"Fools! to have been frightened at a scarecrow!

"_Carrambo_! It shan't long delay the event. To-morrow I go back to the Alamo. I'll touch that thousand yet, if I should have to spend twelve months in earning it; and, whether or not, the _deed_ shall be done all the same. Enough to have lost Isidora. It may not be true; but the very suspicion of it puts me beside myself. If I but find out that she loves him--that they have met since--since--Mother of G.o.d! I shall go mad; and in my madness destroy not only the man I hate, but the woman I love! O Dona Isidora Covarubio de los Llanos! Angel of beauty, and demon of mischief! I could kill you with my caresses--I can kill you with my steel! One or other shall be your fate. It is for you to choose between them!"

His spirit becoming a little tranquillised, partly through being relieved by this conditional threat--and partly from the explanation he had been able to arrive at concerning the other thought that had been troubling it--he soon after fell asleep.

Nor did he awake until daylight looked in at his door, and along with it a visitor.

"Jose!" he cried out in a tone of surprise in which pleasure was perceptible--"you here?"

"_Si, Senor; yo estoy_."

"Glad to see you, good Jose. The Dona Isidora here?--on the Leona, I mean?"

"_Si, Senor_."

"So soon again! She was here scarce two weeks ago, was she not? I was away from the settlement, but had word of it. I was expecting to hear from you, good Jose. Why did you not write?"

"Only, Senor Don Miguel, for want of a messenger that could be relied upon. I had something to communicate, that could not with safety be entrusted to a stranger. Something, I am sorry to say, you won't thank me for telling you; but my life is yours, and I promised you should know all."

The "prairie wolf" sprang to his feet, as if p.r.i.c.ked with a sharp-pointed thorn.

"Of her, and him? I know it by your looks. Your mistress has met him?"

"No, Senor, she hasn't--not that I know of--not since the first time."

"What, then?" inquired Diaz, evidently a little relieved, "She was here while he was at the posada. Something pa.s.sed between them?"

"True, Don Miguel--something did pa.s.s, as I well know, being myself the bearer of it. Three times I carried him a basket of _dulces_, sent by the Dona Isidora--the last time also a letter."

"A letter! You know the contents? You read it?"

"Thanks to your kindness to the poor _peon_ boy, I was able to do that; more still--to make a copy of it."

"You have one?"

"I have. You see, Don Miguel, you did not have me sent to school for nothing. This is what the Dona Isidora wrote to him."

Diaz reached out eagerly, and, taking hold of the piece of paper, proceeded to devour its contents.

It was a copy of the note that had been sent among the sweetmeats.

Instead of further exciting, it seemed rather to tranquillise him.

"_Carrambo_!" he carelessly exclaimed, as he folded up the epistle.

"There's not much in this, good Jose. It only proves that your mistress is grateful to one who has done her a service. If that's all--"

"But it is not all, Senor Don Miguel; and that's why I've come to see you now. I'm on an errand to the _pueblita_. This will explain it."

"Ha! Another letter?"

"_Si, Senor_! This time the original itself, and not a poor copy scribbled by me."

With a shaking hand Diaz took hold of the paper, spread it out, and read:--

Al Senor Don Mauricio Gerald.

_Querido amigo_!

_Otra vez aqui estoy--con tio Silvio quedando! Sin novedades de V. no puedo mas tiempo existir. La incert.i.tud me malaba. Digame que es V.

convalescente! Ojala, que estuviera asi! Suspiro en vuestros ojos mirar, estos ojos tan lindos y tan espresivos--a ver, si es restablecido vuestra salud. Sea graciosa darme este favor. Hay--opportunidad. En una cort.i.ta media de hora, estuviera quedando en la cima de loma, sobre la cosa del tio. Ven, cavallero, ven_!

Isidora Covarubio de los Llanos.

With a curse El Coyote concluded the reading of the letter. Its sense could scarce be mistaken. Literally translated it read thus:--

"Dear Friend,--I am once more here, staying with uncle Silvio. Without hearing of you I could not longer exist. The uncertainty was killing me. Tell me if you are convalescent. Oh! that it may be so. I long to look into your eyes--those eyes so beautiful, so expressive--to make sure that your health is perfectly restored. Be good enough to grant me this favour. There is an opportunity. In a short half hour from this time, I shall be on the top of the hill, above my uncle's house. Come, sir, come!

"Isidora Covarubio De Los Llanos."

"_Carajo_! an a.s.signation!" half shrieked the indignant Diaz. "That and nothing else! She, too, the proposer. Ha! Her invitation shall be answered; though not by him for whom it is so cunningly intended. Kept to the hour--to the very minute; and by the Divinity of Vengeance--

"Here, Jose! this note's of no use. The man to whom it is addressed isn't any longer in the pueblita, nor anywhere about here. G.o.d knows where he is! There's some mystery about it. No matter. You go on to the posada, and make your inquiries all the same. You must do that to fulfil your errand. Never mind the _papelcito_; leave it with me. You can have it to take to your mistress, as you come back this way. Here's a dollar to get you a drink at the inn. Senor Doffer keeps the best kind of aguardiente. _Hasta luejo_!"

Without staying to question the motive for these directions given to him, Jose, after accepting the _douceur_, yielded tacit obedience to them, and took his departure from the jacale.

He was scarce out of sight before Diaz also stepped over its threshold.

Hastily setting the saddle upon his horse, he sprang into it, and rode off in the opposite direction.

CHAPTER FORTY EIGHT.

ISIDORA.

The sun has just risen clear above the prairie horizon, his round disc still resting upon the sward, like a buckler of burnished gold. His rays are struggling into the chapparal, that here and there diversifies the savanna. The dew-beads yet cling upon the acacias, weighting their feathery fronds, and causing them to droop earthward, as if grieving at the departure of the night, whose cool breeze and moist atmosphere are more congenial to them than the fiery sirocco of day. Though the birds are stirring--for what bird could sleep under the shine of such glorious sunrise?--it is almost too early to expect human being abroad--elsewhere than upon the prairies of Texas. There, however, the hour of the sun's rising is the most enjoyable of the day; and few there are who spend it upon the unconscious couch, or in the solitude of the chamber.

By the banks of the Leona, some three miles below Fort Inge, there is one who has forsaken both, to stray through the chapparal. This early wanderer is not afoot, but astride a strong, spirited horse, that seems impatient at being checked in his paces. By this description, you may suppose the rider to be a man; but, remembering that the scene is in Southern Texas still spa.r.s.ely inhabited by a Spano-Mexican population-- you are equally at liberty to conjecture that the equestrian is a woman.

And this, too, despite the round hat upon the head--despite the serape upon the shoulders, worn as a protection against the chill morning air-- despite the style of equitation, so _outre_ to European ideas, since the days of La d.u.c.h.esse de Berri; and still further, despite the crayon-like colouring on the upper lip, displayed in the shape of a pair of silken moustaches. More especially may this last mislead; and you may fancy yourself looking upon some Spanish youth, whose dark but delicate features bespeak the _hijo de algo_, with a descent traceable to the times of the Cid.

If acquainted with the character of the Spano-Mexican physiognomy, this last sign of virility does not decide you as to the s.e.x. It may be that the rider in the Texan chapparal, so distinguished, is, after all, a woman!

On closer scrutiny, this proves to be the case. It is proved by the small hand clasping the bridle-rein; by the little foot, whose tiny toes just touch the "estribo"--looking less in contrast with the huge wooden block that serves as a stirrup; by a certain softness of shape, and pleasing rotundity of outline, perceptible even through the thick serape of Saltillo; and lastly, by the grand luxuriance of hair coiled up at the back of the head, and standing out in shining clump beyond the rim of the sombrero. After noting these points, you become convinced that you are looking upon a woman, though it may be one distinguished by certain idiosyncrasies. You are looking upon the Dona Isidora Covarubio de los Llanos.

You are struck by the strangeness of her costume--still more by the way she sits her horse. In your eyes, unaccustomed to Mexican modes, both may appear odd--unfeminine--perhaps indecorous.

The Dona Isidora has no thought--not even a suspicion--of there being anything odd in either. Why should she? She is but following the fashion of her country and her kindred. In neither respect is she peculiar.

She is young, but yet a woman. She has seen twenty summers, and perhaps one more. Pa.s.sed under the sun of a Southern sky, it is needless to say that her girlhood is long since gone by. In her beauty there is no sign of decadence. She is fair to look upon, as in her "buen quince"