“Ah! so eet vas you, senorita!” she exclaimed, her voice betraying her emotion,—­“you, who come so dis night. Sapristi! vy you follow me dis vay?  By all de saints, I make you tell me dat!  You vant him, too?  You vant rob me of all thing?”

The visitor, startled by this sudden challenge, stood before her trembling from head to foot with the nervous excitement of her journey, yet her eyes remained darkly resolute.

“You recognize me,” she responded quickly, reaching out and touching the other with one hand, as if to make certain of her actual presence.  “Then for God’s sake do not waste time now in quarrelling.  I did not make this trip without a purpose.  ‘He,’ you say?  Who is he?  Who was it that rode away from here just now?  Not Farnham?”

Mercedes laughed a trifle uneasily, her eyes suddenly lowered before the other’s anxious scrutiny.

“Ah, no, senorita,” she answered softly.  “Eet surprises me mooch you not know; eet vas Senor Brown.”

Miss Norvell grasped her firmly by the shoulder.

“Brown?” she exclaimed eagerly.  “Stutter Brown?  Oh, call him back; cannot you call him back?”

The young Mexican shook her head, her white teeth gleaming, as she drew her shoulder free from the fingers clasping it.

“You vas too late, senorita,” she replied, sweetly confident.  “He vas already gone to de ‘Little Yankee.’  But he speak mooch to me first.”

“Much about what?”

“Vel, he say he lofe me—­he say eet straight, like eet vas vat he meant.”

“Oh!”

“Si, senorita; he not even talk funny, maybe he so excited he forgot how, hey?  An’ vat you tink dat he say den to Mercedes—­vat?”

The other shook her head, undecided, hesitating as to her own purpose.

“He ask me vould I marry him.  Si, si, vat you tink of dat—­me, Mercedes Morales, de dancer at de Gayety—­he ask me vould I marry him.  Oh, Mother of God!”

The young American stared at her upturned animated face, suddenly aroused to womanly interest.

“And what did you say?”

Mercedes stamped her foot savagely on the hard ground, her eyes glowing like coals of fire.

“You ask vat I say?  Saints of God! vat could I say?  He vas a good man, dat Senor Brown, but I—­I vas not a good voman.  I no tell him dat—­no! no!  I vas shamed; I get red, vite; I hardly speak at all; my heart thump so I tink maybe eet choke me up here, but I say no.  I say no once, tvice, tree time.  I tell him he big fool to tink like dat of me.  I tell him go vay an’ find voman of his own race—­good voman.  I tell him eet could nevah be me, no, nevah.”

“Then you do not love him?”

The puzzled dancer hesitated, her long lashes lowered, and outlined against her cheeks.

“Lofe?  Dat vas not nice vord as eet come to me.  I know not ver’ vell just vat.  Maybe if I not lofe him I marry him—­si; I no care den.  I make him to suffer, but not care; ees eet not so?  Anyhow, I—­vat you call dat?—­respect dis Senor Brown mooch, ver’ mooch.  Maybe dat last longer as lofe—­quien sabe?”