"; and, possibly he might have said, "Ha! ha!" But,
being a practical, good-natured, selfish rascal, not much better or
worse than his neighbors, he sat himself down at his desk and began to
carefully consider how HE could best make use of the memoranda jotted
down by Dr. West of the proofs of the existence of his son, and the
consequent discovery of a legal heir to his property.

CHAPTER VIII

When Faquita had made sure that her young mistress was so securely
closeted with Dona Maria that morning as to be inaccessible to curious
eyes and ears, she saw fit to bewail to her fellow-servants this
further evidence of the decay of the old feudal and patriarchal mutual
family confidences. "Time was, thou rememberest, Pepita, when an
affair of this kind was openly discussed at chocolate with everybody
present, and before us all. When Joaquin Padilla was shot at Monterey,
it was the Dona herself who told us, who read aloud the letters
describing it and the bullet-holes in his clothes, and made it quite a
gala-day--and he was a first-cousin of Guitierrez. And now, when this
American goat of a doctor is kicked to death by a mule, the family must
shut themselves up, that never a question is asked or answered." "Ay,"
responded Pepita; "and as regards that, Sanchez there knows as much as
they do, for it was he that almost saw the whole affair."

"How?--sawest it?" inquired Faquita, eagerly.

"Why, was it not he that was bringing home Pereo, who had been lying in
one of his trances or visions--blessed St. Antonio preserve us!" said
Pepita, hastily crossing herself--"on Kooratora's grave, when the
Doctor's mustang charged down upon them like a wild bull, and the
Doctor's foot half out of the stirrups, and he not yet fast in his
seat. And Pereo laughs a wild laugh and says: 'Watch if the coyote
does not drag yet at his mustang's heels;' and Sanchez ran and watched
the Doctor out of sight, careering and galloping to his death!--ay, as
Pereo prophesied. For it was only half an hour afterward that Sanchez
again heard the tramp of his hoofs--as if it were here--and knowing it
two miles away--thou understandest, he said to himself: 'It is over.'"

The two women shuddered and crossed themselves.

"And what says Pereo of the fulfillment of his prophecy?" asked
Faquita, hugging herself in her shawl with a certain titillating shrug
of fascinating horror.

"It is even possible he understands it not. Thou knowest how dazed and
d