"Search and you will find," said Pablo laughing.
"Ah! Holy Virgin! chocolate! how I love chocolate!—nuts—and something done up in paper. What is it? Oh, Blessed Virgin! a sweetie! Do not I like sweeties! How rich I am! We do not have such good things to eat at home, Pablo. There is no luxury in our food; there is no luxury in our clothes either, to be sure. In fact, no luxury of any sort."
"Where shall we go to-day?" repeated the blind lad.
"Wherever you like, child of my heart," replied Nela, eating the sugar-plum and tearing up the paper it had been wrapped in. "I hear and obey, king of the world."
The child's black eyes sparkled with happiness; her sprightly little birdlike face smiled and wrinkled with satisfaction, and was not still for an instant, as though fitful flashes came and went there like dimpling light on wavelets in a pool. This helpless little creature, whose spirit seemed imprisoned and confined in the feeble body, expanded and rose elastic when she was alone with her master and friend. With him she at once became original, bright and intelligent; she had feeling, grace, refinement and fancy. When she left him, the dark doors of a prison seemed to close on her once more.
"But I tell you we will go wherever you like," remarked the blind youth. "I like to do what you like. If you wish we will go to the clump of trees beyond Saldeoro—but just as you like."
"Yes, yes, delightful!" exclaimed Nela, clapping her hands. "And as there is no hurry, we can sit down whenever we are tired."
"There is a nice place near the spring—do you remember, Nela? And there are some large tree-trunks, which seem to have been left there on purpose for us to sit upon, and we hear so many, many birds singing, that it is quite glorious."
"And we can go past the mill-stream that, you say, talks and mumbles the words out like a tipsy man. Oh! what a lovely day and how happy I am!"
"Is the sun very bright, Nela? Though if you say 'yes,' I shall be none the wiser, since bright has no meaning for me."