It was a most delightful promenade. High trees on either side, whose branches formed a green arcade above the heads of the promenaders. Beds of roses in profusion—brilliant tropical plants, bronze statues, marble statues, and plenty of pleasantly situated seats. One portion was reserved for those who chose to walk, another for horses and their riders. Hither came all the aristocracy of the city, when they grew weary of the zocala of the Plaza de los Hombres Ilustres, and on this day the alameda was crowded.
In a gaily decorated bandstand, an excellent company of musicians played bright music, mostly airs from comic operas, and Philip was amused to hear Offenbachian frivolities sounding in this spot. They seemed out of place. The musicians had no sense of the fitness of things. They should have played boleros fandangos—the national music of Spain—instead of which they jingled the trashy airs of minor musicians.
The alameda was thronged by a motley crowd, presenting more varied features than are to be seen in any other part of the world. Indian women squatting at the corners selling fruit and pulque, beautiful señoritas with black mantillas and eloquent fans, gay young cavaliers dashing along on spirited horses, in all the bravery of the national costume, and not seldom a sour-looking duenna, jealously watching her charge. Occasionally a priest in shovel-hat and black cassock—but these were very rare. The army was also represented by a number of gaily-dressed officers who smoked cigarettes, smiled at the señoritas, and clanked their huge spurs ostentatiously together. It was a gay scene, and Philip admired it greatly.
“I have never seen such a mixed crowd anywhere,” he said, lightly, “save in the Strada Reale in Valetta.”
“Well!” said Maraquando, after a pause, “and what do you think of Tlatonac?”
“It is a terrestrial Paradise,” replied Philip, “and Hypolito is the serpent.”
Chapter VII.
Dolores
Your eyes
Are dark as midnight skies,
And bright as midnight stars,
Their glance
Is full of love’s romance,
When no hate loving mars.
Oh let those eyes look down on me,
Oh let those glances wander free,
And I will take those stars to be
My guides for life,
Across the ocean of wild strife,
Dolores!
My heart
Those looks have rent apart,
And now ‘tis torn in twain;
Oh take
That broken heart, and make
With kiss it whole again;
Oh lightly from thy lattice bend,
Give but a smile, and it will mend,
Then love will love be till we end
Our life of tears,
For some sweet life in yonder spheres,
Dolores!
The next day Jack came back with Dolores and Doña Serafina. He was puffed up with exceeding pride at his good fortune, for it is not every young man in Central America who gets a chance of talking unreservedly with the girl of his heart. The Cholacacans treat their women folk as do the Turks: shut them up from the insolent glances of other men, and only let them feel their power over the susceptible hearts of cavaliers at the yearly carnival. Jack never did approve of these Orientalisms, even in his days of heart-wholeness, and now that his future hinged on the smile of Dolores, he disapproved of such shuttings up more than ever.
Fortunately Don Miguel was not a Turk, and gave his womenfolk greater freedom than was usual in Tlatonac. Dolores and her cousin were not unused to masculine society, and Doña Serafina was the most good-natured of duennas. Consequently they saw a good deal of the creature man, and were correspondingly grateful for the seeing. Still, even in Cholacaca it is going too far to let a young unmarried fellow ride for many miles beside the caleza of two unmarried ladies. So far as Doña Serafina was concerned, it did not matter. She was old enough, and ugly enough, to be above suspicion; but Dolores—ah, ah!—the scandal-mongers of Tlatonac opened their black eyes, and whispered behind their black fans, when they heard of Don Miguel’s folly, of the Señor Americano’s audacity.
As a rule, Don Miguel, proud as Lucifer, would not have permitted Jack to escort his sister and niece in this way; but the prospect of a war had played havoc with social observances. Don Rafael was away, Don Miguel could not leave the capital, and the ladies certainly could not return by themselves, over bad roads infested by Indians. Thus, the affair admitted of some excuse, and Don Miguel was grateful to Jack for performing what should have been his duty. He did not know that the gratitude was all on the other side, and that Duval would have given years of his life for the pleasant journey, obtained with so little difficulty. If he had known—well, Don Miguel was not the most amiable of men, so there would probably have been trouble. As it was, however, the proud Spaniard knew nothing, not even as much as did the gossips of Tlatonac; so Jack duly arrived with his fair charges, and was duly thanked for his trouble by the grateful Maraquando. Fate was somewhat ironical in dealing with the matter.
That journey was a glimpse of Paradise to Jack, for he had Dolores all to himself. Doña Serafina, being asleep, did not count. A peon, with a long cigar, who was as stupid as a stone idol, drove the caleza containing the two ladies. Doña Serafina, overcome by her own stoutness, and the intense heat, slept heavily, and Jack, riding close to the carriage, flirted with Dolores. There was only one inconvenience about this arrangement—the lovers could not kiss one another.
It was a long way from the estancia, but Jack wished it was longer, so delightful was his conversation with Dolores. She sat in the caleza flirting her big fan, and cooing like a dove, when her lover said something unusually passionate. Sometimes she sent a flash of her dark eyes through the veil of her mantilla, and then Jack felt queer sensations about the region of the heart. A pleasant situation, yet tantalising, since it was all the “thou art so near and yet so far” business, with no caresses or kisses. When the journey came to an end, they were both half glad, half sorry; the former on account of their inability to come to close quarters, the latter, because they well knew they would not again get such a chance of unwatched courting.
Eulalia, who guessed all this pleasantness, received her cousin with a significant smile, and took her off to talk over the matter in the solitude of the bedroom they shared together. Don Miguel seized on his sleepy sister in order to extract from her a trustworthy report as to how things were at the estancia, and Jack departed to his own house, to announce his arrival and that of Dolores.
It was late in the afternoon, for the journey, commencing at dawn, had lasted till close on four o’clock, and Jack found his three friends enjoying their siestas. He woke them up, and began to talk Dolores. When he had talked himself hoarse, and Peter asleep, quoth Philip—
“What about the railway
