a, if he had them. Moreover, his object in coming to the Hacienda
del Venado, was to make himself its future proprietor."

"Blood and thunder!" cried Cuchillo, started as if bitten by a
snake--"that cannot be--it is not possible I could be fooled in that
manner by a child!"

"That child is a giant beside you, master Cuchillo," coldly replied
Arechiza.

"It is impossible!" exclaimed the exasperated Cuchillo.

"Do you wish the proofs?--if you do you shall have them--but I may tell
you they are of a nature to make you shudder from the crown of your head
to the soles of your feet."

"No matter; I should like to hear them," said Cuchillo in a suppressed
voice.

"I will not speak of your conscience--mark that well, Cuchillo! For I
know that it never shudders--nor yet shall I speak of your timidity,
which I observed last night while you were in the presence of the
jaguars--"

Don Estevan paused, to let his words have their full effect. It was his
design to crush by his superiority the man whose fidelity he had a
thousand reasons to suspect.

"Tiburcio," continued he, "is of a race--or appears to be of a race--
that unites intelligence with courage; and you are his mortal enemy. Do
you begin to understand me?"

"No," said Cuchillo.

"Well, you will presently, after a few simple questions which I intend
to ask you. The first is:--In your expedition with Arellanos, had you
not a horse that stumbled in the left leg?"

"Eh!" ejaculated Cuchillo, turning pale.

"A second question:--Were they really _Indians_ who murdered your
companion?"

"Perhaps it was me?" replied the outlaw, with a hideous smile.

"Third question:--Did you not receive, in a deadly struggle, a wound in
the leg? and fourth: Did you not carry upon your shoulder the dead body
of Arellanos?"

"I did--to preserve it from being mutilated by the Indians."

"One more question:--Was it for this you flung the dead body into the
neighbouring river--not quite dead, it may be?"

The beams of the moon, slanting through the leaves of the granadines,
shone with a livid reflection on the face of the outlaw, who with
haggard eyes listened, without comprehending whence they came, to the
proofs of a murder which he believed forever buried in the desert.

Cuchillo, when imparting to Don Estevan the knowledge of his marvellous
secret, had of course taken care not to give in detail the exact manner
by which he had himself become master of it; he had merely