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Updated: June 18, 2025
A Brazilian aloe flowered by the side of the gate; we drooped in our saddles; and the heavy knocks against the wooden portal seemed to go on without cause, and stop without reason, like a sound heard in a dream. We entered Seraphina's hacienda. The high walls inclosed a square court deep as the yard of a prison, with flat-roofed buildings all around. It rang with many voices suddenly.
The other hand paused in the act of conveying a pinch of snuff to the nostrils of the hooked nose that had, on the skin stretched tight over the bridge, the polish of old ivory; the elbow pressing the black cocked-hat against the side; the legs, one bent, the other bowing a little back this was the attitude of Seraphina's father.
As for him, he dared not kill me and he dared not give me up to the admiral. In his suspense, since, for him, I was the only person in the world who knew Seraphina's fate, he dared not let me out of his grip. And all the while he had me he must keep the admiral there, waiting for the surrender either of myself or of some other poor devil whom he might palm off as Nikola el Escoces.
Otto was all roseate, in and out, with flattery and Tokay and an approving conscience. He saw himself in the most attractive colours. If even Greisengesang, he thought, could thus espy the loose stitches in Seraphina's character, and thus disloyally impart them to the opposite camp, he, the discarded husband the dispossessed Prince could scarce have erred on the side of severity.
There, leaning against a tree, with my firelock under my arm, I forgot the wolf-hunt entirely; my thoughts had travelled back to Seraphina's cosy room. After a time shots were heard in the far distance; but at the same moment there was a rustling in the reed-bank, and I saw not ten paces from me a huge wolf about to run past me. I took aim, and fired, but missed.
Below, a voice at the gate challenged, "Who goes there?" I ran on. Two tiny flames burned before Carlos' door at the end of the long vista, and two of Seraphina's maids shrank away from the great mahogany panels at my approach.
He revealed the unholy ideals of all that band of scoundrels ideals that he said should find fruition under his captaincy. He boasted of secret conferences with O'Brien. There were murmurs of satisfaction. I don't wonder at Seraphina's shudder of horror, of disgust, of dismay, and indignation.
Presently we would hear the old Don muttering dotingly to himself the name of Seraphina's mother, the young wife of his old days, so saintly, and snatched away from him in punishment of his early sinfulness. The intendente was a man of great intelligence, and full of reverence for her memory.
Every moment the daylight increased; young négresses in loose gowns ran here and there, cackling like chased hens, and a fat woman waddled out from under the shadow of a veranda. She was Seraphina's old nurse. She was scolding volubly, and suddenly she shrieked, as though she had been stabbed. Then all was still for a long time.
Also she cross-examined Charlotte afterwards upon my performances, and supplemented what I had omitted by delivering the passage in full. My poor version, however, pleased Charlotte just as much, for merely being "walked out" gave her a standing among Miss Seraphina's young ladies, who asked her what it felt like to be engaged.
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