What was to be done with this droll fellow? The alcalde felt no inclination to question him farther, but left him to go to sleep again and sleep as long as he pleased.
Any further investigation appeared to Don Ramon to be useless—at least until some order might be received from higher quarters—besides it would be necessary to graduate the expenses of justice to the means of the prosecutor; and with this reflection, the alcalde went home to his breakfast.
In the evening of this eventful day for the village of Elanchovi—when the twilight had fallen upon the water—two persons might have been seen wandering along the beach, but evidently desirous of shunning one another. Both appeared in grief, though their sorrows sprang from a very different cause.
One was a poor old steward, who, while heaving a sigh at the thought that his worldly store was about to be absorbed in the inexorable gulf of justice, at the same time searched for some trace of his lost mistress, praying for her and her child, and calling upon God to take them under his protection.
The other pensive wanderer was Cagatinta, of whom the alcalde had again taken the advantage. Profiting by the confidence of the scribe, Don Ramon had induced the latter to commit his oath to stamped paper; and then instead of the liver-coloured breeches had offered him an old hat in remuneration. This Cagatinta had indignantly refused.
He was now lamenting his vanished dreams of ambition, his silly confidence, and the immorality of false oaths—not paid for. Nevertheless, he was meditating whether it would not be more prudent to accept the old hat in lieu of the liver-coloured breeches, alas! so well earned!