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He turned and left the room with rapid strides, and would have dragged Manuela after him, if that young lady had not been endued with a pace neat, active, and what is sometimes called "tripping," which kept her easily alongside of the ancient man of war. Lawrence followed mechanically. Pedro, with an arm round Mariquita's waist, brought up the rear.
Receiving it with dramatic eagerness, Pepe opened it and looked with delight at its contents. "A detente!" he cried. "Manuela! and the most beautiful that has been seen upon the earth. This is not for me! No! Impossible! The General alone is worthy to wear this object of an elegance so resplendent."
"Tell me," cried Lawrence, suddenly shaking off the dream of unbelief, advancing a step, and gazing so intensely into the colonel's eyes that the man of war made a quick, involuntary, motion with his right hand towards his sword, "Tell me, Colonel Marchbanks is Manuela, who, I thought, was an Inca princess, really your daughter!"
Virginia's heart was beating fast as she joined her brother and the Countess, and her hand was not quite steady as she offered her field-glass to the beautiful Portuguese, who had long ago begged the two ladies on board to call her "Manuela." "What a large island!" exclaimed the Countess. "And we seem to be making for it. What can it be? Mr. Trent says perhaps it is a mirage.
To miss an experience, possibly terrible, certainly thrilling; to have lost an opportunity of declaring herself a daughter of Cuba, possibly of shooting a Spaniard for herself, and to have been deceived, tricked like a child; this brought her slender brows together, ominously, and made her eyes glitter in a way that Manuela would have known well.
Colonel Marchbanks, Manuela, and the fair Mariquita followed. Antonio, Spotted Tiger, the sportsman and his friend came next, and Lawrence with Quashy and Sooz'n brought up the rear. In this order they set off at full gallop over the roadless plains, diverging a little here and there as the nature of the ground required, but otherwise steering a straight line in the direction of the rising sun.
"A descendant of the Hottentots, sir!" exclaimed the colonel, becoming furious, for he now thought the young man was attempting to jest; "the fact that my daughter my daughter, sir, was persuaded to assume that useless and ridiculous disguise, and the fact that you rendered her assistance when so disguised, gives you no right to to insult her in public, and and I have heard, sir, from Manuela herself, that "
In one corner was a pile of dried grass and leaves, with a blanket thrown over it, evidently Don Carlos's bed. There was a camp-stool, a rude box set on end, that seemed to do duty both for dressing and writing table, since it was littered with papers, shaving materials, cigarette-cases, and a variety of other articles. Manuela spread out her arms with a despairing gesture.
In his half-sleeping condition, Lawrence, believing it to be the war-whoop of wild Indians, leaped up and grasped his cudgel, but nothing was to be seen save the grinning face of Quashy and the amused looks of Manuela and Pedro. "Purrits," remarked the negro, by way of explanation. "What do you mean by purrits?" demanded Lawrence, half ashamed of his alarm. "I mean what I says, massa, purrits."
"Surely," said Lawrence, stretching himself on his saddle-cloths and glancing at Manuela, who was by that time seated on the opposite side of the fire arranging some hard biscuits on a plate, "surely people have not been starved to death here, have they?" "Indeed they have only too often, senhor.
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