“Servants! Bah! Of what use are they, Roberto, since they also have got hold of American ideas?”
“Isabel and Antonia will be here.”
“Let me only enumerate to you, Roberto. Thomas and his wife and four children arrived last night. You may at this moment hear the little Maria crying. I dare say Pepita is washing the child, and using soap which is very disagreeable. I have always admired the wife of Thomas, but I think she is too fond of her own way with the children. I give her advices which she does not take.”
“They are her own children, dearest.”
“Holy Maria! They are also my own grandchildren.”
“Well, well, we must remember that Abbie is a little Puritan. She believes in bringing up children strictly, and it is good; for Thomas would spoil them. As for Isabel’s boys—”
“God be blessed! Isabel’s boys are entirely charming. They have been corrected at my own knee. There are not more beautifully behaved boys in the christened world.”
“And Antonia’s little Christina?”
“She is already an angel. Ah, Roberto! If I had only died when I was as innocent as that dear one!”
“I am thankful you did not die, Maria. How dark my life would have been without you!”