The Doomswoman. Gertrude Franklin Horn Atherton
consul bowed. "True, coronel. I have seen no one here like Doña Chonita. There is a delicious uniformity about the Californian women: so reserved, shrinking yet dignified, ever on their guard. Doña Chonita changed so swiftly from the typical woman of her race to an houri, almost a bacchante—only an extraordinary refinement of nature kept her this side of the line—that an American would be tempted to call her eccentric."
Alvarado lifted his hand and pointed through the window to the stars. "The golden coals in the blue fire of heaven are not higher above censure," he said.
Doña Modeste raised her eyebrows. "Coals are safest when burned on the domestic hearth and carefully watched; safer still when they have fallen to ashes."
"What is this rumor of pirates on the coast?" demanded Alvarado, abruptly.
I put my hand through Estenega's arm and drew him aside. The music of the contradanza was playing, and we stood against the wall.
"Well, you know Chonita better since that dance," I said to him. "Polar stars are not unlikely to have volcanoes. Better let the deeps alone, my friend; the lava might scorch you badly. Women of complex natures are interesting studies, but dangerous to love. They wear the nerves to a point, and the tired brain and heart turn gratefully to the crystalline, idle-minded woman. She is too much like yourself, Diego. And you—how long could you love anybody? Love with you means curiosity."
His face looked like chalk for a moment, an indication with him of suppressed and violent emotion. Then he turned his head and regarded me with a slight smile. "Not altogether. You forget that the most faithless men have been the most faithful when they have found the one woman. Curiosity and fickleness are merely parts of a restless seeking—nothing more."
"I was sure you would acquit yourself with credit! But you have an unholy charm, and you never hesitate to exert it."
He laughed outright. "One would think I was a rattlesnake. My unholy charm consists of a reasonable amount of address born of a great weakness for women and some personal magnetism—the latter the offspring of the habit of mental concentration—"
"And an inexorable will—"
"Perhaps. As to the exercise of it—why not? Vive la bagatelle!"
"It is useless to argue with you. Are you going to let that girl alone?"
"She is the only girl in the Californias whom I shall not let alone."
I could have shaken him. "To what end? And her brother? I have often wondered which would rule you in a crisis, your head or your passions."
"It would depend upon the crisis. I am afraid you are right—that altiloquent Reinaldo will give trouble."
"Is it true that he has been conspiring with Carillo, and that an extraordinary and secret session of the Departmental Junta has been called?"
He looked down upon me with his grimmest smile. "You curious little woman! You must not put your white fingers into the Departmental pie. If you had been a man, with as good a brain as you have for a woman, you would have been an ornament to our politics. But as it is—pardon me—the better for our balancing country the less you have to do with it."
I could feel my eyes snap. "You respect no woman's mind," I said, savagely; "nothing but the woman in her. But I will not quarrel with you. Tell that baby over there to come and waltz with me."
At dawn, as we entered our room, I seized Chonita by the shoulders and shook her. "What did you mean by such a performance?" I demanded. "It was unprecedented!"
She threw back her head and laughed. "I could not help it," she said. "First I felt an irresistible desire to show Monterey that I dared do anything I chose. And then I have a wild something in me which has often threatened to break loose before; and to-night it did. It was that man. He made me."
"Ay, Dios!" I thought, "it has begun already."
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