Part 8 (1/2)

Benicia laughed. ”It would not be worth while, my friend. You will leave your message.”

”It is a report for Dom Clemente,” and again the man spread out his hands. One could have fancied he felt it necessary to excuse himself for such an answer.

”Then,” said the girl, ”it is, as I think you know, quite safe with me.”

There was no smile in her eyes this time, and her companion thought rapidly. Then, after another gesture which expressed resignation, he spoke for some three or four minutes until the girl checked him with a sign.

”If Dom Clemente has any questions to ask he will send for you,” she said. ”If not, you must not trouble him about the matter. I think you understand?”

It was evident that the man did so, for he went out with a respectful gesture of comprehension, and then turned and shook a yellow fist at the door which closed behind him. He could foresee that to do as he was bidden might involve him in difficulties, but Benicia Figuera was something of a power in that country, and he knew it was seldom advisable to thwart her. She, as it happened, sat still thinking for a time, and as the result of it when Desmond's gig went ash.o.r.e next morning a negro handed one of her crew a little note. That afternoon Desmond dressed himself with somewhat unusual care before he was rowed ash.o.r.e, and on being ushered into a white house by a uniformed negro was not altogether astonished to find Benicia Figuera waiting for him alone in a big cool room. He had met her in Las Palmas, and she smiled at him graciously as she pointed to a little table where wine and cigarettes were laid out.

”They are at your disposal. Here one smokes at all times and everywhere,” she said.

Desmond sat down some distance away from her, for as he said afterwards, she was astonis.h.i.+ngly pretty as well as most artistically got up, and he was on his guard.

”I almost fancy it is advisable that I should keep my head just now, and it already promises to be sufficiently difficult,” he said with a twinkle in his eyes. ”Dom Clemente is presumably not at home. That is why you sent for me?”

Now the compliments men offer a lady in the Iberian Peninsula are as a rule artistically involved, but the girl laughed.

”He will not be back until this evening, but the excellent Senora Castro in whose charge I am is now sitting on the veranda,” she said.

”You need not put your armor on, my friend. It would be useless anyway.”

”Yes,” said the man reflectively, ”I almost think it would be.”

”And my intentions are friendly.”

Desmond spread his hands out as the men of her own nationality did.

”The a.s.surance is a relief to me, but I should feel easier if you told me what you wanted. After all, it could not have been merely the pleasure of seeing me.”

Benicia nodded approvingly. His keenness and good-humored candor appealed to her. It was also in some respects a pleasure to meet a man who could come straight to the point. Her Portuguese friends usually spent an unreasonable time going around it.

”Well,” she said, leaning forward and looking at him with eyes which he afterwards told Ormsgill were worth risking a fortune for, ”I will tell you what I know, and I leave you to decide how far it is desirable for you to be frank with me. In the first place, you are not going inland to shoot big game. You are going to wait at the Bahia Santiago for somebody.”

Desmond's face grew a trifle red. ”If I had Lister here I think I should feel tempted to twist his neck for him.”

The girl laughed. ”It would be an interesting spectacle. I suppose you know that last night he broke a man's wrist?”

”I did not,” said Desmond dryly. ”When he amuses himself in that way he seldom tells me--but, to be quite frank, I've almost had enough of him. It's rather a pity the other fellow didn't break his head.

Still, perhaps, that's a little outside the question.”

”The question is--who are you going to wait for at the Bahia Santiago?”

”Ah,” said Desmond, ”I almost think you know.”

Benicia smiled. ”It is, of course, Mr. Ormsgill. He is a friend of yours. Now, as you can recognize, it is in my power or that of my father to involve you in a good many difficulties. I wish to know what Ormsgill went inland for. It was certainly not on a commercial venture.”

Desmond thought hard for the next half-minute. He was a man who could face a responsibility, and it was quite clear to him that Miss Figuera already knew quite enough to ruin his comrade's project if she thought fit to do so. Still, he felt that she would not think fit. He did not know how she conveyed this impression, or even if she meant to convey it, for Benicia Figuera was a lady of some importance in that country, and, as he reflected, no doubt recognized the fact. She sat impa.s.sively still, with her dark eyes fixed on him, and there was a certain hint of imperiousness in her manner, until he suddenly made his mind up.