When Coronado proposed to Clara, she was for a moment stricken dumb with astonishment and with something like terror.

Her first idea was that she must take him; that the mere fact of a man asking for her gave him a species of right over her; that there was no such thing possible as answering, No.  She sat looking at Coronado with a helpless, timorous air, very much as a child looks at his father, when the father, switching his rattan, says, “Come with me.”

On recovering herself a little, her first words—­uttered slowly, in a tone of surprise and of involuntary reproach—­were, “Oh, Coronado!  I did not expect this.”

“Can’t you answer me?” he asked in a voice which was honestly tremulous with emotion.  “Can’t you say yes?”

“Oh, Coronado!” repeated Clara, a good deal touched by his agitation.

“Can’t you?” he pleaded.  Repetitions, in such cases, are so natural and so potent.

“Let me think, Coronado,” she implored.  “I can’t answer you now.  You have taken me so by surprise!”

“Every moment that you take to think is torture to me,” he pleaded, as he continued to press her.

Perhaps she was on the point of giving way before his insistence.  Consider the advantages that he had over her in this struggle of wills for the mastery.  He was older by ten years; he possessed both the adroitness of self-command and the energy of passion; he had a long experience in love matters, while she had none.  He was the proclaimed heir of a man reputed wealthy, and could therefore, as she believed, support her handsomely.  Since the death of her father she considered Garcia the head of her family in New Mexico; and Coronado had had the face to tell her that he made his offer with the approval of Garcia.  Then she was under supposed obligations to him, and he was to be her protector across the desert.

She was as it were reeling in her saddle, when a truly Spanish idea saved her.

“Munoz!” she exclaimed.  “Coronado, you forget my grandfather.  He should know of this.”

Although the man was unaccustomed to start, he drew back as if a ghost had confronted him; and even when he recovered from his transitory emotion, he did not at first know how to answer her.  It would not do to say, “Munoz is dead,” and much less to add, “You are his heir.”

“We are Americans,” he at last argued.  “Spanish customs are dead and buried.  Can’t you speak for yourself on a matter which concerns you and me alone?”

“Coronado, I think it would not be right,” she replied, holding firmly to her position.  “It is probable that my grandfather would be better pleased to have this matter referred to him.  I ought to consider him, and you must let me do so.”

“I submit,” he bowed, seeing that there was no help for it, and deciding to make a grace of necessity.  “It pains me, but I submit.  Let me hope that you will not let this pass from your mind.  Some day, when it is proper, I shall speak again.”