he gazed at Ramona, sitting there in
the shimmering light, her face thrown out into relief by the gray wall
of fern-draped rock behind her; her splendid hair, unbound, falling in
tangled masses to her waist; her cheeks flushed, her face radiant with
devout and fervent supplication, her eyes uplifted to the narrow belt of
sky overhead, where filmy vapors were turning to gold, touched by a sun
she could not see.

"Hush, my love," she breathed rather than said. "That would be a sin, if
you really thought it.

'O beautiful Queen,
Princess of Heaven,'"

she continued, repeating the first lines of the song; and then, sinking
on her knees, reached out one hand for Alessandro's, and glided, almost
without a break in the melodious sound, into a low recitative of the
morning-prayers. Her rosary was of fine-chased gold beads, with an ivory
crucifix; a rare and precious relic of the Missions' olden times. It
had belonged to Father Peyri himself, was given by him to Father
Salvierderra, and by Father Salvierderra to the "blessed child," Ramona,
at her confirmation. A warmer token of his love and trust he could not
have bestowed upon her, and to Ramona's religious and affectionate
heart it had always seemed a bond and an assurance, not only of Father
Salvierderra's love, but of the love and protection of the now sainted
Peyri.

As she pronounced the last words of her trusting prayer, and slipped the
last of the golden beads along on its string, a thread of sunlight
shot into the canon through a deep narrow gap in its rocky eastern
crest,--shot in for a second, no more; fell aslant the rosary, lighted
it; by a flash as if of fire, across the fine-cut facets of the beads,
on Ramona's hands, and on the white face of the ivory Christ. Only a
flash, and it was gone! To both Ramona and Alessandro it came like an
omen,--like a message straight from the Virgin. Could she choose better
messenger,--she, the compassionate one, the loving woman in heaven;
mother of the Christ to whom they prayed, through her,--mother, for
whose sake He would regard their least cry,--could she choose better
messenger, or swifter, than the sunbeam, to say that she heard and would
help them in these sore straits.

Perhaps there were not, in the whole great world, at that moment to be
found, two souls who were experiencing so vivid a happiness as thrilled
the veins of these two friendless ones, on their knees, alone in the
wilderness, gazing half a