looking into each other's eyes, listening to the
frail sound. Then the prattle stopped. The child laid its head against
its mother's breast and was still.

"'It was for you,' he began. 'Forgive.' His voice failed him. Presently
I heard a mutter and caught the pitiful words: 'Not strong enough.'

"She looked at him with an extraordinary intensity. He tried to smile,
and in a humble tone, 'Forgive me,' he repeated. 'Leaving you . . .'

"She bent down, dry-eyed and in a steady voice: 'On all the earth I have
loved nothing but you, Gaspar,' she said.

"His head made a movement. His eyes revived. 'At last!' he sighed out.
Then, anxiously, 'But is this true . . . is this true?'

"'As true as that there is no mercy and justice in this world,' she
answered him, passionately. She stooped over his face. He tried to raise
his head, but it fell back, and when she kissed his lips he was already
dead. His glazed eyes stared at the sky, on which pink clouds floated
very high. But I noticed the eyelids of the child, pressed to its
mother's breast, droop and close slowly. She had gone to sleep.

"The widow of Gaspar Ruiz, the strong man, allowed me to lead her away
without shedding a tear.

"For travelling we had arranged for her a sidesaddle very much like a
chair, with a board swung beneath to rest her feet on. And the first day
she rode without uttering a word, and hardly for one moment turning her
eyes away from the little girl, whom she held on her knees. At our first
camp I saw her during the night walking about, rocking the child in
her arms and gazing down at it by the light of the moon. After we had
started on our second day's march she asked me how soon we should come
to the first village of the inhabited country.

"I said we should be there about noon.

"'And will there be women there?' she inquired.

"I told her that it was a large village. 'There will be men and women
there, senora,' I said, 'whose hearts shall be made glad by the news
that all the unrest and war is over now.'

"'Yes, it is all over now,' she repeated. Then, after a time: 'Senor
officer, what will your Government do with me?'

"'I do not know, senora,' I said. 'They will treat you well, no doubt.
We republicans are not savages and take no vengeance on women.'

"She gave me a look at the word 'republicans' which I imagined full of
undying hate. But an hour or so afterwards, as we drew up to let the
baggage mules go first along a narrow path sk