Page:Works of Jules Verne - Parke - Vol 1.djvu/153

Rh were arranged about the chamber, and it might have been imagined that the mind of the sleeper was reveling amidst their beauties.

Her father came close to her side and bent down to watch her slumber. She was evidently agitated by some painful dream, and once the name of Martin Paz escaped her lips. The old man went to his room.

At break of day Sarah arose in eager haste. She summoned Liberia, an Indian attached to her service, and bade him saddle a horse for himself and a mule for her.

It was no long task for her to array herself in such a toilette as suited her design. A broad-brimmed hat, and her loosely-flowing tresses of black hair sheltered her face from observation, and the better to conceal the thoughts by which she was preoccupied, she placed a small perfumed cigarette between her lips.

She was no sooner mounted than she started off with her attendant across the country in the direction of Callao. The harbor was all alive with excitement, the coastguards having had to keep watch all night long upon the schooner, whose uncertain tackings indicated a fraudulent design. At one moment it would seem as though the vessel was waiting near the river's mouth for some suspicious-looking boats; but before they came alongside she was off again to avoid the long-boats belonging to the harbor. Many were the surmises about her destination. Some said that she had brought a body of Colombian troops, and intended to take possession of Callao, and to avenge the insult offered to the Bolivian soldiers who had been ignominiously expelled from Peru. Others maintained that she was merely a schooner driving a contraband trade in European wool.

To Sarah these speculations were all indifferent. She had only come to the port as a pretext, and now returned to Lima, which she reached at the point nearest to the river. Following the banks of the stream she went as far as the bridge, whence she noticed the groups of soldiers and half- breeds gathered along shore.

Liberta had made the girl acquainted with the events of the night. In obedience to her orders he now inquired further particulars from some of the soldiers, and learnt that although Martin Paz was doubtless drowned, his body had not yet been recovered.