Chapter 2 COMINGS AND GOINGS

Tim rode on through the town, soon left the last house behind him, and came into the open country. A rough track led northward to Mr. O'Hagan's hacienda, three miles away. Several years before, Mr. O'Hagan had bought his estate, consisting of some thousands of acres, at a very low price, and planted it partly with coffee, partly with sugar. His workers were Cholos (the native Indians) and Japanese. The cost of living and of labour being low, and the soil very fertile, the plantations had in a short time brought him wealth. The chief drawback was difficulty of transport.

San Rosario was in a remote province between the Andes and the forests, far from railways and from good roads. There were steep hills almost all round the town, crossed only by rough paths over which goods were carried on the backs of mules. Some of the planters had tried to introduce wheeled vehicles; but the customs of the country proved too strong for them, and the arriero or muleteer, dirty, cheerful, hard-working and incorrigibly unpunctual, remained the common carrier.

On first leaving the gobernador, Tim was glowing with pleasure and pride in his feat. But as he neared his home, his spirits gradually sank. He did not much relish the coming explanations with his father. Mr. O'Hagan was by no means strict with his only son as a general rule, but he was apt to look darkly on escapades which involved the townsfolk. By the time Tim came to the house he was in quite a sober frame of mind.

The dwelling was a long, one-storied building of adobe and wood, constructed in Peruvian style. The entrance hall led into a patio--a sort of courtyard open to the sky, with palms and boxes of flowers around the walls. To the right of this were the drawing-room and study. Beyond was another patio with a well in the centre, and a veranda looking on the garden. On the other side were the dining-room and bedrooms, and a small room used by Mr. O'Hagan as an office. Then came the servants' patio, the kitchen and servants' bedrooms, and at the end of the house a large enclosure, part vegetable garden, part poultry run.

Tim placed his bicycle in its shed behind the house, and entered, resolved to "get it over." He hoped to see his mother in the patio; she was often a very convenient buffer between him and his father; but she was not there, and he remembered that this was the time of her afternoon nap. He went on until he reached the office, where Mr. O'Hagan and a Peruvian clerk were at work.

Mr. O'Hagan threw a rapid glance at the boy as he entered, and was relieved to see no cuts, bruises, or other signs of accident.

"Had a good ride, Tim?" he said.

"Pretty good," replied Tim somewhat gloomily. "I saved Se?or Fagasta's life."

"What's that you say? I suppose you overtook him and didn't run him down, eh?"

"It wasn't exactly that," said Tim. "I did overtake him on his mule; he'd been to San Juan; but we were pounced on by four rough-looking fellows he called brigands. They let me off, and I walked back and found the gobernador tied to a tree. I brought him in on my machine."

"You don't tell me so! This is very vexing; I wish it hadn't happened."

"But, Father, you wouldn't have left the old gentleman to die!"

"How do you know he'd have died?" said Mr. O'Hagan testily. "The fellows probably only wanted to squeeze a ransom out of him. Upon my word, Tim, you're a great trouble to me, with your machine. You know how careful I am to keep out of local squabbles, and yet you've run head-first into one."

"Really, I couldn't help it, Father."

"I suppose you couldn't, but it's a pity. You've made an enemy of the Mollendists, and in this country they may be our governors next week. You'll cost me a pretty penny. Still, you couldn't help it; only don't let it occur again."

Tim heaved a sigh of relief.

"You'd have laughed if you'd seen him," he said. "We came through the street in fine style. He was perched on the carrier, clinging on for dear life, and all the people shouting like anything."

"You don't mean to say you brought him right through the street?"

"Indeed I did."

"Why on earth did you do that?"

"It was such fun, Father. I really couldn't help it."

"And don't you know you must never be funny with a Peruvian? He has no sense of fun, especially when the fun is at his expense. You're terribly thoughtless. You ought to have dropped the gobernador before you came to the town. However!"

Mr. O'Hagan did not continue his rebuke. In his mind's eye he saw the recent scene, and remembered the time when he himself might have yielded to the temptation to which Tim had succumbed. Years before, when quite a young man, just arrived from home, he had thrown himself with Irish impetuosity into the struggle between Peru and Chile; and having been a lieutenant of volunteers when living in London, he had made use of his military knowledge in his new domicile. He had been given a commission in the Peruvian cavalry, and had led many a daring sortie, many a gallant charge. With those reckless feats still clear in his memory, he could not bear hardly on the boy who so much resembled him. "You can't put old heads on young shoulders," he thought; "but I was a fool to buy him that motor-cycle."

The conversation between father and son had, of course, been carried on in English. The Peruvian clerk, bending over his books, listened attentively, but could understand only a word or two here and there. What little he picked up whetted his curiosity, and by and by, when he found an opportunity of speaking to Tim alone, he tried to pump him. But Tim did not like Miguel Pardo. He could scarcely have told why; it was an instinctive feeling which did not need explanation. When the young Peruvian began to ply him with questions in Spanish, perfectly polite, but yet, as Tim thought, rather too pressing, he gave short and vague answers. Pardo saw that he was being fenced with, and presently desisted, breaking off the conversation with a smile.

A little later, when the O'Hagans were having tea in the patio, Pardo spent the last few minutes before closing work for the day in writing a letter. Then, locking up his books, he left the house by the servants' entrance and, instead of going to the huts half a mile away, in which Mr. O'Hagan's employees lodged, he set off for the town.

He had not gone far when he was met-by Nicolas Roma?a, the young Peruvian who was storekeeper and general factotum of the estate. The two men were always so excessively polite to each other that Mr. O'Hagan shrewdly guessed them to be hostile at heart. They never quarrelled; but it was impossible to be in their company long without feeling that at any moment sparks might fly.

"Ah, se?or," said Roma?a, on meeting Pardo, "you are about to take the air? Let me give you a friendly warning: beware of a storm. I just now heard rumblings of thunder."

"Many thanks, se?or," replied Pardo. "I shall not go far afield. Perhaps to the town. San Rosario is not Lima, unluckily. There I should have a friend's house at every few yards to give me shelter."

This, as Roma?a very well knew, was a mere boast, an assumption of superiority: every Peruvian wishes to be regarded as a native of Lima.

"How strange we never met there!" he said politely. "I myself was born at Lima, and lived there fully twenty years."

"What a loss to me!" said Pardo. "I bid you good-evening."

He swept off his hat and passed on.

Roma?a stood looking after him in some surprise. It was an unusually abrupt ending of the conversation. Ordinarily the bandying of words would have been kept up for several minutes. What was the reason of Pardo's haste? He was walking very quickly, too, as if he had an errand of importance.

A man who has weighty secrets himself is very apt to suspect others of harbouring secrets also. This may perhaps explain why Roma?a, instead of proceeding on his way to the hacienda, turned about, and dogged Pardo to the outskirts of the town. There the clerk entered a small house--a chacara belonging to one of the Indian agriculturists of the neighbourhood. In a few minutes he returned, passed unsuspiciously the clump of bush behind which Roma?a was spying, and retraced the road homeward.

Roma?a remained on the watch. Presently an Indian came out of the house, went to his corral hard by, caught and saddled a horse, and rode off, not towards San Rosario, but along a bridle-path that ran westward and led into the high road to San Juan.

The watcher felt that he had not come in vain. Instead of returning to the hacienda, he walked rapidly into the town, and showed signs of pleasure on meeting, near the plaza, a thin, wiry man of about sixty years of age, with whom he entered into earnest conversation. A few minutes later this man might have been seen riding quickly out of the town, on the same road as that which the Indian had struck perhaps half an hour before.

Next morning, when the workers were busy about the plantation, and Mr. O'Hagan was engaged with Pardo in the office, Roma?a strolled to an orange orchard a quarter of a mile southward from the house. After waiting there impatiently for nearly an hour, he was joined by the man with whom he had conversed in San Rosario on the previous evening.

"Well, caballero?" said Roma?a eagerly.

"I followed him, se?or, into San Juan."

"Where did he go?"

"To the Prefect's house."

"Good!" said Roma?a with satisfaction. "Is there any news?"

"None, se?or. The gobernador gives out that he very much enjoyed his ride."

Roma?a smiled.

"Very well, caballero. Go back and keep eyes and ears open."

They parted, and Roma?a returned to his work.