The house of Captain Tiago was no less disturbed than the imagination of the people. Maria Clara, refusing to listen to the consolation of her aunt and foster sister, did nothing but weep. Her father had forbidden her to speak to Ibarra until the priests should absolve him from the excommunication which they had pronounced upon him.  
Captain Tiago, though very busy preparing his house for the reception of the Governor General, had been summoned to the convent.
 
“Don’t cry, my girl,” said Aunt Isabel as she dusted off the mirrors. “They will certainly annul the excommunication; they will write the Pope.... We will make a large donation.... Father Dámaso had nothing more than a fainting spell.... He is not dead.”
 
“Don’t cry,” said Andeng to her, in a low voice. “I will certainly arrange it so that you can speak to him. What are the confessionals made for, if we are not expected to sin? Everything is pardoned when one has told it to the curate.”
 
Finally, Captain Tiago arrived. They scanned his face for an answer to their many questions, but his expression announced too plainly his dismay. The poor man was sweating, and passing his hand over his forehead. He seemed unable to utter a word.
 
“How is it, Santiago?” asked Aunt Isabel, anxiously.
 
He answered her with a sigh and dried away a tear.
 
“For God’s sake, speak! What has happened?”
 
“What I had already feared!” he broke out finally half crying. “All is lost! Father Dámaso orders that the engagement be broken. If it is not broken off, I am condemned in this life and in the next. They all tell me the same thing, even Father Sibyla! I ought to shut the [113]doors of my house and ... I owe him more than fifty thousand pesos. I told the Fathers so, but they would take no notice of it. ‘Which do you prefer to lose,’ they said to me, ‘fifty thousand pesos, or your life and your soul?’ Alas! Ay! San Antonio! If I had known it, if I had known it!”
 
Maria Clara was sobbing.
 
“Do not cry, my daughter,” he added, turning to her. “You are not like your mother. She never cried ... she never cried except when she was whimsical just before your birth.... Father Dámaso tells me that a relative of his has just arrived from Spain ... and that he wants him to be your fiancé.”...
 
Maria Clara stopped up her ears.
 
“But, Santiago, are you out of your head?” cried Aunt Isabel. “Speak to her now of another fiancé! Do you think that your daughter can change lovers as easily as she changes her dress?”
 
“I was thinking the same thing, Isabel. Don Crisostomo is rich.... The Spaniards only marry for love of money.... But what would you have me do? They have threatened me with excommunication. They say that I am in great peril: not only my soul, but also my body ... my body, do you hear? My body!”
 
“But you only give sorrow to your daughter. Are you not a friend of the Archbishop? Why don’t you write him?”
 
“The Archbishop is also a friar. The Archbishop does only what the friars say. But, Maria, do not cry. The Governor General will come. He will want to see you and your eyes are all inflamed..............