CHAPTER IV
Don Ramon Diaz
Uncle and nephew rose to receive the belated caller.
Don Ramon Diaz was a tall, swarthy individual, with rather plump features, loose lipped, and with a nose that bore a resemblance to a parrot's beak. His dark hair was long and plastered down with pomade. When he smiled, which was very frequently, the effort was "like the grin of a sea-sick monkey", as Peter afterwards described it.
He wore evening dress, with a broad crimson sash over his shoulder and the Order of the Sun of Rioguay on his breast. His tobacco-stained fingers were glittering with diamond rings.
"Here is my nephew, Peter Corbold, Señor Diaz," announced Brian.
Both men bowed—Ramon Diaz with the grace and dignity of an hidalgo of Old Spain, Peter with as much display of cordiality as he could muster.
"S'pose he's a natural product of the country," thought Peter. "Dashed if I like the cut of his jib; but since he's my uncle's friend, I must take him at his own valuation—not mine."
"So you have arrived in Rioguay, young man," exclaimed Don Ramon Diaz, speaking in tolerable English.