“Mother, be not afraid!” said Chata, desperately. “She and my grandfather will not yet have left Doña Francisca’s, and that you know is quite away from the plaza or the barracks; they have only to cross the gardens and be home in a ‘God speed us!’ But as for me, I am in more fright and misery than if a thousand guns were levelled upon me. Do you not see, I know only that I am not your child! Who am I? What is to become of me?”
“The last seems settled already,” returned Doña Rita, with an accent of chagrin which was almost spiteful; “and the long and short of it is, child, that you were sent to Doña Isabel, but that my mother-in-law had the fancy you would be safer with me; and I, like a tender-hearted simpleton, did not object to humoring her whim, thinking at the same time I was doing a person whom I loved a service she would know how to appreciate,—and now when the time has come for recompense, instead of gain, comes loss. There is nothing in this world but vexation and disappointment.”
“I cannot understand anything of this,” said Chata, with a deep sigh. She had risen to her feet, and was looking pitifully at Doña Rita, who walked up and down the corridor, listening to the distant and irregular firing, and interrupting her discourse with interjections and doubts as to the safety of her daughter. “But when I see my father, Don Rafael, I will ask him, or Doña Feliz,—yes, Doña Feliz always loved me.”
“Ay, but you must ask nothing,” almost screamed Doña Rita, running to Chata and seizing her by the shoulders. “They will think it was I who betrayed the secret; they will never forgive me. Oh, I should lead a dog’s life! You[You] are not old enough to know how cruel an angry husband or a baffled mother-in-law can be. And poor Rosario—”
“What can it matter to Rosario?” interrupted Chata. “Were you not lamenting that her dowry would be so small? Will it not be double now that I shall not innocently rob her?”
“Yes, yes,” whispered Doña Rita, eagerly. “The General Ramirez promised me this very day that when you, Chata, married Ruiz, he would make a gift to Rosario of all my husband may bestow on you, and that as much more should be given her on her wedding day, provided that the secret of your birth be kept. It is useless to ask me his reasons. He gave me none. I cannot guess them any more than I can surmise why Doña Isabel would not receive you, and therefore you were thrust into my arms. Heavens, what a reverberation! the whole house shakes!”
“It is nothing,” cried Chata, “but the slamming of a door. I hear the voices of Don José Maria and Rosario. Stay!” she added, grasping Doña Rita as she was about to run down the stairs. “I warn you that I will know all the truth. Your poor reasons shall not keep me from demanding it. Doña Feliz shall not refuse me!”
“Doña Feliz will do as she wills!” retorted Doña Rita. “But this I tell you, child, that the moment Ramirez knows that those who once crossed his plans are warned against him, you will be spirited away. Ramirez has his own purposes, and is not to be thwarted. He is already angry against Rafael and Doña Feliz for their attempted and long successful deception. He is a man of great and mysterious power, and knows not the meaning of the word forgive; and as sure as you stand there, if you disobey his commands sent you through me he will separate you at once from your home and friends, and bring ruin upon those who have cared for you.”
Doña Rita spoke with that impressive eloquence and fire which upon occasion seems at the command of every Mexican. She stood with one foot on the corridor floor, the other upon the stair, which she was about to descend, and she had turned half-way round, stretching out her hands, and lifting her dark and anxious eyes to encounter and fix the gaze of Chata. Below, in the stone entrance-way, stood Rosario, volubly describing to a servant the dangers she and her grandfather had encountered. For the moment Doña Rita appeared in Chata’s eyes like some timorous yet desperate animal standing between her and her young. “My Rosario, my poor child,” said the mother in a low voice, “is her life to be blasted by you? Ramirez is in two minds now. One is to resent the frustration of his will, and be the mortal enemy of those who have sheltered you; the other to applaud and reward them. Upon your discretion all depends.”
“But I shall go mad if I have only this to think upon,” exclaimed Chata. “Who, who can tell me anything to make this dreadful revelation endurable, if not Don Rafael or Doña Feliz? Ah, yes, there is—there is the General.”