第71章 XIII(5)

It was strange how little bitterness toward the Senora was in the girl's mind; how comparatively little she thought of her. Her heart was too full of Alessandro and of their future; and it had never been Ramona's habit to dwell on the Senora in her thoughts. As from her childhood up she had accepted the fact of the Senora's coldness toward her, so now she accepted her injustice and opposition as part of the nature of things, and not to be altered.

During all these hours, during the coming and going of these crowds of fears, sorrows, memories, anticipations in Ramona's heart, all that there was to be seen to the eye was simply a calm, quiet girl, sitting on the veranda, diligently working at her lace-frame. Even Felipe was deceived by her calmness, and wondered what it meant,-- if it could be that she was undergoing the change that his mother had thought possible, and designated as coming "to her senses." Even Felipe did not know the steadfast fibre of the girl's nature; neither did he realize what a bond had grown between her and Alessandro. In fact, he sometimes wondered of what this bond had been made. He had himself seen the greater part of their intercourse with each other; nothing could have been farther removed from anything like love-making. There had been no crisis of incident, or marked moments of experience such as in Felipe's imaginations of love were essential to the fulness of its growth. This is a common mistake on the part of those who have never felt love's true bonds. Once in those chains, one perceives that they are not of the sort full forged in a day. They are made as the great iron cables are made, on which bridges are swung across the widest water-channels,-- not of single huge rods, or bars, which would be stronger, perhaps, to look at, but of myriads of the finest wires, each one by itself so fine, so frail, it would barely hold a child's kite in the wind: by hundreds, hundreds of thousands of such, twisted, re-twisted together, are made the mighty cables, which do not any more swerve from their place in the air, under the weight and jar of the ceaseless traffic and tread of two cities, than the solid earth swerves under the same ceaseless weight and jar. Such cables do not break.

Even Ramona herself would have found it hard to tell why she thus loved Alessandro; how it began, or by what it grew. It had not been a sudden adoration, like his passion for her; it was, in the beginning, simply a response; but now it was as strong a love as his,-- as strong, and as unchangeable. The Senora's harsh words had been like a forcing-house air to it, and the sudden knowledge of the fact of her own Indian descent seemed to her like a revelation, pointing out the path in which destiny called her to walk. She thrilled with pleasure at the thought of the joy with which Alessandro would hear this,-- the joy and the surprise. She imagined to herself, in hundreds of ways, the time, place, and phrase in which she would tell him. She could not satisfy herself as to the best; as to which would give keenest pleasure to him and to her. She would tell him, as soon as she saw him; it should be her first word of greeting. No! There would be too much of trouble and embarrassment then. She would wait till they were far away, till they were alone, in the wilderness; and then she would turn to him, and say, "Alessandro, my people are your people!" Or she would wait, and keep her secret until she had reached Temecula, and they had begun their life there, and Alessandro had been astonished to see how readily and kindly she took to all the ways of the Indian village; and then, when he expressed some such emotion, she would quietly say, "But I too am an Indian, Alessandro!"

Strange, sad bride's dreams these; but they made Ramona's heart beat with happiness as she dreamed them.