But he was unable to dispel from his mind a tenacious remembrance. He could see, as he closed his eyes, a great orchard of oranges which was about an hour's distance, between Benimaclet and the sea. There he had gone many times on business, and there he would go now to see if the devil would be so good as to let him come across the master, as there was hardly a day that his avaricious glance did not inspect the beautiful trees as though he had the oranges counted on every one.
He arrived after two hours of walking, during which he stopped many times to balance his body, which was swaying back and forth upon his unsteady legs.
The brandy had now taken complete possession of him. He could no longer remember for what purpose he had come here, so far from that part of the huerta in which his own family lived, and finally he let himself fall into a field of hemp at the edge of the road. In a short time, his laboured snores of drunkenness sounded among the green straight stalks.
When he awoke, the afternoon was well advanced. He felt heavy of head and his stomach was faint. There was a humming in his ears, and he had a horrible taste in his coated mouth. What was he doing here, near the huerta of the Jew? Why had he come so far? His instinctive sense of honour arose; he felt ashamed at seeing himself in such a state of debasement, and he tried to get on his feet to go away. The pressure on his stomach caused by the sickle which lay crosswise in his sash, gave him chills.
On standing up, he thrust his head out from among the hemp, and he saw, in a turn of the road, a little man who was walking slowly along enveloped in a cape.
Barret felt all his blood suddenly rise to his head; his drunkenness came back on him again. He stood up, tugging at his sickle. And yet they say that the devil is not good? Here was his man; here was the one whom he had been wanting to see since the day before.
The old usurer had hesitated before leaving his house. The affair of old Barret had pricked his conscience; it was a recent event and the huerta was treacherous; but the fear that his absence might be taken advantage of in the huerta was stronger even than his cowardice, and remembering that the orange estate was distant from the attached farm-house, he set out on the road.
He was already in sight of the huerta, scoffing inwardly at his past fears, when he saw Barret bound out from the plot of cane-brake: like an enormous demon he seemed to him with his red face and extended arms, impeding all flight, cutting him off at the edge of the canal which ran parallel to the road. He thought he must be dreaming; his teeth chattered, his face turned green, and his cape fell off, revealing his old overcoat and the dirty handkerchiefs rolled around his neck. So great was his terror, his agitation, that he spoke to him in Spanish.
"Barret! My son!" he said, in a broken voice. "The whole thing has been a joke; never mind. What happened yesterday was only to make you a little afraid ... nothing more. You may stay on your land; come tomorrow to my house ... we will talk things over: you shall pay me whenever you wish."
And he bent backward to avoid the approach of old Barret: he attempted to sneak away, to flee from that terrible sickle, upon whose blade a ray of sun broke, and where the blue of the sky was reflected. But with the canal behind him, he could not find a place to retreat, and he threw himself backward, trying to shield himself with his clenched hands.