Chapter Twenty Six.
The Play of Eyes.
The ceremony of laying the foundation-stone had been brief and it was yet only an early hour of the afternoon when the procession passed back along the Callé de Plateros. The scavengers were still at work, and it is scarcely necessary to say that two of their number were earnestly on the lookout for a certain carriage. Sorry plight as they were in, neither felt ashamed or reluctant to come again under those eyes, after the expression they had observed in them. Rivas had hopes that in another exchange of glances with the Condesa, he might see something still further to instruct him; while Kearney, not so confident about his interpretation of those given to himself, longed to have a second reading of them.
Nor was he disappointed. The procession returned sooner than they expected, the looked-for carriage still holding its place in the line; the ladies in it, but now no officer of Hussars, nor any other, riding alongside. Santander, an aide-de-camp as known, had likely been ordered off on some official errand, and likely, too, his chief did not relish seeing him so near that particular equipage. Whatever the cause, his absence gave gratification to the two men noting it. With less constraint glances might now be exchanged—even gestures.
And both were. The look Kearney had given to him was accompanied by a nod of recognition; slight and timid, for it could not well be otherwise under the circumstances. But the eyes spoke more eloquently, telling him of respect undiminished, faith that had never faltered, love strong and true as ever. If he read pity in them too, it was not such as he would now spurn.
To Rivas were accorded signs of a very different sort. He had them not only from eyes, but the movement of a fan and fingers. They seemed satisfactory to him; for as the carriage passed out of sight, he turned to the other and said in a cheerful whisper:
“Keep up heart, camarado! I perceive you’re not unknown to a friend of my friend. You heard the brute of a gaol-governor taunt me about a certain Condesa?”
“I did.”
“Well; that’s the lady, alongside her who’s just been making eyes at you. An old acquaintance of yours, I see; and I think I could say where it was commenced. Never mind about that now. Enough for you to know that if friendship can get us out of this fix, with gold to back it, we may yet have a chance of giving leg-bail to the turnkeys of the Acordada.”
Their dialogue was terminated by Dominguez, who, temporarily absent for a swill at one of the neighbouring pulquerias, now returned to the superintendence of his charge, and roughly commanded them to resume their work.
For nearly another hour the work went on, though not so regularly as before. The stream of returning sightseers still lined the foot-walks, many of them showing by their behaviour they had been paying a visit to pulquerias too, and more than once. Some stopped to fraternise with the soldiers, and would have done likewise with the forzados, if permitted. They were not hindered, however, from holding converse with the former, and extending hospitality to them in the shape of treats; sentry after sentry stealing away from his post after the proffered and coveted toothful. Nor was Dominguez an exception, he too every now and then repeating his visit to the dram-shop.
All this gave the scavengers licence of speech, with some liberty of action, or rather rest from their disagreeable task. And in the interval, while they were thus idling, the young Irishman noticed that the eyes of his chain companion were kept continuously on the foot-walks, now on one side now the other, his face towards the Plaza Grande—as though he expected to see some one coming that way. Kearney himself was regarding the people who came along—but only from curiosity—when his attention was more particularly drawn to one who had come to a stop on the sidewalk nearly opposite. This was a girl of rather diminutive stature, dressed in the ordinary fashion of the common people, short-skirted petticoat, sleeveless camisa, arms, ankles, and feet bare; but the head, breast, and shoulders all under one covering—the reboso. Even her face was hidden by this, for she was wearing it “tapado,” one eye only visible, through a little loop in the folded scarf, which was kept open by the hand that held it. The girl had drawn up in front of a jeweller’s window, as though to feast that eye on the pretty things therein displayed. And thus Kearney would not have noticed her, any more than the others, many of them in like garb passing to and fro. But, just as his eye happened to light upon her, he saw that hers—literally a single one—was fixed upon him, regarding him in a way altogether different from that which might be expected on the part of a chance stranger. Her attitude, too, was odd. Though facing nearly square to the shop window, and pretending to look into it, her head was slightly turned, and the eye surely on him.
At first he was puzzled to make out what it could mean, and why the girl should be taking such an interest in him. Possibly, had she been wearing shoes and stockings, he might have come easier to the comprehension of it. But a little brown-skinned, barefooted muchacha, in a petticoat of common stuff, and cheap scarf over her shoulders, he could think of no reason why she should have aught to do with him.
Only for a few seconds, however, was he thus in the dark. Then all became clear, the éclaircissement giving him a start, and sending the blood in quick rush through his veins—pleasant withal. For the girl, seeing she had caught his attention, relaxed her clasp upon the scarf, partially exposing her face, and the other eye.
Kearney needed not seeing the whole of it for recognition now. Well remembered he those features—pretty in spite of the dark skin—he had often seen wreathed with pleasant smiles, as their owner used to open the door for him in the Casa de Calvo.