Purposely, he spoke in a loud tone, and Lady Vale-Avon heard through the Cherub’s honeyed murmurs. She rose, and called Monica, who was swept away without finding the dagger.
It was dinner-time when we returned to our hotel; but Carmona’s party did not appear in the dining-room. We lingered on hoping that they would come, until it was useless to hope longer, and as we drank black coffee, in the _patio_, Colonel O’Donnel asked a waiter where were the people who had lunched with us. “They have taken a private sitting-room,” replied the man, which was a relief, as I began to be haunted by black fear that Carmona had flitted by night.
By and by Pilar’s long lashes drooped, and the Cherub, catching her in the act of stifling a yawn, laughingly ordered her off to bed. “You haven’t had enough sleep these last few nights to keep a _cigarron_ alive,” said he. Soon afterwards his own eyes began to look like those of a sleepy child, and he excused himself with all the ceremony of Spanish leave-takings. Dick and I were left alone together, and were discussing what the morrow might bring forth, when a waiter hovered near us, bowing.
“The Excelentísima Señora Duquesa de Carmona would consider it a favour if Señor Waring and Teniente O’Donnel would visit her in her sitting-room,” he announced.
Were the heavens about to fall? My lifted eyebrows and Dick’s questioned each other in bewilderment. But our lips were silent as we followed the servant.
The sitting-room of the “Excelentísima Señora” was on the first floor, perhaps a big bedroom hastily transformed. What we expected to see as the waiter opened the door I hardly know; but we assuredly did not expect to see the Duchess sitting alone.
The table where the party had dined was covered now by a piece of gaudy, pseudo-Moorish embroidery, and adorned with flowers. A few guide-books and novels were scattered about, and in her hand the Duchess held a paper-covered volume, as if she had been reading. But the expression of the dark, heavy face contradicted her pose. We could see that she was excited.
“Forgive my not rising, as I am tired,” she said, as we came in. “It is kind of you to be so prompt, and I thank you.” Then she paused, and we waited.
“I beg you to sit down. I want the pleasure of a talk.”
We obeyed. And still waited.
“I am a little embarrassed,” went on the Duchess. “You must be patient. What I wish to say is difficult. And yet the Señor Teniente, being himself Spanish, will understand. We are in Spain, the land of formality and rigid etiquette, among people of our class. That an automobile with two young unmarried men in it (and even Colonel O’Donnel is a widower, not old)—that such an automobile should be closely following ours which contains a beautiful girl, is calculated to cause gossip. Everywhere we go along this route my son and I have acquaintances, friends; and already there has been talk, which flies from place to place in gossiping letters between women. I am sure you would not like to think that you had caused me this distress on account of my sweet young guest and her mother?”
Never had I been more completely taken aback. She had us at her mercy; for how is a man to fight against a woman?
“We are motoring in your direction,” I said lamely. “The chances of the road bring us together.”
“Ah! but I ask you, as a woman of my age may ask a favour of young men like you, señores, not to take those chances. If it is as you say—and of course I believe—that you happen to be motoring on our road, it would be no great hardship to delay and give us a longer start. Remember, it is for the sake of a young girl, and for an old woman’s peace of mind. Will you do this kindness, then, for me?”
She had struck me dumb. I did not know how to answer her, and she knew it. Even Dick, with his quick Yankee wit, for once was unready. And indeed, the Duchess had us at a hateful disadvantage.
“We are in something of a hurry, Señora Duquesa,” I stammered awkwardly.
“Then, rather than cause you loss of time, we will be off very early, and go as far as may be in the day. If we leave at—let us say seven o’clock to-morrow, it would not be too inconvenient for you to wait till nine? That is all I ask; and to stay the night at Manzanares instead of trying to get on to some other stopping place. If you promise this, you are honourable men, and I know you will keep your word.”
She had her lesson well, and had evidently rehearsed it with her son, for this lymphatic, weary-eyed woman was not one to know in advance the names of halting places on an automobile tour. It was clever of Carmona to use his mother’s plump hand as a cat’s-paw to pull his chestnuts from the fire; but it was not brave, because he must know that we could not let it touch the flames.
I thought for a moment in silence. Only boors could in so many words refuse such a request, put with apparent frankness by a woman old enough to be their mother. Yet I must not be trapped into promising anything that could separate me from Monica.
To be near her, at her service always, was the one thing of supreme importance; but to throw aside my sheep’s clothing and declare myself a wolf would be to lose her; for the instant that Carmona was sure of my identity he would denounce me. I would be sent across the frontier while Monica remained with him, unprotected save by her mother, who was his loyal friend. This was sure to happen, even if I did not count the trouble I might cause Colonel O’Donnel if I were arrested while posing as his son.
It seemed to me that we must agree to do what the Duchess asked, and, while keeping the letter of our promise, take means to see Monica in Seville. There, I must let her know all that had taken place, even if I could not communicate with her before. And I must implore her to come away with me lest some plot had been hatched meanwhile behind my back.
“What do you think, Waring?” I said. Then, giving him a cue, “I feel that we must consent, even though we may not see things according to the Duchess’s point of view.”
“Why, of course, a man can’t refuse a lady; a lady generally knows that,” Dick answered, avenging our wrongs with one sharp dig.
She thanked us effusively. “Then I may depend on you?” she asked, looking at me.
“You may depend upon us,” I said. “And pray don’t trouble to leave at an inconvenient time. My friend and I promise you two hours’ start.”
XXII
THE LUCK OF THE DREAM-BOOK
It was late, and Monica must have gone to bed, therefore it was impossible to send her a message. Next morning I was up early, and had my coffee and roll on a little table in the _patio_, in the hope of snatching a word with her. But she came down as closely attended by her mother and the Duchess as if she had been a queen, and they her ladies-in-waiting. I had only a chance to say good-bye, as they were ready to drive off; and when I would have added a hasty explanation of our delay, the Duchess began to speak, so that Monica was whisked away without hearing.
“Wicked—old—_cat!_” was Pilar’s exclamation when Dick told her the story of last night’s dilemma. But when asked what she would have done in our place, her invention failed; and the Cherub approved our course.
The others had taken full advantage of our generosity, and had not left Toledo till nine. Therefore, according to our contract, we were obliged to wait until eleven, surprising Ropes by our procrastination.
But as we were on the point of spinning away from the hotel, a goat-herd turned the corner at the head of his shaggy flock. The man, tanned a dark bronze with constant exposure, wore his rags with the air of a king marching to conquest, and rather than show vulgar curiosity, strode past scarcely deigning a look at the automobile, though it was as likely as not the first he had ever seen. His goats, equally unconcerned, strayed among our wheels without hurry, and when they chose clattered off with much play of little cloven hoofs on cobblestones. A sharper note of contrast could hardly have been struck, Dick and I said to each other. A meeting between the automobile, latest product of man’s restless invention, made to fly across states and continents, and the goat-herd whose knowledge of the world might extend ten miles beyond the place where, since his birth, he had carried on one of the most ancient occupations on the globe. So the ages seemed united, and Virgil and Theocritus brought suddenly face to face with Maeterlinck and Henley; and an instant later we had taken a small excursion into the middle ages of superstition. Pilar told us gravely that in a volume of “Dreams and Love Lore,” valued beyond all other books by the young girls of Andalucía, one read that it brought good luck to lovers to meet a flock of goats when starting on a journey in the morning.
Thus encouraged to hope for what I dared not expect, we set off, again and again finding ourselves hard put to it to get the long chassis of the Gloria round sharp corners of narrow streets. More than once it could be done only by backing the car, a feat which was witnessed with cries of astonishment by a crowd of water-sellers with painted tin vessels, milkmen on donkey back, knife-grinders, and Murillo cherubs who were following to see us off. Thus attended we slid down the steep hill which twisted past the old fortifications of Toledo, and brought us out at last upon the Puente de Alcántara, that most wonderful bridge of all the world.