I
“Buenas dias, señor!”
The girl’s liquid accents exactly fitted the dark, piquant, little face whence they had emerged. The slender grace of her slight form, the delicate arch of her instep, the shapely grace of her dainty ankle, all marked her as the child of a Mexican laborer, Margarita the Maid of Muchacho.
“Muchus gracious, seenora!”
Adam Larey’s Spanish was not that of the lower class of Mexicans, but it was the best he had. Adam Larey’s face flushed beneath its coat of tan and his breath came in short pants, for he was clothed in the innocence of eighteen summers. Though his lofty stature betokened budding manhood, Adam Larey had never before spoken to a woman other than his mother or an occasional sister.
Then, suddenly, Margarita launched herself upon him. Her slender twining form enveloped him like a wind of flame, like a lissom spectre. A strong shuddering shook his heart. His blood leaped, beat, burnt in his veins. He was gathered in her close embrace.
“Don’t! don’t!” he gasped. “You mustn’t! Someone will see——”
His words were stifled by those eager searching lips and—she kissed him.
It was over in a single, scorching, flaming moment. Exerting his enormous strength to the utmost, he tore himself from her twining arms, half ran, half stumbled up the rocky path to his cabin, flung himself upon his bed and burst into a blinding flood of tears.