The poor girl stifled her sobs long enough to listen to the old woman's remark but made no other answer to it than to shake her head; little Tessa turned her face in the direction indicated by old Mage and saw Manuello with a look of diabolical triumph mingled with fear and hatred on his dark face so that, in spite of her love for him, his expression frightened her and made even her turn away from the sight of the great change in his countenance from what she had seen resting there only that morning. Ruth Wakefield had spend the hour devoted to the funeral exercises of her own husband very quietly and in entire solitude; she was accustomed to the latter condition and there was no one among her acquaintances in whom she cared to confide except the good Priest who had done what he could to console and sustain her spirit through this trial that had been forced upon her by untoward circumstances and her own faith in humanity; she watched her own carriage descend the hill and pass into the little village ... she saw the small funeral procession as it wended its way along the palm-lined street ... she watched it enter the gate of the little cemetery and even saw poor Estrella as she alighted from the vehicle and leaned upon the arm of her small friend as she approached the open grave that was to contain the mortal remains of the man who had been, if only for a short space of time, her own husband ... and yet she did not faint ... she did not cry out ... she had had her fight with her own nature and she had won out after a hard struggle; all that was left of the love she had entertained for the handsome Cuban who had entered into her life so disastrously, was an open wound which time alone could ever heal. When old Mage returned to the mansion on the hill she sought out her young lady and would have, in her usual garrulous manner, reported everything that she had noticed during her absence had she received encouragement to do so; on the contrary, she found Ruth, apparently, deeply interested in a large volume which she had placed on a table before her chair; she rested her head on her hands, from time to time, and only looked up to welcome her old nurse, then resumed the perusal of the page she happened to have open at the time of her entrance into the library. Ruth Wakefield had always found her chief delight among her many good books; she browsed among them for mental sustenance and for spiritual solace and found rich pasturage; it had been said of her, while she was yet a small child, that, in case it ever became necessary to perform a surgical operation upon any part of her delicate body, an anæsthetic would not be essential, as all that she would need would be to have someone read aloud to her from some fine piece of literature.