There is a good dinner ready; and you are hungry, no doubt."
"For three hours I have been faint. Ah! you have made me a
custard also! You are a very comforter."
But the girl was still and sad, and Antonia was hard pressed
to find any real comfort for her. For she knew that their
only hope lay in the immediate attack of the American force,
and its success; and she did not think it wise to hide from
her sister the alternatives that lay before them if the
Americans failed.
"I am afraid," said Isabel; "and so unhappy. A very sad
business is life. I cannot think how any one can care to
live."
"Remember Luis, and our father, and Jack, and Thomas, and our
dear mother, who this morning stood between us and Fray
Ignatius. Will you let this priest turn the sky black above
you?"
"And also, men will fight. What for? Who can tell? The
Americans want so much of everything. Naturally they do not
get all they want. What do they do? Fight, and get killed.
Then they go into the next world, and complain of people. As
for Luis, I do not expect to see him again."
Fortunately, the norther moderated at sunset. Life then
seemed so much more possible. Adverse elements intensify
adverse fortune, and the physical suffering from the cold had
also benumbed Antonia's spirits, and made her less hopeful and
less clear-visioned.
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