“I am quite contented here,” responded Pepe. “I was just now saying to Rosario that I find this city and this house so pleasant that I would like to live and die here.”
Rosario turned very red and the others were silent. They all sat down in a summer-house, Jacinto hastening to take the seat on the left of the young girl.
“See here, nephew, I have a piece of advice to give you,” said Doña Perfecta, smiling with that expression of kindness that seemed to emanate from her soul, like the aroma from the flower. “But don’t imagine that I am either reproving you or giving you a lesson—you are not a child, and you will easily understand what I mean.”
“Scold me, dear aunt, for no doubt I deserve it,” replied Pepe, who was beginning to accustom himself to the kindnesses of his father’s sister.
“No, it is only a piece of advice. These gentlemen, I am sure, will agree that I am in the right.”
Rosario was listening with her whole soul.
“It is only this,” continued Doña Perfecta, “that when you visit our beautiful cathedral again, you will endeavor to behave with a little more decorum while you are in it.”
“Why, what have I done?”
“It does not surprise me that you are not yourself aware of your fault,” said his aunt, with apparent good humor. “It is only natural; accustomed as you are to enter athenaeums and clubs, and academies and congresses without any ceremony, you think that you can enter a temple in which the Divine Majesty is in the same manner.”
“But excuse me, señora,” said Pepe gravely, “I entered the cathedral with the greatest decorum.”