She walked hurriedly up and down the room, flinging her arms about, so overcome that any thing like connected thought was impossible.
"He must not see me—I would rather be hurled over the precipice! He must not stay here. Oh! mercy—mercy! if Philip should come home!"
She cast one more feverish glance through the window and hurried out of the room, nerved to action by the near approach of pain and danger. But directly she came back again, looking wild and frightened, like a bird coming back to the branch where it has been wounded. She took up the glass again, steadied it firmly. She was evidently doubtful still if she had seen aright.
[CHAPTER II.]
A FACE FROM THE PAST.
The party of strangers were slowly winding their way across the plain, and had arrived within a short distance of the house. The woman gazed on them through her glass till the man supported on his mule became quite visible to the naked eye; she then dropped her hand heavily, and drew a deep breath.
"How white he is! There has been violence. He has fainted. See how his head falls on the guide's shoulder," she murmured, sweeping a hand across her eyes as if some dimness had come over them.
The lady was quite alone in her dwelling. The Indian women who acted as the household servants had gone to the hills in search of berries, and thus she was compelled to descend and open the door, when a summons was made by the party whose approach had given her so much anxiety. At another time, knowing, as she did, the lawless nature of the population around, she would have allowed the besiegers to knock unanswered, and go away at their leisure; but now she descended the stairs, trembling violently as she went. She had thrown a black silk scarf over her head, thus giving her dress a Spanish effect, and, unclosing the door, stood framed in the opening—and a more remarkable picture was never presented in the wilderness of any country. It was not that the woman was so beautiful, in fact, but the color of her hair and the wild anxiety in her eyes gave that to her person which no artist could ever have caught. The guide, who had come in advance of his party, stepped back in amazement as she presented herself, for it was seldom that the people of the region had obtained a glimpse of her person, and her presence took him by surprise.