“Listen, mi madre, and may the Holy Lady make you believe me! I have had a dream. God be blessed that it is not yet true! I will tell you. It was about Fray Ignatius and our uncle the Marquis de Gonzaga. My good angel gave it to me; for myself and you all she gave it; and, as my blessed Lord lives! I will not go to them! SI! I will cut my white throat first!” and she drew her small hand with a passionate gesture across it. She had stood up as she began to speak, and the action, added to her unmistakable terror, her stricken face and air of determination, was very impressive.
“You have had a dream, my darling?”
“Yes, an awful dream, Antonia! Mary! Mary! Tender Mary, pity us!”
“And you think we should not go to the house of the marquis?”
“Oh, Antonia! I have seen the way. It is black and cold, and full of fear and pain. No one shall make me take it. I have the stiletto of my grandmother Flores. I will ask Holy Mary to pardon me, and then—in a moment—I would be among the people of the other world. That would be far better than Fray Ignatius and the house of Gonzaga.”
The Senora was quite angry at this fresh complication. It was really incredible what she had to endure. And would Antonia please to tell her where else they were to go? They had not a friend left in San Antonio—they did not deserve to have one—and was it to be supposed that a lady, born noble, could follow the Americans in an ox-wagon? Antonia might think it preferable to the comfortable house of her relation; but blessed be the hand of God, which had opened the door of a respectable shelter to her.
“I will go in the ox-wagon,” said Isabel, with a sullen determination; “but I will not go into my uncle’s house. By the saint of my birth I swear it.”
“Mother, listen to Antonia. When one door shuts, God opens another door. Our own home is yet undisturbed. Do you believe what Fray Ignatius says of the coming of Santa Anna? I do not. Until he arrives we are safe in our own home; and when the hour for going away comes, even a little bird can show us the way to take. And I am certain that my father is planning for our safety. If Santa Anna was in this city, and behaving with the brutality which is natural to him, I would not go away until my father sent the order. Do you think he forgets us? Be not afraid of such a thing. It cannot take place.”
Towards dusk Senor Navarro called, and the Senora brought him into her private parlor and confided to him the strait they were in. He looked with sympathy into the troubled, tear-stained faces of these three helpless women, and listened with many expressive gestures to the proposal of the priest and the offer of the old marquis.
“Most excellent ladies,” he answered; “it is a plot. I assure you that it is a plot. Certainly it was not without reason I was so unhappy about you this afternoon. Even while I was at the bull-fight, I think our angels were in a consultation about your affairs. Your name was in my ears above all other sounds.”