LITMIR.BIZ

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(straw cigarette), lit it, and commenced smoking with immense sangfroid, never ceasing to watch, out of the corner of his eye, the corpse lying a few yards from him.

      Let us profit by this moment of respite to make the reader a little better acquainted with this interesting personage.

      He was a man a little below the average height, but the breadth of his shoulders and bigness of his limbs showed him to be endowed with immense muscular power; his forehead was low and receding like that of a wild beast; his nose, long and hooked, bent down over a mouth immense in size, but with thin lips, and garnished with long pointed and irregular teeth; gray eyes, with squinting pupils, stamped his physiognomy with a sinister expression.

      The man was dressed in a hunter's garb, similar to that of the cavalier. Calzoneras (loose trousers) of leather, bound about at the hips with a faja, or sash of silk, and falling as low as the knee, were fastened under botas vaqueras (heavy boots), intended to preserve the legs. A kind of half-jacket, half-blouse, also of leather, covered the upper part of his body, which garment, open in front like a shirt, had sleeves reaching to the elbow; a machete or straight sword, passed without sheath through an iron ring, hung on his left hip; and a game bag, apparently well supplied was slung to his right side by a strip of bison hide worn across the shoulder; a zarapé, or Indian blanket, motley with brilliant colours, lay on the earth beside him.

      In the meanwhile time was passing; an hour and a half had already elapsed without our friend, who smoked cigarette after cigarette, appearing to be able to decide upon going to convince himself of the death of him on whom he had treacherously drawn trigger from behind the rock.

      During all this time, the cavalier, after he fell, had preserved the most complete immobility; attentively watched by the assassin, the latter had not been able to perceive the slightest motion. The zopilotes (turkey buzzards) and the condors, in all probability attracted by the scent of the corpse, were beginning to circle in wide rings over it, uttering their rough and discordant cries; the sun, on the point of disappearing, had assumed the shape of a globe of fire on the edge of the horizon. It became necessary to act.

      The assassin rose, greatly against his will.

      "Pooh!" he murmured, "The man must be dead enough by this time, or if not his soul has turned to ashes in his heart. Let's go and look. Nevertheless, as prudence is the mother of safety, let us be prudent."

      And in accordance with this reasoning, he drew from his garter the sharp-pointed knife which every Mexican carries for the purpose of cutting the thong if an enemy happens to cast the lasso round his neck. Having tried the spring of the blade against a stone, and convinced himself that the point was not broken, he made up his mind, at last, to approach the body, still lying motionless on the spot where it had fallen. But in the American deserts there is an axiom the justice of which is acknowledged by all. It is this: That the shortest road from one point to another is a curve. Our friend took good care to put it in practice on this occasion. Instead of advancing straight to the object of his visit, he made a long circuit, drawing nearer little by little, stealing along softly, stopping at intervals to examine the body, and ready to fly at the slightest movement he might see, and with his knife ready to strike.

      But these precautions were useless; the corpse preserved the immobility of a statue, and our man stopped almost within reach without discovering a single thing to betray an atom of life in the unhappy wretch stretched upon the ground before him.

      The murderer crossed his arms over his chest, and contemplated the body, whose face was turned to the ground.

      "By my faith, he is dead indeed. It is a pity; for he was a formidable fellow. I should never have dared to attack him face to face. But a man must stick to his word. I had been paid; I was bound to fulfil my engagement. Curious! I see no blood! Pooh! It is a case of internal bleeding. So much the better for him, for his sufferings will have been less. However, to make doubly sure, I'll plant my knife between his two shoulders: in that way I shall be sure of my bird, although there is no danger of his coming to life again. You see, one must not deceive those who pay us; a man must stick to his word."

      After this soliloquy he knelt down, bent over the body, supporting himself by one hand on its shoulders, and lifted his knife; but suddenly, by a movement of unexampled rapidity, the supposed corpse rose with a bound like a jaguar, and oversetting the stupefied assassin, seized him by the throat, pinned him to the earth, planted his knee on his chest, and deprived him of his knife before his brains could render an account of what was happening.

      "Hulloa, compadre!" (comrade) said the cavalier in a jeering tone; "One moment, if you please, ¡cuerpo de Cristo!"

      All this passed in much less time than we have taken to write it.

      However, sudden and unexpected as the attack had been, the other was too much accustomed to strange vicissitudes in somewhat similar situations not to recover his presence of mind almost immediately.

      "Well, comrade," resumed the cavalier, "what have you got to say to all this?"

      "I?" replied the other, with a sneer; "¡Caray! I say the game has been well played."

      "Then it is one you are acquainted with?"

      "A little," was the modest reply.

      "I have been a little sharper than you."

      "Yes, sharper; yet I certainly thought I had killed you. Curious," he continued, as if talking to himself, "the others were right; it is I who have been a fool. I will take a silver ball next time; it is surer."

      "What are you saying?"

      "Nothing."

      "Pardon me, you did say something."

      "Are you very anxious to know?"

      "Apparently, since I have asked the question."

      "Very well. I said I would take a silver bullet next time."

      "What for?"

      "Why, to kill you."

      "To kill me? Go to; you are a fool! Do you fancy I will let you escape?"

      "I do not fancy anything of the kind, the more so as you could not do anything worse."

      "Because you would kill me?"

      "By Heavens! Yes, as soon as possible."

      "Then you hate me?"

      "I? Not the least in the world."

      "Well, then, if not, what is your motive?"

      "Confound it! A man must stick to his word."

      The cavalier cast a long look upon him, shaking his head the while with a thoughtful air.

      "H'm," said he, at last, "promise me not to attempt to escape if I leave you free for a time."

      "I promise, with so much the more pleasure, since I am obliged to confess that I find myself in a most fatiguing posture, and am very anxious to change it."

      "Rise," said the cavalier, helping him up.

      The other did not wait for the mandate to be repeated: in an instant he was on his legs.

      "Ah," he replied, with a grunt of satisfaction, "liberty is a blessing!"

      "Is it not? Now shall we talk a little?"

      "I desire nothing better, caballero. I can only be the gainer by your conversation," replied the other, bowing, with an insinuating smile.

      The two enemies placed themselves side by side, as if nothing extraordinary had happened between them.

      This is one of the distinctive traits of Mexican character: murder amongst these people has grown so thoroughly into a habit, that it never astonishes anyone; and it often happens that the man just escaped falling a victim to an ambuscade, does not scruple to press the hand extended by his would-be assassin, foreseeing that someday or other he too will be called on to play in his turn the part of murderer.

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