last moment of grace had come; that it was useless to hesitate
longer. She glanced at the Captain, then at the Padre and then down at
the pretty, tear-stained face of the clinging child. Again she felt that
peculiar pain at the heart and thought she was going to faint as she
struggled with herself between honor, her love and respect for Captain
Forest and Padre Antonio and her devotion to the child whose life, she
knew, depended upon her answer. Up to that moment she had been
completely at a loss to know what to say or how to act, but that
invisible something which until then had deprived her of speech, now
seemed to impel her to answer in the affirmative.

It was the supreme moment of her life. After all the years she could not
abandon the child now; the woman in her forbade it. She must go on to
the end. Again she glanced down at Marieta, and then raising her head
and looking into Padre Antonio's eyes, said quietly: "Yes, she has that
right."

"It's not true; I don't believe it!" cried Captain Forest in a tone in
which was expressed all the shame and disgust he experienced on seeing
the woman he loved dragged into the mire before his eyes.

"Captain Forest, you have heard the truth," answered Chiquita.

"Then there is nothing further to be said!" broke in Padre Antonio who
was anxious to end a scene that was growing more painful each moment.
Without a word, the Captain whirled on his heel and walked toward the
garden. Clearly, the effects of the drop of poison instilled so adroitly
into their lives by Don Felipe were beginning to be felt.

It is doubtful whether Blanch would have given Don Felipe the signal
could she have foreseen the consequences. Her rival could have been
exposed without being publicly humiliated. Nevertheless, an ineffable
joy filled her soul. She knew now that Jack either must return to her,
or he would never marry. His sensitive, overwrought mind frenzied and
made desperate by despair might even drive him to kill himself in the
end, but what did it really matter so long as no other woman possessed
him?

Don Felipe fairly reveled in his revenge and took no pains to conceal
it. It was the sweetest moment of his life. At last she too knew what it
was to be struck to earth, to lie prone with one's face in the dust, the
jeers of the world ringing in her ears. Of a truth, to quote Dick's
words, "Had the devil raked hell with a fine-tooth comb, he could not
have produced a more accomplished villa