street, out of the crowd, and was standing waiting, near the doorway in which Kate stood, silently, with averted face.
“Look! Niña! This master is waiting for you. Then come! Oh Niña, come!”
The voice of the criada had sunk to the low, crooning, almost magical appeal of the women of the people, and her black eyes glistened strangely, watching Kate’s face. Kate, almost mesmerised, took slow, reluctant steps forward, towards the man who was standing with averted face.
“Do you mind?” she said in English, in great confusion. And she touched his fingers with her own.
His hand, warm and dark and savagely suave, loosely, almost with indifference, and yet with the soft barbaric nearness, held her fingers, and he led her to the circle. She dropped her head, and longed to be able to veil her face. In her white dress and green straw hat, she felt a virgin again, a young virgin. This was the quality these men had