Page 493 - nostromo-a-tale-of-the-seaboard

being was besieged by anxious inquiries.
‘There is nothing; there is nothing to see!’ he would re-
peat impatiently.
There was nothing. And when the picket in the bushes
near the Casa Viola had been ordered to fall back upon the
main body, no stir of life appeared on the stretch of dusty
and arid land between the town and the waters of the port.
But late in the afternoon a horseman issuing from the gate
was made out riding up fearlessly. It was an emissary from
Senor Fuentes. Being all alone he was allowed to come on.
Dismounting at the great door he greeted the silent by-
standers with cheery impudence, and begged to be taken
up at once to the ‘muy valliente’ colonel.
Senor Fuentes, on entering upon his functions of Gefe
Politico, had turned his diplomatic abilities to getting hold
of the harbour as well as of the mine. The man he pitched
upon to negotiate with Sotillo was a Notary Public, whom
the revolution had found languishing in the common jail on
a charge of forging documents. Liberated by the mob along
with the other ‘victims of Blanco tyranny,’ he had hastened
to offer his services to the new Government.
He set out determined to display much zeal and elo-
quence in trying to induce Sotillo to come into town alone
for a conference with Pedrito Montero. Nothing was fur-
ther from the colonel’s intentions. The mere fleeting idea of
trusting himself into the famous Pedrito’s hands had made
him feel unwell several times. It was out of the question—it
was madness. And to put himself in open hostility was mad-
ness, too. It would render impossible a systematic search for

Nostromo: A Tale of the Seaboard