"What an idea! Don't worry about that, as if we don't know who is the prettiest!" said the other, with evident pique.

"Gently, gently, senoras," exclaimed Gonzalo. "It is true that Pablo began by talking of the perfections of Nieves, but it is certain that he had meant to go on to those of all the rest, if he had not been interrupted. Is it not so, Pablo?"

"Yes, I meant to go on to Valentina."

Whereupon the girl referred to raised her head and looked at him with the half-frowning, half-roguish look that was peculiar to her.

"Take care, Nieves, that these young men don't forget themselves."

Pablo, without heeding the interruption, proceeded:

"And then from Teresa and Encarnacian, Elvira, and Generosa, I should have gone on to Venturita, for of course all men are at her feet; to Cecilia, no, for she is engaged; and then I should have said something about Senora Dona Paula, who, be it said without offense to anybody, is the most beautiful of all."

"What a humbug!" exclaimed the lady, pleased at her son's flattery.

Then Pablo rose from his armchair and embraced his mother affectionately.

"Get away, get away, flatterer!" she said, laughing.

"Come, open your purse, mama," said Venturita.

"I see! A spiteful remark as usual," exclaimed the young man in a rage, as he turned his head to his sister; but she only smiled to herself maliciously, without raising her head from her embroidery frame.

"You have done a great deal," said Gonzalo in a low voice, as he took a seat by the side of his fiancee.

"So, so," returned Cecilia, looking at him with her large, luminous eyes.

"But, indeed, it is a great deal. Yesterday you had not embroidered this clove. It looks to me like a clove."

"It is jasmine."

"Nor these two leaves, either."

"Bah! That is nothing."

"And what are you embroidering now?"

Cecilia went on plying her needle without answering.

"What are you embroidering now?" asked Gonzalo in a louder voice, thinking that she had not heard.

"A sheet--hush!" returned the young girl, slightly raising her eyes in the direction of the embroideresses, and quickly dropping them again.

At that moment Gonzalo's and Venturita's eyes met in a meaning glance over Cecilia's head.

"Well, you see, every one to his taste," said Pablito, as he looked fixedly at Nieves, as much as to say:

"Don't pay any attention. I only say that as a duty."

"What is there to suit everybody, Don Pablo?" asked Valentina in an ironical tone.

"Flowers, girl."

"Give them to the saints."

"And to pretty girls like you."

"If I am not pretty, I precede those that are, without any by your leave."

"The deuce she does! Valentina puts her back up directly one goes near her," exclaimed the snubbed young man.

The joke made the needlewomen laugh.

"Valentina does not like young men," said Encarnacian.

"She is quite right; you get nothing from young men but promises, lost time, and often a lifetime of misery," said Dona Paula sententiously, unmindful of her own fortunate lot. "As to that, Sarrio is quite demoralized; there is hardly a girl who keeps company with one of her own cla.s.s. The young man is at least expected to wear a cravat, to carry a cane and a cigarette-holder, although he may not have a plate to eat off. Young girls do not mind being seen at dusk nowadays with young gentlemen, nor do they object to returning from fairs on the arm of one of them, singing at the top of their voices."

"Poor young things! I don't know what you expect. Because the son of Don Rudesindo married Pepe la Esquilla, and the pilot of the 'Trinidad' the Mechacan girl, you think all is gold that glitters. But seeing is believing. Look at Benita, the girl at Senor Matias's, the sacristan.

She does not look very pretty now, eh?"

"Benita has her marriage lines," said Encarnacian.

"Lines, eh? She will see what her lines are worth."

"Senora, the lad can not desert her; if he does, she will pursue him all her life."

"Silence, silence, chatterbox; who put such ideas into your head?"

"It is a well-known fact that Benita has gone to law."

"Look here, senora," said the dark, sentimental girl, "it is quite true that we run risks, but what are we to do? The artisans of the town are just as bad; they mostly spend Sunday and Monday and one day in the week at the tavern. How many are there who take their wages home to their wives regularly? If the husband is a sailor, he sends it home one quarter, keeps it three quarters, and then keeps it altogether. The supplies ceasing, the unhappy woman is forced to work to get bread for her children.

"And then in other cases what thanks or reward does the wife get from her husband? If he does go out with her on a Sunday afternoon, he stops at every public house on the road and leaves the poor creature at the door; or if there is some friend with him, he shouts out some insulting remark at her that makes her blush like a peony.

"Yes, yes, senora, they are all such vagabonds. Goodness knows they are not worth the bread they eat. The other day I met Tomasina--you know the girl at Uncle Rufio's who married one of Prospero's clerks less than a year ago--well, she was at that moment going to get two reales from her father to buy some bread, for she had not had a mouthful all day. Her husband drinks nearly all his wages, so the poor thing has nothing to eat by the middle of the week.

"G.o.d help her! And most nights the great pig comes home hopelessly drunk, and nearly beats her to death. Sometimes the poor thing goes to bed bruised and supperless.

"And then, seeing these things, people want a--well, better hold one's tongue! But I do say, caramba, that if one has to go to the devil, it is better to go in a coach."

"Look here," intervened Valentina, raising her face with its habitual frown, albeit a trifle more p.r.o.nounced, "don't go on like that; you say you like young gentlemen. Well and good. I don't care; but don't you throw all the dirty water on your own cla.s.s. If they drink--and there are those that do--don't I also see gentlemen coming home quite intoxicated? And if they do beat their wives, half the time they would not do it if the women's tongues were not so long, don't you see? And Don Ramon, the music-master, beat his wife when he came home one night.

You must know that, as you live near."

"I don't chatter about everything, girl," returned Teresa, somewhat dampened by the fear that her swarthy friend would make her reveal her nocturnal perambulations with Donato Rojo, the medical officer of health; "only I say there are many a.s.ses."

"Very well, leave them in peace, then, and don't talk of them, and they won't talk of you. Every one for herself, and let sleeping dogs lie."

"Listen, Valentina," said Elvira, smiling maliciously. "Do you think Cosme will beat you when you marry?"