless after the dance; her
beautiful eyes shone dark and luminous in the pure oval of her face.
Beautiful she was, and from a man's point of view, infinitely
desirable; and though for some unexplainable reason she did not appeal
to Timothy in that sense, nevertheless he was conscious of a great
feeling of sympathy for her--almost of pity, for she obviously was not
happy.

She asked for an iced drink, and Tim got her an orangeade; while she
sipped it through the straws she kept her eyes over the glass fixed
upon Tim, with a look, so he thought, of anxiety.  Presently she put
her glass down and asked an abrupt question.

'It isn't all true, is it?'

'What is?'

'That you go about in all sorts of low haunts in the city and talk to
disreputable characters...?'

Tim laughed.  'I don't know about "low" or about "disreputable," but
being a student of human nature...'

She gave a quaint little smile.  'You need not study human nature in
the drinking-booths of the old city....'

'But suppose I say that I find the drinking-booths of the old city more
interesting than'--with a glance he indicated the elegant assembly at
the _th dansant_--'than this sort of thing.'

Teresa remained silent for a moment or two.  Apparently she was
pondering over what he had just said.  Then all of a sudden she seemed
to make up her mind.

'Don't go about to those places any more, Major O'Clerigh,' she said,
with an earnest glance of her dark expressive eyes.  'It isn't safe,
you know.'

'Oh!'

'I know.  I know.  Men are all alike.  They think women are cowards
just because they are prudent.  But foolhardiness is not bravery.'

Tim smiled, with the indulgent contempt of the male at the girl's
anxiety.

'There's no question of foolhardiness or of bravery,' he said; 'only
curiosity.'

'Then promise me...'

She had spoken abruptly, and then, just as abruptly she paused, the
eager sympathy died out of her eyes, and an expression came into them
all of a sudden which Tim could not define.  It looked almost like
fear.  He was sitting with his back turned to the rest of the crowd
while talking to Teresa, so did not see Dom Manol, who had worked his
way back to their table.  It was not until the pleasant, cheery voice
struck on his ear that he understood why the expression in the girl's
face had changed so suddenly.

'One more waltz, _cara_--then I'm afraid I shall have to go.  If our
dear Major will excuse....'

Dom Manol, as before, took possession of Teresa and led her to the
dancing floor and Tim was left to ponder over the strange little
episode.

He did not see the girl again that day, but the next morning a
barefooted urchin brought a small parcel for the senhor Inglez to the
hotel.  He didn't wait for an answer, but said he had orders to deliver
the parcel into the senhor's own hands.  Very much intrigued, Tim
opened it.  It contained a short dagger, with handle and sheath of
exquisite Toledo workmanship, and with it a note written in quaint,
rather stilted English in an ornate, foreign hand.  It said:


'A very dear friend gave me this toy once.  I have no use for it, but
it will serve you well whenever the study of human nature leads you
into trouble.  Promise me never to go out into the streets of this city
without it.  It is safer and more feared than a Browning.'


The note was not signed.  Tim took up the dagger, drew it out of its
sheath, and looked with admiration on the beautiful Toledo blade and
the exquisite silver inlay in the finely-tempered steel.  He laid it
down upon the table and then re-read the note.

'Funny girl,' he murmured.  'Why she should ... "safer than a
Browning"?  I suppose she means that it makes no noise.'  And then,
following a fresh train of thought: 'I wonder how much she does know.'

But that evening when he went to meet his friend the Dutchman, at the
Bom Genio, he had Teresa's gift safely stowed away in his hip-pocket.




XIV

It was a couple of evenings later that Dom Manol persuaded Tim to join
him and Doctor da Pinto at the Hespanha music-hall.

'Not quite so elegant,' he explained, 'as the Conquistador, where your
friend, Inez, is the somewhat worn-out star, but far more amusing.
Just now there is a Negro dancer--a girl who, I am told, is quite
wonderful.  Teresa very much wants to see the creature and I would like
to take her.  We'll have to have old da Pinto for a chaperon.  We can
have supper there--their _Vatapa  Bahiana_ is superb--and, anyway, I
can promise you a pleasant evening.  You'll come, won't you?'

'Only if you will allow it to be my party.  The doctor and the
senhorita have been very kind to me---it would give me a chance of
making some return.'

'Very well--just as you like.  Will you book a table or shall I?  It is
better, as the place gets very crowded....'

'I'll see to all that,' said Tim.

The Hespanha turned out to be a small place of the usual pattern of
music-hall in that part of the world: a stage, a floor crowded with
seats, a balcony on three sides of the hall.  On the balcony,
trestle-tables with benches and chairs, at which supper was served
during the performance.  Tim had secured a table for his little party
and the evening began gaily enough.  The doctor appeared less truculent
than usual and Teresa was in one of her happy moods; her eyes sparkled
with joy; she prattled away as gaily as a young bird.  The Hespanha was
evidently one of those Bohemian places which exist in most countries:
neither salubrious nor comfortable, offering but a poor entertainment
and indifferent food; the haunt, too, of many undesirables in the
social world--they have, nevertheless, a strange attraction for
fastidious and refined women of the world, such as Teresa da Pinto, and
for reasons which they themselves could not explain.  Is it that they
like to rub their dainty shoulders against the coarse fibres of
humanity?  Is it the novelty of the surroundings?  The tasting of fruit
which, though no longer forbidden these days, still retains a certain
savour of the unusual and the provocative?  Who can say?  Certain it is
that the exquisite Teresa seemed greatly to enjoy the dish of _Vatapa 
Bahiana_, the highly spiced national dish, something like an Indian
curry, which is the favourite supper dish in these parts, served on a
thick earthenware plate by a seedy-looking, chocolate-coloured waiter;
and it was with obvious relish that she sipped iced champagne out of
tumblers a quarter of an inch thick.

She seemed to have totally forgotten her earnestness of the other
day--her anxiety on Tim's behalf--and when, with mock ostentation, he
drew the beautiful Toledo dagger from his pocket and placed it beside
his plate, she appeared highly amused and pleased.  Dom Manol remarked
on the pretty toy: apparently he had never seen it before and did not
know that it was a gift from Teresa.  She gave Tim a quick look and,
unseen by Manol, she raised a finger to her lips, which he took to
mean that the gift and her note were to remain a secret between them.

Neither Tim nor his friends paid much heed to the performance; it was
very poor, the dancers were badly dressed and neither very young nor
very pretty.  The audience was not worth looking at.  What Tim did
enjoy was to gaze at Teresa.  Never had he seen her look more
beautiful, because for once she seemed perfectly happy.  Dom Manol was
entirely lover-like, attentive, taking every opportunity to whisper in
her ear--words unheard by anyone but herself and which had the effect
of sending a soft blush up to her cheeks.  The doctor made obvious
efforts to talk amiably with Tim.  He drank more than was good for him,
however; more than he had done in public recently.  Tim noticed that
whenever he reached out for the bottle of champagne in order to fill
his glass, Dom Manol would give him a stern look, but the power of
that look was evidently not great, for, after a shrug and a scowl at
his friend, da Pinto would deliberately have yet another glass.

At first there had been a good many free tables on the balcony, but
towards midnight several hilarious groups came trooping into the hall.
Among these, Tim caught sight of Van Smeet.  He had a girl with him
and, after some discussion with the seedy-looking waiter, took
possession of a table close by.  He wanted the table next to Tim's
party, but the waiter assured him that that was booked.  In the

meanwhile, Tim had nodded to him, and Dom Manol also condescended to
give him a look of recognition.

It was just after midnight that a set of very rowdy people invaded the
balcony and with a great deal of talking, shrieks of laughter and
stentorian commands to the waiter, spread themselves round the table
nearest to Tim and his party.  There were three men and a couple of
girls--rough-looking fellows, whom Tim more than suspected of being
some sort of half-breeds: the girls were showily dressed, and the whole
party soon began to drink very freely, whilst smoking innumerable
cigarettes.

From the first these people made themselves objectionable to Tim and
his friends.  The girls, shrieking at the top of their strident voices,
scrutinized Teresa with blatant impertinence.  The men roared with
laughter whenever the women made insolent remarks in loud whispers,
evidently intended to be overheard.  All of them drank and ate noisily
and expectorated all over the floor.  Tim complained to the waiter, who
shrugged his shoulders and declared himself powerless to interfere.
Accustomed to the ways of his own country, Tim then demanded to see the
manager, who was nowhere to be found.  Dom Manol and the doctor were
making very obvious efforts to avoid a row, although both of them--the
doctor especially--were fast losing control over their tempers.  Tim by
now was boiling with rage.

He rose from his seat and went over to the next table to expostulate
with the offensive crowd, but the men, contrary to the custom of the
country, where courtesy amounts to a virtue, were truculent and
aggressive; they used words and gestures which further irritated Tim.
The girls did not help matters either, for they went off from time to
time into shrieks of hysterical laughter.  There were a few angry
'Sh-sh-sh' from the audience, but beyond that no one took much notice.
Then suddenly, without any warning, one of the men hit out and struck
Tim in the face.  Tim, of course, at once returned the blow.  The
doctor and Dom Manol jumped up from the table and hurried to his
assistance, whilst the men at the other table seemed ready to back up
their friend.  The two girls remained seated, still laughing, talking
and smoking cigarettes.

Something of a scuffle ensued.  More angry 'Sh-sh-sh' on the part of
the audience; but apparently a row of this sort between the patrons of
the hall was not an uncommon occurrence at the Hespanha, and people did
not do more at first than turn their heads in the direction whence came
all the noise.  The band, equally accustomed, probably, to this kind of
incident, made a few ear-splitting attempts to drown the sound of the
scuffle, while the dancers did their best to keep the attention of the
audience concentrated on themselves.

Up in the gallery the row had resolved itself into a bout of
fisticuffs.  Tim, as soon as he had been so violently and so
unwarrantably attacked, landed out right and left with his fists, but
with his fists only.  He never gave more than a passing thought to
Teresa's gift.  Being a past-master in the art of self-defence, he was
getting on very well, and his three adversaries pretty badly, when all
of a sudden he saw da Pinto--who, he thought, had come to his aid--join
in the fray against him.  And not only that, but he saw the doctor's
hand reach out for one of the knives on the table and then raise it
with a gesture which could have but one object--murder.  The man must
have gone raving mad--drunk probably, and homicidal in his cups.  But
what was more amazing still, Tim suddenly caught sight of Dom Manol's
face leering at him above da Pinto's shoulder, with an expression that
was no longer good-humoured and gently sarcastic, as was its wont; the
lips were no longer smiling, the lips were drawn back like those of a
feline, showing sharp white teeth and the gums above.  It was, in fact,
a face on which vice, rage and hatred had thrown their hideous imprint.
Then Timothy saw red.  As in a flash he realized that these two devils
had brought him here in order to entrap him, in order to murder him.
He hit out savagely at the man in front of him, who was in the way,
caught the doctor's wrist in a vice-like grip and forced his hand to
open convulsively and drop the knife.

The next moment an amazing--a horrible thing happened: da Pinto's face
became distorted in a spasm of agony, a gurgling sound came from his
throat, he stretched out his arms, lurched forward, then sideways and
fell like a log right across the table.




XV

'You foreign devil, you've killed him!'  Who uttered these words Tim
didn't know.  He was too dazed for the moment to do anything but stare
down at the inanimate body, over which Dom Manol was now anxiously
stooping.  The other men had hastily backed away; the girls had bolted
down the balcony stairs; and there Timothy O'Clerigh stood
staring--staring at that inert, rigid back and at the dark stain which
rapidly spread from beneath it over the coarse table-cloth.

And all at once confusion in the hall became chaotic.  All the women
seemed to shriek at once; the men jumped up from their seats, swore and
shouted, tables and chairs were overturned, plates and bottles fell
with loud clangs on the floor.  After a strident crash of brass
instruments, the orchestra was mute: the curtain had been hastily rung
down.

There were cries of 'Police!'

And now by the side of Dom Manol, who had succeeded in turning the
body over and was trying to undo the fallen man's tie, collar and
waistcoat, Tim saw Teresa da Pinto.  She, too, was stooping over the
body of her father, but at the moment that Tim caught sight of her she
raised her head and their eyes met.  To his dying day Tim never forgot
the expression of her face just then.  It appeared rigid and grey, as
if carved in stone; there was not a drop of blood in her cheeks or her
lips; and the eyes--those beautiful, dark, luminous eyes of
hers--stared and stared vacantly, as if suddenly struck with blindness.
Like an automaton she stood there, her back half-bent, one hand resting
on the dead man's shoulder; and like an automaton she now raised the
other hand and pointed to the top of the stairs.  Through the white
frozen lips came a half-articulate sound and, presently the words:
'Go--go ... at once ... go!'

As soon as the words were uttered Dom Manol looked up.  Evidently he
had not realized that she was still there, for the first thing he said
was:

'For God's sake, Teresa, stand aside.  I'll see you home as soon as...'

By handling the dead man's clothes, his own, as well as his hands, had
become stained: except for that, he might have been turned out of a
bandbox.  He looked up at Tim, and while Teresa still murmured like an
automaton repeating a lesson: 'Go--it is better--go!' Dom Manol said,
quite coolly:

'Don't do anything so foolish, Major--unless, of course...'

Tim, indeed, had no intention of doing anything of the sort.  After the
first moment of bewilderment he was regaining all his self-possession.
The incident was tragic in the extreme: horrible in view of Teresa's
presence here.  It was also inexplicable to a mind, ignorant of medical
facts, why there should be all that blood, as it seemed obvious now to
Tim that the doctor had suddenly died of heart failure, brought on by
over-excitement.  He did not feel in any way remorseful, as he
certainly was not responsible for the catastrophe.

A couple of gendarmes now appeared upon the scene, accompanied by a
little dark man in a black frock-coat, who evidently was a medical man.
They had forced their way through the crowd up the staircase, asking no
questions, guided to the scene of the disaster by a dozen eager hands.
An over-curious group of newsmongers gathered round them, awed and
silenced by the magnitude of the tragedy.  The rest of the hall was
being rapidly cleared by two or three more gendarmes.  All the noise
and confusion had subsided; soon the hall, save for that compact group
on the balcony, appeared dark and deserted.  It seemed as if those that
remained up there had been struck dumb.

The man in the black coat was busy with the lifeless body.  The
gendarmes asked what had happened; and one of them produced pocket-book
and pencil, while the other did the interrogating.  He turned first to
Tim, who, quite cool and unruffled now, did his best to give a clear
and concise explanation.

He had objected, he said, to the behaviour of some men and women at the
table next to his: they had been very offensive to the lady in his
party.  He expostulated.  One of the men struck at him, and he struck
back.  Then, all of a sudden, to his utter astonishment, Doctor da
Pinto, whom he knew well in society and who was his guest this evening,
seized a knife and would undoubtedly have struck at him had not he,
Tim, grabbed him by the wrist and forced him to drop the knife;
whereupon, without the slightest warning, the doctor seemingly fell
dead.

There were a few murmurs in the crowd, either of astonishment or
incredulity, followed by a kind of shiver of excitement when Dom
Manol, respectfully questioned by the gendarmes--since he was a person
of much consequence in the city--gave his version of the tragedy.  As
usual he was very self-possessed, very urbane, above all very helpful.

'I think,' he said, 'in fact, I am sure that my friend, Major
O'Clerigh, is entirely wrong in one particular.  Doctor da Pinto most
obviously never raised his hand against him.  If he did seize a knife,
which I suppose he did, since the Major says so, it could only have
been in order to defend our kind host of to-night, and not to attack
him.'

'Where is the knife?' the gendarme asked, and a dozen eager eyes
immediately searched the floor.  Unfortunately this by now was littered
with debris of china, of glasses and bottles, with knives, forks and
spoons: all scattered pell-mell when the dying man clutched at the
cloth before falling prone across the table.

'I am quite certain of one thing,' Tim was saying meanwhile, 'that
Doctor da Pinto's mind was in a very confused state.  He had been
drinking a great deal all the evening and I don't suppose he had the
least idea what he was doing.'

'Can the senhorita give any other detail?  It is very sad and very
regrettable to have to ask you questions, senhorita ... but if you
could help me...?'

'I saw nothing,' Teresa replied, with extraordinary selfpossession.  'I
heard the dispute going on, but preferred to look another way ... I was
regretting that I had ever thought of coming here when...'

'Quite so,' the gendarme said kindly, and then turned to the
black-coated doctor.

'The immediate cause of death, senhor _doutor_?'

'A knife thrust,' the little man replied, 'in the neck, severing one of
the jugular veins.  Doctor da Pinto died instantaneously.'

'Impossible!' Tim exclaimed, involuntarily.

'Why impossible, senhor?'

'I was at grips with him at the moment.  I should have seen if anyone
had...'

'But someone--we'll say someone unknown--did, senhor Inglez--and with
this unpleasant looking little instrument.'  And the doctor held out to
the gendarme a small dagger with an exquisitely inlaid blade and hilt
of Toledo workmanship.

'My God!' Tim exclaimed, 'that is mine.'

'Is it?' the doctor queried, with a smile.  The gendarme took the
dagger from him and showed it to Tim.

'You recognize it?' he asked.

'Why, yes!'

'Then how do you account for what the senhor _doutor_ has just told us?'

'I can't account for it--the knife is mine--I have carried it about
with me lately.  To-night, during supper, I took it out of my pocket
and put it on the table beside my plate.  Senhor da Lisbao would
remember....'  And he turned to Dom Manol, who at the moment was
intent on persuading Teresa to drink a glass of champagne.  At the
sound of his own name he turned.

'My dear fellow--is there anything I can do?'

'Yes--you remember this knife?  I put it on the table--you remarked on
it.'

'I remember--yes.  What about it?'

'Senhor _doutor_ has just told us,' the gendarme said, 'that senhor
_doutor_ da Pinto was stabbed in the neck with this knife.'

'Good God!'

'But the knife was on the table--you remember?'

'Of course I do.  I've said so.'

'When did you last see it, senhor?' the gendarme asked.  'I mean at
what moment during the dispute?'

Dom Manol shrugged his shoulders till they almost touched his ears and
threw out his hands with an expressive gesture.

'That I am afraid I can't tell you.  I know that at one time the knife
was on the table.  Major O'Clerigh took it out of his pocket and laid
it down beside his own plate, but what became of it afterwards I really
couldn't say.'

'There is the sheath, at any rate,' somebody from the crowd remarked
and pointed to the table, where, amidst the remnants of the supper
party, among the forks and the spoons and glasses, lay the Toledo
sheath.

The two gendarmes were evidently embarrassed.  It was the first time in
their lives that they had been called upon to suspect a person of high
social standing of being concerned in an ugly business of this sort.
They did not quite know how to act.  In cases like this, one just took
the delinquent by the scruff of the neck and marched him off to the
cells, pending inquiry before the justices of the peace.  But to drag
an illustrious stranger, who was a major in the King of England's army,
through the streets of Monsataz, and to thrust him into the police
cells along with a lot of vagabonds and half-breeds, was out of the
question.  And it was too late to telephone the Town Hall for
instructions: on the other hand, the matter was terribly serious.  If
what the senhor _doutor_ had said turned out to be a fact, then...

Instinctively they turned for advice to Senhor da Lisbao: a prominent
citizen, friend of the Governor of the province and of all the
dignitaries of the city, he would better than anyone know just what to
do.  Dom Manol was as usual most helpful.

'I will be guarantee for the senhor Inglez,' he said, in answer to the
mute question put to him by the perplexed gendarmes.  'The whole thing
is, of course, a tragic mistake.  I don't pretend to know, but I'll
guarantee that the cavalheiro Inglez will go straight back to his hotel
now, and that he will be ready to appear before the magistrate in the
morning, whenever you come for him.  I'll see the Governor myself and
explain; you won't be blamed, I promise you--so if you are satisfied...'

They were.  Not only satisfied, but much relieved.

'That's all right, isn't it, Major?' Dom Manol asked in English.

'I suppose so.  It's very kind of you, of course, but I have no
intention of running away.  There's some ghastly muddle here which I
don't understand--against that I don't mind in the least spending the
rest of the night in a police cell rather than...'  He had been on the
point of saying: 'rather than owe anything to you,' but thought better
of it.  This was not the time for giving way to any sudden impulse, and
any ill-considered speech might have unpleasant consequences.

A couple more gendarmes had now turned up, and between them the four
men jostled the crowd in order to make way for Senhor da Lisbao and the
senhorita.  Teresa had made almost superhuman efforts not to give way
under the terrible strain; and Tim in his heart, and despite worry over
his unpleasant position, gave ungrudging tribute to her marvellous
pluck and endurance.  Everything had been so sudden and was so terribly
bewildering that he did not know what impression she had gathered of
the awful catastrophe.  Surely she did not believe him guilty of
murdering her father: such a purposeless crime must to any sane person
appear impossible, and Teresa was more than ordinarily sane--except
where Manol was concerned.  That that smooth-tongued devil had a hand
in the whole tragic incident Tim did not doubt for a moment; exactly
what rle he did play in it was difficult as vet to determine.  But
somehow Tim already had the impression that Teresa knew certain things,
which had brought that look of frozen horror upon her face and forced
the words: 'Go!--go at once!' from her lips.  In view of what followed,
those words, which had sounded like a command, were more than puzzling.
Tim tried to meet her eyes once more as Manol guided her through the
crowd, but she was looking straight before her, leaning heavily on
Manol's arm, and despite the heat holding her shawl wrapped closely
round her shoulders.

'Shall I send the motor back for you?' Manol asked, as he brushed past
Timothy.

'No, thanks.  I'd sooner walk.'

He followed down the stairs, the crowd closing in behind him; there was
still a lot to see; the fourth act of the drama--the body to be
conveyed to the mortuary--the _pices de conviction_ to be carefully
collected, and so on.  At the door of the hall Tim waited long enough
to see Teresa and Manol get into the motor and drive away.  He
supposed that she would go straight home, where probably she had a kind
maid or nurse who would look after her.  What a strange enigma was this
whole affair!  Tim, walking down the cobbled streets of the old city in
these small hours of the morning, with the waning moon casting her
mysterious light over this remote corner of God's earth, felt as if he
were dreaming, as if all these events had not really occurred--not to
him, Timothy O'Clerigh, Major in the Irish Guards, whose life hitherto
had been so easy, so simple and straightforward, with every action
mapped out and directed by convention.  How could it be he himself who
had just been led to the very edge of a precipice, made to gaze into an
abyss wherein life or honour might conceivably have been wrecked?

What did it all mean, anyway?  What were the meshes of the net into
which he had been driven and in which he might so easily have been
caught?  Had it been a _guet-apens_ with a view to his receiving a
casual knife thrust in a scrimmage?  Were those men mere bravoes hired
by Dom Manol to get rid of him?  And had one of them struck the doctor
by mistake?  That was, perhaps, the most likely explanation of the
affair.  And yet the longer did Tim think over every moment of the
fateful evening, the more did a certain vision--a flash that did not
last longer than a few seconds--thrust itself before his mind's eye.
As he walked through the ill-lighted streets he saw that vision,
marvelling if it was real; wondering if, at the very instant when da
Pinto seized the knife and brandished it, he, Tim, had really caught a
sudden glimpse of Manol's face, distorted with rage and with passion,
immediately behind the doctor's uplifted arm--or if he had dreamed it.
But the longer he thought of it the more he was sure--although reason
fought against the suggestion, for, in very truth, what object could
one devil have in killing his partner in crime?

And yet there was Teresa's frozen look of horror.  She most certainly
had seen something, which had filled her whole soul with a withering
despair.  Terribly tragic as would, in any case, have been the death of
her father in such circumstances, there was something more desperate
than mere affliction or even anguish in her attitude.  She wanted Tim
to go--to go away at once, lest he should hear or know--what?  Lest he
should be embroiled in a net of infamy, which she knew had been spread
for him--and not only for him, but also for her father.

God!  What a tangle!  Again Tim was assailed with doubts.  Was the
whole thing worth while?  Whither would his mad desire for right and
justice to himself lead him after this?

When first he set out on his adventure he knew that he would have
enemies to deal with, unscrupulous blackguards who would be prepared to
commit any crime in order to conceal their past felonies.  Well! here
he was now in the midst of it all.  The Irish fly had walked into the
dago spider's parlour--and probably here he was, too, without a friend
in the world to show him the way out again.

Not that Tim felt any anxiety with regard to his own future over this
affair.  His conscience was so absolutely clear, his actions had been
so entirely straightforward, that he had no fear of a flagrant
miscarriage of justice.  After all, he was in a civilized country, and
Timothy O'Clerigh was one of those who still clung to the belief that
there was some kind of magical power in being a citizen of the British
Empire.

_Civis Romanus sum_.




XVI

Nor was there any flagrant miscarriage of justice.  Even at the moment
when Timothy heard the magistrates' decision and realized that it meant
the ruin of all his hopes, he could not, in the bitterness of his
heart, do more than curse himself for his folly--for his senseless
idiocy in walking straight into the trap so cunningly laid for him.

Cunning?  Of course it was cunning.  A masterpiece of devilish
craftsmanship.  He, Timothy O'Clerigh, had to be got out of the way--by
some means more or less foul.  Murder might have proved inconvenient
with a British Consul not so many miles way, so there must be something
else.  He had come here intending to unmask two rogues, who were not
mere vagabonds and ruffians, but important members of a civilized
community, rich and influential--therefore, away with him.  What more
easy for a resourceful brain, like that of Dom Manol da Lisbao, than
to devise a scheme whereby this meddlesome Irishman would be involved
in a brawl in a low-class music-hall, get mixed up in an affray which
would end in the death of a prominent citizen of Monsataz and be
expelled from the country as an undesirable alien?

For that is how the anxiety, the mental torture of the past few weeks
culminated in the end.  Expelled from the country!  Ordered to quit
Monsataz within forty-eight hours, as his presence there was
undesirable!  How often in the past few years had Tim read in his
_Daily Mail_ that this or that alien had been ordered by the magistrate
to be sent back to his own country as an 'undesirable.'  And here he
was--Major O'Clerigh, D.S.O., of the Irish Guards, an undesirable in
the opinion of the provincial magistrate of this country, ordered to
clear out within forty-eight hours.

The British Consul--so kind and considerate--took a cheerful view of
the situation.

'It might have been much worse,' he said.

'How--worse?'

'Two or three years' imprisonment--in a Brazilian prison....'

'Bah!  No worse than banishment....'

For this was the end of all Tim's hopes, of all his schemes.  God!
What a fool he had been!  And yet--how in the world could he have
guessed?  The whole tragedy had been so magnificently planned and
everything went as smoothly, as naturally as if he himself had helped
to construct the drama until the final fall of the curtain--the
sentence of banishment.

Everyone had been most kind, most helpful.  Bail was granted without
demur, though the charge was serious; an advocate of renown in the
province was at his disposal and burned the midnight oil to collect
evidence in his client's favour.  Medical evidence went to prove that
Doctor da Pinto had died of heart failure, consequent on
over-excitement, and that the knife-thrust had been delivered either at
the very moment or immediately after the collapse.

Dom Manol did his best to be of service to the accused, who was his
friend, just as the deceased had been.  But as a matter of fact he had
seen nothing really--nothing that would be of any use to the defence.
He recognized the dagger, remembered its lying on the table at one
time, but after that...?  No!  He could not in conscience recollect
anything more.  The shock he had experienced on seeing his friend fall
so suddenly had almost unmanned him ... he had hurried to his side as
quickly as he could.  He did not realize that the doctor was dead until
he ... oh! it was all very, very horrible.  Senhor da Pinto had been
one of his greatest friends.  And the whole tragedy had been all the
more horrible from the fact that the Senhorita Teresa had been there,
not a dozen paces away from the scene.  Fortunately, she had seen
nothing--nothing.  Dom Manol could swear to that, because, although he
had, from the first, tried to intervene between the accused and his
opponents, he had never ceased to keep an eye on the senhorita to make
sure that she was not being molested.  No--no--there was no occasion to
call her ... she had seen nothing, and it would be cruel to drag her
into the affair.  Dom Manol, who throughout was a witness such as any
examining magistrate would delight in--calm, lucid, ready to help in
every way--concluded his deposition by reiterating his firm belief that
Major O'Clerigh was mistaken when he thought that Doctor da Pinto was
threatening him with a knife.

'It was an unfortunate mistake, as it turned out,' were the words the
witness used, 'perhaps a natural one, under the circumstances, but I
owe it to the memory of my friend to vindicate his character in this.
Besides, what possible object could the unfortunate man have for
attacking Major O'Clerigh, whom he hardly knew and with whom he had no
cause for quarrel?'

Senhor da Lisbao was warmly thanked by both sides for the impartial way
in which he had deposed.  He stepped down from the witness-box, looking
the perfection of well-groomed, well-bred manhood, anxious only for the
truth, but ready to vindicate the honour of both his friends--the
living and the dead.  As he passed close to the accused, he gave him an
encouraging nod.  Tim, consumed inwardly with rage, nevertheless gave
ungrudging admiration to the skill of his enemy.  His was a complete
triumph, for his name and reputation remained unscathed.  The three
ruffians whom he had paid to start the row at the Hespanha had served
him well.  Never for a moment had Senhor Manol da Lisbao been involved
in the affair, save as a sympathetic looker-on.  They themselves played
their rle of impartial witnesses to perfection.  The accused, they
said, had sought quarrel with them and they had been forced to use
their fists in self-defence.  They swore that they did not see Doctor
da Pinto lift an arm against the cavalheiro Inglez.  But then they were
facing the accused, so could not have seen what went on behind their
backs.

Indeed, at one time during the inquiry, which lasted close upon a
month, things looked very black for Tim.  The general trend of evidence
led to the conclusion that he had drunk too much champagne, that he
became truculent and aggressive, assaulted three inoffensive persons at
a neighbouring table--and they were the principal witnesses against
him--and then, for no apparent reason, thrust at Doctor da Pinto with
murderous intent.  Timothy, very reluctantly, had put his advocate in
possession of a few facts--not all--connected with his own life, which
he thought might help his case: his right to a great peerage, the rle
played by Doctor da Pinto and others in defrauding him of his heritage,
his reasons for coming out to Monsataz.  But the advocate--very
wisely--came to the conclusion that such evidence would only be
prejudicial to the defence; for, thought it might presuppose a motive
for da Pinto's desire to be rid of Timothy, it might also turn out to
be a two-edged sword and demonstrate that the accused, not having
succeeded in proving that the affidavit sworn by the doctor was
perjury, had the strongest possible motive for assassination--namely,
revenge; a motive, by the way, most readily understood in this country.

And thus did the inquiry pursue its wearisome way.  The British Consul
and Dom Manol had gone bail for Tim and, though he hated the very
thought of being beholden to his worst enemy for anything, he could not
find any reasonable ground for refusal.  And he passed his days in the
dreary room of the Hotel Angola, gazing out over the sun-lit bay and
the towering, sun-baked rocks that appeared now like two Titanic
sentinels at the gates of this implacable prison.  The pitiless sun,
the harsh blue of the sky, the searing glare of the ocean, the tropical
heat, all tended to aggravate the tension on his nerves, until he began
to wonder whether he would not sooner be dead and have done with it all.

In the end it was his friends from the Bom Genio who saved him from a
really cruel fate.  Van Smeet and the two Germans, who had been sitting
at a table close by and had stood up in order to watch what they
thought was just an amusing row, were quite positive that the deceased
was brandishing a knife a few seconds before he fell.  They had seen
Tim's hand clutching da Pinto's wrist and the knife dropping out of the
latter's hand.  After that, persons and things intervened and they did
not see exactly what happened, but their evidence enabled Tim's
advocate to seize on the question of self-defence.  This plea the
examining magistrate accepted, but he held that a quarrelsome foreigner
like this Major O'Clerigh, who was evidently over-fond of champagne and
then became aggressive in his cups, was an undesirable visitor to these
peaceable shores, and had better be returned to his own country.

The accused was ordered to quit the country within forty-eight hours.




XVII

Tim, sitting in the hotel, staring at his luggage, wondered if there
had ever been on earth a bigger fool than himself, or a man more
absolutely done in by a clever scoundrel.  Manol da Lisbao had indeed
triumphed in the most thorough, most complete manner.  He had even in
one swoop rid himself not only of Timothy, his enemy, but also of his
partner, da Pinto, who in all probability was becoming inconvenient.

The more he thought the whole tragedy over, the more convinced he was
that it was Manol who had struck the doctor, that it was his face he
had seen, distorted with rage and a sardonic grin, just above da
Pinto's shoulder before the unfortunate man fell dead across the table.
But what was the good now of brooding over that?  What was the good of
eating out one's heart in regret and bitterness?  He had been enmeshed
and had fallen a victim.  He was the foreigner, unknown, unconsidered;
Manol the native, with riches and influence.  It was all inevitable.
Fate and his own folly had brought about the catastrophe.  He might
have done this or that; he should not have gone here or there; said one
thing rather than another.  All futile now.  He was ordered to clear
out of the place, and the last chance of probing the mystery of Dudley
Stone would sail with him across the ocean.

Late that evening Fra Martino came to see him.  He appeared panting,
breathless, and perspiring profusely, as if he had hurried through the
streets.

'My dear friend,' he began, as soon as he had put down his amazing hat
and stick, and fell with a sigh of relief into the arm-chair which Tim
offered him.

'Bad luck, isn't it?' said Tim with a smile.  He had taken a liking to
the old fellow, who, during the last wearisome month, had often been to
see him, and had done his best to cheer and comfort him.  His grudge
against Fra Martino had soon died away.  If the old priest had been the
recipient of Fra Bartolomeo's confession, he was entirely within his
rights--it was his sacred duty, in fact--to keep the secret of that
confession inviolate.  True, he had benefited through Fra Bartolomeo's
crime, but would it have been in human nature to refuse a legacy, which
meant a fortune to him, because he knew its provenance to be corrupt?
There had been something in the priest's attitude towards him during
the terrible ordeal of the inquiry which had been a real
comfort--something kindly, sympathetic.  He seemed to be the one friend
Tim had in this crowd of enemies and callous lookers-on.

He got the old man a whisky and soda, and said ruefully: 'The last I
shall be mixing for you, Padre.'

The priest had a long drink; after which he evidently felt better
physically.  But there was something on his mind.  Tim knew the
symptoms well: a troubled look, and then a blank expression, a steady
avoidance of the other's gaze, and the thick, red hand fidgeting the
cigarette.

'It might have been much worse, my dear Major,' he said at last.

'Not much, Padre.'

Tim sat down beside the old man.  The window was wide open, and they
had before them a picture of the noble bay with the huge rocks, and the
water, smooth as a mirror, reflecting in shades of rose and purple the
marvel of the setting sun.  And Tim gazed across that ocean which
seemed so tranquil and yet to him so pitiless, since in a very few
hours it would roll on forever between him and his vanished hopes.  And
suddenly the desire seized him to speak once more of those hopes and of
his despair.  He did not really know just how much the old priest knew
of the affair which had brought him, Tim O'Clee, to these shores.  Like
the beautiful Teresa, Fra Martino had always remained something of an
enigma.  His share in the profits derived from Hold-Hands Juliana's
suborning hands was undoubted, but how much did he know of the whole
conspiracy which had ousted Tim from his rightful inheritance?

'Did I ever tell you, Padre,' he began, rather abruptly, 'why I came to
Monsataz?'

Fra Martino hesitated; for a second or two it almost seemed as if there
was nothing he longed for so much at this moment as to run away.  At
last he said tentatively:

'No ... my dear friend ... that is--no--I don't think you ever...'

'I came here, Padre, because I hoped to discover something which would
have given me back what is rightly mine.'

'And what may that have been, my dear Major?'

'Whether a certain man named Dudley Stone did really die in Monsataz in
May, 1924.'

'But why should that...?'

'Because if Dudley Stone really did die on that date, then the marriage
of a common, vulgar woman with my uncle, who was an Irish peer, was a
legal one, and her son born of the marriage has a perfect right to the
title and estates which I claim to be mine.'

'And if this Dudley Stone did not die on the day you name?'

'Then the woman who went through the ceremony of marriage with my uncle
had a husband living at the time: the marriage was illegal, the child
illegitimate, and I the sole and rightful heir to one of the finest
names in Ireland.'

'But why should you think...?'

'That the woman is a liar?  I can't tell you why, but I know it.  I am
as sure of it as that I am alive.  Three men over here swore an oath
that Dudley Stone died six years ago--and I know that that oath was
false.'

Tim paused a moment or two: he was watching the old man intently.  But
up to now Fra Martino's face had remained an expressionless mask.

'And I came here, Padre,' he resumed, 'in order to find out exactly
what had become of Dudley Stone.  I had already made some progress.  I
held a thread--a very slender one--but a thread nevertheless.  I know
that in the end I should have succeeded.  God is not always on the side
of the wicked.'

'My dear friend!'

'I know--I know.  Forgive me, Padre, one does blaspheme sometimes.  I
know it is wicked, but just now I haven't any goodness in me.  I was
succeeding--I know I was succeeding--and now I'm being kicked out of
the country and have to throw up the sponge.  The wicked do prosper,
you see, Padre.  They even did so in the Bible, or David wouldn't have
said so.'

Fra Martino had another drink before he spoke again, and there was
genuine sympathy in the tone of his voice:

'I am really sorry, my dear Major.  You never told me....'

'How could I?' Tim retorted, somewhat roughly.  'The perjurers were
your friends.'

'Oh!' came in protest at this from Fra Martino.

'I think you know that, too, don't you, Padre?'

To this the old priest made no reply.  He thought it better to give
this confidential conversation another turn--a less unpleasant one.

'When you are back in your own country...' he began.

'When I'm back?' Tim retorted.  'I'm never going back to my own
country, Padre--never!'

'But why?'

'Only because in Ireland there happens to be an old, old grey house--a
wonderful old pile it is, too--it has towers covered with ivy, and the
oaks and beeches in the woods around have stood there centuries before
this place over here was even dreamed of.  I was born in that house,
Padre, and so was my father, and his father before him, and grandfather
and great-grandfather.  You don't know about such things, Padre, do
you?  And what I say sounds idiotic, doesn't it?  But to us a house
like that means everything we hold most sacred.'

'Religion, my dear friend...'

'It is a part of our religion, too.  To me, that house, the woods, the
lake, mean ... Well! they just mean my life, for God knows that they
are mine, and I have been deliberately robbed of them by a lying wanton
woman, who now sits in the arm-chair by the fire where my old granny
used to sit; she sleeps in her bed; she eats off the old china plates;
and pours her tea out of our old Irish silver teapot.  I know you don't
understand, Padre; but even that old Irish teapot means as much to me
as the altar in your Lady Chapel perhaps means to you.  Well! by coming
here I thought I could unmask her trickery.  With money which she
got--wheedled out of a doting old man--she bribed three men to swear
the false oath which enabled her to do me out of my rights.  I
know--and you know, Padre--who those three men are, or rather were, for
two of them are dead.  The third, the vilest of the lot, has got the
better of me.  He has triumphed, and I am down and out.  I can do
nothing once I am turned out of here.  And I was so near succeeding.  I
shall become a wanderer now on the face of the earth, but I couldn't go
back to Ireland.  It would break my heart to see the old place again,
now that I have failed so lamentably.'

Tim was sitting opposite Fra Martino, his elbows resting on his knees,
his hands sometimes clasped together, sometimes his fists supporting
his chin.  All the time that he spoke he stared straight out before him
into the corner of the room where stood his luggage ready packed: the
outward sign of his dismal failure.  The old priest let him talk on.
He had seen so much in his day of shipwrecked humanity: had, in his
funny, rough way, comforted so many broken fortunes that instinctively
he knew that the best solace for this man's trouble at the moment was
to let him put all the bitterness of his heart into words, and just to
listen in silence.  To show neither sympathy, nor even understanding,
only to remain the mute recipient of words--that meant a measure of
comfort.

It was only when, after a time, words were lost in a spasm of soul
agony, and Timothy jumped to his feet and strode to the window in order
to hide the tears which despite his every effort forced themselves into
his eyes, that Fra Martino made up his mind to speak; and this he did,
after he had very noisily blown his nose and cleared his throat.

'Why, my young friend,' said he,' should you accept failure so easily?'

Tim swung round on his heel.

'Easily?  Great God!  Haven't I got to clear out of this place within
forty-eight hours?'

'The magistrate ordered it--yes!  But...'

'But what?'

'There are ways, you know.'

'What ways?'

'So long as you disappear from Monsataz--go away for a time ... a long
time even....'

'But what would be the good of that, Padre?  I should anyhow...'

'Wait one moment, my dear Major.  What I meant was that the magistrate
ordered you to quit the country.  Good!  But he did not say which way
you were to go.'

'What in the world do you mean?'

Tim came and sat down beside Fra Martino.  A strange excitement had
suddenly crept into his blood, making his finger-tips tingle and his
temples throb.

Fra Martino went on placidly: 'You can go which way you like, not?'

'Yes.  But where to?'

'That is your affair.  To obey the magistrate you can just as well go
north to Pernambuco as south to Rio.'

That the old priest had something definite at the back of his mind was,
of course, evident.  Tim by now was too excited to talk clearly: all he
could do was to try by monosyllabic words to jog Fra Martino's slow
diction along.  Could he have dragged the words through the old man's
mouth with his fingers, he would have done it.  The trouble was that
Fra Martino was still hesitating.  Apparently he had begun to speak on
impulse, but was now on the very verge of regretting what he had
already said.  And Tim was terrified lest a false move on his part, a
mere word spoken at the wrong moment, would send the old man into one
of his slippery moods--when nothing more could be got out of him.

'Of course, Padre,' he said, as calmly as he could, 'I can go to
Pernambuco by the coasting steamer.'

'Not all the way, my dear friend--not necessarily all the way.'

'But what else can I do?'

'You need not go all the way to Pernambuco.  You might, for instance,
land at one of the ports of call--there are two or three on the
coast--and then ... the steamer might go on without you, eh?  And you
might find yourself...'

'Where?  In God's name, Padre, try and tell me just what you mean or my
head will burst.'

'It is very simple what I mean.  You have been given your passport,
not?  It is possible that to-morrow when you are ready to start they
will ask you how you intend to travel.  You say to Pernambuco by the
steamer, and from there to New York, or Europe--I don't know.  Good!
The authorities will be satisfied.  Probably they will escort you to
the steamer.  And, of course, if you thought of returning, they would
make it unpleasant for you.  But you go--you go--you are on board the
steamer with your luggage, bound for Pernambuco.  But at San
Christovao, where the steamer calls, you go on shore; and then you lose
count of time; the steamer goes--and you are left behind.'

'All very pretty, Padre!'  And Tim sighed, bitterly disappointed.  He
had begun to think that Fra Martino really had a scheme for helping
him: he hardly knew what; it seemed impossible, of course, but still he
had hopes.  And now this futility!  'If I come back here, they'll only
turn me out again.  Dom Manol would see to that.'

'But you need not come back here.  You mustn't come back here.  It is
not here that you will find--what you seek.'

'Padre!  In God's name, what do you mean?'

Fra Martino took a long drink.  He looked terribly perplexed--unhappy
even.  Some kind of mental struggle was evidently disturbing his usual
indolent complacency.  He wiped his mouth with the back of his hand,
took a long pull at his cigarette, while Tim felt as if during these
few seconds he was living through eternity.

Said Fra Martino at last: 'I should advise, you, my dear friend, after
you have missed your steamer at San Christovao--eh?--to take a train
up-country....'

'Yes?'

'It is a dreary journey--ten or twelve hours--a slow train--many
wayside stations--till it gets to Bomfin.'

'Bomfin?  Where is that?'

'A long way--a long, long way--on the confines of the desert.'

'The desert?'

'We call it a desert because it is so dry, so lonely....  Yes ... the
desert ... the Sertao.'

'The Sertao?  But what should I be doing there?'

The priest did not reply.  He appeared absorbed in thought: sipping the
whisky and soda and taking long pulls at his cigarette.  He avoided
meeting Timothy's searching, inquiring eyes; and as Tim gazed on that
large, florid, bloated face, it ceased to appear ugly to him.  It
seemed to him transfigured, like the face of a seer who had drawn aside
for his benefit, and for one moment only, the veil which had fallen
over his hopes.  The 'Sertao!'  Gradually the word found its way to his
inner consciousness.  The vision of that dreary court-room, where he
had sat day after day while the inquiry pursued its weary course,
slowly faded from his ken.  It had haunted him incessantly for these
four miserable weeks; he could see nothing else, waking or dreaming,
but those whitewashed walls, the tall bench where sat the overworked,
perspiring magistrate, and the chink in the _persienne_ with that one
glint of sunshine which at a certain hour of the day struck him in the
face and seared his eye-balls.  But now at the magic word 'Sertao' that
ugly vision faded away.  In its stead he saw the cheerful interior of
the Bom Genio caf: the jovial Dutchman, the fat-headed blond Germans,
the surly, silent half-breeds.  He heard again their murmuring voices
talking of the mysterious desert, the resurrected prophet, the Great
Unknown, who was such an audacious cattle-thief and the rightful
emperor of Brazil, with the huge army of half-savage _vaqueiros_
trained to arms by European officers.  Tales! tales!  He had heard them
dozens of times, and paid little heed to them: only at times he used to
wonder vaguely whether in that army of the Great Unknown he would one
day come across the English adventurer, Dudley Stone.

And suddenly, with Fra Martino's tentatively uttered words, it all came
back to him: the tales whispered by the half-breeds, laughed at by the
Europeans, and the wonder which had seized hold of him when he heard
about this army commanded by European officers.

'The Sertao, Padre...?' he murmured.

'Yes!' Fra Martino replied.  'It is a strange, lonely, desolate place,
but you could find shelter there for a time until...'

'Only shelter?'

Fra Martino ignored what the question implied.  He had apparently
fallen back on his favourite policy of 'back-pedalling.'  Having gone
so far, timidity had seized on him; his natural indolence rebelled
against this attempt at giving a hand to the foreign under-dog, because
of the worry, the anxiety it would bring in its train.  He had resumed
that air of complacent bonhomie which became him so well and which in
the past had so often been a source of irritation to O'Clerigh.  He
drank and smacked his lips, and did not in any way hurry himself or
take the slightest notice of poor Tim's impatience.

'I have a friend,' he said, 'a colleague, a saintly man, who is the
priest in charge of the district round the Sertao.  The villages, you
understand, are so scattered, the population is sparse: the Church
cannot afford to have a minister of God in every village, so there is
one for a whole district, and my friend...'

'Does he live in Bomfin?'

'No, no, some way up the Sertao district--on the way to Canudos--you
understand?'

Tim had got hold of a note-book and was jotting down all these names.

'And how shall I get to him?'

'Oh! at Bomfin anyone will tell you ... you will find Esteban, the
local carrier ... he has mules ... he acts as guide if a foreigner
wants to go up-country ... you will find him outside the station ...
with his mules, or his cart ... Esteban, the carrier....  You won't
forget?'

'No, Padre.  I won't forget.'

'You just tell Esteban you want to find Fra Federico Evangelista: he
will take you--he always knows where Federico is to be found.  It will
be another horrible journey ... the country is miserable....'

'And will Fra Federico help me to find...?'

'He is a saintly man.  He will look after you--you will find shelter in
his house.  But there, I am staying too long.  You have much to do to
get ready.  You must excuse an old man gossiping and taking up your
time.'

He struggled to his feet.  It was always a great effort for Fra Martino
to get out of a comfortable chair.  It took a lot of puffing and
blowing and regaining of balance.  On this occasion, as he finally
steadied himself on his fat, stumpy legs, he found his hands imprisoned
in Tim's firm, warm grasp.

'Padre, I am not going to attempt to thank you....'

'To thank me, my friend?  Whatever for?  Fra Federico Evangelista is a
saintly man, but he is very poor.  Your stay with him will be a help,
and it will cheer him.'

'I know.  I know all that, and as I say, I am not going to attempt to
thank you, because there are no words in any human language that would
express what I feel.  I know that the members of your Church think that
we of the English community are not even Christians, but I can assure
you that we do believe in God, and that it is from the bottom of my
heart that I will always pray to Him to bless you and reward you for
what you have done to-day.'

'If I have comforted you a little...'

'A little?  Heavens above!'

'But here am I gossiping again, and I have work to do to-night--no end
of work, mine is a big parish.'

He was ostensibly looking for his hat and stick, and doing so was
snorting like a porpoise.

'Shan't I see you again, Padre?'

'Alas--no, my dear Major O'Clerigh.  To-morrow is a feast day, and you
know how busy I always am.'

'But I may write to you?'

'Better not--better not.  You see, the authorities must believe that
you have left the country ... and sometimes in the post letters get
opened and read by officials who...'

'Perhaps Fra Federico will find a way of letting you know that I have
arrived.'

'Perhaps--perhaps.  That would be capital, and then...'

'Oh!  I will contrive to let you know if I have succeeded in
finding--shelter, eh?'

'When you are back in Ireland--yes--then you can write, but...'

'I'll be most careful, don't be afraid.'

'Then good-bye, my friend.  God bless you, and ... you have money?'

'Oh, yes!  In cash--a few thousand milreis.'

'Capital!  Capital!  And don't forget ... Bomfin ... Esteban ... Fra
Federico Evangelista....  Good-bye.'

He was gone: and Tim remained for a long while gazing at the door
through which that quaint, obese old scamp had just passed out of his
sight.  Old scamp?  Who would dare call him that after this spontaneous
act of unprecedented kindness?  Of course, Fra Martino was a scamp in a
way; his life and morals had been none too clean; he was living on the
proceeds of an abominable act of perjury, and enjoying all the luxuries
which it had showered into his lap, without a tinge of remorse.  By his
tacit silence he aided and abetted the crime of perjury every day of
his life, and with it all was a minister of God and preached the gospel
of purity and truth to a lot of ignorant peasants, who looked upon him
as the pattern of all the virtues.  But in his heart he had kept a
feeling of pity for the downtrodden and the shipwrecked: his hand was
stretched out to help a lame dog over a stile.  And pity being akin to
love, who shall say but that this venal and profligate priest would not
find a full measure of mercy at the foot of the Throne of Him Who said
that the greatest of all the virtues is Charity?




_Book Three_

THE GREAT ADVENTURE




I

It was with very mixed feelings that Tim O'Clee set out on this last
phase of his life's adventure.  Somehow he knew that it was going to be
the last phase.  He felt it in his bones and, with a careless laugh,
would at that time have assured you that those same bones would
probably in the course of time become one with the dust of the desert.

He was going into a country absolutely unknown to him--unknown even to
most Brazilians.  God alone knew what he would find if he ever got
there, which was more than doubtful.  But, heavens above!--what an
adventure!  And this was the point where his feelings got mixed.  He
was itching to go, certain of success, confident that out there in the
wilds he would suddenly come nose to nose with Dudley Stone.  What he
would do with him when he did find him was rather more problematical.
There was no collaring a man by the scruff of the neck and dragging him
through a hundred miles of arid, waterless country.  Dudley Stone--such
as he was, such as he had become out there--would have to be a
consenting party to Tim's desire to prove him still alive.

And Tim O'Clee began to think of himself as a kind of male Alice going
down a well into Wonderland; and when he embarked on the coasting
steamer which plied between Monsataz and Pernambuco he quite thought
that the crew and his fellow passengers might suddenly turn into a
large mad tea-party over which he, as the maddest of them all, would
naturally preside.  The authorities, though firm, had been quite kind.
His passport and papers were handed back to him as he stepped on board,
and so farewell to Monsataz and all the preliminary excitements it
stood for.

Tim thought over the events of the past two months with a grim smile.
He had not done badly so far as adventures were concerned.  Teresa, Dom
Manol, the murdered doctor, even Fra Martino, had proved to him that
even the twentieth century could provide exciting adventures that vied
successfully with those invented by the fertile brain of Jules Verne,
or old Dumas.

According to plan, and carrying his gun and a small suitcase, Tim went
ashore at San Christovao.  He duly missed the boat, where apparently
and fortunately nobody missed him, and found his way to the station.
Here he had to wait four hours for the first train that would take him
up-country.

A ten hours' journey by rail--over the miseries and discomforts of
which he never afterwards cared to dwell--and, finally, Bomfin, where
he had no difficulty in finding Esteban the carrier; a well-known
figure, Esteban, owner of two pack-mules and a couple of horses, the
man who was the intermediary between the fringe of the desert and this
outpost of civilization.  (Bomfin was not much more than that, and
civilization a mere comparative term.)  And Esteban knew Fra Federico
Evangelista, and he contracted for the modest sum of ten milreis to
convey the crazy Englishman to Cumbe, where Fra Federico had a house.

And ever since then, these two, Tim O'Clee and Esteban, had jogged
along on the hard-baked sandy track which marked the initial stage of
their journey.  Three days!  They seemed like three years to Tim.  They
had eaten their provisions by the road-side; at night they had pitched
their tent in the centre of the most convenient village they came
across; and morning and evening they had ambled along, and at midday
had taken their _siesta_ wherever a clump of thick thorny palms gave
them the necessary shade.

One hundred kilometres, it seems, lay between the railhead and the
village of Cumbe, where Fra Federico Evangelista had his
dwelling-house.  The road was a mere cattle-track, baked dry by the
sun, rough and stony; at times it was non-existent save to the
experienced eyes of Esteban.  This was October and the nights were
chilly, while the days were beginning to be insufferably hot.  The
water they found on the way was tepid and brackish; the approaches to
it trodden into a sea of mud by the cattle brought hither by the
_vaqueiros_ for drink.

Of human habitations there were only a few; a village here and there,
bare, sandy; a few houses, little better than huts; women,
gaunt-looking and dark-skinned; a few naked children all staring, as
the mules and the horses, Tim and Esteban, ambled by.  There were never
any men to be seen in the villages; they were all out in the scrub
looking after the cattle.  A smell of coffee and of peat pervaded the
atmosphere around the villages; clouds of dust obliterated the
distance.  Desolation, indescribable desolation, seemed to Tim the very
keynote of this desert land.

But in spite of this utter loneliness, perhaps because of it, Tim's
spirits rose higher and higher as he followed his guide up the mountain
trail; more and more did he become convinced that Fra Martino had not
spoken mere idle words nor sent him on a fool's errand to this dreary
land.  Fra Martino knew something of the secrets of the desert, and
knew it in connection with Dudley Stone.

And, as weary even beyond definite sensation, saddle-sore, and eyes
aching with the perpetual glare, Tim's gaze wandered across the thorny
scrub and stunted palms to the elusive distance forever hidden behind a
cloud of dust, his fancy peopled the dreary Sertao with a weird and
fantastic multitude.  The _vaqueiros_ and _jagunos_, of which the
patrons of the caf Bom Genio were wont to talk almost with bated
breath, seemed to have come to life now beneath the magic wand of this
utter solitude; and with his mind's eye Tim saw them, centaur-like
creatures at one with their horses, dressed in their panoply of
leather, their only protection against the cruel thorny vegetation.

They all seemed real to Tim now, as did their dead prophet, Antonio
Conselheiro, with the flowing locks and the sandalled feet, preaching
the Second Advent of the Lord and the coming Day of Judgment, whilst
his centaurs rode before him, wielding their lassoes and iron-shod
goads, like beings from that far-off region where the Valkyries ride
and where Titans and demi-gods hold sway.

The farther Tim plunged into the solitude, the farther he left behind
him civilization and modern thought, the more real did those
legend-like tales appear.  The prophet!  Why not?  A kind of
super-revivalist, with only the minds of ignorant, primitive people in
which to kindle a semi-religious, semi-political fanaticism!  Why not,
indeed?  Here, in this wilderness, miles away from the nearest outpost
of civilization, with mile upon mile of desolate country entirely
unknown to nine-tenths of the inhabitants of the very province in which
it is situated: here, anything might happen--the most fantastic events
at once appeared not only possible, but natural.

And now the Great Unknown, with his alternate claim of resurrected
prophet or heir to the throne of Brazil, highway-robber and
cattle-thief--what had seemed beyond the bounds of credibility over in
Monsataz was quite feasible in this mountain-girt desert.  Civilization
here was put back several centuries.  Tim felt that he was back in the
days of the robber-barons, who raided their neighbours' castles, stole
their cattle, and successfully defied king and government.  And what
more likely than that an adventurer like Dudley Stone should elect to
link his fortune with this mysterious Brazilian, half-breed or whatever
else he might be?

Tim tried to get as much information as he could out of Esteban, but
the carrier was one of those unimaginative creatures, rare enough in
this part of the world, who know nothing except what goes on under
their very noses.  The Great Unknown?  Yes! he would say, the
resurrected prophet who was the grandson of Dom Pedro, late Emperor of
Brazil.  Yes! he was going to overthrow the present Government and
place himself upon the throne of his forebears.  How this was going to
be done, Esteban had only the vaguest notion.  The Great Unknown had a
huge army, all armed to the teeth, that much he did know; and, also,
that in the surrounding district what was left of the inhabitants of
the villages and so on, had over and over again petitioned the
provincial Government to protect them against the depredations of this
army of robbers.  The Government did on two or three occasions send
troops out to restore order, but every time these expeditions failed
lamentably: the troops were decimated, hundreds of men perished, and
the prestige as well as the impudence of the Great Unknown grew to
immense proportions.  Cattle ranches were constantly raided, live-stock
driven wholesale, and the hides shamelessly sold to the foreign traders
who bought them cheap and asked no questions.  On the other side of the
Sertao, where lay the diamond mines, matters were even worse: whole
villages had been laid to the dust, mine-owners been massacred or
driven away.  Esteban had it for a fact that practically all the
diamond mines west of the Sertao had been acquired by force by the
Great Unknown: that he owned gold mines and ruby mines, and all the
land where had lain buried for centuries the treasures of the Incas of
Peru.

Allowing for exaggeration, and the timidity of the narrator, the whole
story was not unlikely--at least it no longer seemed so to Tim; and
undoubtedly the whole affair--robbery, pillage, untold wealth, Great
Unknown, and all the rest of the bag of tricks--was just what would
appeal to the greedy and adventurous spirit of Dudley Stone.




II

Three days of this terribly wearisome climb to the arid upland and then
on the fourth day, in the late afternoon, Esteban turned in his saddle
and pointed northward.

'Cumbe,' he announced laconically.

Had he pointed to a new Garden of Eden, Tim could not have been more
elated.  Nor was he disappointed when he came in sight of the village,
for it was neither better nor worse than those through which he had
passed before; a couple of dismal-looking streets, lined with squalid
huts, leading up to the usual kind of market-place, deserted just now,
but which perhaps on certain days in the year might look lively
enough--and that was all.  On one side of the square was the inevitable
'Commandacia,' with the Republican flag hanging limp and caked with
dust on its post; opposite to the Commandacia a stuccoed building,
which had once been painted but from which most of the plaster had long
since fallen away; the presence of a bell surmounting the sloping roof,
and of a large wooden cross on the wall beside a door that hung loosely
on its hinges, suggested that this broken-down building might possibly
be a church.  Immediately by the side of it there was a square hut,
with a kind of wooden veranda in front of it, to which a couple of
broken steps gave access.

To this Esteban pointed and said in his usual laconic way: 'Fra
Federico Evangelista's house.'

Over the whole place there hung at this hour a thick cloud of dust.  A
few stunted palms grew in a clump round the priest's house; another
group flanked the tumble-down little church.  The smell of peat and
coffee was very pronounced.  But none of these unpleasant aspects
affected Tim's spirits in the least.  Weary beyond expression, stiff
and saddle-sore, his throat dry as a lime-kiln, his eyes smarting with
the heat and the dust, his skin sore with stings of innumerable insects
and flies--nevertheless he forgot all his troubles at sight of that
miserable hovel to which Esteban had just pointed.

Though the village had appeared deserted when they approached, it soon
became alive with a crowd of dark-skinned women and children, who
crowded round the strangers in silent wonder.  The women, wrapped in
blankets, all appeared to have reached the age of Methuselah, their
coffee-coloured skins looked like old parchment; the children,
large-eyed and pot-bellied, gazed open-mouthed, clinging to their
mothers.  As in all the other villages, there were no men to be seen.

Esteban, seemingly, was well known in Cumbe.  Several among the crowd
of women greeted him with a dismal show of welcome.  The first
disappointment came when he asked whether Fra Federico was at home, and
was told that his Reverence had been at Cumbe a week or so ago, but had
gone on to some other village since then and would not be back for some
time.

Esteban turned inquiringly to Tim.

'What will you do, senhor?' he asked.  'There is no one in the house
when his Reverence is away.'

This sounded cheerful and comforting.  Tim, with true Irish
light-heartedness, could not help laughing at what seemed an impossible
situation.  To have travelled three hundred kilometres by rail, and one
hundred on horseback, only to find that the man whom he had come all
this way to seek was from home and would not be back for days, was an
eventuality that would have seemed absolutely tragic did it not savour
of the ridiculous.

'Isn't there anywhere I can get a bed?' he asked.

'Oh, yes, senhor.  The store.'

The store occupied the main portion of that side of the square which
was opposite the church.  It was a low stuccoed house, which had once
been painted yellow, and had a red roof set askew upon it.  Apparently
it served the double purpose of village store and drinking-bar, with
the possibility of a bed for a stranger thrown in.  Esteban, the
carrier, had brought some goods over on his pack-mule for the
store-keeper of Cumbe.  Taking Tim's acquiescence for granted, he now
led the four beasts across the square, leaving Tim to come along or
not, as he chose.  The crowd of dark-skinned lookers-on did not attempt
to move: they remained standing where they were, following with large,
dark, melancholy eyes the movements of the carrier as he brought the
animals to a halt outside the store and tethered them to the
hitching-posts.  Not a sign of life came from inside the building.
Through the iron-grated windows Tim caught sight of various
unsavoury-looking provisions hanging on strings, and as he neared the
door the usual atmosphere of coffee and peat was supplemented by other
scents, just as strong but far less pleasing.

The door stood invitingly open.  Tim allowed Esteban to precede him,
and in his wake entered the low-raftered room.  Only a dim afternoon
light found its way through the grated windows, and Tim's eyes took
some time in focusing the interior of the room.  Stretched out upon his
back on a rough-hewn bench a man was snoring loudly.  Esteban's
peremptory voice woke him from his slumbers, and he turned a lazy head
in the direction of the intruders.  At sight of them he blinked his
eyes as if unwilling to trust in the reality of what he saw.  Esteban
he knew well enough, but the other one--the stranger!  How often in a
year did he, Filippo Vanzea, owner of the one and only store of Cumbe,
see a stranger?  And how many years was it since he had seen one so
fine and clean as this one?

He struggled to his feet with alacrity.  Already the carrier, conscious
of added importance as the guide, philosopher and friend of this
wonderful stranger, had, in a lordly manner, demanded supper and beds
for himself and the noble senhor whom he had escorted hither.

As far as his own recollections of that evening were concerned, Timothy
O'Clerigh could not have written a book about them--not even a single
chapter.  All that he could have told you about it subsequently was
that he ate what was put before him, and drank a good deal of white rum
and black coffee.  After sunset the men came back to the village, in
straggling groups of twos and threes.  Later on, some of them drifted
to the store and sat round the bar, sipping rum and coffee, and smoking
their long-stemmed pipes: all in absolute silence.  Some of the men
played cards, or dominoes, others looked on, but not one of them spoke
more than three or four words on end.  Nor did they take much notice of
Tim.  He was for them some kind of foreign trader who had drifted out
here in order to purchase stolen hides.  They certainly did not enter
into conversation with him, but responded politely, if always
laconically, to his greeting.

Tim asked no questions.  He saw at once that they would have been
useless and would remain unanswered; also, he was too utterly weary to
think coherently of anything.  The men he only saw dimly: they seemed
like the dream creatures whom in his mind he had seen peopling the
thorny desert.  How he ultimately got to bed he couldn't have told you,
nor whether the bed in which he presently went to sleep was hard or
downy, or even clean.  But with only the third of a century behind one,
what matter the bed, when dreams not altogether unpleasant haunt the
watches of the night!

Timothy dreamed that he wandered through the rocky fastnesses of the
Sertao, and that in a deep defile he came face to face with Dudley
Stone.  Though he had never seen the man, he knew in his dream that
this was Dudley Stone right enough.  And somehow or other the scene in
his dream immediately changed, and he was back in Old Ireland, in the
old house which overlooked the lake, and he was lord of the house and
of all the land around: and a dim figure, whom he could not clearly
see, was pouring out tea for him from the old Irish silver teapot.

And Hold-Hands Juliana, in cap and apron, was scrubbing the floor of
the hall.




III

And the next morning Tim said to Esteban: 'Esteban, my friend, this is
not the end of our journey.  You've got to take me on to Canudos.'

Whereupon the carrier, who at the moment was engaged in doing nothing
at all over a cup of black coffee and a long-stemmed pipe, said with
firm emphasis:

'To Canudos?  No, senhor, I do not take you to Canudos.  Not I.'

'Why not?'

'Because, senhor--because no one goes to Canudos who values his life or
his purse.'

'I value both, my friend; but I'm going to Canudos, all the same.'

'Then you will have to go alone, senhor Inglez, for I will not take
you.'

And Esteban, by way of emphasizing the finality of his decision,
knocked the ashes out of his pipe, finished his coffee and rose from
the small trestle-table at which he had been partaking of his frugal
breakfast.

'I stay here a day,' he said, 'to rest the mules; then I go to
Joazeiro.  You said you would like to buy the horse.'

'I will buy the horse and one of your mules,' Tim said, 'and you can
rest the other two beasts, and presently you can go to any other
God-forsaken place you choose.  But to-morrow you are going with me to
Canudos.'

Esteban shook his head vigorously.

'Not I, senhor; ask someone else.'

'I'd rather go with you, for I know you are honest.  And you are coming
with me because when we've reached Canudos I will give you one hundred
milreis.'

'Not for five hundred.'

'With one hundred milreis,' Tim insisted, 'you can purchase a couple
more mules and another horse; with four mules and two horses you can do
twice the business you are doing at the moment; then, presently,
instead of carrying a few cheap goods backwards and forwards to these
out-of-the-way villages, you could set up for yourself in one of the
big towns--Bahia, perhaps, eh?  You would soon become a rich man,
Esteban.  All you've got to do is to take me to-morrow to Canudos.'

Gradually, while Tim unfolded these rosy prospects, the look of
obstinacy began to fade from Esteban's face.  He was wavering.  Greed,
or perhaps the thought of a little chocolate-coloured family over in
Bomfin, had already shaken the firm determination of a while ago.

'But it isn't safe, senhor,' he argued; 'it isn't safe.'

'Why not?'

'Strangers are not made welcome in Canudos.'

'I'll take my chance of that.'

'Then you can take it, senhor--alone.'

'One hundred milreis, Esteban,' Tim urged.

'What are one hundred milreis to a dead man?' Esteban retorted.  He
remained silent for a little while after that--pondering apparently.
One hundred milreis might be no good to a dead man, but they would be
mighty acceptable to a poor one.

'Look here, senhor,' he said at last, 'Canudos is a hundred kilometres
from here.  I will take you along the trail to within twenty kilometres
of it.  We shall be on the height and you will look down on the city in
the valley.  If you want to go farther than that, you will do it at
your risk and peril of your life, but you couldn't lose your way after
that.'

'Good man!' was Tim's only comment, and he gave the carrier a vigorous
clap in the middle of the back, which sent poor Esteban coughing and
spluttering across the veranda floor.

Filippo Vanzea now appeared in the doorway of the bar.  He was wielding
a toothpick with much energy and sucking his teeth audibly.

Esteban, who had picked himself up and shaken himself free of dust,
like a frowsy old dog, turned to him and said: 'Did you hear, Filippo?'

Filippo had heard every word: thought the stranger a complete fool--a
crazy Englishman--but it seems would have thought Esteban a greater
fool if he had refused the hundred milreis.  He also had an eye to
business, had Filippo Vanzea, and promptly fell to discussing with the
carrier what provisions the store should supply for the expedition.

Tim no longer listened: as he was going to have his way, he didn't care
what arrangements Esteban chose to make.  'We start as soon as the heat
of the day has gone,' he announced.

And Esteban gave a final shrug, as much as to say: 'Well! if you like
to go and get massacred it's no longer my affair.'

And suddenly while the two men were talking with unusual
volubility--for they are silent men, these Sertanejos--they let fall a
name which caused Tim to prick up his ears.

Something was said about the supply of dried meat for the expedition,
and Vanzea said: 'I have a good stock in hand.  I bought some about
five weeks ago from the Madre de Dios ranch.'

'Oh!' Esteban remarked, 'has the Senhor da Lisbao been up here lately?'

'I saw him, as I say, about five weeks ago, when I went down to the
ranch for some goods I wanted.'

Tim turned abruptly to the men.

'Are you,' he asked, 'by any chance speaking of Dom Manol da Lisbao?'

'Why, yes, senhor,' one of them said.  And Esteban at once added: 'Now,
if you happen to know the Senhor da Lisbao...'

'Why, what good would that do me?'

'All the good in the world.  He is hand in glove with the Great Unknown
and...'

It was Esteban who had spoken.  But he suddenly paused, the sentence
remained unfinished, and the man's face was distorted with a quick
spasm of physical pain.  What had happened was that Filippo Vanzea had
suddenly given his friend a violent punch in the ribs.  Tim saw it, and
noted that Esteban did not pursue the subject but went off at a
tangent, talking once more of provisions for the journey.

All of which gave Tim O'Clee furiously to think.  Being a native of
Ireland he had a ready faculty for jumping to conclusions--not always
at the right ones, although his intuition did not often lead him
astray.  In this case, it was not difficult to put two and two
together.  Manol da Lisbao, with the huge fortune mysteriously
acquired, who owned a ranch in the immediate vicinity of the stronghold
of the Great Unknown, could be no other than the middleman, the trader
who bought from the resurrected prophet and his robbers the loot which
he afterwards re-sold at an immense profit.  Surely this was the key to
the whole enigma.  It also explained Manol's attitude with regard to
Dudley Stone--Dudley Stone, his partner and his tool--now probably the
agent or emissary of the Great Unknown, sworn to as dead, erased off
the face of the earth in order to evade any inquiries about him that
might at the time have been set on foot.  Tim felt that he held the key
of the enigma at last, and his excitement gave itself vent in snatches
of song from his limited repertoire.  In a thunderous baritone,
entirely out of tune, he sang:

'Come, rest in this boo-zum...'


The two men listened open-mouthed, deeply impressed.  A crowd of small
dark-skinned picaninnies, their little pot-bellies draped in rough
shirts of brilliant hue, came running out of the huts and stood gaping
at this amazing phenomenon of Nature which emitted sounds such as they
had never heard before.  And the women, already busy with their
cooking-pots, gazed with dark, melancholy eyes on this curious product
from the great world outside, of which they had only vaguely heard.




IV

They did not start the same afternoon, but on the following morning at
early dawn.  And once more they ambled up the mountain trail, Tim and
Esteban, the two horses and the two mules.  They carried provisions of
water and food for man and beast for six days, and Tim had been duly
rigged out at the store in the panoply of leather, which, with the tan
on his face, made him as like a _vaqueiro_ as made no matter.

'You leave me in sight of Canudos,' he had said to the guide.  'After
that I shall need nothing more.'

'But on the way back, senhor...' Esteban urged.

'The Great Unknown shall pack a hamper for me--a Christmas hamper, it
shall be, my friend, with all the best that he himself feasts on....'

But Esteban shook his head dolefully.  He had taken a fancy to the
crazy Englishman and was quite convinced that he would never see him
alive again.

All day horses and mules plodded on with hot sand up to their knees.
Two nights they bivouacked in the scrub: they were icy cold; against
that the days were baking hot, rendering a halt at noontide imperative.
Pasture, such as it was, became more scarce as they neared the upland;
fortunately, it was still moderately early in the season and the
water-holes were not yet dry.  There were very few habitations along
the trail, or indeed within sight; those they did come across were
deserted.  Tim remarked on this, and Esteban, with his habitual shrug
of indifference, said laconically: 'All gone to join the army of the
Great Unknown.'

'The army of brigands, you mean,' Tim retorted.

But at this Esteban's face seemed to close up as with a snap.  The
nearer he came to the kingdom of the Great Unknown the more taciturn
did he become.  At one time, when Tim pressed him with questions, he
turned quite nasty in his fright and threatened to leave the crazy
Englishman to his fate then and there, as he himself had no cause for
quarrel with the prophet and had no desire to molest him.

After that brief but harrowing episode, there was nothing left for Tim
but to possess his soul in patience and, above all, to hold his tongue
on the one subject which absorbed all his thoughts.  As Esteban did not
offer any other subject, conversation necessarily flagged.

After the second night, they had still some thirty or forty kilometres
ahead of them.

'You are sure of the way, Esteban?' Tim asked his guide.

'I know every inch of it, senhor,' Esteban replied.

'You come here sometimes, then?'

'I have bought--various things from the _vaqueiros_--I sell them to the
stores in the villages....'

It was Tim's turn to shrug.  Everyone apparently bought the loot from
the army of brigands, and no one wished to molest them or to ask
questions.  Obviously it paid best to be friends with the robber-chief
and his hordes.

The trail now became very stony in places, and at times it was safer to
walk and lead one's horse than to ride.  There were several patches of
forest land to traverse: of meagre palms, thorny bushes and thick
undergrowth, where the path was narrow, and in one or two places the
two wayfarers were obliged to set to and hack and cut and beat down the
scrub in order to enable the beasts to get through.

Tim, who at one time had the idea that he could find his way to Canudos
without a guide, was thankful that Esteban had relented and decided to
come with him, for this part of the journey presented difficulties with
which no one unacquainted with the desert could have grappled
successfully.  The trail itself almost disappeared at times in the
intricate defiles around the foot-hills: at others it was crossed and
re-crossed again by cattle-tracks, so that the inexperienced eye could
easily have lost the right direction.

It was obvious that Esteban's eye was not inexperienced, for presently
they came out into the open once more and, pointing to the high
table-land on ahead, he said, with an attempt at cheerfulness: 'Nearly
there now, senhor.'

This last stage of the journey was very trying, for the water-holes on
the upland had become few and far between, and Esteban was unwilling to
encroach too far on the water supply which he had brought along, as he
wanted it, he said, for the journey home.  Also, the vegetation became
more and more scrubby and stunted, and there was little, if any, shade
against the sun, whilst the sun-baked dust under foot was like a welter
of hot ashes, through which they and their beasts plodded wearily.

But, as a matter of fact, of all these discomforts and all the minor
annoyances of flies and insects and prickly thorns Tim was hardly
conscious.  In his own mind he was riding towards the conquest of the
patrimony that had been filched from him, and the final undoing of the
thieves and liars who had done the nefarious deed.

In the late afternoon of the third day they reached the summit of the
table-land.

'That is as far as I can take you, senhor,' Esteban said, as he made
preparations for bivouacking for the night.  'Canudos lies the other
side of that mountain yonder.  I will put you on the right path, which
winds round the foot of it; when you are the other side, you will see
Canudos in front of you.'

'The mountain yonder,' to which he pointed, appeared strangely
menacing.  It seemed like a gigantic fortification guarding the
approach to the mysterious city, with battlements and towers carved in
the rock by Titanic hands.

To Tim it was the land of mystery--the land of promise.  In his folly
he had thought at one time that he held the key to the enigma which
those arid mountains kept wrapped in their stony bosoms.  Folly, of
course!  Now that from the table-land he looked across that barren
valley, with the yellowish ribbons of the two streams meandering
through the dun-coloured earth, he felt a sinking of the heart, a
presentiment of something abnormal, strange, monstrous even,
perhaps--yet not altogether evil--which would happen to him over there
in the city of the Great Unknown.

When, guided by Esteban around the foot of the mountains he did at last
obtain the first glimpse of the mysterious city, he could have laughed
at these presentiments.  What he saw was not calculated to strike awe
into any Irish heart.  Was that the land of rapacious brigands, the
stronghold of strange and enigmatic personalities, the city wherein
dwelt a mystic Cabalist whose sway over the multitudes was akin to that
of a prophet?  That agglomeration of mud huts and stony dwellings, all
of a dull brown hue--the huts brown, the vegetation brown, the earth
brown, and the dust--oh! the dust!--which made even the horizon appear
brown?

'Won't the senhor Inglez come back with me?' Esteban murmured in a kind
of hoarse whisper.  Apparently that brown mass of teeming life tucked
away in the midst of this arid desert filled the worthy guide with a
kind of religious awe.

Tim couldn't help laughing.  'Not I,' he said.  'Believe me, my good
friend, there is nothing very fearsome about those mud huts over there.
The only evil thing about the whole place is this abominable climate.'

'Ah! the climate?' said Esteban with a sigh.  'Yes!  Terrible!  The
cold!  And the heat!  Only the natives can endure it.  Come back with
me, senhor.'

'Away with you, you old croaker!' Tim cried; and, breaking into song,
he helped Esteban to transfer a few special necessities from the one
mule to his own pack.  'You will see me back at Cumbe before very long.'

'God and the Virgin grant it, senhor,' was Esteban's final comment, as
he dolefully shook his head, before he finally took leave of this mad
foreigner.  Even the hundred milreis which Tim now thrust into his hand
failed to bring a smile to his furrowed face.

Then he turned his own beasts and started ambling along on the dusty
road back the way he had come.

Tim did not watch him go.  His eyes were fixed on the dun-coloured
horizon, on the barren mountains that guarded this land of mystery,
still a dozen miles or more away; already in the east the sun with
swift darts of gold had overcome the dawn, whilst in the west the night
still lingered secure in rocky fastnesses.  In a moment now the brown
molecules of dust turned to myriads and myriads of glittering atoms; a
cloud of vaporous gems, veiling the life that teemed below.  And all
around--an ocean of mountains and rocks, of dull earth and sparse
vegetation, and the mud huts and stone buildings that clustered around
and atop of the table-land which was Canudos.

Tim threw out his arms with a gesture of passionate longing for
success.  Through almost incredible adventures he had come thus far,
almost unscathed.  The scene of the last phase lay there behind those
clouds of dust; the man who could be the means of restoring to him what
he held dearer than anything on earth, lived, breathed, toiled, robbed
and pillaged on this desert land.  And Tim was here now to wrest that
man's secret from him, to force him back into civilization and drag the
truth out of him, even if life was to be the forfeit in the end.




V

The track, such as it was, wound in and out and round about the
undulating rocky ground; anon it plunged abruptly into a thicket of
scrub and dwarf palms and thorny aloes.  Waterholes, as Esteban had
indicated, became very scarce, and as far as Tim could judge he would
have some twelve miles or so to get over before he came to the
outskirts of the desert town.  Of these twelve miles, at least five
would be through the forest into which he now plunged, after
recommending his soul to God, for he was indeed beginning to wonder if
Esteban had not been right after all when he said that no one but a
madman would venture alone within the precincts of the mysterious city.

The trail which led through the forest was easy enough to follow, for
cattle had trodden down the scrub, and signs of the passage of men and
beasts were apparent all along the track.  Tim had dismounted and led
his horse, whilst the mule ambled along in the rear.  He walked as fast
as the roughness of the ground would allow, treading rock or hard-baked
earth, up or down the incline, with weary, aching feet.

His thoughts went roaming back to Old Ireland and stately Traskmoore,
to Uncle Justin, that prince of sportsmen.  What would he think of Tim
now and this wild adventure, the end of which was still on the knees of
the gods?  From roving thoughts his brain switched off to day-dreams,
and thence to a state of semi-consciousness, akin to sleep, peculiar to
tired humans when wandering through the hot, damp atmosphere of the
tropics.

And Tim dreamed on until sudden contact with a prickly thorn-bush
dragged him with a rude shock out of his meditations.  He looked about
him, surprised to see how the trail had widened, until some distance on
ahead it finally curved out into a broad plateau, stony and scrubby as
the rest of the landscape and hedged in at its farther boundary by
bush, seemingly more impenetrable than any that Tim had traversed as
yet.

Hallo!  Tim had advanced up the incline, confident now that on the
plateau he would find one of the brackish lakes, or at any rate a
water-hole, where his poor patient beasts could get a drink and a rest
in the shade, when suddenly he saw at the farther limit of the plateau
a herd of cattle, lean and wide-eyed, massed together around a pool of
water, too muddy to mirror the deep blue of the sky.

As Tim drew nearer, the beasts ceased drinking one by one, and looked
up--more scared than savage--at the intruder.  A kind of human Robot on
horseback, a creature apparently made up of steel and leather--the
usual panoply of the _vaqueiros_--appeared to be in charge.  For the
moment, he turned leisurely round in his curved saddle and gave Tim a
careless glance.  There was nothing threatening or even challenging in
the glance, but a stranger being a rare sight in these parts, the
_vaqueiro_ did look twice at this one.  The next minute, however,
something--anything--scared his beasts; there was a sudden whirling of
dry mud and stones, a padding of cloven hoofs, a snorting like that of
a dozen engines letting off steam, a quick shout from the _vaqueiro_, a
stampede--and in less than three minutes herd and _vaqueiro_
disappeared as if the bush had swallowed them up.

And Tim remained standing there, vaguely listening to the multitudinous
sounds as they gradually faded away.  The whole scene had appeared and
then flitted away so quickly that he could scarcely believe that he had
actually seen those lean, wide-eyed, frightened creatures and the
Robot-like, leather-clad centaur, whose shouts had now turned to a
quaint, soothing, melancholy song, which grew fainter and fainter--more
and more like the murmur of wind through leaf-laden trees--and then
died away altogether.

And when the last of the murmur became softer than the whispering of
ghosts, a strange, unaccountable silence descended on this corner of
the wilderness.  Silence, and a kind of expectant hush, with the
distant, unknown city, screened from view by the bush, and all sounds
stilled of that human life which must be teeming over there round the
stronghold of the mysterious robber-king.  The heat had become intense,
but Tim was hardly conscious of that.  His shirt clung to his chest and
his back, and, at first, the sight of that brackish water had given him
a longing for its embrace.  But even that longing seemed to die away
with the _vaqueiro's_ song, and all that he was conscious of was just
the immensity of the desert and of its absolute stillness.

His eyes remained fixed upon the distant thicket: there, where far away
a quivering of thorny branches, receding now farther and even farther,
betrayed the pathway of moving cattle.  At last, even that quivering
ceased.  Nothing stirred.  No sound of bird or beast broke this
Infinity of Silence.


And suddenly, as Tim gazed out into the blue horizon far away, there
rose in the distant haze a palace of cool white marble, with slender
colonnades and wide terraces, mirrored in a lake that was crystal
clear.  He could not take his eyes off that fairy vision, although he
knew it to be but a mirage: he had never seen such an exquisite one
before.  Coming on the top of that vivid picture of frightened cattle,
on the top of that snorting and stampeding, this picture of clear water
and cool marble was to him like the beauty of peace after the roar of
strife.

And while he gazed on this unreal vision he forgot all about his aims
and his quest, about Dudley Stone and Hold-Hands Juliana: they no
longer seemed real to him.  Indeed, he did not seem real even to
himself: so much so, that when presently he saw something exquisite,
something that was both enchanting and bewildering, moving along his
line of vision, he thought that this was just another manifestation of
his dream state.

The mirage had faded from the sky: the table-land lay arid and
sun-baked.  On one side a tallish clump of thorny palms, with pallid
flowers drooping in the heat, threw a sheet of densely purple shadow
upon the reddish earth.  And out of this shadow a slender girlish
figure moved towards Tim O'Clee.  Hair in colour like burnished copper
framed a small oval face out of which shone a pair of dark,
mystery-filled eyes.  Some sort of dress, of a russet tint, fell
straight and rather stiff from the slim shoulders, screening the figure
and the limbs: feet and legs were encased in leather, only the hands
were bare.  On one of them a kind of leather cap hung by a strap.  But
of all this Tim was not, at first, aware.  He only saw what he thought
was the most beautiful woman he had ever seen in all his life, with a
face like mellow ivory, and lips, full and cherry-red, parted in a
smile.  No wonder he did not think that she was real, but only a vision
come to him in a dream.

'Were you frightened?' spoke the vision in Portuguese.  And then the
cherry-red mouth widened into a laugh.  'I think you are frightened
now,' were the words that accompanied the laugh, which to Tim's ears
sounded like the tinkling of a silver bell.

He had not moved.  The sun was scorching his shoulders, his back, his
chest, and now, with the instinct born in courteous Old Ireland, he
raised his hand and took off his hat.  The vision had come to a halt in
the purple shadow of the scrub and stood there, with one arm gently
swinging the leather cap to and fro.

'Put your hat on again, quick--or you'll get a sunstroke.'

Tim would not have cared if he had got a sunstroke, but, nevertheless,
he obeyed and put his hat on again.  So far he had not spoken one word.
The vision had carried on the conversation entirely on her own.

'Come along here.  It is nice and cool in the shade.'

And again Tim obeyed like an automaton.

'You understand what I say?' the vision went on.  'Then why don't you
speak?'

'Because I don't believe that you are real, and I am afraid that, now I
have spoken, you will vanish like a sprite.'

Tim said this in English, chiefly because he did not want the sprite to
understand: as perhaps in that case she would not vanish away.

But seemingly, and most amazingly, the sprite did understand, for the
great mysterious eyes opened very wide and the cherry-red lips
murmured: 'Oh!'--and then went on at once--'so you are English?'

'Very nearly,' Tim stammered, 'that is ... no, I'm not ... I'm
Irish--if you know what that means.'

The sprite did know, for she nodded sagely and smiled.  Smiles were
never long absent from that cherry-red mouth.  Then suddenly they
emitted a peremptory command:

'Come and sit down.'

There was a large flat stone close by: it was covered with parched moss
and well screened from the sun.  The vision sat down and beckoned to
Tim to sit beside her.  It certainly was moderately cool in the shade.
Tim removed his hat and threw it on the ground.  He had suddenly
realized two great facts: one was that he was tired, footsore, dirty
and unkempt; and the second, that he was no longer dreaming, and that a
beautiful woman--and a real woman at that--was sitting within a few
yards of him and actually commanding him to sit beside her.  Now Tim
O'Clee had never been shy of a woman before.  He would have thought his
beloved Ireland disgraced were he tongue-tied when a beautiful woman
was by, but even his hot-blooded Celtic ancestors would, I think, have
forgiven him his clumsy shyness on this occasion.  The situation was,
to say the least, distinctly novel.  How could any man, even an
Irishman, be expected to fall into casual conversation with this
exquisite being who had descended upon him from heaven knew where, and
who looked about as incongruous in this inhospitable land as a bird of
paradise would in a London slum?

And suddenly she spoke again.  Said she: 'My name is Marivosa da
Gloria.  What is yours?'

Tim couldn't recollect for the moment what his name was, so he said:
'Marivosa da Gloria!  What a perfectly ripping name.'

But she insisted: 'What is yours?'

'Timothy,' he contrived to reply.  'Timothy O'Clerigh.'

'Timothy?  Timothy?  What a funny name!'

'It is Irish, you know.'

'Yes! you said you were Irish and I believed you.  But what in the name
of the Holy Virgin are you doing here?'

Tim for the life of him couldn't remember, so he said vaguely: 'I am
travelling, you see--er--exploring.'

But she shook her head.

'No one travels in this wilderness,' she said--and just for once the
smile faded from her mouth--'there is nothing to explore.  Blue sky,
ugly vegetation, dust and stones.  Nothing else.  Why, then, did you
come here?'

She turned large inquiring eyes upon him, and Tim caught himself
wishing that she would not look at him like that, for he felt that he
was in danger of losing his head, and this impossible desert-land was
not a place--he knew that--where an Irish gentleman could conveniently
spare that commodity.  However, with those eyes gazing inquiringly upon
him and those lips smiling with such provoking challenge, what could he
do but come a step or two nearer?--which he did, and then half-sat on
the moss-covered stone, with one knee almost touching the ground.

'I think,' he said, 'it must have been because the hosts of Heaven came
down to me once in my sleep and whispered to me that I should find you
here.'

But at this, and perhaps at the glance in his eyes, which were grey,
she edged slightly away from him, and an almost imperceptible shadow
fell over her face, like an ethereal veil.

'Who taught you to lie so readily?' she asked, dryly.

He laughed and said: 'No one.  It is a natural gift.'

This brought the smile back to her lips, but only for a second or two:
the next moment she became serious once more and her voice had a note
of sharpness in its ring.

'You are not a Government spy?' she asked; 'are you?'

'Great Lord, no!' he exclaimed.  'What made you think...?'

'There have been a few about lately,' she said; then paused a moment,
and added: 'But they have been no use to the Government....'  She
paused a second time, and then continued coolly: 'There is a corner in
the burial ground set apart for them--it is only a ditch.'

She said this just as simply as if she wished to convey the fact that a
couple of seats were reserved for some friends at a theatre; and now
she plucked a drooping, pallid flower from the palm branch close to
her, and Tim, puzzled, enchanted, bewitched, watched her slender
fingers as they plucked the parched-up petals and then allowed them to
drop to the ground one by one.  She was extraordinarily beautiful: not
so much a question of features as of marvellous colouring, the
exquisite mellow look of sunset in the spring, a golden glow over her
whole personality, and with it all that indefinable thing called
_charm_, which no man has ever been able to define even whilst
acknowledging that it fascinates him more than any other womanly
attribute.

It was not the tropical heat that made Tim's pulse beat at fever speed,
or caused his temples to throb and his eyes to ache; it was just this
girlish beauty and its nearness, the loneliness of this desert spot
where, like a new Paul and Virginia, they might, if she so willed,
dream away the rest of their lives together, forgetful of the world.

How long the silence lasted between them, how long those perfect lips
remained set with a curious air of determination and wilfulness, Tim
couldn't say.  He had gradually become conscious, even in the midst of
his enchantment, of a feeling of wonder and puzzlement.  Who and what
was this extraordinarily beautiful girl?  Not that he cared.  She was
just she--the eternal feminine--for the moment the one and only woman
for him--but he did wonder.  For the first time since first she had
spoken, it struck him as strange that she spoke English--and such good
English.  He hadn't thought of this before, being spellbound, but now
that she was silent, and he longing to hear her voice again, he asked,
somewhat clumsily:

'How is it you speak English so well?'

'I have spoken it all my life,' she replied.

'But who taught you?'

'My father.'

'But you don't live in this God-forsaken hole, do you?'

And she replied quietly: 'I live here, yes.'

'Why do you?'

'Because my father wishes it.'

'The devil he does!  What on earth for?  He must be crazy to...'

And then he paused, tongue-tied all at once, gazing on her, wide-eyed,
for she had suddenly become absolutely transformed.  All the
winsomeness, the laughter, went out of her face.  She threw back her
head; her figure seemed to have grown taller, more majestic; she sat on
the lichen-covered stone as if on a throne.

'How dare you talk like that?' she asked coldly.  'Do you not know that
my father is the direct descendant of Dom Pedro of Bragana, the last
Emperor of Brazil?  He is the rightful emperor of this great country,
and only waits for a fitting opportunity to enter into his own empire
again.'

'The deuce he does!' Tim stammered in complete bewilderment.

'The people about here,' she went on, still speaking in a cold and
detached voice, like some sibyl instructing the ignorant, 'call my
father the Great Unknown.  No one has seen his face save his few
privileged lieutenants; but there are five thousand men in Canudos
to-day ready to fight to the death in his cause and mine.'

'Yours?'

'I am my father's only child and after him the rightful Empress of
Brazil.'

She paused, and turning her graceful head she gazed out over the sea of
low scrub to the quivering blue ether beyond: and it seemed to Tim
O'Clee as if she saw there the golden mirage of rich palaces and
stately terraces which had dazzled his eyes a short while ago, but
which to her were very real indeed.  He gave a long low whistle, which
he devoutly hoped that she had not heard, because its flippancy, though
unintentional, would jar upon the romanticism of the moment.

What a situation!  No wonder that poor Tim's aching head did not take
it in, all of a piece.  This adorable creature, this rose of the
desert, the daughter of that mysterious charlatan in whose camp he
hoped to find the elusive Dudley Stone!  And she the deluded offspring
of a highway robber, of a shameless pirate whom sooner or later an
outraged Government would lay low, together with all his followers,
whilst she--poor, lovely, helpless little pawn in this game of lying
and of cheating--would be thrown as a sop to appease the wrath of an
outraged countryside!  The whole thing was unthinkable!  After that one
flippant whistle Tim could only groan and, resting his elbows on his
knees, he buried his face in his hands, so that she should not catch
the look of horror and distress in his eyes.

Evidently she mistook this gesture for one of awe at this stupendous
revelation, for she went on gently and more lightly: 'Perhaps you
wonder why I am here alone, but I come most days to this silent and
lonely spot.  I love the solitude and the silence, for all about the
city there is so much bustle and noise, and I like to dream sometimes.
Do you sometimes dream, Mr. Timothy?'  And she turned once more her
large inquiring eyes upon Tim.

He looked up quickly.

'Sometimes,' he replied, and had the joy of seeing the faintest
possible tinge of pink rise to her ivory cheek.

'I love dreaming,' she said simply, 'here especially, because some
days, when it is very hot, there is a beautiful Fata Morgana in the
sky, and the pictures which I see, although I know, of course, that
they are not real, always seem just the right background for my dreams.
Have you ever seen a mirage, Mr. Timothy?'

'Yes,' he replied, truthfully, 'to-day.'

'There was a beautiful one to-day.  I don't know when I have seen it so
clear and so lovely.'

'Nor I.  That is why I'll come again--to-morrow, in the hope of seeing
it once more.'

But at this she put up her thin small hand, with one finger up in a
peremptory gesture:

'No!  No!' she reiterated several times vehemently, 'you must not come
here again.  This is my place--my solitude.  I cannot allow you to....'
She checked herself and after a second or two continued more quietly:
'It was nice, of course, to see you.  I am not a savage, you know.  I
like my fellow-men--better than the women: though I like the women
also.  And it was nice to speak English.  I never speak English
otherwise, except with my father.'

There was a certain something about her now which gave him the
impression that she was on the point of going away.  Perhaps she was a
sprite after all and would vanish as she had come--melt away in the
purple shadows.  Tim had the feeling that if she went something of his
very life would go with her; that if he saw her pass out of his sight
he would just draw his last breath and become one with the stony soil
of the desert.  He had an idea that while she spoke to him, answered
his questions, she couldn't very well go away.  It wouldn't be polite
to go--or to vanish--and leave, say, a leading question unanswered.  So
he put an eager question to her, asked her whether she had ever been in
England, which obviously was ridiculously out of the question.  She
said that she never had--not to her recollection--although when she was
very small her father and mother had travelled about a great deal in
different parts of Europe.  Her father's nearest relations, she
explained navely, were the sons of the late Emperor of Brazil and they
lived in Europe, so she supposed that she had been taken sometimes to
visit them.

'I was a long time in the convent school at Sao Paolo,' she said,
'while my mother was alive.  But now she is dead, and my father had to
devote himself to his country and to regaining his Empire.  He brought
me out here with him so that his people might get to know me, too.'

'How long ago was that?'

'Some years ... I'm not sure....'

Again that intangible feeling that she was going.  Tim racked his
brains for something to say that would keep her here.  He felt like one
of those characters in fairy books who either must guess unsolvable
riddles, or be forthwith transformed into a dragon or a bear.  His
gaze, for once, was withdrawn from the exquisite daughter of the
biggest rascal unhung, and he allowed it to roam, unseeing at first,
over the sunbaked plateau.  And sure enough, far away, coming from the
direction where the stampeding cattle and their Robot herdsman had
disappeared, he saw three or four moving black specks which, drawing
nearer, were gradually taking shape.  He put them down as a group of
centaurs with, among them, an ordinary horse carrying the small curved
saddle usual in these parts.

This, then, was the end.  Obviously.  Inevitably.  Unless he could
think of a question that would take her hours--days--to answer, she
would be gone within the next five minutes.  The centaurs had
come--this he knew--to take her away to that abominable dust-laden
city, where dwelt the arch-robber, the consummate charlatan and
liar--her father.  How and under what circumstances he would see her
again, he could not as yet conjecture.

In desperation he asked her a question which he felt at once was not
very tactful: 'You said just now that no man is allowed to see your
father's face save a privileged few.  Why is that?'

'Because he is a man above all other men on this earth: a being almost
sacred.  In him there lives the reincarnated soul of our great prophet,
Antonio Conselheiro.  His life is spent in prayer for the liberation of
his country from its vile oppressors, and for the day when the
Archbishop Primate of Brazil will place the imperial crown upon my
head.  Did I not tell you that my devoted father has given up his right
to the throne in my favour?  Unseen, unheard, he wanders through the
wilderness like the prophet, drawing men to him, and through him up to
God.  And the people venerate him.  There is not a man in the Sertao
who would not lay down his life for the Great Unknown.'

Well!  That was that.  Tim O'Clee had his answer with a vengeance, and
he had just heard through the most exquisite lips in the world the
_expos_ of a situation so insane, so fantastic, and--since he knew the
underlying truth--to him so ridiculous, that words for once in his life
completely failed him.  The centaurs were quite close now.  They came
to a halt on the fringe of the shadow.  They turned out to be men on
horseback--_vaqueiros_ such as his wanderings through these desert
lands had rendered familiar to him.  Two of them dismounted.  They were
swarthy of face, with very dark eyes and sharp, beak-like noses that
betrayed their mixed blood.  And now they waited, silent, solemn, like
statues cast in bronze; their stolid faces, haughty and detached in
expression, did not betray the slightest perturbation at seeing the
Empress of Brazil in close conversation with a stranger.

And within a very few minutes the girl had risen from the whinstone and
was up in the curved saddle in the midst of her Robot attendants.  One
of them, before remounting, had helped her on with a long-sleeved
leather coat and adjusted her leather cap over her head.  She did not
once turn her head to look at Tim; indeed, she seemed to have forgotten
his existence.  As the little cavalcade started off she took the lead,
the men following some little way behind her.  Soon horses and riders
were mere black specks at the far end of the table-land.  A few moments
later they plunged into the scrub on the very spot where the stampeding
cattle had disappeared a little while ago.  Tim, with aching eyes,
watched the spot as he had done before; he saw the quiver of the thorny
palms as the horses passed beneath their boughs.  The ground sloped
away very gradually and so he could follow--or thought that he
could---the progress of the cavalcade for some considerable distance.
But anon the scrub was merged in a sea of impenetrableness.  Nothing
more moved.  No sound emerged out of the thicket.  The wilderness was,
indeed, as the girl had described it, silent and infinitely lonely.
'Perhaps,' thought Tim O'Clee, 'I am really awake now at last.  This
past hour--or day--or an on of time--cannot have been real.'

Indeed, this beautiful girl with the inquiring eyes and the cherry-red
mouth, and all her wild talk of a saintly father and the crown of
Brazil, did not belong to the world of everyday life.  She was a being
from another sphere altogether--from the world of Romance, of Poesy,
and of Love.

'My God!' sighed Tim, 'what would any man give for just one kiss?'  Tim
felt that his blood was on fire; he ached in every limb with an
intensity of longing for just another glimpse of her.  Fool that he had
been to let her go like that--unkissed!  Fool not to have seized her in
his arms, touched those exquisite lips with his own--lived, in
fact--lived as he had never done before.  Perhaps those centaurs would
have risen from the ground after such sacrilege, seized him and crushed
the life out of him for his daring.  Well! why not?  This was not
reality: this was romance--and in the days of romance men before now
had died for a kiss.

Fool that he was!  Fool to have let her go!  The heat oppressed him:
his temples throbbed, his lids, aching with the heat, fell over his
eyes.  It was close on noontide and he longed for sleep.  The purple
shadows still lay over the brackish pool.  Tim remembered the two
beasts.  What would Uncle Justin say to a man who could forget his
horse because of a woman?  Tim smiled to himself.  How far--how very
far away did Traskmoore seem now: the silvery lake, the shady trees,
the Irish walls and five-barred gates!  Where was Hold-Hands Juliana?
And what did she matter now?

'I'll join the army of the Great Unknown,' Tim murmured to himself,
'and set Marivosa da Gloria on the throne of Brazil--see if I don't!
... Marivosa! ... Marivosa ... Even her name is music and romance....'

'Marivosa! ... Marivosa!...'  He kept repeating the name over and over
again, rolling it on his tongue as the sweetest sound it had ever
uttered.  And he remembered a song--one of his favourite ones--which he
used to sing to Uncle Justin at Traskmoore to the accompaniment of the
gramophone:

  Oh! if to lo-love thee more,
    Each hour I number o-o-o'er,
  If this a pa-hash-hashion be
    Worthy-hee of thee.
  Then be ha-happy, for thus
    I adore thee-hee-hee.

And surely never did the echo of these rocky fastnesses respond to more
lusty song.  Whether Tim had the vague idea that it would reach the
ears of his lady fair it was impossible to say, or whether she in her
turn would echo:

  If pleasure's truest spell
    Be to love well,
  Then be happy, for thus
    I adore thee.


Tim led the two beasts to the pool and watched them drink; then he cast
off his clothes and plunged into the water.  He had to cool his blood
somehow.  The water, though muddy and none too sweet, gave a sense of
comfort to his skin and limbs.  He let the sun dry him and then resumed
his clothes; after which he made his way back to the hallowed spot
where first he had beheld his vision.  He lay down on the hard ground,
put his head on the parched moss as near as possible to the place where
she had sat, closed his eyes, and presently dropped off to sleep.

Just before he did drop off he remembered that the one question which
interested him most, and which he had never thought of putting to
Marivosa, was whether among her saintly father's proselytes there was a
stranger--an Englishman--named Dudley Stone.




VI

It was late afternoon before Tim O'Clee emerged out of the belt of
forest land and scrub, and the city of Canudos burst in upon him like a
scene on the stage when the curtain goes up.

A background of towering, irregular mountain-tops, a valley watered by
two streams, between them a gently sloping hill on which clustered a
conglomeration of rudely-built houses and huts intersected by clumps of
prickly palms and dwarf trees, and bare patches of rough grass; and
towering on the summit of the hill a low outspreading building of rough
stone, which gleamed mysterious and golden through a veil of dust in
the glow of the setting sun.

There was no beauty in the scene, no colour, no line; but it had a
touch of grandeur in its very ugliness, its isolation, its amazing
defiance of Nature in her most stern moods.  Tim stood up in his
stirrups and raised his hat, welcoming the sight.  He and his beasts
had had a rest; he himself had even had a wash in the brackish water,
and he had succeeded in taking off a two days' stubbly growth of beard
from his chin.  The last phase of his adventure found him refreshed and
ready.

'This,' he said to himself, 'is Canudos; you, Tim, my lad, have come to
the end of your wanderings at last.  Over there, inside that ugly city
which you were beginning to think was only a legend, you may find the
man whose existence would be the means of giving you Traskmoore and all
it stands for.  But, apart from that, inside that city there lives the
most beautiful woman God ever made.  She may be Empress of Brazil or

she may not.  Her father may be a saintly prophet, or the greatest
blackguard unhung, but one thing is certain--she will one day be
Countess of Traskmoore, or you Tim, my lad, are a damned fool and an
unworthy son of Erin.'

He rode on past the first habitation he had encountered for days.  It
was the usual haphazard construction of poles and laths and muddy
plaster, a wooden outside staircase, a veranda, a stockade around the
courtyard, and several sheds; but in the courtyard there were a couple
of dogs and they barked.  Chickens, lean and mangy, strutted about and
clucked; pigs over by the sheds grunted as they buried their snouts in
their troughs; and all these sounds put further heart into Tim and
assured him that he was not dreaming, that he was still on the familiar
planet known as Earth--and not in Uranus, or Neptune, as he might
otherwise have feared.

As he neared the outskirts of the city, teeming life greeted him at
every turn: _vaqueiros_ driving their cattle home; rudely-constructed
carts creaking on the dusty road; large-eyed, gaunt women wrapped in
blankets sitting by the roadside guarding a herd of goats; naked,
dark-skinned children darting out of the huts at sound of the horses'
hooves.  So far nothing hostile had greeted him.  The men, busy with
their cattle, passed him by without a second glance--the women did not
even appear curious.

And suddenly the delicious odour of hot coffee struck his nostrils, and
round the bend of the road he came on a long, low building with a tiled
roof and the usual wooden veranda along one side of it.  The welcoming
word: 'Hospedaria'--half-obliterated by the sun--and a weather-worn
sign with the legend 'Bom Viagem' gave promise of shelter and rest.  A
number of men stood about in the front yard, smoking and leaning
against the veranda posts.  There were a few horses, too, some of which
were tethered to hitching-posts, others just hobbled; there were a
couple of hooded carts, two or three curs unworthy the name of _dog_,
and the all-pervading succulent scent of coffee.  These men, gaunt of
mien and very dark of skin, had probably been talking before Tim came
into view, but as soon as he turned into the stockade and drew rein
they became silent and, for the first time, Tim thought that he
detected an inimical suspicious glance in their eyes.  However, he
greeted them all comprehensively in quite good Portuguese.  They nodded
in reply, and he then asked whether this was a house where he could get
food and shelter for himself and his beasts; again they nodded, and Tim
dismounted and entered the house.

It seemed almost a replica of that other place over at Cumbe; flecks of
dim afternoon light struggling in through chinks in the walls or narrow
grated windows; the rough-hewn benches and tables lined up against the
plastered walls; the smell of coffee and rank tobacco, the sacks of
beans and farinha, the miscellaneous store of matches and cigarettes,
goads, lassoes, tin pots, leather hats--even to the owner of this
princely store stretched out on one of the benches snoring lustily.
Some half-dozen men, all dressed in the usual panoply of leather, were
sitting round the room drinking coffee and smoking cigarettes.  They
hardly glanced at Tim when he entered, for the place was dark and he
looked at first sight like one of themselves.  It was only when he sat
down at one of the tables and rapped on it with the palm of his hand,
demanding attention, that they realized he was a stranger.  But, beyond
staring stolidly and unblushingly at him, they did not molest him in
any way.

The store-keeper, or whatever he was, roused from his slumbers, also
did some staring at Tim before he asked him what he wanted.  Tim
demanded supper and hot coffee, and as he did this in their own tongue
the men withdrew their gaze from him for a moment or two in order to
consult mutely with one another as to this amazing situation.  Here was
a stranger who was not a stranger since he spoke their language.  What
did that mean?

The store-keeper, a lean fellow of immense height and very little
breadth, with large hook nose, copper-coloured skin and very black
hair, rolled his long lean body from off the bench, stretched out his
arms so that they nearly touched the ceiling, and, without comment or
second glance at Tim, sauntered off to an inner room.  Tim waited
patiently and in silence, returning the men's persistent stare with one
equally unashamed.  A few more men strolled in from time to time till
the place was quite full, and when every seat was occupied the
late-comers sat on the tables, or some of them on the hard-baked floor.
A few stood about in and around the doorway, with arms folded, smoking
cigarettes and staring.  No one spoke.  They were a silent lot, these
_vaqueiros_ of the desert; the Indian blood in them tending to
introspection and a kind of coma of the brain.

Presently the tall Indian returned, he had a wooden bowl in one hand
and a platter in the other.  These he placed in front of Tim, together
with a wooden spoon and a tin fork.  The platter was well heaped up
with strips of dried meat stewed in rice, and in the bowl there was the
ubiquitous mixture of black beans and bacon powdered over with farinha.
To a capricious palate the food would have been uneatable, but Tim was
young, he had an iron constitution, and he was hungry.  He, also, had
become used to these native concoctions by now and did not really
dislike them.  What was more, the coffee was excellent.

By dint of dragging out a few words from his taciturn host he learned
that he could get a bed for the night and stabling for his beasts.

It was all very like Cumbe.  He was dog-tired, and again could not have
told you what kind of bed he slept in that night.  Unlike Cumbe,
however, his dreams were neither of Ireland nor Traskmoore, nor of
Hold-Hands Juliana, nor even Dudley Stone; they were all of an
exquisite vision carved in ivory and clad in gold, who looked at times
like a beautiful woman with bright-red lips and disturbing eyes, at
others like an image with an immense jewelled crown on its head, and
surrounded by huge centaurs, half-men, half-beasts, who twitched
lassoes above their heads and threw them at Tim and invariably missed
him--until one of them, who was the thinnest and blackest thing Tim had
ever seen, caught him round the shoulders and dragged him to the
ground; whereupon Tim woke up with a yell, to find himself on the
hard-baked floor in company with half a dozen cockroaches.  But even
so, he was so tired and sleepy that he contentedly rolled himself in
his rug again and went once more fast--and this time dreamlessly--to
sleep.




VII

Tim stayed eight days at the Bom Viagem, trying with all his might to
enter into the life of the place by mingling freely with the habitus
of the inn.  It was very difficult, for they were a taciturn lot.  They
would sit about or stand, sip their white rum and their coffee, or else
play cards or dominoes, and stare at Tim--stare by the hour.  Over and
over again he would meet a fusillade of dark eyes, all directed at him
at one and the same time, or else furtive glances above a hand of
cards.  But no one asked him any questions: when he volunteered
information, they listened, but he could not for the life of him say
whether they believed him or not.

He had given his name as Tim O'Clee, thinking it would be easy for them
to pronounce.  They translated it into _Timocla_ and left it at that.
There were two factors, fortunately, which stood Tim in good stead
during his first acquaintance with the dwellers of this strange desert
land: one was his working familiarity with their language, and the
other his sound knowledge of cattle and horses.  He could not be a real
stranger, so these _vaqueiros_ seemed to argue: this man who spoke
their language and who appraised the points of a horse with unerring
judgment.

Without venturing on any definite statement, Tim let fall hints that he
came from the other side of the Sao Francisco river, being attracted by
the tales he had heard of fortunes to be picked up in the Sertao by
trading hides and cattle with foreigners.  On the whole, he hoped that
they were taking him at his own valuation; certain it is that he
detected nothing hostile in the men's attitude towards him, and as day
succeeded day they stared less frequently and less persistently at him.

But the news of his arrival at the Bom Viagem had apparently spread
about the town, for evening after evening now there were strange faces
to be seen among the habitus.  Of these strange faces some gave
Timothy plenty of food for thought.  On the whole a villainous lot.
Men who apparently had ascendancy over the rest of the crowd.  His
Indian host whom, in despair at obtaining information in any other way,
Tim took to questioning with untiring obstinacy, did inform him curtly
and with bated breath that these were the Lieutenants of the Great
Unknown, the privileged guardians of his sacred person.  After which,
Tim studied the appearance of those men, marvelling if the fantastic
clothes, the long hair and beard, the tan and the dirt, did not by
chance conceal the personality of Dudley Stone.  But they were every
one of them half-breeds: mamalucos, mestizos, mulattos of every
conceivable hue and cast of countenance.  They went by curious names,
which Tim tried to commit to memory.  Flat-Face, Black-Fang,
Lean-Shanks were some of them.  They seemed to have been selected by
the Great Unknown principally for their ferocity, probably for unavowed
and unpunished crimes which had forced them into exile in the desert
and allegiance to his cause.  They were less taciturn than the common
crowd, but their conversation consisted chiefly of highly-coloured
accounts of their own prowess in the field of crime and their
ruthlessness in face of their enemies.

Tim, not being a fool, knew well enough that he was completely at the
mercy of these men, who, according to their own showing, revelled in
crime and took pride in savagery.  They were not likely to spare him
should they presently prefer to see him dead rather than alive.  He was
just Daniel in a den of ferocious lions.  Yet it was this very sense of
perpetual danger that thrilled Tim O'Clee's adventurous spirit, but for
this spice in his life he ran the risk of becoming an amorous dreamer.
Thoughts of Marivosa haunted him day and night.  Every day he rode out
through the forest to the table-land where first he had met her, and
there waited for hours, hoping for the sight of her.  And while he
waited he made plans for the future--all sorts of extravagant plans; he
would, of course, succeed in finding Dudley Stone, through him he would
regain possession of his Irish heritage, and end by laying his wealth
and his life at his beloved lady's feet.  It wouldn't, he thought, be
difficult to persuade her that to be Countess of Traskmoore was a finer
thing than to be crowned Empress of Brazil.

Not only did Tim dream of this future by day in the solitude of the
table-land, but in the evenings, with nothing to do in the coffee-room
of the Bom Viagem, he would still dream on, and forget that at the
moment he was no nearer to finding Dudley Stone than he had been over
at Monsataz--until his wandering eyes caught one of those suspicious
glances which warned him that it was not good to dream in the presence
of these fearsome Lieutenants; an unguarded word, a look, even, might
result in a knife-thrust and the ditch which the lovely lady of his
dreams had described as reserved for traitors and Government spies.

The most acute danger lay in a possible quarrel over cards, or
dominoes, for the men were all gamblers: but as there was not much
loose money about, the stakes over these games of hazard were never
very high.  Tim had been very careful to keep his small store of
milreis concealed from prying eyes.  Not that the men were thieves in
the European sense of the word: to raid a farm, to drive a herd of
cattle, to pillage a township, was their _mtier_; but to put their
hands in another man's pocket, or rob a stranger of a few milreis did
not appeal to their virile nature.  Living as they did in a community
of pirates and highway robbers, and in an entirely democratic spirit,
they had not much use for petty cash.

To all appearances this Timocla was an out-at-elbows vagabond, who,
like themselves, had been forced into exile by some misunderstanding
with the laws of the country.  A highly-coloured version which Tim gave
one night of what actually took place at the Hespanha music-hall in
Monsataz, including the murder of Doctor da Pinto--but with the names
of places and persons carefully disguised--was received with much
approbation.  It was the kind of autobiography that the Lieutenants
understood.  As a fellow-criminal, driven to seek service with the
Great Unknown as an alternative to the gallows, the newcomer was no
longer an object of suspicion.  He had at once become a man and a
brother.

His health was drunk in white rum.  He was even slapped on the back by
one man and embraced by another.  His stock had risen a hundred per
cent that night.

While he told that tale, he had been aware of the presence and the
attention of one man who in general appearance was unlike any of the
others.  He was small and spare, and though his skin was dark it had
become so through the action of sun and weather, and was not the
outcome of mixed blood.  His face was thin and almost ascetic-looking,
his hair was scanty and lank, of a nondescript colour.  He had gentle,
watery grey eyes.  But, in spite of obvious physical weakness, amongst
this crowd of stalwarts he seemed to be a person of authority.
Whenever he spoke the others listened; and Tim had already noticed that
when he entered the crowded _hospedaria_ a chair was at once vacated
for him, and the host hastened to attend to his wants.

While Tim told his highly-coloured tale, this little old man gazed on
him with an expression of indulgent irony which presently changed to
one of gentle pity.

'Have I found a friendly lion in this den?' thought Tim.

It seemed so indeed, for when his story was ended and he had received
the accolade from Lean-Shanks, Black-Fang and the others, and the
company began to disperse, the strange old man beckoned him to his side
and offered him coffee, which seemingly was a great honour, for the
others all retired and left the two men isolated and free to talk
together in whispers.  Tim drank the coffee, conscious that the strange
old man was scrutinizing him very closely.

'Since you came from the other side of the river, Senhor Timocla, how
do you come to know so accurately what occurred in the Hespanha
music-hall at Monsataz that night, a couple of months ago?'

The voice was gentle, cultured, slightly ironic.  Tim, on whom the
question so tersely and quietly put had the effect of a sudden shock
from a powerful battery, tried to meet the glance of the gentle, watery
eyes with one equally frank.

'I might retort with the same question, senhor,' he said.

'Would your answer be as truthful as mine?'

'Try me,' said Tim boldly.

'I had the story from my friend and brother, Fra Martino, cur of Sao
Felice in Monsataz.'

'Heavens above!' Tim exclaimed, 'then you are...?'

'I am Fra Federico Evangelista, cur of the district which embraces
this city.'  Then, as Tim, bewildered and silent, stared at him in
amazement, he went on, with a smile: 'It is your turn to reply to my
first question--truthfully, remember.'

'I need not do that,' Tim murmured, 'your reverence will have
guessed....'

The old man nodded.  'I am not "your reverence" here,' he said, with
his gentle, ironical smile.  'They have not much use for religion over
here.  But it is my duty to visit this place, which is in my district,
and so I come from time to time.  I say Mass occasionally, though there
is only a derelict hut in which to perform the holy office, and though
the men go as readily to the Gri-gri man, or the witch-doctor, as they
do to me.  But there are just a few souls who have seen the truth and
have not forgotten it, and I minister to them.  On the whole they all
respect me, for I know something of the lore of simples, and when I
come I bring a few medicaments with me, which I apply for the relief of
their bodies when they are racked by fever.  For this they are grateful
in their rough way.  My predecessor tried to show them the wickedness
of their superstition--the Great Unknown, the resurrected prophet, and
all that folly--but they would not listen and drove him out of the
place, and they threatened to kill him if he ever dared set foot in
Canudos again.  Then our Archbishop sent for me and gave me the cur of
these poor lost souls.  I do what I can for them, but without the
ministrations of the Church it is very difficult.  So I just trust in
God's mercy, for they are ignorant!'

The gentle, tired voice died away.  Tim was hardly conscious whether
Fra Federico had really ceased speaking.  His whole personality seemed
so incongruous, his simple autobiography so out of place in this savage
_milieu_ of men and beasts.  One by one the fearsome Lieutenants and
the _vaqueiros_ had gone.  The Indian innkeeper was snoring on one of
the benches: the whole of the _hospedaria_ was silent, dark, and
deserted.  How like a dream it all was!

'It is getting late,' Fra Federico resumed after a little while,
'though I daresay you have noticed that we do not mark time in Canudos.'

Tim partially woke out of his dream.

'Have you far to go, your reverence?' he asked.

'Less than a league.  It is nothing.'

'You will let me escort you...?'

'Not only that.  You will pack up your valise and come with me to my
house.  It is not much, but it is better than this.'

'But, your reverence...'

Fra Federico put up a warning finger: 'Sh-sh!  Did I not tell you that
I am no "reverend" here?  You will come with me, senhor, and your
company will be a solace to me while I am here.  When I go, you will
come with me, for this is no place for Europeans.'

Tim shook his head.

'When you go, senhor, I will stay here and wait for your return.  Did
not Fra Martino tell you why I came out here?'

'No.  When he sent me word, I was at Cumbe.  He was interested in you:
he was sorry you had had such misfortune, but he did not know why you
wished to visit this God-forsaken hole.'

'Shall I tell your reverence why I came here?'

'You certainly must.  While we amble along to my house on the hill you
shall tell me all that you told my Brother Martino--all that caused him
to send you out to me, with the thought, I suppose, that I could be of
service to you.'

Without waiting for definite acquiescence from Tim, Fra Federico
clapped his thin hands vigorously together until he had succeeded in
rousing the Indian from his slumbers.

'Senhor Timocla's mount and my mule,' he commanded; and the Indian,
obsequious and alert, rolled off the bench, picked himself up again and
straddled out of the room.

'Does your reverence really mean...?' Tim ventured in protest.

'If you say those words again,' the old man retorted, 'I leave you
here.'

Happy and excited, Tim hurried across to his room.  He felt that with
this civilized, kindly friend as a stand-by his star was already in the
ascendant.  He packed up his few belongings, then ran out and saddled
his horse, and hoisted his valise on his pack-mule: the Indian in the
meanwhile looked after Fra Federico's mount, a lean, hungry-looking
beast, which the old man straddled and set going with gentle words of
encouragement.  The innkeeper did not seem surprised at this sudden
departure of his guest: the milreis which Tim had tendered him in
payment of his week's board and lodging were apparently more than he
had expected, for he was most profuse in his offer of himself and his
house and everything he possessed for the future service of the Senhor
Timocla.


And it was while ambling in the moonlight along the dusty track that
led up to the mountain city that Tim O'Clee once more recounted the
story of Uncle Justin, of Hold-Hands Juliana, and of Dudley Stone.  Fra
Federico listened.  He was obviously interested and very sympathetic.

When Tim had finished his story, he said: 'I still wonder, Senhor
Timocla, why my Brother Martino sent you out here to me.'

'But obviously, your rev----  I mean obviously, senhor, because he
thought that as you know this place so well you would tell me all you
know about Dudley Stone.'

'Certainly I would, senhor, if I knew anything of such a person.  But
never in my life have I seen the man or ever heard such a name.'

'You don't know if there is a foreigner here, an Englishman ... a
foreigner in the service of this ... this Great Unknown?'

'A foreigner?  No.  Where should he come from?  What should he be doing
here?'

'But there must be, senhor,' Tim insisted, unwilling to admit even to
himself that black despair was hovering near, ready to seize upon his
spirit, 'there must be--there is--a foreigner ... an Englishman ...
think again, senhor ... one of the Lieutenants, probably--or a member
of that charlatan's household ... there must be, I say ... there must
be--or Fra Martino would not have sent me....'

But Fra Federico could only shake his head.

'There's no one here, senhor--not in Canudos.  I know every man in
Canudos--all the important ones, that is--there never was a foreigner
near the person of the Great Unknown.'

And still they ambled on, sometimes side by side, and now and then,
when the track narrowed, in single file.  The old priest had pulled a
rosary out of his pocket and, now that Tim had lapsed into silence, he
muttered his Aves in a half-audible murmur.  His mule needed no
guiding: it knew its way through the maze of narrow, intricate streets
which formed the city of Canudos.  The moon looked down, placid and
silvery, on the immensity of this desert land, smiling her wan, cool
smile on thatch, or hut, or wigwam, as complacently as she did on
stately European homes.

A great patch of silvery light lay over the mysterious mansion of the
Great Unknown, lending to the ugly, squalid city nestling in this vast
amphitheatre of distant rocky fastnesses, a certain eerie grandeur.
Tim rode on in silence, with tightened heart and an aching desolation
of spirit.  Had he come all this way, ventured so much, hoped so
considerably, only to find failure at the goal?  If so, what would be
the end of it all?  The fortune that he was going to lay at the feet of
his beloved, the title that would compensate her for losing an
imaginary throne: were they all to end in smoke--be swallowed up in the
dust of this stony-hearted desert?

Perish the thought!  Perish despair!  This was not stuff of which Irish
adventurers are made!  He had come all these thousands of miles to
recover fortune and a title for himself.  They had seemed dear then,
when he alone would have tasted their joys; but now how doubly precious
had they become, now that one unforgettable image filled his heart as
it already had stirred his imagination!

Surely, surely God had not led his footsteps all this way only in order
to make him taste the bitter fruits of failure.  It was unthinkable!
Such things did not happen! not, at any rate, to an Irishman in whose
lexicon hitherto there had not been such a word as _failure_.

And Tim laughed aloud, a gay, defiant, confident laugh.  'God,' he
said, 'does not do such things!  He has too great a sense of humour.'




VIII

The old priest had spoken the truth when he told Tim that though his
house was a poor one, it was better than the Bom Viagem.  Poor it
certainly was, but it was built of stone instead of the usual laths and
mud, and, though the floor was only beaten-down earth and the tiny
windows were unglazed, the house actually boasted of three separate
rooms.  In the principal one of these there were chairs and benches, a
table and a cupboard, all roughly fashioned of wood; a couple of
hammocks were slung in another room, whilst the third was partly a
lumber-room and partly a kitchen.

The cupboard in the centre room contained an array of phials and
pill-boxes and bundles of dried herbs, together with pestle and mortar,
a primitive kind of retort, and various other implements for the
pursuance of the old priest's simple pharmaceutics.  And piled up on a
couple of shelves there were a number of tattered and much-thumbed
books.  These were principally devotional in character, mostly of a
very nave order; there were several medical treatises and pamphlets,
and one or two ancient herbals--one of the sixteenth century--which
would have fetched large sums at auction in London.  There was an old 
Kempis, a New Testament, and the Maximes of La Rochefoucauld, all in
Portuguese translation and--wonder of wonders--the plays and sonnets of
one William Shakespeare in the original.

Fra Federico met his guest's astonished glance with a gentle
self-deprecating smile.

'Ah, yes!' he said, 'we all learn a little English in the seminary;
there are always a few Irish students with whom we talk.  I used to
speak your beautiful language quite fluently at one time--even now I
can stumble along and understand most of what is said--but I am old,
and I have forgotten ... so much ... so much....'

'And you read Shakespeare, Padre?' Tim remarked.

'The greatest poet the world has ever known, senhor,' the old man
replied, with strange fervour.  'The greatest man who ever walked the
earth since our blessed Lord.'

The priest made the sign of the Cross, in case what he said might,
perchance, be blasphemous; then he added, more lightly: 'At one time I
could have recited the whole of Romeo and Juliet to you by heart.'

'And in the intervals, Padre, you studied medicine, and probably knew
more about remedies than half the bigwigs in Europe.'

'I have studied herbs and the simples, senhor.  I have no means of
obtaining drugs in these wilds, so I go to Nature for my potions and
she has yielded up to me some very precious secrets.'

With loving hands he fingered the phials and bottles in the cupboard,
took up one or two of them and showed them to Tim with some pride.

'It took me days and nights of search,' he said, with reference to one
of these, 'to find the one plant which that old herbal over there
recommends as the supreme remedy for gangrene--a horrible affection of
which these poor people here often suffer through dirt or neglect of
wounds.  I have used it often and it is infallible.  This,' and he held
up another bottle to the light, 'I succeeded in concocting after two
years' patient search for a herb which only grows the other side of Sao
Francisco river: it is a sovereign remedy against infantile croup, or
whooping-cough.  The formula dates from the sixteenth century.'

He showed Tim a jar which contained a thick brown paste.  'The most
perfect cure for every disease of the skin--it never fails in the very
worst cases of scurvy or eczema.'

'You are a wonder, Padre,' Tim said, with genuine admiration for the
modesty, the charm, the simplicity of his new friend.  He could have
listened for hours while the old man droned away in his gentle tired
voice, recounting to him some of those marvels wherewith Nature,
seemingly so cruel to her children, has placed at their disposal all
her treasures to palliate the evils which they bring upon themselves.

'And what is this, Padre?' Tim asked, as he picked up a bottle which
contained a thick fluid of a deep golden colour.  Instead of a Latin,
or Greek name, such as the other potions wore upon their labels, it
bore the strange legend: 'Romeo and Juliet,' and below that: 'Friar
Laurence's potion.'

'That,' Fra Federico replied, 'is the most precious tincture in my
collection.  I made it up from a recipe in that old sixteenth-century
herbal over there.'

'But why that funny label?'

'Because, senhor,' said the old priest, with a return to that quaint
earnestness which lent such dignity to his worn, ascetic face, 'because
I firmly believe that your great Shakespeare had studied that old
herbal, and had this same recipe in mind when he made Friar Laurence
give to Juliet the potion which would cause a state closely resembling
death.  Do you remember his words to her when he gives her the phial?'

He paused a moment as if to collect his thoughts; then, in excellent
English, he recited the immortal words:

  'When presently through all thy veins shall run
  A cold and drowsy humour, for no pulse
  Shall keep his native progress, but surcease,
  No warmth, no breath, shall testify thou livest;
  The roses in thy lips and cheeks shall fade
  To paly ashes; thy eyes' windows fall,
  Like death, when he shuts up the day of life;
  Each part, deprived of supple government,
  Shall, stiff and stark, and cold, appear like death.
  And in this borrowed likeness of shrunk death
  Thou shall continue two and forty hours.
  And then awake as from a pleasant sleep.'


The priest had long ceased speaking, and Tim still stared at him,
amazed.  Many a time, since he had embarked on his great adventure, had
he believed himself to be in a dream-state, but never so much as now
when, standing in a squalid hut, in the most forgotten corner of this
world, hundreds of miles away from the outposts of civilization, he
heard a Portuguese ambulant priest recite, in perfect English, words
which he had last heard at the Old Vic in London.

He could only stare at the funny old man with the sparse hair and domed
forehead, with the sunken cheeks and trembling hands, and reiterate,
with profound conviction: 'You are a wonder, Padre!'

After a moment or two he added: 'And do you mean to tell me that you
have actually concocted a draught which will have the effect that
Shakespeare talks about?'

'I didn't concoct it, my son,' Fra Federico said with a smile.  'I
studied the old herbals and found a formula.'

'And you've actually got it in that bottle?'

'I've actually got it in this bottle.'

'Have you tried it on anyone?'

'On myself.'

'And--was it successful?  I mean, what did it feel like?'

'"Like Death, when he shuts up the day of Life,"' the old man quoted.

'And when you woke again...?'

'I felt rather giddy and sick, chiefly from want of food, I believe;
but, as you see, I am here to tell the tale.'

'They might have buried you alive.'

'I went out into the scrub; no one knew where I was, so there was no
danger.'

Fra Federico said this quite simply, as if that episode in his life had
not in its sublime self-confidence and contempt of danger a spark of
heroism.

'May I look at the stuff, Padre?' Tim asked, and the priest gave him
the bottle.  The liquid was of a golden colour, semi-opaque.  Tim
sniffed it.  It had an indefinable, aromatic, intoxicating odour.

'Shall I tell you, Padre, what I'm going to do?' he said, after he had
handed back the precious bottle to his old friend.  'I'm going to write
an account of everything you've just told me.  You shall give me a
small draught of the thing--enough, of course, to produce the right
effect, say, on a dog--and as soon as I get back to England I shall
send it to one of the medical bigwigs in London with a biography of you
and of your life here.  You shall become famous throughout the
scientific world, Padre, as you jolly well deserve to be.  And the
Pope, or whoever has a say in these things, shall make you a Cardinal,
or an Archbishop, or anything else you like.  Now do, to please me,
decant some of that precious liquid into a bottle small enough to go
into this pocket inside my belt, where I keep what money I've got left.
I mean every word I say, Padre....  Men have become rich and famous for
less than this.'

The old priest shook his head, smiling indulgently.

'I don't care for fame, nor money, my son--not now any longer.'

'Not for yourself, of course.  But as a man of science it is your duty
to give your discoveries to the world--at least, I've always understood
that that was the unwritten law.'

It took Tim a long time to bring Fra Federico over to his way of
thinking; but his was a persuasive tongue, and not even in the desert
is a man entirely free from vanity.  Tim, being Irish, had kissed the
Blarney Stone.  He knew just what to say and how subtly to flatter his
old friend into doing what he wished.  Somewhat navely, perhaps, he
believed that the concoction of an old potion culled from a medival
herbal was one of the most marvellous discoveries man had ever made;
and he had taken such a liking to the old priest, and thought it such a
shame that so fine a fellow should end his days in these barbaric
regions, that he was determined to do him what he called 'a jolly good
turn'.

In the end, Fra Federico, obviously not good at an argument and,
equally obviously, not obstinate of character, gave in to him.  He
filled a small phial with the liquid and gave this to Tim, who stowed
it away carefully in the pocket inside his belt.

Little did either of the two men guess what immense significance this
simple act would have, not only on Tim's present quest, but on both
their lives.

For the moment, the subject was dropped.  The priest, with the
well-thumbed volume of the great poet's works on his knee, appeared to
be living through some half-forgotten dream again.  His quivering lips
murmured the words which he knew by heart; his pale, watery eyes
wandered round this narrow, squalid room, which meant home for him.
Tim wondered what picture memory had traced for him on its dingy
walls--a face?  A smile?  A picture out of the past?--which he lived
again in the tragedy of Romeo and Juliet, and which caused those faded
eyes to look a little more sad, a little more resigned than they had
been before.




IX

Quite apart from his erudition and his enthusiasm for Shakespeare, Fra
Federico Evangelista proved a delightful companion.  Many days went by
before Tim had dragged out of him the history of his eventful life; it
was a life of disappointment and of resignation, from the time when he
was in charge of a fashionable parish in Seville to the day when his
superiors sent him as an ambulant priest to minister to the spiritual
needs of a horde of savages in the desert.  What had brought this cruel
exile about, Tim never knew.  He could only vaguely guess at a romantic
adventure, the recollection of which would at times bring a strange
look of yearning to the faded old eyes.

That it was a woman who had played an important part in Fra Federico's
life--a part which had wrecked his career--could not be doubted; the
old man even now would lend a sympathetic ear to every tale of love and
romance; and soon Tim found himself telling his friend of that first
never-to-be-forgotten encounter with the mysterious lady of the
woods--Marivosa da Gloria, Empress of Brazil.

'What a woman, Padre!' he exclaimed.  'You have seen her, of
course--talked to her, perhaps, you lucky dog.  She is exquisite!  I
have seen some beautiful women in my day--Ireland, you know, is famous
for them--but never in my life have I seen such eyes, such a skin, and
her mouth, Padre...!  My gosh! just think of the first kiss from those
lips...!'

Thus Tim talked wildly, extravagantly, one day when, after the usual
meal of black beans and farinha, he and Fra Federico sat over their cup
of coffee.  The air on that day was peculiarly oppressive; though Tim
did not know much about the climate of the Sertao, he felt that in
spite of the clearness of the sky a storm was drawing near.  He felt
the heat more than he had ever done since he had come to this part of
the world: his temples throbbed painfully, and he felt rather
light-headed.  But the coffee was good and strong, and talking of the
one subject which absorbed his thoughts seemed to ease the tension of
his nerves.

'I mean to unmask that blasphemous charlatan who calls himself the
Great Unknown, poses as a resurrected prophet or whatnot, and is,
unfortunately, Marivosa's father ... the abominable mountebank, with
his talk of being Emperor of Brazil! ... I shall tear that veil from
his ugly face, see if I don't!'

They had gradually got into the habit of talking in English, even when
they were alone.  Tim's outspoken sentiments might have got his old
friend into trouble if spying ears were about.  And it was delightful
to listen to the elegantly stilted diction of the priest, who had
learned most of his English from Elizabethan authors.

He smiled at Tim's vehemence.  'How will you accomplish that, senhor?'
he asked.

'I don't know yet,' Tim replied.  'I must see Marivosa again first.'

'She is more closely guarded than a European queen.'

'Nevertheless, I shall take her away from here.'

'Take her away...!' the old man gasped.  'Why in the world should you
dream of taking her away?'

'Because she is too pure and too good and far too beautiful to live in
this den of brigands, and because...'

He paused, and again the old priest smiled, gently, indulgently, and
then spoke as if to a child who is crying for the moon: 'You are nearly
two hundred kilometres here, my son, from the nearest railhead.'

'I know that.'

'You don't know the country; and in this city there are ten thousand
pairs of eyes to follow her movements wherever she may go.'

'I know all that, Padre,' said Tim, 'but it's going to be done in spite
of all that.'

'Even if she were willing....'

'Let me see her once more,' Tim asserted boldly, 'and she will be
willing.'

But Fra Federico again shook his old head.

'You forget,' he said, 'that Marivosa da Gloria has been brought up to
believe in her own exalted rank.  That father of hers may or may not be
a descendant of Dom Pedro--I don't know ... I am inclined to think that
he is ... but, anyway, his daughter is firmly convinced that she is the
rightful Empress of Brazil, and that the welfare of her country is
bound up with her destiny.  And she worships her father as she does the
good God Himself.'

'But, Padre, that story of the throne of Brazil is sheer humbug, I tell
you.  The only descendants of the last Emperor of Brazil live in
Europe.  This man has no connection whatever with the House of
Bragana: he is nothing but an impostor, and one day that bubble is
bound to burst.  Marivosa will then find out that her father is an
arrant liar.  He must know that....  What does he propose to do then?
What does he think will happen?'

Fra Federico sighed.  'I don't know how he'll work it,' he said.  'If
what you say is right, and I dare say it is, then, of course....  But,
in any case, by that time she will be married, I suppose....'

Tim had given such a jump that the bench on which they were both
sitting tipped up, and the poor old man rolled down upon the floor.
Tim, full of humble apologies, helped him back to his feet, and all the
while kept on exclaiming: 'Married!  Married, Padre?  Are you mad, or
am I?  Married?  To whom?'

'Her father has pledged her to a rich Brazilian whom surely you have
met in Monsataz; they all believe here that he will help her to gain
the throne.  Because of that, I think that she is quite willing....'

'Who is the man?' Tim insisted.

'Dom Manol da Lisbao, he is called.'

'Great God!'

Tim put his hand to his forehead; he wanted to steady himself, to hold
his wits together, which he felt were scattering in all directions.
Heavens above!  What a tangle!  What an inextricable medley of
intrigues and of lies!  Tim felt as if some Titanic spider had woven a
gigantic web which held him captive, and that the Herculean task lay
before him of struggling out of this web, of loosening each individual
thread, and trying to join it to another which persistently evaded him;
whilst outside the web, and free from the spider's trammels, he could
see all those others--Dom Manol, the murdered doctor, Teresa da Pinto,
and that arch-charlatan, the mysterious Great Unknown; and they were
holding Marivosa captive--Marivosa and Dudley Stone.

Tim's state at this moment was almost like a trance.  Ever since he had
embarked on this mad Odyssey he had had the feeling that he was leading
a dream-life, that he was a wanderer in a kind of Wonderland, and would
presently wake to find himself in the placid and sedate milieu of
European capitals; but never had the sense of unreality been so strong
as now when this tangled skein of events and intrigues was, as it were,
thrust into his hands to be unravelled by dint of foresight, of
courage, and of tact.  He swung round to see whether the funny old
priest was really there, whether he had actually spoken--or whether,
like a dream-vision, or a sprite--he had vanished after delivering that
stupefying blow.

But Fra Federico was once more sitting placidly on the rickety bench.
Tim had, supposedly, been silent for some time, for the old man had
taken up his rosary and was filling in time by counting his beads.

'Forgive me, Padre,' Tim said, and sat down beside him, doing his very
best to calm his nerves and to speak in an even voice.  'I was so
thunderstruck by what you told me that I forgot my manners.  I suppose
you know that this man, da Lisbao, whom you have just mentioned, is the
greatest blackguard unhung?'

'Sh-sh-sh! you must not say that, my son,' Fra Federico put in quickly.

'But I do say it--for I know.  Manol da Lisbao is a liar, a forger, a
perjurer, and a murderer; and if you lend a hand in uniting that black
scoundrel to the loveliest creature God ever made, then you'll commit a
sacrilege.'

'_Ave Maria, gratia plena_,' the old priest murmured, scared like a
rabbit at Tim's vehemence.

'Marivosa is a Christian--isn't she?'

'_Madre de Dios!_ of course she is: she was brought up at the Convent
of the Sacred Heart in Sao Paolo--a most pious institution.'

'Very well, then--you have no right to let her wallow in all this
abominable superstition over here....  Please, please forgive me, Padre
... it is frightful cheek on my part to talk to you like this ... but I
cannot understand how you can contemplate the idea of a sweet Christian
girl being perpetually humbugged by a blaspheming father who poses as a
resurrected prophet, surrounds her with an army of bandits, and
wants--for some nefarious purposes of his own, of course--to throw her
into the arms of one of the vilest scoundrels on earth.'

'But what can I do, my friend?  I am only a poor priest of God.  What
can I do except try to save her soul...?'

'You can, at any rate, enlighten her about her precious father; you may
think that he has some connection with the last Emperor of Brazil, but
you must know that he is not a prophet, either resurrected or
otherwise, but just a brigand and a cattle thief.'

But Fra Federico only shook his old head dolefully.

'She would not listen to me,' he said.  'Is it likely?  She has been
taught to worship that father of hers.  If I tried to enlighten her, I
should be driven out of this place like my predecessor--and the poor
souls whom I am trying to save will be damned for want of guidance.'

Tim gave an impatient sigh.  He rose and went to the door to get a
breath of fresh air, for the atmosphere in the narrow room had become
stifling.  What was the good of arguing with this timid old ascetic,
whose very existence in this land of brigandage was an incongruity?
Nor did Tim wish to scare the old man too much with his vehemence, or
to set him against him by arguments and reproaches.  He did feel that
he had an ally--a friend--in Fra Federico; and though all his senses
were on the rack with impatience, he knew that by trying to rush
matters, by endeavouring to precipitate a crisis, he might be courting
an early and perfectly futile death.

His own life had become a precious thing.  He felt that he, and he
alone, stood between an exquisitely pure and beautiful girl and the
venal passions of a crowd of blackguards, who wanted to use her for
their own despicable ends, caring nothing if they wrecked her life, her
happiness, even her faith in God.  The old priest, absorbed in his
orisons, took no further notice of his guest, and Tim was left to the
bitter-sweet company of his own thoughts and of his dreams.

Of these, the one that had most absorbed his thoughts and been the
mainspring of all his actions, namely, his quest of Dudley Stone,
seemed suddenly to have taken a secondary place in his plans for the
future.  It was not so much of Dudley Stone that he thought, of Uncle
Justin, or Hold-Hands Juliana; whenever his mind conjured up those
faces now, a pair of dark, mysterious eyes, ivory cheeks and cherry-red
lips would superimpose their loveliness over every other mental vision
and blur every image with the radiance of their own.




X

Tim had wandered out into the open.  The air had grown more and more
oppressive, and heavy clouds now hung over the rockies in the west.
The storm was drawing nearer: it would certainly burst before nightfall.

The priest's house was one of a number situated on a large open
_plaa_: a rocky table-land, over half a mile long and equally wide,
dominated by a spur, on the summit of which stood the stronghold of the
Great Unknown.  The houses on the _plaa_ were, like that of Fra
Federico, of more substantial construction than the bird-cage-like huts
in which dwelt the rest of the population: this was evidently the
Mayfair of Canudos.  Each house had its veranda and its stockade, and
commanded a fine view of the jutting rock on which was perched the
castle of the veiled prophet.

Tim, oppressed by the heat, stood idly by for a long time, gazing up at
that stone construction, which was the prison-house of the most
beautiful woman on God's earth.  At any rate, he chose to picture her
to himself as a prisoner, her lovely eyes perpetually fixed upon the
mountain-girt horizon beyond which lay a world which she must be
longing to know.

'And I swear that she shall!'  Tim registered the vow, in spite of the
hundreds of kilometres that lay between the desert and civilization,
and in spite of the ten thousand eyes that were set to guard her every
movement.

It was after he had stood staring upwards for some time, and had heard
the first distant rumblings of the coming storm, that he first became
aware of an unusual animation in the city, like the shuffling of
hundreds and thousands of feet on the rocky slopes behind him.  He
looked down the narrow streets which led up to the _plaa_ and saw a
crowd of people tramping upwards in this direction--men in their full
panoply of leather, others just in cotton shirts and trousers, with
bare feet caked in mud.  Hundreds of people, all tramping upwards.  Men
and women and children.  The women wore cotton skirts; their heads and
shoulders were wrapped in woollen blankets.  Most of them dragged naked
children up with them by the hand; others hugged babies against their
breasts.

Up they came, and up, from every street that converged on the _plaa_
in their hundreds and their thousands; while Tim, lost in amazement,
stood and watched this extraordinary spectacle.  Never in his life had
he seen anything like it.  It seemed as if the earth had suddenly
opened and disgorged this crowd of men and women and children out of
its bowels.

Up they tramped, and up, and came to a halt on the _plaa_: all in dead
silence.  Not one man spoke.  Not a child cried.  The narrow streets
were black with this tramping, moving humanity, like ants wandering up
their hill.  And now the _plaa_ itself was black with that moving,
oscillating mass: a silent, dun-coloured crowd, that stared with great
dark eyes up at the mysterious castle on the hill-top, or at the great
rolling clouds that presaged the storm.

And suddenly from the top of the hill there came the rolling of
drums--a dull, muffled sound, unlike any other kind of drum Tim had
ever heard; a sound that made the silence of the _plaa_ seem more
eerie, more weird than before.

Fra Federico had finished his prayers.  At the first sound of the drums
he came out of his hut.

'What have they all come up here for, Padre?' Tim asked of him,
thankful for the old man's companionship in the midst of this weird
spectacle.

'To take their oath of allegiance,' the priest replied.

'My God!  To that charlatan up there?'

'Why, yes!--and also to his daughter.'

'Of course--to his daughter.  I suppose I am awake--it isn't a dream,
is it?'

'What, my son?'

'This crowd.  This awful silence.  Those drums....'

The old priest smiled.

'I thought also that it was a dream ... the first time I saw them all
... five years ago....'

'But why to-day?' Tim asked.

'Because the storm is approaching.'

'The storm?  What has it got to do with this mummery?'

'A good setting, my son, when the Great Unknown comes out to bless his
people.'

'To bless them?  Great God!  You don't mean to tell me...'

'_Miserere nobis_,' the priest mumbled, '_libera nos a malo_ ... God
forgive them, poor ignorant sheep....'

'And are you going to stand by, Padre, and lend a hand in this
blasphemous rubbish?'

'I lend no hand in any blasphemy, my son,' Fra Federico retorted, with
a certain simple dignity.  'The men swear allegiance to Marivosa da
Gloria di Bragana, rightful Empress of Brazil, and give up their lives
in her cause.  I know nothing of politics, nor whether the man up there
has any claim to the throne of this country.  I dare say that to you it
does seem rubbish, but it is not blasphemous.'

'But this business of the resurrected prophet...'

'They are poor, ignorant sheep....  They mean no harm....'

'No harm?  But there are thousands of them.'

'Thousands, as you say.  And new recruits come in all the time from
beyond those mountains, and even from beyond the shores of the Sao
Francisco river.  The former prophet, Antonio Conselheiro, had an army
of twenty-five thousand men; for years they defied the Government up at
Rio, until the whole lot was exterminated, or driven back into the
jungle and the swamps.  This man's aim is to collect an army that will
march on Pernambuco.  If you are wise, my son,' Fra Federico added,
after a moment's pause, 'you will herd with the crowd and take your
oath as a new recruit.'

'What? ... I? ... Play that fool's game...?'

'It will be a fool's game for you, perhaps, but if you value your
life...'

The hint was significant and the argument unanswerable.  If Tim valued
his life, there was only one way of safeguarding it--to fall in with
the mummery, to merge his individuality as far as possible in this
conglomeration of brigands, dagoes and half-breeds.  But, heavens
above!--what a situation for Major O'Clerigh of the Irish Guards!  All
he could do was to thank his stars that it was to the lovely lady of
his dreams that he was expected to swear allegiance, and this he was
ready to do.  She was welcome to his oath, to his life, to everything
that he could lay at her feet for the furthering of her happiness.

'Prudence is the mother of valour, my son,' Fra Federico added, as if
to clinch the argument.

'You are right, Padre,' Tim admitted, with an impatient sigh; 'as I
have made my bed so must I lie on it; and there is a good old Irish
proverb which says that: "Whoever has said A, must be prepared to say
B."'

'And if you wish to see the Empress Marivosa, senhor,' the old priest
concluded, 'keep your eyes open and you will see her soon.'

With that prospect in view, Tim would have walked straight into Hades.

The crowd in the meanwhile had grown to astonishing proportions.  The
men were congregated in the centre of the _plaa_; some were
bareheaded, others wore large sombreros, others again had on the
leather cap affected by the _vaqueiros_; the women formed the outer
circle of the throng, mere bundles of shawls and wraps, their dark
faces hidden in the folds of their blankets, their bodies huddled up
against one another, or else leaning against the surrounding stockades.

The priest had spoken of an army of ten thousand, and this crowd did
not fall far short of that number: and yet, on the whole _plaa_ hardly
a sound.  Occasionally the cry of a child quickly suppressed, or else a
smothered groan of pain, and from the summit of the hill that roll of
drums unlike any sound Tim had ever heard before.

Overhead, heavy clouds came rolling up from behind the rocky heights; a
dull, leaden light hung in the sky; the air was terribly oppressive.
Tim, though clad in the thinnest cotton shirt and trousers, felt
stifled.  Taking Fra Federico's advice, he kept close to his side while
the old priest threaded his way through the throng.  For the most part
respectful way was made for them, and occasionally one or other of the
men or women would stop and raise the priest's robe to their lips.  On
the edge of the plateau where the ground rose sharply towards the
summit of the hill, there was a kind of rough stone altar, raised on a
couple of shallow steps.  Around this altar the fringe of the crowd had
formed a wide circle, in the forefront of which Tim recognized several
faces with which he had been familiar at the Bom Viagem--the fearsome
Lieutenants with the significant names that were so reminiscent of
Fenimore Cooper and Wild West shows.  Black-Fang was there, and so was
Lean-Shanks.  Tim noticed that the latter threw him a quick, suspicious
glance, and then, drawing Fra Federico aside, spoke to him in a quick
agitated whisper.

'I suppose,' thought Tim, 'that my engaging friend of the thin legs is
hastily making up his mind whether I am to be killed at once or left to
die presently in the good cause.'

Apparently Fra Federico had been equal to the occasion.  What he said
to Lean-Shanks was repeated to Black-Fang and seemed to carry weight,
for no more notice was taken of Tim, who was left to mingle with the
crowd.  The occasion was too solemn to worry over a mere new recruit.

From over the chain of mountains in the west the storm was fast
advancing: already one or two distant rumblings presaged the approach
of thunder and vied with the monotonous nerve-racking roll of those
persistent drums.  And suddenly the awesome silence was broken by a
sound akin to the soughing of the wind in leaf-laden forest trees.  A
great sigh had risen to thousands of throats, a sigh that was both
joyful and expectant, and yet strangely weird and impish; not only were
all eyes turned up now towards the summit of the hill, but thousands of
arms were outstretched as if in prayer.

To say that Tim was thrilled would be to put it mildly.  He pinched his
arms to make sure that he was alive: he sighed and he groaned in sheer
excitement.  'Am I mad, or sane--awake or dreaming?' he asked himself
over and over again.

Upon the hill-top a group of men now appeared.  They filed out of the
stockade which surrounded the dwelling-house, and then slowly came down
the hill.  First came the drummers, with their long cylindrical drums
suspended from their necks; then came a number of men armed to the
teeth with miscellaneous weapons, guns, rifles, bayonets, sabres,
lances; then another group, who carried banners made of coloured rags.
Slowly they came down the hill-side, drums rolling, but otherwise in
silence.  Tim got the feeling that he was in the Pavilion Theatre in
London watching one of Mr. C. B. Cochran's revues.

And all at once there appeared the majestic figure of the Great
Unknown.  Mountebank, cattle thief, brigand he might be, but he was
certainly majestic: even Tim felt impressed, and he understood what a
tremendous effect this strange personality was bound to have on
superstitious, ignorant, and mystic folk.  To begin with, in among this
sturdy but rather stocky race, the charlatan appeared very tall, and he
had very cleverly accentuated his height by the blue robe which he wore
draped about his long, lean figure in the manner of a Roman toga.  His
head was entirely swathed in a thin cotton material, which only left
the nostrils free for breathing.  His right arm was outstretched as he
walked, with two fingers of the hand and the thumb extended for
benediction.  It was difficult to imagine how an ignorant cattle
dealer--or whatever the man had been originally--could have invented
all this mummery.

But soon Tim ceased to contemplate the Great Unknown for, immediately
behind him, surrounded by a crowd of women, came Marivosa da Gloria.
She was lovelier even than she had been when first Tim saw her in the
forest.  She no longer wore the panoply of leather which had given her
such a quaint, almost boyish appearance.  Like her precious father, she
wore a kind of draped robe and mantle which made her look like one of
those beautiful marbles of Diana, or Artemis, in the Vatican galleries
in Rome.

Her head was very small, and her brown hair, which had glints of copper
in its waves, was cut quite short at the nape of the neck.  Round her
brow she wore a straight band of gold.  She was taking herself very
seriously, the poor darling.  Tim just longed to make a wild rush
through that crowd of mountebanks, to pick her up in his arms and to
run and run and run away with her, through forest and desert lands,
over rocks and swamps, and through the jungle, away from this
wonderland of unreality where a set of unconscionable blackguards were
scheming to break her heart.

Down she came in the wake of her father, walking solemnly, like a
lovely little idol.  Tim never took his eyes off her; he felt that by
the magic of his love he would draw her gaze to him, and that when
their eyes met he would convey to her the adoration and the devotion of
his soul.  She would understand just by virtue of that one glance that
here were two arms ready to defend and guard her, to embrace and to
cherish, a breast on which she could lay her lovely head and rest, a
brain that formulated schemes for her which a man's body could carry
through.  She looked so sweet and so innocent--so proud, too, the poor
darling, unaware that that mummer whom she worshipped would soon lay
her lovely head in the dust.

Down she came in the wake of her father.  The drummers and the armed
men and the banner-bearers had already ranged themselves in a
semicircle around the altar.  Fra Federico stood there--the poor, timid
old man, self-deluded in the belief that this ceremony to which he lent
the authority of his priesthood was not a blasphemy.  The veiled man
had paused beside the altar, with his arm still outstretched.  Everyone
was prostrate.  Tim, in response to a look of appeal from Fra Federico,
had perforce to kneel also: this he did facing Marivosa, thus rendering
this act of worship to her.

And suddenly a vivid flash of lightning tore the leaden clouds asunder
and a terrific crash of thunder shook the rocky foundations of the
dream-city, and drowned the roll of drums.  After which, it seemed as
if the mighty voice of Heaven had loosened ten thousand tongues.  The
men beat their breasts with their clenched fists, or beat against the
ground with their palms; the women shrieked and groaned, all the
children started to cry and went on crying unchecked.  Overhead, the
very heavens seemed to be at war; thunder was almost continuous, one
flash of lightning followed another at a mere second's interval; whilst
down below the people groaned and shrieked and beat their breasts, and
the veiled charlatan stood towering above them as if he were the
supreme power that ruled over the storm, or commanded the hurricane to
be still, and who at will could hurl this multitude into Gehenna, or
raise it by his benediction to Elysian fields.

How long this pandemonium lasted Tim didn't know.  It may have been
half an hour: for him it seemed like an endless stretch of time.  His
knees ached, his head ached, his back ached, and he was furious with
himself for being an unwilling actor in this idolatrous pageant, and
furious with Fra Federico for having thrust him into the rle.  It was
only the sight of Marivosa that calmed his nerves: to look at her was
compensation for all that he endured in the way of humiliation and
impotent rage.  She seemed entirely detached from all this mummery, and
just stood there beside her father, like an exquisitely carved statue
of ivory--a perfect body, from which the soul had departed, gone
a-roaming into a land of dreams.  Tim imagined that he could read her
thoughts--thoughts of her great destiny, of a vast Empire over which
she would rule, dispensing faith, hope, and charity to starved and
ignorant souls--and he was able to groan with the best of these
devil-worshippers in the knowledge that all her beliefs, her own faith,
and her every hope were fated to be shattered to dust by the impious
hand of the father whom she worshipped.




XI

Apparently this orgy of shrieks and groans marked the last stage of
this amazing pageant.  While the uproar gradually died down, the veiled
charlatan turned his back on his prostrate worshippers and, preceded by
his drummers and his men-at-arms, marched slowly back up the hill.

'The King, the King of France and his forty thousand men,' Tim murmured
to himself, 'marched up the hill, up the hill, and then down again.'

But Marivosa da Gloria with her female attendants still remained on the
_plaa_, and so did the majority of the fearsome Lieutenants, while the
banner-bearers, waving their bits of coloured rags, stood in a
semicircle around the lovely Empress.

Slowly, one by one, men and women struggled to their feet and resumed
their attitude of passivity and of silence.  The storm in the meanwhile
had abated and the air was considerably cooler; only from the farther
side of the mountains there still came muffled rumblings and occasional
pale flashes of lightning.  The leaden clouds, chased by a
north-westerly breeze, left the sky clear and of a deep azure.  In the
west, soft tones of emerald and purple heralded the coming sunset.
Tim, gazing on the people, had the impression of thousands of dogs
shaking themselves after a beating.  He also had the impression that
the crowd was thinning: after such tempestuous emotions even these
tough _vaqueiros_ and brigands must be longing for the peace and quiet
of their bird-cages and their wigwams and a dish of farinha or a cup of
coffee to calm their nerves.

The final tableau of the pageant was of a much more simple order.
There were some twenty or thirty men, some of them with their women and
children, who came up in single file, each accompanied by a local
inhabitant who seemed to act as sponsor, as far as the altar steps, and
there, facing Marivosa da Gloria, said a few words which Tim did not
understand.  He supposed that these were the new recruits, come from
different parts of the country to join the army of the prophet, and
that they each took some sort of oath in their own native tongue.  Some
of these men were full-blooded Indians or Negroes: others half-breeds
of varying cast of countenance and diversity of colour.

Fra Federico stood by the altar and seemed to be the one to administer
the oath.  Marivosa did not speak; nor did she make a sign until after
each man had spoken, when she just bent her beautiful little head,
looking every inch the Empress she believed herself to be.  While this
went on, there was a perpetual roll of drums proceeding from the
hill-top, and the standard-bearers shook their ragged banners.  The
fearsome Lieutenants scrutinized each recruit as he took the oath,
whispered with one another, exchanging their views.  Sometimes the
sponsor would be challenged and there was a long colloquy, while the
recruit stood by, trembling with fear, for obviously his life was in
the balance.

'It will be my turn soon,' thought Tim.  'Heaven, help me through this
mummery!'

He felt that the eyes of the Lieutenants were upon him.  Would he pass
muster as a desirable recruit?--failing which there was always the
ditch reserved for traitors.  All sorts of queer thoughts gave chase to
one another in Tim's mind: 'Will this Saturnalia end with human
sacrifice, and shall I be the first victim?' was one; and then the
other: 'While she stands there, I am safe.  She won't allow me to be
butchered.  But then she'll go away presently and I shall be left at
the mercy of these savages.'

Finally, he wondered what would have been Uncle Justin's attitude in
these circumstances.  The prince of sportsmen!  What would he have
done?--struggled for his life, one against ten thousand, or accepted
the inevitable?

Fra Federico's voice roused him from this state of mental confusion.

'Come hither, my son.'

And then the man who was called Lean-Shanks asked an abrupt question:
'Who is this stranger?'

'He comes,' said the priest, 'from the shores of the great river.  He
will swear to devote his life to the House of Bragana.'

'Do you sponsor him, then, Federico Evangelista?' another man asked.

'I do.'

This seemed to allay some of the Lieutenants' worst suspicions: but
still one of them was not quite satisfied.

'What language does he speak?' he asked.

'He speaks our language,' Fra Federico replied, 'and also his native
tongue.'

'Speaks our language, does he?  The same that they speak in Pernambuco?
What does that mean?'--and he promptly answered his own question--'That
he has been in Pernambuco and consorted with our enemies--the
Government?'

There were ominous murmurs.  Fra Federico protested: 'It is I who
sponsor him.'

'But how can you know that he is not a spy of the Republicans?'

More ominous murmurs, more dark suspicious glances directed at Tim; and
then suddenly, like a silver bell, came the words from Marivosa's lips:
'The stranger is no spy.  He will serve me devotedly, and I welcome him
in my father's name.'

That settled the matter.  Fra Federico beckoned to Tim, who stepped
boldly up to the altar.  His excitement was intense.  Marivosa's clear,
bell-like voice, speaking the soft-toned Portuguese, had obscured his
vision of everything but herself.  He saw nothing but her.  Drawn to
her by invisible and irresistible bonds, he came forward and then stood
still, facing her, with only the stone altar between her and him.
Conscious of the imperative necessity of safeguarding his life as far
as possible, he repeated mechanically the words suggested to him by Fra
Federico.

'I swear obedience, loyalty and devotion to Marivosa da Gloria of the
House of Bragana, rightful Empress of Brazil'--and so on through the
farce, which had in it now so much of reality.  'My life for her
service, and in her cause I am prepared to shed my blood.'  All very
true.  While he spoke the extravagant words he held Marivosa's glance
as surely as a hypnotist holds that of his medium, and he had the
satisfaction of seeing the faintest possible tinge of colour mount up
to her cheeks and her eyelids flutter like a butterfly's wing.

Having become a personage of some consequence, he was permitted to go
round and kneel at the Empress's feet.

'You may kiss Her Majesty's robe,' he of the lean-shanks commanded,
with lofty condescension.

How gladly does a man perform such an act of humility towards the woman
he loves!  Tim would as soon have grovelled in the dust to feel her
tiny foot upon his neck.

'I adore you,' he murmured in English, which, except for his friend,
Fra Federico, she alone could understand.  'You are the loveliest being
God ever made, and He made you for me....  Before long I shall take you
in my arms, and with my lips on yours I will give you your first lesson
in love.'

There was something impish in this situation which tickled Tim's fancy
so that he could have shrieked with laughter.  How he forbore to put
his arms round her then and there was a miracle of self-control.  But
it was the strength and the reality of love that controlled his actions
now.  His life, he felt, had suddenly, by virtue of his love, become
one of the most precious things on earth.  It alone stood between
her--his ideal, his beloved--and the band of brigands who had power
over her very soul.  This day of strange events had brought him close
to her at last.  She had ceased to be a dream, and had become a
woman--the one woman on earth: and Tim was fatalist to the extent of
believing that all this would never have happened--his quest after the
elusive Dudley Stone, his journey to this land of sortilege--if this
flower of the desert had not been created for him.

That being so, he was content to wait.  Apparently the Lieutenants had
accepted him as one of the great army and had cast off all suspicion of
him, at any rate for the present.  And now the mad pageant was over:
what was left of the crowd was only waiting, seemingly, until the
Empress finally turned her back upon them.  This she did presently, and
preceded by the banner-bearers, with a bodyguard of armed Lieutenants
about her, she marched slowly up the hill.  Soon she and her escort
disappeared within the stockade.  But to Tim it seemed that in the end
her last look had been for him.

After her departure the crowd dispersed rapidly, and Tim soon found
himself almost alone on the wide _plaa_--the scene of the most amazing
spectacle he had ever witnessed in all his life.  All he could do was
to pass his fingers through his hair, to hold on to his brains as it
were, for they were threatening to scatter in all directions.  'Well,
I'm dashed!' was the most rational thing he could say.  It had all been
so ridiculous and yet he could not laugh: it had all been so abnormal,
so mad, and yet he knew that it was real, that he had not dreamed it
all.

'Well!  I'm dashed!'

Fra Federico, timid and gentle, touched him lightly on the shoulder:
'Take care, my son, all may not yet be well.'

Tim looked down at the quaint ascetic face, with the pale eyes so like
those of a rabbit.  To himself he said: 'Thank God for this one
rational, sane human being'--and then aloud: 'All is bound to be well,
Padre, for Marivosa loves me.'

'God forbid!' the old man ejaculated piously.

'God is not going to do anything of the sort.  He has brought me to
this hellish place so that Marivosa should see me, love me, and come
away with me.'

'Come away with you?  Heavens alive! my son, you are mad!'

'I know I am--or I shouldn't be here.'

'I have heard tell that in other countries men have learnt how to fly,'
the old man said, with a dubious shake of the head.  'I call it
impious, because God never intended men to fly or He would have given
them wings ... but unless you have learnt the impious art, my son, you
cannot escape unseen from Canudos.'

'The impious art of flying!  Do say that again, Padre.  It is the most
refreshing thing I've heard said in all my life.  But joking apart, let
me assure you that the impious art can certainly not be practised in
this God-forsaken land.'

'Well, then...?'

'Let's go in, Padre,' Tim said irrelevantly.  'I am sick of this place
now Marivosa has gone.  You shall read your Shakespeare, and I'll make
plans for kidnapping the Empress of Brazil.'




XII

All night there was a rumbling of distant thunder.  Tim hardly slept a
wink.  Just before dawn he rose and, slipping on his cotton shirt and
trousers, he wandered barefoot down to the stream to bathe.  It was
very cold, but he welcomed this change from the oppressive heat of the
day.  After splashing about in the sweet, clean water, he felt better:
his brain was clearer, his nerves were more steady.  He slipped back
into his clothes, meaning to wander back to the priest's hut, when a
stirring in the tall coarse grass lower down the stream arrested his
attention.  All he thought at the moment was that a kindred spirit had,
like himself, come down here to bathe, and as he did not think that
many of the inhabitants of Canudos were much inclined that way, he felt
rather curious to know who it might be.  He tucked up his cotton
trousers and waded down the shallow stream, peeping cautiously about
him as he went, for he had already realized that in this place one
never knew whence an unpleasant arrow or some other flying weapon might
unexpectedly come.

Suddenly he paused.  He had heard a voice--a woman's voice--a laugh
that was the most delicious music mortal ears could possibly hear.
There were other voices, too--women's voices--but what did they matter?
What did anything matter except the fact that the woman he adored was
now within a few yards of this clump of tall grass behind which he,
Tim, crouched like a criminal.  In his school days he had been taught
the story of the chaste goddess who struck a man with blindness because
he had seen her in her bath.  He quite felt that in this land of
sorcery something like that might very easily happen to him.  But that
didn't matter either.  All he knew was that he was not going away from
here without seeing her, or without a word.

Now, Tim O'Clee believed in his luck, and in this instance luck did
favour him.  He waited for a time until there was no more splashing in
the water and certain words, dropped at random, suggested that the
Empress and her ladies were putting on their clothes.  Then he peeped
out cautiously from between the grasses.  At some little distance a
dozen or so young women, some of them of a deep coffee-colour, others
almost white, were busy with clothes and blankets or whatnot.  Isolated
from them, and not more than twenty yards from where Tim was crouching,
there was Marivosa, looking more like an Image of carved ivory than
ever: for she had draped a white cloth all about her exquisite body.
She was doing nothing in particular, only gazing at the water, or now
and then at the sky.

Tim made a sound like the plaintive cry of some little beast in pain.
The girl heard it: she turned her head and listened.  The others were
too far: they had not heard.  Tim repeated the cry, a little more
loudly this time, and gently stirred the grasses around him.  Again she
listened--paused--listened again: then when the cry fell for the third
time upon her ear, she came slowly, cautiously, in the direction where
the clump of grass still quivered in Tim's hand.  He thought that his
heart would burst with excitement.  It was pounding away in his breast
like a sledge-hammer.  And now she was quite close.  The first thing he
saw was one exquisite little hand, as she pushed the grass aside, and
then her foot....  Then she saw him, and uttered a cry--not a loud one,
fortunately.  The others didn't hear.  She would have stepped back, and
probably run away before Tim had the chance of freeing himself from the
reeds, but he was too quick for her.  He had her in his arms before she
could move, and if she did intend to call to the others she could not
do it, because he held her cherry-red mouth imprisoned with a kiss.

Of course, she struggled.  Of course, she was furious, indignant--hated
him no doubt, at this moment, and would as soon have killed him as not.
But it was the first kiss she had ever received; it was the first time
that strong arms had held her close; the first time that between two
hot kisses words came tumbling out, words she had never heard before:
'My divine lady, I adore you!'  And then those strong arms encircled
her closer and she felt a heart-beat right against her own.  The arms
at first were round her shoulders, her arms were pinioned with
inseverable bonds, and hot kisses seared her neck and throat; that was
the moment when she felt most indignant; when, had her arms been free,
she would have struck that arrogant male in the face.  But now the
steel-like bonds were around her knees, and the man's head was down in
the very roots of the grass, and his hot lips were pressed against her
foot.

'My divine lady ... kill me if you wish ... I have lived I my life ...
I wish for nothing now!'

He remained there crouching at her feet for a long, long time; and
somehow her wish to kill him died away.  She was still indignant, of
course.  Very indignant.  And furious, because her cheeks were as if
they had been scorched in front of the fire.  She put her hands up to
her face.  Just for a moment she wanted to cry.  But he looked up just
then, and there was such a look in his eyes that all she could do was
to turn her head away.

'I worship you!' he murmured.  And he stretched out his arms and put
his two hands around her head, and drew it down, down, so that she lost
her balance and fell right up against his breast, with her head
nestling upon his shoulder and her face quite close to his.

'I will not steal another kiss, _madonna mia_,' he whispered: 'but give
me your lips....'

Nor did he steal that kiss the rapture of which made her not only
forget how indignant she had been a short while ago, but also ashamed
that she was no longer indignant now.

Primitive man had gained the victory.  Captive of his bow and spear,
captive of his love and passion, the mysterious flower of the desert
lay passive upon his breast.




XIII

They both woke from their love-dream with the sound of voices quite
close to their sheltering arbour of grass.  Tim was more scared than
she was; womanlike, having taken the plunge, she cared not one jot what
happened after this.

'Your maids, or whatever they are,' Tim whispered; 'they might come
round.'

'Let them,' she retorted, smiling with lofty unconcern; 'they don't
count.'

'You adorable thing!  If they don't count, so much the better.  The day
is young--I have not even begun to make love to you yet.'

But, like a woman again, she back-pedalled at this.

'There are plenty of other days,' she said, 'and I must go now.'

'Must you?'

'I always go to my father at this hour.  He likes to see me early in
the morning.'

'What do you do when you go to him?'

'We talk.'

'What about?'

'The affairs of the country--our plans for the future----'

She paused, and suddenly a cloud seemed to fall over her face; its
gaiety died down, there was a troubled look in her eyes.

'The future,' she reiterated vaguely.

Obviously she had forgotten, in this new experience which had come into
her life, what kind of a future her father had planned for her.  She
was standing close to Tim at this moment, while he still squatted upon
the bed of grass: he held her two little delicate hands, and looked up
at the exquisitely moulded face and into those dark, mysterious eyes in
which he had kindled the first glow of love.

'Your future, my divine lady,' he said slowly and earnestly, 'is no
longer in your father's control.  God has given you to me.  Your future
rests with me.'

She shook her head slowly.

'We are not masters of our own destiny, senhor.'

'My name's Tim,' he said.  'Say it, my dear, just like that--Tim.'

She smiled.  It was a wan little smile this time, and tears gathered in
her eyes.  Now, to a lover like Tim O'Clee there is a great deal of joy
to be got out of tears that may be dried with a kiss, and Marivosa
quickly learned the lesson that crying may be very sweet under certain
circumstances.  As a matter of fact, she soon came to the conclusion
that she had never hated anyone so much as she did those women over
there who were looking for her and calling her by name.

'I must go,' she said, and sighed; and then she added softly, 'Tim!'

'I'll only let you go if you'll promise to come to that place--you
know--where first I saw you.'

'When?' she asked navely.

'You adorable thing!  Why not to-day?'

She shook her head.

'It is difficult for me to go so far--alone!'

'Anywhere else, then.  I don't care, so long as I see you.'

'I go to the chapel sometimes, to pray.'

'The chapel?'

'Fra Federico Evangelista knows.  He will tell you.  He says Mass there
sometimes.'

'He never told me.'

'Perhaps he thinks you are a pagan, or a heretic.  The English are
heretics, I know, so perhaps----'

'At this moment I am nothing but a pagan, for I am worshipping you.'

'If Fra Federico says Mass to-morrow I shall know, and I will come.'

'But heavens alive!  How am I going to live until to-morrow?'

'Well,' she said navely, 'sometimes he has Benediction--that is at
sunset--and perhaps to-day----'

'If the old reprobate does not have Benediction to-day, I'll kill him!'

'Good-bye, Tim!'

'Not yet!'

'Good-bye.  Ask Fra Federico to have Benediction in the chapel to-day.
You can let go my hands now.'

'No!  I swear I can't.'

'Good-bye ... Tim!'

How she managed to get away he didn't know, but suddenly she was gone,
and only the trembling of tall grasses showed which way she went.
Tim's first impulse was to struggle to recapture her; the thought of
the hours which lay before him until sunset was in itself a kind of

mild torture.  But the cackling of the women brought a glimpse of
common sense into his disordered brain.

It were perhaps indiscreet to pry now into the secrets of Tim O'Clee's
soul.  Alone between earth and sky he lay, with face buried in the
grassy bed on which the exquisite body of Marivosa had rested.  The
love that had come to him in this desert land was the strongest and
purest emotion of which a man's soul is capable: to him, Marivosa was a
perfect flower, the delicate petals of which he had caressed with
rapturous ecstasy.  She had lain against his breast, pure and innocent
as a child, whilst with his lips on hers he had kindled in her the
first spark of passion.

For the moment he had no thought of the future: he had taught her to
kiss, and in time she would learn to love--two things that are co-equal
and yet are a world apart.  She, the half-civilized child of the
desert, would one day grace his home in Ireland with her presence; and
never for a moment could he doubt that she would be just as perfect in
the stately surroundings of Traskmoore as in the mysterious solitude of
Canudos.

The remembrance of Traskmoore came to him while he lay in the grass
dreaming of Marivosa ... Traskmoore! ... Between him and his home there
still hovered the elusive personality of Dudley Stone.  His love for
this desert child, born as it were in a mirage, had certainly for the
time being weakened his ardent desire to run that mysterious personage
to earth.  In this God-forsaken land, far from the haunts of men,
surrounded by customs, spectacles, personalities that might as well
have belonged to a prehistoric age, life over in Europe, Traskmoore,
Hold-Hands Juliana were fading into insignificance.  So entirely
absorbing had been his desire to see Marivosa again, to speak to her of
love and to kindle response in her heart, that nothing else in the
whole wide world seemed to matter any more; and as day had followed day
without another glimpse of her, and she remained as intangible as a
dream, he had been ready to bargain with fate--had been, in fact,
prepared to throw in his lot with all these brigands, and to swear
allegiance to any mountebank, or unclean spirit even, if possession of
Marivosa had loomed ahead as his ultimate reward.

But those days were now past.  Marivosa was no longer a dream product:
she had materialized, lain in his arms, with her warm red lips clinging
to his.  He had conquered her, won her: she was his already by virtue
of her love for him.  Thoughts of home, of civilization, of Ireland,
were the natural outcome of his victory.  The knowledge, too, that she
was the innocent pivot round which revolved every conceivable
ghoulishness and crime: that, in fact, for some secret purpose of his
own her abominable father was throwing her into the arms of that
arch-scoundrel, Manol da Lisbao, set Tim's imagination stirring for
the means--the prompt means--of fleeing with her out of this Gehenna.
Fra Federico might talk as he would of difficulties--of impossibilities
even--in a lover's lexicon is there ever such a word as _impossible_?
Tim, lying there in the grass, with the vision of his beloved still so
vivid, that with closed eyes he could trace every line of her
loveliness, laughed at obstacles, at rocky strongholds and fastnesses,
at the trackless wilderness, and at the army of ten thousand brigands.

'She belongs to me, and I'll have her,' he declared.  'God gave her to
me.  He brought me here that I should take her away out of this hell.
He won't go back on His purpose.  God does not do such things.'




XIV

The little chapel--it was hardly worthy of the name--was situated on
the _plaa_, not far from Fra Federico's house.  Tim had not noticed it
before.  It certainly was undistinguished.  A square box-like
construction, which had once been plastered over and painted, but from
which the paint had long since faded and the plaster peeled away.  The
tiled roof was surmounted at one angle by a roughly carved stone cross.

It was in this desolate little hole that Fra Federico ministered to the
souls of a few Christianized barbarians.  From time to time he would
say Mass, and a hundred or so men and women would congregate round him
and hear with due reverence the age-old words in a language they did
not understand.  Perhaps it was because they did not understand the
words which Fra Federico mumbled at the improvised altar that they held
him in such respect, and concealed from him the fact that they
alternated attendance at the Mass with visits to their Gri-gri man.
They would confess their sins--or such actions as they considered were
sins--to Fra Federico, and take Holy Communion in much the same spirit
as they swallowed a decoction of lizard-blood and toad spittle or other
abomination brewed for them by the witch-doctor.

Fra Federico did his best with them, and in some cases succeeded in
inculcating Christian civilization into these barbaric minds.  But it
was a difficult task, for often after a morning spent in confession and
atonement there would come an order from the Great Unknown to start off
on an expedition which had for its goal the looting of some distant
village store that had lately been supplied with provisions, or the
driving of a herd of bullocks that had excited the charlatan's cupidity.

The uphill task had its compensations, however, in the few simple souls
that tried to keep away from the savage life of this desert community.
Fra Federico in his nave way had taught them the elements of
Christianity, had administered to them the Holy Sacraments: and when he
saw a small crowd of these humble folk kneeling inside the tumble-down
chapel he felt indemnified for all the heartache which he endured in
this perpetual fight against superstition and idolatry.  Marivosa gave
him endless joy.  She had been thrust into a convent at Sao Paolo when
she was little more than a child.  Pious, cultured women had brought
her up and taught her all they knew.  She had proved responsive and had
absorbed eagerly all the knowledge which the nuns had been able to
impart.  True that knowledge of the world had not been part of the
curriculum, and that the books which she had been allowed to read were
only those that her father confessor had approved; but, even so, she
had imbibed a great deal of general information and not a little of
literary and artistic culture.  She was not yet sixteen when that
arch-reprobate, her father, dragged her out of the shelter of the Sao
Paolo convent after he had made the discovery that he had an
exquisitely beautiful daughter who would be a valuable asset to him in
his many tortuous schemes.  Since then her intercourse with Fra
Federico had been the one bright spot in her lonely life.  She
worshipped her father because his mysterious personality had captured
her imagination when she was at a most impressionable age, but she had
nothing in common with him; she looked up to him, perhaps not as to a
resurrected prophet, but certainly as to a man endowed with supernal
powers and a scion of the Imperial House of Brazil.  But intellectually
he was no companion: he despised all books as the product of effeminate
brains--nothing appealed to him but action and virile physical force.

At the same time he did not object to his daughter's friendship with
the old priest: he had, in fact, a certain amount of respect for Fra
Federico, chiefly because Fra Federico knew how to cure him of his
bodily aches and pains.  It was because of his rudimentary medical
knowledge, and not because of his priestly calling, that the old man
enjoyed immunity among this tribe of brigands; if he chose to perform
what the Great Unknown and his Lieutenants called _hocus-pocus_ in his
tumble-down little barracks--well! that was his affair.  What he did
there was no worse than what the Gri-gri man did over by the river
bank, or the witch-doctor in front of his dog-hole.  It was only the
warriors of the Great Unknown, his fighting force, who were forbidden
to take part in the _hocus-pocus_.  It was all right for women, that
sort of thing: even the Empress could listen to Federico's mumbo-jumbo
if she chose; but any man who lent himself to that rubbish was little
better than a woman, and there was no room for women in the army of the
Great Unknown.

With the result that in Canudos religious services could not be held
very often during Fra Federico's brief visits to the place.
Opportunity had to be snatched when the Great Unknown and his fearsome
Lieutenants were either in a conciliatory mood or busy with other
things: otherwise unpleasant interruptions, desecrations, even
sacrilege might break in on the peace and solemnity of the service.
But when an opportunity did arise, then the word would quickly go round
and Mass in the early dawn, or Benediction at sunset, would see a
procession of worshippers winding its way slowly up the hill.  Were it
possible to analyse the mentality of these mystic barbarians, it would
probably be found that their attitude towards Fra Federico's form of
worship was that it could not do any harm, Federico Evangelista being a
good and learned man, who knew how to cure ague and subdue a fever: and
there might, after all, be something in it, in which case it was best
to be on the safe side.

And so some came to worship and some just out of curiosity.  There was
room for about a hundred inside the chapel, but usually a couple of
hundred and more would stand outside on the _plaa_ listening to the
thin, quaking voice of Fra Federico as he intoned the Latin words.  A
good many came also in order to catch sight of the Empress.  She would
come down from her castle with half a dozen women; and though some of
these men were not far removed from savagery, though they lived a life
of brigandage, with their cattle for chief company, and though their
own womenfolk had nothing left of feminine charm, Marivosa's beauty had
a strange power over their minds.  For them she was not quite earthly:
and though they did not believe in angels, they felt that she belonged
to a spiritual world that was beyond their ken.  As the daughter of the
resurrected prophet she was in their opinion endowed with supernatural
powers; and often as she passed the men would bow their heads down to
the ground, and the women would push their piccaninnies forward so that
they might lay their baby hands on her robe.

Marivosa, who had remained ardently a Christian, knelt devoutly
throughout the service.  As a rule her thoughts never wandered from the
holy texts expounded by Fra Federico, nor did her eyes stray from her
book or from her reverently clasped hands.  But to-day, during
Benediction, she had the feeling that there was something at the back
of the chapel which distracted her from her prayers: she had, in fact,
the feeling that an invisible power got hold of her head and forced it
to turn round and look behind her.  This was at a very solemn moment of
the service, when her eyes should have been riveted on the altar:
instead of which, she turned and saw Tim.  She only had a very brief
glimpse of his dark head and of his blue eyes which seemed to shine
through the gloom: for the next moment she was down on her knees,
prostrate, begging the Holy Virgin to forgive her for this sin.  It was
strange how long the service lasted to-day: surely Fra Federico had
interpolated several new prayers.  It was very hot, too, and her knees
ached: and it was with a real--though a sinful--feeling of relief that
she knelt down for the final benediction.

When it was all over, she called Fra Federico and begged him to tell
the people to go.

'Tell them not to wait for me, father.  I am tired and want to be
alone.'

Fra Federico did his best.  He transmitted the Empress's wish to her
subjects as if it were a command.  Obediently they dispersed.  The
chapel, too, was soon clear.  The Empress's maids had been ordered to
wait outside, for Her Majesty would now make her confession and it
would be an hour or more before she would be ready to return to the
castle.  And Marivosa asked Fra Federico to let her pray and meditate
alone.  Her father had told her certain things, spoken to her of
marriage: and she wanted to ponder over it all.

It must be supposed that Fra Federico's eyes were dim and that he did
not see that dark head vaguely outlined in the gloomiest corner of the
little chapel: certain it is that in answer to Marivosa's desire for
privacy all he said was: 'Very well, my daughter.  God bless you.
Remember the Holy Virgin and your guardian angel never cease to watch
over you.'

A pious admonition which caused Marivosa to blush.  Her guardian angel,
she thought, must have been rather startled this morning while he was
watching over her in the grassy arbour.  Fra Federico picked up her
rosary which had slipped to the ground and placed it in her hands: then
he softly stole away.

The next moment Tim was by her side, his arm round her, her head upon
his shoulder.  The more sacred the place, the more holy the deed--if
the deed be one on which God does not frown.  And who shall dare say
that God frowns on a kiss?

'I am so ashamed,' Marivosa murmured.

'Ashamed of what, you angel?  Not of this, surely?'  And the recreant
kissed her again.

'It is a sin,' she whispered.

'You get that out of your darling head.  There is no sin in love--not
in love like ours--and what would be the good of love if there were no
kisses?'

'This will be the last time I shall ever see you, Tim,' she said
presently.

'It is not,' he answered.  'That is another thing that you must get
into your darling head: that you belong to me, and that I am going to
take you away from here.'

'You know that that is impossible,' she sighed.

'Nothing is impossible, my sweet, when one loves.'

'I never take a step without I'm seen.'

'Then we must steal away when it is so dark that not even a cat's eyes
could follow us.'

'My father's eyes are sharper than any cat's.  He has spies everywhere:
and we don't know the way.'

'It's going to be done, nevertheless, my dear.'

'How?'

'Don't ask me.  I don't know yet.  Since I've seen you I've thought of
nothing but your beauty.  But reason will come along presently, and
then we'll make plans and go.'

'I wish I could believe you.  But...'

'There is no _but_, my sweet.  We are going away together, I tell you.'

She looked up at him.  He was smiling with such sublime confidence in
himself, and his Irish eyes flashed such power and so much resolution
that, like a bird that has been frightened and now feels reassured, she
edged nearer still to him and nestled closer still in his arms.

'You are quite sure?'

'Quite sure.'

'Where shall we go?'

'At first, no farther than a place called Queimadas.  We'll take Fra
Federico with us.  There is a real consecrated church in Queimadas, so
he told me once, and we'll get married there, and Fra Federico will
perform the ceremony.'

'I have read the service for holy matrimony in my prayer book,' she
said navely.  'It is very beautiful.'

'You are adorable!  My God! what a lovely time we'll have!'

'After we are married, what shall we do?'

'We'll make straight for Pernambuco and sail for Europe.'

'Europe?  I was in Europe when I was a child.  I told you, I think.  My
mother was alive then.  I think she is dead now.'

'How do you mean?  You think she is dead?  Don't you know?'

'Not for certain.  I haven't seen her for years and years.  I used to
ask my father about her, but he never seemed to care to say very much,
so after a little while I gave up asking.'

'Do you remember her at all--or were you too young?'

'I do remember her--she was very beautiful....  Would you like to see
her picture?'

'I would--very much.'

'I always carry it about with me--my mother's photograph, I mean--also
my dear father's picture, and the few letters they wrote to me from
time to time while I was at the convent.'

While she spoke she drew a small flat packet from inside her gown; it
was carefully tied up with a faded piece of blue ribbon and wrapped in
a piece of thin silk.  Marivosa undid the precious little parcel very
carefully.  It contained a few old letters and a couple of photographs.
She took one of these and held it out to Tim.

'I think,' she said softly, 'she must have been lovely, don't you?'

Tim took the photo and looked at it.  Only a feeble light came through
the tiny grated window, but he saw the picture well enough: the shock
of dark shingled hair, with the one heavy wave falling over the left
eye, the full lips and huge white teeth, and the large goggled eyes.
_Hold-Hands Juliana!_

Marivosa's tiny hand came to rest upon his coat sleeve, her eyes turned
to his and then back to the photo, mutely reiterating the query: 'Don't
you think she must have been lovely?'

Tim could not speak; all he could do was to stare down at the photo.
Hold-Hands Juliana!  Marivosa's mother!  It seemed to him as if the
ground had suddenly opened and that unless he held himself very stiff
and erect he would fall headlong into a yawning abyss.  Hold-Hands
Juliana!  The mother of this exquisite woman whom he adored.  Surely
there was laughter both in Heaven and Hell at this stark, naked fact.
Why, he himself could have laughed and laughed, but for this feeling
that he must hold himself stiff and erect for fear of tumbling headlong
into a yawning abyss.

'I haven't seen her for years and years.  Perhaps, when we go to
Europe, you will help me to find her.'

Her voice recalled Tim to himself.  He blinked his eyes and had another
good look at the photo.  He turned it over and looked at the back of
it; there was an inscription, written in English in a handwriting he
had often seen before: 'Your loving mother, Juliana Stone.'

Juliana Stone?  Why, of course!  Amazement had addled his brain for the
moment, but now it all came back to him.  The stark, naked fact that
must have provoked laughter both in Heaven and in Hell....  'Your
loving mother, Juliana Stone.'  Then ... then--or was he going
mad?--then, in that case, her father, the arch-charlatan, the
mountebank, the Great Unknown, was Dudley Stone, and ...

'Tim, are you ill?  Is it the heat?'

'No, dear--why?'

'You are so silent--so funny....'

'Thoughts, sweetheart, thoughts--all sorts of queer thoughts.'

'But you are all right?'

'Perfectly all right.  Let me kiss you once--no, never mind about the
chapel and the altar--just one kiss, and I shall feel better ... I
shall be ill if you don't kiss me....'

Then a pause--and Tim felt better.

'Show me your father's photograph now.'

But she shook her head.  'I mustn't do that,' she said, in that quaint
artificial manner she always assumed when she spoke of her father.  'No
one is allowed to see his face.  He is the Great Unknown.'

She was adorable.  But, God in Heaven!  What a situation!  Dudley
Stone, the Great Unknown!  Alive!  Here in the desert!  Playing the
fool for all sorts of reasons, each more nefarious probably than the
other--loot, piracy, treasure-hunt: all this mummery to keep his band
of brigands tied to his fortunes by dint of mysticism and superstitious
fear.

Dudley Stone!  And this adorable woman his daughter!  And away in
beloved Ireland, Hold-Hands Juliana enjoying life and fortune, not
knowing that the house of cards which she had built up on the
foundations of lies and perjuries was on the point of tumbling about
her ears.

'My beloved one,' Tim said at last--and then again: 'My beloved one!'
All he could do was to put his arms round her and to press her closely
to his heart.  No more trouble, no more fear now; and she would have no
reason to regret the imaginary crown of Brazil, for he was in a
position now to offer her a real sovereignty amongst his people at
Traskmoore--far more brilliant, more stable, and more desirable than
what she had been taught to expect.

Indeed, the world went very well for Tim O'Clee during this happy hour
which he spent in this tumble-down barn with his beloved.  Dudley Stone
was found--he was alive!  'God's in His Heaven!  All's right with the
world!'

Though Marivosa refused to show her lover the photograph of her
mysterious father, she allowed him to look through some old letters
which he had written to her while she was still a little girl at the
convent of Sao Paolo.  They were all signed: 'Your loving father,
Dudley Stone.'  The last two or three referred to his going over to Sao
Paolo to fetch her from the convent and take her to live with him in
his new home in Canudos: 'Where,' he said, 'a glorious and splendid
life awaits you, worthy of your rank.'  These letters were dated 1925,
nearly a year after his supposed death at Monsataz which had been sworn
to by Hold-Hands Juliana and her accomplices.

Holding Marivosa clasped in his arms, Tim talked to her of Ireland and
of his home, of the stately elm trees, with their cool shadows in which
it was so good to lie on hot summer afternoons: and of the chorus of
nesting birds in the spring when the morning air shook with the melody
of thousands of bird throats.  He told her of the silvery lake and the
plumed reeds upon its shores which sang such tender songs when the
summer breeze stirred their stately heads, and of the water-lilies with
the great shiny leaves on which little frogs sat and croaked; of the
woods through which they would soon wander together--his arm round her,
her head against his shoulder.

And then about the satin-skinned Irish hunter on which she would ride,
the meets in Traskmoore courtyard on a cold winter's morning, the
fences and the water-jumps and the gallops across country and ploughed
fields, the horn of the huntsman, the find--the kill; and about Uncle
Justin, and the stables and the kennels, and the quiet evenings after a
day's hunting--tired and happy--just the two of them alone in the snug
boudoir at Traskmoore.

'And then,' he concluded, 'I'll turn on the gramophone and sing to you
the sweet Irish ballads which Uncle Justin loved.'

'Oh, Tim!' she exclaimed, and turned great worshipping eyes upon him.
'Can you sing?'

'Can I sing?' he retorted.  'You shall hear me--not now, perhaps,
because it might attract a crowd; and there's Fra Federico at the door,
come to break up the happiest hour of my life.'

'Yes! you must go now, Tim ... but to-morrow we will meet again....
And you are sure, quite sure, Tim, that you can take me away from here
without annoying my father?'

'I am quite sure,' he replied, with sublime self-confidence, 'that your
father himself will elect to come with us.'

She shook her head and sighed.  'Not to Europe.  In Europe they would
not understand the Great Unknown.'

'You are right there, sweetheart; they would not,' and Tim was
conscious of a swift vision of the veiled prophet arriving in the
boat-train at Victoria Station with his fearsome Lieutenants--'so
perhaps,' he added reassuringly, 'we'll persuade him to assume the
disguise of an English gentleman.'

And in this mood they parted: she to dream of this newly-found
happiness of which she had not even heard the nuns in the convent
speak--it was unknown to the pious sisters seemingly--and she,
Marivosa, thought it so wonderful that it should come to her; and he,
Tim, to plan his interview with Dudley Stone which must come about on
the morrow.  Would the charlatan be amenable to reason?  Was he sick of
all this play-acting and only too ready to re-enter civilization again?
Tim was prepared with munificent offers: the Traskmoore fortune was
large enough to satisfy the greed of any adventurer, and after all said
and done, the chief reason for this mummery was loot and
brigandage--Dudley Stone himself could not believe in the possibility
of a political revolution which would place his daughter on an
ephemeral throne.

'He is not such a blithering ass as all that,' argued Tim to himself,
'and I can make it worth his while to give up his fool's paradise for a
life of luxury.'

And for the first time for many a day he ceased to think of Marivosa
for at least half an hour.




XV

'No one allowed to enter!'

These were the words which greeted Tim O'Clee when on the following
morning he made his way to the top of the hill to the castle of the
Great Unknown.  It stood entirely isolated, perched on the extreme
summit of the hill, and surrounded by arid rocks and clumps of stunted
palms and dwarf bushes.  It consisted of a roughly-constructed stone
dwelling, with a tiled roof: the whole built in the shape of a capital
L.  A high stone wall surrounded its extended courtyard.  That much
could be seen from the _plaa_ below, but once past the belt of scrub
and palms only the encircling wall was visible, with heavy wooden gates
hermetically closed.  Nor did any amount of pounding and hammering on
the gates bring the slightest response, although the sound of people
moving about, of men's voices, and even the clatter of arms and pawing
of horses' hoofs, proved conclusively that there was plenty of life
going on, on the other side of the stone wall.

Since hammering on the gate was no use, Tim decided to enter the
fortress by stratagem, recommending his wits to Saint Patrick for an
inspiration.  Safely hidden behind a clump of dwarf bushes he waited
patiently for some event to favour him, but nothing happened for close
on half an hour.  No one came through the scrub, the gates remained
closed, and the sound of men and horses still went on inside the
courtyard.

It was still early morning and the heat not too great.  Tim, flat on
his stomach peeping from behind the bush, waited, trusting in Saint
Patrick's help.  And presently he heard a steady tramping coming up the
hill.  'Thank you, Saint Patrick,' he murmured and waited, on the
alert.  A few minutes later he saw a number of _vaqueiros_--a hundred
or so--come straggling up the incline.  Some of them were in their
leathers, but quite a number were dressed the same as Tim, in cotton
shirts, and trousers tucked into their high boots.  They came up in
groups of ten or a dozen at a time, silent as usual, and swinging their
arms as they walked.  And Tim, coming out boldly from his hiding-place,
joined up with one of these groups and walked up with them, silent, and
swinging his arms.

The men all came to a halt by the gate; and when the last of the
stragglers had assembled, they set up a call, which sounded not unlike
the howl of a wolf.  In response to this the gates were opened and the
men filed in, with Tim among them.

'Well!  I've got that far, anyway,' he murmured to himself with
self-satisfaction.

He found himself in a wide courtyard, with the castle in front of him.
Along one side of the building was the usual wooden veranda, to which a
flight of wooden steps gave access from the courtyard.  A number of
small barred windows and a number of doors gave on the veranda.

The courtyard was already full of men--_vaqueiros_ in their leathers
who appeared to be on parade.  Lean-Shanks and Black-Fang had seemingly
inspected them.  They stood at what might pass for attention, and Tim
noticed that they all carried very modern-looking rifles.  Their eyes
were fixed upwards, all staring in one direction; and Tim, glancing up
also, saw that the veiled mountebank was on the veranda.  At the moment
he was making a gesture of dismissal; and the men who had been on
parade broke ranks and hastened out of the courtyard, whilst the new
contingent took their place.

Major O'Clerigh of the Irish Guards had no intention of submitting to
inspection by these bandits.  He stepped boldly across the courtyard in
the direction of the building, but was brought to a sudden halt at the
foot of the wooden staircase by a vice-like grip on both his shoulders,
and a couple of bayonets pointing at his lower chest, while a voice
from somewhere or other called loudly:

'No one allowed to enter.'

Tim offered no resistance; only said in a voice loud enough to reach
the ears of anyone up on the veranda:

'I have an urgent message for the Great Unknown.'

'Give me the message.  I will take it.'

This time Tim recognized the rasping voice of Lean-Shanks--a huge,
loose-limbed half-breed, with a grip like steel, a cruel mouth, and
furtive, piercing eyes.

'My orders are to deliver the message to no one save to the Great
Unknown.'

This was greeted with a sneer from Lean-Shanks and a derisive laugh
from the other Lieutenants, who had strolled across the courtyard in
order to have a closer look at this impudent intruder.

'Ah! your orders are to deliver the message to no one save to him who
is lord over us all,' the half-breed said with insolent deliberation.
'And who has dared to give you such orders, I would like to know,' he
added with sudden violence.  'Where does he live?'

'In Monsataz,' Tim replied.  'I come from there with an urgent message
from one who is known to your lord.'

It is to be supposed that the followers of the Great Unknown were not
often caught speaking with such self-confidence; certain it is that the
mulatto, as well as the other Lieutenants, appeared doubtful at this
point as to what they had better do.  Two of them still held Tim
tightly by the shoulders, and the bayonets were still pointed at him;
but Lean-Shanks did start a whispered consultation with one of his
colleagues, and Tim, through the corner of his eye, saw them looking up
at the veranda as if waiting for orders, whereupon an impish idea
seized him, and he said aloud in English:

'I have an urgent message for you.  You'll be sorry if you refuse to
see me.'

The fact that Tim spoke in a language that they did not understand did
not worry the Lieutenants.  They were used to men coming from all over
the country, each speaking his own dialect.  But apparently the Great
Unknown had made them a sign, for suddenly the grip on Tim's shoulders
was lifted, the ominous bayonets raised.  Lean-Shanks and his pal
continued their whispered conversation, wherein Tim felt that his fate
was being discussed.  For the first time since he had embarked on this
final project of his, Tim realized that he had very effectually run his
head into a noose and that at this moment his life was only worth a
wave of the hand from that veiled charlatan up there.  He certainly
passed a few minutes of very unpleasant suspense, during which, for the
umpteenth time in his life, he cursed himself for an impetuous fool.
Then suddenly a peremptory voice from above called to Lean-Shanks, and
there followed an animated conversation between the Great Unknown and
his Lieutenant in a language which Tim did not understand.  The
conversation presently drifted into a one-sided oration from above,
Lean-Shanks merely nodding his head from time to time and showing his
large white teeth in an unpleasant-looking grin.

However, the upshot of this was that the grip was lifted from Tim's
shoulders and the bayonets vanished from his line of vision.
Lean-Shanks then said: 'Follow me!' and led the way up the wooden
stairs, Tim immediately following.  Down in the courtyard a hundred
pairs of eyes followed Tim's progress upwards; obviously the admittance
of a mere nobody into the great presence had never been witnessed
before.

When Tim and Lean-Shanks reached the veranda, the veiled figure was no
longer there.  Lean-Shanks led the way through one of the doors, and as
soon as Tim had followed in his wake, he closed that door behind him.
Tim found himself in a small square room, with a grated window set high
up in the wall facing him, through which he only caught a tiny glimpse
of the sky.  Lean-Shanks curtly ordered him to wait and then
disappeared through another door on the left.  While he waited, not
without a feeling of nervous excitement, Tim heard again the peremptory
voice speaking some dialect or other; and, after a moment or two,
Lean-Shanks returned, held the narrow door open, and beckoned to him to
enter.

Tim walked in; the door was closed behind him, and he stood alone in
the presence of the Great Unknown.  He sat on a chair with a high back;
there was a table in front of him littered with papers.  His head was
swathed in a veil, but he wore fairly ordinary clothes: flannel shirt
and trousers, and a wide sash round his waist, and he had on a pair of
brown shoes, and wore a wrist-watch--two things which added a strange
note of incongruity to the surroundings.  There was a carpet on the
floor and several chairs ranged against the walls.  All the furniture
looked as if it had come out of a good cabinet-maker's hands.  Tim had
not seen any like it since he left Monsataz.

'You claim to have a message for me?' the Great Unknown said in
Portuguese, after the first few moments of silence during which Tim
felt that a pair of piercing eyes were scrutinizing him from behind the
veil.

'If you don't mind, we'll talk English,' Tim retorted firmly, and,
without waiting to be asked, he dragged a chair nearer to the table and
sat down facing the veiled man.

Rather to his surprise the latter replied in English also.

'By all means,' he said, and then added: 'What is your message?'

'Let me begin by introducing myself to you.  My name is Traskmoore.  I
am a Major in the Irish Guards, acting Brigadier-General during the
War, now retired.  Until I succeeded to the title on my uncle's death
two years ago I was Timothy O'Clerigh--you have heard the name when
last you were in England.'

The veiled man did not take up the challenge; and after a few seconds
he asked, speaking very slowly and still in English: 'And why have you
come here?'

Tim answered boldly: 'To find you.'

After which there was absolute silence in the room.

The veiled man had not made the slightest sign nor uttered the faintest
exclamation: he sat there, in his high-backed chair, like some strange
and ghostly image.  Tim kept his eyes fixed upon the veiled face before
him, trying with all his might to guess at what went on behind those
folds; but though he could vaguely discern the outline of a prominent
nose and long, hard chin, and felt, rather than saw, the fixity of a
searching gaze which rested upon him, he could not gauge how this
sudden revelation had affected the mountebank.  After a while the
silence got on his nerves; it had become so tense that he almost
thought he could hear the ticking of the other's wrist-watch, and the
stertorous breathing of someone--Lean-Shanks probably--the other side
of the door.

When he could stand the silence no longer he said: 'Would you like me
to lay my cards down on the table?  We are Europeans, both of us--not
half-civilized barbarians.  Shall I tell you the purpose of my coming
to this God-forsaken hole?'

'If you please,' the veiled man replied curtly.

This attitude of aloofness on the part of the charlatan was certainly
disconcerting.  Tim wondered what he was playing at.  He had already
made it pretty clear to this play-actor that he, Tim, had no doubt as
to his identity, and also that he was approaching him now in an
entirely friendly European spirit.

'Would you mind taking off that veil?' he asked good-humouredly.  'I
should find it easier to talk sense if you would.'

'You will have to talk sense, nevertheless, Mr.--er--Major--I forget
your name....'

'Traskmoore is my name, Mr.--er--Dudley Stone.'

No! the man did not wince.  He certainly had nerve.  All he said was:
'You'll have to be brief, too, I have no time to waste'--which nearly
caused Tim O'Clee to lose his temper.  Fortunately he had tight hold
over himself.  His whole fortune and that of the woman he loved
depended on this man's good will--not altogether, perhaps, because
there were those photographs and the old letters which Marivosa had
shown him, but difficulties could be got over so much more smoothly if
only this abominable charlatan would be amenable to reason.

'Look here, Mr. Stone,' Tim said firmly, 'let us, in heaven's name,
understand one another like two decent civilized Europeans.  I have
travelled thousands of miles for the sole purpose of finding
you--alive, I hoped.  God only knows what I haven't been through before
I got here; but now here I am, and, thank heaven--here you are also.
If you won't take off that stupid veil, you won't, and that's that; but
do let me assure you, on the word of honour of an Irish gentleman--and
you still remember what that means, don't you?--that my feelings
towards you are entirely friendly, and that my greatest hope at the
present moment is that when I go back to Europe it will be in your
company and that of your--adorable daughter.'

The veiled man leaned forward in his chair and rested his arms on the
table.

'You really interest me,' he said, 'Mr.--or should I say Lord
Traskmoore?'

'The latter, if you please,' Tim replied cheerily.  'As a matter of
fact, your being alive at this moment, sitting opposite to me, has made
it possible.  So you see ... But for God's sake take off that awful
veil, or I shall begin to think that you are a leper, or something
horrible.'

'Suppose you get on with what you have to say, Lord Traskmoore'--and to
Tim's sensitive ear there appeared to be an ironical emphasis on his
name--'I have already told you that you interest me.'

'There isn't much more,' Tim went on, in a harsh, rather rasping voice,
for his nerves by now were getting frayed.  'I have already told you
that I came to this God-forsaken hole in order to find you.  I
sincerely hoped that you were still in the land of the living, but if
you had gone west, I wanted a solid proof that you, Dudley Stone, were
still alive in the month of October, 1924, when your wife, Juliana,
went through a ceremony of marriage with my uncle, the Earl of
Traskmoore, whose legitimate heir I had always held myself to be.'

'Very interesting--but I don't quite see...'

'You will in a moment.  I am taking it for granted that you, as an
Englishman, still have that sense of justice and fair play for which
your country, and mine, too, are famous.  I don't want to pry into your
affairs.  They are no business of mine, but I am not such a fool as not
to guess that you have amassed an immense fortune in this unhallowed
spot.  But, hang it all, man, you must be sick of it all by now, with
no one but niggers to talk to!  Well now!--what do you say?  Come back
to Europe with me: give me a hand in seeing justice done to my poor
self.  It is a big fortune that you will help to throw into my lap and
all you have to do is to name your own price.  You won't regret it, I
swear you won't.  I do believe, once you are back in England, and have
met one or two of your old friends, you'll never want to get back
here--you'll be far happier as plain Mr. Dudley Stone than as the
mysterious over-lord of this horde of savages.  Millionaires have a
very good time in Europe these days....'

Tim paused, chiefly because he was out of breath--he had never made
such a long speech in all his life--but also because he felt that his
nerves were getting more and more on edge, and that his voice grew more
and more rasping, almost shrill; while the veiled man made no sign, nor
uttered a word, only kept that veiled face of his turned fixedly upon
him.

'For God's sake, man, say something!' he cried out at last, driven to
exasperation by the silence, the statue-like stillness of that veiled
and mysterious image.  'Surely,' he went on, with a forced laugh, 'I
haven't talked all this time without making some impression upon you.'

'What impression did you expect to make?'

'I have appealed to your sense of fair play and justice, for one thing.'

'Not to mine--to that of an imaginary person whom you named Dudley
Stone.'

Tim gave a long, low whistle.  So that was the game, was it?  The
rascal wanted a big price probably--bigger than he imagined Tim was
prepared to pay, and thought that a little more of this mummery would
prove the right kind of thumbscrew to apply in order to gain his own
ends.  Aloud, he said: 'Put it that way if you like.  But anyway, I am
now offering you--whatever you choose to call yourself--one-third of my
entire fortune, which was sworn for probate two years ago at three
million English pounds, if you will accompany me on a trip to Europe.'

'A million English pounds!  A princely offer!'

This time there was more than a suspicion of irony in the man's voice.

'Which means, I suppose,' Tim said dryly, 'that you count your wealth
by the million and that one more or less does not tempt you--any more
than an appeal to your sense of justice.'

No answer.  Silence.  Fixity.  And now, in the atmosphere of the narrow
room, the first sense of approaching danger.  The man's statue-like
calm had become ominous.  Tim was conscious of a weird foreboding, a
presage of something evil and mysterious which threatened him at the
hands of this veiled, impenetrable image.  But his mercurial
temperament would not allow him to give way to any such fancies; fear
for his own safety had never been a part of his character, and as soon
as he felt the silence weighing his spirits down, he broke it with what
might pass for a light-hearted laugh.

'That being the case,' he said, 'you had best hear my final argument.
I admit that it is the strongest of all, but it means so much to me
that I hardly like to speak of it at all ... I have seen your daughter
... I have spoken with her ... I love her beyond everything on
earth....'

Tim paused.  For the first time since the beginning of the interview he
had seen the statue-like figure give a distinct start.  'At last,' Tim
thought, 'I have touched a vulnerable spot.'  Aloud, he said: 'I am not
a vain man, but I do know that Marivosa loves me--she is a mere child
and perhaps does not quite understand, but ... Well!--never mind about
that.  I know that she adores you, that she believes you, and that,
poor darling!--she believes in all that rubbish about her being Empress
of Brazil....  Now, I cannot imagine that you, her father, can fail to
worship such an exquisite creature as Marivosa: therefore I put it to
you, as one civilized man to another, do you really think it fair to go
on hoodwinking her like this?  She will have to be undeceived
presently, and if she has nothing else to fall back on in the way of
happiness, the poor darling will break her heart.'

Once more silence and absolute calm.

'My finding you here alive,' Tim went on earnestly, 'has made me a rich
man.  I can give Marivosa all the luxury--everything, in fact, that any
woman can desire, not to mention love and loyalty....  Well! never mind
about that.  She'll soon forget all this business over here.  After a
bit it'll seem like a dream, for she's not happy now.  You know she is
not, but I swear that as my wife she shall never know one moment's
unhappiness.  Now do you see why I just beg you to come to Europe and
help me put everything right over there--for Marivosa's sake?  If you
don't...'

'Well!'--and the voice from behind the veil came loud and
peremptory--'why do you hesitate?'

'I don't.  I don't see why I should not tell you straight that I am not
really dependent on your good will for getting my rights.  I came to
you with a sporting offer, as man to man, and you refuse to listen to
me.  Well! you may have your reasons for that.  I don't know what they
are and I don't care.  Just answer me one straight question and I won't
trouble you again.  Will you allow Marivosa to come away with me?  I
swear to you that she loves me.  Will you let me take her away from
here and make her my wife?'

'No.'

The answer had, at any rate, the advantage of being straight and to the
point.  The veiled man had not moved: he only spoke the word in a hard
and peremptory tone.

Tim rose, and said quietly and with a very good assumption of
light-heartedness: 'Very well! then there's nothing more to be said.
I'm sorry you've taken it that way.  I hoped we might have been
friends, for we have both of us suffered at the hands of the same
woman--though each of us in a different way.  However--now I shall have
to fight my battles myself, which is all to the good as far as I am
concerned.  Don't vent any spleen on Marivosa, will you?  It wouldn't
be fair, would it?  She loves me, and she's going to be my wife--that
is a fact which is as unalterable as the laws of the Medes and
Persians....  Well! s'long, old man!  We won't shake hands on it, will
we?'

With a light laugh he turned and went to the door.  Still the veiled
man did not speak.  Tim pushed open the door and stepped out.  The next
moment a loud oath broke from his lips: 'You devil!  You treacherous
devil!'

Lean-Shanks and three of his colleagues had been waiting for him.  Two
pairs of hands seized hold of his arms and twisted them backwards with
a violent jerk; two more were entwined round his legs, so that he lost
his balance and came down on his knees.  He struggled fiercely,
desperately, but already his arms were being tied behind his back with
a rope; then, when he knew that it was a four-to-one fight and that the
game was up, he threw back his head and laughed.

'Tim O'Clee,' he said to himself, 'you are the biggest fool that ever
walked on God's earth.'  But he said nothing aloud, because one of
those damned niggers was forcing his head back so that he thought his
neck would break, whilst he stuffed a thick wad of something soft into
his mouth.

The last thing he was conscious of was the tall figure of the veiled
charlatan standing over him and of his sepulchral voice saying slowly
in English: 'Fool! you utter, damned fool!  You thought by chucking a
few miserable pounds at me you would persuade me to give up wealth such
as you with your silly brain never dreamed of ... and you dared make
love to my daughter, did you?  Well! she's not for you--see....'

Then he spoke to his Lieutenants:

'Throw this garbage away,' he said.  'If he's still alive to-morrow
morning, you may shoot him or do anything else you like with him.'

Tim was just conscious enough to hear those beastly niggers chortle;
then one of them struck him a violent blow on the head, and the last
thing that reached his fading senses was a derisive laugh and an
ironical voice calling: 'S'long, old man!'




XVI

An eternity had gone by since Tim had regained partial consciousness.
He was lying on a mud floor: his arms were tied behind his back and a
thick rope was wound round his legs.  His head ached furiously, and he
was terribly hungry and still more thirsty.

Eternity had been spent in vain, bone-breaking, nerve-shattering
struggles to get his arms free--all in vain; those damned niggers knew
how to truss a man securely.  Once or twice Tim fainted: partly through
the pain in his head, partly through the foul atmosphere and filthy
exhalations from dank walls and earthen floor.  The place was in total
darkness: never since it had been built had any outside air penetrated
within its walls.

It was while he was slowly returning to his senses after one of these
syncopes that a familiar voice came to his ears.  At first he only
caught a few disjointed sentences.

'There were rumours on the _plaa_ ... I feared it might be you ...
Holy Virgin and all the Saints...!  What incredible rashness...!'

Tim slowly opened his eyes.  The voice was Fra Federico's.  Heavens
alive!  How welcome!  A door somewhere had been left open and a streak
of faint, grey light revealed the vague outline of the old priest
bending over Tim.

'Well!  I'm in for it this time, Padre,' said Tim ruefully.

The old man woefully shook his head.

'Whatever induced you...?' he began.

'To beard that cursed charlatan in his den?' Tim broke in, with a shrug
of his aching shoulders; 'I thought he was a white man, you see--and
never dreamed he would be such a damned traitor.'

'If only I could do something for you....'

'I suppose you can't?'

'No man alive can help you, my son.'

'Could you, at any rate, undo these cursed ropes, Padre?  It is so
awful being trussed like a bally fowl.'

The old man's weak and trembling fingers fumbled for a long time with
the cords, but at last he succeeded in loosening them, and with a final
effort Tim got his arms and legs free.  He stretched them with a sense
of ease, though his limbs still ached furiously.  He sat on the mud
floor, with legs stretched out, since there was no attempt at furniture
in the dank cell.  The old man squatted on his heels.

'You must think me such a blithering fool, Padre,' Tim said, with a
shamed laugh.

'Rash, my son,' the priest replied, 'very rash.  Your story is all over
the town--a stranger, so they say, a spy of the Government of Rio come
to assassinate the Great Unknown, and was caught in the act.  He is to
be shot in the morning.'

'Shot or worse, Padre,' Tim said dryly.  'I have no illusions on that
score, and I wouldn't care--much, because such a fool as I am has
really no business to live.  But it is on her account....'

'I know.'

'When you see her, Padre, tell her that I ... tell her ... No; never
mind, don't say anything to her.  She'll understand, I think.'  He
paused a moment, and then added: 'There will only be you now to look
after her.  And though I have behaved like the biggest fool outside
Bedlam, I did just have sense enough not to carry what money I still
possessed about with me when I went to visit that scurvy brigand.  You
will find a few thousand milreis in my pocket-book, Padre--you know,
the old black one under my pillow in the hammock.  Will you use that
for the purpose of getting the poor darling into a convent?  She will
be better there, now that I can't...'

But the old man only shook his head dolefully.

'You attribute powers to me, my son,' he said, 'that I don't possess.
I no more can stay the course of events in this place than I can, like
Joshua, bid the sun to stand still.  It was by the greatest miracle
that I got here at all.  One of the sentinels in charge of you had bad
colic last night.  I brought him some pills--they did him good and he
was grateful--so I persuaded him to let me have a look at the prisoner
... I pretended it was curiosity ... and so...'

While the old man meandered on in a sad and dreary voice a strange
change had come over Tim.  Tired and stiff, he had struggled to his
feet and started to pace up and down his murky prison cell; the habits
of a lifetime caused him to re-adjust his shirt and trousers about his
person, for they had been much damaged during his futile struggles with
the Lieutenants.  By the same token he unhitched and then re-buckled
his belt, and it was while he did this that this sudden change came
over him.  He no longer listened to the old man's well-intentioned
talk: actually, he forgot his aches and pains, the hopelessness of his
position, his shame at his own folly ...  his fingers had come in
contact with a small phial which a few days ago he had tucked into the
small pocket in his belt.

And now, when Fra Federico ceased speaking, trying to find the right
words with which to introduce a subject that lay very near his heart,
Tim paused in his restless pacing and squatted down beside his old
friend.  Had the light been a little less dim the priest could have
seen a smile--a real, happy smile--hovering round the condemned man's
firm lips; nor would he have failed to note a twinkle and a glimmer of
hope and self-confidence in the Irish blue eyes.

'As you were saying, Padre?'

Even the voice was clearer, fresher: with a ring in it that to Fra
Federico's sensitive ears almost sounded like triumph and joy.
'Though, alas! he is a heretic,' thought the old man, 'God has touched
him with His grace: he does not fear death, and has hopes of eternal
life.'

Aloud, he said: 'I spoke too much of earthly things, I fear, my son,
when my sole object in coming to see you was to try and help you to
turn your thoughts now to God.'

'You are the kindest friend man ever had, Padre,' Tim said, still with
that happy smile upon his face.  'Would it comfort you if I told you
that my whole train of thought has changed, all within the last two
minutes?

'I can see that God's grace, Padre--and--and--something else....  No!
I'm not blaspheming--I feel humble and thankful....  Oh! you can't
think how thankful ... and I'll listen to any sermon you like to preach
to me.  You can recite the prayers for the dying, if you like, and I'll
listen to them most reverently ... and I'll hum the "Dead March" to
you--I know most of it--and if you want me to confess my sins to you,
I'll even try to do that....'

'You mustn't scoff, my son.  Remember...'

'I wouldn't scoff for the world.  I swear that I have never been so
earnest or so reverent in all my life.'

'If you feel that you have a grievous sin upon your conscience...'

'Lots and lots, Padre ... lots of sins, but none very grievous, unless
you'd call a longing to strangle that damned mountebank a sin ... and
there are at least two other human fiends I would murder to-morrow if I
got the chance.'

The prisoner was obviously getting light-headed.  Fra Federico captured
his hands, and spoke kind, soothing words to him.  In his soft tired
voice he said the things that lay nearest his heart: the brevity of
this miserable life, the freedom from sorrow only to be found in death,
the felicity of eternal life.  Tim would sooner have choked than
interrupt the old man.  To this pious ascetic, pitch-forked by the most
amazing fate into this lair of brigands and savages, to talk to a
fellow-Christian was an infinite joy and comfort; and reaction had set
in as far as Tim was concerned: after hours of nerve-strain,
sleeplessness, physical pain and mental anguish, this soft droning of a
sympathetic voice acted as a soporific; his eyes closed, his head fell
forward, and, still squatting on his heels, his hands imprisoned in the
kindly grasp of his friend, he slept.

When he woke again, after a very few minutes, he was once more in total
darkness, and Fra Federico had gone.

His fingers at once returned to the small pocket in his belt: they
found the small phial and drew it out cautiously.  With his teeth he
loosened the cork, and holding the phial to his nose he sniffed it.
Some of the last words which the veiled mountebank had spoken came
ringing back to his ears.

'Throw this garbage away.  If he's still alive to-morrow morning you
may shoot him.'

And what he, Tim, thought at this moment amounted to this: 'It is a
chance, anyway.'

He was still smiling.  That Celtic, optimistic temperament was not
playing him false: nor did the Irish sense of humour.  He kept thinking
of the Old Vic in London.  Fancy thinking of the Old Vic in London
while squatting in this pitch-dark, filthy hole, waiting to be shot--or
something--on the morrow!

But he did think of the Old Vic and of a performance he had seen there
of _Romeo and Juliet_: of Juliet taking the draught given her by the
Friar, which was to simulate death for her, so that she need not marry
Paris and could remain faithful to her Romeo.  And he also thought of
Fra Federico as another Friar, dispensing the precious liquid, showing
him the row of little bottles and saying in his gentle, tired voice:
'It interested me to gather all the herbs which your great Shakespeare
mentions in his plays, and to concoct those potions which play such an
important part in some of his tragedies.'  Then Fra Federico had talked
of Romeo and Juliet, and recited the piece when the Friar gives Juliet
the precious phial:

  'No warmth, no breath, shall testify thou livest....'

And then again:

  '... thy eyes' windows fall,
  Like death, when he shuts up the day of life.'


And Tim had been so interested: the whole thing had so fired his Irish
imagination that he had begged the old man to give him a small bottle
of what he called 'Juliet's cold poison.'  He had not really believed
in it then--just an old dreamer's hobby, he thought--and he did not
altogether believe in it now....  It was just a chance--and Tim, being
Irish, liked to take his chance, especially with the prospect before
him of being handed over to Lean-Shanks & Co., to do what they liked
with him.

Well!--old Shakespeare, who knew most of what there is to know of human
nature, did not make Juliet a coward.  She took her chance; and Tim
O'Clee, tossing down the contents of the phial at a draught, took his
also.




XVII

There are moments in the life of every adventurer worth his salt that
he would give years of his life not to have gone through: moments when
manhood is at its lowest ebb, when humiliation begets shame, and the
wish to die becomes so strong that it is akin to despair.  There is no
brave man living who has not had his moments of cowardice: who has not
once in his life felt the pangs of physical fear, or shrunk from facing
the horrors of an unforeseen doom.

Tim, when he woke out of the coma into which Fra Federico's potion had
thrown him, went through such an experience--felt the cold sweat, not
of fear, but of unspeakable horror.  He woke, at first only to
semi-consciousness, to find himself lying on his back, under the clear
star-lit canopy of night, on a bed, the feel of which he could not
define.  What he was chiefly conscious of was the awful stench that
poisoned the midnight air and brought about a violent fit of nausea.
He was frankly and horribly sick; and it was when he turned over on his
side that he realized what the bed was on which he lay.  It was
composed of hundreds of corpses in a varying state of decomposition.  A
nightmare, such as Dante in his wild imaginings could alone have
dreamed!  And he, Tim, was lying on the top of these dead men; and as
he turned over on his side, pieces of rotted flesh fell away from the
bones, and skeletons rattled beneath his weight.  A pale moon issuing
from behind a veil of clouds shed a dim light over this Inferno, and
Tim, luckily, fell into a swoon before its full horror was thus
revealed to him.

When he awoke, the first streak of lemon-coloured light had rent the
banks of clouds in the east.  It was bitterly cold.  Tim, clad only in
cotton shirt and trousers, shivered until his teeth chattered, and his
limbs felt as if they were encased in ice.

Dawn!  What dawn?  Was it only an hour ago that he had been thrown out
like offal into this ditch?--the ditch reserved for traitors, and spies
of the Government--or had he laid here two days and two whole nights,
the only living thing in this open, unclean sepulchre?  Had he been
left here as dead, and as dead been left to rot, or become the prey of
carrion?--or would the bodyguard of the Great Unknown come round
presently to see whether among this heap of garbage there was still a
spark of life extant which it was their duty to quench?

This was the moment in the adventurer's life to escape which he would
have bartered all his best years: the moment when an overwhelming shame
deprived him of the very desire to live, when the wish to die killed
the very sense of hope.  To be dead before these fiends returned: to
close his eyes in the last long sleep before the rosy dawn drove away
the night.

The rest is silence.  Who shall dare probe the secrets that lie hidden
with a brave man's soul?  Horror, despair, a nameless, numbing fear:
and, above all, the bitter humiliation, the shame of folly and of
failure--Tim O'Clee knew them all during this agonizing hour, and
shared the knowledge only with his Maker.

Then came the reaction.  It came with the sudden lighting up of the
desert by the risen sun, by the torrid heat of day that came instantly
on the top of the iciness of the night, and turned the shivers of cold
that shook Tim's spine into an ague-like fever.  With the fever came a
rush of blood to the head: a certain light-headedness, followed by a
sense of bravado, a defiance of fate and a contempt of self, all of
which are peculiar to the Anglo-Saxon and the Celtic temperament.  Had
Tim been really and fully conscious, he would probably have put his
feelings into some such words as: 'I am dashed if those savages are
going to get the better of me.'

As it was, he took his bearings, set his teeth, and crawled out of the
noisome ditch.  Fortunately it was neither deep nor precipitous: hands
and knees did all that was required.  Again, fortunately, the rascal
who had robbed him of his boots, and of his leather belt, had not
thought it worth while, apparently, to take his shirt and trousers: at
least he was not naked and could dare to creep out into the open.  But
he proceeded cautiously before he ventured to glance over the top.
There was no one about--no reason, of course, to mount guard over the
dead, and the ditch of traitors was a long way out of the city, facing
the north and in the rear of a rocky promontory, which Tim presently
tried to scale.

'I must look a disgusting object,' he said to himself, when after much
effort, much scraping of hands and knees and considerable damage to
cotton trousers, he reached the stony eminence, from whence he was able
to survey his own position and the lie of the city.  It lay before him
like a map; the narrow streets, the bird-cage huts, the stone
habitations of the _lite_ in this land of brigands, the _plaa_ where
he had witnessed the most astounding spectacle of superstition and
sorcery, and the so-called castle where dwelt that mighty charlatan,
that arch-traitor, mountebank, devil incarnate, whom Tim now cursed up
and down with all the forceful language which his state of weakness had
left at his command.

When he had done cursing, he felt again very sick; the sun was blazing
down upon him, his skin was burning, and he felt icy cold; his legs
would hardly bear him.  Spying a clump of scrubby palms, he crawled
into their shade.

'Something has got to be done, Tim, my lad,' he said to himself.  'And
to begin with, food of sorts and drink must be got somehow.'

He knew by now something of the Sertao, and his brief but close
friendship with Fra Federico had revealed to him some of the secrets of
this arid land.  He had learned how to look for water-holes, and where
these were most likely to be found: and where there was a water-hole,
there also would the deep-rooted _patatas_ be found.  Naked,
monotonous, inhospitable as was this desert-land, it furnished food and
drink for cattle, and what was good for cattle was in Tim's present
desperate condition good also for him.

Throughout the ages the greatest incentive for man's enterprise and
courage has been the necessity to feed himself, and Tim found that he
had quite a good deal of strength left in him to go in search of a
water-hole.  When he found one, he drank of the water first, and washed
himself in it afterwards: then, having found a clump of _patatas da
Vaqueiro_ close by, he pulled some up and ate, recommending his
digestion to the tender care of Saint Patrick.  After which sumptuous
meal, he stretched out his aching body in the shade and went to sleep.

'Nothing to be done till nightfall,' he murmured, as he slipped away
into the Land of Oblivion.  'After that, we shall see.'




XVIII

Fra Federico's time at Canudos had come to an end, and to-morrow would
see him on his way to another less strenuous scene for his activities.
He felt very sad because there were one or two strong sentimental ties
that bound him to this arid, inhospitable spot.  There was Marivosa for
one--a pure, sweet soul, whom he implored the Holy Virgin to take under
her protection: and there were, perhaps, a score of Christian souls,
who he hoped had learned to resist the many temptations to sin and
crime which were so constantly thrown in their way.  As for that nice
rash young heretic--Fra Federico caught himself shedding a tear over
his terrible fate.  He had been too defiant, too sure of himself: had
not been content to follow humbly in God's Will.  Thank God! he, Fra
Federico Evangelista, had had the privilege of receiving his last
confession and had spoken the comforting words of absolution in his ear.

And Fra Federico busied himself packing up his books, and his phials
and pill-boxes; and in the interval, when he was tired, he recited his
rosary, and asked God to bless the Christian souls who lived in the
Sertao--with special reference to the nice young heretic who at the
last had no doubt seen the truth--and to forgive all those who sinned
against His laws.

And suddenly the open doorway of his humble abode was darkened by the
appearance of a figure, which caused the pious old priest to throw up
his arms and to fall upon his knees, praying God to have mercy on his
soul, for he beheld a ghost.

'Go, Satan, go!' he ejaculated, 'in the name of the Father, and of...'

But a whole-hearted if somewhat harsh laugh broke in upon his orisons.

'It isn't Satan, Padre; only a miserable shred of humanity.'

The voice was unmistakable--and surely a ghost neither laughed nor
talked.  It was the young heretic, no doubt; but had he risen from the
dead, or...?

Tim was already by the side of the old man, and his arms were round the
thin, bent shoulders.

'Let me help you up, Padre,' he said, 'you are all of a tremble.'

With Tim's aid, Fra Federico struggled back to his feet.

'My son!' he exclaimed feebly, for his fright had upset his weak old
heart, so that it pounded away in his chest and deprived him of breath,
'where in heaven's name do you come from?'

'From the grave, Padre,' Tim replied seriously.  Then, seeing that the
old man's cheeks had become the colour of ashes and that his poor thin
lips were quivering, he went on more lightly: 'They thought I was dead,
and did not waste either their time, or powder and shot on me, but just
treated me like hog-wash and threw me into a ditch, on the top of
decaying corpses and rattling skeletons.'

'Sit down, my friend,' Fra Federico said more calmly, 'and tell me more
clearly ... I am a little bewildered ... that is, I don't really
understand....  You say that...?'

Tim O'Clee embarked upon a succinct narrative of everything that had
befallen him from the time when his old friend left him alone, fast
asleep in the murky prison cell, until the happier moment when, unable
to contain his impatience any longer, he had braved detection and made
his way, with infinite precautions, to the door of Fra Federico's
abode.  Long after he had finished his story the old man sat with
clasped hands entwined in his rosary, murmuring his Pater Nosters and
Ave Marias.  Tim was loath to break in on his meditations; but at last
the priest drew a long, deep sigh, and he said: 'Ah!, he is a wonderful
man, your great Shakespeare.  Next to the good God Himself, it is he
who saved your life.'

'Next to God and you, Padre,' Tim said earnestly.  'Do you remember
giving me that little bottle?'

'Yes, I do.  But I never thought...'

'Nor did I.  I meant to take it back with me to England and send it to
the bigwigs of the medical profession, with notes about you, Padre, and
what a wonder you really are ... and now I have drunk it all, and I can
swear what a wonderful thing it is ... so you will have to give me
another bottle.'

'You make fun of me, my dear young friend.  My poor experiments
wouldn't interest the great ones of the world.'

'Wouldn't they just?  You give me another bottle, Padre, of your
wonderful liquor and I'll guarantee that your fame will be all over the
world in no time.  You'll have to come to Europe, and they'll give you
a splendid appointment--something to do with the Pope in Rome--with
lots of money and a beautiful house.'

Tim babbled on, half-intoxicated with his own eloquence, and his jaded
nerves taking the form of excited loquaciousness.  He felt
light-headed, very sick, very giddy, and had but little idea of what he
was talking about.

Fra Federico smiled indulgently, and passed quivering fingers over his
precious phials.

'I am too old, my son, for splendid appointments, for money, or
beautiful houses,' he said, 'but...'

'Is that the bottle?' Tim said, as the old man paused and with loving
eyes gazed on a small phial which rested in his hand almost as if it
were alive.

'Yes!  This is it.  The last draught I possess.'

'Will you trust me with it, Padre?'

'Of course I will, my son.  Not for my sake--I care no more for fame
now--but for the honour of your great Shakespeare, to prove that in
this, as in everything else, he was always learned and always right.'

He handed the small phial to Tim, just as if he were parting from
something more precious than life.  Tim took it and clasped it tightly
in his hand.  It was with a tightening of the heart that he watched his
old friend tottering about among his few belongings; the poor old knees
were very shaky, and the thin, frail hands trembled all the while that
they fingered the books and the phials that had been the solitary
ascetic's only source of joy.

After a little while Tim rose and said: 'A wash and a shave is what I
need most now, Padre, and with your permission...'

'And you must be hungry, too.  How remiss of me not to have thought....'

'When I am clean I'll eat, my friend.  Just for the moment I feel as if
I could never touch food again.'

'Then you must refresh yourself as best you can.  You are young, and
physical troubles with the young are soon past and forgotten.  You know
the poor resources of this small house, but I have a nice supply of
fresh water just now from yesterday's rain.'

'Oh!  It rained yesterday, did it?'

'A storm, my son ... you didn't know?'

'How could I, Padre?  I was a dead man, lying on a mattress of corpses.
I don't even know how long I lay there, dead to the world.'

'Two days and two nights have gone by since I said farewell to you in
your prison cell.'

'Good Lord!  What a sight I must look!  Where is that water you speak
of?  I shall want bucketsful before I'm clean.'

'Take all you want, my friend; and when I'm back, you must tell me more
fully just how you felt when you took the draught.'

'You're going out, Padre?'

'To say farewell to my flock.'

'Then ... you will see her?'

'Most likely.'

The old man's reply came half-hesitatingly and obviously troubled.  He
fidgeted, too, looking for his hat and stick, and avoided meeting Tim's
glance.

'There is something on your mind, Padre,' Tim said abruptly, and seized
hold of the priest's wrists.  'Out with it!'

'There is much on my mind, my son.'

'Then, tell me....'

'The Great Unknown leaves Canudos to-morrow....'

'What?  For good?'

'No, no!  He often goes on great expeditions, with his Lieutenants and
an escort--a different escort every time.  No one knows his
destination, nor the day of his return.'

'The old devil!  And he goes to-morrow ... you are sure?'

'Quite sure.  I go part of the way with them.'

'Then, while he is gone, I shall see Marivosa!' Tim exclaimed, his
voice quivering with excitement.

The old man shook his head.

'She goes with her father,' he said softly.

'Goes? ... goes? ... where?'

'No one knows.'

'But you go with them.'

'Part of the way.  I go on to Cumbe, where I have a house.'

'You can guess, though'--and Tim's hold tightened on the old man's
wrists--'you can guess ... you know!'

Fra Federico made no reply.  Tears gathered in his dim eyes and rolled
slowly down his withered cheeks.

'Tell me, Padre,' Tim said calmly.  'You needn't be afraid.  It is just
possible that I have already guessed; and, in any case...'

'Her father,' the old priest said slowly, and his voice was half-choked
with the sorrow that he felt, 'her father is taking her to the _quinta_
of Dom Manol da Lisbao, whom she is to marry almost immediately.'

Tim allowed Fra Federico's hands to fall from his grasp.  He stood
quite still for a few seconds, meeting his old friend's sorrowful gaze
with a firm glance; then he said slowly: 'I swear by God that she is
not.'

Fra Federico shook his head dolefully.

'You cannot prevent it, my son.  She is guarded day and night now; and
what are you among these thousands?'

'You ask me that, Padre,' Tim retorted impulsively, 'you, the minister
of God!  I am the minister of His will,' he went on boldly, and threw
back his head with a superb gesture of self-confidence and defiance,
'and His will is that Marivosa shall not be thrown to the wolves, but
be given to me, to love and to cherish, and to cause her to forget this
abominable life of brigandage and cruelty.  She is mine, Padre, I tell
you.  God gave her to me.  She is mine, and I'll not give her up to ten
thousand devils, or to that arch-fiend, Dom Manol.  Now then,' he said
more calmly, 'what you've got to do, Padre, is to bring her here.  I
must see her ... talk to her...'

Fra Federico sighed.  'She will not listen to you, my friend.  They
have poisoned her mind against you ... they've persuaded her that you
tried to assassinate her father ... half a dozen of them have sworn
that they caught you in the act, and killed you as you struck at the
Great Unknown.'

'The lying devils!  But all the more reason, Padre, why I should see
her.'

'She wouldn't come if she thought you were here.'

'Don't tell her.  Say nothing.  Don't name me.  Don't speak of me.  But
for God's sake, bring her here, or I swear I'll scale the walls of that
damned palace of hell and carry her off in my arms--and then let all
those devils do their worst with us both.'

Fra Federico had already experienced some of these wild moods of his
friend.  He had put them down to the Irish temperament, and realized
before now that nothing he could say or do would check them.  Frankly,
also, some of the young adventurer's enthusiasm had fired his dormant
imagination.  Perhaps he remembered the day when he, a young
theological student, had laughed at bars and bolts, and penetrated to
the very presence of the woman he loved, regardless of husband,
brother, father, or the disgrace which, in consequence of his audacity,
had fallen upon him and blighted his career.  Because of the velvety
eyes of a lovely Andalusian, he had lost all chance of benefice, of
preferment, or of consideration.  By orders of superior authorities he
had been relegated to this distant corner of the earth, where ambition
could find no scope and where temptation could not hold sway.  And
remembering all that, his atrophied heart went out in affection and
hope to this young lover, who, like himself, was prepared to hazard
everything for a woman's sake.

'I'll see what I can do,' he murmured softly.  'Wait for me here.
Promise you'll wait, and not venture out ... for my sake....'

'I promise.'

Fra Federico picked up his hat and stick.  It was late afternoon: the
hot sun was sinking down behind the range of mountains in the west.  In
this land, where there is no twilight, darkness treads hard on the
heels of light.

And there would be no moon to-night, for the sky was heavy with clouds.




XIX

And Tim waited for what seemed an eternity.  He washed and he shaved;
fortunately he did possess another belt to replace the one which had
been stolen from him: into his pocket he reverently stowed the precious
phial given to him by Fra Federico.  Then he brewed himself some coffee
and drank that, though he could not force himself to eat.

The veil of night had fallen over the _plaa_ when he heard Fra
Federico's voice outside the hut.

'Will you honour my poor house?' the priest was saying; 'your
Lieutenants can wait outside.'

There followed a certain clatter and din which more than suggested that
the Empress of Brazil was under an armed escort.  However, the priest's
house had always been looked upon, even by the worst of these brigands,
as something akin to holy ground.  There was not one man among this
crowd of semi-savages who would dare to cross the threshold unbidden.
From what Tim could hear, the Lieutenants who accompanied Marivosa
settled themselves down on the _plaa_: probably one or two of them
mounted guard outside the door.  He drew back into the darkest corner
of the room and waited.  A second or two later she came in, closely
followed by Fra Federico.

She came in, and stood quite still and expectant while the old man
busied himself with lighting the small oil-lamp, and then placing it in
the centre of the roughly hewn table in the middle of the room.  This
still left the corner where Tim was standing in darkness, though he
could see the priest's glance wander timorously round the room.  But
Tim made no movement: he just feasted his eyes on his beloved.  By a
happy chance she had on the same quaint leather suit which she was
wearing when first he saw her coming towards him in the forest
clearing.  Since then she had completely absorbed his thoughts; her
beauty had captured both his senses and his imagination, and her
personality had thrust itself within the innermost recesses of his
heart.  With unappeasable hunger his eyes devoured her loveliness: the
small head, with its crown of auburn hair, the dark, unfathomable eyes,
the cherry-red lips that were fashioned for kisses, and the straight
slimness of her beneath the tough leather, the skin like ivory, the
slender hands that he had held imprisoned while her small head nestled
upon his shoulder.

As she stood there with the feeble light of the oil lamp outlining her
beautiful profile, she appeared so young, so innocent, so unprotected,
that an immense tenderness for her welled up in the adventurer's
heart--a tenderness greater than the intense physical longing for
another touch of her lips and hands.  And when she turned suddenly to
Fra Federico and asked: 'Is anyone else here?' he came forward out of
the shadow and, with head bent, knelt down at her feet.

She saw him before he had sunk on his knees and at once she stepped
back, as if she was afraid of contact with something ugly and
obnoxious; and again she turned to Fra Federico, and she asked: 'What
is this man doing here?'

But the old priest had already tiptoed out of the room.

Marivosa looked around her with an expression on her face as of a
trapped young animal.  The next moment she would obviously have turned
and fled from the room, but that Tim was the quicker of the two and
already held her imprisoned in his arms.  She had entire mastery over
herself and made no effort to free herself; bred as she was amongst a
race of strong men she had a very clear knowledge of what physical
force could do, and was, moreover, far too deeply conscious of her own
dignity to attempt the impossible.  But she did look Tim squarely in
the face, and what he saw in her eyes and the curl of her lips caused a
hot flush of mingled shame and anger to rise to his forehead.

'Heavens alive!' he murmured, 'what have I done?  Why do you look at me
like that?'

'Because,' she said coldly, and with complete self-possession, 'I am
wondering at this moment whether I hate you or despise you most.'

'But, God in Heaven!--what for?'

'You came like a miserable sneaking thief to this place, where no one
wanted you ... God knows why you came, or who paid you to spy on us
all.'

Even then he did not let her go: in fact, he held her tighter than
ever.  Fortunately Fra Federico had prepared him for her attitude of
mind, or he might have thought that something had unhinged her brain.

Now, when she paused, obviously--alas!--because tears were choking her
voice, he said, with all the gentleness, the tenderness that he could
command: 'My beloved one, Fra Federico has already warned me that those
devils up there have told you lies about me.'

'Fra Federico was mistaken,' she interrupted calmly, 'there are no
devils up there and no one has told me lies.  It is from my dear, dear
father's own lips that I heard what happened at the castle three days
ago.'

'And what did he tell you?'

'The truth.'

'What did he tell you?' Tim insisted.

'That with subtle cunning you wormed yourself into his presence and
there raised your murdering hand against him.'

'The wicked old liar!'

The words had escaped before Tim could check them.  Marivosa heard them
without flinching, only the look in her eyes became harder, more fully
charged with contempt than it had been before.

'My God!' thought Tim, 'but she knows how to hate,' and manlike, he
added to himself: 'She would not hate me so if she did not love me.'

'What do you think you will gain by blasphemy?' she asked him coolly.

'Whoever told you that I raised as much as a finger against your
father,' Tim retorted, 'lied--lied abominably.  I went to him as one
white man to another.  I put a proposal before him which was fair and
straightforward.  I told him that I worshipped you.  He listened to me,
and then treacherously let his beastly niggers seize me and throw me
into a filthy dungeon.  He ordered me to be shot--or worse than
shot....  How can you say that there are no devils up there?'

'They told me that you were dead: that God had been good to you and
allowed you to escape the punishment that you deserved.'

'Would you rather I had been tortured to death by those unclean niggers
... I, a white man--and your lover?'

For the first time she struggled, and, as he was taken unawares, she
succeeded in freeing herself, and turning to the door would certainly
have run away only that Tim, quick as lightning, forestalled her and
stood firm as a rock between her and the door.  Just for the space of a
few seconds he wondered if she would call for help, in which case, of
course, the game would have been up; but she had not done it yet, and
all she did now was to draw herself up to her full height and to give
him another dose of her withering, contemptuous glance.  It seemed to
sweep him up and down, as if such contempt as she felt must annihilate
anything that dared to go on living.  After which, she said, with a
shrug and in a tone of bitter irony:

'My lover....'

'Yes!' Tim retorted coolly.  'I am your lover, and you are mine.  We
belong to one another as surely as the moon does to the night and the
sun to the day....  We belong to one another: you to me and I to you,
because of that wonderful hour when you lay in my arms by the bank of
the stream, and your lips received and gave that first kiss.  Do you
think that after that I would allow any power on earth or in hell to
take you from me? ... that after that I would stand by and see you
married--married, my God! to that disgusting swine, da Lisbao?--now
that I know what it feels like to hold you to my heart, to see the
light of love kindled in your eyes, to taste the sweetness of your kiss
... that I should ... Great God!  I would be a miserable fool...!'

'A fool, or a madman, I think,' she said, still apparently with
absolute self-possession.

'That's it--a madman.  But, my dear, how can I help going crazy now
that I have found out just how much you love me?'

'Love you?' she exclaimed.  'I?'

'Yes, you! you beautiful, adorable, worshipped woman, you love me....'
He came a step or two nearer to her: 'If you do not love me--if you
hate and despise me as you say you do, why do you not call to those
beastly niggers out there and let them drag me out of your sight ...
let them mete me the punishment which you say I deserve? ... Call to
them, my dear, if you hate me--for if you hated me really, I would as
soon be dead.'

His voice had sunk to a whisper, so soft and so low that it scarcely
rose above the sound of the distant murmuring stream, or the mumbling
of Fra Federico's orisons in the next room.  He came nearer to her and
nearer, and suddenly seized her once more in his arms, and hungrily his
lips sought hers, her eyes, her hair, her throat and chin.  Nor did he
let her go till he had had his fill.  When his arms fell away from her,
he threw back his head and gave a low, triumphant laugh.  'Now send any
dirty nigger in here, and tell your precious father that I am
alive--very much alive--and let him do his damnedest with me....  Go,
for God's sake, my dear, as I might forget that I am a white man and
that the dream of my life is still to make you my wife.'

He stood away from the door, and, like a man dazed or dreaming, went
slowly back into the gloom.  He no longer looked at her.  What gesture
she made then, or how she looked, he never knew: all he did know was
that presently he heard the soft patter of her feet upon the floor, the
opening and closing of the door, and then nothing more.

She had gone; and Tim, crouching in the gloom, buried his burning head
in his hands, and a queer kind of sob rose to his throat and nearly
choked him.  A moment or two later, Fra Federico came shuffling back
into the room.  The old man seemed to bring an atmosphere of peace and
common sense back into the place.  Tim, after a while, watched him
moving about the room, once more sorting out his phials and pill-boxes
ready for packing for the coming journey: and the sight comforted and
soothed his nerves.

After a few minutes he asked his old friend: 'What about this
expedition to-morrow, Padre?  You start with them, don't you?'

'Yes, my son.  We start as soon after dawn as possible.  The Great
Unknown and his daughter ... some of his Lieutenants, a mounted escort,
and the carriers with the pack mules.'

'You don't know the destination?'

'No.  But I can guess.'

'That swine, da Lisbao, has a ranch somewhere in the Sertao...?'

'Yes!'

'And that is where they are going?'

'I think so.'

'Do you go with them as far as there?'

'Yes.  And from there I go to Cumbe.'

'How do you travel, Padre?'

'Like they all do--on horseback.'

'I see.'

Tim said nothing more, but sat musing in the darkness, while Fra
Federico muttered a few Aves in the interval of collecting his scanty
possessions.

Suddenly the old priest spied something that was lying on the ground.
He stooped, picked it up, and held it to the light to see what it was.
It was a small packet wrapped up in a piece of silk and tied together
with a bit of faded ribbon.

'Sua Excellenia must have dropped this,' he said, and turned the
packet over and over between his trembling fingers.

Tim, at once impelled by curiosity, came out of his corner and looked
over the priest's shoulder.  He recognized the packet which Marivosa
had undone for his benefit one day: it contained photographs and
letters which meant the possession of Traskmoore to him.  Without
saying 'by y'r leave,' he took the packet out of the old man's hand.

'It is mine as much as hers, Padre,' he said quietly, in response to
Fra Federico's protest.  'Your finding it here is the greatest proof of
all that God is on my side in this business.'

'I shall have to give it back to Marivosa da Gloria, my son,' the old
man objected.

'So you shall, Padre.  With your own kind hands you shall give it to
her on her wedding-day.'

And in spite of Fra Federico's reiterated protests, he broke open the
packet and examined the contents.  Once more the goggling eyes of
Juliana seemed to jeer at him from the photograph; but it was not on
her face that he gazed so intently, as on that of a man with narrow,
hatchet face and hollow cheek, with deep-sunk, penetrating eyes, a
beak-like nose, and large, protruding chin.  'From your loving father,
Dudley Stone,' was inscribed on the back, with the date 1926--two years
after the marriage of Uncle Justin to that woman with the large teeth
and goggling eyes.

The letters were there, too--the last one dated 1925, all signed
'Dudley Stone'; which went to prove that in that year the adventurer
had not yet embarked on his career of charlatanism, and had not yet
thought of burying his identity in a maze of blasphemous appellations.

'I wonder,' thought Tim, 'if these proofs would appear absolutely
conclusive in a court of law.'

He did up the packet carefully once more and hid it in the pocket of
his belt.  Leaving his old friend still fussing over pill-boxes, he
went out on the _plaa_.  The night was very dark.  He climbed to the
top of a rock, from which he had a good view of the castle on the
summit.

'If there is anything in thought transference,' he murmured to himself,
'my lovely one up there must know that her precious packet is in my
hands now, and that, please God, she'll be Countess of Traskmoore
before the month is out.'

After that, as his nerves were still very much on edge, he went for a
long tramp along the bank of the stream.




XX

Slowly, through dust and sand, over stony tracks and winding bush
paths, the company of _vaqueiros_ detailed to guard the sacred person
of the veiled prophet in his travels wound its way eastward.  There
were about a score of these men, magnificent riders, knowing every inch
of this desert land, and inured to its pitfalls and dangers; dressed in
their leather panoply, they looked more than ever like centaurs, at one
with their splendid horses, which, but for the want of grooming, could
have more than held their own at any European horse show.

The Great Unknown himself, with the Empress of Brazil beside him, rode
in the van, with his bodyguard of fearsome Lieutenants both in front
and behind him.  With them rode Fra Federico Evangelista.

In the rear came a couple of covered wagons drawn by mules, and laden
with provisions and all the paraphernalia necessary for the night's
encampment.  It was under the hood of one of these wagons that Tim had
scrambled at the last moment of departure, when the multitude assembled
on the _plaa_ was down on its knees receiving the final blessing of
that abominable mountebank, who had used this opportunity for the
display of some of his most blasphemous bits of play-acting.

Fra Federico alone knew what Tim's intentions were, and had spent most
of the night in prayer for the safety of this young adventurer whom he
had learned to love as a son.  As soon as Tim had finally assured
himself that his beloved would indeed ride away with that limb of
Satan, her father, he carried out the plan which he had devised in the
night.  He joined the crowd which was massed around the horses and the
wagons, and boldly lent a helping hand to the carriers, who were busy
loading and packing.  No one took any notice of him.  That was one of
the most salient characteristics of this amazing place: the rank and
file of the army of the Great Unknown, and the mass of the population,
neither knew nor cared about one another.  They were so introspective,
so detached and mystical, that they had no knowledge--nor desire for
knowledge--of their fellow-desert-dwellers.  It was only the immediate
bodyguard of the veiled prophet who kept a sharp look out on strangers
or possible spies: the others, in spite of their disconcerting habit of
staring, and staring hard for hours at a time, did not seem to be
memorizing the person, or thing, on which their dark, melancholy eyes
had rested for so long.

Tim had not been in Canudos much longer than a month.  He had never
become a prominent member of this community of brigands: and in Canudos
Nature provides all the black mud necessary for effectual make-up and
disguise.  Tim, unrecognizable even to Fra Federico, with a coating of
grime over his face and hands, the rest of him encased in his leather
suit, worked stolidly with the carriers--who took him for one of
themselves--until the moment when the final order for departure was
given and the cavalcade set in motion, when, along with two or three
half-breeds, he scrambled into the rearmost wagon.  Marivosa, riding
beside her father, passed so close to him that he could have touched
her stirrup with his hand.

It seemed strange to go over the ground again which he had traversed
such a little while ago with Esteban the carrier.  From where he sat,
as the mule-drawn wagon went jolting over the stony track, he saw
receding slowly from his sight the landmarks which a very few weeks ago
had appeared to him like portents of triumph.  The mysterious city,
dominated by the castle on the hill-top, with the houses and huts
massed below seeming to stretch upwards like human arms extended in an
eternal appeal--the panorama became smaller and smaller, more and more
lost in that cloud of dust which hung over it like a drab shroud,
masking for ever all the cruelties, the superstitions, and the crimes
which were the life of that city of dreams.

'Dante, on his way home from the Inferno,' Tim said to himself, as the
vista slowly faded from his sight.

The cavalcade had gone past the Bom Viagem which had been Tim's first
halt in sight of Canudos; the Indian storekeeper was in his
doorway--staring; one or two of his usual clients trooped out into the
compound to see the horses and wagons go by.  Landmarks all.  Tim saw
them go by with a faint sense of regret.  Please God, he never would
see this terrible place again; but there is always something sad in
absolute finality ... and, after all, this God-forsaken hole was also
the hallowed spot where he had met the one woman in the world, and
where he had learned, even while teaching her, the first lesson of love.

The vanguard side-tracked before the road plunged into the scrub where
Tim had beheld that wonderful mirage out of which Marivosa had come
towards him like an angelic vision out of a dream.  He was glad in a
way not to have to jog along through it, sandwiched as he was between
two niggers, and needing all his wits not to come in too close contact
with their filthy bodies.  By this time the sun was high in the
heavens, and soon the halt was called for the midday _siesta_.

Tim, fated to feed and sleep with a lot of half-breeds, did his best to
gulp down his own feelings and to appear normal in his behaviour.
Fortunately they were a taciturn lot and took no notice of Tim's
silence and abstraction.  After a meal of black beans, followed by the
ubiquitous farinha, he found a bit of shade under a clump of rough
palms: and there, stretched out upon his back, his clasped hands under
his head, he gazed upwards into nothingness and dreamed of Marivosa da
Gloria.




XXI

Though the road was different from the one along which Esteban had
guided Tim on his way to Canudos, it was every bit as dreary, every bit
as monotonous, as dusty, and as stony as the other.  Three days and two
nights of this awful monotony.  Tim, who was inured to many hardships
since first he landed in this southern hemisphere, did feel at times,
while the wearisome jogging of the wagon lulled his senses into a state
of semi-consciousness, that he had never suffered physically so much as
he did now.  After the second day he lost count of time: felt as if he
had gone on like this since ons of time and would still go on
throughout eternity.

He never once caught sight of Marivosa.

It was on the third day, after the midday _siesta_, that the whole
landscape appeared to wake up as if from a cataleptic sleep: the road
widened, stones were less to the fore, there was less dust, and
water-holes were more frequent.  In the distance, large patches of
coarse grass became visible in the foot-hills, and immense herds of
cattle could be seen grazing on the slopes.  From time to time on the
road the cavalcade would encounter a _vaqueiro_ on his way home to his
village, or even a cattle-dealer with pack-mule and a guide.  Whenever
this happened, Tim noticed that the traveller, whoever he might be,
dismounted, uncovered his head, and stood respectfully by the roadside
till the vanguard had gone by.  The fame of the Great Unknown, his
supposed miracles and reputation of sanctity, apparently extended even
beyond the confines of the desert, and Tim remembered how, in the
native quarters of Monsataz, even a few of the foreign traders spoke of
the so-called prophet with bated breath.

Just before the sunset great excitement prevailed.  The end of the
journey was in sight.  The half-breeds in charge of the wagons set up a
chattering like a herd of monkeys, all the more marked after their
habitual taciturnity.  It seemed as if with this exit out of the desert
most of these men were ready to follow Nature's lead, to shed their
churlishness, and to don a new garment made up of good-fellowship and
good-humour.

The _quinta_ was in sight.  All was well with the world.  As soon as
Tim understood this, he jumped down from the wagon, thankful to be able
to walk a mile or two, and stretch himself out as it were both mentally
and physically.

Soon he caught sight of the house where lived the man whom he hated
most in all the world.  Memories, which during the past hectic months
had become somewhat dim, crowded in upon him once more, thick and fast.
A number of faces flitted quickly past his mental vision: Dom Manol,
the thief and perjurer; Doutor da Pinto, victim of abominable
treachery; Fra Martino, the genial rascal who had been his best friend;
and amongst these, the sweet, sad face of Teresa, bending over the dead
body of her father, her great dark eyes filled with unuttered horror.
Memories of the days at Monsataz: his search for Dudley Stone, the Caf
Bom Genio, the Dutchman, the Portuguese, the fantastic tales of the
Great Unknown, who turned out to be Dudley Stone after all.

Ah, well! the Odyssey was ended: the mad adventure was drawing to a
close.  Would the play finish on a tragic, or a happy note?  Would all
that knavery, that blasphemous play-acting, triumph in the end, or
would God stand by the adventurer who, single-handed, meant to outwit
it all?

When Tim O'Clee in the wake of the last wagon finally turned into the
stockade, the night had already closed in.  The horsemen had dismounted
and were leading their horses to the rear of the house, where
supposedly the stables were situated.  Tim only took a cursory glance
at his surroundings: noted that the principal dwelling-house was large
and substantially built on the brow of a hill, with verandas running
along the outside walls, that two smaller houses nestled close by, that
there were a number of outhouses and huts all inside the stockade, and
that the whole group of buildings was backed by a grove of palms and
acacias, beyond which stretched out as far as the distant range of
hills innumerable cattle-pens, with cottages interspersed among them
here and there.

But he was in no mood to study the landscape.  He was only vaguely
conscious of the beauty of the night: a clear, starlit, moonless night.
Gradually the noise and bustle inside the stockade had subsided.  Every
man was busy with his own affairs, and Tim, after he had helped with
the unloading of the wagons, was left to do very much as he pleased.
He could only bless the happy disposition of these _vaqueiros_, with
their habit of lounging against anything that was convenient, smoking
endless cigarettes, and staring without comprehension, or desire to
interfere.

He took a leaf out of their book, and, taking his stand against the
shafts of an empty wagon, he, too, lounged and stared.  He had chosen a
position from whence he had a good view of a row of doors and windows
which gave on the veranda.  Three of these windows were brilliantly
illuminated from within: they were wide open.  Behind a thin
mosquito-net stretched across the windows Tim caught sight of a table
spread out obviously for supper.  Places were laid for four, and there
was a profusion of flowers and of silver.  A couple of coffee-coloured
servants in white coats, immaculately turned out, were putting the
final touches to what was obviously the table of a rich man accustomed
to European luxury.

'Strange that we should meet here, senhor!'  The voice came to Tim out
of the gloom--a familiar voice.  He turned quickly, and met a pair of
dark eyes that gazed with an expression of astonishment rot unmixed
with respect into his face.

'Esteban!' he exclaimed.

'At your service, senhor.'

'Great God! what are you doing here?'

'My business, senhor, is as it always was.'

'Of course.  Stupid of me.  But how did you know me?'

'I couldn't forget you, senhor, even though you have changed--greatly
changed.  But good times came to me after I had the privilege of
escorting you to Canudos.'

Esteban spoke in a whisper.  He had, moreover, taken a good look round
to make sure that there were no prying eyes about.

'You have done well, have you?' Tim remarked; 'I am glad.'  Then he
added, with a short laugh: 'You see, I have come back alive after all.'

'So far, senhor,' the guide remarked dryly.

'You shall take me to Queimadas to-morrow, Esteban,' Tim rejoined
lightly.  'You have a cart now, perhaps?'

'Two, senhor.  I do twice the business I used to before I met you, and
it grows week by week.  This is one of my wagons,' he added, and struck
the shaft with the palm of his hand.  'I have four good horses now ...
half a dozen mules....  To-morrow I have contracted to take Fra
Federico Evangelista as far as Cumbe--you remember Cumbe, senhor?'

'Of course I do.  Rather!'

'I can go round by Cumbe,' the carrier went on, 'it is not much out of
the way.  If you agree, senhor....  You see, I have contracted with Fra
Federico....'

'Fra Federico will come to Queimadas with us, Esteban.  So have your
wagon ready, for we start at dawn.  Plenty of provisions, you know ...
blankets ... everything for the journey ... and no halt on the way.'

'At your service, senhor.'

'And remember, my friend ... no questions ... not a word ... not even
to Fra Federico.'

'Oh, senhor...!' the guide uttered in protest.

And Tim knew well that Esteban had sufficient Indian blood in his veins
to be a model of discretion and of silence.  Even now, without another
word, he seemed to melt away into the gloom: at any rate Tim saw him no
more.  His eyes were fixed once more upon the lighted window, behind
which he now saw the company filing into the room.  In they came, these
four people around whose life or death Tim's whole existence was
entwined.  Marivosa da Gloria, exquisite in a European dress that might
have hailed from Paris: her sweet face very pale and with an expression
of bewilderment, perhaps even of fear, which caused Tim to curse under
his breath and to grind his teeth with inward rage.  Her little hand
rested on the arm of Dom Manol da Lisbao, faultlessly dressed, just as
he would have been for a dinner-party in London or Paris, suave,
urbane, making himself agreeable to his beautiful companion, who did
not respond with as much as a smile.  Behind them towered the tall
figure of Dudley Stone.  This was the first time that Tim had seen the
impudent charlatan unveiled: but there was the hatchet face, the
beak-like nose, the deep, penetrating eyes of the photograph: 'From
your loving father, Dudley Stone.'  Tim's heart was pounding away in
his breast like a sledge-hammer.  Within the next few hours his
wearisome and exciting Odyssey would culminate either in triumph or in
death.  The man actually stood there, within easy reach of him, the man
whose existence meant everything that he, Tim, had ever longed for--his
inheritance in Ireland, and the possession of the one woman in the
world who could make that inheritance worth while.

The company sat down to table.  Then only did Tim recognize in the
fourth person Teresa da Pinto.  Teresa, with the tragic eyes, the set
mouth, the whole beautiful face indicative of burning passion, hatred,
vengeance: all that Tim had seen in it that evening in the music-hall
at Monsataz when da Pinto fell assassinated, and she, Teresa, alone
knew whose was the hand that had struck her father.

It was, indeed, strange to see those two beautiful young girls sitting
there, silent, self-absorbed, hardly touching the food that was served
them, and each harbouring in her heart a nameless fear and an unspoken
sorrow.  Teresa from time to time threw a glance across the table at
Marivosa, and to the watcher in the night those glances boded evil and
danger for his beloved.  The two men on the other hand ate heartily,
drank copiously, and carried on an animated discussion in English.
Only a few snatches of this reached Tim's ears, but he heard enough to
know that cattle-driving, loot, brigandage, money, diamonds, and the
vast profits made through all these villainies were the sole topic of
conversation.  The men made no attempt to modulate their voices.  No
one, they believed, outside the room could understand what they said,
and apparently in their eyes the two young girls did not count.  Teresa
paid no heed to them; probably she had known long ago of this criminal
association between Dom Manol and the English adventurer.

But to Tim the gradual unravelling of a skein which had seemed to him
in such a tangle was intensely thrilling.  Details of that association,
at which he had only vaguely guessed, became clear even though he only
heard fragments of conversation.  He understood now the reason of the
gigantic hoax which had caused plain Mr. Dudley Stone to assume the
rle of a resurrected prophet or, alternatively, of the rightful ruler
of Brazil.  A band of ignorant savages had to be held together by means
of mysticism and superstition; they were made to obey by means of
terror of an unknown, deified power, and the veiled prophet--the Great
Unknown became part of their religion--the fetish whom they revered and
feared.

Given a temperament, hard, cruel, and cynical, and a certain talent for
play-acting, such as Stone evidently possessed, the rle was not
difficult to assume or to keep up.  There was also his predilection for
adventure, and his obsession for the search after buried treasure: all
these characteristics made him a willing tool in the hands of that far
cleverer scoundrel, Dom Manol.  It was Dom Manol, obviously, who was
the brain of the association: Dudley Stone merely the tool.  Monsataz
had been the setting wherein the nefarious partnership was first
discussed and entered into.  Fate had indeed played into the hands of
these brigands by sending Hold-Hands Juliana along, with money wrung
from an old dotard which she was only too ready to spend in the
purchase of false affidavits to prove that Dudley Stone was dead.  The
disappearance of Dudley Stone off the face of the earth was the
keystone of the enterprise.  Traskmoore's fifty thousand pounds became
the initial capital.  Since then these two blackguards had amassed
untold wealth: cattle-driving, illicit diamond buying, raids on farms
and homesteads, were their chief sources of revenue.  Dudley Stone
brought the loot to his partner, who disposed of it to the foreign
traders who, in their turn, were ready to buy anything and everything
and ask no inconvenient questions.

All this and more, Tim O'Clee had guessed during his sojourn at
Canudos, and through conversations with Fra Federico.  What he
overheard now only confirmed what he already knew.  It was the effect
of all that cynical talk upon Marivosa, of these elaborate plans for
more brigandage, more piracy and murder, openly discussed, which wrung
her lover's heart till he could have groaned aloud.  Gradually he saw
the look of bewilderment in her dear eyes turn to horror and loathing;
once or twice she tried to speak, but evidently horror of what she
heard choked the words in her throat.

Was she not witnessing at this moment the total shattering of the great
illusion of her life--the tearing down from a self-raised pedestal of
the idol whom she had worshipped?  Her father's soul was being laid
bare before her in all its hideous nakedness.  She saw him at last as
he was--cynical, vicious, cruel: and herself as the miserable pawn in
this money-making game, thrown across from one partner to the other so
as to make the criminal bond more lasting and more secure.

And Tim was forced to get a real stranglehold over himself, lest he
should yield to the temptation of rushing across the courtyard, forcing
his way into that room and seizing one of those two miscreants by the
throat.  He felt that this world could hold no greater satisfaction
than that of squeezing the life out of those rascals.  Unfortunately,
Nature had only provided him with one pair of hands, and these were
required for guarding his beloved and saving her from those brigands:
whilst his own life had become the most precious asset for bringing
about her safety and ultimate happiness.

And so he forced himself to remain on the watch and to gaze mutely on
the soul-agony of the woman he worshipped.  He saw her turn with an
expression of pathetic appeal to Teresa da Pinto--a young girl, her own
age, who must, she thought, have felt the same horror as she did at
what they were both made to hear.  But in Teresa's glance she saw
nothing but indifference for what she obviously knew already, and when
she met her eyes, there was nothing in them but detestation for herself.

With a half-suppressed sob she rose and fled quickly from the room.  At
a peremptory sign from Dom Manol, Teresa reluctantly followed.

The two men were left alone, wholly indifferent to the storm of misery
which their baseness had provoked.  They drank, and smoked excellent
cigars, and Tim heard Stone say cynically: 'It's that damned convent
education--she'll be all right presently.'

And Dom Manol retorted, with a suavity far more loathsome than the
other's frank brutality: 'Don't worry, my dear fellow.  I like 'em like
that.  I like a woman with some spirit in her.  Teresa fawns too much.
She adores me--women do as a rule----Your lovely Marivosa's hatred will
be refreshing ... while it lasts.'

Tim heard and saw no more for a moment or two, because his gorge had
risen and he was seeing red.  A mist which was the colour of blood
spread before his eyes, and his hand wandered to the place in his belt
where an automatic should have been.  Fortunately there was none there,
or the temptation would have been too strong to resist, and the
consequences of such an act would have meant the end of everything--of
his last hope of saving the woman he worshipped.

When he looked about him once more, the two men had strolled out upon
the veranda.  The light was behind them and Tim could only vaguely
distinguish their silhouettes in the gloom; the odour of two excellent
cigars came wafted to his nostrils on the evening air, and made him
curse with a longing for a good smoke, after the rank tobacco which had
been his only solace for the past few weeks.

The conversation between those two villains up there had drifted to the
events of the past few days, and Tim heard snatches of the charlatan's
version of his own adventures.

Dom Manol appeared incredulous.  'That fellow O'Clerigh,' he said,
'who would like to be Earl of Traskmoore, was turned out of the country
as an undesirable alien nearly a couple of months ago.  I had to
engineer that, for he was after you, my friend, and was beginning to be
troublesome.'

'All I know is,' Dudley Stone rejoined, 'that he turned up at Canudos,
and that he was fool enough to seek an interview with me.'

A graphic description ensued of how he, Tim, had died in gaol and been
thrown to the carrion in a ditch.

'So that's the last of him,' Stone continued.  'The damned fool
thought, I suppose, that I would give up this business for the sake of
the few thousands which he promised me.'

'You couldn't very well do that, could you, my friend?' Dom Manol
retorted dryly.  'They have not forgotten in England, I imagine, that
little transaction, during the War, with the Austrian High Command
which caused the rout of the Serbian Army, what?'

'Forgotten or not, with money one can disprove anything....'

'Except the correspondence on the subject, signed by yourself, which I
hold as a guarantee of your loyalty....  But don't let's quarrel, my
friend,' Dom Manol went on glibly, 'I only wanted to remind you that
it is out of your power to leave me in the lurch.  We work together for
our common good, and as yours is the harder task you get the lion's
share.'

'I am not going on with it for ever, you know, my friend.  I am getting
rather sick of my rle in that God-forsaken desert.'


'For ever?  No!' Dom Manol rejoined, with a shrug; 'but a good many
years must elapse yet before we have made our pile and can retire to
our respective homes ... then we'll destroy the incriminating
correspondence, my friend; and as your lovely Marivosa will be old and
ugly by then, I will even return her to your loving arms, and you can
then build yourself a palace anywhere you choose, and forget that you
ever were a resurrected prophet and potential Emperor of Brazil.'

There was silence after that between the two partners in infamy; and
Tim, troubled as he was over the future of his beloved, could not help
chortling at thought of these two brigands each holding the other,
figuratively, by the throat, threatening one another, each prepared to
murder the other, if only he dared.

Then, after a few minutes of this silence, Stone curtly proclaimed that
he was tired and wanted to go to bed.  Dom Manol, in the rle of a
polite and attentive host, at once went back into the dining-room with
his guest, offered him a last drink, called to his dusky servants to
attend on him, and finally bade him a cordial good night.

But for some time after that Tim remained leaning against the shaft of
Esteban's wagon, staring up at the house.  Somewhere behind those walls
the woman whom he worshipped moved and breathed.  Perhaps she was
crying her eyes out with shame and disappointment: and he, Tim, not
there to kiss away those tears and swear to her that all-conquering
love would inevitably triumph over treachery and perfidy.  Perhaps she
was asleep: and he not there to watch over her slumbers.  But he had it
in his mind that his love and longing were so strong that presently
they would pierce those stone walls and reveal to him the room where
his beloved lay.  And as he stood there, watching, he saw a light
suddenly peep through the chinks of a shuttered door at the farthest
end of the veranda; and a moment or two later the shutters were thrown
open, then the door, and Marivosa stood for a moment under the lintel
and looked out into the night.  For one minute, not more, she stood
there, and even at one moment turned her head in the direction where
Tim was on the watch; the next moment she was gone, and the door was
closed once more.

But Tim had his wish: he knew where she was, knew the door at which he
could stand guard over her and the spot on which her foot had rested.
Creeping noiselessly in the shadow, he made his way across the
courtyard and up the veranda steps.  He found the door which had just
closed on that which was dearer to him than life; he pressed his lips
against the panel, and murmured the words of love which could not reach
her ears.

Then he lay down across the threshold and waited for the dawn.




XXII

For the rest, it is all so strange, some of it so inexplicable, that it
seems at first glance almost impossible to disentangle the truth from
the many extravagant versions of what occurred on that fateful
dawn--the dawn which followed on the arrival of the Great Unknown and
his escort at the _quinta_ of Dom Manol da Lisbao.  Of that _quinta_
nothing remains to-day but an agglomeration of ruined buildings: only
the stone walls, blackened with soot, are left to testify that a
prosperous homestead flourished here some time, not so very long ago,
with its verandas and stockade, cart-sheds, cattle-pens, stablings and
outhouses.

A devastating bush fire, mysterious in its origin, kindled some say by
a vengeful hand, laid waste the _quinta_ as well as several hundred
acres of forest and of cultivated land.  This catastrophe was
coincident with those other events which have remained more
inexplicable and far more mysterious than the destruction by fire of
the place where they occurred.

On the whole, I am inclined to agree with those who place the greatest
credence on Esteban's version of the affair.  The carrier had been at
the _quinta_ when the Great Unknown arrived there with his daughter and
his train of armed men and wagons: and he had actually held
conversation with the mad stranger, whom he had, it seems, escorted to
within sight of Canudos a month previously.

This he related to a group of sympathetic listeners in the coffee-room
of the station inn at Bomfin, when the events of that unforgettable
morning were still fresh in his mind.

'I left him at the turning-point,' he said, speaking of the mad
stranger--English, he believed he was, though some people said he was
something else, equally mad--'at the point from which there is a good
view of that accursed city, and I warned him then that if he ventured
any farther he would never return alive.'

'But he did return, Esteban,' one of his hearers argued, 'since you
spoke with him that night.'

'I did speak with him,' the carrier rejoined.  'He was leaning against
the shaft of one of my wagons, staring up at the house, which was all
lighted up.  I had been busy loading the wagon, because I had engaged
to take Fra Federico Evangelista as far as Cumbe on the morrow, when I
saw the senhor Inglez.  I knew him at once, though he had smeared his
face over with dirt to make himself look like a Mamaluco; but I owe all
my good fortune to the hundred milreis he gave me when I put him on the
way to Canudos; he was good to me, he was genial and not proud, and I
never forget a face.'

'So you talked?'

'Only a few words.  He made me promise to have a cart and horses ready
for him in the early dawn to take him to Queimadas, and I promised,
because I could still fulfil my contract with Fra Federico Evangelista
by going round the way of Cumbe.  I arranged all this with the
stranger, and after that I lay down under the hood of my wagon and went
to sleep.'

'What did the Inglez do?'

'I left him still leaning against the shafts and staring up at the
house, though I told him that if he liked he could get some sleep
beside me in the wagon.'

'Then what happened?'

'I had just dropped off to sleep when someone pulled me by the leg.  It
was Barbosa; you know him, he is Dom Manol's body-servant.  He came to
tell me that his master wished to speak with me.  So out I scrambled.
It may have been half an hour before midnight then, or perhaps more.
The waning moon was still low down in the sky.  I do not like a waning
moon,' Esteban remarked, with a shake of his lean shoulders, 'all the
ill-luck I ever had came to me while the moon was on her decline.'

He drank down a glass of rum in order to shake off that sense of
superstitious fear, always on the alert in the temperament of a
half-breed.  The others waited until he had smacked his lips and
appeared more content; then they encouraged him to proceed.

'But you have not had ill-luck this time, Esteban, have you?  It was
Dom Manol who...'

'That is it, my friends.  The cursed moon was bound to bring ill-luck
to someone, you see.  Well! as I say, I scrambled down from the wagon,
ready to follow Barbosa.  He was going towards the house, and I just
stopped to see if the stranger was still leaning against the shafts.
But he was no longer there.  I peeped under the wagon, thinking that
perhaps he had crawled there to get some sleep, but I saw no trace of
him, and seeing that Barbosa was making me signs to hurry up, I ran
after him.  I followed him up the stairs, and he pushed open the tall
window of one of the rooms and told me to go in.

'Dom Manol was there, sitting at a table where he and his guests had
been dining.  There were a lot of empty bottles about, I noticed, and I
saw at once, that he had been drinking very hard.  Well!--that was no
business of mine, was it?  He began by ordering me to look to the
windows and the door to see that there were no eavesdroppers about, and
then to come and stand close to him so that he need not raise his
voice.  And he gave me the most extraordinary orders I had ever
received in all my life: "You will have a wagon ready at dawn," he
said, "harnessed with three of your best horses, and well supplied with
provisions."  Imagine my surprise, for these were the same instructions
so far that the senhor Inglez had given me; and already I was wondering
how I should manage to satisfy both my clients when Dom Manol went on,
and, as I say, he gave me the most extraordinary orders I had ever
received in this life.  "La Sua Excellenia Teresa da Pinto will travel
in your wagon, and you will drive her straight to my house outside
Queimadas, which you know.  You will drive straight into the courtyard,
and directly you arrive you will ask to speak with the Senhor Silva
Givareira, and you will give him a letter from me.  La Sua Excellenia,
I must tell you, will be escorted by a female servant.  Two of my own
men will accompany you.  On the way you must halt only at places where
there are no habitations within sight: never in a village, nor near a
_quinta_.  On no account must Excellenia be allowed to speak to anyone
on the road, nor must you take or deliver any message from her to
anyone.  Is that understood?"  I did understand well enough; but,
putting my amazement aside for the moment, I just wondered how I could
fulfil my obligations at the same time to Fra Federico Evangelista, to
the mad stranger, and to Dom Manol.  I certainly had two wagons
available.  I had horses and mules, but I myself could not possibly
drive both.  Fortunately I am a man of resource; and, thought I, so
long as Dom Manol does not insist on there being no one else in the
wagon except La Sua Excellenia and his servants, he need know nothing
about Fra Federico Evangelista and the senhor Inglez until afterwards.
For the moment all I did was to assure His Excellency that I was
entirely at his service; whereupon he gave me the letter for Senhor
Givareira, who is the governor of his estates, and whom I have the
honour of knowing, and finally he said: "If you carry out my orders in
every respect, and arrive at my house on the third day from this,
Senhor Givareira will give you two hundred milreis.  And now you can
go."  He waved his hand.  I assured him once more that I was entirely
at his service, and then bowed myself out of the room.'

'You must have felt very queer, Esteban,' was the universal comment on
this part of the story.  But Esteban had more amazing things yet to
relate, and after more refreshment he went on:

'I did feel queer, I can assure you, my friends, but I had confidence
in myself, and I still thought that I would ultimately find a way to
satisfy all my customers.  You see, Dom Manol had promised me two
hundred milreis; but I was sure that I could get another two hundred
from the stranger; and Fra Federico, though he pays me very little,
does give me absolution for my sins and a passport up to Heaven, which
is very comforting.  As I felt rather troubled and wanted to think
rather than go to sleep again, I did not scramble back into the wagon,
but followed the example of the stranger and leaned against the shafts,
thinking.  The moon was well up in the sky now, and the night was very
still.  There was no one about, for it certainly was past midnight
then, and scarcely any sound broke the silence of the night except in
the far distance the snorting of horses in the sheds, or the stirring
of the cattle in their pens.  I had a good view of the house from where
I was standing, and of the veranda with the row of doors and windows
opening on it.  All of these were closed, but through the chinks of two
of the shuttered windows I could see a faint streak of light.  One came
from the room where I had the interview with Dom Manol, and the other
from another room a good deal farther along the veranda.  One strange
thing struck me at that moment, and this was that up against the door
of that distant room I could see a man lying across the threshold.

'And suddenly I saw Dom Manol come out on the veranda.  The light of
the moon was full on him.  His beautiful clothes looked all crumpled,
and his hair was untidy.  He was stooping a little and stumbled in his
walk.  He crept along the veranda in the direction of that other door
against which the man was still lying.  Never in my life have I seen
such an evil look on any man's face as there was on Dom Manol's then.
And all at once he saw the man who was lying across the threshold, and
the man saw him and jumped to his feet, Dom Manol ordered him to get
out of the way, but the man would not budge.  He was tall, taller than
Dom Manol; that was all I could see of him, for he was in the shadow
caused by an angle of the wall.  The next moment those two were at
grips with one another.  I tell you, my friends, it was terrible.  Dom
Manol, of course, was the weaker of the two--he had been drinking, you
understand--but the other was unarmed, and Dom Manol had quickly drawn
a dagger out of his hip pocket.  At first they fought in silence, and
it was that silence which made it all seem so horrible: one heard
nothing but a kind of snorting, like two bulls in a fight.  But when,
after a few moments, Dom Manol was brought down to his knees and was
forced by an iron grip on his wrist to drop the dagger, he gave a
terrific cry for help.

'I had been on the point of doing that myself, I can tell you, but I
hadn't dared.  Of course, in one moment the _quinta_ became alive.  You
heard footsteps, shouting, calls from everywhere.  Just for a few
seconds I suppose my attention wandered from that terrible scene up on
the veranda.  When I looked again, Dom Manol was still down on his
knees, but the other now had him by the throat.  Down he forced him, my
friends, and down, and would have killed him the next minute for sure,
but it was just too late, for the house was alive, I tell you, and half
a dozen of Dom Manol's servants were already on the veranda.  They
rushed to their master's aid: they tried to seize that other man, but
he hit about him, fighting like a lion.  Still it was six to one, you
understand, and more men rushing up the stairs.  I was sorry for him in
a way; though I am not a brave man myself, I like to see a good fight,
and six to one did not seem to be a just one.  I deliberately turned my
head away then, as I did not wish to see that fine lion brought down.
At the moment there had been a terrific din, men shouting, stamping,
banging, an awful scramble there was on stairs and veranda; but,
suddenly, there was a dead hush, and back I turned to see what had
happened.

'My friends, it was just a flash: a wonderful sight, I tell you.  The
door immediately behind the man was suddenly opened from within, and in
the doorway appeared the most beautiful lady you ever saw in all your
life.  Like ivory she was, and her hair was like gilded copper.  She
put out a hand and grasped the man by his ragged shirt-sleeve, and drew
him into the room away from Dom Manol, who had recovered his breath
and was snarling and crouching like a jaguar ready to spring, and away
from the crowd who at sight of her had stopped yelling and stamping,
and stood there as if they had suddenly been turned to stone.  I heard
a voice--I think it was Dom Manol's--cry out hoarsely: "Marivosa!"
And I, too, felt then as if I had been turned to stone as I looked for
the first time on the daughter of the Great Unknown, the real Empress
of Brazil--Marivosa da Gloria.'

'But what had happened to the man?' listeners demanded eagerly, while
others added: 'I, too, like to see a brave man fight.'

'I don't know what happened to him,' Esteban replied, 'and I don't know
to this day who he was and what became of him.  The last I saw of him
he was streaming with blood and still fighting with his back to the
wall: then I saw the lovely lady and her ivory hand dragging him in by
his shirt-sleeve.  I think he was so dazed and so exhausted that he did
not know himself what had happened.  The room behind the lady was all
in darkness, but that rascally moon did play the happy trick of
lighting up her beautiful pale face, so that she looked like the Holy
Virgin.  No wonder the men couldn't move: they just stood transfixed.
Some of them dropped on their knees.  But she ordered them to go, and
obediently they all slunk off.  You see, some of them were the men from
Canudos, and they look upon her as a heavenly being, the daughter of
their prophet; even Dom Manol's servants wouldn't dare to touch her,
because for them she is the Empress.

'What I thought was strange at the time was that Dom Manol let them
all go away; in fact, when some of them seemed to want to hang back, he
snarled at them and ordered them to go.  The beautiful lady would have
stepped back into the room then, but Dom Manol was too quick for her.
The next thing I saw was that he had lifted her off her feet and held
her in his arms.  My friends, this is where the terrible thing
occurred.  I saw it all; indeed, I was the only one to see everything,
for the men were all slinking back to their own quarters and not one of
them seemed to dare to glance back.  But I saw it all; I saw another
door close by softly open, and the Senhorita Teresa da Pinto come out
on the veranda.  When she saw Dom Manol with the Empress Marivosa in
his arms, she stood for two seconds like a statue, stiff and stark, and
her eyes were like those of a wild cat when it is in a rage, and her
white teeth shone like a jaguar's: then, suddenly she darted back into
the room and out again.  This time, my friends, she had a glistening
steel blade in her hand.  Dom Manol had his back to her.  She ran to
him, and without a sound or cry, she drove that blade into him.
Horrible it was, my friends!  Horrible, I tell you! and she, the
senhorita, no more than a young girl.  Jealousy had maddened her, and
when she saw Dom Manol loosen his hold on the beautiful Marivosa, when
she saw him reel and fall and heard the death-rattle in his throat, she
cried out: "As you did to my father"--or some words to that effect--and
she stepped over the still body of Dom Manol, and with the dripping
dagger still in her hand, she stood over the Empress Marivosa.  My
God!--but I did find my voice then.  I gave a cry, I tell you, fit to
wake the dead.  I suppose it was that cry which brought the unfortunate
senhorita to herself.  She dropped the dagger and ran back into her
room; and it was the Empress Marivosa who, forgetting that Dom Manol
had planned to do her the greatest wrong that any man can do to an
innocent girl, ministered to him as best she could until some of his
own men had realized what had happened and went back the way they had
just come.  But, as you know, my friends, Dom Manol was past all help.
They carried him to his room, and he died within the hour!'

'But the Empress?' some of the listeners inquired eagerly.

'The veiled prophet, her father, had come out by then--the Great
Unknown.  He said no word, but beckoned to his daughter.  She came
along the veranda to him, and he then took her by the hand and led her
away to his own apartments.  I saw her no more that night.'

'And the senhorita?' they asked.

'She was in a raging fever for two days and two nights, and could not
leave her bed, or the _quinta_.  But at noon, following the dawn on
which she started on her journey to Monsataz, a terrific fire broke out
in the _quinta_.  It started in the room where the body of Dom Manol
was lying in state before being conveyed to the family graveyard in
Bahia.  Some say that it was caused by the upsetting of one of the tall
candles, the flame of which caught a corner of the lace coverlet.
That's as it may be.  All I know is what Barbosa himself told me, which
is, that the last person to enter the death chamber, in order to look
on him who had been her lover and whom she had sent to face his Maker,
was the Senhorita Teresa da Pinto.  No one else entered the room after
that.'




XXIII

But, of course, that was not the end of the story.  They all wanted to
know about the departure of the Great Unknown and of the Empress of
Brazil from the _quinta_, where Dom Manol da Lisbao, the owner and the
host, now lay dead, and Teresa da Pinto in a raging fever.  And no one
could tell that part of the story better than Esteban, the carrier; for
he had been there all the time, from the moment when the messenger of
evil tidings arrived at full gallop with the alarming news, until that
when the Great Unknown himself--the resurrected prophet and mysterious
chieftain--deigned to enter into his, Esteban's, wagon and allowed so
humble a guide to take him to his destination.

'After that terrible hour,' Esteban resumed, as soon as he had
refreshed himself with hot coffee and a drink of rum, 'most of us did
not feel much like sleep, I can tell you.  The night was bitterly
cold--you know what they are like in the Sertao this time of year after
scorching hot days--so we lit a fire in the courtyard and squatted
round it, smoking and drinking, for one of the men of the house had
brought out a jar of rum, and it was welcome, I assure you.  But there
wasn't much talk between us: it seemed as if what we had seen had
stiffened our tongues.  The waning moon was smiling down placidly on
all the mischief she had wrought, for surely it was she who had muddled
the brain of Dom Manol da Lisbao, and turned the senhorita into the
paths of madness.

'I suppose that presently the warmth of the fire outside, and of the
rum inside our stomachs, made us all drowsy.  I, for one, curled myself
up in a blanket and must then have dropped off to sleep.  When I awoke,
the moon was still up, but the Southern Cross had begun to pale.  It
must have been an hour, or less, before dawn; the fire was out, and the
men round it all fast asleep.  I had seen nothing of the English
stranger since I left him leaning against the shafts of my wagon,
whilst I scrambled inside it.  I wondered what in the world had become
of him.  Some of the men were snoring, and in the distance I could hear
the hobbled horses fidgeting and the cattle far away snorting in the
pens.  I was feeling cold and dazed; the terrible events which I had
witnessed seemed unreal, like a horrible nightmare, which I hoped
presently to forget.  What had roused me, I do not know.  I sat up and
listened.  All the sounds were familiar enough: animals and men
breathing, the rustling of leaves, the soughing of the night breeze in
the tall grasses--they were all familiar to me.  All save one.

'It was a strange sound, my friends, that struck my ear, strange to
every dweller in the Sertao when heard in the night.  No wonder it had
roused me, for I am a light sleeper.  It was the sound of a horse's
hooves galloping full tilt in this direction.  A horse broken loose, I
thought at first, maddened, perhaps, by the sight of a jaguar and
tearing about in blind fear.  But no!--for the sound of those hooves
came nearer and nearer, never swerving to right nor left: not like a
frightened beast, or a _vaqueiro_ rounding up his cattle.

'I had been the first to be wakened by the sound, but gradually one man
woke and then another; and presently we were all of us astir, and all
of us gazing across the courtyard in the direction from which those
thundering hooves were drawing nearer and nearer.  Such amazing and
terrible events had marked the early part of this night, that in the
hearts of most of us there came the dread that this rider galloping in
the night was none other than one of the four horsemen of which the
Holy Scriptures speak.

'But he turned out to be a huge Mamaluco, riding a white horse--at
least, we all put him down as a Mamaluco, for what we saw of his face
was of a dark, reddish-brown colour: it was streaming with sweat.  He
had obviously been riding very hard.  His horse, as he drew rein
outside the stockade, was snorting and panting like a wild beast and
was covered with lather.  The man shouted loudly, demanding admittance.
By now the whole _quinta_ was astir, and the gatekeeper out with his
keys.  And there were we all, crowding round to see the gates swing
open and the horseman enter the stockade.  This he did without
dismounting, rode to the very centre of the courtyard, and then threw
up his left hand and shouted loudly: "Treachery!  Where is the
prophet?"  His poor horse, maddened with the noise and with the lot of
us all crowding round, reared and plunged in a way that would have
thrown any rider I've ever seen on a horse, but the way that Mamaluco
sat that horse, you never saw anything like it.  He was dressed like a
_vaqueiro_ from the Sertao, with leather hat and visor to shield his
face, and leather clothes head to heel, which they all wear to protect
themselves against the thorny scrub.

'And there he was, my friends, in the very middle of the courtyard, a
dark figure on a white horse, holding up one hand and shouting:
"Treachery!  I must speak with the Great Unknown."  This brought
Lean-Shanks, the huge Negro whom you all know, and who is one of the
chiefs of the prophet's bodyguard, out on the veranda of the house.  As
soon as the Mamaluco saw him, he swung himself out of the saddle and
strode across the courtyard, with all of us close on his heels, eager
to know what would happen next.

'Lean-Shanks by this time was half-way down the steps, shouting louder
than the Mamaluco: "Silence!  What is this noise?"  And again:
"Silence!  The prophet sleeps!"  And the Mamaluco raised his voice and
yelled louder still: "Wake him!  Wake him!  There's treachery in
Canudos, and I must speak with him."

'"Impossible!" was what Lean-Shanks said, but he ran down the steps and
seized the Mamaluco by the arm.  "Tell me!" he commanded.  "To no one
will I speak," the Mamaluco said, "save to the prophet: for treachery
is loose in Canudos...."  "Impossible!" the Negro declared again.  But
the other retorted loudly: "I started at sunset yesterday and have not
drawn rein since.  If I do not speak with the prophet now, Canudos
within a week will cease to be."

'I cannot, of course, repeat to you the very words that they both
spoke,' Esteban, the carrier, continued; 'but that was the substance of
what they said: the Mamaluco insisting on speaking with the prophet,
and Lean-Shanks declaring that that was out of the question.  The
Mamaluco was not shouting quite so loudly now.  In fact, his voice got
weaker and weaker, and he was gasping for breath--which was not to be
wondered at if he had ridden all the way from Canudos without drawing
rein.  Lean-Shanks was holding him by the arm all the time.  I could
see the Negro's face turning grey and his eye-balls rolling in their
sockets.  He is very full of his own importance as a rule, and they say
that he is the right-hand man of the Great Unknown and a monster of
cruelty, but I am sure that at this moment he was scared out of his
wits.  Of course, all of us who had nothing to do with him, and all
that horde of brigands over in Canudos, were not sorry to hear that
treachery had crept into their camp.  We had all hoped for some time
that the thing couldn't go on, and that the Government would one day
send out sufficient troops to break up that abominable thieving crowd,
or else that they would quarrel among themselves and just devour one
another like so many caged beasts.  This we hoped had happened now: and
there was not one amongst us, decent men, who did not rejoice to think
that all that looting and plunder and rapine would perhaps find its own
punishment at last.

'The Sertanejos who had come over with their Great Unknown jostled us
and pushed us about in order to get nearer to those two men, and hear
what else the Mamaluco had to say.  In the meanwhile that cursed moon,
who had already done so much mischief, had hidden herself behind a
cloud--and you know how dark that last hour can be just before the
dawn: we could only vaguely see the two men now at the foot of the
steps.  They were still arguing whether the Mamaluco should be allowed
to enter the presence of the Great Unknown, and at one moment
Lean-Shanks threatened him with a machete if he did not deliver his
message then and there.  But the Mamaluco was firm: "I will speak with
the prophet and no one else," he said.  He stood up boldly to the
Negro, I can tell you, and to us he appeared tall and fine and lean,
while Lean-Shanks, who, as you know, is a giant, seemed more fleshy
about the body and with limbs less firm and straight.

'However, there was never any question of a fight between them, and,
after a few minutes of all that arguing, Lean-Shanks suddenly turned
and ran up the steps, shouting: "The prophet himself shall decide!"  At
the top of the stairs he turned and loudly ordered the Mamaluco to stay
where he was at peril of his life: he alone, he said, was privileged to
enter the presence of the Great Unknown.  But the Mamaluco was not to
be done.  He, too, ran up the steps.  "There's black treachery in
Canudos," he shouted once more at the top of his voice, "and what I
have to say is for the prophet's ear alone."  And this he bellowed in a
voice that resembled a bull's--no doubt in order to attract the
attention of the Great Unknown.

'And in this he succeeded, for presently one of the doors was opened,
and there stood the tall figure of the Great Unknown in his long
flowing robes, his head and face all hidden by a veil.  At once the
Mamaluco fell on his knees, with his forehead touching the ground.
Lean-Shanks began talking very glibly, telling the story of what was
happening, but the veiled prophet ordered him to be silent, and then
looked down at the kneeling figure, and with one word ordered him to
speak.  The Mamaluco made no movement; there he knelt, with his
forehead touching the ground, and when the prophet repeated the
command: "Speak!" he said, in a funny kind of husky voice: "What I have
come to say is for the prophet's ear alone!"  The Great Unknown said,
for the third time: "Speak!"  And when the Mamaluco still remained
silent and motionless, he turned to Lean-Shanks and said, in a way that
made us all shudder: "Take him away and make him speak."  For a second
or two the Mamaluco still remained motionless, then he put out his
right hand towards the prophet, and in his hand there was a
murderous-looking dagger.  He did not speak, but he pulled the visor of
his hat right down over his face, threw back his head, bared his neck,
and said the one word: "Strike!"

'We all held our breath, for anything more awful I had never seen,
although I have travelled in many places in that desolate part of the
country.  The veiled man took the dagger and held it for a time in both
his hands.  Of course, mind you, though he is a prophet and all that,
he is no fool, and I daresay he realized that nothing would be gained
by threatening this Mamaluco.  But I suppose that the habits of years
are difficult to shake off, and the Great Unknown had been so
accustomed to hedge himself round with bodyguards, and all sorts of
paraphernalia, that he had no more pluck left in him to face any man
alone; and he must have known that he had so many enemies--desperate
men, some of them, whom he had robbed and outraged--that the fear of
assassination must always have been present in his thoughts.  In the
end, he seemed to make up his mind all of a sudden.  He turned to
Lean-Shanks and said: "Strip him, and search him: then send him in to
me."  After which, he turned on his heel and went back to his room.'

Esteban, the carrier, was coming to the end of his story.  His mouth
was very dry and had frequently to be moistened with coffee or white
rum.  It was marvellous how much of the latter he could imbibe without
losing the thread of his narrative, or the clearness of his diction.
His listeners, too, were thirsty through sheer excitement and eagerness
to know more of the last of the series of events that had marked that
unforgettable night.

'How did it all end, Esteban?' some of them cried, while others
threatened the carrier with a hiding if he did not immediately proceed.

'It ended,' Esteban resumed after a moment or two, 'as it had begun, in
a most amazing manner.  All of us down in the courtyard waited to see
what would happen.  There were a good many of the Sertanejos there, and
a number of men belonging to the _quinta_; we were, so to speak, two
camps, getting more and more hostile towards one another.  Up on the
veranda, the Mamaluco had risen to his feet.  Lean-Shanks curtly
ordered him to strip, which he began to do by taking off his leather
coat.  He had a white shirt on underneath, and as soon as his coat was
off, Lean-Shanks's huge black hands wandered over his body in search of
hidden weapons.  And suddenly, all in a flash, the Mamaluco took off
his leather hat and clamped it down over the Negro's head right down to
his ears; then, with a jerk of his knee he sent him staggering
backwards, and before Lean-Shanks could possibly recover from such a
sudden assault, he forced him against the balustrade, with his spine
bent right over the woodwork.  Of course, although the two men were
fairly equal in strength, the Negro was handicapped through that tight
hat over his eyes, and through his being taken completely by surprise.
Moreover, the whole thing had occurred so quickly, in far less seconds
than it takes to relate, and Lean-Shanks had not even the time to
bellow before the other had him by the legs and just turned him over
the balustrade, down into the courtyard below, where his big, fleshy
body came down with a thud.  Then we heard a door bang, and when we
looked up again the Mamaluco had disappeared.

'Now I must tell you that there was not one of us there who was not
convinced by this time that the Mamaluco was just an assassin, who had
come with the intention of killing that murderous prophet up there, and
who in all probability now would succeed; and I can assure you that
those of us who did not belong to that gang of pirates rejoiced at the
idea that we had seen the last of the Great Unknown, and that, with his
death, the murdering horde would in all probability soon be dispersed,
and honest farmers be allowed to live in peace for the future.  So when
the Sertanejos and _vaqueiros_ who belonged to the Great Unknown showed
signs of going first to the aid of Lean-Shanks and then, perhaps, to
swarm up the veranda for the protection of their prophet, we all did
what we could to prevent them: and a short, sharp, free fight ensued.

'Our party held the veranda steps against the Sertanejos, who could not
fight so freely as our men did because of their stiff, bulky leather
clothes, but they were more numerous than we were, and also had more at
stake.  They fought desperately, I can tell you, and at one time knives
were freely used.  The battle had commenced in silence--those
Sertanejos are always a silent lot--but in the heat and excitement of
the fight some of us did begin to shout, and there was the tramping of
feet, too, on the veranda steps as the defenders were gradually being
forced up the stairs.  Our party, I certainly thought, was getting the
worst of it.  I was watching the fight from a splendid vantage
ground--not being a fighting man, you understand--nevertheless I had
already rendered our cause signal service, for when Lean-Shanks, after
his heavy fall, began to wriggle again, I just stamped on his face
first, and then on his hands, and finally sat down upon his chest.  And
from there I could see everything beautifully.  I saw the door upon the
veranda open once more, and the veiled prophet standing there in his
long robe, as calm as you please.  Immediately behind him I caught
sight in the gloom of the beautiful Empress of Brazil.

'And there he was, the villain, still veiled and still the Great
Unknown.  At sight of him the Sertanejos stopped fighting, and all fell
on their knees, with their foreheads touching the ground; and I must
admit that I could not shake off a feeling of awe, and even of a
certain reverence, when I saw that tall mysterious figure extend an arm
and raise a hand as for a benediction.  The Sertanejos groaned and
struck the ground with their foreheads.  I felt the Negro's big body
wriggling beneath me, so, as he was still helpless and only
half-conscious, I gave his thick black throat a good squeeze, just to
keep him quiet.  And then I heard the Great Unknown say in a kind of
hoarse, sepulchral voice: "To horse!  We start for Canudos at once."
The Sertanejos all struggled to their feet, and off they went to get
their horses and wagons.  There was a good deal of confusion about the
place by that time, I can tell you.  Just think of all that had
happened in the last few hours.  Up in that house its master lay dead;
the senhorita who had killed him was in a raging fever, with half a
dozen distracted women to look after her, and as I heard later, Fra
Federico Evangelista doctoring her with his potions; and one shuddered
to think what had happened in that other room, on the threshold of
which the veiled prophet still stood, with his lovely daughter by his
side.  Did the Mamaluco lie in there dead?  Had that innocent young
girl witnessed yet another murder, a few more horrors?  What had she
seen?  What did she know?

'You know how quickly day follows night in these parts?  Well!  It was
broad daylight by now.  I thought that I had best set to work, too, and
get my team ready, and my wagon, for the journey to Cumbe and
Queimadas.  True, I had seen nothing of the English stranger for the
best part of the night, but I supposed that, like myself, he was not a
fighting man, and that he had found shelter somewhere, while all that
uproar and clamour were going on.  However, I had promised him that I
would be ready with wagon, provisions, and horses, and in any case I
had contracted to take Fra Federico Evangelista to Cumbe; so I was
making up my mind to set to work and get things straight, when I heard
the Great Unknown call once more in his sepulchral voice:
"Lean-Shanks!"  The sound of his name caused that filthy Negro to give
such a jerk of his big body that I fell off my perch, but I soon
recovered myself, and just to teach him a lesson I gave his throat
another squeeze, and as the Mamaluco's hat had rolled off his head, and
lay close by, I picked it up and clamped it hard over his face.

'The Great Unknown called once more for his faithful Lean-Shanks, and,
when one of the men in the courtyard said in reply: "Lean-Shanks is
sick and cannot move," he called out loudly: "Is Esteban, the carrier,
there?"  Imagine my surprise!  I can tell you that a bird could have
knocked me down.  I wished I could have crawled under the hood of my
wagon.  I do not pretend to be a man of courage, and the idea of being
asked for by that awesome creature up there sent a cold shiver down my
spine.  I kept as still as a mouse.  Unfortunately, some busybody had
already pointed to me and called out: "Here is Esteban!"  I thought I
should just have time to creep out of sight, and would have done it,
only that the prophet had already seen me.  To my amazement what he
said was: "Come here, Esteban.  Do not be afraid."  And what filled me
with greater amazement still, I heard a lovely, sweet woman's voice
saying: "Do not be afraid, Esteban."

'As I say, I never made pretence to be a brave man, but there was
something reassuring about that girlish voice, and after a few more
moments of reflection, I got to my feet.  I took the precaution of
stamping once more on the Negro's face and on his hands, and then I
walked boldly across the courtyard and went up the veranda steps.  The
Great Unknown and the lovely Empress had gone back to their room, but
the door stood open and, after a great deal of trepidation, I ventured
at last to knock.  Someone said: "Enter!"  And in I went.  The Great
Unknown was standing in the middle of the room, and I caught a glimpse
of the Empress standing near the window opposite.  On a couch in one
corner of the room lay what was obviously the body of the unfortunate
Mamaluco, covered over with a sheet.  It was the Empress who spoke to
me.  "Go down, Esteban," she said, "and fetch two strong men.  They
must come here and carry the body of this man down into the yard, and
lay him on the floor of your wagon.  He is a man of great
consideration, and you must treat his body with the utmost respect.
Then wait and watch beside it, and allow no one to come near.  After
that, Esteban, you will be greatly honoured because my father, the
Great Unknown, and I, myself, as well as the saintly Fra Federico
Evangelista, will travel in your wagon to Cumbe."  She waited a moment.
I suppose she saw how scared and agitated I was.  I did not relish the
idea, I can tell you, of driving that king of brigands through places
where his men had committed most revolting crimes.  But this I would
not have said to the lovely innocent girl, who, after all, could not
help being the villain's daughter.

'However, she knew well enough, apparently, what was going on in my
mind, for she came nearer to me.  In her stretched little hand I saw a
heavy-looking purse.  "Here are a thousand milreis for you, Esteban,"
she said.  "If you are discreet and watchful, if you hold your tongue
and obey my father's orders without question, there will be another
thousand milreis for you when we reach Cumbe."

'Two thousand milreis, my friends!' Esteban went on excitedly.  'Why!
I did not even know before then, that there was such a sum in the whole
countryside.  I took the purse quickly enough, I can tell you, and
would have kissed her hand, only I did not dare.  She also gave me ten
milreis for each of the men who would come up and fetch the poor
Mamaluco's body away.  Of course, I knew now that he was no Mamaluco,
or the Great Unknown--who is the most cruel and arrogant devil in
creation--would not have treated his would-be murderer with so much
consideration.  Amazed I was, I can tell you.  I did not know if I was
awake or dreaming, but the purse was real enough, and for two thousand
milreis I would have driven Satan from earth back to hell.

'Well!  I got two of Dom Manol's _vaqueiros_ to come up and give me a
hand with the body.  I didn't tell them that the Great Unknown was
still up there, or maybe they would have been as scared as I had been.
When we got to the room, however, the prophet and the Empress were no
longer there.  We lifted the body, still wrapped in a sheet, and
carried it down the stairs.  It was heavy, I can tell you: the body of
a large, powerfully-built man.  The courtyard, of course, was full of
bustle.  The Sertanejos were getting to horse, and the carriers had
finished loading the wagons: they were all waiting for the order to
start.  It was a curious fact, which struck me at once, that
Lean-Shanks, who was obviously a very sick man now, was left without
anyone near him.  I think he was hated by all the other brigands, and
that they were actually hoping that he was dead.

'Anyway, at the same moment that the three of us, carrying our gruesome
burden, reached the foot of the steps, the Great Unknown reappeared
upon the balcony.  In his deep, sepulchral voice he ordered his men to
make way for us, which they did, and we passed quietly between them to
my wagon, and laid the body down on the floor on a blanket.  I remained
there sitting under the hood with the dead man, watching over him and
waiting.  From the movement in the courtyard, from the noise and the
tramping of hooves, I gathered that the order for departure had been
given; and sure enough, when, after ten minutes or so, I ventured to
peep out from under the hood, I saw the troop of Sertanejos ride out of
the stockade, followed by a couple of carts.  And "Thank God!" I said
to myself when I saw the backs of those brigands, "the air in the
_quinta_ will be cleaner now!"

'But I still had the greatest ordeal in front of me.  As soon as the
Sertanejos had all gone, I ventured to get down from the wagon--just in
time to see the Great Unknown, with his veil and his robes, come down
the veranda steps.  The Empress was with him, and Fra Federico
Evangelista, whilst Barbosa, and half a dozen of Dom Manol's servants
were hovering round them, very obsequious and offering horses,
carriages, all sorts of things in their dead master's name, but at the
same time obviously mightily glad to see their unwelcome guests depart.
I thought to myself: "There'll be some looting done in the house
presently, as good as what the Great Unknown and his pirates have ever
done."  However, that was no business of mine.  I got blankets ready in
the wagon for my three distinguished passengers, who evidently meant me
to start immediately.  What in the world induced that mysterious and
wonderful prophet to travel in a humble carrier's cart with his
daughter, who, he claims, is Empress of Brazil, I cannot think.  But
there they were, anyway.  I helped the Empress into my wagon, and made
her as comfortable as I could, which was not easy with that dead body
lying full length on the floor.

'The Great Unknown came next.  He tried on some of his benediction
business with the crowd of Dom Manol's servants, but though they were
most respectful in their attitude, and not a little scared of him, they
did not beat the ground with their foreheads as the Sertanejos had
done.  However, when I had seen him installed beside his daughter, and
Fra Federico also as comfortable as possible, I got up into the wagon,
ordered my man to sit beside me, and slowly we swung out of the
stockade.  We left behind us a dead man, a sick woman, and a lot of
scared and distracted servants.  I never saw them or that _quinta_ of
evil again.'




XXIV

That was as far as Esteban knew of the tragic events of that memorable
affair, and that was the substance of the story which he related for
the twentieth time to his friends in the coffee-room of the station at
Bomfin while waiting for a train.  In detail the story varied at times;
with reiteration it gained in picturesqueness, but in the main facts,
it never varied, and was always listened to with eagerness and
deference.  For Esteban was a rich man now.  He was still a carrier by
trade, but what a carrier!  He owned a large number of horses and
mules, and wagons: and what's more, he had recently acquired a motor
lorry, which went lumbering on the impossible roads that led inland as
far as the Sertao.

But though he was now a man of consideration, and though his friends
and sycophants hung upon his lips when he told his exciting tale, there
were one or two points which he had never been able to elucidate to his
own satisfaction.  The chain of events was there right enough, but
there were one or two missing links in it, and Esteban often puzzled
his head over those mysteries.  This, however, he would not for worlds
have admitted to his friends.

Yes! there were one or two things which Esteban did not know: one or
two fragments which he never could piece rightly together.

He did hot know, for instance, that when Tim O'Clee, after his fight on
the veranda with Dom Manol da Lisbao, found himself so unexpectedly
out of the reach of Dom Manol's servants who were thirsting for his
blood, he had not the least idea at first where he was, nor how he had
got there.  Marivosa da Gloria had closed the door upon him, and the
room was in almost total darkness, and as the stone walls of the house
were thick and solid, he heard nothing of what was going on
outside--neither Dom Manol's cowardly attack on Marivosa, nor Teresa's
swift act of revenge.  Moreover, after the strenuous fight, and the
blows which he had received and dealt, his brain was not in a
sufficiently clear state to enable him to think and to recollect
exactly what had happened.

But this muddled condition passed away after a few minutes spent in
darkness and in solitude.  He remembered now that earlier in the
evening he had had a brief vision of Marivosa at a certain door which
gave on the veranda, that he had crept across the courtyard and up the
steps, and then lain down across the threshold to watch unseen over her
in the night.  He had had his plan already in mind then, but the time
had not yet come for putting it into execution.  He had taken off his
leather coat and used it as a pillow, but he did not sleep.  Thank God
that he had been able to locate the room where Marivosa lay helpless at
the mercy of the most devilish blackguard that had ever defiled God's
earth.  Then had come the fight, and his unexpected and unexplainable
rescue.  And, since then, confused sounds of heavy, tramping feet, of
thuds, of swinging and closing doors, and a few vague mutterings, had
alone reached his consciousness.  He wondered what was happening out
there.  Had he been lucky enough to send Dom Manol to Hades, or so far
injured him that he could do no more mischief for some time to come?
He knew not.  He waited for some time till the tramping outside on the
veranda had subsided: then he opened the door cautiously and peeped
out.  There was no one on the veranda now except at its farthest end:
and there he saw Dudley Stone standing in one of the doorways, with his
arm round his daughter's shoulders.  Satisfied that his beloved was, at
any rate, in safety with her father for the moment, he turned his
attention to the courtyard.  Vague forms were flitting soundlessly
about.  The men, after the excitement of the fight, were making ready
to light a camp-fire and to snatch a little rest before the dawn.

Tim hesitated.  His plan was clear and ready in his mind, but secrecy
was his only sure ally, and the more men there were about when he
started, the greater the risk of failure.  And fail he would not.  Not
on your life!  His beloved.  His mate.  The better part of his very
soul.  Out of the jaws of death, out of the clutches of fiends he would
snatch her this night, and resting in his arms she would forget the
cruel past, the lies, the deceptions--all that she had endured--and
learn at last how fair God's earth could be, and how exquisite was love.

Tim looked about him.  His eyes were growing accustomed to the gloom,
and he saw that exactly opposite the door there was a window.  It was
shuttered, of course, but he soon had it open and peeped out.  It gave
on a grove of palms and acacias, and beyond this was the open country:
cultivated fields, with a few huts dotted about, some outhouses,
stables, and the horse and cattle-pens.  The height from the window to
the ground was fifteen feet, perhaps, not more.  Tim swung himself over
the sill and dropped down.

'Now for a bit of luck, and a horse,' he said to himself, as he plunged
into the belt of trees.  The waning moon was a tiresome enemy, for she
shed a brilliant radiance over every exposed bit of ground, but, guided
by ear and nostrils, Tim found his way to one of the lean-to sheds
where a dozen or more horses were tethered.  With a quick and practised
eye he adjudged their respective qualities, selected the one most
suited to his purpose and saddled it.  In one of the stalls there was a
pile of leather clothes.  He found a coat that was not too small for
him, slipped it on, led the horse out to a piece of soft ground,
mounted and rode away.

He rode at random.  For hours.  Over fields and cultivated land, till
his horse was covered with lather, and its flanks shook with excitement
and exhaustion.  Only once did he draw rein and dismount by the bank of
a narrow stream, where grew the huge dock-like leaves which yield a
dark brown juice.  He gathered an armful of these: then stripped to the
skin, and rubbed his face and his body all over with the stain.
Carefully he did it, and thoroughly.  It was one of the many tricks
which he had learned from his kind old friend, Fra Federico.  All over
his body did he rub the juice, for he would take no risks this night.

'I look like a bally nigger now,' he said triumphantly, examining his
fine long limbs, his hands, his feet.  'Bless Fra Federico for this and
many other things.'

He swung himself up in the saddle once more.  Weary?  Not a bit of it!
And again he rode and rode round and round over fields and cultivated
lands.  What would Uncle Justin have said to this?  'Always save your
horse, boy, never weary him.'  And here was he, Tim, riding his horse
nearly to death.

And when the waning moon after reaching her zenith began her downward
course, he made his way to the stony road which gleamed white and dusty
in her light, and rode, still at breakneck speed, back to the _quinta_.

Nothing of this did Esteban guess when he talked of the Mamaluco, of
Lean-Shanks, and of the Great Unknown.  How could he guess that the
Mamaluco who threw Lean-Shanks over the balustrade down into the
courtyard below, and then entered the presence of the veiled prophet,
was none other than the English stranger?

'Now speak!' the veiled prophet had commanded, as soon as Tim had
followed him into the room.  He was standing with his back to a large
table littered with papers, and Tim came close to him.  'Stand back!'
he added suddenly, but that command came just a second too late, for
Tim had learned many tricks from the finest sportsman in Ireland.  With
the swiftness of lightning his left shot out and caught the charlatan
under the jaw; he staggered and fell prone across the table, with Tim
all at once on the top of him, squeezing his long, lean throat to the
point of unconsciousness.  Dudley Stone was no longer a young man.
What chance had he against this other, who had everything on his side;
youth, training, knowledge, and, above all, incentive--the greatest
incentive of all, the safety and happiness of his beloved?

And Tim was of set purpose.  He had thought it all out, planned it, and
schemed and estimated every eventuality.  Marivosa's presence, her
non-presence: how he would act in either case.  Well! she was not here.
Not at the moment.  So it was all quite simple.  One hand firmly
clamped on the old villain's face, finger and thumb holding the
nostrils tightly pressed together: then the phial in the pocket of the
belt, the precious potion concocted by Fra Federico Evangelista, which
had already saved Tim's life--saved it for the means of escape of his
beloved from the hell which her own father had prepared for her.  And
now it would do its work again, finish the great work it had begun.
The nostrils held tightly: the phial pressed to the half-conscious
man's lips, the precious potion poured into his mouth.  Then the
convulsive, mechanical movement of the sinews as the fluid slowly
trickled down the throat.

A second later Tim looked up.  Marivosa had come into the room.  At
first, probably, she could not make out what was happening; she did not
see her father, only Tim's back.  But when he looked up and
straightened himself out, she recognized him immediately.  In spite of
the dark stain on his face she recognized him.  Had she been for a
moment in doubt, she would have called for help.  But seeing him, she
remained silent, even though she saw her father lying prone right
across the table, with the veil torn from his face.

'You have killed him?'

The words came like a hoarse murmur from her throat.  Her face was
whiter than any ivory, and her eyes dilated in a look of horror.

'I swear that I have not,' Tim replied in a hurried whisper.  'By my
love for you, I swear that I have done him no harm.  If you trust
me--if you love me, help me now, and within the hour you and I will be
miles away in safety.'

Then, as for a second or two she still remained motionless, standing
there and staring at him, he said once more: 'If you love me, help me
now--or else we must both perish.'

Confused sounds came from the outside: fighting, shouting, tramping.
Tim knew that he had less than three minutes to spare: three minutes in
which to lift the inert body from the table, take off the long robe,
wrap it round himself, pick up the veil, and swathe his face and head
with it.  He had not glanced again on Marivosa.  He dared not look at
her again.  On her trust in him, now, at this supreme moment, depended
his life and hers: in her tiny hands she held both their destinies.
And the moment of uncertainty was so tense that he dared not look on
her and learn what their fate was to be.

There was plenty of noise down in the courtyard: greater and louder did
it grow every moment, but it seemed to come from very far away.  Here
in the room it seemed so still--so still, that Tim thought he could
hear the beating of his own heart in his breast.  And then, all of a
sudden, a sound broke that stillness, a sound so strange that Tim must
needs catch his breath and marvel if excitement had not addled his
senses: for the sound was not only strange.  It was like the most
delicious music that comes from a choir of angels--the music of a
girlish laugh.  A sweet, low, rippling laugh, like the trill from a
warbler's throat.  And then, the words: 'Oh, Tim! you don't know how
funny you look!'

Thus did he learn that all was well.  But there was no time now, not
even for a kiss.  She understood everything.  Guessed at what she did
not know.  She fetched a sheet from the next room and helped him to lay
it over her father's body.  She also put a wad of milreis into his hand.

'We'll need it,' she said simply.

For a second, then, did he look into her sweet face, and, resting his
hand on the body of that cruel mountebank, who was her father, he said
earnestly: 'He will sleep for forty-eight hours, as I did once.  I
swear to you that he is not dead.'


Then he went out on the veranda in full sight of all the men, while
Marivosa went to find Fra Federico.




XXV

But Esteban knew nothing about all that.  All he knew was that the
Mamaluco had forced his way into the chamber of the Great
Unknown--presumably with murderous intent--but that it was the Great
Unknown who came out of the chamber unscathed: while he, Esteban, was
ordered to lay the dead body of the mysterious Mamaluco on the floor of
his wagon.

That the Mamaluco was a mysterious personage was patent to Esteban.
Had he not been ordered by no less a person than the Empress Marivosa
herself to treat that inert form under the sheet with every care and
respect?  But Esteban had not done with surprises and puzzlement yet.
Indeed, the next few hours were richer in excitement than any that had
gone before; for what occurred during the previous night were matters
that pertained to man and woman--such men and women as Esteban was
acquainted with--wild, primitive, savage natures, with primal instincts
of hate, jealousy, and revenge, culminating in outrage or murder:
whereas what occurred in the course of the next two days savoured of
the supernatural.  And although it was all made clear to Esteban
subsequently, he never could quite repress a shudder of superstitious
awe when he thought over the events of those two days.

That the beautiful Empress of Brazil and her extraordinary father
should choose to travel in a carrier's wagon was in itself a strange
occurrence.  An inexplicable occurrence really: for why did they not go
back to Canudos with their own escort of armed brigands?  However,
there they were, under the hood of Esteban's cart, and whenever Esteban
looked over his shoulder at them, the arm of the veiled prophet was
round his daughter's shoulders and her little head was resting against
his breast.  That, of course, was right and proper, and even
understandable.  Though the man was an arch-pirate and a cattle-thief,
he loved his daughter apparently: and even the fearsome mother jaguar
cares for her progeny.

At intervals, too, the lovely Empress would stoop over the inert body
on the floor of the wagon, raise the sheet, and look down on the face
beneath it.  And once Esteban caught sight of her face after she had
done this, and he saw that there were tears in her eyes.  But then the
veiled prophet said something in a language which Esteban did not
understand, whereupon the Empress smiled through her tears.  This,
again, was both natural and understandable.

The puzzle came when, on another occasion, Esteban looked over his
shoulder and saw that the Great Unknown held the Empress in both his
arms, and that he was kissing her in a way that to Esteban's knowledge
no man had ever kissed his own daughter before: he kissed her on the
mouth, the eyes, and just between her throat and chin; and to Esteban
it seemed as if he would never leave off kissing the beautiful Empress
of Brazil.

But apparently the sight of those two kissing in that way had no ill
effect on Fra Federico's peace of mind.  He sat opposite the Empress,
with the inert body of the Mamaluco lying between them on the floor.
The priest had an open book on his knee, the contents of which he must
have known by heart, for despite the jolting of the wagon he kept his
eyes fixed upon the book, and went on murmuring words and words and
words, not one of which did Esteban understand, and which no man living
could possibly have read out of the book, which bumped and bumped on
Fra Federico's knee as the wagon went lumbering over the stony road.

What already then struck Esteban as extraordinary was that during this
period of kissing, the prophet had drawn aside his veil.  Esteban,
however, could not see his face, but it struck him as odd that the
man's hair should be crisp and brown, like the hair of a young rather
than old man.  Also what Esteban saw of his hands and arms suggested
the hands and arms of a young and vigorous man.  Strangely, also, they
appeared to have been stained recently with dock leaves: some of the
stain had worn off and looked streaky, showing lines of singularly
white skin between the dark ones--all of which gave Esteban a great
deal of food for thought.

And suddenly, there came the greatest surprise of all.  This was just
about midday, when a rest for the horses and men had become imperative,
also food and drink.  Esteban drew rein in a small coppice, where a few
coarse palms, tall scrub, and acacia trees afforded welcome shade from
the glaring sun.  He knew of a water-hole close by, and, jumping down
from the wagon, he ordered his man to do the same, to unhitch the mules
and take them for a drink.  He was busy for a time with his man, the
mules and the wagon-shaft, and it was only after a few minutes that he
turned round, with a view to receiving further orders from his exalted
passengers.

And that was the moment in Esteban's life when he felt more pious,
because more terrified than he had ever been before.  All he could do
was to try and remember the prayers to his guardian angel and to his
patron saint which the cur of his native village had taught him, for
he needed protection from Heaven in face of what looked neither more
nor less than black art.  What did he see?  He saw the Great Unknown
standing there in the dusty road, busy divesting himself of his flowing
robes.  His veil he had already cast aside.  And a moment later, there
stood revealed before Esteban's astounded gaze the face and form of the
mad English stranger!

Esteban fell on his knees, and murmured: 'Lord, have mercy on me, for I
am but a miserable sinner!'  Whereupon the stranger laughed in the
happy, hearty way which Esteban knew of old, and he came round to where
Esteban was kneeling, raised him to his feet as if he were a child,
slapped him on the back with such a thump that the poor man saw a
constellation of stars, and said, with another equally loud laugh:

'Didn't I tell you, man, that I would come away from Canudos laden with
a hamper provided for me by the Great Unknown?  There's the hamper,
friend Esteban.  Spread out the feast for the loveliest Empress the
world has ever known: then go and feed yourself.  Eat your fill, and
drink your fill, for you see before you the happiest man on God's
earth.'

Esteban's senses were positively reeling.  How and when had the
sortilege occurred?  Was the mad English stranger in reality the Great
Unknown--the impudent cattle-thief, the hellish brigand and pirate?
Was he the Mamaluco, and had he slain the Great Unknown?  Was he father
or lover of this Marivosa da Gloria, Empress of Brazil?  These were
puzzles to which Esteban has never found a completely satisfactory
answer to this day.  All he could do at the time was to obey the
commands of the great and mysterious personage, encouraged, and in a
way comforted, by the presence and kindly smile of the beautiful
Empress.

And while Esteban carefully unpacked the hamper and laid the provisions
in the dense shade of a clump of tall scrub, he could see through the
corner of his eye the English stranger and the lovely Empress standing
under an overhanging acacia tree.  He had his arm round her, and every
moment she would look up into his face; whereupon Esteban, being a man
of discretion, promptly looked another way.

But poor Esteban could not bring himself to eat.  Thoughts of that
inert body lying on the floor of his wagon worried him into a lack of
appetite.  If the veiled prophet whom he had seen walking out of the
_quinta_ and entering the wagon at dawn to-day was the English
stranger, whose body was it that he, Esteban, had carried down the
veranda steps and laid reverently on the floor of the wagon?  That,
again, was a puzzle, the true solution of which Esteban has never found
to this day.  That the man was not dead became, of course, evident as
the two days of the long, wearisome journey went by.  He just lay there
on the floor of Esteban's cart, rigid and still, for a day and a night,
and then the whole of the next day.  What power on earth, heaven or
hell, kept him thus Esteban dared not conjecture.  It was comforting to
see Fra Federico sitting there so quietly all the time, telling his
beads or murmuring orisons at intervals, or else muttering to himself
words out of his big book.  It made Esteban feel that if the worst came
to the worst and Satan had, in very truth, something to do with all
that sortilege, then Fra Federico would be there ready to shrive him,
Esteban, and his driver from participation in the black art.

It was towards the close of the second day's journey that the inert
mass under the sheet first began to stir.  Esteban by now had become
accustomed to his surroundings.  The English stranger, with his
laughter and his jokes, had done his best to put him at his ease, Fra
Federico had been encouraging and kind, and the lovely Empress gracious
and merry.  At the first stirring of the man under the sheet Esteban
was ordered to halt.  His three passengers at once ministered to the
revitalized corpse, plied him with drink, then laid him down to rest
once more.  Esteban did not dare to look round too often.  During the
remainder of the way to Cumbe he was ordered alternately to halt and to
move on, which he did obediently, smothering his curiosity as best he
could.  That the inert mass had become a living person was, of course,
patent: that he was a man of great consideration was equally so.  What
puzzled Esteban was that the beautiful young Empress ministered to all
his wants with such obvious tenderness and affection.

But the man did not respond: neither by word nor sign did he respond to
Marivosa da Gloria's gentleness, nor to the English stranger's
solicitude, and he repulsed Fra Federico's attempts at ministration
with rude words and contemptuous gestures.  He hardly ever spoke: gave
no reply when the others spoke to him.  Most of the time he still lay
on the floor of the wagon, almost as stark and certainly as silent as
before.  He spent the intervening night on the floor of the wagon, and
the best part of the next day.  In the afternoon he sat up for a time,
but still he did not speak, although the lovely Empress would often
look at him tenderly with tear-filled eyes.

Puzzle?  Of course it was a puzzle, an unsolvable riddle.  Surely it
could not be the Great Unknown himself, the mysterious chief of an army
of five thousand lawless brigands, the resurrected prophet, the
claimant to the throne of Brazil, who had travelled for two days and
two nights, still and stark on the floor of a carrier's wagon?  No
wonder that Esteban no longer knew whether he himself was alive or
dreaming.

Cumbe was reached on the evening of the third day.  Esteban brought his
wagon to a halt in the centre of the village, opposite Fra Federico's
dwelling-house.  With what wonderful feelings of joy and triumph did
Tim O'Clee jump down from the wagon and look once more on the squalid
huts, the dusty square, the stuffy store which had been the setting for
the first act in his romantic adventure; the old familiar smell of
coffee and peat pervaded the atmosphere.  The same actors in that scene
were still here: the naked, pot-bellied children, the dusky, wide-eyed
women.  They all gazed on him, on the wagon, on the lovely girl beside
him, with the same silent, melancholy wonder as before.

Fra Federico had offered the hospitality of his dilapidated, musty
abode to his fellow-travellers.  The English stranger and the Empress
accepted with gratitude.  A woman was pressed into doing some cleaning
in the two rooms before the hammocks were slung up for the night.  But,
as before, the mystery man refused to leave the wagon.  He took no
food: just lay there like a log, obstinately shutting his ears to every
word of hospitality and solicitude; presumably he was already asleep.

By order of the Empress, Esteban placed a few simple provisions inside
the cart within easy reach of the sleeper.  Then he bade good night to
everyone, drew the wagon across the square close to the store, where he
and his man, and his horses, found shelter for the night.




XXVI

At dawn the next morning in the dilapidated little church of Cumbe, far
from the haunts of civilization, Fra Federico pronounced a blessing on
the Empress of Brazil and the English stranger.  Esteban, who had
contracted to take them to Queimadas, where they wished to take the
train to Pernambuco, declared that he witnessed the simple little
ceremony with tears running down his cheeks, and when those two
beautiful young creatures subsequently said farewell to the old priest,
Esteban sobbed like a child.

Never had he seen anything so affecting.  The Empress kissed Fra
Federico's old, withered hand, and the English stranger begged him to
come away with them.

'Let us make a home for you, Padre, in good Old Oireland,' he said,
'where you can live your life in peace, with your orisons and your
books.  I promise you that your fame will be spread all over the world,
and that the bigwigs from every part will come in pilgrimage just to
have a talk with you, and the Pope will make you a cardinal or whatever
else you wish to be.'

But all that the lovely Empress said was: 'Come with us, dear Father
Federico, and we will love you and care for you, and never cease to be
grateful to you for all you have done for us.'

But the old priest only smiled and gently shook his head.

'I thank you both, my dear, dear children,' he said, 'but I want no
home on this earth.  I look forward very soon to my last home in
Heaven.  Until then, I have the few books which I love, and there are a
few simple souls in these lonely byways whom it has been my privilege
to bring a little nearer to God.  I could not now leave them to become
once more a prey to Satan.  What few more years it pleases God to grant
me, I will devote to His service.'

Thus they parted, with many more words in a tongue which Esteban did
not understand.  Their eyes were full of tears: only the old man's face
remained serene and irradiated with unuttered happiness.

Together the little group now walked across the square to where
Esteban's driver was busy attending to the horses; the storekeeper
stood by, staring and offering no assistance.  It seemed as if the
thought of her father suddenly roused Marivosa out of the sadness which
her parting from Fra Federico had brought about.  She ran along despite
the heat, outdistancing the others.

A cry of alarm from her soon brought Tim to her side.

'He went about an hour ago,' Esteban's driver said in answer to mute
looks of anxiety from Tim and Marivosa, 'while you were in there.' He
pointed to the little church, and then added, with a careless shrug: 'I
thought you knew.'

'An hour ago!' Marivosa exclaimed, and looked appealingly at Tim.

'We wait, then, till the senhor returns?' Esteban asked.

'Of course we wait,' Tim replied; 'but find out at once, Esteban, which
way the senhor went.'

Esteban did his best.  He interrogated the wide-eyed, melancholy women
who sat in front of their huts, stirring their cooking-pots.  He also
interrogated the biggest of the pot-bellied _pequenos_.  All of them
agreed that the senhor had got out of the wagon about an hour ago, and
that he had wandered out into the scrub.  A certain number of
coffee-coloured arms were extended to show in which direction the
strange senhor had gone.

Tim and Esteban and the driver, as well as one or two of the taller
_pequenos_, went off in search of the missing man.

They found him within a few hundred yards of the village.  Tim and
Esteban found him.  He was lying in the scrub, face downwards, with a
terrible gash across his throat.  The knife, which belonged to one of
Esteban's provision baskets, had fallen out of his convulsed right hand
and lay near by.  Close by, also on the ground, a dirty scrap of paper,
held down by a stone, fluttered feebly in the breeze.

Tim lifted the stone.  Four words were scribbled on the paper in pencil
above the initials 'D.S.'

'_Now do your damnedest!_'

Esteban went back to fetch his driver and a couple of boys.  They
borrowed the tools from the storekeeper, and they buried the mysterious
adventurer on the spot where they had found him.  Fra Federico--gentle,
understanding, Christian-spirited as always, murmured the prayers for
the dead above the lonely grave.

Dudley Stone, cruel, vengeful, arbitrary to the end, had chosen to face
his Maker rather than face the complications which his downfall from
his proud position of Emperor and Seer, the death of his associate and
the loss of his daughter, would bring into his life.

The one man who had defied and outwitted him, the man who had humbled
his arrogance and had stolen his daughter, was, like a conqueror of
old, taking him captive and in chains to witness his triumph.
Well!--the adventurer, after having staked his all, had lost.  The
story of his capture and of his humiliation, known already to Esteban
the carrier, would be all over the countryside very soon.  Never again
would his prestige as the resurrected prophet rally the scum of
humanity round him.  Never again could he, with uplifted arm, wander
across the desert in the midst of thousands kneeling with heads in the
dust at his feet.

To the adventurer it was not the loss of fortune that mattered: that
might, no doubt, have been recovered to a very large extent.  It was
the mummery, the bodyguard of fearsome Lieutenants, the oaths
administered while the heavens rolled out their thunders: it was the
rle of Seer and Emperor that had been the breath of his life.  Hatred
of the man who had robbed him of it all guided the knife which brought
about the supreme end.

That, at any rate, was to Tim O'Clee the only plausible explanation of
Dudley Stone's dying message to him.  But, as a matter of fact, the
mystery that brought about the adventurer's death remained as
unsolvable as that which had guided his life.  The Great Unknown
remained the Great Unknown to the end.




XXVII

Often now Tim and Marivosa talk of those far-off days on the arid lands
of the Sertao--the dangers, the mysteries, the horrors of that
never-to-be-forgotten time.

And Marivosa da Gloria looks up with a smile at her husband and murmurs
the question: 'Was it worth while after all?'

It would be indiscreet to put on record Lord Traskmoore's reply to that
question.  Suffice it to say that it was not couched in words.  'Was it
worth while?'  The most glorious adventure that had ever come a man's
way, culminating in the possession of the most exquisite woman that had
ever come out of the Creator's hands!  Was it worth while?  Even
though, when on landing in England, Tim O'Clee learned that the child
born of the illegal marriage of Uncle Justin and Hold-Hands Juliana was
dead, and that he, Timothy O'Clerigh, had therefore automatically
succeeded to the title and estates of Traskmoore: even though the life
or death of Dudley Stone meant nothing more now, it still was very much
worth while.

A marriage in the English church at Pernambuco, a year's honeymoon in
Italy and France, and Marivosa da Gloria, woman-like, adapted herself
as easily to European conditions and the rle of a great lady in
Ireland as she had done to that of potential Empress of Brazil.

Anyway, she was the finest horsewoman in Ireland--a sure passport to
the love and admiration of the old country's many gallant sportsmen.

And Hold-Hands Juliana has found her right milieu in Cannes and in
Deauville.  She is rich, with a superb jointure and the undisputed
title of Dowager Countess of Traskmoore--a still surer passport to the
love and admiration of cosmopolitan crowds.

For the sake of Uncle Justin's beloved memory, the legality of his
marriage was never touched upon after Tim's return from Brazil: though
he would have loved to have seen one more dream of his come true--the
one which he had dreamed that night at Cumbe, when he saw Hold-Hands
Juliana in cap and apron, on her hands and knees scrubbing the floors
of Traskmoore.




[End of Marivosa, by Baroness Orczy]
