ttles on his work, without staining the snowy mass. And all
the while, from the moment that the mattress is open till the heap is
complete, the two sticks never cease playing their thin and woody air so
that any within hearing may know that the "colchonero" is at work.

When the mattress case is empty he pauses to wipe his brow (for he must
needs work in the sun) and smoke a cigarette in the shade. It is then
that he gossips.

In a Southern land such a worker as this must always have an audience,
and the children hail with delight the coming of the mattress-maker. At
the Convent School of the Sisters of the True Faith his services were
required once a fortnight; for there were many beds; but his coming was
none the less exciting for its frequency. He was the only man allowed
inside the door. Father Muro was, it seemed, not counted as a man. And in
truth a priest is often found to possess many qualities which are
essentially small and feminine.

The mattress-maker of Pampeluna was a thin man with a ropy neck, and keen
black eyes that flashed hither and thither through the mist of wool and
dust in which he worked. He was considered so essentially a domestic and
harmless person that he was permitted to go where he listed in the house
and high-walled garden. For nuns have a profound distrust of man as a
mass and a confiding faith in the few individuals with whom they have to
deal.

The girls were allowed to watch the colchonero at his work, more
especially the elder girls such as Juanita de Mogente and her friend
Milagros of the red-gold hair. Juanita watched him so closely one spring
afternoon that the keen black eyes kept returning to her face at each
round of the long whistling stick. The other girls grew tired of the
sight and moved away to another part of the garden where the sun was
warmer and the violets already in bloom; but Juanita lingered.

She did not know that this was one of Marcos' friends--that in the summer
this colchonero took the road with his packet of cigarettes and two
sticks and wandered from village to village in the mountains beating the
mattresses of the people and seeing the wondrous works of God as these
are only seen by such as live all day and sleep all night beneath the
open sky.

Quite suddenly the polished sticks ceased playing loudly and dropped
their tone to pianissimo, so that if Juanita were to speak she could be
heard.

"Hombre," she said, "do you know Marcos de Sarrion?"

"I