"I was telling the Señora," explained the woman volubly, "that she must not so much as look inside the cottage in the mountains. I have not been there for six months and the men--you know what they are. They are no better than dogs I tell them. There is plenty of clean hay and dry bracken in the sheds up there and you can well make a soft bed for her to get some sleep for a few hours. And here I have unfolded a new blanket for the lady. See, it is white as I bought it. She can use it. It has never been worn--by us others," she added with perfect simplicity.
Marcos took the blanket while Juanita explained that having slept soundly every night of her life without exception, she could well now accommodate herself with a rest of two hours in the hay. The woman pressed upon them some of her small store of coffee and some new bread.
"He can well prepare your breakfast for you," she said, confidentially to Juanita. "He is like one of us. All the valley will tell you that. A great gentleman who can yet cook his own breakfast--as the good God meant them to be."
They set forth at once in the yellow light of the waning moon, Marcos leading the way up a pathway hardly discernible amid the rocks and undergrowth. Once or twice he turned to help Juanita over a hard or a dangerous place. But they did not talk, as conversation was not only difficult but inexpedient. They had climbed for two hours, slowly and steadily, when the barking of a dog on the mountainside above them notified them that they were nearing their destination.
"Who is it?" asked a voice presently.
"Marcos de Sarrion," replied Marcos. "Strike no lights."
"We have no candles up here," answered the man with a laugh. He only spoke Basque and it was in this language that Marcos gave a brief explanation. Juanita sat on a rock. She was tired out. There were three men--short, thick-set and silent, a father and two sons. They stood in front of Marcos and spoke in monosyllables after the manner of old friends. Under his directions they brought a heap of dried bracken and hay. In a shed, little more than a roof and four uprights, they made a rough couch for Juanita which they hedged round with heaps of bracken to protect her from the wind.
"You will see the stars," said the old man shaking out the blanket which Marcos had carried up from the cottage at the ford. "It is good to see the stars when you awake in the night. One remembers that the saints are watching."
In a few minutes Juanita was sleeping, like a child, curled up beneath her blanket, and heard through her dreams the low voices of Marcos and the peasants talking hurriedly in the half-ruined cottage. For Marcos and these three were the only men who knew the way over the mountains to Torre Garda.
The dawn was just breaking when Marcos awoke Juanita.