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"No, Tatita," he replied, quite out of breath; "something worse than that! I have seen it!" "What?" I exclaimed. "A ghost!" said the Indian in a low tone, crossing himself. "Pluck up your spirits," said I to the Indian; "if you have, we'll kill it to-morrow." "You can't kill it, Tatita." "With ordinary bullets, no; but those which Sumichrast knows how to prepare will soon settle him."
Tatita will set me right if I tell you any thing that is not true. Look here, for instance," continued the Indian, rising up and plucking a plant with slender and whitish stems; "this is the alfilerillo, which mothers give their children to cure them of sore throats. Such shrubs are lost here; for their fruit would be useful in my country.
We were all going to lie down, when the roar of a tiger again shook the air. "Hallo!" cried my friend; "is your beast come to life again?" "No, Tatita Sumichrast; but my tiger is a tigress, and her mate is come to see after her." I told the Indian not to move. "Let him do as he likes," said my companion; "he will only disobey you."
They serve for the reception and distribution of the air. "How is your arm now, l'Encuerado?" I asked, finding the Indian up when I awoke. "Pretty well, Tatita; but I find I mustn't move it much. If I do, it feels as if the blackguard water-dog was still holding me." I again dressed the wound, the Indian continuing to hurl fresh abuse at the otter. I made him keep quiet, and prepared the coffee.
Presently one of the children, a bright little fellow of seven or eight, came running to us with one of the sparkling insects in his hand, and cried: "Look, tatita, I have caught a linterna. See how bright it is!" "The Saints forgive you, my child," said the father.
I cried, angrily. "Don't you think it is nice, Tatita?" "It's perfectly filthy; you've poisoned us!" But I soon recognized the smell of a kind of coriander with which the Indians occasionally saturate their food. Sumichrast, like me, had not got beyond the first mouthful; but Lucien, who shared to some extent l'Encuerado's weakness for the culantro, was having quite a feast.
The fact was, that we were now about the same height as that at which his own country is situated, and he might easily fancy himself near his native village. "What are you thinking of?" said I, tapping him on the shoulder. "Oh Tatita! why did you disturb me?
"And what would have happened if the water-spout had reached the ship?" "We should most likely have been swamped." "How dreadfully frightened you must have been, Tatita!" "Yes, of course; and I was not the only one who was in terror; for the officers and sailors watched the course of the water-spout with evident anxiety."
"If you're going to cut down that colossus," cried my friend, "we had better encamp here, for it's eight days work at least." "Only wait ten minutes more, at most, Tatita Sumichrast. It shall never be said that this great booby broke my head and then laughed at me, to the heart's delight of the parrots, who no doubt were the instigators of such conduct."
"Don't laugh, Tatita," said the Indian to me, with a mysterious air; "especially just at this moment." He then went on to tell us that a friend of his, who was tending his flocks on the mountain, ran into the thickets in pursuit of one of his goats. The animal continued to retreat before him, and led him to the mouth of a cave.
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