The two gentlemen took their seats, and the ladies went towards the drawing-room; but, on their way, Pepa said:
"I want to speak with you on a matter of importance; let us go somewhere else."
Clementina stared with amazement.
"Shall we go into the dining-room?"
"No, we had better go up to your dressing-room."
Her friend was more surprised than ever, but, shrugging her shoulders, she said: "Just as you please; it must be something very serious."
They went upstairs, Clementina imagining that her friend wished to speak of Pepe Castro, and their relations to each other. And as, to tell the truth, the subject had greatly lost its interest, she walked on feeling very indifferent, not to say considerably bored. When they were alone in the boudoir, Pepa took her hands, and looking her straight in the face, she said:
"Tell me, Clementina, do you know how your husband's affairs stand?"
It was a home-thrust; Clementina, though she had no exact information, had heard of her husband's losses, and of his increasing and delirious passion for gambling. And in a discussion on money matters they had recently had, he had frightened her in order to obtain her signature; also she could see that he was every day more absent-minded and depressed. But though she could give her thoughts to such matters for a few minutes now and again, the complicated bustle of her life as a woman of fashion, seconded by her dislike of all disagreeable subjects, soon put them out of her head. It never for an instant occurred to her that such losses might seriously affect her comfort or convenience, her ostentatious display, or her caprices. Osorio's conduct gave her every reason to continue in this faith, for he had never desired her to retrench in her extravagance. But the viper was lurking at the bottom of her heart, and at a lash like this from Pepa it began to gnaw.
"My husband's affairs?" she stammered, as though she did not understand. "I never heard. I do not inquire."