I consented because I felt so worn out, and every bone in my body ached, as we say in the country. As I withdrew I said to Carmiña, in a supplicating tone:
“Will you come to see me?”
“Of course I will. I shall take you a cup of tea made of boiled mallow-flowers to give you a sweat. You have taken cold; probably through some crazy imprudence.”
As soon as I lay down, in a flash, the fever broke out triumphantly, as did my exhaustion and the congestion of my lungs. I began to wander in my mind and grow delirious. It could not have been delirium so much as a capricious and fanciful flight of the imagination through those regions of which I was most fond when in my normal state.
In my lucid intervals, and between the paroxysms of my struggle for breath, I seemed to see the yew tree once more, with its dark green foliage, standing out against the heavenly blue sky and the pale verdure of the river-lands. I heard the songs of working-women, pipes announcing the dawn, the whizz of rockets, the sound of a piano, and there were moments when I was positive that an ugly black bat came fluttering through the window, and, with a pin run through it, expired before me. Of course, Father Moreno was there, and sometimes his presence consoled me, while at other times it would so irritate me, that I would have gladly flung something at his head.
During my delirium, it seems that I sang loudly and gave formulas and propounded problems, in mathematics. What I am sure of is that, over and above my delirium and the fever and terrible discomfort, and the strictures in my bronchial tubes and lungs, an enchanting sensation used to hover. Carmen did not leave my room; she gave me my medicines, smoothed my sheets, and waited on me and attended to me all through. At one time, when, by an involuntary impulse produced by the fever, I threw my arms around her neck, I fancied—was I really out of my head?—that Carmen, so strong, so invincible, far from making the slightest movement to draw away from me, was returning my embrace. I would swear that her eyes gazed at me with a sweet and tender look; that her hands caressed and petted me as one pets and caresses a child; that her lips murmured sweet words which sounded like music of the heart. Allowing myself to be carried away by my fancy, I thought, as I sank to sleep under the influence of a powerful narcotic:
“Carmen loves me; she loves me, without doubt. How happy I shall be if I do not die!”
I sighed, half turned over in bed, and, if I could have put into words the feeling which filled my heart, I would have added, “And how happy I shall be, even if I do die.”