Part 19

“Night and day both?” she said. “Surely it is not well to sleep out in the night?”

“That is the best of all, Senora,” replied Alessandro, earnestly. “I beg the Senora to try it. If Senor Felipe have not mended greatly after the first night he had so slept, then Alessandro will be a liar.”

“No, only mistaken,” said the Senora, gently. She felt herself greatly drawn to this young man by his devotion, as she thought, of Felipe. “When I die and leave Felipe here,” she had more than once said to herself, “it would be a great good to him to have such a servant as this on the place.”

“Very well, Alessandro,” she replied; “make the bed, and we will try it at once.”

This was early in the forenoon. The sun was still high in the west, when Ramona, sitting as usual in the veranda, at her embroidery, saw Alessandro coming, followed by two men, bearing the raw-hide bed.

“What can that be?” she said. “Some new invention of Alessandro's, but for what?”

“A bed for the Senor Felipe, Senorita,” said Alessandro, running lightly up the steps. “The Senora has given permission to place it here on the veranda, and Senor Felipe is to lie here day and night; and it will be a marvel in your eyes how he will gain strength. It is the close room which is keeping him weak now; he has no illness.”

“I believe that is the truth, Alessandro,” exclaimed Ramona; “I have been thinking the same thing. My head aches after I am in that room but an hour, and when I come here I am well. But the nights too, Alessandro? Is it not harmful to sleep out in the night air?”

“Why, Senorita?” asked Alessandro, simply.

And Ramona had no answer, except, “I do not know; I have always heard so.”

“My people do not think so,” replied Alessandro; “unless it is cold, we like it better. It is good, Senorita, to look up at the sky in the night.”

“I should think it would be,” cried Ramona. “I never thought of it. I should like to do it.”

Alessandro was busy, with his face bent down, arranging the bedstead in a sheltered corner of the veranda. If his face had been lifted, Ramona would have seen a look on it that would have startled her more than the one she had surprised a few days previous, after the incident with Margarita. All day there had been coming and going in Alessandro's brain a confused procession of thoughts, vague yet intense. Put in words, they would have been found to be little more than ringing changes on this idea: “The Senorita Ramona has Indian blood in her veins. The Senorita Ramona is alone. The Senora loves her not. Indian blood! Indian blood!” These, or something like them, would have been the words; but Alessandro did not put them in words. He only worked away on the rough posts for Senor Felipe's bedstead, hammered, fitted, stretched the raw-hide and made it tight and firm, driving every nail, striking every blow, with a bounding sense of exultant strength, as if there were suddenly all around him a new heaven and a new earth.

Now, when he heard Ramona say suddenly in her girlish, eager tone, “It must be; I never thought of it; I should like to try it,” these vague confused thoughts of the day, and the day's bounding sense of exultant strength, combined in a quick vision before Alessandro's eyes,--a vision of starry skies overhead, Ramona and himself together, looking up to them. But when he raised his head, all he said was, “There, Senorita! That is all firm, now. If Senor Felipe will let me lay him an this bed, he will sleep as he has not slept since he fell ill.”

Ramona ran eagerly into Felipe's room, “The bed is all ready on the veranda,” she exclaimed. “Shall Alessandro come in and carry you out?”

Felipe looked up, startled. The Senora turned on Ramona that expression of gentle, resigned displeasure, which always hurt the girl's sensitive nature far worse than anger. “I had not spoken to Felipe yet of the change, Ramona,” she said. “I supposed that Alessandro would have informed me when the bed was ready; I am sorry you came in so suddenly. Felipe is still very weak, you see.”

“What is it? What is it?” exclaimed Felipe, impatiently.

As soon as it was explained to him, he was like a child in his haste to be moved.

“That's just what I needed!” he exclaimed. “This cursed bed racks every bone in my body, and I have longed for the sun more than ever a thirsty man longed for water. Bless you, Alessandro,” he went on, seeing Alessandro in the doorway. “Come here, and take me up in those long arms of yours, and carry me quick. Already I feel myself better.”

Alessandro lifted him as if he were a baby; indeed, it was but a light burden now, Felipe's wasted body, for a man much less strong than Alessandro to lift.

Ramona, chilled and hurt, ran in advance, carrying pillows and blankets. As she began to arrange them on the couch, the Senora took them from her hands, saying, “I will arrange them myself;” and waved Ramona away.

It was a little thing. Ramona was well used to such. Ordinarily it would have given her no pain she could not conceal. But the girl's nerves were not now in equilibrium. She had had hard work to keep back her tears at the first rebuff. This second was too much. She turned, and walked swiftly away, the tears rolling down her cheeks.

Alessandro saw it; Felipe saw it.

To Felipe the sight was, though painful, not a surprise. He knew but too well how often his mother hurt Ramona. All he thought now, in his weakness, was, “Alas! what a pity my mother does not love Ramona!”

To Alessandro the sight was the one drop too much in the cup. As he stooped to lay Felipe on the bed, he trembled so that Felipe looked up, half afraid.

“Am I still so heavy, Alessandro?” he said smiling.

“It is not your weight, Senor Felipe,” answered Alessandro, off guard, still trembling, his eyes following Ramona.

Felipe saw. In the next second, the eyes of the two young men met. Alessandro's fell before Felipe's. Felipe gazed on, steadily, at Alessandro.