“I certainly have seen this fellow somewhere!”
Torres was not the man to allow a conversation to drop which was likely to interest him, and for very good reasons.
“And so you think Joam Garral would give me a passage?”
“I do not doubt it,” replied Fragoso. “What he would do for a poor chap like me he would not refuse to do for a compatriot like you.”
“Is he alone on board the jangada?”
“No,” replied Fragoso. “I was going to tell you that he is traveling with all his family—and jolly people they are, I assure you. He is accompanied by a crew of Indians and negroes, who form part of the staff at the fazenda.”
“Is he rich?”
“Oh, certainly!” answered Fragoso—“very rich. Even the timber which forms the jangada, and the cargo it carries, constitute a fortune!”
“The Joam Garral and his whole family have just passed the Brazilian frontier?”
“Yes,” said Fragoso; “his wife, his son, his daughter, and Miss Minha’s betrothed.”