But to go on foot! Kate could hear all her criada’s feelings in the drawled, sardonic Adiosn! But the man behind strode bravely and called cheerfully. His pistol was prominent in his belt.
A bluff of yellow rock came jutting at the road. The road wound round it, and into a piece of flat open country. There were fields of dry stone, and hedges of dusty thorn and cactus. To the left the bright green of the willows by the lake-shore. To the right the hills swerved inland, to meet the sheer, fluted sides of dry mountains. Away ahead, the hills curved back at the shore, and a queer little crack or niche showed. This crack in the hills led from Don Ramón’s shore-property to the little valley where he grew the sugar cane. And where the hills approached the lake again, there was a dark clustering of mango trees, and the red upper-storey of the hacienda house.
“There it is!” cried the man behind. “Jamiltepec, Señorita. La hacienda de Don Ramón!”
And his eyes shone as he said the name. He was a proud peon, and he really seemed happy.
“Look! How far!” cried Juana.
“Another time,” said Kate, “I shall come alone, or with Ezequiel.”
“No, Niña! Don’t say so. Only my foot hurts this morning.”
“Yes. Better not to bring you.”
“No, Niña! I like to come, very much!”
The tall windmill fan for drawing up water from the lake was spinning gaily. A little valley came down from the niche in the hills, and at the bottom a little water running. Towards the lake, where this valley flattened out, was a grove of banana plants, screened a little from the lake breeze by a vivid row of willow-trees. And on the top of the slope, where the road ran into the shade of mango trees, were the two rows of adobe huts, like a village, set a little back from the road.