I observed her conduct toward my uncle. While she treated me, after we were once acquainted, with gay cordiality, her deportment toward her lover was polite and correct, at the same time that it was submissive and attentive. It might be considered the result of bashfulness or modesty by the uninitiated, but to me, viewed in the sinister light which was in my mind, it seemed the unmistakable symptom of absolute coldness.
When I fancied that I had made this discovery, I experienced a mysterious feeling of sympathy with the poor girl. If she really felt the same aversion toward my uncle that I did, what stronger mental tie could bind us than that? “The bridegroom is repugnant to the bride. Perhaps she is unaware of it, but it is so. It is evident; and that proves her good taste and moral delicacy. I said so all along.” Then the same old question would arise, “Why, then, does she marry him?”
While I was propounding this enigma to myself, I did not neglect to ingratiate myself with Carmen. I fancied that all I needed to carry out my plan was time. It lacked but a few days of the date set for the wedding, and evidently, in order to obtain if not the affection, at least the friendship and entire confidence of that young lady, it was necessary to see her frequently, so that every hour might bring forth its fruit little by little; as the dried and withered leaves of the Jericho rose unfold when the stalk is moistened with water. “Of course,” I would say to myself, when I saw her so amiable but so reserved in all matters of the heart, “this girl is not going to intrust me with the key to the treasure all at once. It will not be an easy matter to find out from her own lips why she has accepted my uncle.”
Meanwhile, I was very attentive to her, joked with her, and tried to gain a few inches of ground. My first attempt at a joke was to call her auntie. At first she did not relish my conceit, but finally she made up her mind to join in the joke and to call me nephew. As soon as I heard her pronounce that name, which implied a certain familiarity, I returned to the charge, and asked her permission to call her Auntie Carmen. These two names, the first rather childish, and still more the second, with its aroma of youth and beauty, appeared charming to me, and henceforth I fastened them upon Señorita Aldao, whom I never called by any other name during the rest of my life.
There was a time when I imagined that Auntie Carmen had entered on that stage in which, deliberately or unconsciously, we reflect some of the feelings of others, and through sympathy share the pangs they suffer.
It was one afternoon when my uncle was in Pontevedra, managing and playing the scale of small politics, which he declared that he understood so well. In order to amuse us, Don Román proposed to go fishing for sunfish in the tranquil waters of the estuary. This was usually done on pleasant days, letting the boat float along very slowly, and throwing out the hooks baited with bits of meat or earth-worms. It is really a pleasant excursion on the water, at the most enjoyable hour of the day, for the country. We all went in one launch. Auntie, who was seated at my side, kept joking me because my line never felt the sharp nibble of the fish, while hers was incessantly on the stretch, catching sunfish and some other kinds of small fry. I proposed to change rods, and she consented, but the fish were not to be deceived, and still slighted me. I took advantage of the fact that Candidiña was quarreling with Serafín, and that Father Moreno, of whose acuteness I was afraid, was amusing himself with the fishing like a boy and seemed unobservant, and ventured to say something very sweet to my auntie. She replied, smiling at me with a look I cannot define, except by saying that it seemed a mingling of brightness and innocent archness. If that was mocking, it was mocking coated with honey, adorned with roses, and seasoned with affectionate mirth.
Suddenly it seemed to me that her glorious eyes were overshadowed by deep sadness, and that a sigh came from that breast—a deep sigh that could only mean: “This is all very well, my dear nephew, but unfortunately I am already bound to your disagreeable uncle, and consequently we cannot come to a good understanding. Don’t be foolish, or I shall have to say to you, ‘Much too late.’”
Nightfall put an end to our fishing. We returned to Tejo on foot by the path already described. There was a moon—that kind of a moon which always seems more silvery in the country, more melancholy and even larger than when it lights up a city. Auntie went on ahead, leaning on Candidiña, and would turn occasionally to speak to Father Moreno or to me. In order to go by a shorter route, we went through some plowed fields, and even through an inclosure, rousing the fury of a mastiff, who desired to take a nip at our legs.
On arriving at Tejo and entering the parlor, where a multitude of moths and tiny butterflies were fluttering around the lamp, coming in through the open windows, auntie gave an exclamation, saying:
“Oh, in passing through the inclosure I have covered myself with loves!”