"No," Paz exclaimed, "however, not that way now. Other way. Quite as near. Also," and his dark eyes glistened strangely as he fastened them on Julian, "lead to hacienda. To Desolada. Come. We go through wood--over glade. Very nice wood."
"What do you expect to do there?" Julian asked, divining all the same.
"Oh! oh!" Paz said, his face alight with a demoniacal gleam. "Oh! oh! Perhaps find a body. Who knows? Gunny he shoot very straight. Perhaps a wounded man. Who knows?"
So they crossed the glade, making straight for the spot whence the murderous belch of flame had sprung forth, and, pushing aside flowering cacti and oleanders as well as other lightly knitted together shrubs and bushes, looked all around them. But, except that there were signs of footmarks on the bruised leaves of some of the greater shrubs and also that the undergrowth was a little trodden down, they saw nothing. Certainly nobody lay there, struck to death by Paz's bullet.
The keen eyes of the half-caste--glinting here and there and everywhere--and looking like dark topazes as the rays of the evening sun danced in them--seemed, however, to penetrate each inch of the surrounding shrubbery. And, at last, Julian heard him give a little gasp--it was almost a bleat--and saw him point with his finger at something about three feet from the ground.
At a leaf--a leaf of the wild oleander--on which was a speck that looked like a ladybird. Only--it was not that! But, instead, a drop of blood. A drop that glistened, as his eyes had glistened in the sun; a drop that a step or two further onward had a fellow. Then--nothing further.
"I hit him," Paz said, "somewhere. Only--did not kill." While, instantly he wheeled round and gazed full into Julian's eyes--his face expressing a very storm of demoniacal hate against the late owner of that drop.
"That," he almost hissed, "will keep. For a later day. When I know him."
They went now toward the house, each intent on his own meditations and with hardly a word spoken between them; or, at least, but a few words: Julian requesting Paz to say nothing of the incident, and the latter replying that by listening and not talking was the way to discover a secret.
"Ha! the gentle lady," said the half-breed now, as they observed Madame Carmaux seated on the veranda arranging some huge lilies in a glass bowl, while the form of Zara was observed disappearing into the house. "Ha! the gracious ruler and mistress." Then, as they drew near and stepped on to the veranda, Paz began bowing and scraping before the former with extraordinary deference. Yet, all the same, Julian observed that his eyes were roving everywhere around, and all over the boards near where Madame Carmaux sat, so that he wondered what it was for which the half-breed sought!