"Roberto, dearest! It is not your fault."

"It is my fault. I have waited too long. My sons showed me my duty--my soul urged me to do it. I deserve the shame, but I will wipe it out with crimson blood."

The Senora stood speechless, wringing her hands. Her own pa.s.sion was puny beside the sternness, the reality, and the intensity of the quiet rage before her. She was completely mastered by it. She forgot all but the evident agony she could neither mistake nor console.

"I have come to say 'farewell,' Maria. We have been very happy together--Maria--our children--dearest--"

"Oh, Roberto! My husband! My soul! My life! Leave me not."

"I am going for my arms. I will take them a hundredfold from those who have robbed me. I swear I will!"

"You do not love me. What are these Americans to you? I am your wife.

Your Maria--"

"These Americans are my brothers--my sons. My mother is an American woman."

"And I?"

"You are my wife--my dear wife! I love you--G.o.d Almighty knows how well I love you; but we must part now, at least for a short time. Maria, my dear one, I must go."

"Go? Where to?"

"I am going to join General Houston."

"I thought so. I knew it. The accursed one! Oh that I had him here again! I would bury my stiletto in his heart! Over the white hilt I would bury it! I would wash my hands in his blood, and think them blessed ever afterwards! Stay till daylight, Roberto. I have so much to say, dearest."

"I cannot. I have stayed too long. And now I must ride without a gun or knife to protect me. Any Indian that I meet can scalp me. Do you understand now what disarming means, Maria? If I had gone with my boy, with my brave Jack, I could at least have sold my life to its last drop."

"In the morning, Roberto, Lopez Navarro will get you a gun. Oh, if you must go, do not go unarmed! There are ten thousand Comanche between here and the Brazos."

"How could I look Lopez Navarro in the face? Or any other man? No, no!

I must win back my arms, before I can walk the streets of San Antonio again."

He took her in his arms, he kissed her eyes, her cheeks, her lips, murmuring tender little Spanish words that meant, oh, so much, to the wretched woman!--words she had taught him with kisses--words he never used but to her ears only.

She clung to his neck, to his hands, to his feet; she made his farewell an unspeakable agony. At last he laid her upon her couch, sobbing and shrieking like a child in an extremity of physical anguish. But he did not blame her. Her impetuosities, her unreasonable extravagances, were a part of her nature, her race, and her character. He did not expect a weak, excitable woman to become suddenly a creature of flame and steel.

But it was a wonderful rest to his exhausted body and soul to turn from her to Antonia. She led him quietly to his chair by the parlor fire.

She gave him food and wine. She listened patiently, but with a living sympathy, to his wrong. She endorsed, with a clasp of his hand and a smile, his purpose. And she said, almost cheerfully:

"You have not given up all your arms, father. When I first heard of the edict, I hid in my own room the rifle, the powder and the shot, which were in your study. Paola has knives in the stable; plenty of them. Get one from him."

Good news is a very relative thing. This information made the doctor feel as if all were now easy and possible. The words he said to her, Antonia never forgot. They sang in her heart like music, and led her on through many a difficult path. The conversation then turned upon money matters, and Antonia received the key of his study, and full directions as to the gold and papers secreted there.

Then Isabel was awakened, and the rifle brought down; and Paola saddled the fleetest horse in the stable, and after one solemn five minutes with his daughter, Robert Worth rode away into the midnight darkness, and into a chaos of public events of which no man living could forecast the outcome.

Rode away from wife and children and home; leaving behind him the love and labor of his lifetime--

"The thousand sweet, still joys of such As hand in hand face earthly life."

For what? For justice, for freedom of thought and action, for the rights of his manhood, for the brotherhood of race and religion and country.

Antonia and Isabel stood hand in hand at the same lattice from which the Senora had watched her son away, and in a dim, uncertain manner these thoughts connected themselves in each mind with the same mournful inquiry--Is it worth while?

As the beat of the horse's hoofs died away, they turned. The night was cold but clear, and the sky appeared so high that their eyes throbbed as they gazed upward at the grand arch, sprinkled with suns and worlds.

Suddenly into the tranquil s.p.a.ces there was flung a sound of joy and revelry; and the girls stepped to a lattice at the end of the corridor and looked out.

The residencia of Don Salvo Valasco was clearly visible from this site.

They saw that it was illuminated throughout. Lovely women, shining with jewels, and soldiers in scarlet and gold, were chatting through the graceful movements of the danza, or executing the more brilliant Jota Aragonesa. The misty beauty of white lace mantillas, the glitter and color of fans and festival dresses, made a moving picture of great beauty.

And as they watched it there was a cessation of the dance, followed by the rapid sweep of a powerful hand over the strings of a guitar. Then a group of officers stepped together, and a great wave of melodious song, solemn and triumphant, thrilled the night. It was the national hymn.

Antonia and Isabel knew it. Every word beat upon their hearts. The power of a.s.sociation, the charm of a stately, fervent melody was upon them.

"It is Senor Higadillos who leads," whispered Isabel, as a resonant voice, powerful and sweet, cried--

"O list to the summons! The blood of our sires, Boils high in our veins, and to vengeance inspires!

Who bows to the yoke? who bends to the blow?"

and, without a moment's hesitation, the answer came in a chorus of enthusiastic cadences--

"No hero will bend, no Mexican bow; Our country in tears sends her sons to the fight, To conquer, or die, for our land and our right."

"You see, the Mexicans think THEY are in the right--THEY are patriots also, Antonia."

The sorrowful girl spoke like a puzzled child, fretfully and uncertainly, and Antonia led her silently away. What could she answer?

And when she remembered the dear fugitive, riding alone through the midnight--riding now for life and liberty--she could not help the uprising again of that cold benumbing question--"Is it worth while?"

CHAPTER VII. A MEETING AT MIDNIGHT.

"All faiths are to their own believers just, For none believe because they will, but must; The priest continues what the nurse began, And thus the child imposes on the man."

--DRYDEN.

"--if he be called upon to face Some awful moment, to which heaven has joined Great issues good or bad for humankind, Is happy as a lover; and attired With sudden brightness, like a man inspired; And through the heat of conflict keeps the law In calmness made; and sees what he foresaw, Or, if an unexpected call succeed, Come when it will, is equal to the need."

--WORDSWORTH.

"Ah! love, let us be true To one another, through the world which seems To lie before us like a land of dreams!"

The gathering at Don Valasco's was constantly repeated in various degrees of splendor among the loyal Mexicans of the city. They were as fully convinced of the justice of their cause as the Americans were.

"They had graciously permitted Americans to make homes in their country; now they wanted not only to build heretic churches and sell heretic bibles, but also to govern Texas after their own fashion." From a Mexican point of view the American settlers were a G.o.dless, atheistical, quarrelsome set of ingrates. For eaten bread is soon forgotten, and Mexicans disliked to remember that their own independence had been won by the aid of the very men they were now trying to force into subjection.

The two parties were already in array in every house in the city. The Senora at variance with her daughters, their Irish cook quarrelling with their Mexican servants, only represented a state of things nearly universal. And after the failure of the Mexicans at Gonzales to disarm the Americans, the animosity constantly increased.

In every church, the priests--more bitter, fierce and revengeful than either the civil or military power--urged on the people an exterminating war. A black flag waved from the Missions, and fired every heart with an unrelenting vengeance and hatred. To slay a heretic was a free pa.s.s through the dolorous pains of purgatory. For the priesthood foresaw that the triumph of the American element meant the triumph of freedom of conscience, and the abolition of their own despotism. To them the struggle was one involving all the privileges of their order; and they urged on the fight with pa.s.sionate denunciations of the foe, and with magnificent promises of spiritual favors and blessings. In the fortress, the plaza, the houses, the churches, the streets, their fiery words kept society in a ferment.

But through all this turmoil the small duties of life went on. Soldiers were parading the streets, and keeping watch on the flat roofs of the houses; men were solemly{sic} swearing allegiance to Santa Anna, or flying by night to the camp of the Americans; life and death were held at a pin's fee; but eating and dressing, dancing and flirting were pursued with an eagerness typical of pleasure caught in the pa.s.sing.