Angela Bryton sought until she found Rafael asleep in a corner of the
travellers' room.
"Ana Mendez knows; she has told your wife," she said, abruptly. "Two
nights and a day we have; that is all. Raquel says I am not more to you
than a brown girl in the willows. You make her pay for that!"
"Pay?" He rubbed the sleep of the brandy from his eyes and sat up, then
caught her to him in the instinct of possession.
Quickly she drew aside and eluded him.
"Not yet," she said, with the glint of steel in her eyes. "Not until you
make her pride pay, Rafael mio! She tosses a string of pearls to me as a
queen would to a waiting-maid, to show how trifling a thing it is to
her. One string! Rafael, where now is that boat?"
"The boat?" He stumbled to his feet and stared at her.
"The boat! You said it. Not even my hand shall you touch until it is in
the harbor. Cousin Eduardo and Keith Bryton will send me away when she
tells them; they will never let you see me again."
"Huh!" He flung back his head contemptuously. He had never quite gotten
away from Teresa's conviction that Keith Bryton's impatience with Angela
was born of jealousy. So it was Keith Bryton again!
"He gets you when he has killed me, not sooner," he muttered. "And they
all know, eh? How is that?"
"Perhaps not, but they will. It is that Mendez woman and your wife! I
will _not_ be sent like a pauper back to England! Cousin Edward spoke
yesterday of that; of an allowance for Dolly and me. Now I know what it
means! If I go, I will go in a manner they don't dream of,--alone in
that boat! You can join me anywhere you say, on the coast. How you
stare! It is not so difficult, and there will never, never, never be any
other way we can be together."
"That is true; we will go."
"You want all the coin; you want the jewels; you want--"
"I want only you," he said.
"If you want me, you must give me what I ask. Those women must not--"
"To hell with the women! We will go, and no one need guess we have gone
together. I will send Victorio with a letter to San Pedro for a boat.
Your lips for that promise!"
"When the boat is in the harbor, and the jewels in my hand, Rafael," she
replied, and darted like a bird through the door, and out into the
garden. Later she came into the refectory with an armful of
lilies,--symbols of innocence,--and asked Ana for an olla for them, and
was very demure and sweetly appealing for the rest of the day.
[Illustration: "EACH WAY HE TURNED HE MET AN ALTAR OR A PRIEST"]
[Music: _La Noche esta Serena_.]
La noche 'sta serena, tranquillo el aquilon,
Tu dulce sentinella, te guarda il corazon,
Y en alas de los zefiros,
que vagan por doquier,
Volando van mis suplicas, a ti bella mujer,
Volando van mis suplicas, a ti bella mujer!
De un corazon que te ama, recibe el tier no amor,
No anmentes mas la llama, Piedad a un trobadour,
Y si te mueve a lastima,
Mi eterno padecer,
Como te amo amame, bellisima mujer,
Como te amo amame, bellisima mujer!
[Music]