"O-h-h-h, y-e-e-s." When Aunt Anastacia was preoccupied or excited, these words came from her with a prolonged outgoing and indrawing.
"I must ask her for the recipe for those cakes—the lard ones,
Anastacia. I have lost it."
"O-h-h, y-e-e-s. I love those cakes. Madre de Dios! It is hot!"
"I wonder will she give Eulogia a mantilla when the chit marries. She has a chest full."
"Surely. Jacoba is generous."
"Poor my friend! Ay, her heart—Holy Mary! What is that?"
She and Aunt Anastacia stumbled to their feet. The sound of pistol shots was echoing between the hills. Smoke was rising from the willow forest that covered the centre of the valley.
The Indian whipped up his horses with an excited grunt, the two old women reeling and clutching wildly at each other. At the same time they noticed a crowd of horsemen galloping along the hill which a sudden turn in the road had opened to view.
"It is the Vigilantes," said Eulogia, calmly, from the front seat. "They are after John Power and Pio Lenares and their lieutenants. After that awful murder in the mountains the other day, the men of San Luis and the ranchos swore they would hunt them out, and this morning they traced them to Los Quervos. I suppose they have made a barricade in the willows, and the Vigilantes are trying to fire them out."
"Heart of Saint Peter! Thou little brat! Why didst thou not tell us of this before, and not let us come here to be shot by flying bullets?"