“After YOU—never-r-r.”
“I'll find Mrs. Demorest and send her to ye,” said Ezekiel, hesitatingly.
“Eh, to attract here the ghost? Thank you, no, very mooch.”
Ezekiel's face contracted until nothing but his bright peering gray eyes could be seen. “Attract the ghost!” he echoed. “Then you kalkilate that it's—” he stopped, insinuatingly.
Rosita brought her fan sharply over his knuckles, and immediately opened it again over her half-embarrassed face. “I comprehend not anything to 'ekalkilate.' WILL you go, Don Fantastico; or is it for me to bring to you?”
Ezekiel flew. He quickly found the chocolates and returned, but was disconcerted on arriving under the olive-tree to find Dona Rosita no longer in the hammock. He turned into a by-path, where an extraordinary circumstance attracted his attention. The air was perfectly still, but the leaves of a manzanita bush near the misshapen cactus were slightly agitated. Presently Ezekiel saw the stealthy figure of a man emerge from behind it and approach the cactus. Reaching his hand cautiously towards the plant, the stranger detached something from one of its thorns, and instantly disappeared. The quick eyes of Ezekiel had seen that it was a letter, his unerring perception of faces recognized at the same moment that the intruder was none other than the handsome, reckless-looking man he had seen the other day in conference with Mateo.
But Ezekiel was not the only witness of this strange intrusion. A few paces from him, Dona Rosita, unconscious of his return, was gazing in a half-frightened, breathless absorption in the direction of the stranger's flight.
“Wa'al!” drawled Ezekiel lazily.
She started and turned towards him. Her face was pale and alarmed, and yet to the critical eye of Ezekiel it seemed to wear an expression of gratified relief. She laughed faintly.
“Ef that's the kind o' ghost you hev about yer, it's a healthy one,” drawled Ezekiel. He turned and fixed his keen eyes on Rosita's face. “I wonder what kind o' fruit grows on the cactus that he's so fond of?”