As I delayed to open my eyes, half awake, but unwilling to shock too soon the last lingering desire to doze, I seemed to hear a familiar rebuke from the great pepper tree beyond my window.
"Señora! Señora! Señora!" called an old mocker. "Get up! get up! get up!" screamed his neighbor from the next limb.
I fancied now as I listened, that the birds had tried to awaken me in the night. Vaguely returned an ugly dream, with the ceaseless call of the persistent birds.
In a moment I remembered all. The dead grandmother, Mariposilla, the midnight cry of the mockers—"Señora! Señora! Señora!"
Mariposilla?
Where was she? When had she slipped away? Did the birds alone know?
The couch was empty. Each pillow bore the mark of the child's weary head.
In the night, while I slept, my restless captive had fled.
I sprang across the hall to her room; it was empty, and the bed undisturbed. Trembling I entered the death chamber. The Doña Maria was alone; her child was not with her.
The good woman was again before the shrine of the Virgin, repeating a last prayer for her dead, preparatory to the painful duties of the morning.