Letters came and went, and in the Christmas season Don Enrique found himself in Manila waiting for the good old _Ysla de Panay_ to bring his little girl to him. Many longing hearts have followed those old ships of the Spanish Mail in the days that are gone. For all this was long ago. Not long as you count, perhaps, but I have seen Doña Mercedes' eyes, and they told me that it happened long, long ago, when the world was very young indeed.
But the old ship did not bring Don Enrique his little girl, after all. I wish you might have seen the Doña Mercedes who did come. Your heart would have beaten as fast, I hope, as that of the spruce young lieutenant who almost let her fall as he was helping her into the launch, and retired quite as full of confusion and blushes and speechlessness as if he had never worn shoulder-straps and a smart small-sword, and been aide-de-camp to his Excellency the Gobernador-General. For Doña Mercedes was tall and slight, with all the stateliness of her house, and her head was poised like a queen's on her slender neck, and her little, high-arched feet seemed scarce to touch the deck. Yet it was not the proud lady who made the young lieutenant's hand unsteady--he lived and moved among proud ladies,--it was the eyes of the young girl. For Doña Mercedes still looked out on the world from the shelter of her convent window, with such a gentle, timid, inquiring smile in the depths of her great dark eyes that she was far more dangerous to the peace and happiness of his Majesty's forces than all the natives of the Philippines, with Cuba thrown in besides.
When Don Enrique saw the eyes of the stately lady who had come to him in place of his little girl, he was comforted, for so the little maid whom he gave to the Mother Superior had looked at him. And Tia Maria had good report to make.
"She is the best, dearest, kindest child in the world," said Tia Maria. "She is as good as the Virgin herself, and never has a fault. Only she will not keep her feet dry; and oh! Don Enrique, if you knew how I have to work to make her take care of her complexion--" I suppose old servants are the same all the world over.
So Don Enrique received his little girl, the very finest little girl in all the world, which is not surprising when you consider what a very great man her father was.