Barbara went to her room and Mrs. Coolidge began to tell her visitor, with her most charming enthusiasm and with all the delighted expletives which her knowledge of Spanish made possible, of Barbara’s success, of her love affair, and of how very desirable the match would be.  The old man listened quietly to the end, looked at her steadily for a moment in silence, and then spoke: 

“No!”

Colonel Kate’s eyes opened wide in amazement at the word.  “What!  Don Ambrosio!  Surely—­”

“He wishes to marry her?” the old man broke in.

“Indeed he does!  He told me so scarcely ten minutes ago.  He is very much in love with her and she with him!”

“No!” repeated the Indian emphatically.  “It cannot be!”

“Surely, senor, you do not understand!  You could not find a more desirable husband for Barbara!  Why, he is a lieutenant in the army, a first lieutenant, too, and his position will take her into any society she wishes to enter.  He has money enough to keep her well, and he loves her devotedly!”

“No!  He forgets she is an Indian!  He has seen her in all these clothes of the white women in which you have tricked her out, and he thinks she is the same as a white woman.  She is not.  She was born an Indian, and an Indian she must be until she dies.  Never again shall she leave Acoma.”

“Senor!  How can you be so blind to your daughter’s interests?  You will break her heart!  Surely you cannot be so cruel!”

But Mrs. Coolidge’s protests were broken off by Barbara’s return.  The girl stood before her father with her eyes on the floor and her face cold and impassive.  She was dressed again in the garments she had worn when she first entered the house, three months before, and she seemed a far different creature from the happy and radiant girl to whom her lover had but just said good-bye.  Ambrosio looked her over approvingly.

“Now you are my daughter.  Come.”

With the pueblo children centuries of training have caused unhesitating obedience to parents to become an instinct.  So Barbara did not question, but at once followed her father toward the door.  Mrs. Coolidge was weeping.  Barbara threw both arms around her neck and kissed her again and again.  The girl’s face was expressionless and there were no tears in her voice, but her wide, black eyes, paling now to brown, told the agony that was in her heart.

“Tell him,” she whispered in English, “that I must go back.  My father bids me, and I must go.  My father will never again let me leave Acoma.  Tell him I shall never see him again, but I shall love him always.”

“My poor child!” sobbed Mrs. Coolidge.  “We must find some way to bring you back!”

“It is useless to try.  I know my father, and I know it will be impossible for me ever again to leave the pueblo.  I must be an Indian all the rest of my life.  But I shall love him always.  Tell him so.”