She delivered the towel and retired, abashed and silent at the jests of the man she regarded with awe as the god-sent deliverer of her people. Once in the corridor she looked into Valencia’s room, then in the kitchen where Valencia and Maria and other women were hastening breakfast, and last she sought Clodomiro at the corral.
“Where did you take her, and how?” she demanded, and the youth, tired with the endless rides and tasks of two days and nights, was surly, and looked his impatience. “She, and she, and she! Always women!” he grumbled. “Have I not herded all of them from over the mesa at your order? Is one making a slow trail, and must I go herding again?”
She did not answer, but looked past him at the horses.
“Which did the señora ride from Soledad?” she inquired, and Clodomiro pointed out a mare of shining black, and also a dark bay ridden by Marto.
“Trust him to take the best of the saddle herd,” he remarked. “Why have you come about it? Is the señora wanting that black?”
“Maybe so; I was not told,” she answered evasively. “But there is early breakfast, and it is best to get your share before some quick task is set,––and this day there are many tasks.”
The women were entering the portal at the rear, because the chapel of the old hacienda was at the corner. There was considerable commotion as Fidelio enforced the order to search for arms;––if the Deliverer suspected treachery, how could they hope for the sympathy they came to beg for?
“Tell him there is nothing hidden under our rags but hearts of sorrow,” said the mother of Fidelio. “Ask that he come here where we kneel to give God thanks that El Aleman is now in the power of the Deliverer.”
“General Rotil does not walk, and there is no room for a horse in this door. Someone of you must speak for the others, and go where he is.”
The kneeling women looked at each other with troubled dark eyes.