Page:Romance & Reality 3.pdf/144

142 with a new and bitter feeling of deception. Hastily she collected together the few articles of value left: a chain of gold, a little ruby cross, her English Bible, and the unbroken sum of pistoles she had collected for her former journey. Fortunately, she met none of its other inmates as she left the house—she must have betrayed her purpose. It was at least three miles to the ilexes, but she proceeded with a light fleet step, and gained the appointed place. It was too late to retire unperceived, when she caught sight of the white veil of a female.

Her anxiety was but for a moment—the girl turned, and there was all the encouragement of youth, health, and good spirits, in the bright black eyes of Minora. "My father thought my absence would be less marked than his—so, if you will, Senhora, I am to be your guide to the poor old cave. Garcia and I were very happy there." A narrow, almost imperceptible path led them through the thickest of the wood. Two or three times they had to creep under boughs which, but for the ease with which they gave way, would seem never to have admitted a passage before. Suddenly the trees were broken