ng the deerskin, drew from its
hiding-place the little wooden Jesus. With tears streaming, she laid it
again in the Madonna's arms, and flinging herself on her knees, sobbed
out prayers for forgiveness. Alessandro stood at the foot of the bed,
his arms folded, his eyes riveted on the child. Soon he went out, still
without speaking. Presently Ramona heard the sound of a saw. She groaned
aloud, and her tears flowed faster: Alessandro was making the baby's
coffin. Mechanically she rose, and, moving like one half paralyzed,
she dressed the little one in fresh white clothes for the burial; then
laying her in the cradle, she spread over it the beautiful lace-wrought
altar-cloth. As she adjusted its folds, her mind was carried back to the
time when she embroidered it, sitting on the Senora's veranda; the song
of the finches, the linnets; the voice and smile of Felipe; Alessandro
sitting on the steps, drawing divine music from his violin. Was that
she,--that girl who sat there weaving the fine threads in the beautiful
altar-cloth? Was it a hundred years ago? Was it another world? Was it
Alessandro yonder, driving those nails into a coffin? How the blows
rang, louder and louder! The air seemed deafening full of sound. With
her hands pressed to her temples, Ramona sank to the floor. A merciful
unconsciousness set her free, for an interval, from her anguish.

When she opened her eyes, she was lying on the bed. Alessandro had
lifted her and laid her there, making no effort to rouse her. He thought
she would die too; and even that thought did not stir him from his
lethargy. When she opened her eyes, and looked at him, he did not speak.
She closed them. He did not move. Presently she opened them again. "I
heard you out there," she said.

"Yes," he replied. "It is done." And he pointed to a little box of rough
boards by the side of the cradle.

"Is Majella ready to go to the mountain now?" he asked.

"Yes, Alessandro, I am ready," she said.

"We will hide forever," he said.

"It makes no difference," she replied.

The Saboba women did not know what to think of Ramona now. She had never
come into sympathetic relations with them, as she had with the women of
San Pasquale. Her intimacy with the Hyers had been a barrier the Saboba
people could not surmount. No one could be on such terms with whites,
and be at heart an Indian, they thought; so they held aloof from Ramona.
But now in her bereavement they gathered round her. They wept