GAS
Next day Tim went into the town on an errand for his mother. He was looking at the window of the only book-shop, when he felt a touch on his sleeve. Looking round, he saw Alfonso, the gobernador's son, a sallow, weedy boy of about his own age, whom he had often vainly tried to induce to have a game at cricket in a field behind Mr. O'Hagan's house. He did not think much of Alfonso, who always called him señor!
"Follow me, señor," said the boy mysteriously, "but don't let people know."
He moved off at once. Tim might have thought that he was being enticed away for a practical joke of some kind, only he remembered that the Peruvians never played practical jokes except in carnival time. "I may as well go," he said to himself; so, pushing his hands into his pockets, he sauntered after Alfonso Fagasta. Several persons gave him pleasant greetings, and he stopped once or twice to exchange a word, always keeping his eye on Alfonso.
The Peruvian boy walked past the church in the plaza, and turned into a narrow street, or rather lane, bounded on one side by the wall of the presbytery, on the other by a high wall enclosing a garden. Tim knew the place well; indeed, in days gone by he had sometimes scaled the garden wall in quest of ripe plums or peaches. He followed Alfonso for some distance, until he came to the rear of the enclosure, where there was a dense plantation extending up the slope of a hill. Here Alfonso made signs to him to wait, and disappeared through a wicket gate into his father's garden.
"Why couldn't he tell me where to come?" thought Tim impatiently. "What's the silly secret?"
He climbed a tree by way of passing the time, and presently, from his leafy bower, he saw the gobernador open the wicket gate, glance cautiously round, and then come swiftly towards the plantation. He looked this way and that, and gave a jump when Tim called out, just above his head:
"Here I am, señor doctor."
"Ha! my young friend, come down," said the gobernador.
Tim dropped at his feet.