the reason of your coming on board the raft.
Possessed of a secret which was doubtless given to you, you wanted to
make it a means of extortion. But that is not what I want to know at
present."

"What is it, then?"

"I want to know how you recognized Joam Dacosta in the fazenda of
Iquitos?"

"How I recognized him?" replied Torres. "That is my business, and I see
no reason why I should tell you. The important fact is, that I was
not mistaken when I denounced in him the real author of the crime of
Tijuco!"

"You say that to me?" exclaimed Benito, who began to lose his
self-possession.

"I will tell you nothing," returned Torres; "Joam Dacosta declined my
propositions! He refused to admit me into his family! Well! now that his
secret is known, now that he is a prisoner, it is I who refuse to enter
his family, the family of a thief, of a murderer, of a condemned felon,
for whom the gallows now waits!"

"Scoundrel!" exclaimed Benito, who drew his manchetta from his belt and
put himself in position.

Manoel and Fragoso, by a similar movement, quickly drew their weapons.

"Three against one!" said Torres.

"No! one against one!" answered Benito.

"Really! I should have thought an assassination would have better suited
an assassin's son!"

"Torres!" exclaimed Benito, "defend yourself, or I will kill you like a
mad dog!"

"Mad! so be it!" answered Torres. "But I bite, Benito Dacosta, and
beware of the wounds!"

And then again grasping his manchetta, he put himself on guard and ready
to attack his enemy.

Benito had stepped back a few paces.

"Torres," he said, regaining all his coolness, which for a moment he had
lost; "you were the guest of my father, you threatened him, you betrayed
him, you denounced him, you accused an innocent man, and with God's help
I am going to kill you!"

Torres replied with the most insolent smile imaginable. Perhaps at the
moment the scoundrel had an idea of stopping any struggle between
Benito and him, and he could have done so. In fact he had seen that Joam
Dacosta had said nothing about the document which formed the material
proof of his innocence.

Had he revealed to Benito that he, Torres, possessed this proof, Benito
would have been that instant disarmed. But his desire to wait till the
very last moment, so as to get the very best price for the document he
possessed, the recollection of the young man's insulting words, and the
hate which he bore to all that belonged to