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"And how long did that fit, as you call it, last?" he asked anxiously. "Weeks, months, years, centuries, it seemed to me," returned Mr. Ricardo with feeling. "Of an evening the governor would stroll out into the sala and fritter his life away playing cards with the juez of the place a little Dago with a pair of black whiskers ekarty, you know, a quick French game, for small change.
That I can easily prove." The Judge of the First Instance shrugged his shoulders and looked, with implicit trust, up into O'Brien's face. "That man," I pointed at the Lugareño, "is a pirate. And, what is more, he is in the pay of the Señor Juez O'Brien. He was the lieutenant of a man called Manuel-del-Popolo, who commanded the Lugareños after Nikola left Rio Medio."
Finally, as no one came and the officials had disappeared, we started out upon a tour of investigation. We found the whole town drunk; the juez, the chief of police, the mayores, all were too drunk for measurement. We experimented upon two or three subjects, but soon gave up in despair. Padre Ponce need not have gone to Quiroga for Christmas celebrations; we had them also.
"Sir Juez," said the officer, "it is my opinion that a civil magistrate ought never to have any part in matters which more properly come under the military authorities.
It was reported in town that the private audience the Juez had lately from the Captain-General was of a most stormy description. They say old Marshal What-d'ye-call-'um ended by flinging his last report in his face, and asking him how dared he work his lawyer's tricks upon an old soldier. Good old fighting cock. But stupid. All these old soldiers were stupid, Sebright declared. Old admirals, too.
"But Paul said unto them, they have beaten us openly uncondemned, being Romans, and have cast us into prison; and now do they thrust us out privily? Nay, verily: but let them come themselves and fetch us out." I then bowed to the juez, who shrugged his shoulders and took snuff.
"You know very much about the pirates," the Juez said, with the sardonic air of a very stupid man. "Without doubt you were intimate with them. I sign now your order for committal to the carcel of the Marine Court." I said, "But I tell you I am not Nikola...." The Juez said impassively, "You pass out of my hands into those of the Marine Court.
Every movement in port was reported to the Juez; but this was a feast, and he would not hear of it probably till next day. Even fiestas had their uses sometimes. No ship was to be visited more than once. Still I had seen, myself, soldiers going in a boat to board the American brigantine: a garlic-eating crew, poisoning the cabins with their breath, and poking their noses everywhere.
"That may be true," the Juez said dryly, and then to his clerk: "Write here, 'John Kemp, of noble British family, called, on the scene of his crimes, Nikola el Escoces, otherwise El Demonio." I shrugged my shoulders. I did not, at the moment, realize to what this all tended. The judge said to the clerk, "Read the Act of Accusation.
The cuezcomate is often ten feet high. One or more of them is found in connection with every house. The juez lived in a comfortable house of two rooms, half of which is used at present for the boy's school, of which his son is teacher.
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