"No, Miguel, no," she hastened to say; "you are very good to me, but this evening you have greatly tortured me ... perhaps without being aware of it."
Miguel gave an ironical laugh.
"I am not the one who tortures you ... it is your own self. You insist on seeing visions, you lose your wits, and when it is least to be expected, zas! you are committing some solecism!... What you just did, getting up in a state of anger and calling Filomena, ... and the severity with which you spoke to her, might have compromised us in everybody's eyes.... Fortunately she is a talented girl who knew how to dissemble...."
"Yes, yes; dissemble because it suited her convenience. Indeed, I believe that she dissembles!"
"Come now, don't talk nonsense, Maximina."
"I am telling the truth, and everybody saw it.... This woman either loves you or wants to torment me. This whole evening long she has not ceased to look sneeringly at me...."
"Do you realize how ridiculous you are with your jealousy? Why should Filomena look at you in such a way? You know her character too well, that she is always joking, and that this saucy expression is habitual to her eyes."
"That is right; take her part, take her part!" exclaimed the young wife, in a tone of deep pain. "She is the good saint, the talented woman! I am the fool, the absurd, the ridiculous!"
Miguel jumped up, gave his wife an angry look, and shrugging his shoulders, exclaimed:—
"What stupidity!"