Pimentó had given expression to it the very day of the catastrophe. We will see the fine fellow who dares take possession of those lands!
And all the people of the huerta, even the women and children, seemed to answer with their glances of mute understanding. Yes; they would see.
The parasitic plants, the thistles, began to spring up from the accursed land which old Barret had stamped upon and cut down with his sickle on that last night, as though he had a presentiment that he would die in prison through its fault.
The sons of Don Salvador, men as rich and avaricious as their father, cried poverty because this piece of land remained unproductive.
A farmer who lived in another district of the huerta, a man who pretended to be a bully and never had enough land, was tempted by their low price, and tackled these fields which inspired fear in all.
He set out to work the land with a gun on his shoulder; he and his farm-hands laughed among themselves at the isolation in which the neighbours left them; the farm-houses were closed to them as they passed, and hostile glances followed from a distance.
The tenant, having the presentiment of an ambush, was vigilant. But his caution served him to no purpose. As he was leaving the fields alone one afternoon, before he had even finished breaking up the ground, two musket-shots were fired at him by some invisible aggressor, and he came forth miraculously uninjured by the handful of birdshot which passed close to his ear.
No one was found in the fields,—not even a fresh foot-print. The sharpshooter had fired from some canal, hidden behind the cane-brake.
With enemies such as these, one has no chance to fight, and on the same night, the Valencian delivered the keys of the farm-house to its masters.
One should have heard the sons of Don Salvador. Was there no law or security for property, ... nor for anything?