FOR this last hour, Don Manuel,” she said, placing a hand on his, “I
have been going over all the long story of the past, from the days when
you were a little boy and Rosetta was suckled at my bosom. Why should I
not have loved her?” asked the old duenna almost fiercely. “Why should
I not love her still?” she added, in a lower tone, as she bowed her head
and covered her eyes with her disengaged hand. “There is love that can
never die, Don Manuel.”
“Nor should we wish it otherwise,” he said gently, caressing the hand
extended toward him. “And this very night our undying love for dear
little Rosetta will be proved—tonight at last she will be avenged.”
With a start Tia Teresa sat erect.
“Then it is all arranged?” she asked breathlessly.
“Yes, all finally arranged,” was his quiet rejoinder. “We meet this
evening on Comanche Point—the place where I have always vowed he should
answer for his crime. And you remember what day this is?”
“I remember—can I ever forget?—the very day we found her dead beneath
the cliff.”
“The very day, Tia Teresa. So my vengeance will be complete. Before now
I could have shot him a dozen times. But he would never have known that
his death was by my hand. Tonight, however, he will know. And he will
realize that the vendetta is the law of God—an eye for an eye, a tooth
for a tooth; his life, so precious to himself, for hers so dear to us in
the happy old-time days.”
“But you, Don Manuel?” she asked fearfully.
“It does not matter much about me,” he answered. “But all the same I
have come to speak a little in regard to myself. Tonight Ben Thurston
assuredly will die, and should I perish with him, the story of the
vendetta cannot fail to be revived and the identity of the recluse,
Ricardo Robles, with Don Manuel, the outlaw, will be established. This
will come as a great shock to all my dear friends at La Siesta—to Mrs.
Darlington as well as to Grace and Merle. But this counts for little—the
name of Don Manuel is just as honorable a name as that of Robles. And
you can tell them further that all the loot I ever took from the gringos
lies today untouched in Joaquin Murietta’s cave. I sullied my hands
with none of it. I was made rich by the sale of, my ancestral estates in
Spain. And that wealth the law cannot confiscate, for I have been only
its trustee during all those years. Everything I possess has been vested
from the first in the names of Merle Farnsworth and Grace Darlington.”
“Grace as well?” murmured Tia Teresa, enquiringly.
“Certainly, for I love both the girls dearly; there is ample to divide
between them, and by ranking them together I guard Merle from the
thought that I was anything more to her than to Grace. To both alike I
was just a deeply attached friend.” He paused a moment, then regarded
Tia Teresa fixedly. “For my little girl must never know that her father
was an outlaw, with a price on his head; yes, with blood on his hands,
if it is only the blood of the worthless Thurston breed.”
“That is no stain—it is an honor—it is a duty that you owed,” exclaimed
the duenna with fervency, her hands clenched against her bosom as she
spoke.
“You understand—we understand the vendetta, you and I, Tia Teresa. But
the Americanos do not understand. And I have brought up my little girl
as an American, for her own happiness I long ago realized. So she would
never understand. When she comes to know that her old friend Ricardo
Robles was Don Manuel de Valencia as well, she will breathe a gentle
prayer of rest for his soul. But she will not be distressed by the
knowledge that her father was the bandit and outlaw—she will not have to
face the cruel world with that stigma attached to her name. For that I
have contrived, for that I have suffered the dumb agony of childlessness
all these years.”
“And that, in God’s name,” exclaimed Tia Teresa, “is part of the price
Ben Thurston, thrice accursed, has to pay.”
“And tonight will pay,” responded Don Manuel, determinedly. “But I speak
of all this just to put you on your guard. It will be necessary for me
to say something to Mrs. Darlington as well. I have brought for her the
papers that will establish the rights of Merle and Grace to all I leave
behind.” As he spoke he touched his coat where the shape of a packet in
an inner pocket showed.
“Your will?”
“No. As I have explained, I require no will. The property is theirs
already. And I do not need to tell you, my dear Tia Teresa, my beloved
friend, that you, too, have not been forgotten.” As he spoke he raised
her hand and pressed it reverently to his lips.
“Don’t speak like that, Don Manuel,” she protested.
“I know that all I owe to you can never be repaid,” he continued,
humbly, gratefully—“the devoted life-service for me and for Rosetta and
our beloved parents as well.”
Again he kissed her hand, and this time she accepted the seal of his
high-souled and chivalrous regard. There were tears in her eyes now.
“But, Don Manuel, you need not die tonight. Death for him—that is right.
But why for you?”
“Perhaps not for me—most certainly,” he replied with a little,
reassuring smile. “Oh, do not imagine that I deliberately court death
for tonight. On the contrary, I have all my plans carefully laid. An
automobile is ready for the road, and I have a yacht waiting for me at
a quiet spot on the coast, and if all is well, by tomorrow’s dawn Pierre
and I will be on the ocean. No one around here except at La Siesta will
miss Ricardo Robles, and if the name of Don Manuel is associated with
the death of Ben Thurston, only once more will the White Wolf have
strangely disappeared just as he used to do in the old times.”
He was laughing, not loudly, but just with carefree, almost joyous
triumph, as he rose to say good-bye.
“Then, Tia Teresa, if events work out just as I have planned, we may all
meet again, somewhere, somehow—I cannot say more at present. For I shall
be happy to see my little girl happy in her married love, and later on
I shall close my eyes contentedly when I can feel assured that nothing
from the past will ever emerge to spoil her life or bring to her
distress of mind.”
Tia Teresa, too, had arisen.
“God grant it may be so,” she fervently exclaimed. “But somehow my mind
misgives me. Today I am softened as I have never been before. Even for
the sake of our dear Rosetta in Heaven I feel inclined to plead with you
to let Thurston go his way and the vendetta be forgotten.” And she clung
to his arm imploringly.
“Never!” cried Don Manuel, putting her gently but resolutely aside.
“That can never be, Tia Teresa. You know it. A vow sworn over my wronged
and murdered sister’s grave, over the graves of my parents as well, must
be fulfilled. To break it at the very moment when it is in my power to
give it fulfillment would be the act of a coward—a sacrilege that could
never be atoned. No more words like that. I must not even listen.”
She was sobbing as she dropped back into her chair. Her silence was the
confession that she was powerless to argue against the unwritten law of
the vendetta.
“So I kiss you good-bye for the present, Tia Teresa.” He suited the
action to the word, and, stooping, saluted her first on one cheek, then
on the other. “Be your old brave and resolute self again. Where shall I
find Mrs. Darlington?”
“Alone in her boudoir. This is her day for correspondence,” replied the
duenna, resolutely striving to repress her tears.
“Then I’ll leave you here. Let your best wishes go with me.”
Almost lightly he touched her hand and was gone, disappearing among the
roses.
Tia Teresa bowed her head across her folded arms. She was thinking not
of the past now, but solely of the future.
“How would it all end?”