"I do not need to be told that my father is generous when he is pleased," murmured Francesca.
"Listen, then, to what Senior Reade has written. It cannot help but give you much pleasure."
"The shameless rascal!" Tom exclaimed, inwardly, as the trick became clear to him. "Don Luis is trading upon our sympathies for the girl in order to induce us to sign his lying report."
Don Luis began to read the report, translating into Spanish as he went along. When he came to tables of tedious figures Montez skipped over them hurriedly. He dwelt eagerly, however, on the paragraphs of the report that asserted such vast wealth to exist in El Sombrero. Francesca listened with rising color. Once in a while she shot a pretty, sidelong glance at Tom to show her pleasure over the report, the whole authorship of which she plainly believed to belong to him.
"Why, it reads like a romance!" the girl cried, clapping her hands when the reading had finished.
"A romance? Yes!" ground Tom, under his breath. "It is romance—pure fiction and absurdly false in every line!"
"It must be a wonderful talent to possess, senor," said Francesca, turning to Tom Reade. "A wonderful talent to be able to describe a matter of business in such eloquent language."
"It is a rare gift," Tom admitted modestly, though he had a design in what he was saying. "A rare gift, indeed, and one which I must not claim. This is your father's report, not mine. He had written it in English, and all I did was to copy it on the typewriter, and to make the English stronger at points. So I am not the author—merely the clerk."
Don Luis frowned for a fleeting instant. Then his brow cleared, and one of his charming smiles lighted his face.
"The report is a superb piece of work, and you must not believe as much as Senor Tomaso's modesty would lead him to believe, chiquita. But this is an engineer's report, and, as such, it is not complete until it is signed. Hand it to Senor Reade, chiquita, and ask him to sign it. Then Senor Hazelton will do the same."