When dreams come true

by Ritter Brown

"Exactly; just what I have been saying, Concho mio," Anita went on, surveying her spouse with a look of pitying superiority. "Why, only yesterday, when he was here, I knew instantly by his air of distraction that something unusual had happened. Never has he been so particular before. He went all over the place, inspecting everything to the minutest detail, just like a woman. Nothing pleased him; and when he came to the flowers, which everybody knows are the finest in all Chihuahua, he declared they were not fit for a dog to sniff at, and rated the gardeners soundly for their negligence.

"Ah!" she sighed, the expression of her countenance softening, "the place needs a mistress badly—it is the one thing it lacks. There was a time when I hoped it might be the Chiquita, but since fate has ordained that it should be otherwise, let us pray that it may be this one. In fact," she exclaimed, looking up and emphasizing her words, "from what thou hast told me of her, I know it will be she or none, and may heaven grant that it please the Saints either to give her to him or protect him from her, for the Señor is a man who can really love but once. Take a woman's word for it, Concho, these are the true symptoms of love." Having delivered herself thus forcibly, she tossed aside the end of her cigarette and rose from the doorsill.

"Thou wert always a fool, Concho," she added, regarding him compassionately with a smile and patting him on the cheek. Then turning, she disappeared in the house, leaving Concho to marvel at her astuteness, a thing he had never suspected.

Meanwhile, the subject under discussion was pacing the floor of his room in the Posada like a caged lion. For one whole week Bessie Van Ashton had seemingly thrown wide the portals of her heart and bade him enter, a privilege of which he was not slow to avail himself. Never had woman flirted to better advantage or succeeded more effectually in turning a man's head in so short a time as had this distracting, fair-haired witch. The only regret experienced by Mr. Yankton during these hours of unalloyed happiness, was the thought of the days he had lost—days which might have been spent in her society had he only known. How blind he had been not to have recognized her the instant he had set eyes on her, instead of compelling the Almighty to remind him that she was the woman that had been reserved for him by dropping her down out of a clear sky into his arms! How stupid of him, and how patient Providence was with some of us at times!

During the few short days which followed that happy accident—days that seemed like so many swift, fleeting seconds, Dick floated on a summer sea whose surface was unmarred by shadow or ripple. All the world had changed. He felt as though he had only just begun to live, and he spun a golden web of fancies out of the reality of things which, for one so deeply versed in the game of life, was a marvel of beauty, fair as a poet's dream, yet more substantial. And why not? Had not his life been one replete with adventure and romance from the cradle? His meeting with Bessie was no more remarkable than many other things that had occurred during his lifetime. It was now perfectly clear to him why he had built the hacienda in the face of adverse judgment. It was for her, of course. A place in which to enshrine and worship her during the years to come; for what else could it be?

That insane notion of a white-haired patriarch enjoying the solitude of the place was too absurd—a morbid fancy born of loneliness and melancholy. The walk back to the Posada on the day of their startling encounter and the hours spent in Bessie's society since then—strolling and chatting in the garden, or going for long rides over the plains together, had convinced him it was not intended that man should live alone. He had taken good care that she should learn nothing of the existence of the hacienda or of his wealth, and as little as possible concerning himself, except that he was an agreeable young man with fair prospects; and thus far, thanks to the Captain's silence and her ignorance of Spanish, he had succeeded admirably.

Fair prospects! The secret was almost too good to keep, and he laughed softly to himself as he mused upon it. It was truly an inspiration; just the sort of thing to hand out to one of Newport's smart-set. Although he had not yet proposed to her, he regarded their marriage as a foregone conclusion; an event of the near future. She certainly had led him to infer as much, and the plan he had conceived regarding it was highly ingenious—one worthy of his fertile imagination. Directly they were married, they would spend the first fortnight of their honeymoon camping in the mountains in a style worthy of a grand Mogul, after which he would suggest that they pass the night at a near-by rancho belonging to a friend, and in this wise introduce her to her future home.

The rapture of the picture fairly dazzled him, and he lay awake whole nights contemplating it—the patio palely illumined by the moonlight, the murmur of the fountain in its center, the perfume of flowers, the melodious voices of the dark-skinned Indian attendants, bearing flaming torches, and chanting the time-honored welcome to their new mistress, and her insistent demands to be introduced to their host; and then the delightful dénouement, the surprise she must experience when the truth finally dawned upon her. Truly poet never dreamed a fairer dream. It had taken him a whole week to conceive the idea in detail, and on the morning of the seventh day on which he had decided to ask her to become his wife, he stood with the horses before the Posada expectantly awaiting her appearance to take the ride they had agreed upon the night before. At the end of an hour, during which he fretted over the undue delay with the same impatience as did the horses, Rosita appeared and informed him that the Señorita Van Ashton would not ride that morning; she was not feeling well. A wild alarm seized him. The thought that she might have been stricken suddenly with some serious illness, quite unnerved him for the moment. "Caramba!" he cried, quite forgetting his English. "What has happened? Is it serious? Is anything being done?" But all inquiries concerning the actual state of the Señorita's health proving fruitless, he was left to pass the remainder of the day wandering aimlessly about the garden in the vain hope of finding something to divert his mind. Had he been in possession of his usual calm, he might have noticed the amused expression on Rosita's face, but the extent of one's concern being the measure of one's love for a person, he saw only the vivid mental picture of his consuming passion, Bessie, suffering Bessie!

It was the first jarring note in that state of uninterrupted bliss which he had been enjoying, and as the day wore painfully on he began to realize how much she had become to him. He was haunted by misgivings, and finally, late in the afternoon, having convinced himself that he had exhausted the resources of the garden, he decided to pass the time until the dinner hour upon the veranda on the other side of the house. Thither he repaired, but oddly enough and greatly to his astonishment, as he stepped out upon the veranda, he came face to face with Miss Van Ashton returning from a walk in the town. She was charmingly gowned in a soft, clinging creation of pale lavender and white lace, with long white suède gloves and low lavender shoes and silk stockings, an inch or so of which she flashed before his eyes, proclaiming the society belle's prerogative. She carried a parasol of the same color and material as her dress, while her head was crowned with a sweeping, rakishly plumed Rembrandtesque hat worn at a killing angle. The gold in her hair and the exquisite pink and white of her throat and cheeks blended perfectly with a color scheme, the attractiveness of which was greatly enhanced by her natural charm and the delicate scent of lavender and rose leaves which emanated from her person, the combined effects of which were not lost upon an over-wrought imagination.

To use the current vernacular of the times, so familiar to the world in which she moved, Miss Van Ashton's appearance was decidedly fetching, and strongly suggestive of the things of which poets, in their madness, are continually harping—flower gardens flooded with moonlight and the song of nightingales. Although not modeled on heroic lines, she nevertheless possessed the qualifications which most men seek in women and therefore became quite as formidable as Delilah when she chose to assert herself. To say that Mr. Yankton was dazzled but mildly expresses his feelings; he was ravished, though in no mood for banter. Had their meeting occurred under more auspicious circumstances, he undoubtedly would have complimented her on her charming appearance; but for one who had been eating his heart out during eight consecutive hours solely on her account, it was hardly to be expected. The sight of her, though a relief to his mind, gave rise to thoughts the nature of which he found it difficult to conceal.