Beltran rode down to the coast to meet his young uncle and the child. He started early in the morning, riding the black. The groom led the roan for Uncle Noé's use, Pablo rode the spotted bull, and those peons who could be spared from the cacao planting walked over the two miles to the boat landing, to be ready to carry the luggage that the strange Se?or and the little girl would bring.

As Dulgado's fin-keel neared the shore, Beltran could not distinguish the occupants, for the sail hid them from view; but when the boat rounded to alongside the company's landing, and a sprightly old gentleman got out and turned to assist a young girl to climb up to the flooring of the wharf, Beltran discovered that Time had not broken his rule by standing still. On the contrary, he had broken his record by outstripping in the race all nature's winners, for the young uncle had become a thin little old man, and the child a charming girl in a very pronounced stage of young ladyhood.

"I should have known that my cousin could not be a little child," thought Beltran, as he removed[Pg 172] his old panama, wishing that he had worn the new one. His dress was careless, if picturesque, and he regretted that he had paid so little attention to it.

Notwithstanding his somewhat rough appearance, Beltran raised the perfumed mass of ruffles and lace in his strong arms. He seated the girl in the chair, fastened firmly to the straw aparejo on the back of the great bull. At Agueda's suggestion, he had provided a safe and comfortable seat for the little one, to whose coming Agueda was looking forward with such unalloyed pleasure.

The girl filled it no more completely than Beltran's vision of her younger self would have done, though her billowy laces overlapped the high arms of her chair. Her feet, scarce larger than those of a child, rested upon the broad, safe footboard which Beltran had swung at the side of the straw saddle. Her delicate face was framed in masses of fair hair—pale hair, with glints here and there like spun glass.

Beltran could hardly see her eyes, so shaded was her face by the broad hat, weighted down by its wealth of vari-colored roses. To many a Northern man, to whom style in a woman is a desideratum, Felisa would have looked like a garden-escape. She had a redundant sort of prettiness, but Beltran was not critical. What if her eyes were small, her nose the veriest tilted tip, her nostrils and mouth[Pg 173] large? The fluffy hair overhung the dark eyebrows, the red lips parted to show white little squirrel teeth, the delicate shell-like bloom on cheek and chin was adorable. It brought to Beltran's memory the old farm in Vermont where he had passed some summers as a lad, and the peach trees in the orchard. His environment had not provided him with a strictly critical taste. How fair she was! What a contrast to all the women to whom he had been accustomed! There was nothing like her in that swarthy land of dingy beauties. Her light and airy apparel was a revelation. Unconsciously Beltran compared it with the plain, straight skirts and blouse waists which he saw daily, and to its sudden and undeniable advantage. He was expecting to greet a little child, and all at once there appeared upon his near horizon a goddess full-blown. He had seen nothing in his experience by which he could gauge her. She passed as the purest of coin in this land of debased currency.

Her father, Uncle Noé, bestrode the roan which Eduardo Juan had brought over for him. When Don Noé was seated, Eduardo Juan gave him the bridle, and took his own place among the carriers of the luggage, which was greater in quantity than Don Beltran had expected. Eduardo Juan disappeared with a sulky scowl in answer to Pablo's contented grin, which said, "I have only to walk home,[Pg 174] guide the bull, and see that the Se?orita does not slip, while you—"

Pablo waited with patient servility, rope in hand, until the Se?orita was safely seated in her chair. There was a good deal of sprightly conversation among the Se?ores. There was more tightening of girths and questions as to the comfort of his guests by Don Beltran. Then the cavalcade started, Pablo leading the bull, which followed him docilely, with long strides. The animal, ignorant as are the creatures of the four-footed race, with regard to his power over its enemy, man, was obedient to the slightest twitch of the rope, to which his better judgment made him amenable. The long rope was fastened to the ring in his pink and dripping nostrils. He stretched his thick legs in long and steady strides, avoiding knowingly the deeper pools which he had heretofore aided his kind to fashion in the plastic clay of the forest path.

Beltran rode as near his cousin as the path would allow. It was seldom, however, that they could ride abreast.

It was the southern spring, and flowers were beginning to bloom, but Felisa looked in vain for the tropical varieties which one ever associates with that region. The bull almost brushed his great sides against the tree trunks which outlined the sendica. When she was close enough Felisa[Pg 175] stretched out her hand and plucked the blackened remains of a flower from the center of a tall plant. It had been scorched and dried by the sun of the summer that was passed. She thrust the withered stems into the bull's coarse hair, turned to Beltran, and laughed.

"If I remain long enough, there will be flowers of all colors, will there not, cousin? Flowers of blue and red and orange."

"You will remain, I hope, long after they have bloomed and died again," answered Beltran, gallantly.

They had not been riding long before Felisa sent forth from her lips an apprehensive scream. Beltran spurred his horse nearer.

"What is it, cousin? Is the silla slipping?"

Felisa looked up from under her cloud of spun silk, and answered:

"No, I am wondering how I am to get round that great tree."

Beltran, to whom the path was as well known as his own veranda at San Isidro, had no cause to turn his eyes from the charming face at his side.

"Oh! the trunk of the old mahogany? That has lain across the path for years. Do not be afraid, little cousin. Roncador has surmounted that difficulty more times than I can remember."

They were now close upon the fallen trunk.[Pg 176] Felisa closed her eyes and clutched at the bull's shaggy neck. She screamed faintly.

Pablo turned to the right and pulled at the leading rope, but the bull, with no apparent effort, stubborn only when he knew that he was in the right, turned to the left, and Pablo perforce followed. It was a case of the leader led. When Roncador had reached the point for which he had started, a bare place entirely denuded of branches, he lifted one thick foreleg over, then the other. The hind legs followed as easily, a slight humping of the great flanks, and the tree was left behind. Suddenly Felisa found that they were in the path again.

"Ze bull haave ze raight," commented Pablo. "Ah endeavo' taike de Se?orit' roun' de tre'. Bull ain' come. He know de bes' nor me." Don Beltran leaped his horse over the tree trunk, and Don Noé was taken over pale and trembling, whether or no, the roan following Don Beltran's lead. Beltran smiled openly at Pablo's discomfiture, and somewhat secretly at Uncle Noé's fear.

"A good little animal, that roan, Uncle Noé. How does he suit you?" Uncle Noé looked up and endeavoured to appear at ease, releasing his too tight clutch on the bridle.

"Il est rigolo, bien rigolo!" said Don Noé, gaily, between jerks occasioned by the liveliness of the[Pg 177] roan. He glanced sidewise at his nephew to see if the Paris argot which he had just imported had had any effect upon him. He owed Beltran something for his superior horsemanship. Beltran never having heard the new word, was, however, not willing to give Don Noé a modicum even of triumph. He was bending over, securing a buckle on his bridle. Without raising his figure, he answered, "C'est vrai, mon oncle, c'est tout à fait vrai, il est très, très rigolo."

"Très ha ha!" added Don Noé.

"Bien ha ha!" nodded Don Beltran, not to be left behind.

"What wretched French Beltran speaks!" said Don Noé to his daughter, later.

Uncle Noé belonged to that vast majority, the great army of the unemployed. He loved the gaieties of the world, the enjoyments that cities bring in their train. But sometimes nature calls a halt. Nature had whispered her warning in Don Noé's ear, and he at once had thought of the plantation of San Isidro as the place to rest from a too lavish expenditure of various sorts. He had come to this remote place for a purpose, but he yawned as they rode along.

Beltran, proud of the beauties of San Isidro, pointed out its chief features as they proceeded. He turned, and said, still in French, to please[Pg 178] Uncle Noé, and perhaps to show him that even at San Isidro all were not savages:

"There is much to be proud of, Uncle Noé. It is not a small place, when one knows it all."

"C'est vrai," again acquiesced Uncle Noé. "A la campagne il y a toujours beaucoup d'espace, beaucoup de tranquillité, beaucoup de verdure, et—" The rest of the sentence was lost on Beltran, but was whispered in the pink ear of Felisa, who laughed merrily.

"At what is my cousin laughing?" asked Beltran, turning, with a pleased smile. Uncle Noé did not answer. The words with which he had finished his sentence were, "et beaucoup d'ennui."

"You wanted to come," said Felisa, still laughing.

"Did you ever see such a God-forsaken place?" returned her father. "I had really forgotten how bad it was. Look at those ragged grooms. Imagine them in the Champs Elysées!"

"There can be no question of the Champs Elysées. How stupid you are, papa."

"And down in this valley! Just think of putting a house—I say, Beltran, who ever thought of putting your house down here in the valley?"

"It was my mother's wish," said Beltran. "I suppose that it was a mistake, but the river was further away in those days. It has changed its[............