I Disliked The Whole Tribe, Except A Little Girl
Of About Eight, A Child, It Was Said, Of One Of The Unmarried Sisters.
I Never Discovered Which Of Her Aunts, As She Called All These Tall,
White-Faced Heavy-Browed Women, Was Her Mother.
I used to see her
almost every day, for though a child she was out on horseback early
and
Late, riding barebacked and boy fashion, flying about the plain,
now to drive in the horses, now to turn back the flock when it was
getting too far afield, then the cattle, and finally to ride on
errands to neighbours' houses or to buy groceries at the store. I can
see her now at full gallop on the plain, bare-footed and bare-legged,
in her thin old cotton frock, her raven-black hair flying loose
behind. The strangest thing in her was her whiteness: her beautifully
chiselled face was like alabaster, without a freckle or trace of
colour in spite of the burning hot sun and wind she was constantly
exposed to. She was also extremely lean, and strangely serious for a
little girl: she never laughed and rarely smiled. Her name was Angela,
and she was called Anjelita, the affectionate diminutive, but I doubt
that much affection was ever bestowed on her.
To my small-boy's eyes she was a beautiful being with a cloud on her,
and I wished it had been in my power to say something to make her
laugh and forget, though but for a minute, the many cares and
anxieties which made her so unnaturally grave for a little girl.
Nothing proper to say ever came to me, and if it had come it would no
doubt have remained unspoken.
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