Keep it for me, Father, I pray you," and the Father could not refuse
his imploring tone.
"What are your plans now?" he asked.
"Plans!" repeated Alessandro,-- "plans, Father! Why should I make
plans? I will stay in my house so long as the Americans will let
me. You saw our little house, Father!" His voice broke as he said
this. "I have large wheat-fields; if I can get one more crop off
them, it will be something; but my land is of the richest in the
valley, and as soon as the Americans see it, they will want it.
Farewell, Father. I thank you for keeping my money, and for all
you said to the thief Morong. Ysidro told me. Farewell." And he
was gone, and out of sight on the swift galloping Benito, before
Father Gaspara bethought himself.
"And I remembered not to ask who his wife was. I will look back
at the record," said the Father. Taking down the old volume, he ran
his eye back over the year. Marriages were not so many in Father
Gaspara's parish, that the list took long to read. The entry of
Alessandro's marriage was blotted. The Father had been in haste
that night.
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