“Listen!” broke in Peggy with her finger to her lips. “I hear music!”
Obediently Florence and Jo Ann stopped talking to listen.
“A caballero serenading his lady love,” Florence explained in reply to Peggy’s questioning look.
The next moment Peggy began swaying to the rhythm of the music like a graceful willow tree in the breeze; then catching Florence by the arm, she danced her lightly across the roof.
When they neared Jo Ann again, she called to them softly, “Better not make so much noise!”
“No one’d ever dream of looking up here,” Peggy murmured over her shoulder, dancing away and not stopping till the music ended.
The spell being broken then, the three girls clambered to the top of the wall and sat there for several minutes looking down on the city below. In the brilliant tropical moonlight the winding gray paths and dark shadowy trees and shrubbery of the Plaza were silhouetted against the white-walled buildings beyond. High above all, like a sentinel on guard over the sleeping city, rose the bell tower of the cathedral.
They were still gazing at this enchanting, etching-like picture when the chimes rang out again.
Jo Ann gave a little start. “I didn’t realize we’d been sitting here so long. This moonlight’s cast a spell over me—I’d almost forgotten what we came up here for. I’m going over now to see if there’s enough light shining on that back wall for me to get the rope that we fastened to the iron bars of the window.”
She sprang down lightly and crossed the roof. One glance showed her that she still had a few minutes to wait before the rays of the moon would light the back window. As she stood looking out over the rear wall of the church, her gaze traveled on past the adobe huts toward the river.