“Leave poor papa alone, Don Martin. He believes--” “I have the greatest tenderness for your father,” he began, hurriedly. “But I love you, Antonia! And Moraga has miserably mismanaged this business. Perhaps your father did, too; I don’t know. Montero was bribeable. Why, I suppose he only wanted his share of this famous loan for national development. Why didn’t the stupid Sta. Marta people give him a mission to Europe, or something? He would have taken five years’ salary in advance, and gone on loafing in Paris, this stupid, ferocious Indio!” “The man,” she said, thoughtfully, and very calm before this outburst, “was intoxicated with vanity. We had all the information, not from Moraga only; from others, too. There was his brother intriguing, too.” “Oh, yes!” he said. “Of course you know. You know everything. You read all the correspondence, you write all the papers--all those State papers that are inspired here, in this room, in blind deference to a theory of political purity. Hadn’t you Charles Gould before your eyes? Rey de Sulaco! He and his mine are the practical demonstration of what could have been done. Do you think he succeeded by his fidelity to a theory of virtue? And all those railway people, with their honest work! Of course, their work is honest! But what if you cannot work honestly till the thieves are satisfied? Could he not, a gentleman, have told this Sir John what’s-his-name that Montero had to be bought off--he and all his Negro Liberals hanging on to his gold-laced sleeve? He ought to have been bought off with his own stupid weight of gold--his weight of gold, I tell you, boots, sabre, spurs, cocked hat, and all.” She shook her head slightly. “It was impossible,” she murmured. “He wanted the whole lot? What?”