ion-stand."

"Heavens and earth! don't speak of that!" exclaimed he, impetuously.
"Do you suppose I would allow my beautiful rose to be trampled by
swine. If we fail, I will buy them if it costs half my fortune. But we
shall _not_ fail. Don't let the girls go out of the door till you hear
the signal."

"No danger of that," she replied. "Their father always kept them like
wax flowers under a glass cover. They are as timid as hares." Before
she finished the words, he was gone.

Rosabella remained where he had left her, with her head bowed on the
table. Floracita was nestling by her side, pouring forth her girlish
congratulations. Madame came in, saying, in her cheerly way: "So you
are going to be married to night! Bless my soul, how the world whirls
round!"

"Isn't God _very_ good to us?" asked Rosa, looking up. "How noble and
kind Mr. Fitzgerald is, to wish to marry me now that everything is so
changed!"

"_You_ are not changed, darling," she replied; "except that I think
you are a little better, and that seemed unnecessary. But you must be
thinking, my children, whether everything is in readiness."

"He told us we were not to go till evening, and it isn't dark yet,"
said Floracita. "Couldn't we go into Papasito's garden one little
minute, and take one sip from the fountain, and just one little walk
round the orange-grove?"

"It wouldn't be safe, my dear. There's no telling who may be lurking
about. Mr. Fitzgerald charged me not to let you go out of doors.
But you can go to my chamber, and take a last look of the house and
garden."

They went up stairs, and stood, with their arms around each other,
gazing at their once happy home. "How many times we have walked in
that little grove, hand in hand with Mamita and Papasito! and now they
are both gone," sighed Rosa.

"Ah, yes," said Flora; "and now we are afraid to go there for a
minute. How strangely everything has changed! We don't hear Mamita's
Spanish and papa's English any more. We have nobody to talk _olla
podrida_ to now. It's all French with Madame, and all Italian with the
Signor."

"But what kind souls they are, to do so much for us!" responded Rosa.
"If such good friends hadn't been raised up for us in these dreadful
days, what _should_ we have done?"

Here Madame came hurrying in to say, "Mr. Duroy and the boys have
come. We must change dresses before the whistler goes by."

The disguises were quickly assumed; and the metamorphosis made Rosa
bot