 struck with a sudden thought, dropped the
bucket with a clatter into the lighter.
    »Have you any message?« he asked in a lowered voice. »Remember, I shall be
asked questions.«
    »You must find the hopeful words that ought to be spoken to the people in
town. I trust for that your intelligence and your experience, Capataz. You
understand?«
    »Si, señor. ... For the ladies.«
    »Yes, yes,« said Decoud, hastily. »Your wonderful reputation will make them
attach great value to your words; therefore be careful what you say. I am
looking forward,« he continued, feeling the fatal touch of contempt for himself
to which his complex nature was subject, »I am looking forward to a glorious and
successful ending to my mission. Do you hear, Capataz? Use the words glorious
and successful when you speak to the señorita. Your own mission is accomplished
gloriously and successfully. You have indubitably saved the silver of the mine.
Not only this silver, but probably all the silver that shall ever come out of
it.«
    Nostromo detected the ironic tone. »I dare say, Señor Don Martin,« he said,
moodily. »There are very few things that I am not equal to. Ask the foreign
signori. I, a man of the people, who cannot always understand what you mean. But
as to this lot which I must leave here, let me tell you that I would believe it
in greater safety if you had not been with me at all.«
    An exclamation escaped Decoud, and a short pause followed. »Shall I go back
with you to Sulaco?« he asked in an angry tone.
    »Shall I strike you dead with my knife where you stand?« retorted Nostromo,
contemptuously. »It would be the same thing as taking you to Sulaco. Come,
señor. Your reputation is in your politics, and mine is bound up with the fate
of this silver. Do you wonder I wish there had been no other man to share my
knowledge? I wanted no one with me, señor.«
    »You could not have kept the lighter afloat without me,« Decoud almost
shouted. »You would have gone to the bottom with her.«
    »Yes,« uttered Nostromo, slowly; »alone.«
    Here was a man, Decoud reflected, that seemed as though he would have
preferred to die rather than deface the perfect form of his egoism. Such a man
was safe. In silence he helped the Capataz to get the
