"Parbleu! Seeing that it was I who conducted you there. You were seated near the secretary."
"Señor Vallejos—just so—a very amiable gentleman. Well, these ladies are on the point of quitting Casa-Frama. Don Pablo consents to their departure."
"You wish to leave with them?"
"You have not guessed it; I should like to leave, it is true, but not with them; since they go under the escort of Spanish officers, I should be of no service to them."
"Just so."
"Then they will no longer have any pretext for preventing me quitting them."
"That is true; then—"
"Then I desire that you get your brother to grant me—unless you would prefer to give it me yourself—a safe conduct to traverse your lines and regain as quickly as possible Tucuman, which I ought never to have left."
"Is it really to return to Tucuman that you want a safe conduct?"
"For what reason should it be, then?"