“Very well,” O’Reilly told him, finally.  “I give in.”

Jacket’s face instantly lit up.  He radiated good humor; he hitched his body closer.

“By——!  I get my own way, don’t I?” he laughed.

“Indeed you do.”  O’Reilly laid a hand fondly upon his loyal follower.  “And I don’t mind telling you that I’m more than half glad of it.  I—­I was getting lonesome.  I didn’t know how much I could miss you.  But now we must make some plans, we must have an understanding and decide who we are.  Let me see—­your real name is Narciso—­”

“Narciso Villar.”

“Well, then, I shall be Juan Villar, your brother.  Henceforth we shall speak nothing but Spanish.  Tell me now, what was our father’s name, where was our home, and what are we doing together?”

During the breathless interval before the shower the two sat with their heads together, talking earnestly.  As the wind came and the cooling rain began to rattle on the leaves overhead they took up their bundles and set out.  The big drops drenched them quickly.  Their thin garments clung to them and water streamed down their bodies; overhead the sky was black and rent by vivid streaks of fire, but they plodded onward cheerfully.

Jacket was himself again; he bent his weight against the tempest and lengthened his short strides to O’Reilly’s.  He tried to whistle, but his teeth chattered and the wind interfered, so he hummed a song, to drive the chill out of his bones and to hearten his benefactor.  Now that he was at last accepted as a full partner in this enterprise, it became his duty not only to share its perils, but to lessen its hardships and to yield diversion.

The rain was cold, the briers beside the overgrown path were sharp, and they scratched the boy’s bare legs cruelly; his stomach clamored for a companion to that solitary sweet-potato, too, but in his breast glowed ardor and pride.  Jacket considered himself a fortunate person—­a very fortunate person, indeed.  Had he not found a brother, and did not that brother love him?  There was no doubt about the latter, for O’Reilly’s eyes, when he looked down, were kind and smiling, his voice was friendly and intimate.  Here was a man to die for.

The downpour lasted but a short time, then the sun came out and dried the men’s clothes; on the whole, it had been refreshing.  When evening came the Villar brothers sought refuge in an old sugar-mill, or rather in a part of it still standing.  They were on the main calzada, now, the paved road which links the two main cities of the island, and by the following noon their destination was in sight.

O’Reilly felt a sudden excitement when Matanzas came into view.  From this distance the city looked quite as it did when he had left it, except that the blue harbor was almost empty of shipping, while the familiar range of hills that hid the Yumuri—­that valley of delight so closely linked in his thoughts with Rosa Varona—­ seemed to smile at him like an old friend.  For the thousandth time he asked himself if he had come in time to find her, or if fate’s maddening delays had proved his own and the girl’s undoing.