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what gets ’em. Folks come, make a little money, for, bless the Lord, there
is
money there—but it’s money that brings bad luck; it’s money with a curse on it. It don’t stay in anybody’s palm. You plant a little cacao. . . . ”
    The music now was low and hushed. The card-players had finished their hand. The old man looked the young one straight in the eyes, after darting a glance around at the others who were hanging on his words.
    â€œDid you ever hear tell of an ‘ouster’?”
    â€œI’ve heard it’s some kind of monkey-business with a lawyer who takes the land away from other folks.”
    â€œAn attorney comes along with a colonel; they work an ‘ouster’ and take away the cacao that folks have planted.” Once more he glanced about sharply, then spread out his big rough hands. “You see those hands? They’ve planted many a cacao tree. Me and Joaquim, we set out grove after grove; we worked like beavers, we did. And what did we get out of it?”
    He was putting the question to them all—to the card-players, to the pregnant woman, to the young lad. Then he appeared to be listening to the music once more as he gazed at the distant moon.
    â€œThey say when the moon is the colour of blood like that there’ll be trouble in the street that night. It was like that the night they murdered Joaquim. They had no reason for killing him; they did it out of pure wickedness.”
    â€œBut why did they kill him?” the woman insisted.
    â€œColonel Horacio and Lawyer Ruy worked an ouster; they took the cacao we had planted—claimed the land belonged to the colonel and that Joaquim had no right to it. Colonel Horacio came with his cut-throats and a bunch of certified records. They drove us off the land and even kept the cacao that was drying and about ready for market. Joaquim was a good lad, not afraid of hard work; but he was done for when they took the grove, and he started to drink. And one time when he was drunk he told people he was going to have revenge, that he was going to do away with the colonel. One of the colonel’s
cabras
overheard him and told his boss, and they laid for Joaquim in ambush and killed him the next night, on the road to Ferradas.”
    The old man fell silent and his listeners asked no further questions. The players returned to their game, the dealer threw down a couple of cards, and the others bet. The music was gradually dying away in the night. The wind was blowing harder and harder every minute. The old fellow took up his tale again.
    â€œJoaquim,” he said, “was a law-abiding man; he would not have killed anybody. Colonel Horacio knew that very well, and his men did, too. Joaquim just said that because he’d been drinking; he wasn’t going to kill anyone. He was a hard-working man; all he wanted was to earn a living. He felt bad because they’d taken the plantation, that’s true. But if he hadn’t been drinking, he’d never have said what he did. He wasn’t a killer. They shot him in the back.”
    â€œWere they arrested?”
    Again the old man spat, contemptuously.
    â€œThe very night they killed him, they were drinking in a wine-shop, bragging about it.”
    Silence fell on the group. “Seven,” said one of the players. But the winner did not even rake in his money, so absorbed was he in watching the old man, who stood there all bent over, seemingly oblivious of the world, alone with his sorrow.
    â€œAnd you?” said the pregnant woman in a low voice.
    â€œThey shipped me off to Bahia, told me I couldn’t stay there any longer. But I’m going back now.” The old fellow suddenly drew himself erect, his eyes once more took on the hard gleam they had lost as he finished his tale, and it was with a firm voice that he went on speaking:
    â€œI’m going back now, going back for good. No one is going to drive me away.