The girls exchanged greetings in Spanish with the visitors, then dropped down on the floor beside the two little girls. Jo Ann, in her poor Spanish, attempted to carry on a conversation with the children, while Peggy looked on, amused.
She was interrupted a few minutes later by Mrs. Blackwell. “Girls, María says a bear carried off one of their pigs last night. Isn’t that too bad? They had them in an enclosure against the cliff just back of the house here.”
Jo Ann jumped quickly to her feet. “I bet that’s what got our things at the spring. A bear! Why didn’t we think of that before?”
“We’ve never been bothered with one before,” put in Florence.
“María’s husband, Juan, said the continued drouth up in the mountains has caused the wild animals to come down into the valley in search of food,” Mrs. Blackwell continued. “The bear had evidently followed the river, because they found tracks up the ravine.”
María, who had been watching the expression on their faces intently, now began to shake her head and to talk rapidly in Spanish.
“She says that bears like much the pork,” translated Florence for the girls’ benefit. “She’s afraid he’ll come back for the rest of the pigs, and she doesn’t know what to do to keep him away.”
“What to do!” exclaimed Jo Ann. “Why, shoot him, of course.”
Mrs. Blackwell smiled. “I doubt if Juan has ever owned a gun. About the only weapon the peon ever uses is a stiletto, and it would not be an easy matter to kill a bear with a stiletto—or even with a machete.”
Peggy shivered as if she were cold. “I should say it wouldn’t. I’d hate to get that close to one, especially a real wild bear! It gives me the creeps to think about it.”