ike the device
of an entire race: "O crux, ave, spes unica!"

Soon the night will come. Now they are silent, because the hour is
going, because the moment approaches, because all these crosses on the
road are beginning to intimidate them--

And the day falls, under that sad veil which covers the sky. The valleys
become more savage, the country more deserted. And, at the corners of
roads, the old crosses appear, ever with their similar inscriptions: "O
crux, ave, spes unica!"

Amezqueta, at the last twilight. They stop their carriage at an outskirt
of the village, before the cider mill. Arrochkoa is impatient to go into
the house of the sisters, vexed at arriving so late; he fears that the
door may not be opened to them. Ramuntcho, silent, lets him act.

It is above, on the hill; it is that isolated house which a cross
surmounts and which one sees in relief in white on the darker mass of
the mountain. They recommend that as soon as the horse is rested the
wagon be brought to them, at a turn, to wait for them. Then, both go
into the avenue of trees which leads to that convent and where the
thickness of the May foliage makes the obscurity almost nocturnal.
Without saying anything to each other, without making a noise with
their sandals, they ascend in a supple and easy manner; around them the
profound fields are impregnated by the immense melancholy of the night.

Arrochkoa knocks with his finger on the door of the peaceful house:

"I would like to see my sister, if you please," he says to an old nun
who opens the door, astonished--

Before he has finished talking, a cry of joy comes from the dark
corridor, and a nun, whom one divines is young in spite of the
envelopment of her dissembling costume, comes and takes his hand. She
has recognized him by his voice,--but has she divined the other who
stays behind and does not talk?--

The Mother Superior has come also, and, in the darkness of the stairway,
she makes them go up to the parlor of the little country convent; then
she brings the cane-seat chairs and everyone sits down, Arrochkoa near
his sister, Ramuntcho opposite,--and they face each other at last, the
two lovers, and a silence, full of the beating of arteries, full of
leaps of hearts, full of fever, descends upon them--

Truly, in this place, one knows not what peace almost sweet, and a
little sepulchral also, envelopes the terrible interview; in the depth
of the chests, the hearts beat with great blows,