to be sure, but only as any ordinary young girl is
pretty. And underneath that servile gentleness of hers lay an
intelligence even more obtuse than her father's, a mind filled with
nothing but piety and the religious phrases in which she had been
educated.

That morning, followed by an aged servant, and with all the gravity of
an orphan who must busy herself with the affairs of her household and
act as head of the home, Remedios had walked by Rafael twice. She
scarcely looked at him. The submissive smile of the future slave with
which she usually greeted him had disappeared. She was quite pale, and
her colorless lips were pressed tight together. Without a doubt in the
world she had seen him, from a distance, talking and laughing with "the
chorus girl." His mother would know all about it within an hour! Really,
that young female seemed to think he was her private property! And the
angry expression on her face was that of a jealous wife taking notes for
a curtain-lecture!

Scenting a danger Rafael took hasty leave of don Matias and his other
friends, and left the market place to avoid another meeting with
Remedios. Leonora was still there. He would wait for her on the road to
the orchard. He must take advantage of the early hour!

The orange country seemed to be quivering under the first kisses of
spring. The lithe poplars bordering the road were covered with tender
leaves. In the orchards the buds on the orange-trees, filling with the
new sap, were ready to burst, as in one grand explosion of perfume, into
white fragrant bloom. In the matted herbage on the river-banks the first
flowers were growing. Rafael felt the cool caress of the sod as he sat
down on the edge of the road. How sweet everything smelled! What a
beautiful day it was!

The timorous, odorous violet must be sprouting on the damp ground yonder
under the alders! And he went looking along the stream for those little
purple flowers that bring dreams of love with their fragrance! He would
make a bouquet to offer Leonora as she came by.

He felt thrilled with a boldness he had never known before. His hands
burned feverishly. Perhaps it was the emotion from his own sense of
daring. He had resolved to settle things that very morning. The fatuity
of the man who feels himself ridiculous and is determined to raise
himself in the eyes of his admirers, excited him, filling him with a
cynical rashness.

What would his friends, who envied him as Leonora's lover,