Ramona felt the chill, and was silent for a time, her face sad, and
her eyes tearful. At last she said, "I wish I knew if my mother was
dead."
"Why?" asked the Senora.
"Because if she is not dead I would ask her why she did not want
me to stay with her."
The gentle piteousness of this reply smote the Senora's conscience.
Taking the child in her arms, she said, "Who has been talking to
you of these things, Ramona?"
"Juan Can," she replied.
"What did he say?" asked the Senora, with a look in her eye which
boded no good to Juan Canito.
"It was not to me he said it, it was to Luigo; but I heard him,"
answered Ramona, speaking slowly, as if collecting her various
reminiscences on the subject. "Twice I heard him. He said that my
mother was no good, and that my father was bad too." And the
tears rolled down the child's cheeks.
The Senora's sense of justice stood her well in place of tenderness,
now. Caressing the little orphan as she had never before done, she
said, with an earnestness which sank deep into the child's mind,
"Ramona must not believe any such thing as that.
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