Sabas, although in the arms of his mother, cast a wandering and afflicted glance about the dining-room.
"Matilde! My children!" he cried in a dramatic manner.
"All have abandoned thee except thy mother!" responded Doña Amparo in most pathetic accents.
Sabas leaned his head, a resigned victim, against the maternal bosom. At this Doña Amparo hugged him yet more fervently, ready to give her life-blood for her abandoned son. He freed himself at last, arranged his cravat, and held out his hand to us solemnly, in the dignified attitude of a general who concludes a capitulation after a heroic resistance.
He went up to greet Cristina, but she turned her back upon him, and went out of the room. He shook his head in a sentimental manner, and gave us a sweet, expressive glance. Then he raised his eyes to heaven, as if petitioning for the justice that earth denied him.
I was truly alarmed to see that his face was black and the skin peeled off in some places, especially the nose.
He looked as if he had returned from a scientific and civilizing expedition into Central Africa, rather than from a romantic expedition with a young lady to the capital of Catalonia.
Doña Amparo made him drink a glass of orange-flower water to calm him. There was no need of it. His attitude on that critical occasion, at once tranquil and resigned, impressed us profoundly. However, when he had drunk the orange-flower water, he said with astonishing firmness:
"I must see Matilde."
And, joining the action to the word, he proceeded, full of majesty, towards the door. He went on into the inner rooms. And we all followed him, we were so fascinated by his noble and severe manner.