"Why," said Ramon, simply, "to tell truth, I intended to cover him up in the grave he had made, all but his head, and let him get out as best he could!" "Appropriate," agreed Rollo, "but crude, and in the circumstances not feasible. We must take this Fernandez indoors after we have arranged the garrison of the house. We will make his brother nurse him. Fraternal affection was never better employed, and it will keep them both out of mischief. And how soon, think you, could your wife be moved?" asked Rollo. Ramon shrugged his shoulders helplessly, and turned to La Giralda. "When I had my second," she said ("he that was hanged at Gibraltar by the English because the man he stabbed died in order to spite him), it was at the time of the vintage. And, lo! all unexpectedly I was overtaken even among the very clusters. So I went aside behind the watcher's _cana_ huts.... And after I had washed the boy I went back and finished my row. There are no such women in these days, El Sarria. This of thine----" "Peace, Giralda," said Ramon, sternly; "Dolores is as a dove, and weak from long trouble of heart. On your head, I ask of you, could we move her in twenty-four hours and yet risk nothing of the life?" "Yes, as the Virgin sees me," asserted La Giralda, holding up her hands, "if so be I have the firming of the bands about her--of linen wide and strong they must be made--to be mine own afterwards. And then she must be carried between four stout men, as I will show you how." "It shall be done," cried Rollo. "I will find the men, do you provide the linen, El Sarria. I will hie me to the convent early to-morrow morning and talk with this little Concha!" "You will not be admitted," said La Giralda, somewhat scornfully; "the Mother Superior is most strict with all within the walls." "But I shall ask for the Mother Superior," said the modest youth, "and, gad! if I get only six quiet minutes of the old lady, I warrant she will refuse me nothing--even to the half of her kingdom. Meantime, here we are! Is it not so?" The huge black circle of the mill-wheel rose before them against the whitewash of the un-windowed wall. They could not see the mill-house itself from this point, and they halted before going further, in order to make their dispositions. "What we are going to do is not strictly within the letter of the law," explained Rollo, cheerfully, "but it is the best I can think of, and containing as it does the elements of justice, may commend itself as a solution to all parties. If these Fernandez gentlemen kidnap other men's wives, devise the murder of their children, and strive to have the men themselves shot, they cannot very well complain of a little illegality. This is the house. Well, it must be ours for twenty-four hours--no more, no less. Then, if no accidents happen, we will return it to Senor Luis Fernandez. All set? _Adelante_, then!"