"The villa is quite deserted, senora," said Quentin, as they stood in irresolution and perplexity on the terrace. "How far are we from Salorino?"
"Six miles at least."
Quentin hallooed loudly two or three times, but the echoes of the tenantless abode alone responded, and the deathlike stillness there made Isidora shrink close to his side.
"I was not prepared for this," she said, while her eyes filled with tears; "yet what else can we expect while a Frenchman remains alive on this side of the Pyrenees?" she added, bitterly.
"There seems to be no living thing here, senora; not even a household dog."
"What shall we do, senor?" she asked, earnestly.
"Whatever we do ultimately, senora, we must take shelter now, for here comes the storm again, and with vengeance, too!"
So intent had they been in observing the indications of desertion and decay about this noble villa, that they had failed to see how fast the storm had gathered round them. A gust of wind tore past the edifice, strewing the terrace with withered acacia flowers and orange leaves, and then the rain descended in torrents, driving the travellers for shelter into the open vestibule.
In blinding sheets it rushed along the earth, from which it seemed to rise again like smoke or mist, then the thunder hurtled across the darkening sky, and the yellow lightning played like wild-fire about the bare granite scalps of the distant sierras, throwing forward every peak in strong outline from the dusky masses of cloud, amid which they "were an instant seen, and instant lost."
"Madre de Dios! there seems a fatality in all this!" exclaimed Isidora, as the overstrained and half Moorish ideas of etiquette and female propriety which prevail in Spain and Portugal occurred to her; then, looking at Quentin, while a blush suffused her cheek, she added, "to be wandering in this manner is a most awkward situation, especially for me."