Captain Forest crossed over to where Chiquita sat, resting after the exertion of the dance.
"I'm sure you've had enough dancing this evening, Señorita," he said, handing her her fan. "Let us go into the garden; it's quieter there." His words filled her with a tumult of emotion. She realized that the moment for which she had been waiting had arrived. She looked up at him without replying, then rose from her seat, and the two quietly left the patio, disappearing among the shrubbery and the shadows.
Neither spoke. Each guessed the other's thoughts, and they walked on in silence until they came to an open circular space surrounded by trees and flooded by moonlight, where, as if moved by a common impulse, they halted. Without a word he turned and silently folded her in his arms.
"Jack—" she murmured.
"Chiquita mia," he said at length, gazing down into her upturned face where the dusk and the moon-fire met and blended in a radiance of unearthly beauty, "is it not wonderful that, all unwittingly and unconscious of each other's existence, we have been brought together from the ends of the earth?" She was about to reply when a voice, close at hand, cut her short. It was Don Felipe's.
"A pretty sentiment, Captain Forest," he said, stepping out into the light before them. "I wish I might congratulate you, but you will never marry her."
"How dare you!" cried the Captain furiously, advancing toward him with flushed face and clenched hands. Chiquita started violently at the sound of Don Felipe's voice. The apprehension of an
impending catastrophe that had oppressed her during the day, but which she had forgotten during the excitement of the dance, again took possession of her.
"I apologize most humbly for intruding on your privacy," answered Don Felipe, meeting the Captain's gaze unflinchingly, "but as one who wishes you well, I could not stand quietly by and see a man like you cunningly tricked by this woman."
"What do you mean?" asked the Captain, his eyes blazing and his voice almost beyond control.