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“But,” cried Chata, flushing with astonishment and some anger, “how can I be beautiful and strong and like a grown woman at will? My grandmother says it is well I am still a child, while Rosario is almost a woman; and I do not mind being little, no, nor even that my nose turns back to run away, as you say, from my mouth every time I open it; but it is growing more courageous, I know,”—and she gave the doubtful member an encouraging pull. “I do not mind all this in the least, while my father and my grandmother love me; but my mother and you and every one else look only at Rosario, and talk only of her—” and her lip trembled.

“But do I talk to Rosario?” asked Chinita, much mollified. “Do I ever tell her my dreams, and all the fine things I see and hear, when I wander off in the fields and by the river, and up into the dark cañons of the hills? And,” she added in an eager whisper, “shall I ever tell her about the American’s ghost when I see him?”

“Bah! you will never see him,” ejaculated Chata, contemptuously, though she glanced over her shoulder with a sudden start. “There is no such thing. I asked my grandmother about it yesterday, and she says it is all wicked nonsense. There could have been no American to be murdered, for she remembers nothing about it.”