aejos says, exhaled in the distance thin, vapors that the moon,
now at its full, gradually converted into mysterious transparent gauze.

A distant sound became audible, a noise that rapidly
approached. Isagani turned his head and his heart began to beat
violently. A carriage was coming, drawn by white horses, the white
horses that he would know among a hundred thousand. In the carriage
rode Paulita and her friend of the night before, with Dona Victorina.

Before the young man could take a step, Paulita had leaped to the
ground with sylph-like agility and smiled at him with a smile full of
conciliation. He smiled in return, and it seemed to him that all the
clouds, all the black thoughts that before had beset him, vanished
like smoke, the sky lighted up, the breeze sang, flowers covered the
grass by the roadside. But unfortunately Dona Victorina was there and
she pounced upon the young man to ask him for news of Don Tiburcio,
since Isagani had undertaken to discover his hiding-place by inquiry
among the students he knew.

"No one has been able to tell me up to now," he answered, and he was
telling the truth, for Don Tiburcio was really hidden in the house
of the youth's own uncle, Padre Florentino.

"Let him know," declared Dona Victorina furiously, "that I'll call in
the Civil Guard. Alive or dead, I want to know where he is--because
one has to wait ten years before marrying again."

Isagani gazed at her in fright--Dona Victorina was thinking of
remarrying! Who could the unfortunate be?

"What do you think of Juanito Pelaez?" she asked him suddenly.

Juanito! Isagani knew not what to reply. He was tempted to tell all
the evil he knew of Pelaez, but a feeling of delicacy triumphed in his
heart and he spoke well of his rival, for the very reason that he was
such. Dona Victorina, entirely satisfied and becoming enthusiastic,
then broke out into exaggerations of Pelaez's merits and was already
going to make Isagani a confidant of her new passion when Paulita's
friend came running to say that the former's fan had fallen among
the stones of the beach, near the Malecon. Stratagem or accident, the
fact is that this mischance gave an excuse for the friend to remain
with the old woman, while Isagani might talk with Paulita. Moreover,
it was a matter of rejoicing to Dona Victorina, since to get Juanito
for herself she was favoring Isagani's love.

Paulita had her plan ready. On thanking him she assumed the role of
the off