I was not slow in the fulfilment of that vow. The very next day, after being released from morning parade, I repaired to the place in which the fair apparition had made itself manifest.
I had no difficulty in recognising the house. It was one of the largest in the street, easily distinguished by its frescoed front, windows with "balcons," and jalousies inside. A grand gate entrance piercing the centre told that carriages were kept. In short, everything betokened the residence of a "rico."
I remembered the very window--so carefully had I made my mental memoranda.
It looked different now. There was but the frame; the picture was no longer in it.
I glanced to the other windows of the dwelling. They were all alike empty. The blinds were drawn down. No one inside appeared to take any interest in what was pa.s.sing in the street.
I had my walk for nothing. A score of turns, up and down; three cigars smoked while making them; some sober reflections that admonished me I was doing a very ridiculous thing; and I strolled back to my quarters with a humiliating sense of having made a fool of myself, and a resolve not to repeat the performance.
CHAPTER FOUR.
A PAIR OF COUNTERPARTS.
It was but a half-heart resolve, and failed me on the following day.
Again did I traverse the Calle del Obispo; again scrutinise the windows of the stuccoed mansion.
As on the day before, the _jalousies_ were down, and my surveillance was once more doomed to disappointment. There was no face, no form, not even so much as a finger, to be seen through the screening lattice.
Shall I go again?
This was the question I asked myself on the third day.
I had almost answered it in the negative: for I was by this time getting tired of the profitless _role_ I had been playing.
It was perilous too. There was a chance of becoming involved in a maze, from which escape might not be so easy. I felt sure I could _love_ the woman I had seen in the window. The powerful impression her eyes had made upon me, in twenty seconds of time, was earnest of what might follow from a prolonged observation of them. I could not calculate on escaping without becoming inspired by a pa.s.sion.
And what if it should not be reciprocated? It was sheer vanity, to have even the slightest hope that it might be!
Better to give it up--to go no more through the street where the fair vision had shewn itself--to try and forget that I had seen it.
Such were my reflections on the morning of the third day, after my arrival in the Angelic city.
Only in the morning. Before twilight there was a change. The twilight had something to do in producing it. On the two previous occasions I had mistaken the hour when beauty is accustomed to display itself in the balconies of La Puebla. Hence, perhaps, my failing to obtain a view of her who had so interested me.
I determined to try again.
Just as the sun"s rays were turning rose-coloured upon the snow-crowned summit of Orizava, I was once more wending my way towards the Calle del Obispo.
A third disappointment; but this time of a kind entirely different from the other two.
I had hit the hour. The _doncella_--of whom for three days I had been thinking--three nights dreaming--was in the window where I had first seen her.
One glance and I was completely disenchanted!
Not that she could be called plain, or otherwise than pretty. She was more than pa.s.sably so, but still only _pretty_.
Where was the resplendent beauty that had so strangely, suddenly, impressed me?
She might have deemed me ill-mannered, as I stood scanning her features to discover it; for I was no longer in awe--such as I expected her presence would have produced. I could now look upon her, without fear of that possibly perilous future I had been picturing to myself.
After all, the thing was easy of explanation. For six weeks we had been among the hills--in cantonment--so far from Jalapa, that it was only upon rare occasions we had an opportunity of refreshing our eyes with a sight of the fair Jalapenas. We had been accustomed to see only the peasant girls of Banderilla and San Miguel Soldado, with here and there along the route the coa.r.s.e unkempt squaws of Azteca. Compared with these, she of the Calle del Obispo was indeed an angel. It was the contrast that had misled me?
Well, it would be a lesson of caution not to be too quick at falling in love. I had often listened to the allegement, that circ.u.mstances have much to do in producing the tender pa.s.sion. This seemed to confirm it.
I was not without regret, on discovering that the angel of my imagination was no more than a pretty woman,--a regret strengthened by the remembrance of three distinct promenades made for the express purpose of seeing her--to say nothing of the innumerable vagaries of pleasant conjecture, all exerted in vain.
I felt a little vexed at having thrown away my sword-knot!
I was scarce consoled by the reflection, that my peace of mind was no longer in peril; for I was now almost indifferent to the opinion which the lady might entertain of me. I no longer cared a straw about the reciprocity of a pa.s.sion the possibility of which had been troubling me.
There would be none to reciprocate.
Thus chagrined, and a little by the same thought consoled, I had ceased to stare at the senorita; who certainly stared at me in surprise, and as I fancied, with some degree of indignation.
My rudeness had given her reason; and I could not help perceiving it.
I was about to make the best apology in my power, by hastening away from the spot--my eyes turned to the ground in a look of humiliation--when curiosity, more than aught else, prompted me to raise them once more to the window. I was desirous to know whether my repentance had been understood and acknowledged.
I intended it only for a transitory glance. It became fixed.
Fixed and fascinated! The woman that but six seconds before appeared only pretty--that three days before I had supposed supremely beautiful-- was again the _angel_ I had deemed her,--certainly the most beautiful woman I ever beheld!
What could have caused this change? Was it an illusion--some deception my senses were practising upon me?
If the lady saw reason to think me rude before, she had double cause now. I stood transfixed to the spot, gazing upon her with my eyes, my soul--my every thought concentrated in the glance.
And yet she seemed less frowning than before: for I was sure that she had frowned. I could not explain this, any more than I could account for the other transformation. Enough that I was gratified with the thought of having, not idly, bestowed my sword-knot.
For some time I remained under the spell of a speechless surprise.
It was broken--not by words, but by a new _tableau_ suddenly presented to my view. Two women were at the window! One was the pretty prude who had well nigh chased me out of the street; the other, the lovely being who had attracted me into it!
At a glance I saw that they were sisters.
They were remarkably alike, both in form and features. Even the expression upon their countenances was similar--that similarity that may be seen between two individuals in the same family, known as a "family likeness."
Both were of a clear olive complexion--the tint of the Moriseo-Spaniard--with large imperious eyes, and ma.s.ses of black hair cl.u.s.tering around their necks. Both were tall, of full form, and shaped as if from the same mould; while in age--so far as appearance went--they might have been twins.
And yet, despite these many points of personal similarity, in the degree of loveliness they were vastly different. She who had been offended by my behaviour was a handsome woman, and only that--a thing of Earth; while her sister had the seeming of some divine creature whose home might be in Heaven!
CHAPTER FIVE.
A NOCTURNAL SORTIE.