Teresa is lost, he thought despairingly. Then a flash of light seemed to illumine the abyss into which he felt himself rolling with her.
"Huascar," he said abruptly, "if you save Don Christobal's daughter …"
He stopped a moment, for his heart was beating as if it would burst. In those few seconds of silence, which seemed an eternity, the barbaric picture of that scene became imprinted on his brain for all time—this dark archway under which they had instinctively drawn, the somber and deserted street before them, the intermittent uproar from the plaza mayor, and, in the adjacent streets, the banging of cohetes thrown by mischievous boys under the feet of all that passed. Just opposite, at a window on the first floor, half-a-dozen globules of colored fire flickered in the darkness; a family of royal Arequipenos had been illuminating in honor of Garcia before going to see the torchlight procession, or to the gala at the Municipal Theater.
Dick waited until an Indian, loaded down with horse-cloths, had passed and vanished; perhaps, sub-consciously, he was awaiting the miracle which would render unnecessary what he was about to say. The Indian waited, motionless as a statue.
"If you save her, I swear to you by my God that she shall never be my wife."
