"Emilio, do me the favour to see me home. I want to speak to you."
"Hang it all!" thought the young fellow.
"And Irene?" he said.
"She can go alone. The bogueys won't eat her," replied Pepa tartly.
"Worse and worse," Emilio reflected.
And, in point of fact, Irenita, eyeing her mother and her husband with fear and anxiety, went off alone in her carriage, leaving them together.
As Pepa's brougham rolled away, Emilio, to disarm his mother-in-law, tried, like the boy that he was, to divert the lightning by saying something to please her.
"Do you know," said he, "that I heard your praises loudly sung by the President of the Council and some men who were with him? They admired your costume immensely, but yet more your figure. They declared that there was not a girl in the room to compare with you for freshness, that your skin was like satin, and smoother and softer every day."
"Good heavens, what nonsense! That is all gammon, Emilio. A few years ago, I do not say——"
"No, no, indeed; your complexion is proverbial in Madrid. What would Irene give for a skin like her mother's!"