"Tonight."
"My prayers will go with her to sustain her in the anguish of her ordeal," said Borromeo, in his simple piety. "I thought Padre Ignacio had stopped it. He was against it from the first word."
"He has not consented, neither forbidden it. Gertrudis will not offend him; she will go about it quietly after the governor has retired and all is still. Padre Ignacio has only to keep out of the way, and you too, my good Borromeo. If her strength is equal to her faith she will carry it through, but she is so pale and worn by her vigils and grief that I am afraid."
"As for me, I do not know. I never heard of such a thing. Maybe Our Señora will be pleased by such a sacrifice, but I say I do not know."
"I have heard of it being done," Magdalena said, her voice low and reverent. "It comes from the old times, when there were miracles. Who knows?"
"At least it can do no harm, only to herself," said Borromeo, also reverent and hushed of voice as if he stood in a holy place. "Consider the pain of it, doña. I might undertake it for my own eyes, but for another's"
"You would if that other one was more to you than eyes, than your whole body,—yes even your life and your very soul."
"In that case there would be nothing left of a man, doña."
"There is nothing left of a woman when she loves a man as Gertrudis does Juan. She can go
