“Father Crawford,” exclaimed one of the grown-up young men, “what is this about another letter from Edward? I came over to hear the news.”
“Letter?” said Mr. Crawford. “I should say so! I guess I’d better read it aloud. It was a long time getting out and coming around by way of England. There are all sorts of delays in war-time. It is the last of three that he wrote before escaping into the interior of Mexico with his new friends. I am glad that he did go with them, though, and there must be other letters on the way. We shall hear from him again pretty soon.”
They all were silent then, and he read the letter through, with now and then a few words of explanation, but Mrs. Crawford had evidently read it before, and all she could say now was:
“Oh, dear! I don’t like it! I wish he had come home!”
“It’s all right, mother,” said Mr. Crawford, “for I have something more to tell. Captain Kemp is here, and, from what he says, it is plain that it would not have done for Ned to have remained anywhere on the coast. He will be safe where he is, and he will learn a great deal. I would not have him miss it for anything. What’s pretty good, too, we have been paid all our insurance money for the loss of the Goshawk, and our firm has been given a contract to furnish supplies for the army. I shall be down on the gulf before long myself, in charge of a supply ship, and I can make inquiries about Ned. He will turn up all right.”
Everybody appeared to be encouraged except Ned’s mother, and it was a pity she could not have seen how well he was looking at that very time. If, for instance, she had possessed a telescope which would have reached so far, she might have seen a fine, large bay horse reined in to a standstill in front of a modern-appearing country-house, well built of a nearly white kind of limestone. Around this residence was a wide-spreading lawn, with vines, shrubbery, flowers, and other evidences of wealth and refinement. The rider of the horse appeared to sit him easily, and he was a picture of health and high spirits, but for an expression of discontent that was upon his sunburned face.
“This is all very beautiful,” he said, as he glanced around him, “but I wish I were out of it. I want to hear from home. They must have my letters by this time, but they couldn’t guess where I am now.”
He was silent for a moment, and the horse curveted gracefully under him, as if in doubt whether to gallop away again, or to ask his rider to get off.
“Well!” said Ned, with a pull on the rein. “It seems like a long, wonderful dream since I saw General Zuroaga ride away from us at the cross-roads. What a skirmish that was! Then we made our way through the mountains, and came here, and hasn’t it been a curious kind of life ever since? I’ve learned how to ride like a Mexican. I’ve seen all there is to see for miles and miles around this place. I’ve seen lots of old ruins, all that’s left of ancient houses and temples and altars. I believe the señora likes nothing better than to tell me yarns about the Montezuma times and about her ancestors in Spain. That’s a great country. I think I’ll go over there, some day, and see Granada and the Alhambra and the old castles and the Spanish people. I like the Mexicans first-rate, all that I have seen of them. They will be a splendid nation one of these days, but they’re awfully ignorant now. Why, every one in these parts believes that our army is all the while being whipped all to pieces by theirs, and I can’t exactly swallow that. I’d like to know just what is really going on. I’m all in the dark.”
“Señor Carfora!” called out a clear, ringing voice.