"The man you lost at Valparaiso, senor?" said Moreno.
"Exactly—the same brave fellow."
"Oh, Don Pedro, this is romance upon romance!" exclaimed Ignez, as, with two very white hands, she smoothed back the dark masses of her magnificent hair, evidently greatly pleased with the impostor, to whose rhodomontades she listened as a charming and romantic young lady, whose life has just been saved by a striking, athletic, and imposing dark stranger, may be supposed to do.
Her cousin and fiancé, who had clung for life or death to the keel of the pinnace, which he had overset by mismanagement, was fearfully at a discount—even little Donna Paula did not mind him a bit; and of this state of matters Don Pedro Florez, cousin of the Marshal Duke de Serrano, hastened ito make the best use, for he could temper his assurance with vast art when he chose, affecting actually to be timid and shy—he "had always been so, when studying at Salamanca," as he whispered to Ignez, when seated at the piano.
He soon cherished a love (if we may call it so) for this unsuspecting girl; but, like the love that Hawkshaw bore for Ethel Basset, the lust of lucre was its basis—recklessness and obstinacy did the rest.
On the other hand, a long, weary, and somewhat tame engagement with her cousin—an understood affair, that had lasted all her girlhood—rendered Ignez, perhaps, more open to the advances of a stranger, by the very novelty of his attentions.
After making an appointment to drive with the whole party to the beautiful valley of Mepooho next day, Pedro returned to his hotel extremely well pleased with himself, and just in time to prevent Zuares, who had been imbibing too freely in the Reeoba, or market-place, from being carried off by the horse-police, for drawing his knife on the waiters, kissing the chambermaids, and other little eccentricities.
Pedro made such admirable use of the opportunities afforded by that expedition to the valley, and others, in which the young ladies took him to see the Jesuits' Church, the Chapel of Our Lady del Rosario, the great Church of La Campagnia, and other public sights, that he had thrice spoken of love to Ignez, who only blushed and smiled, but did not forbid him, or seek to avoid the subject, unless when Perez or her father were within hearing, when a quick warning glance from her charming eyes withheld him. Thus the heedless girl, unfortunately for herself, established with him a species of secret understanding, which made Pedro conceive a very daring scheme indeed—to compel her to become his by a coup-de-main, as he dreaded the result of the padre's correspondence with the bishop, and an exposure of his escapade at the Posada de San Augustin.
More than one painful and unpleasant scene ensued between Ignez and her cousin Perez now. She was piqued, and he was furious; hence the coldness that ensued between them favoured the adventurous Pedro. Yet poor Don Perez loved the wilful girl to distraction, as the phrase is.
He was too feeble to compete in bodily strength with such a bulky ruffian as Pedro, and was too honourable to resort to secret means of getting rid of him. Failing with Ignez herself, he disdained to apply for the intervention of her father's authority, and yet he saw daily, yea, hourly, how, misled by her imagination alone, the heart of his beautiful cousin was being corrupted, warped and turned from him.