Then of a sudden Isabel’s whole dream-world dissolved.  She awoke, or thought she did, at hearing her name shouted.  But although she underwent the mental and the physical shock of being startled from slumber, although she felt the first swift fright of a person aroused to strange surroundings, she knew on the instant that she must still be asleep; for everything about her was dim and dark, the air was cold and damp, wet grass rose to her knees.  It flashed through her mind that she had simply been whirled from a pleasant dream into one of terror.  As she fought with herself to throw off the illusion of this nightmare its reality became overwhelming.  Warring, incongruous sensations, far too swift for her mind to compass, were crowded into the minutest fraction of time.  Before she could half realize her own condition she felt herself plunged into space.  Now the sensation of falling was not strange to Isabel—­it is common to all sufferers from nightmare—­ nevertheless, she experienced the dawn of a horror such as she had never guessed.  She heard herself scream hoarsely, fearfully, and knew, too late, that she was indeed awake.  Then—­whirling chaos—­A sudden, blinding crash of lights and sounds—­Nothing more!

Esteban Varona sat until a late hour that night over a letter which required the utmost care in its composition.  It was written upon the thinnest of paper, and when it was finished the writer inclosed it in an envelope of the same material.  Esteban put the letter in his pocket without addressing it.  Then he extinguished his light, tip-toed to the door connecting his and Rosa’s rooms, and listened.  No sound whatever came to his ears, for his sister slept like a kitten.  Reassured, he stole out into the hall.  Here he paused a moment with his ear first to Pancho Cueto’s door, and then to the door of his step-mother’s room.  He could hear the overseer’s heavy breathing and Isabel’s senseless babbling—­the latter was moaning and muttering ceaselessly, but, being accustomed to her restlessness, Esteban paid no heed.

Letting himself out into the night, he took the path that led to the old sunken garden.  Nocturnal birds were chirruping; his way was barred with spider-webs, heavy with dew and gleaming in the moonlight like tiny ropes of jewels; the odor of gardenias was overpowering.  He passed close by the well, and its gaping black mouth, only half protected by the broken coping, reminded him that he had promised Rosa to cover it with planks.  In its present condition it was a menace to animals, if not to human beings who were unaware of its presence.  He told himself he would attend to it on the morrow.

Seating himself on one of the old stone benches, the young man lit a cigarette and composed himself to wait.  He sat there for a long time, grumbling inwardly, for the night was damp and he was sleepy; but at last a figure stole out of the gloom and joined him.  The new-comer was a ragged negro, dressed in the fashion of the poorer country people.