"No—I swear it on my word of honour."
"On your word, and on your money, wretched man? Well, I am off," she added, with a fond little pat, and she went to look at the clock on the chimney-piece. "Mercy! How late it is—I must fly. Good-bye."
She ran to the door, waving her hand to her lover, without looking at him. He could only clutch it, and kiss the tips of her fingers.
He rushed to open the door for her, but her hand was already on the lock; indeed, she was in a fury, because her feeble efforts would not turn it.
"By-bye—till Saturday!" said she, in a whisper.
"Till the day after to-morrow."
"No, no—till Saturday."
She ran downstairs with the same cautious haste as she had used in coming up, nodded imperceptibly to the porter, and went out. She walked as far as the Plaza del Angel; there she took a hackney coach to drive home.
It was now past six; the lights in the shops had been blazing for an hour or more. She sat as far back in the corner as she could and gazed without interest or curiosity at the streets she passed through. Her face had resumed its characteristic expression of scornful haughtiness, qualified by a certain degree of disdain and absent-mindedness.
Her refined elegance, her arrogant mien, and, above all, the severe majesty of her exceptional beauty stamped Clementina beyond question as one of the most distinguées women of Madrid. At the same time, though she was recognised as such, figuring in all the drawing-rooms of the aristocracy, in all the lists of fashionable persons which the papers publish on the day after a ball, a race, or any other entertainment, by birth-right she was far from belonging to such a set. Her origin could not have been more humble. Her mother had been an Irish girl, the mistress of a cooper, who had landed at Valencia in search of work. Her name was Rosa Coote; she was extraordinarily handsome, and would have been even more so if she had cared for dressing or adorning her person; but the squalor in which the illicit home was kept had made her neglectful and dirty. The Valencia waif and the handsome Irish girl came to an understanding behind the cooper's back. Salabert was quite young and a brisk youth; he was not, like the girl's present protector, a victim to drunkenness. Rosa abandoned her former lover to go off with him. Within a few months, Salabert, who saw an opening for going to Cuba as steward on board a steamboat, in his turn deserted her. The Irishwoman, expecting then the birth of the offspring of this connection, wandered about for some time without any protector or means of living till she became acquainted with a carpenter, who ultimately made her his lawful wife. Clementina grew up as an intruder in this new home. Her mother was a violent and irascible creature, with bursts of tenderness which she kept exclusively for her legitimate children. Clementina she seemed to hate, and avenged on her her father's offence with cruel injustice.