Part 20 (1/2)
Ramona's eyes dilated, her cheeks paled; she opened her lips, but no sound came from them; she looked toward Felipe, and seeing him with downcast eyes, and an expression of angry embarra.s.sment on his face, despair seized her. Felipe had deserted their cause. Oh, where, where was Alessandro! Clasping her hands, she uttered a low cry,--a cry that cut Felipe to the heart. He was finding out, in thus being witness of Ramona's suffering, that she was far nearer and dearer to him than he had realized. It would have taken very little, at such moments as these, to have made Felipe her lover again; he felt now like springing to her side, folding his arms around her, and bidding his mother defiance. It took all the self-control he could gather, to remain silent, and trust to Ramona's understanding him later.
Ramona's cry made no break in the smooth, icy flow of the Senora's sentences. She gave no sign of having heard it, but continued: ”My son tells me that he thinks our forbidding it would make no difference; that you would go away with the man all the same. I suppose he is right in thinking so, as you yourself told me that even if Father Salvierderra forbade it, you would disobey him. Of course, if this is your determination, we are powerless. Even if I were to put you in the keeping of the Church, which is what I am sure my sister, who adopted you as her child, would do, if she were alive, you would devise some means of escape, and thus bring a still greater and more public scandal on the family. Felipe thinks that it is not worth while to attempt to bring you to reason in that way; and we shall therefore do nothing. I wish to impress it upon you that my son, as head of this house, and I, as my sister's representative, consider you a member of our own family.
So long as we have a home for ourselves, that home is yours, as it always has been. If you choose to leave it, and to disgrace yourself and us by marrying an Indian, we cannot help ourselves.”
The Senora paused. Ramona did not speak. Her eyes were fixed on the Senora's face, as if she would penetrate to her inmost soul; the girl was beginning to recognize the Senora's true nature; her instincts and her perceptions were sharpened by love.
”Have you anything to say to me or to my son?” asked the Senora.
”No, Senora,” replied Ramona; ”I do not think of anything more to say than I said this morning. Yes,” she added, ”there is. Perhaps I shall not speak with you again before I go away. I thank you once more for the home you have given me for so many years. And you too, Felipe,” she continued, turning towards Felipe, her face changing, all her pent-up affection and sorrow looking out of her tearful eyes,--”you too, dear Felipe. You have always been so good to me. I shall always love you as long as I live;” and she held out both her hands to him. Felipe took them in his, and was about to speak, when the Senora interrupted him. She did not intend to have any more of this sort of affectionate familiarity between her son and Ramona.
”Are we to understand that you are taking your leave now?” she said. ”Is it your purpose to go at once?”
”I do not know, Senora,” stammered Ramona; ”I have not seen Alessandro; I have not heard--” And she looked up in distress at Felipe, who answered compa.s.sionately,--
”Alessandro has gone.”
”Gone!” shrieked Ramona. ”Gone! not gone, Felipe!”
”Only for four days,” replied Felipe. ”To Temecula. I thought it would be better for him to be away for a day or two. He is to come back immediately. Perhaps he will be back day after to-morrow.”
”Did he want to go? What did he go for? Why didn't you let me go with him? Oh, why, why did he go?” cried Ramona.
”He went because my son told him to go,” broke in the Senora, impatient of this scene, and of the sympathy she saw struggling in Felipe's expressive features. ”My son thought, and rightly, that the sight of him would be more than I could bear just now; so he ordered him to go away, and Alessandro obeyed.”
Like a wounded creature at bay, Ramona turned suddenly away from Felipe, and facing the Senora, her eyes resolute and dauntless spite of the streaming tears, exclaimed, lifting her right hand as she spoke, ”You have been cruel; G.o.d will punish you!” and without waiting to see what effect her words had produced, without looking again at Felipe, she walked swiftly out of the room.
”You see,” said the Senora, ”you see she defies us.”
”She is desperate,” said Felipe. ”I am sorry I sent Alessandro away.”
”No, my son,” replied the Senora, ”you were wise, as you always are.
It may bring her to her senses, to have a few days' reflection in solitude.”
”You do not mean to keep her locked up, mother, do you?” cried Felipe.
The Senora turned a look of apparently undisguised amazement on him.
”You would not think that best, would you? Did you not say that all we could do, was simply not to interfere with her in any way? To wash our hands, so far as is possible, of all responsibility about her?”
”Yes, yes,” said the baffled Felipe; ”that was what I said. But, mother--” He stopped. He did not know what he wanted to say.
The Senora looked tenderly at him, her face full of anxious inquiry.
”What is it, Felipe dear? Is there anything more you think I ought to say or do?” she asked.
”What is it you are going to do, mother?” said Felipe. ”I don't seem to understand what you are going to do.”
”Nothing, Felipe! You have entirely convinced me that all effort would be thrown away. I shall do nothing,” replied the Senora. ”Nothing whatever.”
”Then as long as Ramona is here, everything will be just as it always has been?” said Felipe.