"I ask nothing better. I will only take Violanta with me."
"As you please."
At a sign from her mistress the camarista went up to the peons, who were still motionless, and gave them orders not to leave the clearing under any pretext before her return. Then, guided by Valentine, the two females proceeded toward the camp of the filibusters, Curumilla forming the rear guard. On arriving about a hundred yards from it Valentine stopped.
"What is the matter?" Doña Angela asked him.
"I hesitate about troubling my friend's repose. Perhaps he will be angry with me for having brought you to him."
"No," she said, "you are deceiving me: that is not your thought at this moment."
He regarded her with amazement.
"Good heavens!" she continued with animation, "do you fancy I do not know what is troubling you now? It is to see a girl of my age, rich and well born, take what your countrymen would call an improper step, and which, were it known, would inevitably destroy her reputation. But we Americans are not like your cold and staid European women, who do everything by weight and measure. We love as we hate. It is not blood, but the lava of our volcanoes that circulates in our veins. My love is my life! I care naught for anything else. Remain here a few moments, and let me go on alone. Don Louis, I am convinced, will understand and appreciate my conduct at its just value. He is no common man, I tell you. I love him. In a love so true and ardent as mine there is a certain magnetic attraction which will prevent it being spurned."
The young Mexican was splendidly lovely as she uttered these words. With her head thrown haughtily back, her flashing eye and quivering lip, she was at once a virgin and a Bacchante. Subdued, in spite of himself, by the maiden's accent, and dazzled by her glorious beauty, the hunter bowed respectfully before her, and said, with considerable emotion in his voice,—
"Go, then; and may Heaven grant that, by your aid, my brother may be again led to take an interest in life!"