The Pirates of the Prairies Part 43

"Nothing; but I wish to speak a few minutes with the Spanish girl."

"All right."

The two men pushed on with the maiden, and Valentine took his place on the right of the Gazelle, who was riding thoughtfully, without paying any attention to her horse.

The revelations made by Curumilla had the more struck Valentine, because he did not at all comprehend the Gazelle's hatred of Ellen. Every feeling must have its reason, every hatred a cause; and both these escaped him. In vain did he seek in his memory a fact which might account for, if not excuse, the strange conduct of White Gazelle; he found nothing that would put him on the right track.

He recalled to mind that he had seen the girl several times in the vicinity of Don Miguel de Zarate's hacienda, at the Paso del Norte; he also remembered that Don Pablo had done her a slight service, when she craved his help, but her relations with the hacendero's son had terminated there.

He believed it certain that, although Red Cedar's daughter lived near the hacienda, the Gazelle had never seen her before they met at the Indian village. Still, as he knew Don Pablo's love for Ellen, a love of which the young man had never spoken to him, but which he had long seen; as, too, the position was grave, and Ellen might at any moment fall into danger, which must be avoided at any cost, Valentine resolved to have a conversation with the Spanish girl, and try to read clearly in her heart, were that possible.

But if gentle means failed, he would show her no indulgence, or let a gentle and unoffending creature be exposed to the perfidy of a cruel woman, whom no consideration seemed to arrest in her sinister plans.

Valentine looked round. Ellen was about two hundred yards ahead, between Eagle-wing and Don Pablo. Temporarily rea.s.sured, he turned to the Spanish girl, who at this moment was talking eagerly, and in a loud voice, with Pedro Sandoval. The girl blushed, and ceased speaking.

Valentine, not appearing to notice the confusion his presence caused the speakers, bowed slightly to the Spaniard, and addressed her in a calm voice:--

"I beg your pardon," he said, "if I interrupt a doubtless interesting conversation; but I wish to have a few words with you."

The girl blushed still more deeply. Her black eye flashed fire under the long lash that veiled it, but she answered in a trembling voice, as she stopped her horse--

"I am ready to listen to you, senor caballero."

"Do not stop, I beg, senora," Valentine said. "This worthy man, who doubtless shares all your secrets," he added, with an ironical smile, "can hear our conversation, which, indeed, will relate to him."

"In truth," the girl answered, in a firmer voice, as she let her horse proceed, "I have nothing hidden from this worthy man, as you do him the honour of calling him."

"Very good, senora," the hunter continued with equal coldness. "Now, be good enough not to take in ill part what I am about to say to you, and answer a question I shall take the liberty of asking you."

"I presume you intend me to undergo an interrogation?"

"That is not my intention, at least at this moment; it will depend on you, madam, that we do not pa.s.s the limits of a friendly conversation."

"Speak, sir. If the question you ask me is one of those a woman may answer, I will satisfy you."

"Be good enough to tell me, madam, whether you found us cruel enemies last night?"

"Why this question?"

"Be so kind as to answer it first."

"I can only speak in terms of praise of your conduct."

"I thank you. And how did Miss Ellen treat you?"

"Admirably."

"Good. You are not ignorant, I think, that through your yesterday's aggression, an aggression which may be regarded as attempted murder and robbery, since, as you are not at war with the Indians, and as, belonging to our race, should regard us as friends--you are not ignorant, I say, that you have rendered yourself amenable to the prairie law, which says, 'an eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth.'"

"What do you wish to arrive at?"

"Pardon me. You are not ignorant, I a.s.sume, that, instead of treating you as I did, with the most perfect respect, I should have been quite justified in pa.s.sing a rope round your neck, and hanging you, with your worthy friend, to the branches of the first tree: and there are some magnificent specimens in these parts!"

"Sir!" the girl exclaimed, as she drew herself up, and became livid with fury.

"Pardon me," Valentine continued impressively. "I am alluding here to an incontestable right, which you cannot deny: do not get in a pa.s.sion, but answer me categorically, yes, or no."

"Well, sir, yes; you had that right, and you still have it. What checks you? Why do you not use it?" she added, as she gave him a defiant look.

"Because it does not suit me to do so at this moment," Valentine said, coldly and drily.

These stern words suddenly checked the pa.s.sion that was boiling in the girl's heart: she let her eyes fall, and replied:--

"Is that all you have to say to me?"

"No, it is not all; and I have a final question to ask you."

"Speak, sir, as I am condemned to listen to you."

"I will not occupy much of your time."

"Oh, sir," she answered ironically, "my time cannot be employed better than in conversing with so polished a gentleman as yourself."

"I thank you for the good opinion you are kind enough to have of a poor hunter like myself," he replied, with a tinge of sarcasm; "and I now reach the second question I wished to ask you."

"In truth, it seems, sir, that like the _juces de letras_, your accomplices," she added bitterly, "you have cla.s.sified in your head the questions that compose my examination: for, in spite of what you did me the honour of telling me, I persist in seeing only an examination in what it pleases you to call our conversation."

"As you please, madam," Valentine replied with imperturbable coolness.

"Will you explain to me how it is, that, after having been treated, according to your own statement, by us so kindly, you laid aside all grat.i.tude and feelings of honour last night, to join two villains in a plot for carrying off a girl to whom you owe your life, and handing her over as a slave to the most ferocious Indians on the prairies--the Sioux?"

CHAPTER XXIX.

THE AMBUSCADE.

If the lightning had struck the ground at the Spanish girl's feet, it would not have caused her greater terror than this revelation, which she was far from expecting, made in a dear, dry, and unmoved voice.

Her features were contracted--the blood mounted to her head--she tottered on her horse, and would have fallen off, had not Valentine held her. But overcoming by the strength of her will the terrible emotion that troubled her, she repulsed the young man, saying in a firm voice, and with an implacable accent:

"You are well informed, sir; such is my intention."

Valentine felt momentarily stupefied. He regarded this woman, who had hardly emerged from childhood, whose lovely features, distorted by the pa.s.sions that agitated them, had become almost hideous: he recalled, as in a dream, another woman nearly as cruel whom he had once known. An indescribable feeling of sorrow pervaded his heart at the terrible reminiscence thus suddenly evoked. So much perfidity seemed to him to go beyond the limits of human wickedness; and for an instant he almost fancied himself in the presence of a demon.

"And you dare confess it to me?" he at length said, with badly concealed terror.

"And why not? What can you do to me? Kill me! A glorious revenge for a brave man! And, besides, what do I care for life? Who knows? perhaps, without wis.h.i.+ng it, and fancying you are punis.h.i.+ng me, you would do me an uncommon service by killing me."