Next morning we arrived at Buenos Ayres, and cast anchor about two miles from shore, for that was as near the land as we could get. Presently we were boarded by a Custom House officer, and for some time longer I was engaged in getting out our luggage and in bargaining with the captain to put us on shore. When I had completed these arrangements I was very much surprised to see the cunning old soldier I had talked with the evening before sitting in the Custom House boat, which was just putting off from the side. Demetria had been looking on when the old fellow had left the ship, and she now came to me looking very excited. “Richard,” she said, “did you notice that man who was a passenger with us and who has just gone off in the boat? It is Santa Coloma.” “Oh, absurd!” I exclaimed. “I talked with that old man last night for an hour--an old grey-bearded gaucho, and no more like Santa Coloma than that sailor.” “I know I am right,” she returned. “The General has visited my father at the _estancia_ and I know him well. He is disguised now and has made himself look like a peasant, but when he went over the side into the boat he looked full into my face; I knew him and started, then he smiled, for he saw that I had recognised him.” The very fact that this common-looking old man had gone on shore in the Custom House boat proved that he was a person of consequence in disguise, and I could not doubt that Demetria was right. I felt excessively annoyed at myself for having failed to penetrate his disguise; for something of the old Marcos Marcó style of speaking might very well have revealed his identity if I had only had my wits about me. I was also very much concerned on Demetria's account, for it seemed that I had missed finding out something for her which would have been to her advantage to know. I was ashamed to tell her of that conversation about a relation in Buenos Ayres, but secretly determined to try and find Santa Coloma to get him to tell me what he knew. After landing we put our small luggage into a fly and were driven to an hotel in Calle Lima, an out-of-the-way place kept by a German; but I knew the house to be a quiet, respectable one and very moderate in its charges. About five o'clock in the afternoon we were together in the sitting-room on the first floor, looking down on the street from the window, when a well-appointed carriage with a gentleman and two young ladies in it drew up before the door. “Oh, Richard,” exclaimed Paquíta in the greatest excitement, “it is Don Pantaleon Villaverde with his daughters, and they are getting out!” “Who is Villaverde?” I asked. “What, do you not know? He is a Judge of First Instance, and his daughters are my dearest friends. Is it not strange to meet them like this? Oh, I must see them to ask for _papa_ and _mamita!_” and here she began to cry. The waiter came up with a card from the Señor Villaverde requesting an interview with the Señorita Peralta.