On reaching the other side of the hill Manos-gordas descried in a glen, a short distance off, a corpulent Moor dressed in white, ploughing the black earth with the help of a fine yoke of oxen, in patriarchal fashion. This man, who seemed a statue of Peace carved in marble, was the morose and dreaded renegade, Ben-Munuza, the details of whose story would make the reader shudder with horror, if he were to hear them.  
Suffice it for the present to say that he was some forty years old, that he was active, vigorous, and robust, and that he was of a gloomy cast of countenance, although his eyes were blue as the sky, and his beard yellow as the African sunlight, which had bronzed his originally fair complexion.
 
"Good-morning, Manos-gordas!" cried the renegade, as soon as he perceived the Moor.
 
And his voice expressed the melancholy pleasure the exile feels in a foreign land when he meets some one with whom he can converse in his native tongue.
 
"Good-morning, Juan Falgueira!" responded Ben-Carime, in ironical accents.
 
As he heard this name the renegade trembled from head to foot, and seizing the iron bar of the plough prepared to defend himself.
 
"What name is that you have just pronounced?" he said, advancing threateningly toward Manos-gordas.
 
The latter awaited his approach, laughing, and answered in Arabic, with a courage which no one would have supposed him to possess:
 
"I have pronounced your real name; the name you bore in Spain when you were a Christian, and which I learned when I was in Oran three years ago."
 
"In Oran?"
 
"Yes, in Oran. What is there extraordinary in that? You had come from Oran to Morocco; I went to Oran to buy hens. I inquired there concerning your history, describing your appearance, and some Spaniards living there related it to me. I learned that you were a Galician, that your name was Juan Falgueira, and that you had escaped from the prison of Granada, on the eve of the day appointed for your execution, for having robbed and murdered, fifteen years ago, a party of gentlemen, whom you were serving in the capacity of muleteer. Do you still doubt that I know who you are?"
 
"Tell me, my soul," responded the renegade, in a hollow voice, looking cautiously around, "have you related this story to any of the Moors? Does any one but yourself in this accursed land know it? Because the fact is, I want to live in peace, without having any one or anything to remind me of that fatal deed which I have well expiated. I am a poor man. I have neither family, nor country, nor language, nor even the God who made me left to me. I live among enemies, with no other wealth than these oxen and these fields, bought by the fruit of ten years' sweat and toil. Consequently, you do very wrong to come and tell me—"
 
"Hold!" cried Manos-gordas, greatly alarmed. "Don't cast those wolfish glances at me, for I come to do you a great service, and not to vex you needlessly. I have told your unfortunate story to no one. What for? Any secret may be a treasure, which he who tells gives away. There are, however, occasions in which an EXCHANGE OF SECRETS may be made with profit. For instance, I am going to tell you an important secret of mine, which will serve as security for yours, and which will oblige us to be friends for the rest of our lives."
 
"I am listening; go on," responded the renegade quietly.
 
Aben-Carime then read aloud the Arabic document, which Juan Falguei............