Five days had passed since the entrance of Caballuco into the Penitentiary’s house. It was evening. Remedios entered her uncle’s room with the lighted lamp, which she placed on the table. She then seated herself in front of the old man, who, for a great part of the afternoon, had been sitting motionless and thoughtful in his easy chair. His fingers supported his chin, wrinkling up the brown skin, unshaven for the past three days.
“Did Caballuco say he would come here to supper to-night?” he asked his niece.
“Yes, senor, he will come. It is in a respectable house like this that the poor fellow is most secure.”
“Well, I am not altogether easy in my mind, in spite of the respectability of the house,” answered the Penitentiary. “How the brave Ramos exposes himself! And I am told that in Villahorrenda and the surrounding country there are a great many men. I don’t know how many men–What have you heard?”
“That the soldiers are committing atrocities.”
“It is a miracle that those Hottentots have not searched the house! I declare that if I see one of the red-trousered gentry enter the house, I shall fall down speechless.”
“This is a nice condition of things!” said Remedios, exhaling half her soul in a sigh. “I cannot get out of my head the idea of the tribulation in which Senora Dona Perfecta finds herself. Uncle, you ought to go there.”
“Go there to-night? The military are parading the streets! Imagine that some insolent soldier should take it into his head to–The senora is well protected. The other day they searched the house and they carried off the six armed men she had there; but afterward they sent them back to her. We have no one to protect us in case of an attack.”
“I sent Jacinto to the senora’s, to keep her company for a while. If Caballuco comes, we will tell him to stop in there, too. No one can put it out of my head but that those rascals are plotting some piece of villany against our friend. Poor senora, poor Rosarito! When one thinks that this might have been avoided by what I proposed to Dona Perfecta two days ago–”
“My dear niece,” said the Penitentiary phlegmatically, “we have done all that it was in human power to do to carry out our virtuous purpose. More we cannot do. Convince yourself of this, and do not be obstinate. Rosarito cannot be the wife of our idolized Jacintillo. Your golden dream, your ideal of happiness, that at one time seemed attainable, and to which like a good uncle, I devoted all the powers of my understanding, has become chimerical, has vanished into smoke. Serious obstructions, the wickedness of a man, the indubitable love of the girl, and other things, regarding which I am silent, have altered altogether the condition of affairs. We were in a fair way to conquer, and suddenly we are conquered. Ah, niece! convince yourself of one thing. As matters are now, Jacinto deserves something a great deal better than that crazy girl.”
“Caprices and obstinate notions!” responded Maria, with an ill-humor that was far from respectful. “That’s a pretty thing to say now, uncle! The great minds are outshining themselves, now. Dona Perfecta with her lofty ideas, and you with your doubts and fears—of much use either of you is. It is a pity that God made me such a fool and gave me an understanding of brick and mortar, as the senora says, for if that wasn’t the case I would soon settle the question.”
“You?”
“If she and you had allowed me, it would be settled already.”
“By the beating?”
“There’s no occasion for you to be frightened or to open your eyes like that. There is no question of killing any body. What an idea!”
“Beating,” said the canon, smiling, “is like scratching—when one begins one doesn’t know when to leave off.”
“Bah! say too that I am cruel and blood-thirsty. I wouldn’t have the courage to kill a fly; it’s not very likely that I should desire the death of a man.”
“In fine, child, no matter what objections you may make, Senor Don Pepe Rey will carry off the girl. It is not possible now to prevent it. He is ready to employ every means, including dishonor. If Rosarito—how she deceived us with that demure little face and those heavenly eyes, eh!—if Rosarito, I say, did not herself wish it, then all might be arranged, but alas! she loves him as the sinner loves Satan; she is consumed with a criminal passion; she has fallen, niece, into the snares of the Evil One. Let us be virtuous and upright; let us turn our eyes away from the ignoble pair, and think no more about either of them.”
“You know nothing about women, uncle,” said Remedios, with flattering hypocrisy; “you are a holy man; you do not understand that Rosario’s feeling is only a passing caprice, one of those caprices that are cured by a sound whipping.”
“Niece,” said Don Inocencio gravely and sententiously, “when serious things have taken place, caprices are not called caprices, but by another name.”
“Uncle, you don’t know what you are talking about,” responded Maria Remedios, her face flushing suddenly. “What! would you be capable of supposing that Rosarito—what an atrocity! I will defend her; yes, I will defend her. She is as pure as an angel. Why, uncle, those things bring a blush to my cheek, and make me indignant with you.”
As she spoke the good priest’s face was darkened by a cloud of sadness that made him look ten years older.
“My dear Remedios,” he said, “we have done all that is humanly possible, and all that in conscience we can or ought to do. Nothing could be more natural than our desire to see Jacintillo connected with that great family, the first in Orbajosa; nothing more natural than our desire to see him master of the seven houses in the town, the meadow of Mundogrande, the three gardens of the upper farm, La Encomienda, and the other lands and houses which that girl owns. Your son has great merit, every one knows it well. Rosarito liked him, and he liked Rosarito. The matter seemed settled. Dona Perfecta herself, without being very enthusiastic, doubtless on account of our origin, seemed favorably disposed toward it, because of her great esteem and veneration for me, as her confessor and friend. But suddenly this unlucky young man presents himself. The senora tells me that she has given her word to her brother, and that she cannot reject the proposal made by him. A difficult situation! But what do I do in view of all this? Ah, you don’t know every thing! I will be frank with you. If I had found Senor de Rey to be a man of good principles, calculated to make Rosario happy, I would not have interfered in the matter; but the young man appeared to me to be a wretch, and, as the spiritual director of the house, it was my duty to take a hand in the business, and I took it. You know already that I determined to unmask him. I exposed his vices; I made manifest his atheism; I laid bare to the view of all the rottenness of that materialistic heart, and the senora was convinced that in giving her daughter to him, she would be delivering her up to vice. Ah, what anxieties I endured! The senora vacillated; I strengthened her wavering mind; I advised her concerning the means she might lawfully employ to send her nephew away without scandal. I suggested ingenious ideas to her; and as she often spoke to me of the scruples that troubled her tender conscience, I tranquillized her, pointing out to her how far it was allowable for us to go in our fight against that lawless enemy. Never did I counsel violent or sanguinary measures or base outrages, but always subtle artifices, in which there was no sin. My mind is tranquil, my dear niece. But you know that I struggled hard, that I worked like a negro. Ah! when I used to come home every night and say, ‘Mariquilla, we are getting on well, we are getting on very well,’ you used to be wild with delight, and you would kiss my hands again and again, and say I was the best man on earth. Why do you fly into a passion now, disfiguring your noble character and peaceable disposition? Why do you scold me? Why do you say that you are indignant, and tell me in plain terms that I am nothing better than an idiot?”