me, for I expect Don Antonio de Leyva
every minute."

The duenna went out muttering a _Gloria Patri_, which was exactly
finished by the time she got at the other side of the door. She then
hastened to the chamber of her charge, by no means pleased with a
somnolency that exposed her to any rebuke, however trifling.

"Oh you sluggish girl," she began. "_Dios me perdone_,[22] what means
this? Are you not ashamed to be in bed at this time in the morning, and
allow a christian matron like me to be disturbed at her prayers on your
account? This comes of your nocturnal meetings; I must put a stop to
them; they may be very refreshing to the heart, but cannot contribute to
the health, nor to the good keeping of the soul; up, up _perezosa_,[23]
and never more expose a kind duenna to your father's rebukes; up,
immediately, Don Manuel is waiting." Receiving no answer, she took it
for granted, being not a little deaf, that Theodora was replying with
the various excuses which were naturally to be expected, under similar
circumstances. She continued, therefore, without troubling herself as to
their import. "Nay, nay, attempt not to exculpate yourself, for it is
very wrong to expose me thus, because I am so amiably inclined as to
overlook your frailties with christian charity. Holy Virgin! I shudder
when I think to what perilous compromises my unsullied reputation is
daily exposed by the tenderness of my disposition. What is it you
say?--Eh?--What?--you are silent then, well child, after all that is the
wisest thing you can do; it pleaseth me to see you thus humble, for
humility, like charity, covereth a multitude of sins." The good duenna
proceeded in this strain for some time, without receiving any check to
her eloquence, till at length, surprised at such an excess of
contrition, she grew impatient, flung the windows wide open, pulled the
bed hangings aside, when to her utter consternation she found the object
of her intended visitation vanished. The surprise of the duenna was
strongly pictured on her shrivelled visage, as the dismal truth obtruded
itself upon her mind. The wrath of Monteblanco, and the blot upon her
own dear reputation, as the natural consequences of this disaster, took
possession of her mind. She first uttered something between a whine and
a discordant cry, meaning thereby to indicate at once her emotions of
anger and sorrow. Then she began busily to invoke the protection of all
the saints in the calendar. But the