Don Jose (aside). His coolness is suspicious. Can it be that he expects the girl will follow him? Mother of G.o.d! perhaps it has been already planned between them. Good! Thank Heaven I can end it here. (Aloud.) Diego!

Sandy. Old man.

Don Jose. For my daughter's sake, you understand,--for her sake,--I am willing to try you once more. Hark ye! My daughter is young, foolish, and romantic. I have reason to believe, from her conduct lately, that she has contracted an intimacy with some Americano, and that in her ignorance, her foolishness, she has allowed that man to believe that he might aspire to her hand. Good! Now listen to me. You shall stay in her service. You shall find out,--you are in her confidence,--you shall find out this American, this adventurer, this lover if you please, of the Dona Jovita my daughter; and you will tell him this,--you will tell him that a union with him is impossible, forbidden; that the hour she attempts it, without my consent, she is PENNILESS; that this estate, this rancho, pa.s.ses into the hands of the Holy Church, where even your laws cannot reach it.

Sandy (leaning familiarly over the table). But suppose that he sees that little bluff, and calls ye.

Don Jose. I do not comprehend you (coldly).

Sandy. Suppose he loves that gal, and will take her as she stands, without a cent, or hide or hair of yer old cattle.

Don Jose (scornfully). Suppose--a miracle! Hark ye, Diego! It is now five years since I have known your countrymen, these smart Americanos.

I have yet to know when love, sentiment, friendship, was worth any more than a money value in your market.

Sandy (truculently and drunkenly). You hev, hev ye? Well, look yar, ole man. Suppose I REFUSE. Suppose I'd rather go than act as a spy on that young gal your darter! Suppose that--hic--allowin' she's my friend, I'd rather starve in the gutters of the Mission than stand between her and the man she fancies. Hey? Suppose I would--d.a.m.n me! Suppose I'd see you and your derned old rancho in--t'other place--hic--d.a.m.n me. You hear me, ole man! That's the kind o' man I am--d.a.m.n me.

Don Jose (aside, rising contemptuously). It is as I suspected. Traitor.

Ingrate! Satisfied that his scheme has failed, he is ready to abandon her. And this--THIS is the man for whom she has been ready to sacrifice everything,--her home, her father! (Aloud, coldly.) Be it so, Diego: you shall go.

Sandy (soberly and seriously, after a pause.) Well, I reckon I had better. (Rising.) I've a few duds, old man, to put up. It won't take me long. (Goes to L., and pauses.)

Don Jose (aside). Ah! he hesitates! He is changing his mind. (SANDY returns slowly to table, pours out gla.s.s of liquor, nods to DON JOSE, and drinks.) I looks towards ye, ole man. Adios!

[Exit SANDY.

Don Jose. His coolness is perfect. If these Americans are cayotes in their advances, they are lions in retreat! Bueno! I begin to respect him. But it will be just as well to set Concho to track him to the Mission; and I will see that he leaves the rancho alone.

[Exit Jose.

Enter hurriedly JOVITA CASTRO, in riding habit, with whip.

So! Chiquita not yet saddled, and that spy Concho haunting the plains for the last half-hour. What an air of mystery! Something awful, something deliciously dreadful, has happened! Either my amiable drunkard has forgotten to despatch Concho on his usual fool's errand, or he is himself lying helpless in some ditch. Was there ever a girl so persecuted? With a father wrapped in mystery, a lover nameless and shrouded in the obscurity of some Olympian height, and her only confidant and messenger a Bacchus instead of a Mercury! Heigh ho! And in another hour Don Juan--he told me I might call him John--will be waiting for me outside the convent wall! What if Diego fails me? To go there alone would be madness! Who else would be as charmingly unconscious and inattentive as this American vagabond! (Goes to L.) Ah, my saddle and blanket hidden! He HAS been interrupted. Some one has been watching.

This freak of my father's means something. And to-night, of all nights, the night that Oakhurst was to disclose himself, and tell me all! What is to be done? Hark! (DIEGO, without, singing.)

"Oh, here's your aguardiente, Drink it down!"

Jovita. It is Diego; and, Mother of G.o.d! drunk again!

Enter SANDY, carrying pack, intoxicated; staggers to centre, and, observing JOVITA, takes off his hat respectfully.

Jovita (shaking him by the shoulders pa.s.sionately). Diego! How dare you!

And at such a time!

Sandy (with drunken solemnity). Miss Jovita, did ye ever know me to be drunk afore at such a time?

Jovita. No.

Sandy. Zachy so. It's abnormal. And it means--the game's up.

Jovita. I do not understand. For the love of G.o.d, Diego, be plain!

Sandy (solemnly and drunkenly). When I say your game's up, I mean the old man knows it all. You're blowed upon. Hearken, miss. (Seriously and soberly.) Your father knows all that I know; but, as it wasn't my business to interfere with, I hev sorter helped along. He knows that you meet a stranger, an American, in these rides with me.

Jovita (pa.s.sionately). Ingrate! You have not dared to tell him! (Seizing him by the collar, and threatening him with the horsewhip.)

Sandy (rising with half-drunken, half-sober solemnity). One minit, miss!

one minit! Don't ye! don't ye do that! Ef ye forget (and I don't blame ye for it), ef ye forget that I'm a man, don't ye, don't ye forget that you're a woman! Sit ye down, sit ye down, so! Now, ef ye'll kindly remember, miss, I never saw this yer man, yer lover. Ef ye'll recollect, miss, whenever you met him, I allers hung back and waited round in the mission or in the fields beyond for ye, and allowed ye to hev your own way, it bein' no business o' mine. Thar isn't a man on the ranch, who, ef he'd had a mind to watch ye, wouldn't hev known more about yer lover than I do.

Jovita (aside). He speaks truly. He always kept in the background. Even Don Juan never knew that I had an attendant until I told him. (Aloud.) I made a mistake, Diego. I was hasty. What am I to do? He is waiting for me even now.

Sandy. Well (with drunken gravity), ef ye can't go to him, I reckon it's the squar thing for him to come to ye.

Jovita. Recollect yourself, Diego. Be a man!

Sandy. Fash jus war I say. Let him be a man, and come to ye here. Let him ride up to this ranch like a man, and call out to yer father that he'll take ye jist as ye are, without the land. And if the old man allows, rather than hev ye marry that stranger, he'll give this yer place to the church, why, let him do it, and be d.a.m.ned.

Jovita (recoiling, aside). So! That is their plan. Don Jose has worked on the fears or the cupidity of this drunken ingrate.

Sandy (with drunken submission). Ye was speaking to me, miss. Ef ye'll take my advice,--a drunken man's advice, miss,--ye'll say to that lover of yours, ef he's afeard to come for ye here, to take ye as ye stand, he ain't no man for ye. And, ontil he does, ye'll do as the ole man says.

Fur ef I do say it, miss,--and thar ain't no love lost between us,--he's a good father to ye. It ain't every day that a gal kin afford to swap a father like that, as she DOES KNOW, fur the husband that she DON'T! He's a proud old fool, miss; but to ye, to ye, he's clar grit all through.

Jovita (pa.s.sionately, aside). Tricked, fooled, like a child! and through the means of this treacherous, drunken tool. (Stamping her foot.) Ah!

we shall see! You are wise, you are wise, Don Jose; but your daughter is not a novice, nor a helpless creature of the Holy Church.

(Pa.s.sionately.) I'll--I'll become a Protestant to-morrow!

Sandy (unheeding her pa.s.sion, and becoming more earnest and self-possessed). Ef ye hed a father, miss, ez instead o' harkinin'

to your slightest wish, and surroundin' ye with luxury, hed made your infancy a struggle for life among strangers, and your childhood a disgrace and a temptation; ef he had left ye with no company but want, with no companions but guilt, with no mother but suffering; ef he had made your home, this home, so unhappy, so vile, so terrible, so awful, that the crowded streets and gutters of a great city was something to fly to for relief; ef he had made his presence, his very name,--your name, miss, allowin' it was your father,--ef he had made that presence so hateful, that name so infamous, that exile, that flyin' to furrin'

parts, that wanderin' among strange folks ez didn't know ye, was the only way to make life endurable; and ef he'd given ye,--I mean this good old man Don Jose, miss,--ef he'd given ye as part of yer heritage a taint, a weakness in yer very blood, a fondness for a poison, a poison that soothed ye like a vampire bat and sucked yer life-blood (seizing her arm) ez it soothed ye; ef this curse that hung over ye dragged ye down day by day, till hating him, loathing him, ye saw yerself day by day becoming more and more like him, till ye knew that his fate was yours, and yours his,--why then, Miss Jovita (rising with an hysterical, drunken laugh), why then, I'd run away with ye myself,--I would, d.a.m.n me!

Jovita (who has been withdrawing from him scornfully). Well acted, Diego. Don Jose should have seen his pupil. Trust me, my father will reward you. (Aside.) And yet there were tears in his drunken eyes.

Bah! it is the liquor: he is no longer sane. And, either hypocrite or imbecile, he is to be trusted no longer. But where and why is he going?

(Aloud.) You are leaving us, Diego.

Sandy (quietly). Well, the old man and me don't get on together.

Jovita (scornfully). Bueno! I see. Then you abandon me.

Sandy (quickly). To the old man, miss,--not the young one. (Walks to the table, and begins to pour out liquor.)

Jovita (angrily). You would not dare to talk to me thus if John Oakhurst--ah! (Checking herself.)

Sandy (drops gla.s.s on table, hurries to centre, and seizes DONA JOVITA).

Eh! Wot name did you say? (Looks at her amazed and bewildered.)

Jovita (terrified, aside). Mother of G.o.d! What have I done? Broken my sacred pledge to keep his name secret. No! No! Diego did not hear me!

Surely this wretched drunkard does not know him. (Aloud.) Nothing. I said nothing: I mentioned no name.