“Run back into the house fast as feet can carry me. Come along!”
Keeping up the jocular bravado, the younger sister leads the way out. Arm-in-arm the two cross the patio, then the outer courtyard, and on through a narrow passage communicating with the walled enclosure at back; once a grand garden under careful cultivation, still grand in its neglect.
After entering it, the sisters make stop, and for a while stand surveying the scene. The moon at full, coursing through a cloudless sky, flings her soft light upon gorgeous flowers with corollas but half-closed, in the sultry southern night giving out their fragrance as by day. The senses of sight and smell are not the only ones gratified; that of hearing is also charmed with the song of the czentzontle, the Mexican nightingale. One of these birds perched upon a branch, and pouring forth its love-lay in loud passionate strain, breaks off at sight of them. Only for a short interval is it silent; then resuming its lay, as if convinced it has nought to fear from such fair intruders. Its song is not strange to their ears, though there are some notes they have not hitherto heard. It is their own mocking-bird of the States, introducing into its mimic minstrelsy certain variations, the imitations of sounds peculiar to Texas.
After having listened to it for a short while, the girls move on down the centre walk, now under the shadow of trees, anon emerging into the moonlight; which shimmering on their white evening robes, and reflecting the sparkle of their jewellery, produces a pretty effect.
The garden ground slopes gently backward; and about half-way between the house and the bottom wall is, or has been, a fountain. The basin is still there, and with water in it, trickling over its edge. But the jet no longer plays, and the mason-work shows greatly dilapidated. So also the seats and statues around, some of the latter yet standing, others broken off, and lying alongside their pedestals.
Arriving at this spot, the sisters again stop, and for a time stand contemplating the ruins; the younger making a remark, suggested by a thought of their grandeur gone.
“Fountains, statues, seats under shade trees, every luxury to be got out of a garden! What Sybarites the Holy Fathers must have been!”
“Truly so,” assents Helen. “They seem to have made themselves quite comfortable; and whatever their morals, it must be admitted they displayed good taste in landscape gardening, with an eye on good living as well. They must have been very fond of fruit, and a variety of it—judging by the many sorts of trees they’ve planted.”
“So much the better for us,” gleefully replies Jessie. “We shall have the benefit of their industry, when the fruit season comes round. Won’t it be a grand thing when we get the walks gravelled, these statues restored, and that fountain once more in full play. Luis has promised me it shall be done, soon as the cotton crop is in. Oh! it will be a Paradise of a place!”
“I like it better as it is.”