“What a distance you have walked to gather lilies, Monica!” I said, approaching her. “Will you give me one of your stalks?”
“They were gathered for the Virgin, so I cannot give away any of these,” she replied. “If you will wait here under the trees I will find one to give you.”
I agreed to wait for her; then, placing the cluster she had gathered on the grass, she left me. Before long she returned with a stalk, round, polished, slender, like a pipe-stem, and crowned with its cluster of three splendid crimson flowers.
When I had sufficiently thanked her and admired it, I said, “What boon are you going to ask from the Virgin, Monica, when you offer her these flowers—safety for your lover in the wars?”
“No, señor; I have no offering to make, and no boon to ask. They are for my aunt; I offered to gather them for her, because—I wished to meet you here.”
“To meet me, Monica—what for?”
“To ask for a story, señor,” she replied, colouring and with a shy glance at my face.
“Ah, we have had stories enough,” I said. “Remember poor Anita running away this morning to look for a playmate in the wet mist.”
“She is a child; I am a woman.”
“Then, Monica, you must have a lover who will be jealous if you listen to stories from a stranger’s lips in this lonely spot.”
“No person will ever know that I met you here,” she returned—so bashful, yet so persistent.
“I have forgotten all my stories,” I said.
“Then, señor, I will go and find you another ramo of lilies while you think of one to tell me.”
“No,” I said, “you must get no more lilies for me. Look, I will give you back these you gave me.” And, saying that, I fastened them in her black hair, where by contrast they looked very splendid, and gave the girl a new grace. “Ah, Monica, they make you look too pretty—let me take them out again.”
But she would not have them taken. “I will leave you now to think of a story for me,” she said, blushing and turning away.
Then I took her hands and made her face me. “Listen, Monica,” I said. “Do you know that these lilies are full of strange magic? See how crimson they are; that is the colour of passion, for they have been steeped in passion, and turn my heart to fire. If you bring me any more of them, Monica, I shall tell you a story that will make you tremble with fear—tremble like the willow-leaves and turn pale as the mist over the Yí.”
She smiled at my words; it was like a ray of sunlight falling through the foliage on her face. Then, in a voice that was almost a whisper, she said, “What will the story be about, señor? Tell me, then I shall know whether to gather lilies for you or not.”
“It will be about a stranger meeting a sweet, pale girl standing under the trees, her dark eyes cast down, and red lilies in her hand; and how she asked him for a story, but he could speak to her of nothing but love, love, love.”
When I finished speaking she gently withdrew her hands from mine and turned away amongst the trees, doubtless to fly from me, trembling at my words, like a frightened young fawn from the hunter.
So for a moment I thought. But no, there lay the lilies gathered for a religious purpose at my feet, and there was nothing reproachful in the shy, dark eyes when they glanced back for a moment at me; for, in spite of those warning words, she had only gone to find more of those perilous crimson flowers to give me.
Not then, while I waited for her return with palpitating heart, but afterwards in calmer moments, and when Monica had become a pretty picture in the past, did I compose the following lines. I am not so vain as to believe that they possess any great poetical merit, and introduce them principally to let the reader know how to pronounce the pretty name of that Oriental river, which it still keeps in remembrance of a vanished race.
Standing silent, pale her face was,
Pale and sweet to see:
’Neath the willows waiting for me,
Willow-like was she,
Smiling, blushing, trembling, bashful
Maid of Yí.Willow-like she trembled, yet she
Never fled from me;
But her dove-like eyes were downcast,
On the grass to see
White feet standing: white thy feet were,
Maid of Yí.Stalks of lilies in her hands were:
Crimson lilies three,
Placed I in her braids of black hair—
They were bright to see!
Lift thy dark eyes, for I love thee,
Maid of Yí!
XV
When the Trumpet Calls to Battle
In the evening Alday returned with a couple of his friends, and, as soon as an opportunity offered, I took him aside and begged him to let me have a horse to continue my journey to Montevideo. He answered evasively that the horse I had lost in the neighbouring forest would probably be recovered in the course of two or three days. I replied that if he would let me have a horse, the one I had lost, together with saddle, poncho, etc., could be claimed by him whenever they turned up. He then said that he could not very well give me a horse, “with saddle and bridle also.” It looked as if he wanted to keep me in his house for some purpose of his own, and this made me all the more determined to leave it immediately, in spite of the tender, reproachful glances which Monica flashed on me from under her long, drooping eyelashes. I told him that if I could not have a horse I would leave his estancia on foot. That rather put him in a corner; for in this country, where horse-stealing and cheating
