The young fellow, laughing with happiness, still held her by the hand. Maria struggled to escape, though she also was laughing.
"Come, let me go, don't be foolish."
"It shows I'm not foolish because I don't let you go!"
"Think how my head aches!"
"All right, then, I'll let you go."
"Till to-morrow! Be careful whom you dance with now."
"Don't you worry. I am going immediately. Till to-morrow!"
Maria tore herself away. Ricardo tried to catch her again, leaping up the dark staircase, but he did not succeed. The girl said good night[4] with a merry laugh from the top of the stairs.
When Ricardo returned to the parlor he was smiling like a happy man. The light of the chandelier somewhat dazzled him, and he hastened to sit down.
Maria's room, when she entered it, was plunged in darkness. She groped about for the matches and lighted a lamp of burnished iron. The room was furnished with a luxury and good taste rarely to be found in provincial towns. The furniture was upholstered in blue satin; the curtains and paper were of the same color. In the recess between the windows was a mahogany wardrobe with a full-length mirror. The dressing-table loaded down under the weight of its bottles stood against the opposite wall; the carpet was white, with blue flowers. The exquisite niceness with which all these objects were put in place, the elegance and coquetry of the furniture, and the delicate fragrance perceptible on entering, clearly declared the sex and the station of the person who dwelt there.