zita mia!"
until the words became a kind of crooning. Then he would break forth
again, entreating, commanding, "Your Mercy will let me see her? Senor,
you _will_ let me see her!"

At the first note of intrusion Lopez had brought the pommel of his sword
down upon the box in front of him. But the syllables of the girl's name
seemed to get into his memory, and he began to stare with a puzzled
frown at the half-crazed old man. Lifting his eyes, he met Tiburcio's,
and Tiburcio himself nodded in some deep hidden significance. Lopez
straightened abruptly, as at an astounding revelation.

"Tell me, Senor Murguia," he said, "your daughter--Yes, yes, man, you
shall see her!--But listen, what is she like? Has she large black eyes?
Does she wear red sometimes? Come, senor, answer!"

The father gazed, wonderingly, jealously. How should an elegant officer
from the City and the Court know aught of Maria de la Luz?

Tiburcio crept behind the sofa, and bending to Lopez's ear, he
whispered, "Si, si, mi coronel, she is the one you have in mind, and she
is his daughter."

Lopez swung round and searched the blackmailer's face. "And now----"

"You will let him come," said Tiburcio. "But bring two guards. And have
four others with--well, with a stretcher."

Again Lopez searched the dark crescent that was Tiburcio's eye, and
again Tiburcio nodded with deep significance. "Bring him," he repeated,
"but tell him nothing. Seeing will be enough."

Murguia went, unknowing. He would see her, thanks to some freakish
kindness in Don Tiburcio. He was torn between the joy of the meeting and
the sharp grief of the parting that must follow. At the time he never
noticed that they led him up the chapel walk instead of toward the
hacienda house. Tiburcio was ahead with a lantern, but when near the top
of the hill he turned back to them, yet not before the expectant Lopez
had seen a black something on the pavement under the swinging light.

"You first, mi coronel," said Tiburcio.

"I, you mean!" cried Murguia, "I, senor!"

"But we wish to see first if she is here," said Lopez. "Don Tiburcio
thought she might be at vespers."

"Vespers? There are no vespers to-night. Yet we come here! Why? Why do
we come here?"

Tiburcio motioned to the guards. "Hold him until we return," he ordered.

A Dragoon reached out a hand indifferently to Murguia's collar, and that
second the old man's ten fingers were at his throat. They overpowered
him at last, but the