ance, disturbed the
stillness, peaceful as that of a tomb, that reigned everywhere. Suddenly
strange sounds, like the whispering of feminine voices, fell on his ear,
and then the rustling of curtains that were being drawn, a few words,
and finally the humming of a song, the bark of a lap-dog, and other
signs of social life, which seemed very strange in such a place.
Observing attentively, Pepe Rey perceived that these noises proceeded
from an enormous balcony with blinds which displayed its corpulent bulk
in front of the window at which he was sitting. Before he had concluded
his observations, a member of the Casino suddenly appeared beside him,
and accosted him laughingly in this manner:

"Ah, Senor Don Pepe! what a rogue you are! So you have shut yourself in
here to ogle the girls, eh?"

The speaker was Don Juan Tafetan, a very amiable man, and one of the few
members of the Casino who had manifested for Pepe Rey cordial friendship
and genuine admiration. With his red cheeks, his little dyed mustache,
his restless laughing eyes, his insignificant figure, his hair carefully
combed to hide his baldness, Don Juan Tafetan was far from being an
Antinous in appearance, but he was very witty and very agreeable and
he had a happy gift for telling a good story. He was much given to
laughter, and when he laughed his face, from his forehead to his chin,
became one mass of grotesque wrinkles. In spite of these qualities, and
of the applause which might have stimulated his taste for spicy jokes,
he was not a scandal-monger. Every one liked him, and Pepe Rey spent
with him many pleasant hours. Poor Tafetan, formerly an employe in the
civil department of the government of the capital of the province, now
lived modestly on his salary as a clerk in the bureau of charities;
eking out his income by gallantly playing the clarionet in the
processions, in the solemnities of the cathedral, and in the theatre,
whenever some desperate company of players made their appearance in
those parts with the perfidious design of giving representations in
Orbajosa.

But the most curious thing about Don Juan Tafetan was his liking for
pretty girls. He himself, in the days when he did not hide his baldness
with half a dozen hairs plastered down with pomade, when he did not
dye his mustache, when, in the freedom from care of youthful years, he
walked with shoulders unstooped and head erect, had been a formidable
_Tenorio_. To hear him recount his conques