han Ramona's might have indeed been fearful, at
being locked up alone with a woman who looked like that.

Finally, she locked the door and wheeled the statue back into its place.
Ramona breathed freer. She was not, after all, to be thrust into
the wall closet and left to starve. She gazed with wonder at the old
battered boxes. What could it all mean?

"Senorita Ramona Ortegna," began the Senora, drawing up a chair, and
seating herself by the table on which stood the iron box, "I will now
explain to you why you will not marry the Indian Alessandro."

At these words, this name, Ramona was herself again,--not her old self,
her new self, Alessandro's promised wife. The very sound of his name,
even on an enemy's tongue, gave her strength. The terrors fled away.
She looked up, first at the Senora, then at the nearest window. She was
young and strong; at one bound, if worst came to worst, she could leap
through the window, and fly for her life, calling on Alessandro.

"I shall marry the Indian Alessandro, Senora Moreno," she said, in a
tone as defiant, and now almost as insolent, as the Senora's own.

The Senora paid no heed to the words, except to say, "Do not interrupt
me again. I have much to tell you;" and opening the box, she lifted out
and placed on the table tray after tray of jewels. The sheet of written
paper lay at the bottom of the box.

"Do you see this paper, Senorita Ramona?" she asked, holding it up.
Ramona bowed her head. "This was written by my sister, the Senora
Ortegna, who adopted you and gave you her name. These were her final
instructions to me, in regard to the disposition to be made of the
property she left to you."

Ramona's lips parted. She leaned forward, breathless, listening, while
the Senora read sentence after sentence. All the pent-up pain, wonder,
fear of her childhood and her girlhood, as to the mystery of her birth,
swept over her anew, now. Like one hearkening for life or death, she
listened. She forgot Alessandro. She did not look at the jewels. Her
eyes never left the Senora's face. At the close of the reading, the
Senora said sternly, "You see, now, that my sister left to me the entire
disposition of everything belonging to you."

"But it hasn't said who was my mother," cried Ramona. "Is that all there
is in the paper?"

The Senora looked stupefied. Was the girl feigning? Did she care nothing
that all these jewels, almost a little fortune, were to be lost to her
forever?

"Who