He was quite aware of it at the time, and had equally accepted it
with grim cynicism; but it now came back to him with a new and smarting
significance. Might THEY, too, not succeed in weaning the boy's
affection from him, or if the mother had interfered, would they not side
with her in claiming an equal right? He had sometimes laughed to himself
over the security of this hiding-place, so unknown and so unlikely to be
discovered by her, yet within easy reach of her friends and his enemies;
he now ground his teeth over the mistake which his doting desire to keep
his son accessible to him had caused him to make. He put spurs to his
horse, dashed down the little, narrow, ill-paved street, through
the deserted plaza, and pulled up in a cloud of dust before the only
remaining tower, with its cracked belfry, of the half-ruined Mission
church. A new dormitory and school-building had been extended from its
walls, but in a subdued, harmonious, modest way, quite unlike the usual
glaring white-pine glories of provincial towns. Steptoe laughed to
himself bitterly. Some of his money had gone in it.
He seized the horsehair rope dangling from a bell by the wall and rang
it sharply. A soft-footed priest appeared,--Father Dominico. "Eddy
Horncastle? Ah! yes. Eddy, dear child, is gone."
"Gone!" shouted Steptoe in a voice that startled the padre. "Where?
When? With whom?"
"Pardon, senor, but for a time--only a pasear to the next village.
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