mongrel blood, "If the child were pure Indian, I would like it
better," she said. "I like not these crosses. It is the worst, and not
the best of each, that remains."

But the promise once given, Senora Ortegna was content. Well she
knew that her sister would not lie, nor evade a trust. The little
Ramona's future was assured. During the last years of the unhappy
woman's life the child was her only comfort. Ortegna's conduct
had become so openly and defiantly infamous, that he even
flaunted his illegitimate relations in his wife's presence; subjecting
her to gross insults, spite of her helpless invalidism. This last
outrage was too much for the Gonzaga blood to endure; the Senora
never afterward left her apartment, or spoke to her husband. Once
more she sent for her sister to come; this time, to see her die.
Every valuable she possessed, jewels, laces, brocades, and
damasks, she gave into her sister's charge, to save them from
falling into the hands of the base creature that she knew only too
well would stand in her place as soon as the funeral services had
been said over her dead body.

Stealthily, as if she had been a thief, the sorrowing Senora Moreno
conveyed her sister's wardrobe, article by article, out of the house,
to be sent to her own home. It was the wardrobe of a princess. The
Ortegnas lavished money always on the women whose hearts they
broke; and never ceased to demand of them that they should sit
superbly arrayed in their lonely wretchedness.

One hour after the funeral, with a scant and icy ceremony of
farewell to her dead sister's husband, Senora Moreno, leading the
little four-year-old Ramona by the hand, left the house, and early