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196 do not know what we can do, now that it has happened.”

“That's it, mother! That's it!” broke in Felipe. “You see, you see it is too late now.”

The Señora went on as if Felipe had not spoken. “I suppose you would really very much regret to part with Alessandro, and your word is in a way pledged to him, as you had asked him if he would stay on the place, Of course, now that all this has happened, it would be very unpleasant for Ramona to stay here, and see him continually—at least for a time, until she gets over this strange passion she seems to have conceived for him. It will not last. Such sudden passions never do.” The Señora artfully interpolated, “What should you think, Felipe, of having her go back to the Sisters' school for a time? She was very happy there.”

The Señora had strained a point too far. Felipe's self-control suddenly gave way, and as impetuously as he had spoken in the beginning, he spoke again now, nerved by the memory of Ramona's face and tone as she had cried to him in the garden, “Oh, Felipe, you won't let her shut me up in the convent, will you?” “Mother!” he cried, “you would never do that. You would not shut the poor girl up in the convent!”

The Señora raised her eyebrows in astonishment. “Who spoke of shutting up?” she said. “Ramona has already been there at school. She might go again. She is not too old to learn. A change of scene and occupation is the best possible cure for a girl who has a thing of this sort to get over. Can you propose anything better, my son? What would you advise?” And a third time the Señora paused for an answer.

These pauses and direct questions of the Señora's were like nothing in life so much as like that stage