Page:Nostromo (1904).djvu/420

 They saw him, too, waved their hands to him urgently, walking up the stairs as if in procession.

Don Juste, astonishingly changed by having shaved off altogether his damaged beard, had lost with it ninetenths of his outward dignity. Even at that time of serious preoccupation Charles Gould could not help noting the revealed ineptitude in the aspect of the man. His companions looked crestfallen and sleepy. One kept on passing the tip of his tongue over his parched lips, the other's eyes strayed dully over the tiled floor of the corridor, while Don Juste, standing alp, little in advance, harangued the Señor Administrador of the San Tome mine. It was his firm opinion that forms had to be observed. A new governor is always visited by deputations from the cabildo, which is the municipal council, from the consulado, the commercial board; and it was proper that the Provincial Assembly should send a deputation, too, if only to assert the existence of parliamentary institutions. Don Juste proposed that Don Carlos Gould, as the most prominent citizen of the province, should join the Assembly's deputation. His position was exceptional, his personality known through the length and breadth of the whole republic. Official courtesies must not be neglected, if they are gone through with a bleeding heart. The acceptance of accomplished facts may save yet the precious vestiges of parliamentary institutions. Don Juste'fc eyes glowed dully; he believed in parliamentary institutions and the convinced drone of his voice lost itself in the stillness of the house, like the deep buzzing of some ponderous insect.

Charles Gould had turned round to listen patiently,