A house from which agreeable guests have just taken departure is rarely
cheerful. The reverse, if these have been very agreeable--especially on
the first evening after.
The rude sheiling which gives shelter to the refugees is no exception.
Everyone under its roof is afflicted with low spirits, some of them
sad--two particularly so.
Thus has it been since the early hour of daybreak, when the guests
regretted spoke the parting speech.
In the ears of Adela Miranda, all day long, has been ringing that
painful word, "Adios!" while thoughts about him who uttered it have been
agitating her bosom.
Not that she has any fear of his fealty, or that he will prove traitor
to his troth now plighted. On the contrary, she can confide in him for
that, and does--fully, trustingly.
Her fears are from a far different cause; the danger he is about to
dare.
Conchita, in like manner, though in less degree, has her apprehensions.
The great Colossus who has captured her heart, and been promised her
hand, may never return to claim it. But, unacquainted with the risk he
is going to run, the little mestiza has less to alarm her, and only
contemplates her lover's absence, with that sense of uncertainty common
to all who live in a land where every day has its dangers.
Colonel Miranda is discomforted too. Never before since his arrival in
the valley have his apprehensions been so keen. Hamersley's words,
directing suspicion to the peon, Manuel, have excited them. All the
more from his having entertained something of this before. And now
still more, that his messenger is three days overdue from the errand on
which he has sent him.
At noon he and Don Prospero again ascend to the summit of the pass, and
scan the table plain above--to observe nothing upon it, either
westwardly or in any other direction. And all the afternoon has one or
the other been standing near the door of the jacal, with a lorgnette
levelled up the ravine through which the valley is entered from above.
Only as the shades of night close over them do they desist from this
vigil, proving fruitless.
Added to the idea of danger, they have another reason for desiring the
speedy return of the messenger. Certain little luxuries he is expected
to bring--among the rest a skin or two of wine and a few boxes of
cigars. For neither the colonel himself nor the ex-army surgeon are
anchorites, however much they have of late been compelled to the habit.
Above all, they need tobacco, their stock being out; the last ounce
given to their late guests on leaving.
These are minor matters, but yet add to the cheerlessness of the time
after the strangers have gone. Not less at night, when more than ever
one feels a craving for the nicotian weed, to consume it in some way--
pipe, cigar, or cigaritto.
As the circle of three assemble in their little sitting-room, after a
frugal supper, tobacco is the Colonel's chief care, and becomes the
first topic of conversation.
"Carramba!" he explains, as if some new idea had entered his head, "I
couldn't have believed in a man suffering so much from such a trifling
cause."
"What are you referring to?" interrogates the doctor.
"The thing you're thinking of at this moment, _amigo mio_. I'll make a
wager it's the same."
"As you know, colonel, I never bet."
"Nor I upon a certainty, as in this case it would be. I know what your
mind's bent upon--tobacco."
"I confess it, colonel. I want a smoke, bad as ever I did in my life."
"Sol."
"But why don't you both have it, then?"
It is Adela who thus innocently interrogates.
"For the best of all reasons," rejoins her brother. "We haven't the
wherewith."
"What! no cigarittos? I saw some yesterday on one of the shelves."
"But not to day. At this moment there isn't a pinch of tobacco within
twenty miles of where we sit, unless our late guests have made a very
short day's march. I gave them the last I had to comfort them on the
journey."
"Yes, senorita," adds the doctor, "and something quite as bad, if not
worse. Our bottles are empty. The wine is out as well as the weed."
"In that," interrupts the Colonel, "I'm happy to say you're mistaken.
It's not so bad as you think, doctor. True, the pigskin has collapsed;
for the throat of the huge Texan was as difficult to saturate as the
most parched spot on the Staked Plain. Finding it so, I took occasion
to abstract a good large gourd, and set it surreptitiously aside. I did
that to meet emergencies. As one seems to have arisen, I think the
hidden treasure may now be produced."
Saying this, the colonel steps out of the room, soon returning with a
large calabash bottle.
Conchita is summoned, and directed to bring drinking cups, which she
does.