I must talk with thee before thou seest Don Juan; that is why I ran to intercept thee, and not as that fool Antonio would signify, to shame thee.

Wast thou ashamed, my Pancho ?" The boy threw his arm familiarly round the supple, stayless little waist, accented only by the belt of the light flounced saya, and said, "But why this haste and feverishness, 'Nita?
And now I look at thee, thou hast been crying." They had emerged from a door in the corridor into the bright sunlight of a walled garden.

The girl dropped her eyes, cast a quick glance around her, and said,-- "Not here, to the arroyo," and half leading, half dragging him, made her way through a copse of manzanita and alder until they heard the faint tinkling of water.

"Dost thou remember," said the girl, "it was here," pointing to an embayed pool in the dark current, "that I baptized thee, when Father Pedro first brought thee here, when we both played at being monks?
They were dear old days, for Father Pedro would trust no one with thee but me, and always kept us near him." "Aye and he said I would be profaned by the touch of any other, and so himself always washed and dressed me, and made my bed near his." "And took thee away again, and I saw thee not till thou camest with Antonio, over a year ago, to the cattle branding.

And now, my Pancho, I may never see thee again." She buried her face in her hands and sobbed aloud.
The little acolyte tried to comfort her, but with such abstraction of manner and inadequacy of warmth that she hastily removed his caressing hand.
"But why?
What has happened ?" he asked eagerly.
The girl's manner had changed.