Her gestures and tears had told me eloquently enough that she too belonged to the unhappy Blanco party.
“Have you, then, lost some relation in this fight, señora?” I asked.
“No, señor,” she replied; “but if our party had triumphed, perhaps deliverance would have come to me. Ah, no; I lost my relations long ago—all except my father. You shall know presently, when you see him, why our cruel enemies refrained from shedding his blood.”
By that time we had reached the house. There had once been a verandah to it, but this had long fallen away, leaving the walls, doors, and windows exposed to sun and rain. Lichen covered the stone walls, while, in the crevices and over the tiled roof, weeds and grass had flourished; but this vegetation had died with the summer heats and was now parched and yellow. She led me into a spacious room, so dimly lighted from the low door and one small window that it seemed quite dark to me coming from the bright sunlight. I stood for a few moments trying to accustom my eyes to the gloom, while she, advancing to the middle of the apartment, bent down and spoke to an aged man seated in a leather-bound easy-chair.
“Papa,” she said, “I have brought in a young man—a stranger who has asked for shelter under our roof. Welcome him, papa.”
Then she straightened herself, and, passing behind the chair, stood leaning on it, facing me.
“I wish you good day, señor,” I said, advancing with a little hesitation.
There before me sat a tall, bent old man, wasted almost to a skeleton, with a grey, desolate face and long hair and beard of a silver whiteness. He was wrapped in a light-coloured poncho, and wore a black skull-cap on his head. When I spoke he leant back in his seatand began scanning my face with strangely fierce, eager eyes, all the time twisting his long, thin fingers together in a nervous, excited manner.
“What, Calixto,” he exclaimed at length, “is this the way you come into my presence? Ha, you thought I would not recognise you! Down—down, boy, on your knees!”
I glanced at his daughter standing behind him; she was watching my face anxiously, and made a slight inclination with her head.