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Rh He doubted whether he could move her very far. The threat of shutting Ramona up in the convent terrified him more than he liked to admit to himself. Had she power to do that? Felipe did not know. She must believe that she had, or she would not have made the threat. Felipe's whole soul revolted at the cruel injustice of the idea.

“As if it were a sin for the poor girl to love Alessandro!” he said. “I'd help her to run away with him, if worse comes to worst. What can make my mother feel so!” And Felipe paced back and forth till the sun was high, and the sharp glare and heat reminded him that he must seek shelter; then he threw himself down under the willows. He dreaded to go into the house. His instinctive shrinking from the disagreeable, his disposition to put off till another time, held him back, hour by hour. The longer he thought the situation over, the less he knew how to broach the subject to his mother; the more uncertain he felt whether it would be wise for him to broach it at all. Suddenly he heard his name called. It was Margarita, who had been sent to call him to dinner. “Good heavens! dinner already!” he cried, springing to his feet.

“Yes, Señor,” replied Margarita, eyeing him observantly. She had seen him talking with Alessandro, had seen Alessandro galloping away down the river road. She had also gathered much from the Señora's look, and Ramona's, as they passed the dining-room door together soon after breakfast. Margarita could have given a tolerably connected account of all that had happened within the last twenty-four hours to the chief actors in this tragedy which had so suddenly begun in the Moreno household. Not supposed to know anything, she yet knew nearly all; and her every pulse was beating high with excited conjecture and wonder as to what would come next.