He was not alone, as by his side, there sat now a man whose features, as well as his spare, supple frame, bespoke him one of that tribe of half-breeds, namely, Spanish and Carib Indian, which furnishes so large a proportion of the labourers to the whole of Central America. He was an elderly man, this--a man nearer sixty than fifty, with snow-white hair; yet any one who should have regarded him from behind, or watched his easy strides from a distance, or his method of mounting an incline, might well have been excused for considering him to be about thirty-five.
"What did Mr. Ritherdon strike you for this morning?" Julian asked now, while, as he spoke he raised his rifle off his knee, and, with it ready to be brought to the shoulder, sat watching a number of ripples which appeared a hundred and fifty yards away in the lagoon.
"Because he is a cruel man," his companion, who was at the present time his guide, replied; "because, too, everything makes him angry now--even so small a thing as my having buckled his saddle-girth too loose. A cruel man and getting worse. Always angry now."
"Why?" asked Julian, raising the rifle and aiming it at this moment towards a conical grey-looking object that appeared above the ripples on the lagoon--an object that was, in absolute fact, the snout of an alligator.
"Because--don't fire yet, senor; he's coming nearer--because, oh! because things go very bad with him, they say. He lose much money and--and--pretty Missy Sprangy don't love him."
"Does he love her?"
"They say. Say, too, Massa Sprangy much money. Seabastiano wants money as well as pretty missy. Never get it, though. Perhaps, too, he not live get much more."
"What do you mean?" asked Julian, lowering the rifle as the huge reptile in the lagoon now drew its head under water; while he looked also at the man with stern, inquiring eyes. "What do you mean?" Though inwardly he said to himself: "This is a new phase in these mysterious surroundings. My life doesn't seem just now one that the insurance companies would be very glad to get hold of, while also my beloved cousin's doesn't appear to be a very good one. Lively place, this!"
"He very much hated," the half-breed answered. "Very cruel. Some day tommy-goffy give him a nice bite, or half-breed gentleman put a knife in his liver."
"The snakes don't hate him, do they? He can't be cruel to them."