A girl's voice in the patio came softly through the dark in an old Spanish hymn. It was Juanita, and the service of prayer was ending in the usual duo; one of the vaqueros with a fine barytone voice was singing the echoing stanzas of praise.
It was the signal for dispersing, but the man at the couch did not know that. Neither did he know that the crouched form of the Indian was no longer in the hall. She was waiting in the dusk at the door, and she was clutching with a claw-like hand at the robe of the padre, and muttering, "He is there--it is true. He is there--and she is again bewitched. Now you will help me to kill the American?"
The padre looked at her sharply, and then motioned to Ana, who was close behind.
"Remain with the others. Make some excuse to keep them there--another hymn--anything. And be quick--quick!"
Startled though she was, Ana obeyed, and from the door of the hall he heard again the voice of Juanita; this time it was in a favorite known to all, and the volume of sound told him that Don Enrico himself was joining in the refrain, and that no one would leave the patio until the finale was reached.
No candle burned now in the hall. Polonia had blown it out, that no ray might enter the half-open door of the inner room. She would have gone with the padre, but the sudden vigorous grasp of his hand on her shoulder stopped her where she stood, and without a word being spoken, she knew better than to follow.
Quickly as a cat of the hills, the padre crossed the hall and stood where he could see the open window and the kneeling man, and the hand of Raquel on his bent head.
"Every night when the dusk comes it will be our time of the day," she was saying. "They told me you were dead, else--but you know. I think the mad hours have gone by for me; I can go on living if--if you do not forget."
The listening priest could not hear what the man said, but she heard, and smiled, and sighed.
"There is one thing," she said, hesitatingly: "the ring, you have worn it a year--and--"
"I know," and he lifted his head. "We need no visible emblem, you and I. I put it back on your finger, my lady of the spirit,--Doña Espiritu;--a pledge of renunciation, and a reminder of the rosary of the dusk."
