As the visitor passed room after room on his upward way, the sounds of coarse laughter, the oaths of men, the shrill expostulation of women, and the querulous cry of children came to him through closed or half-closed doors, and he drew his cloak around him with an instinctive movement of disgust. Treading almost noiselessly he reached the attic floor, where the doors of three rooms opened on to a narrow landing. Although evidently a stranger to the house he showed little hesitation. With infinite caution he tiptoed across the landing to the farthermost door, and put his eye to a crack in the panel, through which a narrow beam of light fell on the dirt-encrusted wall behind him.
The room into which he looked was in keeping with the rest of the house. The fitful light of a tallow candle showed a man bending over a crazy table, two truckle-beds ranged at right angles to each other in the far corner, and a few articles of clothing hanging from hooks on the wall. The man was intently studying a blue paper spread out on the table, spelling out the words with difficulty, and repeating them under his breath with a growl of impatience that accentuated the unpleasing effect of a countenance by nature unprepossessing.
For some minutes the man beyond the door, drawing shallow breath, watched him closely as he struggled with the intricacies of the document. There was apparently a passage in it that completely baffled him. He turned the paper this way and that, examined it even upside down, but without success, and at last, in a burst of anger, dashed it down on to the table with an audible oath.
The visitor took this as his cue for entry, and tapped gently at the door.
"Adelante!" was the answer, after a distinct pause.
He turned the handle and went in. The man had faced round towards the door, and the dim light of the candle disclosed the narrow features, low receding forehead, thin lips, and shifty eyes of Pablo Quintanar. The blue paper had disappeared.
There was a momentary silence. The host was evidently waiting for his visitor to introduce himself.
"Buenas noches, hombre!" said the stranger suavely, with a conciliatory bow. "I trust I don't come at an unseasonable hour."
The guerrillero scanned him from head to foot with a quick suspicious glance.
"That depends, Señor, upon your business, who you are, and what you want with me."