desire,--to go with Alessandro; nothing was apparently farther from
his thoughts than this. Could she offer to go? Should she risk laying a
burden on him greater than he could bear? If he were indeed a beggar, as
he said, would his life be hindered or helped by her? She felt herself
strong and able. Work had no terrors for her; privations she knew
nothing of, but she felt no fear of them.

"Alessandro!" she said, in a tone which startled him.

"My Senorita!" he said tenderly.

"You have never once called me Ramona."

"I cannot, Senorita!" he replied.

"Why not?"

"I do not know. I sometimes think 'Ramona,'" he added faintly; "but not
often. If I think of you by any other name than as my Senorita, it is
usually by a name you never heard."

"What is it?" exclaimed Ramona, wonderingly.

"An Indian word, my dearest one, the name of the bird you are like,--the
wood-dove. In the Luiseno tongue that is Majel; that was what I thought
my people would have called you, if you had come to dwell among us. It
is a beautiful name, Senorita, and is like you."

Alessandro was still standing. Ramona rose; coming close to him, she
laid both her hands on his breast, and her head on her hands, and said:
"Alessandro, I have something to tell you. I am an Indian. I belong to
your people."

Alessandro's silence astonished her. "You are surprised," she said. "I
thought you would be glad."

"The gladness of it came to me long ago, my Senorita," he said. "I knew
it!"

"How?" cried Ramona. "And you never told me, Alessandro!"

"How could I?" he replied. "I dared not. Juan Canito, it was told me."

"Juan Canito!" said Ramona, musingly. "How could he have known?" Then in
a few rapid words she told Alessandro all that the Senora had told her.
"Is that what Juan Can said?" she asked.

"All except the father's name," stammered Alessandro.

"Who did he say was my father?" she asked.

Alessandro was silent.

"It matters not," said Ramona. "He was wrong. The Senora, of course,
knew. He was a friend of hers, and of the Senora Ortegna, to whom he
gave me. But I think, Alessandro, I have more of my mother than of my
father."

"Yes, you have, my Senorita," replied Alessandro, tenderly. "After I
knew it, I then saw what it was in your face had always seemed to me
like the faces of my own people."

"Are you not glad, Alessandro?"

"Yes, my Senorita."

What more should Ramona say? Suddenly her heart gave way; and without
premedita