Driscoll appreciated the dilemma. The carriage would be in the line of fire. He had had an intuition of its occupants, and for that reason had kept back his men.
“Where was she going?” he demanded.
Rodrigo feigned surprise. “And where,” he asked, “or rather, to whom, should Your Mercy imagine?”
To Querétero! To Maximilian, of course! This, too, Driscoll had divined already.
“No matter,” he retorted shortly, “but how did you run across her this time?”
The outlaw filled his chest, “You Americans, señor, do not understand the feelings of a man bowed under a heavy wrong. You––”
385“We’ll let it go at that,” said Driscoll, with a little wave of the hand, “but–how in––”
“You scoff already, señor? But will you, at these stains of blood? Then let me say to you, señor mio, they make me remember one shameless deed for which the tyrant Maximilian must pay.”
The stains Rodrigo meant were on a little ivory cross which he had taken from his jacket. The emblem served him to lash his emotions, to goad his precious sense of wrong. He studied the cross intently; then, by a vast and excruciating effort, thrust it into Driscoll’s hand.
“Yes, yes,” he cried, “you must take it! He said so.”