"Doña, I--do--not--know." The words came out as if they were being dragged from her. Poor Juanita would have liked the ground to open up and swallow her.
"Don't you know, you little stupid, that he is playing with you, that he will not marry you?"
"If Doña Valencia says so," murmured the Mexican submissively.
"Men are that way, heartless ... selfish ... vain. But I suppose you led him on," concluded Valencia cruelly.
With a little flare of spirit Juanita looked up. Her courage was for her friend, not for herself.
"Señor Gordon is good. He is kind."
"A lot you know about it, child. Have nothing to do with him. His love can only hurt a girl like you. Go back to your Pablo and forget the American. I will see he does not trouble you again."
Juanita began to cry again. She did not want Señorita Valdés or anybody else interfering between her and the friend she had nursed. But she knew she could not stop this imperative young woman from doing as she pleased.
"Now tell me how you know that Pablo has gone to injure the American. Did he tell you so?"
"No-o."
"Well, what did he say? What is it that you know?" Valencia's shoe tapped the floor impatiently. "Tell me--tell me!"
"He--Pablo--met me at the corral the day he left. I was in the kitchen and he whistled to me." Juanita gave the information sullenly. Why should Señorita Valdés treat her so harshly? She had done no wrong.
"Yes. Go on!"
If she had had the force of character Juanita would have turned on her heel and walked away. But all her life it had been impressed upon her that the will of a Valdés was law to her and her class.
"I do not know ... Pablo told me nothing ... but he laughed at me, oh, so cruelly! He asked if I ... had any messages for my Gringo lover."
"Is that all?"
"All ... except that he would show me what happened to foreign devils who stole my love from him. Oh, Señorita, do you think he will kill the American?"
Valencia, her white lips pressed tightly together, gave no answer. She was thinking.
"I hate Pablo. He is wicked. I will never speak to him again," moaned Juanita helplessly.
Manuel, coming out of the post-office with his mail, looked at the weeping girl incuriously. It was, he happened to know, a habit of the sex to cry over trifles.
Juanita found in a little nod from Miss Valdés permission to leave. She turned and walked hurriedly away to the adobe cabin where she slept. Before she reached it the walk had become a run.