"I thank you, Hermosa," said the young man, rising, "I hope soon to prove myself worthy of the name of brother. Come tomorrow, in the afternoon, to my mother's rancho (farmhouse); I shall be there, and most likely able to clear up certain matters which are so obscure today."
"What do you mean?" cried she, in great agitation.
"Nothing at present, dear child; leave me to take my own measures."
"What are your projects? What do you intend to do? Oh, do not attach more importance to my words than I attach to them myself. Involuntarily I have been constrained to utter words from which you would be wrong to draw conclusions—"
"Be calm, Hermosa," said he, interrupting her, with a smile. "I have drawn no conclusion derogatory to you from our conversation. I understand that you have avowed an immense amount of gratitude to the man who saved your life. I see it would make you happy to know that this man is not unworthy of the feelings he has inspired. I draw no other conclusion."
"It is exactly what I feel, Estevan; and I think the wish natural, and one to which no blame can be attached."
"Certainly, my dear child. I do not blame the feeling in the least; only, as I am a man, and can do many things interdicted to a woman, I will try if I can lift the mysterious, veil which conceals the life of your liberator, so as to tell you positively whether he is or is not worthy of the interest you take in him."
"Do that, Estevan, and I will thank you from the bottom of my heart."
The young man only replied by a smile to this passionate outbreak: he saluted Hermosa, and retired.
As soon as he was gone, she hid her face in her hands and burst into tears. Did she regret the confidence into which she had been led, or was she afraid of herself? Only women can decide the question, and only Spanish-American women, who are so impressionable, and through whose veins rushes the lava of their native volcanoes.