ts and retainers was even more impressive. For once, it
seemed that the fortunes and traditions of the family were changed; the
female Guitierrez, instead of impoverishing the property, had augmented
it; the foreigner and intruder had been despoiled; the fate of La
Mision Perdida had been changed; the curse of Koorotora had proved a
blessing; his prophet and descendant, Pereo, the mayordomo, moved in an
atmosphere of superstitious adulation and respect among the domestics
and common people. This recognition of his power he received at times
with a certain exaltation of grandiloquent pride beyond the conception
of any but a Spanish servant, and at times with a certain dull, pained
vacancy of perception and an expression of frightened bewilderment
which also went far to establish his reputation as an unconscious seer
and thaumaturgist. "Thou seest," said Sanchez to the partly skeptical
Faquita, "he does not know more than an infant what is his power. That
is the proof of it." The Dona Maria alone did not participate in this
appreciation of Pereo, and when it was proposed that a feast or
celebration of rejoicing should be given under the old pear-tree by the
Indian's mound, her indignation was long remembered by those that
witnessed it. "It is not enough that we have been made ridiculous in
the past," she said to Maruja, "by the interference of this solemn
fool, but that the memory of our friend is to be insulted by his
generosity being made into a triumph of Pereo's idiotic ancestor. One
would have thought those coyotes and Koorotora's bones had been buried
with the cruel gossip of your relations"--(it had been the recent habit
of Dona Maria to allude to "the family" as being particularly related
to Maruja alone)--"over my poor friend. Let him beware that his
ancestor's mound is not uprooted with the pear-tree, and his heathenish
temple destroyed. If, as the engineer says, a branch of the new
railroad can be established for La Mision Perdida, I agree with him
that it can better pass at that point with less sacrifice to the
domain. It is the one uncultivated part of the park, and lies at the
proper angle."

"You surely would not consent to this, my mother?" said Maruja, with a
sudden impression of a newly found force in her mother's character.

"Why not, child?" said the relict of Mr. Saltonstall and the mourner of
Dr. West, coldly. "I admit it was discreet of thee in old times to
have thy sentimental passages t