"A good distance, I suppose, from Lima?" asked Dick.
"From Lima? yes, a long way; Lima is far to the north."
"And what is the name of that promontory?" Dick said, pointing to the adjacent headland.
"That, I confess, is more than I am able to tell you," replied the stranger; "for although I have travelled a great deal in the interior of the country, I have never before visited this part of the coast."
Dick pondered in thoughtful silence over the information he had thus received. He had no reason to doubt its accuracy; according to his own reckoning he would have expected to come ashore somewhere between the latitudes of 27° and 30°; and by this stranger's showing he had made the latitude 25°; the discrepancy was not very great; it was not more than might be accounted for by the action of the currents, which he knew he had been unable to estimate; moreover, the deserted character of the whole shore inclined him to believe more easily that he was in Lower Bolivia.
Whilst this conversation was going on, Mrs. Weldon, whose suspicions had been excited by Negoro's disappearance, had been scrutinizing the stranger with the utmost attention; but she could detect nothing either in his manner or in his words to give her any cause to doubt his good faith.
"Pardon me," she said presently; "but you do not seem to me to be a native of Peru?"
"No; like yourself, I am an American, Mrs. --;" he paused, as if waiting to be told her name.
The lady smiled, and gave her name; he thanked her, and continued,-
"My name is Harris. I was born in South Carolina; but it is now twenty years since I left my home for the pampas of Bolivia; imagine, therefore, how much pleasure it gives me to come across some countrymen of my own."