ut it as yet.

At last the letter came.

Would that it had never come! Saavedra entered his aunt's house with his
face pale and dark lines under his eyes, and with a mortal sadness
depicted on it. In order to accomplish this theatrical effect he had
spent the previous night in a drunken spree. Julia's face changed when
she saw him; then instantly she knew by intuition what news he had
brought. When they had taken their seat together by the piano, the place
where they had carried on almost all their secret conversations, the
_caballero_ exclaimed in a tone full of sorrow, and hiding his face in
his hands:--

"How unhappy I am, Julita!"

She was silent for a few moments, and then said:--

"Your mother does not consent to our marriage,--is that it?"

Don Alfonso did not reply. Silence reigned for some time. Finally Julia
broke it in a trembling voice:--

"Don't take it so to heart, Alfonso. Instead of helping me, you take
away my courage."

"You are right, my beauty! even in this I am selfish. I ought to
consider that beside the grief that you feel as keenly as I do, if you
love me, you have had an insult put upon you."

"No, no," the young girl hastened to say; "I do not feel that it is an
insult. All I feel is that I cannot be yours."

Saavedra gave her a fascinating look of love, and pressed her hand
warmly.

"Mamma does not speak unkindly of you. If she had said anything that
could be construed as derogatory to you, I should know well how to reply
to it. It will be better for you to read her letter for yourself," he
said, taking it from his pocket.

This letter had been written by Saavedra himself, counterfeiting her
penmanship and sending it to a friend to be mailed back from Seville; it
was a document remarkable for its ingenuity. Julia's name was not
mentioned in it; the mamma deeply lamented, because she had dreamed of a
brilliant match for her dear boy; he well knew who she was. This had
been the hope of all her life, she had pledged her word, and all the
relatives were counting upon it; finally, that as now she was getting
old and feeble, this disappointment would certainly cause her death.

The effect caused by this letter on the young girl was exactly what its
author intended. Instead of quenching the fire, it made it burn all the
more fiercely; jealousy was the principal fuel in this case.

"Who is the woman whom they want you to marry, Alfonso?" asked Julita
timidly, while big tears rolled d