Nevertheless, had not Angelo put her veto on the project, I should have made another visit to the place, provided with a sufficiency of water for the double journey. I, moreover, thought that with time and proper tools I could find water on the spot. However, I went not again, and I renounced my design all the more willingly as I knew that the diamonds I had already found were a fortune in themselves. I added them to my collection of minerals which I kept in my cabinet at Alta Vista. My Quipais being honest and knowing nothing whatever of precious stones I had no fear of robbers.
For several years after Balthazar’s death nothing occurred to disturb the even tenor of our way, and I had almost forgotten his warnings, and that we were potentially “rich beyond the dreams of avarice,” when one day a runner brought word that two men had landed on the coasts and were on the way to San Cristobal.
This was startling news, and I questioned the messenger closely, but all he could tell me was that the strangers had arrived in a small boat, half famished and terribly thirsty, and had asked, in broken Spanish, to be taken to the chief of the country, and that he had been sent on to inform me of their coming.
“The abbé!” exclaimed Angela, “you remember what he said about danger from the sea.”
“Yes; but there is nothing to fear from two hungry men in a small boat—as I judge from the runner’s account, shipwrecked mariners.”
“I don’t know; there’s no telling, they may be followed by others, and unless we keep them here—”
“If necessary we must keep them here; as, however, they are evidently not Spaniards it may not be necessary. But as to that I can form no opinion till I have seen and questioned them.”
We were still talking about them, for the incident was both suggestive and exciting, when the strangers were brought in. As I expected, they were seamen, in appearance regular old salts. One was middle-sized, broad built, brawny, and large-limbed—a squat Hercules, with big red whiskers, earrings and a pig-tail. His companion was taller and less sturdy, his black locks hung in ringlets on either side of a swarthy, hairless face, and the arms and hands of both, as also their breasts were extensively tattooed.
Their surprise on beholding Angela and me was almost ludicrous. They might have been expecting to see a copper-colored cacique dressed in war-paint and adorned with scalps.
“White! By the piper that played before Moses, white!” muttered the red-whiskered man. “Who’d ha’ thought it! A squaw in petticoats, too, with a gold chain round her neck! Where the hangmant have we got to?”