ng at Marcos.
They had lived together like brothers, and like brothers, they had fallen
into the habit of closing the door of silence upon certain subjects.

Juanita, it would appear, was one of these. For neither was at ease while
speaking of her. Spaniards and Germans and Englishmen are not notable for
a pretty and fanciful treatment of the subject of love. But they approach
it with a certain shy delicacy of which the lighter Latin heart has no
conception.

The Count glanced over his shoulder, and Marcos, without looking up, must
have seen the action, for he took the opportunity of shaking his head.

"You shake your head," said Sarrion, with a sort of effort to be gay and
careless, "What do you want? She is the prettiest girl in Aragon."

"It is not that," said Marcos, curtly, with a flush on his brown face.

"Then what is it?"

Marcos made no answer. The Count lighted another cigarette, to gain time,
perhaps.

"Listen to me," he said at length. "We have always understood each other,
except about Juanita. We have nearly always been of the same mind--you
and I."

Marcos was leaning his arms on the table and looked across the room
towards his father with a slow smile.

"Let us try and understand each other about Juanita before we go any
farther. You think that there may be thoughts in your mind which are
beyond my comprehension. It may not be as bad as that. I allow you, that
as the heart grows older it loses a certain sensitiveness and delicacy of
feeling. Still the comprehension of such feelings in younger persons may
survive. You think that Juanita should be allowed to make her own choice
--is it not so--learnt in England, eh?"

"Yes," was the answer.

"And I reply to that; a convent education--the only education open to
Spanish girls--does not fit her to make her own choice."

"It is not a question of education.

"No, it is a question of opportunity," said Sarrion sharply. "And a
convent schoolgirl has no opportunity. My friend, a father or a mother,
if they are wise, will choose better than a girl thrown suddenly into the
world from the convent gates. But that is not the question. Juanita will
never get outside the convent gates unless we drag her from them--half
against her own will."

"We can give her the choice. We have certain rights."

"No rights," replied Sarrion, "that the Church will recognise, and the
Church holds her now within its grip."

"She is only a child. She does not know what l