Before José could say more she rose with fierce suddenness, and passed him and was gone again.
The poor fellow looked after her small swift form mournfully.
“If she had wanted him,” he said, “he would have made her a good husband, and we should have been brothers. But she is not easy to please, and she would not give one a chance who did not please her at first. And there is no one who slays a bull as he does!”
Pepita flew like a bird until she reached the low wall where the jasmine grew, at the spot where she had stood the night before. There she stopped, panting. The breath of the jasmine filled all the air about her. She looked up the white road.
A strange new passion filled her. She did not know whether it was anger or not, but if it was anger it was of a new kind, with more pain in it than she was used to. He would not come again—not at all again! He would not appear at her side as if he had sprung from the earth; he would not follow her or plead with her, or look at her every moment he was near her; he would not try to make her speak. Only last night he was here in this very spot, and now he would never speak like that again. He would forget her, not care for her—forget her, Pepita.
She would not believe it. She knew he could not—they never did; they always loved her best and wanted no one else. And still the labored throbbing went on in her side and she panted for breath.
“Come back,” she cried, looking up the white road. “I tell you to come back. You shall. Do you hear? I tell you—I—Pepita!”
But there was no answer, no sound of any footstep, no sign of any advancing shadow. The road stretched out its white length in utter solitude, and a strange, wild look came into her beautiful little face.
“Do you not hear?” she persisted. “I will not speak to you if you do come; I will give you nothing; I will not look at you; but you shall come because I will it—because I am Pepita.”
Still there was only silence and loneliness. Suddenly she flung out her hands and stamped her foot.