The men dispersed like a foggy neblina under the rays of the sun.
Ferou was some distance ahead of the cuadrilla as it tramped, bowed of head, back up the street. Carson and Morales remained on the rock, busying with the fire which would cremate the remains. There was no one to see.
The Frenchman seized the opportunity. With one hand, he reached under the long mountaineer's shawl that swathed Quesada's body; he reached into the inside pocket of the sheepskin zamarra. He drew forth a small mahogany-colored leather purse. That purse had once been his own.
Without bothering to open it, he thrust it into a pocket of his gray tweed suit. He knew. Within, in that small mahogany-colored leather purse, was the tightly wound roll of five-thousand peseta bills he had stolen from Don Jaime de Torreblanca y Moncada!
When Carson hurried up, a short spell later, to tend to Quesada, Ferou was awaiting him in the hospital, apparent anxiety upon his ashy-hued face.
"Monsenor Carson," he said deferentially, "to-day must have taught you a lesson. It is not wise that these bullfighters and serranos should be armed. They might rise again. I would some advice give you. Collect all the arms in the barrio and keep them under your own hand."
The suggestion met with accord from the American. Readily he could see its precautionary value against future rebellion.
"Just a little, and I'll be finished doing all I can for Jacinto; then I'll be with you."
Together they made a round of the cabanas. They requisitioned ancient muzzle-loading smooth-bores, Mannlichers, Mauser carbines, revolvers, old-fashioned pistols, and guns with muzzles wide as the mouth of a French horn. In Quesada's choza, where Felicidad slept and hourly gained strength, they found a modern smokeless breech-loading hunting gun, a cordite repeater.
They were tireless and microscopically thorough in the search. Despite the mutterings and scowls of the serranos, they seized every instrument which might be used as a weapon of offense. They collected Manchegan knives, navajas, razors, and even alpenstocks and shovels. Against the cork-oak tree in the center of the pueblo street, they made a heap of the conglomeration.