"No, Senorita!" whispered Margarita,-- thinking in her heart, "Yes, she is going away, but it will be with the angels." -- "No, Senorita, I will not tell. I will do anything you want me to."

"Thanks, Margarita mia," replied Ramona. "I thought you would;" and she lay back on her pillow, and closed her eyes, looking so much more like death than like life that Margarita's tears flowed faster than before, and she ran to her mother, sobbing out, "Mother, mother! the Senorita is ill to death. I am sure she is. She has taken to her bed; and she is as white as Senor Felipe was at the worst of the fever."

"Ay," said old Marda, who had seen all this for days back; "ay, she has wasted away, this last week, like one in a fever, sure enough; I have seen it. It must be she is starving herself to death."

"Indeed, she has not eaten for ten days,-- hardly since that day;" and Margarita and her mother exchanged looks. It was not necessary to further define the day.

"Juan Can says he thinks he will never be seen here again," continued Margarita.

"The saints grant it, then," said Marda, hotly, "if it is he has cost the Senorita all this! I am that turned about in my head with it all, that I've no thoughts to think; but plain enough it is, he is mixed up with whatever 'tis has gone wrong."

"I could tell what it is," said Margarita, her old pertness coming uppermost for a moment; "but I've got no more to say, now the Senorita's lying on her bed, with the face she's got. It's enough to break your heart to look at her. I could just go down on my knees to her for all I've said; and I will, and to Saint Francis too! She's going to be with him before long; I know she is."

"No," said the wiser, older Marda. "She is not so ill as you think. She is young. It's the heart's gone out of her; that's all. I've been that way myself. People are, when they're young."

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