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Mercedes! daughter! are you mad to linger so?
Nay, father, it is you who are mad to come back.
We were nearly a mile from the village when I missed you and the child. I had stopped at your cottage, and found no one. I thought you were with those who had started at sunrise.
Nay, I brought Chiquita here last night when I heard the French were coming.
Quick, Mercedes! there is not an instant to waste.
Then hasten, Padre Joséf, while there is yet time.
And you, child?
I shall stay.
Listen to her, Sainted Virgin! she will stay, and the French bloodhounds at our very heels!
Could I leave old Ursula, and she not able to lift foot? Think you — my own flesh and blood!
Ah, cielo! true. They have forgotten her, the cowards! and now it is too late. God willed it — santificado sea tu nombre!
The poor grandmother! she thinks it is a saint's day.
What is life or death to her whose soul is otherwhere? What is a second more or less to the leaf that clings to a shrunken bough? But you, Mercedes, the long summer smiles for such as you. Think of yourself, think of Chiquita. Come with me, child, come!
Ay, ay, go with the good padre, dear. There is dancing on the plaza. The gitanos are there, mayhap. I hear the music. I had ever an ear for tamborines and castanets. When I was a slip of a girl I used to foot it with the best in the cachuca and the bolera. I was a merry jade, Mercedes—a merry jade. Wear your broidered garters, dear.
She hears music.
You are mad, Mercedes. They will murder you all.
They will not have the heart to harm Chiquita, nor me, perchance, for her sake.
They have no hearts, these Frenchmen. Ah, Mercedes, do you not know better than most that a Frenchman has no heart?
I know nothing. I shall stay. Is life so sweet to me? Go, Padre Joséf. What could save you if they found you here? Not your priest's gown.
You will follow, my daughter?
No.
I beseech you!
No.
Then you are lost!
Nay, padrino, God is everywhere. Have you not yourself said it? Lay your hands for a moment on my head, as you used to do when I was a little child, and go —go!
Thou wert ever a wilful girl, Mercedes.
O, say not so; but quick — your blessing, quick!
Á Dios....