"Well, I guess!" assented the Señor Don Juan Smit', with a very knowing wink of the eye, which proved that he had not understood his employer's meaning in the very slightest.
Old Guillermina, who had reared Don Gil's mother, was the only person allowed within the counting-house.
"A very fine place for the black spiders to hide," remarked Guillermina, as she twitched aside the green and white hangings, and exposed the iron sheathing. "There is no place they would prefer to this."
When Don Gil had locked the door, he seated himself and took Escobeda's note from his pocket. He examined the flap of the envelope; it was badly soiled and creased. He was morally certain that Rotiro had possessed himself of the contents of the letter. He had told Rotiro that peons should not think, but they would think, semi-occasionally, and more than that, they would talk. When a peon was found clever enough to carry a message, he also possessed the undesirable quality of wishing to excite curiosity in others, and to make them feel what a great man he was to be trusted with the secrets of the Señor. By evening the insolence of Escobeda would be the common property of every man, woman, and child on the estate, and, what Silencio could bear least of all, the insulting news as to the ultimate destination of Raquel would be gossiped over in every palm hut and rancho far and near. All his working people would know before to-morrow the message which had been brought to him by Rotiro, and it was his own rum that would loosen Rotiro's tongue and aid materially in his undoing. His face grew red and dark. His brow knotted as he perused the vile letter for the fourth time. Escobeda's handwriting was strong, his grammar weak, his spelling not always up to par. The letter was written in Spanish, into which some native words had crept. The translation ran:
"To the Señor Don Gil Silencio-y-Estrada.
"Señor:—You are forbidden to set foot in my house. You are forbidden to try to see or speak to the Señorita Raquel. I do not continue the farce of saying my niece; she is not more than a distant relative of mine. But in this case, might makes right. I control her and she is forever lost to you. You refused me the trocha farm for a fair price. See now, if it would not have been better to yield. The Señorita Raquel starts for the Port of Entry this afternoon. She sails to-night for the government town. The Governor desires her services. Knowing the Governor by repute, you may imagine what those services are."
Silencio struck the senseless sheet with his clenched fist. His ring tore a jagged hole in the paper, so that he had difficulty in smoothing it for re-perusal.
"It pays me better to sell her to him than to give her to you."
Wild thoughts flew through the brain of Silencio. He started up, and had almost ordered his horse. He was rich. He would offer all, everything that he possessed, to save Raquel from such a fate, but he sadly resumed his seat after a moment of reflection. Escobeda hated him, there had been a feud between the families since the old Don Gil had caused the arrest of the elder Escobeda, a lawless character; and the son had made it the aim of his life to annoy and insult the family of Silencio. Here was a screw that he could turn round and round in the very heart of his enemy, and already the screwing process had begun. Don Gil took up the mutilated letter and read to the end: