"Mamma has been begging money of you, hasn't she?"
"No, my girl," replied Martí, coloring a little.
"Don't deny it to me, Emilio. I have known all since this morning."
"Very well, what of it? The thing is not worth wrinkling this little brow," he answered, touching it tenderly.
Cristina remained silent and thoughtful a few moments.
"You know," she said at last firmly, "that I have never opposed your expenditures for Sabas. I have enjoyed your generosity towards all, but your treatment of my brother has especially pleased me. Yet I have asked myself sometimes, 'Will this generosity of Emilio have really good consequences? Will it not encourage my brother to continue in his idle and dissipated habits?' If he were alone in the world, he might indulge in such luxurious ways without much danger. When he came to want, you could, by reducing him to strict necessities, keep him on his feet. But he has a wife, he has children, and I fear that they will have to bear the consequences of your generosity and of the habits which, thanks to your kindness, their father does not abandon. And, too," she added in low tones that trembled a little, "at present we have no great responsibilities, but we shall have them——"
"I believe you; we shall have them!" exclaimed Martí. "It looks to me as if the first of them would not be many days in arriving!"
Cristina's cheeks colored swiftly. Emilio, changing his tone, went over to her, put his arm about her shoulders affectionately, and said to her:
"You are right in this, as you are in everything that you say. You are a hundred times more sensible than I am. Perhaps I should have refused Sabas if he had come begging of me, because I am already a little tired of his affairs; but your mother comes—when I see her crying—you don't know how that moves me."
Cristina lifted to him her eyes shining with immense gratitude, her face quivering with feeling; fearing that she could not control her emotion, she suddenly left the room.