The big, strong fingers of his uninjured hand formed themselves into a sturdy fist. The man's stern, sun-tanned face hardened, and there came over his features a look which told better than any words that Mr. Blunt would deal promptly and with the utmost severity with his enemies.
"Yes," he went on, "they shall have little leniency from me, for nothing but the severest measures and a stern example will stop their practices. However, do not let me trouble you any longer. I have told you that many political exiles from Italy have come to South America and have settled near Montevideo, and, knowing that, you can realize that one or more can send news of me to these people in Italy. There are paid spies amongst them, and if I were to take up my quarters for long in one of the towns, such as Montevideo or Buenos Ayres, why, I should be inviting trouble. There are ruffians to be employed in every city. Now, let us take a stroll on deck. The city of Rio looks magnificent when seen from the sea."
They clambered up the companion and strolled arm in arm from bow to stern, their eyes tracing the city by the numerous lights which twinkled from streets and windows. Late that night they turned in, Mr. Blunt to fall asleep at once, in spite of his wounded shoulder, and Dudley to lie awake and think, and dream of the life before him, of camp fires, of a bed beneath the stars, and of a life of freedom and hardship out in the open.
"Just what I should like," he said over and over again to himself. "I shall do my best to become expert with a horse and to keep up my shooting, while I shall try to learn the business of managing a rancho. Perhaps some of these days I might become manager for Mr. Blunt, or even his partner. At any rate I mean to get on and make a living."
He fell into an uneasy slumber at last, and gradually his still active brain turned from the pampas, from what he imagined a rancho to be, to Italy, to the terrible vendetta which had cast such a cloud over his friend's life. Little did he imagine, or even dream, that in days soon to come he, Dudley Compton, would become involved in that vendetta himself, and stand in fear of his life.
Early on the following morning the anchor was roused, the sails hoisted, and the ship set on a course for Montevideo. A week later they came to a rest off the town.
"We get off here and transship to a river boat," said Mr. Blunt. "I have friends ashore, and we will stay with them for a couple of days, while I lay in a stock of stores for the rancho. At the same time we will get you a suitable outfit. In those clothes you are at once conspicuous, while, if dressed in gaucho costume, no one will know you from a native of the place, for you are as brown as any white man could be."
Having shaken hands with the officers and the passengers who still remained aboard, Dudley clutched his guncase in his hand and went over the side into the small boat awaiting them. They were rowed to the quay, and soon were at the house of Mr. Blunt's friends. Two days later they embarked on a small river boat, a mass of stores being placed aboard under Dudley's supervision.
"Check every article carefully," said Mr. Blunt, "for though people are for the most part honest, it is as well to remember that a ruffian is to be found here and there. How do you like your new outfit, lad? You look well in it."
Dudley colored, for he had donned the garments for the first time that morning. He wore a shirt of dark-blue flannel, open at the neck save where the folds of an ample red scarf surrounded the collar. A wide sombrero of black felt covered his head, an ostrich feather standing up from the ribbon. His nether garments consisted of a pair of trousers of light material; and over these he wore a pair of split buckskin leggings, reaching to his waist, fringed with leather tassels on either side, and the whole held in position by a strong leather belt which encircled his waist, and in which a hunting knife was thrust. On his right hip, with the butt protruding from the top of the pocket stitched to the leggings, was his revolver, so placed that it was always ready to his hand, and yet was out of the way on ordinary occasions, and clear of the saddle when riding. A pair of enormous spurs, with big rowels, completed his outfit, but he wisely refrained from wearing them.