The Frenchman stood forth in his nether garments, a tall, quaking and almost ludicrous figure. He watched Quesada, a nameless fear sharpening his slate-colored eyes.
"Hand over the money, Senor Ferou," said Don Jaime with frosty politeness; then explosively: "All of it! Pronto!"
The eyes of the Frenchman flashed like the eyes of a ferocious animal about to be robbed of its meat. But quickly he got himself in hand; the baleful gleam dulled. He shot a questioning glance toward the disrobing bandolero. Perhaps this thing he sensed and dreaded was only a grisly figment of his imagination. Perhaps, after all, the doctor only wanted the money. It were wise to obey.
With an astonishing readiness, he produced, from the receptacles cunningly prepared beneath his armpits, the purse of the doctor and the bills belonging to Morales and Carson.
Don Jaime did not wait to open the purse and inspect its contents. He shoved the wallet into his pocket. He cast the roll of loose bills upon the platform beside Morales.
"They belong to you and the American. You can take what is due you and return the others to Senor Carson. But hola! let the division go till later!"
He kicked the gray tweeds of Ferou over the hard-tamped earth floor toward Quesada.
"Put them on," he commanded bluntly.
The bandolero nodded, though as yet he did not comprehend the whyfore of it all. With dispatch, he commenced to garb himself in the tweeds of the Frenchman which, despite the hard usage of the last few weeks, still showed the ineradicable signs of good material.
"You, Ferou!" the doctor bit out. "You don the clothes of Quesada!"