“Has he left a will?” asked Marcos.

Sarrion turned and looked at him with a short laugh.  He threw his cigarette away, and coming into the room, sat down in front of the small table where Marcos was still satisfying his honest and simple appetite.

“I have told my story badly,” he said, with a curt laugh, “and spoilt it.  You have soon seen through it.  Mogente made a will on his death-bed—­which was, by the way, witnessed by Leon de Mogente as a supernumerary, not a legal witness—­just to show that all was square and above board.”

“Then he left his money—?”

“To Juanita.  One can only conclude that he was wandering in mind when he did it.  For he was fond of her, I think.  He had no reason to wish her harm.  I have picked up what unconsidered trifles of information I can, but they do not amount to much.  I cabled to Cuba for news as to Mogente’s fortune; for we know that he has made one.  There is the reply.”  He handed Marcos a telegram which bore the words: 

“Three million pesetas in the English Funds.”

“That is the millstone that he has tied round Juanita’s neck,” said Sarrion, folding the paper and returning it to his pocket.

“To saddle with three million pesetas a girl who is at a convent school, in the hands of the Sisters of the True Faith, when the Carlist cause is dying for want of funds, and the Jesuits know that it is Don Carlos or a Republic, and all the world knows that all republics have been fatal to the Society—­bah!” the Count threw out his hands in a gesture of despair.  “It is to throw her into a convent, bound hand and foot.  We cannot leave that poor girl without help, Marcos.”

“No,” said Marcos, gently.

“There is only one way—­I have thought of it night and day.  There is only one way, my friend.”

Marcos looked at his father thoughtfully, and waited to hear what that way might be.

“You must marry her,” said the Count.

Chapter VIII
the trail
The Count rose again and went to the window without looking at Marcos. 
They had lived together like brothers, and like brothers, they had fallen
into the habit of closing the door of silence upon certain subjects.

Juanita, it would appear, was one of these.  For neither was at ease while speaking of her.  Spaniards and Germans and Englishmen are not notable for a pretty and fanciful treatment of the subject of love.  But they approach it with a certain shy delicacy of which the lighter Latin heart has no conception.

The Count glanced over his shoulder, and Marcos, without looking up, must have seen the action, for he took the opportunity of shaking his head.

“You shake your head,” said Sarrion, with a sort of effort to be gay and careless, “What do you want?  She is the prettiest girl in Aragon.”

“It is not that,” said Marcos, curtly, with a flush on his brown face.