"You must pardon me, Señor Tolliver. I so seldom meet an Englishman, I am not yet an expert in discourtesy." The officer continued his observation of the estate: "And horses, Señor Tolliver, mounts for my men. If you could spare a few horses...."
The suggestion irritated the Trinidadian to a remarkable degree. His eyes filled with a pale fire, and with a concentration which surprised the drummer he called down the curses of God on the colonel. In the midst of this outburst, the rancher's eyes fell on Strawbridge. He stopped his profanity abruptly and stared.
"Look here," he demanded, "aren't you a white man?"
The tone and implication left Strawbridge rather uncomfortable in the presence of the Venezuelan.
"I'm an American," he said, avoiding the issue of color.
"Well, what the bloody hell are you following this gang of cut-throats and horse-thieves around for!"
The rancher's qualifications were edged with a righteous anger. Indeed, the fellow's oaths seemed to strip off a certain moral semblance which had hung over the expedition and leave it threadbare and shabby. The drummer hardly knew how to answer, when Coronel Saturnino relieved him of the necessity of answering at all. The officer very courteously introduced the rancher to the salesman and explained the latter's business.
The deep-brown Englishman stood appraising Strawbridge, and at last remarked:
"Well, you Americans certainly chase dollars in tighter places than any other decent man would. But, anyway, you're a white man. So come on in and have lunch. My wife and I get so bloody lonesome out here in this hell-hole, we're glad to see anything that's white."
Strawbridge was about to refuse this scathing hospitality, when Coronel Saturnino burst out laughing.