Essential Novelists - Bret Harte. Bret Harte
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see his way quite clearly into this case, and he had no doubt his perspicacity was greatly aided by the admirable manner in which she had indicated the various points on the paper she had given him. He was now ready to take up her own matters, only he begged as clear and concise a brief as she had already made for her friend. He was so cheerful and gallant that by the time luncheon was announced the widow found him quite charming, and was inclined to forgive him for the disappointment of the morning. And when, after luncheon, he challenged her to a sharp canter with him along the beach, by way, as he said, of keeping her memory from taking cold, and to satisfy herself that the Point of Pines could be doubled without going out to sea, I fear that, without a prudent consideration of the gossips of San Antonio before her eyes, she assented. There could be no harm in riding with her late husband's legal adviser, who had called, as everybody knew, on business, and whose time was so precious that he must return even before the business was concluded. And then "Pepe" could follow them, to return with her!
It did not, of course, occur to either Arthur or Donna Maria that they might outrun "Pepe," who was fat and indisposed to violent exertion; nor that they should find other things to talk about than the details of business; nor that the afternoon should be so marvellously beautiful as to cause them to frequently stop and admire the stretch of glittering sea beyond; nor that the roar of the waves was so deafening as to oblige them to keep so near each other for the purposes of conversation that the widow's soft breath was continually upon Arthur's cheek; nor that Donna Maria's saddle girth should become so loose that she was forced to dismount while Arthur tightened it, and that he should be obliged to lift her in his arms to restore her to her seat again. But finally, when the Point of Pines was safely rounded, and Arthur was delivering a few parting words of legal counsel, holding one of her hands in his, while with the other he was untwisting a long tress of her blown down hair, that, after buffeting his cheek into colour, had suddenly twined itself around his neck, an old-fashioned family carriage, drawn by four black mules with silver harness, passed them suddenly on the road.
Donna Maria drew her head and her hand away with a quick blush and laugh, and then gaily kissed her finger-tips to the retreating carriage. Arthur laughed also—but a little foolishly—and looked as if expecting some explanation.
"You should have your wits about you, sir. Did you know who that was?"
Arthur sincerely confessed ignorance. He had not noticed the carriage until it had passed.
"Think what you have lost! That was your fair young client."
"I did not even see her," laughed Arthur.
"But she saw you! She never took her eyes off you. Adios!"
CHAPTER VI. THE LADY OF GRIEF.
"You will not go to-day," said Father Felipe to Arthur, as he entered the Mission refectory early the next morning to breakfast.
"I shall be on the road in an hour, Father," replied Arthur, gaily.
"But not toward San Francisco," said the Padre. "Listen! Your wish of yesterday has been attained. You are to have your desired interview with the fair invisible. Do you comprehend? Donna Dolores has sent for you."
Arthur looked up in surprise. Perhaps his face did not express as much pleasure as Father Felipe expected, who lifted his eyes to the ceiling, took a philosophical pinch of snuff, and muttered—
"Ah, lo que es el mudo!—Now that he has his wish—it is nothing, Mother of God!"
"This is your kindness, Father."
"God forbid!" returned Padre Felipe, hastily. "Believe me, my son, I know nothing. When the Donna left here before the Angelus yesterday, she said nothing of this. Perhaps it is the office of your friend, Mrs. Sepulvida."
"Hardly, I think," said Arthur; "she was so well prepared with all the facts as to render an interview with Donna Dolores unnecessary. Bueno, be it so! I will go."
Nevertheless, he was ill at ease. He ate little, he was silent. All the fears he had argued away with such self-satisfied logic the day before, returned to him again with greater anxiety. Could there have been any further facts regarding this inopportune grant that Mrs. Sepulvida had not disclosed? Was there any particular reason why this strange recluse, who had hitherto avoided his necessary professional presence, should now desire a personal interview which was not apparently necessary? Could it be possible that communication had already been established with Gabriel or Grace, and that the history of their previous life had become known to his client? Had his connexion with it been in any way revealed to the Donna Dolores?
If he had been able to contemplate this last possibility with calmness and courage yesterday when Mrs. Sepulvida first repeated the name of Gabriel Conroy, was he capable of equal resignation now? Had anything occurred since then?—had any new resolution entered his head to which such a revelation would be fatal? Nonsense! And yet he could not help commenting, with more or less vague uneasiness of mind, on his chance meeting of Donna Dolores at the Point of Pines yesterday and the summons of this morning. Would not his foolish attitude with Donna Maria, aided, perhaps, by some indiscreet expression from the well-meaning but senile Padre Felipe, be sufficient to exasperate his fair client had she been cognizant of his first relations with Grace? It is not mean natures alone that are the most suspicious. A quick, generous imagination, feverishly excited, will project theories of character and intention far more ridiculous and uncomplimentary to humanity than the lowest surmises of ignorance and imbecility. Arthur was feverish and edited; with all the instincts of a contradictory nature, his easy sentimentalism dreaded, while his combative principles longed for, this interview. Within an hour of the time appointed by Donna Dolores, he had thrown himself on his horse, and was galloping furiously toward the "Rancho of the Holy Trinity."
It was inland and three leagues away under the foot-hills. But as he entered upon the level plain, unrelieved by any watercourse; and baked and cracked by the fierce sun into narrow gaping chasms and yawning fissures, he unconsciously began to slacken pace. Nothing could be more dreary, passionless, and resigned than the vast, sunlit, yet joyless waste. It seemed as if it might be some illimitable, desolate sea, beaten flat by the north-westerly gales that spent their impotent fury on its unopposing levels. As far as the eye could reach, its dead monotony was unbroken; even the black cattle that in the clear distance seemed to crawl over its surface, did not animate it; rather by contrast brought into relief its fixed rigidity of outline. Neither wind, sky, nor sun wrought any change over its blank, expressionless face. It was the symbol of Patience—a hopeless, weary, helpless patience—but a patience that was Eternal.
He had ridden for nearly an hour, when suddenly there seemed to spring up from the earth, a mile away, a dark line of wall, terminating in an irregular, broken outline against the sky. His first impression was that it was the valda or a break of the stiff skirt of the mountain as it struck the level plain. But he presently saw the dull red of tiled roofs over the dark adobe wall, and as he dashed down into the dry bed of a vanished stream and up again on the opposite bank, he passed the low walls of a corral, until then unnoticed, and a few crows, in a rusty, half-Spanish, half-clerical suit, uttered a croaking welcome to the Rancho of the Holy Trinity, as they rose from the ground before him. It was the first sound that for an hour had interrupted the monotonous jingle of his spurs or the hollow beat of his horse's hoofs. And then, after the fashion of the country, he rose slightly in his stirrups, dashed his spurs into the sides of his mustang, swung the long, horsehair, braided thong of his bridle-rein, and charged at headlong speed upon the dozen lounging, apparently listless vaqueros, who, for the past hour, had nevertheless been watching and waiting for him at the courtyard gate. As he rode toward them, they separated, drew up each side of the gate, doffed their glazed, stiff-brimmed, black sombreros, wheeled, put spurs to their horses, and in another instant were scattered to the four winds. When Arthur leaped to the brick pavement of the courtyard, there was not one in sight.
An Indian servant noiselessly led away his horse. Another peon as mutely led the way along a corridor over whose low railings serapes and saddle blankets were hung in a barbaric confusion of colouring, and entered a bare-walled ante-room, where another Indian—old, grey-headed, with a face like a wrinkled tobacco leaf—was seated on a low wooden