"It is you who have killed him," cried the woman who had summoned her.
The rest of Rubia's escort, _vaqueros_, _peons_, and the old _alcalde_
of her native village, stood about with bared heads.
"That is true. That is true," they murmured. The old _alcalde_ stepped
forward.
"Who dishonours my friend dishonours me," he said. "From this day,
Senorita Ytuerate, you and I are strangers." He went out, and one by
one, with sullen looks and hostile demeanour, Rubia's escort followed.
Their manner was unmistakable; they were deserting her.
Rubia clasped her hands over her eyes.
"Madre de Dios, Madre de Dios," she moaned over and over again. Then in
a low voice she repeated her own words: "May it be a blight to her. From
that moment may evil cling to her, bad luck follow her; may she love and
not be loved; may friends desert her, her sisters shame her, her
brothers disown her----"
There was a clatter of horse's hoofs in the courtyard.
"It is your lover," said her woman coldly from the doorway. "He is
riding away from you."
"----and those," added Rubia, "whom she has loved abandon her."
IV. BELUNA
Meanwhile Felipe, hatless, bloody, was galloping through the night, his
pony's head turned toward the _hacienda_ of Martiarena. The Rancho
Martiarena lay between his own rancho and the inn where he had met
Rubia, so that this distance was not great. He reached it in about an
hour of vigorous spurring.
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