Duraznillo had a public “rest-house” that had once been an adobe chapel, but which was now as bare as a millionaire’s room in heaven. I boiled oatmeal and eggs in the water Tommy brought from a stagnant pool not far away, but waited in vain for the return of the only European-clad resident, who had volunteered to “arrange us.” As the shades of night spread, the beaten-mud floor looked harder and harder, and in nosing about we were astonished to discover several once-imported mattresses covering a pile of adobe bricks in the back corredor of the chief house of the village, apparently uninhabited. Still, it was possible that the local “authority” would in time come out of hiding, and we lolled patiently, if road-weary, in the moonlight.
We had waited until—well, perhaps eight, though without a watch it seemed hours later, when patience ceased to be a virtue, and we slipped through a hole in the mud fence, each to embrace a mattress. It may be that a trap had been set for us. As we approached the wall again, an unusually large half-Indian, wrapped in a poncho, loomed up on the other side, and shouted in an authoritative voice:
“What are you doing inside that fence?”
Now I do not like any man to address me in that tone, least of all a South American Indian. It is neither good training for his own primitive character nor advantageous to future gringo travelers.
“Speaking to me, indio?” I demanded.
“I am corregidor of Duraznillo, also guardian of this house.”
“Corregidor! Then you are the very fellow we have been looking for these last four hours. You will kindly lend us two mattresses to sleep on.”
“I will not lend you one mattress to sleep on. What are you doing?”
Plainly he was of Aymará rather than meek Quichua blood.
“And where have you been hiding yourself, señor corregidor? We have a letter for you from the government.”