When you return to Cuba--see, my faith is strong again--avoid
Matanzas, for your own sake and mine. Don Mario wanted to marry me
to save me this exile. But I refused; I told him I was pledged to
you, and he was furious. He is powerful; he would balk you, and
there is always room for one more in San Severino. Pancho Cueto,
too, living in luxury upon the fruits of his crime, would
certainly consider you a menace to his security. You see how
cunning my love for you has made me?

If I could come to you, I would, but I am marked. So if you still
desire me you must search me out. You will? I pin my faith to that
as to the Cross. To doubt would be to perish. If we should have to
find another hiding-place, and that is always likely, you can
learn of our whereabouts from Colonel Lopez.

Alas! If you had asked me to go with you that day! I would have
followed you, for my heart beat then as it beats to-day, for you
alone.

The candle is burning low and it will soon be daylight, and then
this letter must begin its long, uncertain journey. I must creep
into my bed now, to pray and then to dream. It is cold, before the
dawn, and the thatch above me rustles. I am very poor and sad and
lonely, O'Reilly, but my cheeks are full and red; my lips could
learn to smile again, and you would not be ashamed of me.

Asensio is rising. He goes to find his horse and I must close. God
grant this reaches you, some time, somehow. I trust the many blots
upon the paper will not give you a wrong impression of my writing,
for I am neat, and I write nicely; only now the ink is poor and