"She leant heavily forward in my arms, and, instead of placing her on the ground, I pressed her tenderly to my breast, with my lips trembling on her forehead. Then I murmured in her ear:
"'Mariquita, mi querida—Marguerita, my idol—I love you—love you dearly! Will you pardon me; will you permit it?'
"She did not reply, but her head sank upon my shoulder, for the crisis had come! Her lovely face was close to mine, and I felt her breath upon my cheek. The colour had left hers, for those emotions which cause some women to blush make others grow pale; but her half-closed eyes sparkled with passion and joy under their long black lashes, and her rosy lips were parted by a divine smile.
"I felt that I had triumphed; that Mariquita, the once proud, cold, and reserved Mariquita, loved me, for that emotion which had made me at first seem timid now made her actually bold, and her sweet lips sought mine, it may be but too readily, in the first glow of her girlish ardour.
"She gave me one long and passionate kiss, and then, without assistance, she sprang from my arms to her saddle, saying, with mingled smiles and tears:
"'We have both been foolish—very foolish, Senor Don Pedro, but let us begone.'
"'Mariquita, consider the heat—your fatigue!' I urged.
"'We are some miles from the granja, and have first the road to find,' she replied hurriedly.
"With her horse's reins and her whip, she had resumed something of her former self, but the memory of my kisses yet burned upon her brow and lips. I endeavoured, in vain, to lead the conversation back to the sudden impulse which the simple act of dismounting had given to both our hearts.
"I begged of her to moderate the pace of her horse, as there was plenty of time for us to reach home; but she would not listen to me, and seemed to blush with anger now at the memory of what had passed between us; yet little cared I for that, felt assured that we had passed the Rubicon, that this beautiful girl loved me, and that the time I had spent with old Miguel Escudero, in rambling among his plantations, where the negroes hoed the sugar, planted tobacco, and gathered the cotton tufts, had not been spent in vain.