Nostromo - A Tale of the Seaboard.pdf - Planet eBook

whom they call the King of Sulaco, the master of the mine?Is it not so?’‘Yes, I am the master of the mine,’ answered CharlesGould.The man cantered for a time in silence, then said, ‘I havea brother, a sereno in your service in the San Tome valley.You have proved yourself a just man. There has been nowrong done to any one since you called upon the peopleto work in the mountains. My brother says that no officialof the Government, no oppressor of the Campo, has beenseen on your side of the stream. Your own officials do notoppress the people in the gorge. Doubtless they are afraidof your severity. You are a just man and a powerful one,’ headded.He spoke in an abrupt, independent tone, but evidentlyhe was communicative with a purpose. He told CharlesGould that he had been a ranchero in one of the lower valleys,far south, a neighbour of Hernandez in the old days,and godfather to his eldest boy; one of those who joinedhim in his resistance to the recruiting raid which was thebeginning of all their misfortunes. It was he that, when hiscompadre had been carried off, had buried his wife andchildren, murdered by the soldiers.‘Si, senor,’ he muttered, hoarsely, ‘I and two or three others,the lucky ones left at liberty, buried them all in onegrave near the ashes of their ranch, under the tree that hadshaded its roof.’It was to him, too, that Hernandez came after he had deserted,three years afterwards. He had still his uniform on