She looked about her fearfully, drew the reboso closely across her shrunken shoulders, and answered in a frightened tone as if the thick walls themselves could hear:
"How should I know? It is what they say. If I should say otherwise they would lash me with the whip, even me, old Catarina."
The captive sighed. Nothing could break the awful wall of mystery that enveloped him. Catarina even did not dare to speak, although no one but himself could possibly hear.
"You mind I smoke?" said Catarina.
"No," replied John with a wan smile. "Any lady can smoke in my presence."
She whipped out a cigarrito, lighted it with a match, held it for a moment between the middle and fore finger, then inserted it between her aged lips. She took two or three long, easy whiffs, letting the smoke come out through her nose. John had never learned to smoke, but he said to her:
"Does it do you good, Catarina?"
"Whether it does me good, I know not," replied the Indian woman, "but it gives me pleasure, so I do it. I have to tell you, Señor John, that my son, Porfirio, has returned from the north. He has been at Monterey and the country about it."
John at once was all eagerness.
"And Antonio Vaquez, the leader of the burro train?" he exclaimed. "Has he heard from him? Does he know if the letter went on beyond the Rio Grande?"