A sharp ear might have distinguished the following:

"I loved you before I had even seen you, and if you had not come I
should have died of grief. Mamma used to give me your father's letters
to read, and he praised you so much in them that I used to say, 'That
is the man who ought to be my husband.' For a long time your father said
nothing about our marrying, which seemed to me great negligence. Uncle
Cayetano, whenever he spoke of you, would say, 'There are not many men
like him in the world. The woman who gets him for a husband may think
herself fortunate.' At last your father said what he could not avoid
saying. Yes, he could not avoid saying it--I was expecting it every
day."

Shortly after these words the same voice added uneasily: "Some one is
following us."

Emerging from among the oleanders, Pepe, turning round, saw two men
approaching them, and touching the leaves of a young tree near by, he
said aloud to his companion:

"It is not proper to prune young trees like this for the first time
until they have taken firm root. Trees recently planted have not
sufficient strength to bear the operation. You know that the roots can
grow only by means of the leaves, so that if you take the leaves from a
tree--"

"Ah, Senor Don Jose," cried the Penitentiary, with a frank laugh,
approaching the two young people and bowing to them, "are you giving
lessons in horticulture? _Insere nunc Meliboee piros; pone ordine
vites_, as the great singer of the labors of the field said. 'Graft the