CHAPTER XXVIII
Which Treats of the Strange and Delightful Adventures That Befell the Curate and the Barber in the Same Sierra
WHEN Cardenio and the curate and the barber looked about they discovered a youth with exquisite, delicate features bathing his feet in the brook below them. His garb was that of a peasant lad; on his head he had a montera. Having finished bathing, he took from under the montera a cloth with which he dried his feet. In removing the cap there fell from under it a mass of auburn hair, and all were amazed to find that instead of a youth, it was a most lovely maiden. In their astonishment either the curate or the barber uttered a cry; and frightened at the sight of them, the girl took to flight, but soon stumbled and fell.
The curate was the first one to reach her. He spoke some kind words and told her that they were there to help her, to fulfill any wish she might express. And he begged her to cast away any pretence, for he was certain that she was there because of some misery that had befallen her.
At first the maiden seemed bewildered, but after a while she showed that the curate had gained her confidence, and she spoke to him in a beautiful, melancholy voice. She seated herself on a stone, while the three gathered around her, and confided to them with tears in her eyes the reasons for her being there. She told them of a certain grandee of Spain, living in Andalusia, of whom her father, lowly in birth but rich in fortune, was a vassal. This grandee had two sons. She had been betrothed to the younger one of these, Don Fernando, and he had jilted her in favor of a lady of noble birth, whose name was Luscinda.
When Cardenio heard his own lady's name, he bit his lips and tears came to his eyes. Dorothea—for that was the maiden's name—wondered at such interest and such emotion, but she continued her story. She told of how, upon Don Fernando's marriage to lady Luscinda, she had fled in despair from house and home. A herdsman in the heart of the Sierra had given her employment as a servant; but when he had discovered that she was a woman, she was forced to leave. While she was bemoaning her evil fate, and praying to God in the woods, she had cut her feet on the stones; and she was bathing them in the brook when she encountered the present gathering.