"Not here; to the arroyo;" and half leading, half dragging him, made her way through a copse of manzanita and alder until they heard the faint tinkling of water. "Dost thou remember," said the girl, "it was here," pointing to an embayed pool in the dark current, "that I baptized thee, when Father Pedro first brought thee here, when we both played at being monks? They were dear old days, for Father Pedro would trust no one with thee but me, and always kept us near him."
"Aye, and he said I would be profaned by the touch of any other, and so himself always washed and dressed me, and made my bed near his."
"And took thee away again, and I saw thee not till thou camest with Antonio, over a year ago, to the cattle branding. And now, my Pancho, I may never see thee again." She buried her face in her hands and sobbed aloud.
The little acolyte tried to comfort her, but with such abstraction of manner and inadequacy of warmth that she hastily removed his caressing hand.
"But why? What has happened?" he asked eagerly.
The girl's manner had changed. Her eyes flashed, and she put her brown fist on her waist and began to rock from side to side.
"But I'll not go," she said, viciously.
"Go where?" asked the boy.
"Oh, where?" she echoed, impatiently. "Hear me, Francisco. Thou knowest I am, like thee, an orphan; but I have not, like thee, a parent in the Holy Church. For, alas," she added, bitterly, "I am not a boy, and have not a lovely voice borrowed from the angels. I was, like thee, a foundling, kept, by the charity of the reverend fathers, until Don Juan, a childless widower, adopted me. I was happy, not knowing and caring who were the parents who had abandoned me, happy only in the love of him who became my adopted father. And now"—She paused.
"And now?" echoed Francisco, eagerly.