She suddenly burst into tears and fled away. Quesada looked after her, perturbed, amazed, and sorely puzzled. Her conduct was altogether inexplicable. But the underwood hid her from further sight. He shrugged his shoulders as one who should say, "She is only a Gypsy, poor thing!" and returned to the fires. His meal awaited him.
CHAPTER XIII
After they had garnished their stomachs with the puchero, they sat brooding around the three fires, the girl, Felicidad, and Jacinto and his three ruffians. The Gypsy lad with the shirt open to the waist and the yellow sash brought out his battered accordion again and played upon it for their entertainment.
He made it scream and exult obscenely; he made it lament like a fallen angel. He made it sing wild and wanton songs of Gypsy love; he made it chant of Gypsy treachery and Gypsy chiromancy. When you heard its uncouth and haunting assonances, you believed in the Evil Eye, the Querelar nasula; in the Hokkano Baro, the Great Trick; and even in the Chiving Drao, that sorcery by which the Gitanos cause horses to become sick and glandered, and swine to die as suddenly as if poisoned. In short, you believed all you ever had heard of the strange doings of the Zincali!
The hours fled by. Those about the fires grew sleepy. One by one, the Gypsy wenches withdrew into their tents. Then the girl Paquita spoke to Felicidad and led her away. They lay down to sleep that night—the highborn young lady and the girl of common Gypsy clay—in a certain wagon of the Gitanos. To that wagon came Jacinto Quesada and his three dorados, a short time later, and upon the open sward before it, threw themselves, their ponchos wrapped around them to protect them from the night cold and dew.
After breakfast next morning, Quesada talked long and earnestly with Pepe Flammenca.
"You had best remain in camp, at least this morning," advised the Gypsy count. "Up above, there is going to be a great monteria, and there will be many men upon the mountains. Some one may see the Senor Don Jacinto and report it to the police."
"It is good, friend Pepe. And the other matter?"
Flammenca called aloud in the Gypsy gerigonza. Instantly followed a scene of extraordinary liveliness and interest. Flammenca, Quesada, Perez, Ignacio Garcia, and Estrada sat cross-legged on the grass. Flammenca's Gypsy lads led before them, first the horses of Quesada and his dorados, and then the three- and four-year-olds attached to the Gypsy caravan. There was a great chaffering; the various points of the horses were appraised enthusiastically and with minute care. It was an impromptu horse fair. Wherever found, whether in Spain, England, Russia, Hungary, or the United States, the true Gypsy is an expert chalan or horse trader.