CHAPTER I.
FROM THE SAME TO THE SAME.
“Ugoibea, August 30th.
“Dear Leon: Think no more of my letter of yesterday; it must have crossed yours, which I have just received. Vexation, and a fit of petty jealousy, made me write a great deal of nonsense, and I am ashamed of having covered my paper with so many dreadful words, mixed up with such childish prevarications; but no—I am not ashamed; I can only laugh at myself and my style, and ask you to forgive me. If I had only had a little patience and waited for your explanations—but that again is nonsense.—Jealousy and Patience! Who ever saw the two things combined in one person? You see there is no end to my absurdities; this proves that after having been a fool, though only for a day, a woman cannot recover her natural balance of mind all at once.
“But now I am recovering mine. An end to recrimination; I am firmly resolved never again to be irritable and suspicious and inquisitive—as you say I am. Your explanations really and entirely satisfy me; their frankness and fulness impress me strongly—I hardly know why—and leave no room in my mind for doubt, but fill my soul with a conviction—how can I express it? that is in itself a sort of affection, that is its twin brother and as inseparable from it as—as—I cannot finish my sentence; but what does it matter?—To proceed; I was saying that I fully accept your explanation. A denial would have increased my suspicions; your confession has removed them. You tell me that you did love—no, that is not the word, that you had a fancy, a mere fancy, as a boy—as children together—for Pepa de Fúcar; that you have known her since she was little, and that you played together—I remember you used to tell me something about it in Madrid, when we first made your acquaintance. It was she, no doubt, who used to go with you to pick up the blossoms fallen from the orange-trees—who was frightened at the rustling made by the silk-worms when they were feeding, and for whom you used to make crowns of Marvel of Peru? Yes, you told me many funny stories of your companion as a child. You and she used to dye your cheeks with blackberries, and make paper crowns to wear; you loved to take birds’ nests, and her greatest delight was to pull off her shoes and stockings and paddle in the streams among the rushes and water-plants. One day, almost at the same instant, you fell from a tree and she was bitten by some reptile. That was Pepa de Fúcar, was it not? You see I remember very well, and could write your history quite accurately.
“The truth is that I really did not pay much attention to those baby stories; but when I saw the girl, and when they said you were in love with her.—It is ten days ago and I still feel as if I were being suffocated—as I did when I first heard it. Believe me; I felt as if the world were coming to an end, as if time were standing still—I cannot express the feeling—or had turned backward and revealed some horrible spot, some unknown desert where—another unfinished sentence! To proceed.
“I remember now some more stories of your childish amusements, which you told me not long ago. How such trifles cling to our memories! When you were a boy, and were studying that science of stones of which I can never see the use; when she—for I think that again it was Pepa de Fúcar—had left off putting her feet in the water and staining your cheeks with blackberry juice or decking herself with your paper crowns, that you played at being lovers with less innocence than before, but still—come, I will allow thus much—still with perfect innocence. She was at some school where there were a great number of lilac shrubs, and a porter who undertook to receive and deliver notes. Are you not astonished at my good memory? I even remember that porter’s name; it was Escoiquiz.
“Well—enough of ancient history. What you have just told me, what I did not know till I just now read your letter (and I repeat that I was not particularly pleased to hear it) was that two years ago you met again where the orange-trees blow and the silk-worms feed and the water flows in the brooks; that you suffered a slight illusion, so to speak, and at that time began to feel a sincere affection for her, which grew and grew until—and here I come to the story—until you knew me.—Thank you Sir, and I make you a pretty curtsy, for the string of compliments, polite hints, protestations, and loving words which here follow. This shower of praises fills a whole page. Such pages as these come before us like a face we love, and this one made me cry with joy. Thanks again, a thousand thanks. It is all charming, and what you say of me is much too kind and good. You are worth a hundred of me.—You live for me? Oh Leon! How can I do better than believe all these romantic speeches? My heart opens wide to accept them all. I am a good catholic and have been brought up to be a true believer.
“Yes, I will be so foolish—I have read that blessed page once more. Oh! it is good to be told that ‘a true, deep, and lofty devotion has blotted out that fancy and left no trace of it’—very good! ‘the illusions of childhood rarely last into mature years’ of course; ‘Your sentiments are sincere, and your intentions thoroughly honest’—yes no doubt; ‘The voice I heard, the words that made me feel as if the world had come to an end, were simply one of those wild suppositions thrown out at random, to be taken up by malice and used by her as terrible weapons’—so it is, so it is; ‘Pepa de Fúcar is as indifferent to you at this moment as any other woman living’—that is perfect, exquisite! and finally ‘I and I alone’—me and no one else.—What joy to press my hand closely to my heart while I think to myself—me, me alone, and no one in the world but me!