h the brown of her hair. From her mother she took a lithe
perfection of form. At two she was well started for a raving beauty, and
as much through his love for her as for Andrea, Paul had come, like
Bachelder, to swear by the Tewana women.
He might have been swearing by them yet, but his company's business
suddenly called him north, and no man could have bidden a white wife
more affectionate farewell or have been more sure of his own return. "It
is a comfort to know that your woman won't go gadding while you are
away, and that is more than a fellow can make sure of at home." These
were his last words to Bachelder.
He was to be absent two months, but after he had reported adversely on a
mine in Sonora, he was ordered to expert a group in far Guerrera, where
the mountains turn on edge and earth tosses in horrible tumult. Then
came a third order to report in New York for personal conference. Thus
the months did sums in simple addition while Andrea waited, serenely
confident of his return. Not that she lacked experience of deserted
wives, or based hope on her own attractions. Her furious mother love
simply could not form, much less harbor, the possibility of Paul's
deserting their pretty Lola.
And, barring her loneliness, the year was kind to her, feeding her
mother love with small social triumphs. For one, Lola was chosen to sit
with three other tots, the most beautiful of Tewana's children, at the
feet of the Virgin in the Theophany of the "Black Christ" at the eastern
fiesta. From morning to mirk midnight, it was a hard vigil. By day the
vaulted church reeked incense; by night a thousand candles guttered
under the dark arches, sorely afflicting small, weary eyelids; yet Lola
sat it out like a small thoroughbred, earning thereby the priest's
kindly pat and her mother's devoted worship.
Then, on her third saint day, the small girl donned her first fiesta
costume, a miniature of the heirlooms which descend from mother to
daughter, each generation striving to increase the magnificence of the
costume just as it strove to add to the gold pieces in the chain which
did triple duty as hoard, dowry and necklace. Andrea subtracted several
English sovereigns from her own to start Lola's, and, with the American
gold eagle, the gift of Bachelder, her _padrino_, godfather, they made
an affluent beginning for so small a girl. As for the costume? Its silk,
plush, velours, were worked by Andrea's clever fingers curiously and
wondr
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