“Padre dear,” she said, looking up at him with twinkling eyes, “I heard Lázaro say a little while before we started that he had lived many years in Simití, and that it had always been very quiet until you came.”
“Ay de mí!” sighed Josè. “I can readily believe that the whole world was quiet until I entered it.”
“But, Padre, perhaps you had to come into it to shake it up.”
He laughed. “Chiquita,” he said, “if ever you go out into it, with your radical views regarding God and man; and if the stupid old world will give ear to you, there will be such a shaking up as it has never experienced since––”
“Padre dear,” she interrupted, “I am not going out into the world. I shall stay in Simití––with you.”
He looked down at her, tenderly, wistfully. And then, while her words still echoed through his mind, a great sigh escaped him.
Dusk had closed in upon them when the canoe emerged into the quiet lake. Huge vampire bats, like demons incarnate, flouted their faces as they paddled swiftly toward the distant town. Soft evening calls drifted across the placid waters from the slumbering jungle. Carmen’s rich voice mingled with them; and Juan and Lázaro, catching the inspiration, broke into a weird, uncanny boating song, such as is heard only among these simple folk. As they neared the town the song of the bogas changed into a series of loud, yodelling halloos; and when the canoe grated upon the shaly beach, Doña Maria and a score of others were there to welcome the returned travelers.
At the sight of Ana, a murmur ran through the crowd. Doña Maria turned to the woman.
“It is Anita, madre dear,” Carmen quickly announced, as she struggled out of Doña Maria’s arms and took the confused Ana by the hand.
The light of recognition came into Doña Maria’s eyes. Quietly, and without demonstration, she went to the shrinking woman and, taking the tear-stained face in her hands, impressed a kiss upon each cheek. “Bien,” she said in a low, tender voice, “we have waited long for you, daughter. And now let us go home.”