CHAPTER II
Demorest's dream of a few days' conjugal seclusion and confidences withhis wife was quickly dispelled by that lady. "I came down with RositaPico, whose father, you know, once owned this property," she said."She's gone on to her cousins at Los Osos Rancho to-night, but comeshere to-morrow for a visit. She knows the place well; in fact, she oncehad a romantic love affair here. But she is very entertaining. It willbe a little change for us," she added, naively.
Demorest kept back a sigh, without changing his gentle smile. "I'm gladfor your sake, dear. But is she not a little flighty and inclined toflirt a good deal? I think I've heard so."
"She's a young girl who has been severely tried, Richard, and perhaps isnot to blame for endeavoring to forget it in such distraction as she canfind," said Mrs. Demorest, with a slight return of her old manner. "Ican understand her feelings perfectly." She looked pointedly at herhusband as she spoke, it being one of her late habits to openly refer totheir ante-nuptial acquaintance as a natural reaction from the martyrdomof her first marriage, with a quiet indifference that seemed almostan indelicacy. But her husband only said: "As you like, dear," vaguelyremembering Dona Rosita as the alleged heroine of a forgotten romancewith some earlier American adventurer who had disappeared, and tryingvainly to reconcile his wife's sentimental description of her with hisown recollection of the buxom, pretty, laughing, but dangerous-eyedSpanish girl he had, however, seen but once.
She arrived the next day, flying into a protracted embrace of Joan,which included a smiling recognition of Demorest with an unoccupied blueeye, and a shake of her fan over his wife's shoulder. Then she drewback and seemed to take in the whole veranda and garden in another longcaress of her eyes. "Ah-yess! I have recognized it, mooch. It es zesame. Of no change--not even of a leetle. No, she ess always--esso."She stopped, looked unutterable things at Joan, pressed her fan belowa spray of roses on her full bodice as if to indicate some thrillingmemory beneath it, shook her head again, suddenly caught sight ofDemorest's serious face, said: "Ah, that brigand of our husband laughshimself at me," and then herself broke into a charming ripple oflaughter.
"But I was not laughing, Dona Rosita," said Demorest, smiling sadly,however, in spite of himself.
She made a little grimace, and then raised her elbows, slightly liftingher shoulders. "As it shall please you, Senor. But he is gone--theespassion. Yess--what you shall call thees sentiment of lof--zo--as hecame!" She threw her fingers in the air as if to illustrate the volatileand transitory passage of her affections, and then turned again to Joanwith her back towards Demorest.
"Do please go on--Dona Rosita," said he, "I never heard the real story.If there is any romance about my house, I'd like to know it," he addedwith a faint sigh.
Dona Rosita wheeled upon him with an inquiring little look. "Ah, youhave the sentiment, and YOU," she continued, taking Joan by the arms,"YOU have not. Eet ess good so. When a--the wife," she continued boldly,hazarding an extended English abstraction, "he has the sentimente andthe hoosband he has nothing, eet is not good--for a-him--ze wife," sheconcluded triumphantly.
"But I have great appreciation and I am dying to hear it," saidDemorest, trying to laugh.
"Well, poor one, you look so. But you shall lif till another time," saidDona Rosita, with a mock courtesy, gliding with Joan away.
The "other time" came that evening when chocolate was served on theveranda, where Dona Rosita, mantilla-draped against the dry, clear,moonlit air, sat at the feet of Joan on the lowest step. Demorest,uneasily observant of the influence of the giddy foreigner on his wife,and conscious of certain confidences between them from which he wasexcluded, leaned against a pillar of the porch in half abstractedresignation; Joan, under the tutelage of Rosita, lit a cigarette;Demorest gazed at her wonderingly, trying to recall, in her fuller andmore animated face, some memory of the pale, refined profile of thePuritan girl he had first met in the Boston train, the faint aurora ofwhose cheek in that northern clime seemed to come and go with his words.Becoming conscious at last of the eyes of Dona Rosita watching him frombelow, with an effort he recalled his duty as her host and gallantlyreminded her that moonlight and the hour seemed expressly fitted for herpromised love story.
"Do tell it," said Joan, "I don't mind hearing it again."
"Then you know it already?" said Demorest, surprised.
Joan took the cigarette from her lips, laughed complacently, andexchanged a familiar glance with Rosita. "She told it me a year ago,when we first knew each other," she replied. "Go on, dear," to Rosita.
Thus encouraged, Dona Rosita began, addressing herself first in Spanishto Demorest, who understood the language better than his wife, andlapsing into her characteristic English as she appealed to them both.It was really very little to interest Don Ricardo--this story of a sillymuchacha like herself and a strange caballero. He would go to sleepwhile she was talking, and to-night he would say to his wife, "Mother ofGod! why have you brought here this chattering parrot who speaks but ofone thing?" But she would go on always like the windmill, whether therewas grain to grind or no. "It was four years ago. Ah! Don Ricardo didnot remember the country then--it was when the first Americans came--nowit is different. Then there were no coaches--in truth one travelledvery little, and always on horseback, only to see one's neighbors. Andsuddenly, as if in one day, it was changed; there were strange men onthe roads, and one was frightened, and one shut the gates of the pateoand drove the horses into the corral. One did not know much of theAmericans then--for why? They were always going, going--never stopping,hurrying on to the gold mines, hurrying away from the gold mines,hurrying to look for other gold mines: but always going on foot, onhorseback, in queer wagons--hurrying, pushing everywhere. Ah, it tookaway the breath. All, except one American--he did not hurry, he did notgo with the others, he came and stayed here at Buenaventura. He wasvery quiet, very civil, very sad, and very discreet. He was not likethe others, and always kept aloof from them. He came to see Don AndreasPico, and wanted to beg a piece of land and an old vaquero's hut nearthe road for a trifle. Don Andreas would have given it, or a betterhouse, to him, or have had him live at the casa here; but he would not.He was very proud and shy, so he took the vaquero's hut, a mere adobeaffair, and lived in it, though a caballero like yourself, with whitehands that knew not labor, and small feet that had seldom walked. Ingood time he learned to ride like the best vaquero, and helped DonAndreas to find the lost mustangs, and showed him how to improve the oldmill. And his pride and his shyness wore off, and he would come tothe casa sometimes. And Don Andreas got to love him very much, and hisdaughter, Dona Rosita--ah, well, yes truly--a leetle.
"But he had strange moods and ways, this American, and at times theywould have thought him a lunatico had they not believed it to be anAmerican fashion. He would be very kind and gentle like one of thefamily, coming to the casa every day, playing with the children,advising Don Andreas and--yes--having a devotion--very discreet, veryceremonious, for Dona Rosita. And then, all in a moment, he would becomeas ill, without a word or gesture, until he would stalk out of thehouse, gallop away furiously, and for a week not be heard of. The firsttime it happened, Dona Rosita was piqued by his rudeness, Don Andreaswas alarmed, for it was on an evening like the present, and Dona Rositawas teaching him a little song on the guitar when the fit came on him.And he snapped the guitar strings like thread and threw it down, and gotup like a bear and walked away without a word."
"I see it all," said Demorest, half seriously: "you were coquetting withhim, and he was jealous."
But Dona Rosita shook her head and turned impetuously, and said inEnglish to Joan:
"No, it was astutcia--a trick, a ruse. Because when my father havearrived at his house, he is agone. And so every time. When he have thefit he goes not to his house. No. And it ees not until after one timewhen he comes back never again, that we have comprehend what he do atthese times. And what do you think? I shall tell to you."
She composed herself comfortably, with her plump elbows on h
er knees,and her fan crossed on the palm of her hand before her, and began again:
"It is a year he has gone, and the stagecoach is attack of brigands.Tiburcio, our vaquero, have that night made himself a pasear on theroad, and he have seen HIM. He have seen, one, two, three men came fromthe wood with something on the face, and HE is of them. He has nothingon his face, and Tiburcio have recognize him. We have laugh at Tiburcio.We believe him not. It is improbable that this Senor Huanson--"
"Senor who?" said Demorest.
"Huanson--eet is the name of him. Ah, Carr!--posiblemente it isnothing--a Don Fulano--or an apodo--Huanson."
"Oh, I see, JOHNSON, very likely."
"We have said it is not possible that this good man, who have come tothe house and ride on his back the children, is a thief and a brigand.And one night my father have come from the Monterey in the coach, and itwas stopped. And the brigands have take from the passengers the money,the rings from the finger, and the watch--and my father was of the same.And my father, he have great dissatisfaction and anguish, for his watchis given to him of an old friend, and it is not like the other watch.But the watch he go all the same. And then when the robbers have made afinish comes to the window of the coach a mascara and have say, 'Whois the Don Andreas Pico?' And my father have say, 'It is I who am DonAndreas Pico.' And the mask have say, 'Behold, your watch isrestore!' and he gif it to him. And my father say, 'To whom have I thedistinguished honor to thank?' And the mask say--"
"Johnson," interrupted Demorest.
"No," said Dona Rosita in grave triumph, "he say Essmith. For thisEssmith is like Huanson--an apodo--nothing."
"Then you really think this man was your old friend?" asked Demorest.
"I think."
"And that he was a robber even when living here--and that it was notyour cruelty that really drove him to take the road?"
Dona Rosita shrugged her plump shoulders. "You will not comprehend. Itwas because of his being a brigand that he stayed not with us. My fatherwould not have object if he have present himself to me for marriage inthese times. I would not have object, for I was young, and we have knewnothing. It was he who have object. For why? Inside of his heart he havefeel he was a brigand."
"But you might have reformed him in time," said Demorest.
She again shrugged her shoulders. "Quien sabe." After a pause she addedwith infinite gravity: "And before he have reform, it is bad for themenage. I should invite to my house some friend. They arrive, and onesay, 'I have not the watch of my pocket,' and another, 'The ring of myfinger, he is gone,' and another, 'My earrings, she is loss.' And I amobliged to say, 'They reside now in the pocket of my hoosband; patience!a little while--perhaps to-morrow--he will restore.' No," she continued,with an air of infinite conviction, "it is not good for the menage--thenecessity of those explanation."
"You told me he was handsome," said Joan, passing her arm carelesslyaround Dona Rosita's comfortable waist. "How did he look?"
"As an angel! He have long curls to his back. His moustache was assilk, for he have had never a barber to his face. And his eyes--SantaMaria!--so soft and so--so melankoly. When he smile it is like themoonlight. But," she added, rising to her feet and tossing the endof her lace mantilla over her shoulder with a little laugh--"it isfinish--Adelante! Dr-rrive on!"
"I don't want to destroy your belief in the connection of your friendwith the road agents," said Demorest grimly, "but if he belongs totheir band it is in an inferior capacity. Most of them are known tothe authorities, and I have heard it even said that their leader ororganizer is a very unromantic speculator in San Francisco."
But this suggestion was received coldly by the ladies, whosuperciliously turned their backs upon it and the suggester. Joandropped her voice to a lower tone and turned to Dona Rosita. "And youhave never seen him since?"
"Never."
"I should--at least, I wouldn't have let it end in THAT way," said Joanin a positive whisper.
"Eh?" said Dona Rosita, laughing. "So eet is YOU, Juanita, that have theromance--eh? Ah, bueno! 'you have the house--so I gif to you the loveralso.' I place him at your disposition." She made a mock gesture ofelaborate and complete abnegation. "But," she added in Joan's ear, witha quick glance at Demorest, "do not let our hoosband eat him. Even nowhe have the look to strangle ME. Make to him a little lof, quickly, whenI shall walk in the garden." She turned away with a pretty wave of herfan to Demorest, and calling out, "I go to make an assignation with mymemory," laughed again, and lazily passed into the shadow. An ominoussilence on the veranda followed, broken finally by Mrs. Demorest.
"I don't think it was necessary for you to show your dislike to DonaRosita quite so plainly," she said, coldly, slightly accenting thePuritan stiffness, which any conjugal tete-a-tete lately revived in hermanner.
"I show dislike of Dona Rosita?" stammered Demorest, in surprise. "Come,Joan," he added, with a forgiving smile, "you don't mean to imply thatI dislike her because I couldn't get up a thrilling interest in an oldstory I've heard from every gossip in the pueblo since I can remember."
"It's not an old story to HER," said Joan, dryly, "and even if it were,you might reflect that all people are not as anxious to forget the pastas you are."
Demorest drew back to let the shaft glance by. "The story is old enough,at least for her to have had a dozen flirtations, as you know, sincethen," he returned gently, "and I don't think she herself seriouslybelieves in it. But let that pass. I am sorry I offended her. I had noidea of doing so. As a rule, I think she is not so easily offended. ButI shall apologize to her." He stopped and approached nearer his wife ina half-timid, half-tentative affection. "As to my forgetfulness of thepast, Joan, even if it were true, I have had little cause to forget itlately. Your friend, Corwin--"
"I must insist upon your not calling him MY friend, Richard,"interrupted Joan, sharply, "considering that it was through YOURindiscretion in coming to us for the buggy that night, that hesuspected--"
She stopped suddenly, for at that moment a startled little shriek,quickly subdued, rang through the garden. Demorest ran hurriedly downthe steps in the direction of the outcry. Joan followed more cautiously.At the first turning of the path Dona Rosita almost fell into his arms.She was breathless and trembling, but broke into a hysterical laugh.
"I have such a fear come to me--I cry out! I think I have seen a man;but it was nothing--nothing! I am a fool. It is no one here."
"But where did you see anything?" said Joan, coming up.
Rosita flew to her side. "Where? Oh, here!--everywhere! Ah, I am afool!" She was laughing now, albeit there were tears glistening on herlashes when she laid her head on Joan's shoulder.
"It was some fancy--some resemblance you saw in that queer cactus," saidDemorest, gently. "It is quite natural, I was myself deceived the othernight. But I'll look around to satisfy you. Take Dona Rosita back to theveranda, Joan. But don't be alarmed, dear--it was only an illusion."
He turned away. When his figure was lost in the entwining foliage, DonaRosita seized Joan's shoulder and dragged her face down to a level withher own.
"It was something!" she whispered quickly.
"Who?"
"It was--HIM!"
"Nonsense," groaned Joan, nevertheless casting a hurried glance aroundher.
"Have no fear," said Dona Rosita quickly, "he is gone--I saw him passaway--so! But it was HE--Huanson. I recognize him. I forget him never."
"Are you sure?"
"Have I the eyes? the memory? Madre de Dios! Am I a lunatico too? Look!He have stood there--so."
"Then you think he knew you were here?"
"Quien sabe?"
"And that he came here to see you?"
Dona Rosita caught her again by the shoulders, and with her lips toJoan's ear, said with the intensest and most deliberate of emphasis:
"NO!"
"What in Heaven's name brought him here then?"
"You!"
"Are you crazy?"
"You! you! YOU!" repeated Dona Rosita, with
crescendo energy. "I havecome upon him here; where he stood and look at the veranda, absorrrb ofYOU. You move--he fly."
"Hush!"
"Ah, yes! I have said I give him to you. And he came, Bueno," murmuredDona Rosita, with a half-resigned, half-superstitious gesture.
"WILL you be quiet!"
It was the sound of Demorest's feet on the gravel path, returningfrom his fruitless search. He had seen nothing. It must have been DonaRosita's fancy.
"She was just saying she thought she had been mistaken," said Joan,quietly. "Let us go in--it is rather chilly here, and I begin to feelcreepy too."
Nevertheless, as they entered the house again, and the light of thehall lantern fell upon her face, Demorest thought he had never but oncebefore seen her look so nervously and animatedly beautiful.