"_Lola! I love you_!"
There was no reply; not a word, not a whisper that reached me; but her
large dark orbs, like the eyes of the _mazame_, flashed forth a liquid
light that entered my soul, like fire from Cupid's torch.
I was half delirious as I uttered the "_adios_." I did not add the
customary "_Va con Dios_!" nor yet the "_hasta luego_"--the "au revoir"
of the Spanish, for which our boorish Saxon vocabulary has no synonym.
Notwithstanding the omission, I registered a mental vow--_to see Lola
Vergara again_.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
The beautiful Jarocha was gone from my sight!
"Shall I ever see her again?"
This was the interrogatory that came uppermost in my thoughts--not the
less painful from my having perceived that she had lingered to look
back.
Would she have preferred the road to Jalapa?
Whether or not, I had the vanity to think so.
Gone, without leaving me either promise or souvenir--only the
remembrance of her voluptuous beauty--destined long to dwell within the
shrine of my heart.
"Shall I ever see her again?"
Once--twice--thrice--involuntarily did I repeat the self-interrogation.
"Perhaps never!" was each time the equally involuntary reply.
In truth, the chances of my again meeting with her were very slight. To
this conclusion came I, after a calm survey of the circumstances
surrounding me. True, I had obtained the name of her native village--El
Lagarto--and had registered a mental resolve to visit it.
What of that? A long campaign was before me, loading me in the opposite
direction. The chances of being killed, and surviving it, were almost
equally balanced in the scale. With such a prospect, when might I stray
towards Lagarto?
There was but one answer to this question within my cognisance:
_whenever I should find the opportunity_. With this thought I was
forced to console myself.
I stood with my eyes fixed upon the turning of the road, where the
overhanging branches of the acacias, with cruel abruptness, shrouded her
departing figure from my sight. I watched the _grecque_ bordering upon
her petticoat, as the skirt swelled and sank, gradually narrowing
towards the trees. I looked higher, and saw the fringed end of the
reboso flirted suddenly outward, as if a hand, rather than the breeze,
had caused the motion. I looked still higher. The face was hidden
under the scarf. I could not see that, but the attitude told me that
her head must be turned, and her eyes, "_mirando atras_!"
Kissing my hand, in answer to this final recognition, was an action
instinctive and mechanical.
"I've been a fool to permit this parting--perhaps never to see her
again!"
This was the reflection that followed. I entered the tent, and flung
myself upon the _catre_ lately occupied by the invalid.
A sleepless night, caused by excited passions, succeeding another passed
equally without sleep, in which I had toiled, taking those useless
howitzers up the steep slopes of El Plan--had rendered me somnolent to
an extreme degree; and spite the chagrin of that unsatisfactory
separation, I at length gave way to a god resistless as Cupid himself.
Story 1, Chapter XIV.