The music had grown plainer, and she recognized an air she had heard when she sat with Grahame in the patio of the International. The contrast was too great, and brought her poignant memories. She was no longer a person of consequence, indulged in every wish, but a homeless fugitive. Then she thought of Grahame, who had translated the song they were singing, for the plaintive refrain of Las Aves Marinas carried clearly through the cooling air. Had the wild sea-hawk got her message, and was he already coming to her rescue? But even this was not of first consequence. What about the peon? Had he betrayed her?
Everything was silent upon the hillside, but a faint breeze was getting up and sighed among the stones. There was a splash of water in the distance, but no sound came from the road. It ran back, a dim white streak, into the deepening gloom, and then faded out of sight upon the shoulder of a hill. There was no movement on it as far as the girl could see.
She waited what seemed an interminable time, and then a faint drumming caught her attention, and grew into a welcome beat of hoofs. Some one was coming along the road. She watched eagerly, straining her eyes to catch a glimpse of the rider. At last an object emerged from the shadow, and as it drew nearer she could see that it was a man riding a mule.
With her nerves at high tension and her heart beating fast, Evelyn left her hiding place in the cacti and stepped out into the middle of the road. The man must see her now, and she had involved herself in fresh difficulties if he were not the peon she expected.
He came on fast; he had caught sight of her and was urging his mule. When he pulled up beside her and dropped from the animal, muttering exclamations in an unknown tongue, Evelyn staggered. It was an Indian from the hills.
CHAPTER XXIV
IN THE CAMP OF THE HILLSMEN
Evelyn instinctively drew back a few paces. Through her brain was beating insistently the admonition that had helped her much in the past few days:
"Keep calm! Don't let him think you are afraid!"
Her first thought had been flight, to the village; but reason told her that was impossible. Here alone on the silent hillside, in the early night, a white woman with this strange Indian, there came over her again a pride in her American blood. She felt that she was a match for him, in wits if not in strength. And with the thought came courage.