Pancho smiled significantly. “I think it is,” he said. “Morales makes certain. He leaves nothing to chance.”
[XXIII — APPLEBY TAKES A RISK]
IT was early next morning when Appleby and Harper sat at breakfast on the veranda. The white wall across the patio already shone dazzlingly against a strip of intense blue, and a patch of brightness grew broader across the veranda, but it was pleasantly cool as yet. From beyond the flat roof there rose the rasping thud of machetes swinging amidst the cane and the musical clink of hoes, with the dull rumble of the crushing machinery as an undertone.
Appleby had apparently not slept very well, for there was weariness in his face, and he lay a trifle more limply than usual in his chair, with a morsel of bread and a very little cup of bitter black coffee in front of him, for in Spanish countries the regular breakfast is served later in the morning. Harper seemed to notice the absence of the major-domo.
“Bread and coffee! Well, when he can’t get anything else one can live on them, but if Pancho had been around he’d have found us something more,” he said. “Their two meals a day never quite suited me. We have steak and potatoes three times in my country.”
“I have seen you comparatively thankful to get one,” said Appleby. “I’m not sure that we will even have bread and coffee to fall upon in another day or two.”
Harper glanced at him sharply. “Where’s Pancho?”
“I sent him away last night with a message for Maccario.”
“As the result of Morales coming round?”
Appleby nodded. “Yes,” he said. “He made a demand I could not entertain.”