I don't remember ever being so moved by the desolate end of a
complete stranger. I looked down the skylight, and there was the devoted
Martin busy cording cowhide trunks belonging to the deceased whose white
beard and hooked nose were the only parts I could make out in the dark
depths of a horrible stuffy bunk.
As it fell calm in the course of the afternoon and continued calm during
all that night and the terrible, flaming day, the late "rich man" had
to be thrown overboard at sunset, though as a matter of fact we were in
sight of the low pestilential mangrove-lined coast of our destination.
The excellent Father Superior mentioned to me with an air of immense
commiseration: "The poor man has left a young daughter." Who was to look
after her I don't know, but I saw the devoted Martin taking the trunks
ashore with great care just before I landed myself. I would perhaps have
tracked the ways of that man of immense sincerity for a little while,
but I had some of my own very pressing business to attend to, which in
the end got mixed up with an earthquake and so I had no time to give
to Ricardo. The reader need not be told that I have not forgotten him,
though.
My contact with the faithful Pedro was much shorter and my observation
of him was less complete but incomparably more anxious. It ended in a
sudden inspiration to get out of his way.
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