Part 12 (1/2)
She fell back a step in utter helplessness.
He, on his side, retreated again into the wheat, holding it back with extended arms to let her pa.s.s. As she moved forward mechanically, without a word he moved backward, making a path for her until she was able to discern the coachman's whip above the bending heads of the grain just beyond her. He stopped here and drew to one side, his arms still extended, to give her free pa.s.sage. She tried to speak, but could only bow her head, and slipped by him with a strange feeling--suggested by his att.i.tude--that she was evading his embrace.
But the next moment his arms were lowered, the grain closed around him, and he was lost to her view. She reached the carriage almost unperceived by the inmates, and pounced upon her sister with a laugh.
”Blessed Virgin!” said Amita, ”where did you come from?”
”From there!” said Maruja, with a slight nervous s.h.i.+ver, pointing to the cl.u.s.tering grain.
”We were afraid you were lost.”
”So was I,” said Maruja, raising her pretty lashes heavenwards, as she drew a shawl tightly round her shoulders.
”Has anything happened. You look strange,” said Carroll, drawing closer to her.
Here eyes were sparkling, but she was very pale.
”Nothing, nothing!” she said, hastily, glancing at the grain again.
”If it were not that the haste would have been absolutely indecent, I should say that the late Doctor had made you a ghostly visit,” said Raymond, looking at her curiously.
”He would have been polite enough not to have commented on my looks,”
said Maruja. ”Am I really such a fright?”
Carroll thought he had never seen her so beautiful. Her eyelids were quivering over their fires as if they had been brushed by the pa.s.sing wing of a strong pa.s.sion.
”What are you thinking of?” said Carroll, as they drove on.
She was thinking that the stranger had looked at her admiringly, and that his eyes were blue. But she looked quietly into her lover's face, and said, sweetly, ”Nothing, I fear, that would interest you!”
CHAPTER IX
The news of the a.s.signment of Dr. West's property to Mrs. Saltonstall was followed by the still more astonis.h.i.+ng discovery that the Doctor's will further bequeathed to her his entire property, after payment of his debts and liabilities. It was given in recognition of her talents and business integrity during their late a.s.sociation, and as an evidence of the confidence and ”undying affection” of the testator.
Nevertheless, after the first surprise, the fact was accepted by the community as both natural and proper under that singular instinct of humanity which acquiesces without scruple in the union of two large fortunes, but sharply questions the conjunction of poverty and affluence, and looks only for interested motives where there is disparity of wealth. Had Mrs. Saltonstall been a poor widow instead of a rich one; had she been the Doctor's housekeeper instead of his business friend, the bequest would have been strongly criticised--if not legally tested. But this combination, which placed the entire valley of San Antonio in the control of a single individual, appeared to be perfectly legitimate. More than that, some vague rumor of the Doctor's past and his early entanglements only seemed to make this eminently practical disposition of his property the more respectable, and condoned for any moral irregularities of his youth.
The effect upon the collateral branches of the Guitierrez family and the servants and retainers was even more impressive. For once, it seemed that the fortunes and traditions of the family were changed; the female Guitierrez, instead of impoveris.h.i.+ng the property, had augmented it; the foreigner and intruder had been despoiled; the fate of La Mision Perdida had been changed; the curse of Koorotora had proved a blessing; his prophet and descendant, Pereo, the mayordomo, moved in an atmosphere of superst.i.tious adulation and respect among the domestics and common people. This recognition of his power he received at times with a certain exaltation of grandiloquent pride beyond the conception of any but a Spanish servant, and at times with a certain dull, pained vacancy of perception and an expression of frightened bewilderment which also went far to establish his reputation as an unconscious seer and thaumaturgist. ”Thou seest,” said Sanchez to the partly skeptical Faquita, ”he does not know more than an infant what is his power. That is the proof of it.” The Dona Maria alone did not partic.i.p.ate in this appreciation of Pereo, and when it was proposed that a feast or celebration of rejoicing should be given under the old pear-tree by the Indian's mound, her indignation was long remembered by those that witnessed it. ”It is not enough that we have been made ridiculous in the past,” she said to Maruja, ”by the interference of this solemn fool, but that the memory of our friend is to be insulted by his generosity being made into a triumph of Pereo's idiotic ancestor. One would have thought those coyotes and Koorotora's bones had been buried with the cruel gossip of your relations”--(it had been the recent habit of Dona Maria to allude to ”the family” as being particularly related to Maruja alone)--”over my poor friend. Let him beware that his ancestor's mound is not uprooted with the pear-tree, and his heathenish temple destroyed. If, as the engineer says, a branch of the new railroad can be established for La Mision Perdida, I agree with him that it can better pa.s.s at that point with less sacrifice to the domain. It is the one uncultivated part of the park, and lies at the proper angle.”
”You surely would not consent to this, my mother?” said Maruja, with a sudden impression of a newly found force in her mother's character.
”Why not, child?” said the relict of Mr. Saltonstall and the mourner of Dr. West, coldly. ”I admit it was discreet of thee in old times to have thy sentimental pa.s.sages there with caballeros who, like the guests of the hidalgo that kept a skeleton at his feast, were reminded of the mutability of their hopes by Koorotora's bones and the legend.
But with the explosion of this idea of a primal curse, like Eve's, on the property,” added the Dona Maria, with a slight bitterness, ”thou mayest have thy citas--elsewhere. Thou canst scarcely keep this Captain Carroll any longer at a distance by rattling those bones of Koorotora in his face. And of a truth, child, since the affair of the letters, and his discreet and honorable conduct since, I see not why thou shouldst. He has thy mother's reputation in his hands.”
”He is a gentleman, my mother,” said Maruja, quietly.
”And they are scarce, child, and should be rewarded and preserved. That is what I meant, silly one; this Captain is not rich--but then, thou hast enough for both.”
”But it was Amita that first brought him here,” said Maruja, looking down with an air of embarra.s.sed thoughtfulness, which Dona Maria chose to instantly accept as exaggerated coyness.
”Do not think to deceive me or thyself, child, with this folly. Thou art old enough to know a man's mind, if not thine own. Besides, I do not know that I shall object to her liking for Raymond. He is very clever, and would be a relief to some of thy relatives. He would be invaluable to us in the emergencies that may grow out of these mechanical affairs that I do not understand--such as the mill and the railroad.”
”And you propose to take a few husbands as partners in the business?”
said Maruja, who had recovered her spirits. ”I warn you that Captain Carroll is as stupid as a gentleman could be. I wonder that he has not blundered in other things as badly as he has in preferring me to Amita.