With her giant beside her, Pascherette’s fears subsided in part. She peered up at him shyly and stepped closer to him, as if to seek actual shelter from the storm that threatened her; but her frightened, dependent demeanor was scarcely in accord with the new light that glinted in her sharp eyes when she dropped them from his face again. There was cunning and craft in them; the brazen assurance of a thief whose conviction is prevented by a lucky mishap.

She spoke rapidly, for his ears only, and her face drooped in an access of confusion that, beautifully simulated, satisfied Milo and sent a warm thrill into his honest breast.

“Pascherette says she only gave Sancho his answer,” Milo told Dolores. “He had demanded her for his mate.”