Essential Novelists - Bret Harte. Bret Harte

and to meet the cynical but respectful observation of Concho; to go forward, at the worst, could only be a slight wetting, and a canter beyond the reach of observation of the stranger, who could not in decency turn back after her. All this Donna Maria saw with the swiftness of feminine intuition, and, without apparently any hesitation in her face of her intent, dashed into the surf below the Point.

      Alas for feminine logic! Mistress Sepulvida's reasoning was perfect, but her premises were wrong. Tita's first dash was a brave one, and carried her half round the Point, the next was a simple flounder; the next struggle sunk her to her knees, the next to her haunches. She was in a quicksand!

      "Let the horse go. Don't struggle! Take the end of your riata. Throw yourself flat on the next wave, and let it take you out to sea!"

      Donna Maria mechanically loosed the coil of hair rope which hung over the pommel of her saddle. Then she looked around in the direction of the voice. But she saw only a riderless horse, moving slowly along the Point.

      "Quick! Now then!" The voice was seaward now; where, to her frightened fancy, some one appeared to be swimming. Donna Maria hesitated no longer; with the recoil of the next wave, she threw herself forward and was carried floating a few yards, and dropped again on the treacherous sand.

      "Don't move, but keep your grip on the riata!"

      The next wave would have carried her back, but she began to comprehend, and, assisted by the yielding sand, held her own and her breath until the under-tow sucked her a few yards seaward; the sand was firmer now; she floated a few yards farther, when her arm was seized; she was conscious of being impelled swiftly through the water, of being dragged out of the surge, of all her back hair coming down, that she had left her boots behind her in the quicksand, that her rescuer was a stranger, and a young man—and then she fainted.

      When she opened her brown eyes again she was lying on the dry sand beyond the Point, and the young man was on the beach below her, holding both the horses—his own and Tita!

      "I took the opportunity of getting your horse out. Relieved of your weight, and loosened by the tide, he got his foot over the riata, and Charley and I pulled him out. If I am not mistaken, this is Mrs. Sepulvida?"

      Donna Maria assented in surprise.

      "And I imagine this is your man coming to look for you." He pointed to Concho, who was slowly making his way among the sand dunes towards the Point. "Let me assist you on your horse again. He need not know—nobody need know—the extent of your disaster."

      Donna Maria, still bewildered, permitted herself to be assisted to her saddle again, despite the consequent terrible revelation of her shoeless feet. Then she became conscious that she had not thanked her deliverer, and proceeded to do so with such embarrassment that the stranger's laughing interruption was a positive relief.

      "You would thank me better if you were to set off in a swinging gallop over those sun-baked, oven-like sand-hills, and so stave off a chill! For the rest, I am Mr. Poinsett, one of your late husband's legal advisers, here on business that will most likely bring us together—I trust much more pleasantly to you than this. Good morning!"

      He had already mounted his horse, and was lifting his hat. Donna Maria was not a very clever woman, but she was bright enough to see that his business brusquerie was either the concealment of a man shy of women, or the impertinence of one too familiar with them. In either case it was to be resented.

      How did she do it? Ah me! She took the most favourable hypothesis. She pouted, I regret to say. Then she said—

      "It was all your fault!"

      "How?"

      "Why, if you hadn't stood there, looking at me and criticising, I shouldn't have tried to go round."

      With this Parthian arrow she dashed off, leaving her rescuer halting between a bow and a smile.

      CHAPTER IV. FATHER FELIPE.

      When Arthur Poinsett, after an hour's rapid riding over the scorching sand-hills, finally drew up at the door of the Mission Refectory, he had so far profited by his own advice to Donna Maria as to be quite dry, and to exhibit very little external trace of his late adventure. It is more remarkable perhaps that there was very little internal evidence either. No one who did not know the peculiar self-sufficiency of Poinsett's individuality would be able to understand the singular mental and moral adjustment of a man keenly alive to all new and present impressions, and yet able to dismiss them entirely, without a sense of responsibility or inconsistency. That Poinsett thought twice of the woman he had rescued—that he ever reflected again on the possibilities or natural logic of his act—during his ride, no one who thoroughly knew him would believe. When he first saw Mrs. Sepulvida at the Point of Pines, he was considering the possible evils or advantages of a change in the conservative element of San Antonio; when he left her, he returned to the subject again, and it fully occupied his thoughts until Father Felipe stood before him in the door of the refectory. I do not mean to say that he at all ignored a certain sense of self-gratulation in the act, but I wish to convey the idea that all other considerations were subordinate to this sense. And possibly also the feeling, unexpressed, however, by any look or manner, that if he was satisfied, everybody else ought to be.

      If Donna Maria had thought his general address a little too irreverent, she would have been surprised at his greeting with Father Felipe. His whole manner was changed to one of courteous and even reverential consideration, of a boyish faith and trustfulness, of perfect confidence and self-forgetfulness, and moreover was perfectly sincere. She would have been more surprised to have noted that the object of Arthur's earnestness was an old man, and that beyond a certain gentle and courteous manner and refined bearing, he was unpicturesque and odd-fashioned in dress, snuffy in the sleeves, and possessed and inhabited a pair of shoes so large, shapeless, and inconsistent with the usual requirements of that article as to be grotesque.

      It was evident that Arthur's manner had previously predisposed the old man in his favour. He held out two soft brown hands to the young man, addressed him with a pleasant smile as "My son," and welcomed him to the Mission.

      "And why not this visit before?" asked Father Felipe, when they were seated upon the little verandah that overlooked the Mission garden, before their chocolate and cigaritos.

      "I did not know I was coming until the day before yesterday. It seems that some new grants of the old ex-Governor's have been discovered, and that a patent is to be applied for. My partners being busy, I was deputed to come here and look up the matter. To tell the truth, I was glad of an excuse to see our fair client, or, at least, be disappointed, as my partners have been, in obtaining a glimpse of the mysterious Donna Dolores."

      "Ah, my dear Don Arturo," said the Padre, with a slightly deprecatory movement of his brown hands, "I fear you will be no more fortunate than others. It is a penitential week with the poor child, and at such times she refuses to see any one, even on business. Believe me, my dear boy, you, like the others—more than the others—permit your imagination to run away with your judgment. Donna Dolores' concealment of her face is not to heighten or tempt the masculine curiosity, but alas!—poor child—is only to hide the heathenish tattooings that deface her cheek. You know she is a half-breed. Believe me, you are all wrong. It is foolish, perhaps—vanity—who knows? but she is a woman—what would you?" continued the sagacious Padre, emphasising the substantive with a slight shrug worthy of his patron saint.

      "But they say, for all that, she is very beautiful," continued Arthur, with that mischievousness which was his habitual method of entertaining the earnestness of others, and which he could not entirely forego, even with the Padre.

      "So! so! Don Arturo—it is idle gossip!" said Father Felipe, impatiently,—"a brown Indian girl with a cheek as tawny as the summer fields."

      Arthur made a grimace that might have been either of assent or deprecation.

      "Well, I suppose this means that I am to look over the papers with you alone. Bueno! Have them out, and let us get over this business as soon as possible."

      "Poco tiempo," said Father