A singular group they presented, standing on the broad and seemingly boundless prairie—­the March wind moaning through the old oaks, and rustling the brown grass.  The moon shone full upon them; Dr. Bryant, with his large cloak wrapped closely about him, and the black cap drawn over his brow—­surprise, reproach, pity, and chagrin strangely blended in his gaze.  One arm was folded over the broad chest, the other hung by his side.  Inez stood just before him, her beautiful head bent so that the black locks well-nigh concealed her features.  Her father’s large variegated blanket hanging loosely about the tall, slender form.  At her feet lay the hat, crushed by the extended foot, and quivering in the night wind, her hands tightly clasped.

“Inez, you crouch like a guilty being before me!  Surely you have done nothing to blush for.  Yet stranger step was never taken by a reasonable being.  Inez, raise your head, and tell me what induced you to venture in this desolate region, alone, unprotected, and in disguise?”

Inez lifted slowly the once beautiful face, now haggard and pale.  Anguish of spirit had left its impress on her dark brow, wrinkled by early care.  Mournful was the expression of the large dark eyes raised to his face: 

“Dr. Bryant, I am alone in the wide, wide world—­there are none to protect—­none to care for me now!  My father sleeps by Manuel’s side, in the churchyard, and I am the last of my house.  The name of De Garcia, once so proud and honored, will become a byword for desolation and misery!  I have said cursed was the hour of my birth! and I now say blessed is the hour of my last sleep!  You see me here from necessity, not choice, for all places would be alike to me now; but I have been driven from my lonely hearth—­I dared not stay, I flew to this dreary waste for peace—­for protection!  There is no rest, no peace for me, Not one is left to whom I can say, guard and keep me from harm!  Alone, friendless, in this wide, bitter world!”

“Your language is strangely ambiguous, Inez!  Can you not explicitly declare what danger threatens, and believe that all I can do to avert evil will gladly be done?”

“Dr. Bryant, the Padre is my most inveterate enemy!  Is not this sufficient to account for my presence here?”

“Unfortunate girl! how have you incurred that man’s hatred?”

“It is a long tale, and needless to repeat:  enough, that he plotted my ruin—­that the strong, silent walls of a far-off convent was my destination.  And why?—­That my flocks and lands might enrich his precious church.  You look wonderingly upon me; strange language, this, I think you say, for a lamb of his flock.  How dare you speak so irreverently of the holy man, consecrated priest of Rome as he is?  Dr. Bryant, I am no Catholic, nor have I been since you have known me.  It was my policy to appear passive.  I attended mass, and sought the confessional, and all the while cursed him in my heart.  I watched him, and saved your