Page:Caroline Lockhart--The full of the Moon.djvu/206

 think of me. But I'll be back within the hour, just to relieve your mind."

Nan turned in the saddle and kissed her finger-tips lightly to her swarthy chaperon as she rode away.

She had been gone less than ten minutes when Rosario, running as for her life through Epiphanio Montejos's alfalfa field, looked with dismay in her eyes at the empty corral.

"The señorita!" Rosario wriggled through the window at the back of the dobe like an eel. "She is not here?"

Mrs. Gallagher waved her hand toward the plaza and Eosario began to cry.

"What you hear?" demanded Mrs. Gallagher.

"The Spain have lick the America!"

Mrs. Gallagher's face relaxed. Was that all? That was a small matter to cry about. She hunched her shoulders.

"I don't care."

"To-night they build big bonfire in the plaza to make glad. At first they talk they hamstring the señorita's horse." Mrs. Gallagher stopped rolling a cigarette and turned her head quickly.