"You are hurt, Consita! For Heaven's sake, what has happened?"
She pushed my hat back with her little hand, and tumbled my hair
gently.
"Nothing. _You_ are here, Pancho--eet is enofe! What shall come after
thees--when I am perhaps gone among the grave--make nothing! _You_ are
here--I am happy. For a little, perhaps--not mooch."
"But," I went on desperately, "was it an accident? Were you thrown? Was
it Chu Chu?"--for somehow, in spite of her languid posture and voice, I
could not, even in my fears, believe her seriously hurt.
"Beat not the poor beast, Pancho. It is not from _her_ comes thees
thing. She have make nothing--believe me! I have come upon your
assignation with Miss Essmith! I make but to pass you--to fly--to never
come back! I have say to Chu Chu, 'Fly!' We fly many miles. Sometimes
together, sometimes not so mooch! Sometimes in the saddle, sometimes on
the neck! Many things remain in the road; at the end, I myself remain!
I have say, 'Courage, Pancho will come!' Then I say, 'No, he is talk
with Miss Essmith!' I remember not more. I have creep here on the
hands. Eet is feenish!"
I looked at her distractedly. She smiled tenderly and slightly smoothed
down and rearranged a fold of her dress to cover her delicate little
boot.
"But," I protested, "you are not much hurt, dearest. You have broken no
bones. Perhaps," I added, looking at the boot, "only a slight sprain.
Let me carry you to my horse; I will walk beside you, home. Do, dearest
Consita!"
She turned her lovely eyes towards me sadly. "You comprehend not, my
poor Pancho! It is not of the foot, the ankle, the arm, or the head
that I can say, 'She is broke.' I would it were even so. But"--she
lifted her sweet lashes slowly--"I have derrange my inside. It is an
affair of my family. My grandfather have once toomble over the bull at
a _rodeo_.[165-1] He speak no more; he is dead. For why? He has
derrange his inside. Believe me, it is of the family. You comprehend?
The Saltellos are not as the other peoples for this. When I am gone,
you will bring to me the berry to grow upon my tomb, Pancho; the berry
you have picked for me. The little flower will come too, the little
star will arrive, but Consuelo, who lofe you, she will come not more!
"When you are happy and talk in the road to the Essmith, you will not
think of me. You will not see my eyes, Pancho; thees little grass"--she
ran her plump little fingers through a tussock--"will hide them; and
the small animals in the black coats that lif here will have much
sorrow--but you will not. It ees better so! My father will not that I,
a Catholique, should marry into a camp-meeting and lif in a tent." (It
was one of Consuelo's bewildering beliefs that there was only one form
of dissent--Methodism!) "He will not that I should marry a man who
possess not the many horses, ox, and cow, like him. But _I_ care not.
_You_ are my only religion, Pancho! I have enofe of the horse, and ox,
and cow when _you_ are with me! Kiss me, Pancho. Perhaps it is for the
last time--the feenish! Who knows?"
There were tears in her lovely eyes; I felt that my own were growing
dim; the sun was sinking over the dreary plain to the slow rising of
the wind; and infinite loneliness had fallen upon us, and yet I was
miserably conscious of some dreadful unreality in it all. A desire to
laugh, which I felt must be hysterical, was creeping over me; I dared
not speak. But her dear head was on my shoulder, and the situation was
not unpleasant.
Nevertheless, something must be done! This was the more difficult as it
was by no means clear what had already been done. Even while I
supported her drooping figure, I was straining my eyes across her
shoulder for succor of some kind. Suddenly the figure of a rapid rider
appeared upon the road. It seemed familiar. I looked again--it was the
blessed Enriquez! A sense of deep relief came over me. I loved
Consuelo; but never before had lover ever hailed the irruption of one
of his beloved's family with such complacency.
"You are safe, dearest; it is Enriquez!"
I thought she received the information coldly. Suddenly she turned upon
me her eyes, now bright and glittering. "Swear to me at the instant,
Pancho, that you will not again look upon Miss Essmith, even for once."
I was simple and literal. Miss Smith was my nearest neighbor, and
unless I was stricken with blindness, compliance was impossible. I
hesitated--but swore.
"Enofe--you have hesitate--I will no more."
She rose to her feet with grave deliberation. For an instant, with the
recollection of the delicate internal organization of the Saltellos on
my mind, I was in agony lest she should totter and fall, even then,
yielding up her gentle spirit on the spot. But when I looked again, she
had a hairpin between her white teeth and was carefully adjusting her
toreador hat. And beside us was Enriquez--cheerful, alert, voluble, and
undaunted.
"Eureka! I have found! We are all here! Eet is a leetle public--eh! A
leetle too much of a front seat for a _tête-à-tête_,[167-1] my yonge
friends," he said, glancing at the remains of Consuelo's bower, "but
for the accounting of taste there is none. What will you? The meat of
the one man shall envenom the meat of the other. But" (in a whisper to
me) "as to thees horse--thees Chu Chu, which I have just pass--why is
she undress? Surely you would no make an exposition of her to the
traveler to suspect! And if not, why so?"
I tried to explain, looking at Consuelo, that Chu Chu had run away,
that Consuelo had met with a terrible accident, had been thrown, and I
feared had suffered serious internal injury. But to my embarrassment
Consuelo maintained a half scornful silence, and an inconsistent
freshness of healthful indifference, as Enriquez approached her with an
engaging smile. "Ah, yes, she have the headache, and the molligrubs.
She will sit on the damp stone when the gentle dew is falling. I
comprehend. Meet me in the lane when the clock strike nine! But," in a
lower voice, "of thees undress horse I comprehend nothing! Look you--it
is sad and strange."
He went off to fetch Chu Chu, leaving me and Consuelo alone. I do not
think I ever felt so utterly abject and bewildered before in my life.
Without knowing why, I was miserably conscious of having in some way
offended the girl for whom I believed I would have given my life, and I
had made her and myself ridiculous in the eyes of her brother. I had
again failed in my slower Western nature to understand her high
romantic Spanish soul! Meantime she was smoothing out her riding habit,
and looking as fresh and pretty as when she first left her house.
"Consita," I said hesitatingly, "you are not angry with me?"
"Angry?" she repeated haughtily, without looking at me. "Oh, no! Of a
possibility eet is Mees Essmith who is angry that I have interroopt her
tête-à-tête with you, and have send here my brother to make the same
with me."
"But," I said eagerly, "Miss Smith does not even know Enriquez!"
Consuelo turned on me a glance of unutterable significance. "Ah!" she
said darkly, "you _tink_!"
Indeed I _knew_. But here I believed I understood Consuelo and was
relieved. I even ventured to say gently, "And you are better?"
She drew herself up to her full height, which was not much. "Of my
health, what is it? A nothing. Yes! Of my soul let us not speak."
Nevertheless, when Enriquez appeared with Chu Chu she ran towards her
with outstretched arms. Chu Chu protruded about six inches of upper lip
in response--apparently under the impression, which I could quite
understand, that her mistress was edible. And, I may have been
mistaken, but their beautiful eyes met in an absolute and distinct
glance of intelligence!
During the home journey Consuelo recovered her spirits and parted from
me with a magnanimous and forgiving pressure of the hand. I do not know
what explanation of Chu Chu's original escapade was given to Enriquez
and the rest of the family; the inscrutable forgiveness extended to me
by Consuelo precluded any further inquiry on my part. I was willing to
leave it a secret between her and Chu Chu. But strange to say, it
seemed to complete our own understanding, and precipitated, not only
our love-making, but the final catastrophe which culminated that
romance. For we had resolved to elope. I do not know that this heroic
remedy was absolutely necessary from the attitude of either Consuelo's
family or my own; I am inclined to think we preferred it because it
involved no previous explanation or advice.
Need I say that our confidant and firm ally was Consuelo's brother--the
alert, the linguistic, the ever-happy, ever-ready Enriquez? It was
understood that his presence would not only give a certain mature
respectability to our performance--but I do not think we would have
contemplated this step without it. During one of our riding excursions
we were to secure the services of a Methodist minister in the adjoining
county, and later that of the Mission _padre_[169-1]--when the secret
was out. "I will gif her away," said Enriquez confidently, "it will on
the instant propitiate the old fellow who shall perform the affair and
withhold his jaw. A little chin-music from your oncle 'Arry shall
finish it! Remain tranquil and forget not a ring! One does not always,
in the agony and dissatisfaction of the moment, a ring remember. I
shall bring two in the pocket of my dress."
If I did not entirely participate in this roseate view, it may have
been because Enriquez, although a few years my senior, was much
younger-looking, and with his demure deviltry of eye and his upper lip
close shaven for this occasion, he suggested a depraved acolyte rather
than a responsible member of a family. Consuelo had also confided to me
that her father--possibly owing to some rumors of our previous
escapade--had forbidden any further excursions with me alone. The
innocent man did not know that Chu Chu had forbidden it also, and that
even on this momentous occasion both Enriquez and myself were obliged
to ride in opposite fields like out-flankers. But we nevertheless felt
the full guilt of disobedience added to our desperate enterprise.
Meanwhile, although pressed for time and subject to discovery at any
moment, I managed at certain points of the road to dismount and walk
beside Chu Chu (who did not seem to recognize me on foot), holding
Consuelo's hand in my own, with the discreet Enriquez leading my horse
in the distant field. I retain a very vivid picture of that walk--the
ascent of a gentle slope towards a prospect as yet unknown but full of
glorious possibilities; the tender dropping light of an autumn sky,
slightly filmed with the promise of the future rains, like foreshadowed
tears, and the half-frightened, half-serious talk into which Consuelo
and I had insensibly fallen.
And then, I don't know how it happened, but as we reached the summit
Chu Chu suddenly reared, wheeled, and the next moment was flying back
along the road we had just traveled, at the top of her speed! It might
have been that, after her abstracted fashion, she only at that moment
detected my presence; but so sudden and complete was her evolution that
before I could regain my horse from the astonished Enriquez she was
already a quarter of a mile on the homeward stretch, with the frantic
Consuelo pulling hopelessly at the bridle.
We started in pursuit. But a horrible despair seized us. To attempt to
overtake her, even to follow at the same rate of speed would only
excite Chu Chu and endanger Consuelo's life. There was absolutely no
help for it, nothing could be done; the mare had taken her determined,
long, continuous stride, the road was a straight, steady descent all
the way back to the village, Chu Chu had the bit between her teeth, and
there was no prospect of swerving her. We could only follow hopelessly,
idiotically, furiously, until Chu Chu dashed triumphantly into the
Saltellos' courtyard, carrying the half-fainting Consuelo back to the
arms of her assembled and astonished family.
It was our last ride together. It was the last I ever saw of Consuelo
before her transfer to the safe seclusion of a convent in Southern
California. It was the last I ever saw of Chu Chu, who in the confusion
of that _rencontre_[172-1] was overlooked in her half-loosed harness
and allowed to escape through the back gate to the fields. Months
afterwards it was said that she had been identified among a band of
wild horses in the Coast Range, as a strange and beautiful creature who
had escaped the brand of the _rodeo_ and had become a myth. There was
another legend that she had been seen, sleek, fat, and gorgeously
caparisoned, issuing from the gateway of the Rosario _patio_,[172-2]
before a lumbering Spanish _cabriolé_[172-3] in which a short, stout
matron was seated--but I will have none of it. For there are days when
she still lives, and I can see her plainly still climbing the gentle
slope towards the summit, with Consuelo on her back and myself at her
side, pressing eagerly forward towards the illimitable prospect that
opens in the distance.