"I do not think he will," said Marcelino. "But if I went, who is to command my negroes when the English come again?"
"They are disbanded," said Dolores. "Besides, the English will not come again. Have they not enough with two defeats? Do you think they will come again, Mr Gordon?"
At this Gordon looked troubled and made no answer, but Evaña answered for him.
"I have lived in England and know the English, I think they will," said he. "You have heard me speak of their game 'the box'; I have seen a man knocked down ten times, and yet get up again all bleeding as he was and win after all. The English are all like that, to be beaten is only to begin again."
"It is their merchants," said Marcelino, "who will force them to continue the war with us. Their commerce is ruined by the continental system of Napoleon, and they think to make a market here for their goods with cannon-shot and bayonets."
At this Gordon rose from his chair and walked away under the trees, and Dolores, looking after him as he went, said sadly:
"It is a barbarity, this war, why cannot we be friends?"
"Our masters the Spaniards will not let us," said Evaña.
"The Spaniards! always the Spaniards," said Dolores impatiently, then she also rose from her chair and went inside the house.
"So you do not care to be Viceroy of Buenos Aires?" said Evaña, as he and Marcelino were left alone.