The stolid face had not once changed; and now that another driver approached, he went sus-ushing off through the mud with never a sidelong glance.
Alberto felt himself grown suddenly pale; but he was no fool. He glanced at the intruder. It was a new man from the country—a tall, powerful fellow with a huge scar on his cheek, shifty eyes, and a beak which had already earned him the nickname of Narigudo—“Big Nose.” He in turn sent a sly, sharp look first at the young Indian ahead, then at the young manager. The latter was already walking quietly toward the well-house.
The silver bell in the old belfry clanged noon. The waders, of two legs and four, clambered out from the mud. In a moment blindfolds and harness lay on the flagging, and the mules, suddenly optimistic, went braying and scampering out through the great gate to bathe and drink by the highway in the little stream which has carried more precious burdens, doubtless, than any other brook on earth.[42] A moment later there was a more deafening clatter, as the hundred mules from the mills came gallopading down the flags in a very avalanche. They would have to work six hours more; but they knew the noon hour. Resistless as a charge of cavalry, they swept around the corners and out of the gate in a jam which seemed sure to kill some of them.
Alberto had laughed a thousand times at this daily avalanche; but now he saw it with far-off eyes. He dipped his hand in a bucket of the pump-wheel and bathed his head, wherein a thousand or more little prickles snapped. It was enough to make anyone’s brain crackle—robbers all about, accomplices in the hacienda itself, nearly fifty thousand dollars in the room at the head of the corridor, and he alone!
This boy had been carefully reared. He was unused to danger and to responsibility; and now he was fearfully scared. And yet—well, he had inherited something from the men who conquered that wilderness so many centuries ago.
In five minutes the young administrador was making his rounds as usual, now and then stopping to pick up a sample of ore and examine it with great apparent interest. Among the groups of laborers he passed at lunch he felt, with a little shiver, that some eyes were on him even more sharply than they are always on the administrador’s back; but outwardly he gave no sign, as he figured away at very much the toughest problem he had ever dreamed of.
Suddenly he struck his head, and turned and walked down to the patio. In full view of the men he took a careful sample from the mud omelet here and there, scrutinized it critically, and carried it off to the assay-room. In ten minutes he was out again; and walking up among the laborers, he said: “A holiday for all, this afternoon. For to me the torta looks to be cooked, and Don Ygnacio should be here to-night, who will know. Go, then; but at dawn again.”
That was an end of lunch, of course. The men sprang up with “Infinite thanks, sir!” and were already making for the gate, except Narigudo and four others, who mumbled over their last enchilada, instead of throwing it away, and looked first at their mates and then at one another.
“Señor, I do not think it done,” broke out “Big Nose,” sullenly.
“Who gave thee a candle in this funeral?” Alberto retorted, coolly. “Answerest thou to the owner whether there be loss or gain?”