Don Louis, confounded by the impassiveness of the speaker, whose face remained calm and voice tranquil, began to feel himself growing angry.
"Now, general," he said, raising his voice, "I have a right to ask you clearly what game we are playing.
"A very simple one, my dear count, I repeat to you; and you can, if you really desire it, hold all the trumps in your hand."
"I confess that I do not at all understand you."
"That is impossible!"
"On my honour! I should feel most sincerely obliged by your explaining to me clearly what is happening; for I assure you that I am in a fog from which I despair ever to escape."
"That depends on yourself alone."
"By Heavens, general, you will allow that you are jesting with me?"
"Not the least in the world."
"What? At the request of your government, I come to Sonora with permission to work the mines. Owing to your influence, as you yourself allow, my treaty is signed. Confiding in Mexican honesty, I organise an expedition—I arrive; and my partners, yourself first of all, turn against me and treat me, not as their friend, their representative, not with even the respect due to a gentleman, but affect to consider me as almost a filibuster."