If the
child had been Felipe's own, he could not have felt for it a greater
love. From the first, the little thing had clung to him as only
second to her mother. She slept hours in his arms, one little hand
hid in his dark beard, close to his lips, and kissed again and again
when no one saw. Next to Ramona herself in Felipe's heart came
Ramona's child; and on the child he could lavish the fondness he
felt that he could never dare to show to the mother, Month by
month it grew clearer to Felipe that the mainsprings of Ramona's
life were no longer of this earth; that she walked as one in constant
fellowship with one unseen. Her frequent and calm mention of
Alessandro did not deceive him. It did not mean a lessening grief:
it meant an unchanged relation.
One thing weighed heavily on Felipe's mind,-- the concealed
treasure. A sense of humiliation withheld him, day after day, from
speaking of it. But he could have no peace until Ramona knew it.
Each hour that he delayed the revelation he felt himself almost as
guilty as he had held his mother to be.
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