"And you—where are you off to?"
"You ask me that, now? Why do you ask me since you know quite well," answered the boy, jerking the stick and bundle. "You know very well that I am going to learn all I can and make money. Did I not tell you it would be to-night?—And here I am, as glad as can be—a little sorry, too, when I think that father and mother will cry. You see, Nela, the Blessed Virgin favored us to-night, for father and mother began to snore sooner than usual; and I had my bundle ready, and I climbed up to the window and got out of it.—Now are you coming or not?"
"Yes, I am coming," said Nela with sudden decision, taking the arm of the adventurous Celipin.
"We will take the train, and we will go in the train as far as we can," said Celipin with liberal enthusiasm. "And then we must beg till we get to Madrid, where the King of Spain lives; and when once we have got there, you can go as a servant in the house of some Marquis or Count, and I will go into another, and at the same time I can study, and you can have a heap of fine things. And I can teach you a little of all I learn—only a little, not too much; for you women have no need to be as learned as we doctors must be."
Before Celipin had ended his speech, they had set out on their road, trotting on as fast as though they already saw in the distance the turrets of the city "where the King of Spain lives."
"Let us get out of the regular path," said Celipin, his practical talents rising to the occasion: "If they see us they will lay hands upon us and give us a good thrashing."
But Nela drew her hand away from her fellow-adventurer's, and sitting down on a stone, she said: "I am not going."
"Nela! what a little fool you are! You have not a brave heart like mine; a heart as big as the rocks in La Terrible!" said Celipin, with a braggart air. "What the devil are you afraid of? Why will you not come?"
"I—oh!—why should I?"
"Do not you know that Don Golfin said that the work here is turning us all to stones? I do not want to be a stone—not I."