III
Although crushed in the rear and broken inwards there, the hut showed its ordinary face to the path as Mercedes reached it in the failing daylight. She ran like a madwoman, and with short, distraught cries, as she neared her home. Her eyes were wild as a hunted creature's, her coarse black hair streamed over her shoulders, her bare feet bled where the rocks and ice had cut them. But one thing she did not doubt—would not allow herself to doubt—that at home she would find her child. For two days she had been parted from him, and in those two days ... God had been good to her, very good: but she could not thank God yet—not until she clutched Sebastianillo in her arms, held his small, wriggling body, felt his feet kick against her breast....
The great sty beside the cabin was empty, of course: and the cabin itself looked strange to her and desolate and unfriendly. For some hours the snow had ceased falling, and, save in a snowstorm or a gale, it was not the family custom to close door or window before dark: indeed, the window-hole usually stood open night and day the year round. Now both were closed. But warm firelight showed under the chink of the door; and on the door she bowed her head, to take breath, and beat with her hands while she called urgently—
"Mother! Quickly, mother—open to me for the love of God!"
No answer came from within.
"Mother! Father! Open to me—it is I, Mercedes!"
Then, after listening a moment, she began to beat again, frantically, for at length she was afraid.
"Quick! Quick! Ah, do not be playing a trick on me: I want my child—Sebastianillo!"
Again and again she called and beat. No answer came from the hut or from the sombre twilight around her. She drew back, to fling her full weight against the door. And at this moment she heard, some way down the path, a man's footstep crunching the snow.
She never doubted that this must be her father returning up the mountain-side, perhaps after a search for her. What other man—now that her husband had gone soldiering—ever trod this path? She ran down to meet him.