Meanwhile Felipe, hatless, bloody, was galloping through the night, his
pony's head turned toward the _hacienda_ of Martiarena. The Rancho
Martiarena lay between his own rancho and the inn where he had met
Rubia, so that this distance was not great. He reached it in about an
hour of vigorous spurring.
The place was dark though it was as yet early in the night, and an
ominous gloom seemed to hang about the house. Felipe, his heart sinking,
pounded at the door, and at last aroused the aged superintendent, who
was also a sort of _major-domo_ in the household, and who in Felipe's
boyhood had often ridden him on his knee.
"Ah, it is you, Arillaga," he said very sadly, as the moonlight struck
across Felipe's face. "I had hoped never to see you again."
"Buelna," demanded Felipe. "I have something to say to her, and to the
_padron_."
"Too late, señor."
"My God, dead?"
"As good as dead."
"Rafael, tell me all. I have come to set everything straight again. On
my honour, I have been misjudged. Is Buelna well?"
"Listen. You know your own heart best, señor. When you left her our
little lady was as one half dead; her heart died within her. Ah, she
loved you, Arillaga, far more than you deserved. She drooped swiftly,
and one night all but passed away. Then it was that she made a vow that
if God spared her life she would become the bride of the church--would
forever renounce the world. Well, she recovered, became almost well
again, but not the same as before. She never will be that. So soon as
she was able to obtain Martiarena's consent she made all the
preparations--signed away all her lands and possessions, and spent the
days and nights in prayer and purifications. The Mother Superior of the
Convent of Santa Teresa has been a guest at the _hacienda_ this
fortnight past. Only to-day the party--that is to say, Martiarena, the
Mother Superior and Buelna--left for Santa Teresa, and at midnight of
this very night Buelna takes the veil. You know your own heart, Señor
Felipe. Go your way."
"But not _till_ midnight!" cried Felipe.
"What? I do not understand."
"She will not take the veil till midnight."
"No, not till then."
"Rafael," cried Felipe, "ask me no questions now. Only _believe_ me. I
always have and always will love Buelna. I swear it. I can stop this
yet; only once let me reach her in time. Trust me. Ah, for this once
trust me, you who have known me since I was a lad."
He held out his hand. The other for a moment hesitated, then impulsively
clasped it in his own.
"_Bueno_, I trust you then. Yet I warn you not to fool me twice."
"Good," returned Felipe. "And now _adios_. Unless I bring her back with
me you'll never see me again."
"But, Felipe, lad, where away now?"
"To Santa Teresa."
"You are mad. Do you fancy you can reach it before midnight?" insisted
the _major-domo_.
"I _will_, Rafael; I _will_."
"Then Heaven be with you."
But the old fellow's words were lost in a wild clatter of hoofs, as
Felipe swung his pony around and drove home the spurs. Through the night
came back a cry already faint:
"_Adios, adios_."
"_Adios_, Felipe," murmured the old man as he stood bewildered in the
doorway, "and your good angel speed you now."
When Felipe began his ride it was already a little after nine. Could he
reach Santa Teresa before midnight? The question loomed grim before him,
but he answered only with the spur. Pépe was hardy, and, as Felipe well
knew, of indomitable pluck. But what a task now lay before the little
animal. He might do it, but oh! it was a chance!
In a quarter of a mile Pépe had settled to his stride, the dogged, even
gallop that Felipe knew so well, and at half-past ten swung through the
main street of Piedras Blancas--silent, somnolent, dark.
"Steady, little Pépe," said Felipe; "steady, little one. Soh, soh.
There."
The little horse flung back an ear, and Felipe could feel along the
lines how he felt for the bit, trying to get a grip of it to ease the
strain on his mouth.
The _De Profundis_ bell was sounding from the church tower as Felipe
galloped through San Anselmo, the next village, but by the time he
raised the lights of Arcata it was black night in very earnest. He set
his teeth. Terra Bella lay eight miles farther ahead, and here from the
town-hall clock that looked down upon the plaza he would be able to know
the time.
"Hoopa, _Pépe; pronto_!" he shouted.
The pony responded gallantly. His head was low; his ears in constant
movement, twitched restlessly back and forth, now laid flat on his neck,
now cocked to catch the rustle of the wind in the chaparral, the
scurrying of a rabbit or ground-owl through the sage.
It grew darker, colder, the trade-wind lapsed away. Low in the sky upon
the right a pale, dim belt foretold the rising of the moon. The
incessant galloping of the pony was the only sound.
The convent toward which he rode was just outside the few scattered huts
in the valley of the Rio Esparto that by charity had been invested with
the name of Caliente. From Piedras Blancas to Caliente between twilight
and midnight! What a riding! Could he do it? Would Pépe last under him?
"Steady, little one. Steady, Pépe."
Thus he spoke again and again, measuring the miles in his mind,
husbanding the little fellow's strength.
Lights! Cart lanterns? No, Terra Bella. A great dog charged out at him
from a dobe, filling the night with outcry; a hayrick loomed by like a
ship careening through fog; there was a smell of chickens and farmyards.
Then a paved street, an open square, a solitary pedestrian dodging just
in time from under Pépe's hoofs. All flashed by. The open country again,
unbroken darkness again, and solitude of the fields again. Terra Bella
past.
But through the confusion Felipe retained one picture, that of the
moon-faced clock with hands marking the hour of ten. On again with Pépe
leaping from the touch of the spur. On again up the long, shallow slope
that rose for miles to form the divide that overlooked the valley of the
Esparto.
"Hold, there! Madman to ride thus. Mad or drunk. Only desperadoes gallop
at night. Halt and speak!"
The pony had swerved barely in time, and behind him the Monterey stage
lay all but ditched on the roadside, the driver fulminating oaths. But
Felipe gave him but an instant's thought. Dobe huts once more abruptly
ranged up on either side the roadway, staggering and dim under the
night. Then a wine shop noisy with carousing _peons_ darted by.
Pavements again. A shop-front or two. A pig snoring in the gutter, a dog
howling in a yard, a cat lamenting on a rooftop. Then the smell of
fields again. Then darkness again. Then the solitude of the open
country. Cadenassa past.
But now the country changed. The slope grew steeper; it was the last
lift of land to the divide. The road was sown with stones and scored
with ruts. Pépe began to blow; once he groaned. Perforce his speed
diminished. The villages were no longer so thickly spread now. The crest
of the divide was wild, desolate, forsaken. Felipe again and again
searched the darkness for lights, but the night was black.
Then abruptly the moon rose. By that Felipe could guess the time. His
heart sank. He halted, recinched the saddle, washed the pony's mouth
with brandy from his flask, then mounted and spurred on.
Another half-hour went by. He could see that Pépe was in distress; his
speed was by degrees slacking. Would he last! Would he last? Would the
minutes that raced at his side win in that hard race?
Houses again. Plastered fronts. All dark and gray. No soul stirring.
Sightless windows stared out upon emptiness. The plaza bared its
desolation to the pitiless moonlight. Only from an unseen window a
guitar hummed and tinkled. All vanished. Open country again. The
solitude of the fields again; the moonlight sleeping on the vast sweep
of the ranchos. Calpella past.
Felipe rose in his stirrups with a great shout.
At Calpella he knew he had crossed the divide. The valley lay beneath
him, and the moon was turning to silver the winding courses of the Rio
Esparto, now in plain sight.
It was between Calpella and Proberta that Pépe stumbled first. Felipe
pulled him up and ceased to urge him to his topmost speed. But five
hundred yards farther he stumbled again. The spume-flakes he tossed from
the bit were bloody. His breath came in labouring gasps.
But by now Felipe could feel the rising valley-mists; he could hear the
piping of the frogs in the marshes. The ground for miles had sloped
downward. He was not far from the river, not far from Caliente, not far
from the Convent of Santa Teresa and Buelna.
But the way to Caliente was roundabout, distant. If he should follow the
road thither he would lose a long half-hour. By going directly across
the country from where he now was, avoiding Proberta, he could save much
distance and precious time. But in this case Pépe, exhausted, stumbling,
weak, would have to swim the river. If he failed to do this Felipe would
probably drown. If he succeeded, Caliente and the convent would be close
at hand.
For a moment Felipe hesitated, then suddenly made up his mind. He
wheeled Pépe from the road, and calling upon his last remaining
strength, struck off across the country.
The sound of the river at last came to his ears.
"Now, then, Pépe," he cried.
For the last time the little horse leaped to the sound of his voice.
Still at a gallop, Felipe cut the cinches of the heavy saddle, shook his
feet clear of the stirrups, and let it fall to the ground; his coat,
belt and boots followed. Bareback, with but the headstall and bridle
left upon the pony, he rode at the river.
Before he was ready for it Pépe's hoofs splashed on the banks. Then the
water swirled about his fetlocks; then it wet Felipe's bare ankles. In
another moment Felipe could tell by the pony's motion that his feet had
left the ground and that he was swimming in the middle of the current.
He was carried down the stream more than one hundred yards. Once Pépe's
leg became entangled in a sunken root. Freed from that, his hoofs caught
in grasses and thick weeds. Felipe's knee was cut against a rock; but at
length the pony touched ground. He rose out of the river trembling,
gasping and dripping. Felipe put him at the steep bank. He took it
bravely, scrambled his way--almost on his knees--to the top, then
stumbled badly and fell prone upon the ground. Felipe twisted from under
him as he fell and regained his feet unhurt. He ran to the brave little
fellow's head.
"Up, up, my Pépe. Soh, soh."
Suddenly he paused, listening. Across the level fields there came to his
ears the sound of the bell of the convent of Santa Teresa tolling for
midnight.
* * * * *
Upon the first stroke of midnight the procession of nuns entered the
nave of the church. There were some thirty in the procession. The first
ranks swung censers; those in the rear carried lighted candles. The
Mother Superior and Buelna, the latter wearing a white veil, walked
together. The youngest nun followed these two, carrying upon her
outspread palms the black veil.
Arrived before the altar the procession divided into halves, fifteen
upon the east side of the chancel, fifteen upon the west. The organ
began to drone and murmur, the censers swung and smoked, the
candle-flames flared and attracted the bats that lived among the rafters
overhead. Buelna knelt before the Mother Superior. She was pale and a
little thin from fasting and the seclusion of the cells. But, try as she
would, she could not keep her thoughts upon the solemn office in which
she was so important a figure. Other days came back to her. A little
girl gay and free once more, she romped through the hallways and kitchen
of the old _hacienda_ Martiarena with her playmate, the young Felipe; a
young schoolgirl, she rode with him to the Mission to the instruction of
the _padre_; a young woman, she danced with him at the _fête_ of All
Saints at Monterey. Why had it not been possible that her romance should
run its appointed course to a happy end? That last time she had seen him
how strangely he had deported himself. Untrue to her! Felipe! Her
Felipe; her more than brother! How vividly she recalled the day. They
were returning from the Mission, where she had prayed for his safe and
speedy return. Long before she had seen him she heard the gallop of a
horse's hoofs around the turn of the road. Yes, she remembered that--the
gallop of a horse. Ah! how he rode--how vivid it was in her fancy.
Almost she heard the rhythmic beat of the hoofs. They came nearer,
nearer. Fast, furiously fast hoof-beats. How swift he rode. Gallop,
gallop--nearer, on they came. They were close by. They swept swiftly
nearer, nearer. What--what was this? No fancy. Nearer, nearer. No fancy
this. Nearer, nearer. These--ah, Mother of God--are real hoof-beats.
They are coming; they are at hand; they are at the door of the church;
they are _here_!
She sprang up, facing around. The ceremony was interrupted. The
frightened nuns were gathering about the Mother Superior. The organ
ceased, and in the stillness that followed all could hear that furious
gallop. On it came, up the hill, into the courtyard. Then a shout,
hurried footsteps, the door swung in, and Felipe Arillaga, ragged,
dripping, half fainting, hatless and stained with mud, sprang toward
Buelna. Forgetting all else, she ran to meet him, and, clasped in each
other's arms, they kissed one another upon the lips again and again.
The bells of Santa Teresa that Felipe had heard that night on the blanks
of the Esparto rang for a wedding the next day.
Two days after they tolled as passing bells. A beautiful woman had been
found drowned in a river not far from the house of Lopez Catala, on the
high road to Monterey.