The Tigrero surveyed her with moistened eye and panting chest. But suddenly the girl drew herself up; her memory returned, and with it that timid modesty innate in all women.
"Begone," she said, recoiling to the extremity of the room, "begone, caballero! How are you here? Who led you to my room? Answer I command you."
The Tigrero humbly bowed his head.
"God," he said, in an inarticulate voice, "God alone has conducted me to your side, señorita, as you yourself said. Oh, pardon me for having dared to surprise you thus! I have committed a great fault, I am aware; but a misfortune menaces you—I feel it, I guess it. You are alone, without support, and I have come to say to you, 'Madam, I am very low, very unworthy to serve you, but you have need of a firm and devoted heart. Here I am! Take my blood, take my life. I would be so happy to die for you!' In the name of Heaven, señora, in the name of what you love most on earth, do not reject my prayer. My arm, my heart, are yours: dispose of them."
These words were uttered by the young man in a choking voice, as he knelt in the middle of the room, his hands clasped, and fixing on Doña Anita his eyes, into which he had thrown his entire soul.
The hacendero's daughter turned her limpid glance on the young man, and, without removing her eyes, approached him with short steps, hesitating and trembling despite herself. When she arrived near him she remained for a moment undecided. At length she laid her two small, dainty hands on his shoulders, and placed her gentle face so near his, that the Tigrero felt on his forehead the freshness of her embalmed breath, while her long, black, and perfumed tresses gently caressed him.
"It is true, then," she said in a harmonious voice, "you love me then, Don Martial?"
"Oh!" the young man murmured, almost mad with love at this delicious contact.
The Mexican girl bent over him still more, and grazing with her rosy lips the Tigrero's moist brow,—
"Now," she said to him, starting back with the ravishing movement of a startled fawn, while her brow turned purple with the effort she had made to overcome her modesty, "now defend me, Don Martial; for in the presence of God, who sees us and judges us, I am your wife!"