A man of middle height, big of head and paunch and of less than mediocre intelligence, Don Jayme was one of those gentlemen who best served Spain by being absent from her, and this no doubt had been considered in appointing him Governor of Porto Rico. Not even his awe of majesty, represented by Don Pedro, could repress his naturally self–sufficient manner. He was pompous in his reception of him, and remained unintimidated by the cold, haughty stare of Don Pedro's eyes, eyes of a singularly deep blue, contrasting oddly with his bronzed face. A Dominican monk, elderly, tall, and gaunt, kept his Excellency company.
«Sir, I give you welcome.» Don Jayme spoke as if his mouth were full. «I trust you will announce to me that I have the honour to meet with his Majesty's approbation.»
Don Pedro made him a deep obeisance, with a sweep of his plumed hat, which, together with his cane, he thereafter handed to one of the Negro lackeys. «It is to signify the royal approbation that I am here, happily, after some adventures. I have just landed from the San Tomas, after a voyage of many vicissitudes. She has gone on to San Domingo, and it may be three or four days before she returns to take me off again. For that brief while I must make free with your Excellency's hospitality.» He seemed to claim it as a right rather than ask it as a favour.
«Ah!» was all that Don Jayme permitted himself to answer. And with head on one side, a fatuous smile on the thick lips under his grizzled moustache, he waited for the visitor to enter into details of the royal message.
The visitor, however, displayed no haste. He looked about him at the cool, spacious room with its handsome furnishings of carved oak and walnut, its tapestries and pictures, all imported from the Old World, and inquired, in that casual manner of the man who is at home in every environment, if he might be seated. His Excellency, with some loss of dignity, made haste to set a chair.
Composedly, with a thin smile which Don Jayme disliked, the messenger sat down and crossed his legs.
«We are,» he announced, «in some sort related, Don Jayme.»
Don Jayme stared. «I am not aware of the honour.»
«That is why I am at the trouble of informing you. Your marriage, sir, established the bond. I am a distant cousin of Dona Hernanda.»
«Oh! My wife!» His Excellency's tone in some subtle way implied contempt for that same wife and her relations. «I had remarked your name: Rueiroz.» This also explained to him the rather hard and open accent of Don Pedro's otherwise impeccable Castilian. «You will, then, be Portuguese, like Dona Hernanda.» And again his tone implied contempt of Portuguese, and particularly perhaps of Portuguese who were in the service of the King of Spain, from whom Portugal had reestablished her independence a half–century ago.