In the pouring rain, Zerlina and her grandmother were leaning over a young man stretched out prone in Adam’s wagon. He wore the green velveteen suit now so familiar to “The Automobile Girls,” and through his belt gleamed the dagger he had used to slash the tires with. When he was lifted out, they caught a glimpse of his face. José it was, but José grown thin and haggard in a day and a night. The boys carried him tenderly upstairs and laid him on his own bed. Zerlina and her grandmother followed close at their heels.
“Do you know him, then?” asked Stephen of the Gypsy girl.
“Yes,” she replied defiantly. “He is my brother. Antonio is his name.”
“Whew-w-w,” whistled Stephen under his breath. “So José was an impostor after all. I must say I hoped till the last.”
“Well, well,” answered the major, “we won’t hit a man when he is down, my son, and this boy is pretty sick. The girl is his sister, you say? She and her grandmother had better nurse him, then. Send the old woman to me. I want to speak with her in the library.”
After being closeted with Granny Ann for half an hour the major flung wide the library door and called to the others to come in. His good-natured, handsome face was wrinkled into an expression of utter bewilderment, but relief gleamed through his troubled eyes.
“Children,” he cried, “come here, every one of you. José is vindicated. Thank heavens for that. The boy upstairs is not our José at all, but his half-brother, Antonio. Now, where do you suppose José has hidden himself? I trust, I earnestly hope, not in the woods.”
“It seems,” continued the major, “José’s father was married twice. A nice chap, José. I trust he is safe to-night, for his poor father’s sake as well as for his own.”
“And his second wife, uncle?” interrupted Stephen.
“Yes, yes, my boy,” continued the major, patting his nephew affectionately on the shoulder, “and the second wife was a beautiful Gypsy singer, who had two children, Zerlina and Antonio, the unfortunate young man now occupying José’s room. A Gypsy rarely marries outside her own people and this one longed to return to her tribe. One day she ran away taking her children with her, and Martinez never saw his wife again, for she died soon after. He has tried, in every way, to recover the children, but until now the Gypsies have always managed to hide them effectually. Since they were children Antonio has hated his half brother José and from time to time has threatened his life. Once, in Gibraltar, the brother almost succeeded in killing him.” (The girls remembered how much José had disliked the mention of Gibraltar.) “Antonio was a bad boy, utterly undisciplined. He ran about Europe and this country, seeing what harm he could do, but neither his father nor his brother could ever locate him. José finally heard that the children were in America and came over to try to reason with the Gypsies to let Zerlina, at least, go to school. I do not suppose he reckoned on finding them so near, and, when Antonio tried to rob and murder, José was divided in his mind as to whether to give his brother up or let him go. He must have suffered a good deal, poor fellow. I wish José had confided his troubles to me. Now, maybe, it’s too late to help him.”