To-day we went with various members of the Morales clan to visit the Hospicio (see the Budders for dates and data!). I only remember a girl of twelve who sat by herself in the playground, the small, cameo, clear face with its sorrowing eyes, the pathetic arrogance in the lift of the chin, her withdrawal from the other noisy little orphans. I knew she must have a story, and when I asked the pretty sister in charge, she burst into eager narrative.
Twelve years ago, approximately, a young physician was called at night to the peon quarter, and to his amazement found that his patient was a lady, a girl whose patrician manner was proof against all her terror and suffering. She utterly refused to look at her child and threatened to smother it if he left it within her reach. He took it to the Hospicio to be cared for temporarily, and a few days later, going as usual to attend the young mother, he found her vanished. There was a lavish fee left for him, and a note, bidding him insolently to banish the whole matter from his memory. The neighbors knew only that they had heard a coche in the dead of night. The child, whom they named in their mournful fashion Dolores Tristeza—sorrows and sadness—was always the doctor's protegée. One day he came in great excitement to tell the pretty sister the sequel. He had been summoned the night before to the bedside of a dying man,—one of the great names of the city. The family was grouped about the father and among the weeping daughters he espied his mysterious patient! Afterward, when he was leaving, she looked him squarely in the eye and said, "You are a newcomer in Guadalajara? You must be, for I have never seen you before!" He told no one but the sister at the Hospicio and not even to her did he divulge the name, but two days later, in a lonely suburb of the city, he was shot and killed.
Sarah, doesn't that make your scalp creep? Dolores Tristeza! "Sorrows and Sadness!" I dashed out and bought her a gorgeous doll and she gave me a gracious smile but she was not at all overcome. She clearly feels her quality. Loads of people have wanted to adopt her but she would never go with them.
And to-morrow we are off to Querétaro to drop a silent tear on Maximilian's dressy little tomb, the Budders, Lupe, the C.E. and I. We are gathering as we roll!
Adíos, querida mia!
J.
Queretaro.
I've paid proper tribute to that poor pawn of Empire who lived so poorly and who died so well, but the real zest of this journey is Lupe! Fresh every hour! Her mental processes are delicious. I was lamenting her frank delight in bull-fights and she said, "Oh, the firs' time I see horse keel,' I am ver' seek. Now they keel four, seven, eleven horse,' I like ver' moach!" When I tried to make her realize the enormity of her taste, she turned on me like a flash—"But you American girl, you go see you' brawther get keel' in football game!"
"Pussy willow," I said, "it's not a parallel case. Our brothers are free agents,—they adore doing it. They're toiling and sweating and praying for the chance—perhaps for years,—and they're heroes, and thousands are making the welkin ring with their names!"
She shrugged. "Oh—eef you care more for some ol' horse than you' brawther——"