He has a cigarette with the vaqueros who ask him about Rawlins, whom they miss. They tell John Grady the news, but nothing of the Rocha family. He goes to the kitchen and waits to see the old señorita. Alejandra's great-aunt tells John Grady he has been a great disappointment to Sr. Rocha and a great expense to her. He replies, "I've been some inconvenienced myself." John Grady is angry that he didn't have the opportunity to tell his side of the story. She says that the Rocha family had John Grady investigated, and they found he lied twice. She confirms what he had suspected — that Alejandra promised never to see him again if the aunt paid for him to be released. They argue about the recent events, and then the great-aunt tells John Grady more of her life's story, about the Mexican Revolution and the Maderos. She talks about her father and his philosophy. She recounts the poverty in Mexico when she was young. She explains how Gustavo Madero helped her face her handicap after the shooting accident and how he was brutally treated — burned and shot after his arrest. She relates how Francisco Madero was also shot and how the family went into exile. She talks about the bonds of grief, about how she stayed in Europe and taught school in London until after her father's death. Now she visits his grave near the house and talks to him. John Grady asks again to be able to make his case, and she tells him she knows his case.
The next morning John Grady tells his friends goodbye and picks out the horse he calls "Rawlins' grullo." At noon, near farmland, he stops to have his lunch given to him at the hacienda, and he shares it with some children who want to know his story. So he tells them of Rawlins and Blevins and Alejandra. An older girl tells him he is forgetting that he is poor and the family is rich. She says he should appeal to the "grandmother," meaning the oldest female member of his intended's family. When he tells them that is not possible, they suggest a medicine woman. Finally, they tell him to pray.
