I rode slowly, and but a few paces before reining up my horse. Although
I was under the impression that it would be useless remaining, and that
an interview with Isolina was impossible--for that day at least--I could
not divest myself of the desire to linger a little longer near the spot.
Perhaps she might appear again upon the azotea; if but for a moment; if
but to wave her hand, and waft me an adieu; if but--
When a short distance separated me from the walls, I drew up; and
turning in the saddle, glanced back to the parapet. A face was there,
where hers had been; but, oh, the contrast between her lovely features
and those that now met my gaze! Hyperion to the Satyr! Not that the
face now before me was ugly or ill-featured. There are some, and women
too, who would have termed it handsome; to my eyes it was hideous! Let
me confess that this hideousness, or more properly its cause, rested in
the moral, rather than the physical expression; perhaps, too, little of
it might have been found in my own heart. Under other circumstances, I
might not have criticised that face so harshly. All the world did not
agree with me about the face of Rafael Ijurra--for it was he who was
gazing over the parapet.
Our eyes met; and that first glance stamped the relationship between
us--hostility for life! Not a word passed, and yet the looks of each
told the other, in the plainest language, "_I am your foe_." Had we
sworn it in wild oaths, in all the bitter hyperbole of insult, neither
of us would have felt it more profound and keen.
I shall not stay to analyse this feeling of sudden and unexpressed
hostility, though the philosophy of it is simple enough. You too have
experienced it--perhaps more than once in your life, without being
exactly able to explain it. I am not in that dilemma: I could explain
it easily enough; but it scarcely merits an explanation. Suffice to
say, that while gazing upon the face of that man, I entertained it in
all its strength.
I have called it an _unexpressed_ hostility. Therein I have spoken
without thought: it was fully expressed by both of us, though not in
words. Words are but weak symbols of a passion, compared with the
passion itself, exhibited in the clenched hand, the lip compressed, the
flashing eye, the clouded cheek, the quick play of the muscles--weak
symbols are words compared with signs like these. No words passed
between Ijurra and myself; none were needed. Each read in the other a
rival--a rival in love, a competitor for the heart of a lovely woman,
the _loveliest_ in Mexico! It is needless to say that, under such an
aspect, each hated the other at sight.
In the face of Ijurra I read more. I saw before me a man of bad heart
and brutal nature. His large, and to speak the truth, beautiful eyes,
had in them an animal expression. They were not without intelligence,
but so much the worse, for that intelligence expressed ferocity and bad
faith. His beauty was the beauty of the jaguar. He had the air of an
accomplished man, accustomed to conquest in the field of love--
heartless, reckless, false. O mystery of our nature, there are those
who love such men!
In Ijurra's face I read more: _he knew my secret_! The significant
glance of his eye told me so. He knew why I was lingering there. The
satiric smile upon his lip attested it. He saw my efforts to obtain an
interview, and confident in his own position, held my failure but
lightly--a something only to amuse him. I could tell all this by the
sardonic sneer that sat upon his features.
As we continued to gaze, neither moving his eyes from the other, this
sneer became too oppressive to be silently borne. I could no longer
stand such a satirical reading of my thoughts. The insult was as marked
as words could have made it; and I was about to have recourse to words
to reply, when the clatter of a horse's hoofs caused me to turn my eyes
in an opposite direction. A horseman was coming up the hill, in a
direct line from the pastures. I saw it was one of the lieutenants--
Holingsworth.
A few more stretches of his horse brought the lieutenant upon the
ground, where he pulled up directly in front of me.
"Captain Warfield!" said he, speaking in an official tone, "the cattle
are collected; shall we proceed--"
He proceeded no further with that sentence; his eye, chance directed,
was carried up to the azotea, and rested upon the face of Ijurra. He
started in his saddle, as if a serpent had stung him; his hollow eyes
shot prominently out, glaring wildly from their sockets, while the
muscles of his throat and jaws twitched in convulsive action!
For a moment, the desperate passion seemed to stifle his breathing, and
while thus silent, the expression of his eyes puzzled me. It was of
frantic joy, and ill became that face where I had never observed a
smile. But the strange look was soon explained--it was not of
friendship, but the joy of anticipated vengeance!