ide he recovered his mandolin and his shoe. He was tired
with the weariness of defeated dreams that slept in his spirit
exhausted, rather than with any fatigue his young muscles had from the
journey. He needed sleep; he looked at the shuttered houses; then at
the soft dust of the road in which dogs lay during the daylight. But
the dust was near to his mood, so he lay down where he had fought the
unknown hidalgo. A light wind wandered the street like a visitor come
to the village out of a friendly valley, but Rodriguez' four days on
the roads had made him familiar with all wandering things, and the
breeze on his forehead troubled him not at all: before it had wearied
of wandering in the night Rodriguez had fallen asleep. Just by the edge
of sleep, upon which side he knew not, he heard the window of the
balcony creak, and looked up wide awake all in a moment. But nothing
stirred in the darkness of the balcony and the window was fast shut. So
whatever sound came from the window came not from its opening but
shutting: for a while he wondered; and then his tired thoughts rested,
and that was sleep.

A light rain woke Rodriguez, drizzling upon his face; the first light
rain that had fallen in a romantic tale. Storms there had been, lashing
oaks to terrific shapes seen at night by flashes of lightning, through
which villains rode abroad or heroes sought shelter at midnight;
hurricanes there had been, flapping huge cloaks, fierce hail and
copious snow; but until now no drizzle. It was morning; dawn was old;
and pale and grey and unhappy.

The balcony above him, still empty, scarcely even held romance now.
Rain dripped from it sadly. Its cheerless bareness seemed worse than
the most sinister shadows of night.

And then Rodriguez saw a rose lying on the ground beside him. And for
all the dreams, fancies, and hopes that leaped up in Rodriguez' mind,
rising and falling and fading, one thing alone he knew and all the rest
was mystery: the rose had lain there before the rain had fallen.
Beneath the rose was white dust, while all around it the dust was
turning grey with rain.

Rodriguez tried to guess how long the rain had fallen. The rose may
have lain beside him all night long. But the shadows of mystery receded
no farther than this one fact that the rose was there before the rain
began. No sign of any kind came from the house.

Rodriguez put the rose safe under his coat, wrapped in the kerchief
that had guarded the mandolin,