Unable to prolong her deception, Santa had told them the story of her tragic idyll, but she refused to pronounce the name of her lover on any condition. Let them find it out if they could.

“I won't tell you, not to save my life! No, no, no!”

Faced with Santa's stubbornness and the fury of her brothers, who were hardly able to contain themselves, who knows what heart-rending words were uttered by the old Agustina as she sat with her hands on her knees, her arms rigid, her body erect, her head thrown back so that her immaculate white mane, falling in disorder on her poor, thin shoulders, resembled the imprecise radiance of a holy image in a dimly lit sanctuary. Whatever she said, her eyes half closed, they were things that weighed heavily in Santa's heart, things about her honorable birth and upbringing, about the sacrifices made by her parents, about her first steps and her first communion, about how “if her father were alive, this would kill him.” Her mother's bitter, candid lamentations in the face of the inevitable sounded childish and sarcastic on the lips of a woman who had lived so long. Agustina did not curse her. No matter how impure, Santa was still her beloved daughter for whom she implored God's infinite mercy. But her mother did repudiate her, as must be done when a virgin leaves the path of righteousness and allows her cloak of innocence to be torn asunder; as must be done when an unworthy daughter stains the honor of an aging mother soon to meet her maker; as must be done when an ungrateful sister dishonors the brothers who labor, day in and day out, to support her. In such cases, she who is no longer a virgin, the unworthy daughter, the ungrateful sister threatens to corrupt all that surrounds her, and she must be repudiated, cast out, and regarded from then on as if no longer alive, may God have mercy on her soul.

And with a supreme effort—the energy that she feigned to possess now totally exhausted—Agustina rose to her feet, exalted and sacred.

And as she rose, Santa shrank in humiliation, lower and lower, falling at her mother's feet, pressing her beautiful, sinful face against the ground.

And Esteban and Fabián, imposing, healthy, and strong as ever, stood and took off their hats as if awed by the priestly solemnity of Agustina's utterance.

“Go, Santa!” ordered the aging mother. “Go! I can't stand any more …” It was true that she could not stand any more. Like an old oak split by lightning, she collapsed into the arms of Fabián and Esteban, who hurried to her assistance.

Meanwhile, Santa, without resisting her mother's final mandate, cast a final anguished look of farewell toward the little white house and its inhabitants, and walked unsteadily to the gate. There she stopped, hoping against hope that they might call to her. She turned to see her mother for the last time, in her brothers' arms, as if in a tableau representing the austere justice of biblical patriarchs. Agustina's right hand was still raised from the moment when she had ordered Santa to leave.