“A dismissal pure and simple, expressed in terms very little flattering to me.”
“Was there ever any thing so unjust!” exclaimed Doña Perfecta, when she had recovered from her amazement.
“What a humiliation!” exclaimed the young man. “It is the first time in my life that I have received an affront like this.”
“But the Government is unpardonable! To put such a slight upon you! Do you wish me to write to Madrid? I have very good friends there, and I may be able to obtain satisfaction for you from the Government and reparation for this brutal affront.”
“Thanks, señora, I desire no recommendations,” said the young man, with ill-humor.
“But what a piece of injustice! what a high-handed proceeding! To discharge in this way a young man of your merit, an eminent scientist. Why, I cannot contain my anger!”
“I will find out,” said Pepe, with energy, “who it is that occupies himself in injuring me.”
“That minister—but what is to be expected from those infamous politicasters?”
“In this there is the hand of some one who is determined to drive me to desperation,” declared the young man, visibly disturbed. “This is not the act of the minister; this and other contrarieties that I am experiencing are the result of a revengeful plot, of a secret and well-laid plan of some implacable enemy, and this enemy is here in Orbajosa, this plot has been hatched in Orbajosa, doubt it not, dear aunt.”
“You are out of your mind,” replied Doña Perfecta, with a look of compassion. “You have enemies in Orbajosa, you say? Some one wishes to revenge himself upon you? Come, Pepillo, you have lost your senses. The reading of those books in which they say that we have for ancestors monkeys or parrots has turned your brain.”