III.
THE BALCONY.
Ahah threw herself in the hammock on the balcony that her apartment opened on. She was shaken with rage, but the more violent the passion the sooner does it consume itself. Destruction would have descended on the head of Hagoth, if it had appeared at that moment; as it was her anger had just three hours to cool.
The stars hung low in the tropic heavens; a nearby field was illumined by the phosphorescent glow of flitting fireflies; below a tree burst into a galaxy of white stars.
As she clenched her small hands until the nails cut the palms, Ahah was not in a mood to contemplate scenery.
"Flirting with a Lamanite frump, indeed! How do I know that Hagoth has not a dozen Indian loves among his own people?" Hitherto Ahah had been so engrossed by her condescension in loving a mere Lamanite, that the possibility of anyone else loving him had never occurred to her. That Hagoth had been whole souled in his devotion to her she admitted. Nothing wins a woman quite so quick as the knowledge that a man has staked his all on her. Else why had she stooped to love him?
Slowly she lived over their acquaintance; all the details were graven on her brain. It had been romantic from the start. The horses of the Lamanite king were running away, dragging the broken chariot behind them. The driver had been hurled out in turning the corner and Tubaloth himself was reeling, when the careening animals were stopped by the impact of a lithe body hurled full at their heads. The catapult was Hagoth who thereafter was knighted and received the order of the tiger, a distinction he valued less than the murmured thanks of a mother who caught up her little brown baby that had been playing in the road directly in the way of the runaway. Since then Ahah's every meeting with Hagoth had tightened the grip on her heart. Yet the thing that made her angriest of all was that she should care so much.
HALL OF THE MONOLITHS, MITLA
PALACE RUINS AT MITLA
When a plumed crest of sable hue loomed up above the passion flower of the balcony she started up as if she had not been looking long for that apparition.
As Hagoth swung himself easily in front of her she faced him with the accusation, "You are late."
"I have been watching the lights below for hours. I thought you were there with Seantum."
"Did he stay so long with mother? I left them hours ago—to wait here alone, while you, forsooth, amused yourself with an Indian girl—Ugh."
"Ahah!"
"I tell you, you were seen walking in the woods with her, whispering to her, carrying her basket, and they said she was pretty," she finished with a wail.
"It is a mistake. I—"
"A mistake! Look at me," she cried fiercely, "You, a Lamanite, an associate of laboring wenches, have made me weep. I, Ahah, who do not shed tears once in five years have wept this night over you." She laughed bitterly.
"But the girl gave me some information from a relative of hers."
"What could I expect, I who without reason, against the warnings of my friends, the opposition of my relatives, have squandered my attention on you."
"Ahah you possess the best part of my life, but if I am bringing you such unhappiness—"
That brought her to terms. Her face shone with transcendent light.
"See, Hagoth," she breathed earnestly, "Beautiful as this is, I lie awake nights worrying where it will end. I am too much of a coward to flee with you for I fear to fail in the new life. You must raise yourself to my station. You have youth, strength, brains and my faith in you."
"And if I win out."
"I will marry you."
"I accept the challenge. In forty days I shall return to claim my own."
Ahah looked startled. "How do you propose to do it?"
"Because of what you have promised me this night, I shall confide to you my secret, though the success of the venture itself depends on silence. At dawn I take command of a party of Lamanites that goes into the mountains to destroy the Gadiantons."
"Oh"—Ahah reeled and she felt the world slipping from under her, such terror did the name of the dread robbers inspire.
"If I win, any favor within the gift of Tubaloth, king of the Lamanites, is mine."
"If you should fail?"
"I fail! You will admit I shall have a splendid tomb, the snow clad summit of Mt. Misti."
Ahah with a moan threw up her arms to shut out the torturous vision for the Gadiantons not only murdered but mangled their victims.
He came closer; his eyes blazed with triumph; his voice was tense with suppressed emotion. "Remember in forty days you are mine," and he was gone.
Ahah threw herself against the post. "You shall not go. I tell you I won't let you," she screamed. In her desperation she almost hurled herself over the balcony, but no answer came. Hagoth had vanished into the night whence he had come. Overwhelmed with remorse for driving him on: steeped in her own misery, she lay where she had fallen until the mocking birds began to sing and the day emerged from the night like Venus, new born, from the sea.
Rising, she dashed the crumpled bell of the passion flower under her feet and entering her apartment she threw herself upon the bed.
When Abish stole softly up to tell her young mistress that the bath water was ready she found her buried among the cushions with all her clothes on, breathing heavily. Throwing a silken shawl over her, she turned and tiptoed out.