Page:The Valley of Adventure (1926).pdf/177

 "Will you enter, Don Juan, and see the class at work?"

"I am only passing, Miss Gertrudis, there is a new liberty for my feet today. You have heard that the soldiers are gone?"

"I saw them ride away at sunrise, thank God!"

"So I can cross the road now, without fear of the dogs," he laughed, shifting his feet like a bashful swain, his eyes now on the path, now on her face, now on the hills, varying as the seed of an alamo blown on its feathery wings.

"Be watchful, Don Juan! How can you go with a laugh when there is so much peril? They may be waiting for you to appear, as before."

"No, there is no pretense this time; they are gone."

"Doña Magdalena says it is a plot to humble the padres. They believe the Indians will rise."

"Never against the padres."

"Against the soldiers themselves, or perhaps against the authority of Don Geronimo?"

"Who knows?" Juan returned her the Spanish answer, making an exposition of entire neutrality of mind with his outspread hands, facile as he was in that mode of expression from long use of sign language among savage neighbors and foes in the forests of Kentucky.

"But why will you cross the road this morning, Don Juan? Captain del Valle is a man who will not accept defeat; he may be waiting around the wall."