“How? Without our hearing?”
“Lotta or one of her children ran to the window instead of coming to the door. We should not have heard that.”
“No. And of course if the call were very urgent, Ramón would not have stopped to tell us that he was going.”
“Put on a mantilla, then, Margarita; we will go together to the lodge. But before we start, we had better be a little cautious. Those rum-runners may have enticed them out.”
“I don’t think so,” his sister said. “Ramón went out to look for you, while you were in the garden.”
“What did he want with me?”
“He did not say. I thought he had something to ask you about supper. I don’t believe he ever came in again. I haven’t heard him. I believe that he has been out ever since; Tia Eusebia went on cooking, but at last became anxious, and then went out to look for him.”
“She would have called.”
“No she wouldn’t, Hilary. Ramón is rather deaf. She never calls him: she always goes to him. Old General Martinez has trained them both to be silent.”
“You’re right, I expect, Pearl,” Hilary said. “Most mysteries have commonplace explanations. But the question is, what has happened to poor old Ramón? He is an old man and may have had a stroke or a fall, and broken a bone.”