at Juanita with a speculative
glance. She was so gay and inconsequent.

"Heaven forbid!" was the reply. "She says she is going to marry a
soldier. I can't think why. She says she likes the drums. But I told her
she could buy a drum and hire a man to hit it. She is very rich, you
know. It is not worth marrying for that, is it?"

"No," answered Marcos, to whom the question had been addressed.

"She may get tired of drums, you know. Just as we get tired saying our
prayers at school. I am sure she ought to reflect before she marries a
soldier. I wouldn't if I were she. Oh! but I forgot...."

She paused and turning to Marcos she gripped his arm with a confidential
emphasis. "Do you know, Marcos, I keep on forgetting that we are married.
You don't mind, do you? I am not a bit sorry, you know. I am so glad,
because it gets me away from school. And I hate school. And there was
always the dread that they would make me a nun despite us all. You don't
know what it is to feel helpless and to have a dread; to wake up with it
at night and wish you were dead and all the bother was over."

"It is all over now, without being dead," Marcos assured her, with his
slow smile.

"Quite sure?"

"Quite sure," answered Marcos.

"And I shall never go back to school again. And they have no power over
me; neither Sor Teresa, nor Sor Dorothea, nor the dear mother. We always
call her the 'dear mother,' you know, because we have to; but we hate
her. But that is all over now, is it not?"

"Yes," answered Marcos.

"Then I am glad I married you," said Juanita, with conviction.

"And I need not be afraid of Senor Mon, with his gentle smile?" asked
Juanita, turning on Marcos with a sudden shrewd gravity.

"No."

She gave a great sigh of relief and shook back her mantilla. Then she
laughed and turned to Sarrion.

"He always says 'yes' or 'no'--and only that," she remarked
confidentially to him. "But somehow it seems enough."

They had reached the corner of the street now, and the carriage was
approaching them. It was one of the heavy carriages used only on state
occasions which had stood idle for many years in the stables of the
Palacio Sarrion. The horses were from Torre Garda and the men in their
quiet liveries greeted her with country frankness.

"It is one of the grand carriages," said Juanita.

"Yes."

"Why?" she asked.

"To take you home," replied Sarrion.

Juanita got into the carriage and sat down in silence. The man who c