She felt more and more uneasy at the thought of the possibility that Torre Bianca might learn the real cause of the rivalry between those two men whose duel he had directed. Mentally she reviewed all that had passed between her husband and herself since the previous day. On returning to the house, Federico had told her of the sad outcome of the duel; he had obviously taken certain precautions in telling her the news, as though fearful of the emotion it might cause her. But later that day he had appeared a changed man. He would not speak, he answered her questions in monosyllables. And twice she surprised him gazing fixedly at her with an expression that she had never seen him wear before. After having closed the window, to shut out the stares of the crowd that so much annoyed him, he had shut himself up in his bedroom, and had gone away the next morning very early, while Elena was still asleep. All that day she had not seen him. What was she to think?
But her uneasiness soon left her. She was so accustomed to controlling her husband that she concluded that her suspicions and fears were all uncalled for. Besides, even though her uneasiness should be well founded, she would always be able to calm and reassure him, as she had done so many times before.
The sight of a passer-by slowly walking in front of the house, and looking attentively at the windows, was enough to make her forget all about her husband ... Manos Duras! An hour earlier, when, as now, she had stood at the window, she had thought once or twice that she saw the gaucho standing at the entrance to an alley that ran into the main street near the house. The notorious cow-puncher was roaming around the town on foot just like a European laborer on a holiday. As soon as he caught sight of the marquesa on the other side of the window panes, he saluted her, taking off his hat with a flourish and showing his wolf’s teeth.
This was the first pleasant greeting that Elena had received since Pirovani’s death. She felt instinctively that this man was the only admirer left her; that this should be seemed to her so comic that she could not help smiling. Henceforth there was only one suitor for her favor whom she could count on in that part of the world ... and he was a cattle-rustling gaucho!
She stood meditating once more, her forehead pressed against the window-panes, staring at the solitary street. Manos Duras had disappeared in the neighboring alleyway, and even the two policemen, considering their vigil unnecessary, had wandered off to the boliche.
Again three discreet raps on the door ... Sebastiana entered more resolutely. This time she spoke very low, and with a confidential expression in her crafty eyes.
“Has the master come in?” asked Elena.
“No; it’s something else I’m to tell you.... I was in the corral a moment ago, and the gaucho they call Manos Duras suddenly looked in at the back gate and he said....”
Sebastiana made a valiant effort to recall the man’s words. He had charged her to tell the señora marquesa that he was “at her orders for anything she might choose to command, that in times of trouble one discovers one’s true friends, and now that there were so many people both in the town and outside of it, talking evil of the señora out of pure envy, Manos Duras was glad to have the opportunity to say that he was just the same in his sentiments as before.”
“Tell your mistress that I don’t turn around with every wind like the others, and that she will always be the same for me, for I’m one of those that break but never bend ... that’s what he told me to tell the señora....”