FATE PLAYS A TRICK
It was nearly noon when Paintbrush trotted quickly up the last rocky bit
of road that led through the narrow defile into Nacozari. Across the
valley the great works of the Nacozari Mining Company lay idle. There
was not a sign of life about.
The gay little plaza, washed green with the rainy season, was deserted,
but the torn grass and the débris littering the place showed that an
army had bivouacked there. The doors of the hotel were closed and
locked; the gates barred. On the main door hung a placard ordering that
the hotel and mine were to remain closed awaiting the return of the
regiment; it was signed by the Colonel. It was a bad place to stay
around, and as Paintbrush had had his fill at the river, Raquel swung
past the fountain and turned up the hill on which the officials of the
company had built their residences. It looked like a California suburb
on the hill--pretty bungalows, tennis courts, a rudimentary golf course.
There were groves of citrus fruits. It was all very pretty.
Raquel dismounted, took off Paintbrush’s saddle and blanket, so that he
could roll on the grass, and then stretched herself beneath the trees.
Here in this hidden spot she and Paintbrush could rest without being
seen.
She slept and dreamed--dreamed she heard some one crying pitifully, in a
heartbroken way. Could it be Mom? The thought jarred her into
consciousness, and she leaped to her feet. But there was not a sound in
this deserted place, except the faint yapping of some little cur dog
from a far hillside, where the huts of the peon miners clung like
swallows’ nests.
The drip, drip of water from near one of the houses broke the stillness.
Raquel stepped quietly over to where a pipe and faucet rose from the
grass near a balcony. As she laid a hand upon the faucet a door on the
balcony before her opened and a slight girlish figure stepped out.
Speechless with amazement, they stood face to face for a moment, the
girl on the balcony wavering slightly back and forth. Then with a moan
she tottered and fell forward. Raquel pulled open the screen door with a
quick movement and reached the girl’s side; she caught her before she
could fall to the floor.
It was Lois Wainwright! Thin and pale she was, but still lovely, though
her closed eyes were red with weeping, and blue hollows smudged her
cheeks. The shock of it almost stunned Raquel. Lois! How could she be
here, of all places!
Lois’ eyelids began to flutter and Raquel, lifting her in wiry arms,
half carried, half dragged the limp figure out on the grass. She bathed
the white face with fresh water from the faucet and fanned her briskly
with a palmetto leaf. Lois’ eyes opened slowly, almost reluctantly, and
she sat up, looking hungrily into the face peering down at her.
“Raquel Daniels,” she faltered. “So it really is you? I was afraid to
look again. I hardly dared believe it.” And she turned her head away as
tears rolled down her cheeks.
“Come, Lois,” Raquel spoke quietly, patiently, as to a child. “Come,
dear, you mustn’t cry. Tell me, is it possible that you are all _alone_
here? Where is your father?”
“Take me away, save me!” Lois’ eyes widened with terror. “Papa, papa--is
dead. He died suddenly.” She could say no more. She was almost unstrung
with strain, fright and grief. A few babbling words about the Chino cook
who had gone away with everything and the Mexican boy who was coming
back to take her off into the mountains roused Raquel to the necessity
for getting away.
Could she get Lois to El Escondido? How was it possible with one so weak
and broken? Leading her gently back into the house, Raquel glanced about
the attractive bungalow. How pleasant it would be to stay right here, if
they only dared. But she herself must return to the Ranch of the Desert
to find Georgie, and she couldn’t leave Lois alone. No, Lois would have
to go with her.
But there was little food in the pantries. They had been looted; doors
were ajar; cupboards open. She found, however, in the places where it
always occurs to womankind to look, whole-wheat crackers, some cheese,
and a box of guava paste. She threw them into a sack, leaving the tinned
milk and sea foods which were most likely to be spoiled. She dashed back
to Lois, who, with frightened eyes, was hastily stuffing clothes and
toilet articles into a suitcase.
“You can’t take that, Lois.” Raquel spoke gently. “We have no way of
carrying it, dear. I am going out now while you put on some riding
clothes--that linen suit would be best--to see if I can’t rout out a
burro, or a mule, to carry what we need--unless I can find another horse
for you to ride. Quick, Lois! We _must_ be quick.”
Lois, with a swift obedience that was touching, and with a piteous
reliance on Raquel, began at once to get into her things. She seemed
afraid to speak aloud, but she did not want Raquel to leave her there
alone for an instant.
“Don’t go, don’t go,” she pleaded, in a whisper. “Wait for me.”
Raquel helped her. They left the wardrobe full of lovely, flimsy frocks,
the bureau drawers full of scented undergarments. Lois snatched her
father’s picture from the dressing table and Raquel, on impulse, pushed
the silver articles into the wardrobe and turned the key in the lock. It
was a stalwart piece of furniture. The owners would be back some day and
might return the things if they had not been filched.
In the corrals they found not a horse nor even a burro. Nor did a quick
survey of the hill top discover a single animal. There was nothing to do
but _find_ some horse for Lois to ride. They could not get away without
it.
It was dangerous to stay where they were. The troops might be back at
any moment. No one knew what treatment the girls might receive. They
could not hope to hide here forever. Bandits looking for ransom were
everywhere. What chance would there be for a fragile, lovely creature
with golden hair like Lois? Raquel was frantic with the dilemma. She
reasoned to herself, “Perhaps it’s better at that to stay here. Here
it’s cool and comfortable; there’s _something_ to eat; wouldn’t it be
better to take our chances so long as we’re alive than to go out on the
desert with only the pinto to carry the two of us, and water and food?”
Then she remembered the threatening placard on the hotel door; she
thought of Georgie. It was a terrible decision, but they must go.
She brought the pinto up to where Lois was waiting on the porch and
spoke to him. She tied on the bag of food and put Lois’ things in her
saddle bag, then she half lifted Lois on his back and took the bridle to
reassure the horse, still wild at heart when any one but his mistress
came too near.
On a last impulse Raquel turned down the hill again toward the plaza,
hoping to catch a glimpse of some stray horse. Perhaps some second-rate
animal had been left behind, tied in a corral, or hobbled on the
mountain side.
As if in answer to prayer she heard a nicker and, down at the end of the
plaza, under a flaming paradise tree, she caught sight of a large roan
horse, awkwardly jumping toward the fountain in the center of the
square. His front feet were hobbled.
She helped Lois off again and left her in the shelter of the trees. Then
Raquel ran out and up to the animal. He was thoroughly _manso_ and
offered her his hind hoof for inspection. He had cast a shoe, but that
was not what made him limp. A nail had become thrust into the tender
part of the hoof just enough to hurt when pressure was put upon it.
Raquel pulled it out and the friendly creature stretched out his head
and wriggled his lips in appreciation.
“And they left you behind for that, old boy!” Raquel talked to him as
she quickly untied the hobble ropes. “Too lazy to find out what made him
lame! Can you beat the ways of a péon with a horse? You were most
certainly picked up over the border anyway, old boy. What a find just
now, when I’d have given several kingdoms for a gentle horse.”
The brown horse still limped, but only slightly. There was no saddle, no
blanket, in sight. They could go by the bungalow again and pick up a
blanket, and Raquel remembered a decrepit old saddle hanging in one of
the stable sheds behind the house.
Every minute seemed an age, yet it was only ten minutes after they left
Lois’ house before they were back; and a few minutes later Raquel had
the new horse nicely blanketed and saddled with the patched-up saddle,
roping the cinch rings together. A rope bridle was rigged from the
pieces with which the animal had been hobbled.
With Lois mounted, they went quietly side by side down through the
grapefruit grove, plucking a number of the big fruits as they passed.
Behind the last house should be the trail which Raquel’s host of the
night before had described. She could not in the least remember what
direction they had taken to Escondido before. Now she was too far to the
right. “Above the houses,” the old woman had said. Ah, there it was, a
fair trail surely! And they were on it, winding over foothills in a
northeasterly direction.
All this while Lois remained silent, dazed. But as they dropped down
into an arroyo, out of sight of the rest of the world, she whispered
timidly, “Where are we going, Raquel?”
“To a ranch called El Escondido, where I hope to find my brother
Georgie, and where we can be very comfortable and safe. It’s not far,
and we’ll rest by the river we are coming to, and eat something before
we start across.”
It was very hot there in the sandhills, with no protection from the
blazing sun. Before them a peccary scuttled away with her drove of
young. Lois’ face was like the white flower of the _Lilia de la
Crucifixion_.
“Just a _coche Javalina_, the wild pig of this country,” Raquel
reassured her. Pigs did not seem formidable to Lois and she relaxed in
her saddle. Raquel was glad that the fierce old sow had not seen fit to
charge them, for a horse will run from a peccary.
Over another hill still! But it was the last, and below them ran a
sluggish, muddy stream, yellow and swollen with the rains. There were no
trees along the river, only mesquite bushes, Spanish dagger and stunted
palms. Lois was already exhausted, though they had ridden scarcely an
hour, and Raquel felt as happy as a lizard in the sun.
“How much farther?” Lois gasped.
“Come, dear, try to pull yourself together.” Raquel spoke sharply, for a
glance at Lois showed her that she was letting go of what reserve force
she had.
Lois winced as if she had been struck, but closed her lips tightly and
held desperately to the saddle horn. Raquel rode close and put an arm
about her. They reached the sandy flats of the river bed and Raquel
leaped off, lifting Lois from her horse. Quickly she sought the one
large spot of shade beneath a maguey plant and, spiking the burlap sack
and the saddle blankets from one thorn to another, contrived a nice bit
of shade.
She pulled out a clean shirt that Lois had given her and wet it in the
stream; then hurried back to fan Lois. A slight breeze was stirring, and
it was surprisingly cooler there in the shade by the river.
In a little while Raquel peeled an orange, making the girl eat it with a
few wheat cakes. She herself then ate as much of the slender provender
as she dared, and with good appetite, for she had breakfasted before
five that morning.
A little color was returning to Lois’ lips. She lay back resting.
Presently she looked at Raquel with puzzled eyes.
“You--you act as though nothing had ever happened, I should think you’d
hate me. I wouldn’t have blamed you for leaving me there--in that
terrible place.” At the thought tears filled her eyes again. Lois was
quite unnerved. What she must have been through, poor child!
“There, you mustn’t think of it,” Raquel said soothingly. “Why, I
wouldn’t leave a horse to suffer, would I? Much less a person.”
Lois was silent, taking this in.
“And perhaps----” It had been on the tip of Raquel’s tongue to say, “I’d
better have left you there. This may be a hard trip.” But she caught
herself just in time, and said instead, “Probably you will feel better
to get into new surroundings.”
Raquel had left her wrist watch at El Escondido on the night of their
hasty flight, but Lois wore a delicate little toy on her own wrist, and
it now started bravely ticking when Raquel wound it and set it at two
o’clock, which she judged by the sun was the correct time.
Raquel hung wet cloths on the bushes above Lois’ head to create a bit of
moisture in that fearful dryness, while the horses flicked their tails
contentedly near, backed into the coolness of the mesquite leaves.
Presently the girls slept. The shadows grew longer and the little watch
said six-thirty when they gradually roused.
Lois’ face was flushed and she seemed scarcely able to shake off the
stupor and heat languor which possessed her. Raquel bathed her face in
the stream, which was running clearer now, and freeing the horses she
led them down to water. The bank seemed firm, without any quicksands
near.
Paintbrush was vastly at home and, as the air cooled, was playful as a
colt. He rolled his pretty, silky back over and over in the water.
“You wouldn’t think of running off from me and playing me a trick, old
boy, would you?” Raquel said to him. “I’ll not take any chances with the
call of the wild,” she thought, and staked Paintbrush with the length of
her reata near by. The big horse stood gratefully in the water, but
seemed unused to open country. “I knew you were stable-bred, old feller,
you,” Raquel told him. “Now don’t get caught in the quicksands.”
“Are you just talking to the _horses_, Raquel?” Lois asked, weakly.
“Of course,” laughed Raquel. “Come down here, Lois, can’t you, and we
can take a bath here in the river that will refresh us for the ride this
evening.”
“Oh, Raquel,” Lois gasped, in dismay, “I couldn’t ride another step
today. Oh, I can’t.”
“You’ll feel better when you have had a bath and some food,” Raquel
answered reassuringly.
After they had bathed and slipped on their freshened clothes they felt
much better. Lois let down her long hair, and brushed it out. In the
rich light of the setting sun it looked like a web of purest gold. But
her thin skin was cracked and blistered from the unaccustomed exposure,
while Raquel’s face was like velvet, well nourished from within. Raquel
remembered a tiny bottle of olive oil in her saddle bag, and she had
Lois rub some over her lips and face. She went off into the desert a
little way and came back with a small bundle of amole root.
“I pulled this out,” she said, “and we’ll put a bit in water. You try it
and see how soft it is. It’s soapweed, you know, and better than any
soap I ever saw.”
She lined a little hollow in the earth with stones that were hot from
the sun, and in a few moments there was a basin of foamy water.
Lois bathed her hands gratefully. “Oh, it’s like velvet.”
They ate sandwiches of crackers and cheese and guava paste. Lois ate
with effort, although the first food she had eaten in days, she said,
was what Raquel had given her that day. “There was no one to fix it,”
she explained.
“You’ve got to get over that,” Raquel remarked dryly. “If we should get
separated I don’t aim to come back and find you all in with starvation
because you are too proud, or too lazy, or something, to fix yourself
something to eat.”
“Separated?” Lois exclaimed. “Don’t leave me a minute, Raquel.”
Lois was not angry at the rebuke, only surprised at the idea of getting
food for herself.
“I--I didn’t feel like eating,” she excused herself. “I’ve never ridden
very far before. Couldn’t we stay here tonight?”
Raquel said nothing for a moment, then answered sternly, “Lois, we can’t
stop at a good hotel till we feel like going on. There’s no choice.
We’ve got to go now. I’ve got to get back to my mother and take her son
back to her; that’s the least I can do. She’s back home not knowing what
has become of me and my kid brother. Her husband and other sons are at
war. She’s alone. We haven’t enough food or fresh water to last another
day. Another hot day in the desert would mean--well, we can’t do it.”
And without another word she got up and saddled the horses methodically,
for the sun had already set and a baby moon was far up in the sky.
In silence she helped Lois to her feet and upon the horse’s back, then
quickly mounted Paintbrush and made for the narrowest part of the
widespread stream. The pinto examined the bottom carefully, withdrew
from two places that he did not like, and finally picked the widest part
of the meandering river as his choice for fording.
The big horse followed obediently in the pinto’s every footstep, which
was a good thing, for he would not lead on a rope. Raquel had already
tried that and found he pulled back. When they were nearly across,
Raquel looked back to see if Lois was all right. She was clinging with
one hand to the pommel while the other was thrown back over her tightly
closed eyes. Her face was white as death. Raquel would have gone to her
side, but the crossing was fraught with too much possible danger to take
her attention from it for an instant. The soluble, slippery, red soil,
the shifting sand of that country, is too treacherous ever to rely upon.
Suddenly in the center of the stream the pinto sank down above his
flanks, rose up with a fine effort of splendid muscles and, bounding
clear of the bottom, began to swim toward the main current.
In a moment he was shaking himself nonchalantly on a firm bit of beach.
But Lois’ horse stood up to his knees on the far side, refusing to
budge. So Raquel had to put Paintbrush across again, which she did
easily a bit further up. Lois was transferred to his back and he seemed
to realize that he must carry her safely across.
Raquel had no trouble in guiding the big brown, though he floundered
dangerously for a few minutes. Ahead of her the pinto swam with Lois
bent over the saddle, and then he leaped violently clear of the shaky
sands beneath him. Raquel’s heart was in her mouth for fear that Lois,
wavering in the saddle, would fall off. But they came through safely,
and mounted the long dune opposite the river, to see a sandy desert
stretching before them, rosy in the setting sun.
“Raquel, Raquel,” begged Lois. “Let me get off. I can’t do these things.
Oh, leave me behind then, if you must go on. I’d rather die.”
“Lois! Hush!” Raquel spoke sternly. “You _can_ do it. You _did_ do it
already, and it is easy riding now across the desert,” she added
relenting.
As the pinto was too quick in movement for Lois, Raquel changed back to
her own _compadre_. The stars were out; the night had fallen as softly
and quietly as a velvet leaf; the little moon rode higher and higher.
Behind them the dark vegetation along the river served as a guide to
Raquel, and ahead were two dark spots that she tried to keep in
position.
“Raquel,” Lois said after a while, “please talk to me. Are we to ride
all--all night?”
“Oh, I was thinking,” Raquel answered, contritely. “I was thinking about
Georgie, my brother. I don’t know where he is. I hope he’ll be at El
Escondido when we get there.
“Why, no, Lois, we don’t need to ride all night, my dear, but we must
get _nearly_ across this mesa tonight.”
“Yes, I know you must be worried about your brother,” Lois faltered. “I
am, too.”
Raquel was touched, for she had never had a considerate thought from
Lois before. She began to feel the charm which Lois had always had for
the girls at school. You couldn’t expect such a girl to stand any
hardship, after all, brought up as she had been. Anne, now--Anne would
probably stand the iron like a good one. Raquel laughed aloud.
“I haven’t thought of school for a mighty long time now, I can tell
you,” she said. “But I thought of it just then. Wouldn’t they be
surprised, back there, at us being together like this? I mean, ’way off
down here.”
So they rode, talking of one thing and another. School--inconsequential
things that did not really enter into the drama of their own lives.
But at length the story of Lois and her father came out, bit by bit.
After spending the winter in California her father had suddenly decided,
Lois said, to return to El Paso; but he stopped off at Douglas, Arizona,
with the sudden idea of going on down to the mine at Nacozari. That was
in April. His physician had told him that the climate would be ideal. He
craved dryness and warmth. He was a large stockholder in the company and
a close friend of two of the high officials of the mining company at
Nacozari. A few telegrams were sent and down they came.
It was very comfortable for the first two months, and there was a nice
young engineer with whom Lois played tennis and croquet. Her father
seemed very happy, and breathed much more easily than he had in the
foggy climate of California.
Then in May every one else went back north to avoid the heat, but her
father _would_ stay. And all at once this new revolutionary disturbance
burst out again, and the troops came down into that part of Sonora. And
then suddenly--oh, so suddenly, her father died. The Mexicans had buried
him up there, on the hillside, and she couldn’t telegraph anybody
because all of the wires had been cut by the Mexican general.
She had waited for the officials to come back; and she had written
letters, including one to her Cousin Jimmy, and given them to some
Mexicans who said they would mail them.
Then the Chinese cook ran away; he was always so frightened that he
would hide when he heard a shot. And the Mexican boy had gone and taken
everything, and the little girl who had been her maid did not come any
more to wait on her.
“What did you do when the army came into town the day before yesterday?”
asked Raquel.
“I hid all the time,” sobbed Lois, “in the cooling cellar. But I had to
come out for water and everything was quiet--that was when I saw you. I
thought you were just a Mexican boy at first, but I could never forget
your face. And then--it _was_ you.” She ended on a gulp of intense
relief.
The big brown horse began to limp. Raquel looked at Lois’ watch by the
light of the moon. It was after twelve, clear and beautiful. They had
been riding for four hours. They must have come at least twelve miles,
perhaps fourteen, she judged. Yet about them stretched only the silvery
desert. The old woman had had the usual native’s idea of distances.
Looking back the way they had come there was nothing to be seen, and
ahead of them the two dark spots had grown steadily larger; they were
apparently two rocky foothills thrusting into the desert. If they could
make that spot tonight, Raquel thought, then by daylight she could see
where they were. Lois did not ask again to stop. She did not speak at
all.
Two hours more of silent riding passed before they stood in the shadow
of a hill at the foot of which the sands of the desert washed like the
sea. There they stopped. Raquel dismounted and spoke to Lois, who was
sitting drooped in the saddle with bent head. She was past speaking, her
eyes closed.
“Asleep in her saddle, poor kid,” breathed Raquel.
Lois slipped gently into Raquel’s arms and was carried to a soft spot
where she lay without so much as stirring. Raquel leaned over and
listened for a moment to the quiet breathing. Then she lay down close to
her charge and fell asleep, while the pinto drooped his head above his
mistress.
It was nearly seven when Raquel waked and looked about. She saw that
these sentinels in the desert were not real foothills. No little water
courses wound their way among the crevices. The horses would have to go
dry for a while, though Raquel could scarcely bear not giving the pinto
a sip from the canteens. They did not seem to mind it, however, and
after all they had drunk their fill last night.
[Illustration: IT WAS STILL COOL ON THE DESERT WHEN THEY RODE AWAY OVER THE SANDS]
From the top of the hill she saw far off to the east a valley of trees,
in the center of which she knew El Escondido must lie, for behind them
rose the foothills, just as she remembered them from that night. Only
three weeks before--less than that! But she had lost count of the exact
number of days that had passed since then.
She came down and found Lois awake. “Lois, when I have made this grass
and wood catch fire, I’ll give you the best breakfast you ever had,” she
promised cheerily.
The fire caught from her burning glass. She made a little stove of
stones about it, and produced from the saddle bags a tiny frying pan,
into which she poured a bit of the oil. From her pockets she took four
good-sized, mottled brown eggs and broke them into the pan.
“A ground bird of some sort laid them. I know they’re good,” laughed
Raquel. They were delicious and satisfying, making a good meal with
crackers and water.
It was still cool on the desert when they rode away over the sands at a
pace that brought them by nine o’clock to the end of the desert, where a
road led away toward the east. There the sands lost themselves in a
growth of stunted shrubbery that rose into a higher vegetation the
farther they went.
But the day grew hotter and hotter. And the brown horse limped more and
more. “I’m afraid his foot is infected,” Raquel thought. At last the
animal stopped, and would go no farther. Lois was herself exhausted,
wilted by the heat. The girls dismounted.
Raquel took the saddle off the brown horse, poured some of the precious
oil in his foot, bound it so that flies could not get at it, and left
him there. He absolutely would not be led another step. “I’ll send back
for you tomorrow, old boy, if I can. You can make out without water
until then.”
She put Lois on the pinto, who by now had become somewhat accustomed to
her, and walked by their side over the heavy sand. Lois looked down at
Raquel trudging stoutly along and every now and then throwing out a
cheerful word. Lois tried to speak, but tears choked her, and she only
shook her head and bit her lips.
Raquel herself was frightened. Dear Heaven! Were they lost? “Just keep
your head, keep your nerve, Rakie, old girl,” she said to herself. Her
feet were growing tired. She was not used to walking any great distance.
The cowhide sandals that she had exchanged for her boots when she
escaped from the mine were not stout enough to protect tender feet from
stone bruises, or from the blistering heat of the road. In spite of her
indifference to fatigue, the pain of her swelling, burning feet became
insistent, unbearable. They stopped again to rest, but when she walked
on a bit farther the discomfort was as great as before.
“Lois, dear, I guess I’ll get up behind you, and let the pinto give us
both a lift for a while.” Paintbrush had never carried a double burden
before, and shied a bit at first, but at Raquel’s soothing command
trotted obediently ahead. But his pace grew slower and slower under the
increased load, and his tender-hearted mistress felt she was asking too
much of the faithful animal.
So she slipped from his back again when they had gone less than half a
mile, and as her foot touched the ground an excruciating pain shot
through it. She had stepped on a cactus thorn which had gone right
through the tough hide sole of the _tegua_, and imbedded itself in the
sole of her foot. At her involuntary cry, Paintbrush stopped dead and
turned a startled eye upon his mistress. Lois clambered off his back and
ran to Raquel.
“Oh, my dear, what have you done? Oh, your poor foot!” Raquel was trying
to pull the thorn out through the sole of the sandal. She could not
remove the sandal without breaking the thorn off in her foot, when the
flesh would close tightly around it.
She explained this to Lois, and they both tried in turn to loosen the
incredible spike. But they could not draw it through the tough hide of
the _tegua_ and at length had to break it, and Raquel took off the
sandal. Her blunt fingernails could not fasten on the stub of the thorn
that remained in her foot, but Lois’ long pointed nails managed to grasp
it before it could become completely imbedded.
Try as she would, however, Lois could not extract the thorn, and finally
she took Raquel’s poor swollen foot in her hands, and placing her mouth
over the slowly bleeding wound, she drew the thorn out with her sharp
little teeth. The pain for a moment made Raquel’s eyes dim like a hurt
deer’s. Lois was tearing her handkerchief into strips, for there was a
rush of blood as the spike came out. When she had bound the wound as
deftly as any nurse, she helped Raquel to the side of the road where
there was shade under a flowering tree. It was impossible to go on. The
heat was terrific, and Raquel could not walk.
“We’ll wait till sundown,” Raquel decided. “Lois, what would I have done
if you hadn’t been so smart getting out that thorn?”
Paintbrush, glad of a chance to rest, browsed quietly on mesquite leaves
and the tender green of a strange plant they did not know. Raquel
drowsed, for the pain had taken her strength and left her sleepy.
When she woke after a while, she sent Lois out to forage for prickly
pear, “tunas” the Mexicans call them, and told her how to knock the
fruit off with a stick. Lois came back with her hat full, and the juicy
sweet fruit allayed their thirst wonderfully, and refreshed them
somewhat. But there were no crackers left in the saddle bags, and hunger
pains gnawed them.
Rabbits were hopping about curiously, and Raquel asked Lois to get her
automatic from the bottom of one of the bags. There were, fortunately, a
few cartridges left. Raquel shot a foolish young cottontail from where
she lay. Lois winced at the sound of the shot, but she went over and
picked up the rabbit, quivering as she laid it beside Raquel.
She gathered moss and sticks, and held the burning glass over the heap
until it caught fire. While Raquel skinned the rabbit, Lois gathered
more fuel. They cooked it at once, and almost starving, could hardly
wait to snatch the pieces from the pan. Never had they been so close to
stark hunger. A faint color came into Lois’ cheeks, as she ate almost
greedily. The two girls finished the rabbit and took a sip from the
canteen.
“My goodness!” said Lois, “look--we’ve eaten a whole rabbit!”
Raquel smiled. Lois was coming on. Indeed, a new spirit seemed to have
come over her. “Food certainly makes a difference, doesn’t it?” she
sighed contentedly as she lay back against the bank at Raquel’s side.
“Let’s start on right away. It’s getting cooler.” But her voice was
drowsy.
Raquel’s eyes were closed. She did not answer, and Lois fell silent.
When night came over the desert it found them both asleep, and covered
them with its soothing mantle of darkness. They did not ride that night,
though the pinto drooped patiently near, and finally lay down in his
saddle, a thing he had never done before.
It was the piercing bright ray of the morning sun that sent a shaft of
recollection to Raquel’s sleeping brain. She sat up, startled, and
called the pinto a trifle wildly. He came running, neighing gratefully.
The girls never knew it, but he had had business with a rattlesnake just
a few paces away, and his lightning hoofs had left a mangled thing for
the coyotes to turn away from.
He nickered at Raquel’s call. Lois did not stir from her deep sleep.
Raquel hated to wake her, but there was no choice and she shook her
insistently. Lois sat up quickly. When she was fully awake Raquel talked
over plans for continuing the journey. These were complicated by her
swollen foot. She knew she could not endure the pain of walking.
“I’ll walk,” Lois insisted. “You know, Raquel, it’s much easier for me
to walk than ride. I’m used to walking, truly I am.”
Raquel agreed, because, really, there was nothing else to do. Lois
gathered some more cactus fruit. They ate these, drank the last of the
water from the canteen, and set out, Lois trudging along so bravely that
Raquel did not suspect what an effort it was for her to keep pace with
Paintbrush’s steady gait.
It must have been past ten-thirty when, after two hours or more, they
struck a hard road. The path from the desert joined it abruptly. As they
turned into it, Raquel looked up and down it and recognized with relief
that this was the way she and Georgie had come before, when they were
guided by the mine foreman. Fortune was with them, for Raquel knew she
could never have found the road again except by stumbling on it as she
had. Her spirits rose immeasurably, and Lois’ too, when Raquel told her
that they were now on familiar ground. Paintbrush also sensed that they
were nearing their goal. Perhaps he knew, for he was almost frisky when
the little party halted, and Lois somewhat awkwardly uncinched him and
pulled off his saddle and blankets with willing but clumsy hands.
“You will not have to walk any more, Lois dear,” Raquel said.
“Paintbrush will carry us both the last three miles to El Escondido.”
They rested a full hour, for Lois was not so hardy a walker as she liked
to believe. Then the two girls saddled the pinto again, Lois lifting on
the heavy saddle and buckling the cinches with much effort after Raquel
had smoothed the blanket. Lois climbed to the saddle, with the aid of
Raquel’s boosting, and Raquel pulled herself on behind. Thus it was they
covered the last blistering miles.
All at once they were there. A lovely paradise opened before them. They
rode through the grove before the front of the hacienda. A windmill was
lazily pumping water that overflowed tanks and troughs, and slipped
clear and brimming through the _acequias_, the irrigation ditches that
nourished the fields of El Escondido.
On through the arched gateway to the courtyard, where there was a
strange silence and not a sign of life. Raquel called. There was a flash
of a bright skirt, and a young Mexican girl appeared from the hacienda.
“Concha,” cried Raquel. “Don’t you remember me? It is Raquel Daniels.”
She pronounced it in the Spanish way, Dan-ee-el, with the accent on the
last syllable.
Concha hurried forward, smiling with relief. But indeed, she did well
remember _el señorito_. So he had escaped safely? That was good. No, she
shook her head commiseratingly, the little brother had not returned.
Raquel’s heart sank. He must be with the army. He must.
And Don Nestor, she inquired. How was he? And where were all of the
_sirvientes_?
Don Nestor was ill, Concha recited. He had been ill nearly three
weeks--ever since the night of the raid, and was still lying in the
basement where he had taken refuge. He could not himself walk up the
_escalera_, and who was she, Concha, to carry him! Indeed, _el padrón_
had shouted at her with terrible wrath when she had offered to push from
behind. Piedad was cooking for them, but then _el señorito_ remembered
how fat was Piedad. He could scarcely move himself further than the
kitchen door, and was of no assistance in the dilemma.
All the others had departed. Manuel had not returned after that night.
Concha always had suspected Manuel anyway, and that hussy Maddalena, who
had disappeared too. Worst of all, her _novio_, Concha’s _novio_, whom
she was to wed next month, had been seized by the troops and carried
off, she knew not where.
Concha’s tongue was all for running on, but Raquel interrupted with the
request that a room be made ready at once for the _señorita_ with her.
The one she herself had had before, Raquel suggested. Concha disappeared
round a corner of the house, and in a moment was heard unbarring the
strong front door from within.
The girls stepped into the cool dimness of the _zaguan_ and passed
through into the patio. Raquel caught Lois by the arm for, now that they
had arrived at their refuge, she gave signs of collapsing. With Concha’s
aid, Raquel got Lois upstairs and to the high white bed. Her face was
pinched with fatigue, and gray; her blonde hair hung in dry and brittle
wisps about her face. She was covered with dust. This was not the
delicately lovely Lois Raquel had known, and her heart was touched with
pity as well as concern.
“Concha, _ve_, see! She faints. Get me quickly some water, some wine if
there is any still, and tell Don Nestor I will be there at once as soon
as I have attended my friend.”
Concha clattered down the stairs, and Raquel slapped water upon Lois’
temples and wrists. Her own sore foot was forgotten. It was the second
time Lois had fainted, and Raquel was not accustomed to such things. She
pulled off the poor child’s boots, and laid her head on the soft pillow.
When Lois had a few sips of the wine that Concha brought, she revived.
“So sorry I’m such a bother, Raquel,” she said weakly. “Perhaps I can do
better from now on.”
“Hush, dear.” Raquel, who had never been demonstrative, even with Mom,
whom she loved so dearly and loyally, took this girl in her arms as if
she had been a sister. “You are going to be all right.” And she knew
that the last bit of hurt and hatred had melted away.
“I must go down to the old Don Nestor, who is ill in the cellar of his
house,” she explained to Lois then. “Concha will stay right here and
I’ll be back as soon as I can.”
Then she slipped out, though her foot was still burning and swollen, not
stopping even to wipe her face, but only to take a deep draft from the
stone water jar hanging in the shade of the _galeria_.
Down in the wine cellar, which had but a single window high up, a barred
affair opening on some hidden inner court, lay Don Nestor on a freshly
made pallet. Raquel spoke to him from the trapdoor above.
“It is I, Raquela,” she said. “I have returned safely, Don Nestor.
“_Gracias a Dios_,” replied a fervent voice from below. “Come down at
once, my child, I have worried terribly about you. That I could have
sent you off with that rascal Manuel whom I trusted so! I have lain here
worrying. Had anything happened to you, I could never have forgiven
myself.”
He seized her hand as, stepping from the ladder-like stairs, she limped
towards his cot.
“Myself? It is nothing. We will speak of that later. But the lad?”
Questions flew back and forth as Don Nestor heard from Raquel her
experiences of that night, of her subsequent adventures and the finding
of Lois. Always, in spite of herself, Raquel returned to the fact that
it had been agreed between Georgie and herself that they would make
their way back to El Escondido if they became separated. She was near
tears at not finding Georgie there.
“But there is no occasion, yet, to despair, for the _muchachito_ would
undoubtedly be obliged to stay with the soldiers for a while. But I am
sure they would not harm him,” Don Nestor reassured her. He listened
with interest to the account of their experiences with Manuel, upon
whose head he invoked frequent holy imprecations.
It was Manuel, he told Raquel, in detailing his own experiences with the
soldiers, who had brought about the raid. Manuel was not, it had
transpired with the discovery of his perfidy, an honest man at all. He
was a rebel--a bandit--who had fled Chihuahua two years before, and
sought refuge in Sonora. He had taken Don Nestor in completely. While he
attended the affairs of El Escondido, he maintained contacts with other
miserable fugitives in the hills, and fomented trouble among the
contented natives. News of his agitations had reached the governor, and
it was to arrest him that the troops had come. After their first anger
at the discovery that Manuel had flown, the troops had not molested El
Escondido.
He knew these things from Concha and old Piedad, Don Nestor explained.
They had conversed with him daily from the top of the _escalera_. Ill?
It was his wretched ankle, dear Señorita, which he had broken in his
hurried descent into this _soterreno_ that terrible night. True, he had
been somewhat ill with the shock and the excitement, for he was no
longer a young man, and it was impossible for him to ascend the ladder
with this useless foot.
Concha had explained to the lieutenant that the _padrón_ could not see
him (Raquel could imagine the dignity which sustained Don Nestor even
under the trying circumstances of being detained in his wine cellar),
and the soldiers had departed with apologies, profuse apologies, taking
with them that fellow José, Concha’s _novio_, but none of Don Nestor’s
good wine, _gracias a Dios_! Don Nestor had set his ankle himself the
next day, and it was nearly well now. But he would run no risks and
would not ascend, only to fall back and break it again.
The soldiers had not returned, and he felt that now that Miss Raquel was
back with another young lady, he would attempt to go up to the upper
chambers again. The gentle old _caballero_ made a gallant effort to
rise, but he was weakened by the pain in his injured foot, and his face
grew white.
“Oh, Señor, do not molest yourself, I beg of you,” Raquel implored. “We
must arrange to get you upstairs at once, for you are very weak and
cannot gain strength down here in this air. It is unthinkable. I shall
go to arrange it now.” The old gentleman lay back gratefully.
Presently the change was accomplished. Raquel and Concha found a high
stepladder which they inclined against the perpendicular stairs that led
from the wine cellar, thus making an easy ascent possible. With Concha
on one side and Raquel on the other, Don Nestor, his ankle bound
straight and stiff, at length climbed to the top where he all but
collapsed on the floor. Then he would not move until Raquel had brought
up the chest that he had kept beneath his cot all this time.
The girls got him into a chair and thus they drew him to the door of his
bedroom, which was on the same floor, not far away. Concha had not even
made the bed. Things were just as they had been on the night of the
raid, because _el padrón_ was very particular, and did not wish his
possessions touched without orders, she explained volubly. Raquel helped
her to lay the bed fresh and smooth, and to assist Don Nestor, weak and
white, in the light of day, to get in.
“Put my treasure chest under my bed,” he directed, smiling whimsically.
“It is many years since I have had a charming woman to think of me and
offer me her services. It is many years since my wife died--and my baby
daughter.” Don Nestor was deeply affected, and Raquel patted his hand
tenderly.
“You must go now, my dear, and have rest,” he commanded. “What! No
luncheon yet? Not even a _refresco_. Concha! Ah, what a place!” And he
became at once so agitated and irascible that Raquel left, promising to
eat something at once, and to lie down immediately.
Piedad already had arranged a table in a cool corner of the gallery
under a honeysuckle vine. Raquel ate the food as in a dream. She had
come at length almost to the end of her own resources. She was no longer
conscious of her burning foot, she scarcely knew she was ascending the
stairs to her room--and then nothing.
Concha undressed the limp, boyish figure on the bed--but, of course, she
had known that the señorito was a girl--and tucked her sympathetically
under the cool sheet, while she went across to the room opposite to see
if that other _pobrecito_, so white faced, was still asleep.