Page:The Valley of Adventure (1926).pdf/250

 time of unrest. Hold the candle to light him, Juan."

"Doña Magdalena!" Juan spoke her name in soft surprise as he opened the door, the candle in his hand.

"I saw by your window that you were not asleep, Padre Ignacio," Doña Magdalena said. Her great dark eyes sparkled like the eyes of a wild creature in the light; her face seemed hollow and gaunt, with shadows in her cheeks. She looked as if she had come from a troubled vigil, her unbound hair in slight disorder, a few strands of it sweeping her face. She stood in the embarrassment of unexpected discovery, having paused indecisively a moment at the door, its sudden opening revealing her in the troubled state between appeal and flight.

"What is it that brings you from your bed at this hour, my daughter?" Padre Ignacio inquired of her gently.

"Don Geronimo," she said, and paused, lifting her great eyes. She moistened her lips, as if they burned, fright, and something more than fright, a horrible questioning, it seemed to Juan, in her face as she looked at him.

"Has his wound broken, is he sick?" Padre Ignacio asked.

"He heard a commotion among the horses in the corral, it must have been two hours ago," she said. "He went out. He has not come back!"

"He is overdoing himself, I warned him," Padre Ignacio said, out of patience with the mayordomo.