“I see you are in the mood to talk at random to-night,” said Leon pleasantly. “But you do not mean what you say, and your sentiments are better than your words.”
His eyes had by this time become accustomed to the darkness, or the night was perhaps a little clearer; Leon could, at any rate, make out Pepita Fúcar’s face against the black interior behind her like the dim blurred outline of an old picture. The whiteness of her skin, her chestnut hair, the brilliancy of her small eyes, where in each pupil burned a tiny spark, the pout of her parted lips and the savage whiteness of her teeth as she still blew away the rose-petals, above all her petulant air made her seem almost pretty, though in fact she was very far from it.
“You might make other people fancy that you were as wild as you pretend to be,” Leon went on, “but I know you better. I have known you since we were children together, and I know you have a good heart. A good mother would have taught you some things you sadly lack and have corrected some faults of manner which make you appear worse than you are; but you have been neglected as a child and now when you are growing up your father has suddenly flung you into the world in a perfect vortex of luxury, folly and riches. You know, better than I, what a state of confusion your household is in—even strangers cannot help reminding you that you are spending at the rate of three months’ income in a week, while your father is too entirely absorbed in making money to think of anything but business. Poor Pepita—so rich and so lonely! I can quite understand all the vagaries which the outside public comment on so severely; I can excuse you—yes, quite excuse you. First you built a hot-house in the garden; then you had it moved to the other side—then you gave up your plants and began to collect china—then bronzes, carvings, old stuffs, what not, and sold them again for a quarter of what they had cost you. They say you established a photographer in your house that he might take views of the garden and portraits of the horses, and all the time you never looked into a single book unless it were some silly almanac or rubbishy novel.
“You are charitable I know, for you are tender-hearted; but Pepa, in what a foolish way! A woman comes to you for help to get masses said; you put two thousand reales into her hand. The same day comes the widow of a bricklayer who has died of an accident while at work on your house, and you give her only a dollar. You have no idea of the magnitude and proportion of the needs and miseries of the poor.
“Poor Pepita—do not wonder at my speaking to you so harshly; it is out of a sincere desire for your good. I speak as your brother might—a brother who wishes to see you wiser and happier.—I tremble for you Pepita; I dread lest hard and bitter experience should teach you, by some awful shock, these realities of life of which you are still ignorant. It really troubles me to see you go so far astray—so lonely too in the midst of your wealth, and to be unable to help you; for our roads lie apart. But I feel for you deeply, and if I may speak to you truly I pity you, yes—I pity you. I admire and esteem you greatly; I can never forget that we have been play-fellows—nay—why should we deny it?—that as boy and girl we had a warmer liking, though a transient one, and that the outside world imagined we were lovers.—All this I can never forget. I have always been, and always shall be your best friend.”
Pepa bit furiously at the stem of the flower, and snatching off the few remaining leaves she almost spit them away again. One or two fell on the young man’s beard. Pepa put her handkerchief to her mouth.
“Bleeding!” exclaimed Leon, seizing the hand that held it.
“A thorn has pricked my lips,” said Pepa, in such a choked voice that Leon Roch was startled and grieved. After a short pause the girl spoke again:
“Do you know,” said she, “that your household will be a funny one?”
“Why?”