I took out my scarf-pin. Her face flushed with pleasure, as it would have flushed for no sum of money. She might have waived away a present for herself, but she could not resist one for the novio, and I was thanked far beyond the gift's merit.
If she went to bed happy, so did I, for I believed that Monica would have my letter in the morning; and if the wistfulness in her eyes meant some new trouble in which I had a part, I hoped that the words I had written might banish it.
XXIV
The Goodwill of Mariquita
Nevertheless I could not sleep on my hard but clean pillows, for wondering about that look of Monica's, and its meaning; and whenever I shut my eyes, hordes of red and yellow figures poured out of white houses upon white roads, forming irritating, kaleidoscopic patterns on my tired retina.
Each hour that passed was cried by the watchman, far away, and then close under my window; a fearsome cry like a groan of agony uttered by a madman in a dying spasm.
I was glad when morning came; and after such a bath as two or three miniature jugs of water afforded (the deer-eyed boy wondered in the name of all the saints what I could do with so many), I threw off the brain-clouds of a sleepless night.
Before long Monica would have my letter. She would know—if she could have doubted—that if I had loved her at first, I worshipped her now. She would know why we had not followed more closely yesterday; and why—unless Carmona chose to accept our help again—we would go on before the grey car to-day. She would know also that my most earnest hope was to take her away, out of the reach of harm.