Courage! Do thy duty, old friend; let them see that the
hospitality of La Mision Perdida does not grow old, if its
mayordomo does. Faquita will bring thee the wine. No; not that
way; thou needest not pass the patio, nor meet that man again.
Here, give me thy hand. I will lead thee. It trembles, Pereo!
These are not the sinews that only two years ago pulled down the
bull at Soquel with thy single lasso! Why, look! I can drag thee;
see!" and with a light laugh and a boyish gesture, she half pulled,
half dragged him along, until their voices were lost in the dark
corridor.
Maruja kept her word. When the sun began to cast long shadows
along the veranda, not only the outer shell of La Mision Perdida,
but the dark inner heart of the old casa, stirred with awakened
life. Single horsemen and carriages began to arrive; and, mingled
with the modern turnouts of the home party and the neighboring
Americans, were a few of the cumbrous vehicles and chariots of
fifty years ago, drawn by gayly trapped mules with bizarre
postilions, and occasionally an outrider. Dark faces looked from
the balcony of the patio, a light cloud of cigarette-smoke made the
dark corridors the more obscure, and mingled with the forgotten
incense. Bare-headed pretty women, with roses starring their dark
hair, wandered with childish curiosity along the broad veranda and
in and out of the French windows that opened upon the grand saloon.
Scrupulously shaved men with olive complexion, stout men with
accurately curving whiskers meeting at their dimpled chins, lounged
about with a certain unconscious dignity that made them contentedly
indifferent to any novelty of their surroundings.
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