She was but a child, now, in her terror, and Gard reassured her.
“He’ll never know,” he said. “No one will ever know. You go back, now, like a good girl. And remember: you must never do a silly thing like this again. Will you promise me?”
She lifted a pale face toward his, in the starlight. Her eyes were luminous, now, with new, strange emotion.
“Señor,” she whispered, “it is the heart of a caballero. Señor—you are good.”
“You will promise?” Gard persisted.
Again that summoning voice rang across the desert. The girl called in Spanish that she was coming.
“I promise,” she cried, with a sobbing catch of the breath. “Buenos noches, Señor.”
She caught Gard’s hand again, for an instant, resting her cheek against it, the fraction of a second.
“Buenos noches,” she whispered again, and sped away into the soft, starry gloom.