They had a hasty breakfast and started again, but rested for some time in a belt of forest during the heat of the day. In the early evening they approached a white aldea perched high upon the edge of a ravine. Evelyn's guide made her understand that they might not be allowed to pass. He implied that she was in no danger, but it was with some anxiety that she rode toward the village.
They skirted the side of the ravine, which was fretted with tumbling cataracts. Steep rocks ran up from the edge of the trail and were lost in climbing forest a hundred feet above, but after a time the chasm began to widen, and small, square houses straggled about its slopes. A barricade of logs, however, closed the road, and as Evelyn approached two men stepped out from behind it. They were ragged and unkempt, but they carried good modern rifles.
"Halt!" ordered one of them.
"Confianza!" the guide answered, smiling, and they let him pass.
Beyond the barricade, the guide stopped in front of an adobe building that seemed to be an inn, for a number of saddled mules were tied around it. Men were entering and leaving and a hum of voices came from the shadowy interior, but the peon motioned to Evelyn that she must get down and wait. Finding a stone bench where she was left undisturbed, she sat there for half an hour while it grew dark, and then a man came up and beckoned her to enter. She went with some misgivings, and was shown into a room with rough mud walls, where a man sat under a smoky lamp at a table upon which a map and a number of papers were spread. He wore plain, white clothes, with a wide red sash; and two others, dressed in the same way, stood near, as if awaiting his orders. Evelyn knew the man, for she had seen him at the International.
"Confianza!" she said. "I believe you are Don Martin Sarmiento."
He gave her a quick glance, and answered in good English:
"It is a surprise to receive a visit from Miss Cliffe. But I must ask who gave you the password?"
"Señora Garcia at Rio Frio."
"That sounds strange. But sit down. There is something we must talk about."