The dogs that leaped around him were a strange pack—some being very large, some very small, and all of different breeds. A few of them had been lamed, and all were more or less marked by the wounds received from jaguars and pumas.
“You expected me, Ignacio?” said Pedro, after the first greetings were over.
“No—not quite so soon, but I chanced to be wandering about in the mountains, and came down to take a look at the old place, to see that all was right. You know I am fond of our old haunts, and never stay long away from them, but I did not expect to find you here.”
The hunter spoke in Spanish, and Lawrence found to his satisfaction that, although he by no means understood all that was said, he had already improved so much in that tongue through his frequent efforts to converse with Manuela, that he could follow the drift at least of the hunter’s remarks.
“I have come back sooner than I intended,” returned Pedro, “for war is a wonderful hastener, as well as dictator, of events; but I have to thank war for having given me a new friend. Let me introduce Senhor Lawrence Armstrong to you; Senhor, my old comrade Ignacio, who, as I have told you, nursed me back to life many years ago.”
The old man held out a hard bony hand, and gave Lawrence a hearty squeeze of friendship that had something vice-like in its vigour. He then turned to Pedro, and began to make anxious inquiries about the war. As the two men spoke in undertones, Lawrence drew back a few paces, and followed them towards the cottage. He observed that Ignacio shook his head very often, and also that he laughed once or twice silently, but with apparent heartiness. As he overheard the name of Manuela just before one of these laughs, he experienced some disagreeable feelings, which it was not easy to understand or get rid of, so he took to fondling the hunter’s dogs by way of diversion to his mind.
The animals testified indirectly to the character of their master by receiving his advances with effusive demonstrations of joy.
At the cottage they found Ignacio’s horse—a very fine one—with a lasso hanging from the saddle. Beside it stood a loose horse with the carcass of a guanaco flung over it, and a Gaucho lad who was the hunter’s only attendant. Quashy was engaged in animated conversation with this youth, and Manuela stood beside him listening.
“I cannot understand,” said Lawrence to Pedro, as they approached, “how men ever acquire dexterity in the use of these bolas.”
“Practice makes perfect, you know,” said the guide, “and it doesn’t matter much what sort of weapons you use, if you only learn to use them well. Of course it’s not easy to a beginner. When Ignacio’s dogs turn out a jaguar or a puma, they follow him hotly till he stops to defend himself. If the dogs fly upon the brute, the hunter usually jumps off his horse, whirls the three balls about till they get up tremendous momentum, and then brings them down on the jaguar’s skull with a whack that generally drops him. But if the dogs are afraid to go at him, Ignacio throws the lasso over him, gallops away, and drags him over the ground, while the dogs rush in and tear him. What between bumping and hounds, the jaguar’s career is soon finished.”