Wood Rangers: The Trappers of Sonora

At this name, which was unknown to the young girl, and which at once destroyed her pleasant delusions, she pressed her hand upon her heart, her lips became white, and the colour which hope had revived in her cheek faded away. She could only repeat mechanically.

“Fabian!”

At this moment the recital was interrupted by the entrance of a servant. The Chaplain begged the haciendado to come to him for an instant, upon some business he had to communicate to him.

Don Augustin quitted the apartment, saying that he should speedily return.

Gayferos and the young girl were now left alone; the former observed her some moments in silence, and with a delight he could scarcely conceal, saw that Rosarita trembled beneath the folds of her silk scarf. By a secret feeling the poor child divined that Gayferos had not yet finished. At length the latter said gently, “Fabian bore another name, Señorita; do you wish to hear it, while we are alone and without witnesses?”

Rosarita turned pale.

“Another name! oh, speak it?” she cried, in a trembling voice.

“He was long known as Tiburcio Arellanos.”

A cry of joy escaped the young girl, who rose from her seat, and approaching the bearer of this good news, seized his hand.

“Thanks! thanks!” she exclaimed, “if my heart has not already spoken them.”

Then she tottered across the chamber, and knelt at the feet of a Madonna, which, framed in gold, hung against the wall.

“Tiburcio Arellanos,” continued the narrator, “is now Fabian, and Fabian is the last descendant of the Counts of Mediana – a noble and powerful Spanish family.”

The young girl continued on her knees in prayer without appearing to listen to Gayferos’ words.

“Immense possessions, a lofty name, titles and honours. All these he will lay at the feet of the woman who shall accept his hand.”

The young girl continued her fervent prayer without turning her head.

“And, moreover,” resumed the narrator, “the heart of Don Fabian de Mediana still retains a feeling which was dear to the heart of Tiburcio Arellanos.”

Rosarita paused in her prayer.

“Tiburcio Arellanos will be here to-night.”

This time the young girl no longer prayed. It was Tiburcio and not Fabian, Count of Mediana. Tiburcio, poor, and unknown, for whom she had wept. At the sound of this name, she listened. Honours, titles, wealth. What were they to her? Fabian lived, and loved her still, what more could she desire?

“If you will come to the breach in the wall, where, full of despair, he parted from you, you will find him there this very evening. Do you remember the place?”

“Oh! my God!” she murmured, softly, “do I not visit it every evening?”

And once more bending before the image of the Virgin, Rosarita resumed her interrupted prayer.

The adventurer contemplated for some instants this enthusiastic and beautiful creature, her scarf partly concealing her figure, her nude shoulders caressed by the long tresses of her dark hair, which fell in soft rings upon their surface; then without interrupting her devotion, he rose from his seat and silently fitted the chamber.

Chapter Fifty Four

The Return

When Don Augustin Peña returned, he found his daughter alone, and still kneeling; he waited until her prayer was finished. The news of Don Estevan’s death so entirely occupied the haciendado’s mind that he naturally attributed Doña Rosarita’s pious action to another motive than the true one. He believed that she was offering up to Heaven a fervent prayer for the repose of his spirit, whose mysterious end they had just been made acquainted with.

“Every day,” said he, “during the following year, the Chaplain will, by my orders, say a mass for Don Estevan’s soul, for this man spake of the justice of God, which was accomplished in the desert. These words are serious, and the manner with which they were pronounced, leaves no doubt as to their veracity.”

“May God pardon him!” replied Rosarita, rising from her knees, “and grant him the mercy he requires.”

“May God pardon him!” repeated Don Augustin, earnestly, “the noble Don Estevan was no ordinary man, or rather, that you may now know it, Rosarita, Don Antonia de Mediana, who, in his lifetime, was Knight of the Grand Cross, and Duke de Armada.”

“Mediana, did you say, my father?” cried the young girl, “what! he must then be his son?”

“Of whom do you speak?” asked Don Augustin, in astonishment, “Don Antonio was never married. What can you mean?”

“Nothing, my father, unless it be that your daughter is to-day very happy.”

As she said these words, Doña Rosarita threw her arms round her father’s neck, and leaning her head upon his breast burst into a passion of tears; but in these tears there was no bitterness, they flowed softly, like the dew which the American jasmine sheds in the morning from its purple flowers.

The haciendado, but little versed in the knowledge of the female heart, misconstrued the tears, which are sometimes a luxury to women; and he could conceive nothing of the happiness which was drawing them from his daughter’s eyes.

He questioned her anew, but she contented herself with answering, while her lips were parted by a smile, and her eyes were still moist.

“To-morrow I shall tell you all, my father.”

The good haciendado did indeed require the explanation of this mystery, when he was left in ignorance of the chief fact concerning it.

“We have another duty to fulfil,” continued he; “the last wish expressed by Don Antonio, on parting from me, was that you should be united to the Senator Tragaduros. It will be in compliance with the request of one who is now no more, that this marriage should no longer be delayed. Do you see any obstacle to it, Rosarita?”

The young girl started at these words, which reminded her of the fatal engagement she had sought to banish from memory. Her bosom swelled, and her tears flowed afresh.

“Well,” said the haciendado, smiling, “this is another proof of happiness, is it not?”

“Of happiness!” repeated Rosarita, bitterly. “Oh! no, no, my father!”

Don Augustin was now more puzzled than ever; for, as he himself alleged, his life had been spent more in studying the artifices of Indians, with whom he had long disputed his domain, than in diving into the hearts of women.

“Oh, my father!” cried Rosarita, “this marriage would now prove a sentence of death to your poor child!”

At this sudden declaration, which he had not expected, Don Augustin was quite stupefied, and it was with difficulty he subdued the anger to which it had given rise.

“What!” he cried with some warmth, “did you not yourself consent to this marriage only a month ago? Did you not agree that it should be consummated when we knew that Don Estevan could not return? He is dead; what then do you wish?”

“It is true, father; I did fix that period, but – ”

“Well!”

“But I did not know that he still lived.”

“Don Antonio de Mediana?”

“No; Don Fabian de Mediana,” replied Rosarita, in a low voice.