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The words “My husband” fell like a thunderbolt among them. Herlinda had rushed to the door, but Doña Feliz caught her in her strong arms, and forced her back. “Tell us what you mean!” she ejaculated; while the frightened governess plucked her by the sleeve, reiterating again and again, “Pardon! pardon! entreat your mother’s pardon!”

But the terrible turn affairs had taken had driven the thought of pardon, or the need of it, from her mind. “I tell you I am his wife! Ah, you think that cannot be, but it is true; the Irish priest married us four months ago in Las Parras. Let me go, Feliz, let me go! I am his wife!”

“This is madness!” interrupted Doña Isabel, in a voice of such preternatural calmness that her daughter turned as if awestricken to look at her. “Unhappy girl, you cannot have been that man’s wife. You have been betrayed! Child! child! the house of Garcia is disgraced!”

A chill fell upon the governess, yet she spoke sharply, almost pertly: “Not disgraced by Herlinda, Madame. She was indeed married to John Ashley, in the parish church of Las Parras, by the missionary priest, Father Magauley.”