Throughout this scene Mrs Gould refers her own grief to Antonia, a mechanism both psychological and allegorical. The silver was supposedly the last hope to save San Tomé from Montero, so its supposed loss means the failure of Mrs Gould's own "unselfish ambitions." But precisely because she is unselfish, she cannot indulge in self-pity, but must transfer her emotions to Antonia, and feel sorry for someone else, as it were. Allegorically, Antonia represents idealism, so on that level Mrs Gould is grieving for the wound to idealism itself.