"Of violating a tomb? Mercy on us, what must she have thought of me!"
"She was not just, she was not generous!" Miss Tita cried
with sudden passion.
The light that had come into my mind a moment before increased.
"Ah, don't say that, for we ARE a dreadful race."
Then I pursued, "If she left a will, that may give you some idea."
"I have found nothing of the sort--she destroyed it.
She was very fond of me," Miss Tita added incongruously.
"She wanted me to be happy. And if any person should be kind to me--
she wanted to speak of that."
I was almost awestricken at the astuteness with which
the good lady found herself inspired, transparent astuteness
as it was and sewn, as the phrase is, with white thread.
"Depend upon it she didn't want to make any provision that would
be agreeable to me."
"No, not to you but to me. She knew I should like it if you could
carry out your idea. Not because she cared for you but because
she did think of me," Miss Tita went on with her unexpected,
persuasive volubility. "You could see them--you could use them."
She stopped, seeing that I perceived the sense of that conditional--
stopped long enough for me to give some sign which I did not give.
She must have been conscious, however, that though my face showed
the greatest embarrassment that was ever painted on a human countenance
it was not set as a stone, it was also full of compassion.
It was a comfort to me a long time afterward to consider that she
could not have seen in me the smallest symptom of disrespect.
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