Page:Weird Tales Volume 9 Number 4 (1927-04).djvu/36

 with our meal, he arose, stretched, gave us a smile, and murmured, "I'm off! See you later!"

Darrell called after him, "Careful, Ned! That demon, you know!"

We were surprized by Connaughton's departure. All except Darrell, who shrugged and said in explanation: "It's always that way with him. Every few weeks. If it wasn't for the women, Connie would be one of the biggest men in the States in whatever line he cared. University man and all that. Had plenty of money to start with, but" He stopped himself as if he had said more than he intended. "Women! Huh!" he muttered.

"But, Señor Darrell!" Don Raman complained. "This Señor Connaughton—will he be back tomorrow to go up the Brazo with us?"

Darrell shook his head. "Don't know. He'll come back when he pleases. Perhaps tonight, perhaps not for a couple of weeks. Oh, don't worry about him! He'll catch up with us. Ned's always there when the divvy comes."

There was little to do that night except to loaf and talk and finally go to bed. Next day, too, we lolled around; except Arnheimer and Don Ramon, who were arranging for flat-boats and men to take us up the Brazo. Late in the afternoon Don Ramon told us he had got the boats. But we would have to do the poling ourselves, unless we eared to wait over for several days, since the morrow was some sort of church holiday. On feast days these people would not work.

"Well, a little perspiration will do us some good," Janis said reflectively. "Sweat some of this rotten alcohol out of our system and harden us for what is coming in the Gran Chaco."

Toward sunset the place began to fill up. The feast days and Sundays brought many people to the village, we were told, and, as in many other Catholic countries, celebration began the eve before the feast. The people were dressed in their best and were rather interesting. Lots of them were Spanish, Portuguese and Italian in origin, but most of them rather mixed in blood, I thought.

After our evening meal we were again seated around a table in the patio, all except Connaughton, who had not yet returned. But there were more people now, chatting, drinking, singing, and playing. Altogether it was getting lively. Occasionally there would be dances, solo or in pairs.

Somewhere near 9 o 'clock I noticed a young woman slip into the court through a small side entrance. Her movements were sinuous, reminding one of a cat, but remarkably graceful. A light mantilla was thrown over her head, so that we could not see her features. But sire was young, that was evident from her movements.

She sat down a few tables from us. With a flirt of her wrist she flung back the lace mantilla, and then we saw her face. When I tell you that I have never forgotten that face, you can imagine that it must have impressed me. To this day I see it vividly before me just as I saw it that night. Yet when I try to describe it, it evades me.

It was beautiful, there was no doubt about that, beautiful with that warmth and class of the high-bred Spanish type. To this was added something of the somber sadness of the Indian. Yet it seemed to me that there was also a certain wildness, a strange ferocity hidden there. Again, it seemed as if she were not quite a woman, since there was an incipient angularity about the jaws and forehead such as one finds in men in their late twenties and in women in their fifties.

Her figure, too, while slender and beautifully rounded, seemed