Looking black as thunder, Jacques Ferou retreated once again into the background of people. There situated, he gave vent freely to his exasperation and fury, muttering savagely: "Name of a name of a name of a name of a dog!" Also, many other choice French curses. But the more he cursed, the more acrimonious and virulent he became. His face went livid with stirred-up bile; his slate-colored eyes snapped in bitter resentment; he bared his long white teeth in a passionate carnivorous snarl of envenomed hate.
But hate for whom? At first his hate was directed against no one in particular. Because he had lost the purse, life had suddenly changed to a more somber color and bitterly he detested the whole world!
Then he turned his eyes upon Jacinto Quesada, thinking, for obvious reasons, to concentrate his spleen upon him. Jacinto Quesada caught the Frenchman's burning look and smiled contemptuously. That contemptuous smile should have infuriated the Frenchman all the more; but strangely, it did not! Somehow the Frenchman sensed that Jacinto Quesada was not the prime mover in his downfall; and, his hate still at a loss for a target to direct itself against, he took his eyes altogether off the youthful bandolero.
Then Sacre Bleu! who was that he glimpsed out of the ends of his irises? Was it not Felicidad, his promised wife? She had made an inconspicuous, an almost clandestine exit, from the third-class coach wherein she had hid herself; and now she was furtively seeking to rejoin the muster of people. Watching her, the Frenchman saw plainly that she it was who had betrayed him to the bandoleros. And his whole malignant rancid soul bunched and crouched in his eyes, and threw toward her a look searing and scalding, a look of vitriolic vindictiveness.
Ever since Felicidad had pushed him with impetuosity and precipitation from the third-class coach, telling him to go quickly and tear from the Frenchman the purse, Jacinto Quesada had been dominated by the will of the girl, doing swiftly and with utter obedience that which she had bade him do. He had worked in a white vacuum of action, without prejudice or plan of his own, without forethought. Never did he doubt but that once the mahogany-hued purse was taken from the Frenchman the whole wrong would automatically right itself. And now—what should he do with the purse? It would be some time before he could plan ways and means to return it safely to Don Jaime.
Of a sudden, then, to make matters more perplexing, Jacinto discovered the Frenchman looking at Felicidad in that ugly and ominous way. At that, he ceased worrying about the mahogany-colored purse; he shoved it into an inside pocket of his sheepskin zamarra and straightway forgot it. The question of its disposal was an insignificant matter; a greater question bothered him. What should he do with the girl?
As one wrestler closes with another, Jacinto Quesada closed with that great question. The while he gripped and folded it in the doughy coils of his brains, however, he did not stand quiet and pensive. Enough time already had been lost. Loudly Quesada shouted orders.
One of his supernumeraries, Pio Estrada, dipped down into the dry gutter of the Arroyo Seco for the horses. The others, Rafael Perez and Ignacio Garcia, fell to prodding the herded passengers with their carbines back upon the train. Instantly the whole panorama took on a brisker look. At haphazard, into any of the coaches which presented themselves, plunged those boarding the train, not caring in what style they rode, or what comfort, so long as they soon speeded away.
Pio Estrada reappeared, leading by their bridles three hairy Manchegan ponies. Another galvanic command from Quesada and, from the work of bundling the passengers aboard the train, hurriedly the other two salteadores detached themselves. They bustled about their ponies, roping upon them the weighty sacks of mail and conglomerate loot, looking to their curved bits and cinch-straps. With dispatch, everything was being prepared for a nimble get-away.
The last of the waylaid passengers were crowding back into the train, the engine driver and his stoker were high in their cab once more and busily engaged in getting up steam. It needed only the word of Quesada, and the Manchegan ponies would be mounted, the train released on its way, and the hold-up of the Seville-to-Madrid consummated.