“He caught her up by the waist.”
“Uncle Gabriel, will you take me with you?” coaxed the little madcap. “With you, yes; with you, no; with you, yes, I will go. Come, take me with you!”
“The commandant threw a kiss to the girl, which she promptly returned.”
“To Leganes it is that I will take you. Be good now! Study your French lesson! Comb that mane of yours! Run into the kitchen to see what the girl is about there! Papa likes his roast beef well done! See to papa’s roast beef!”
As he crossed the threshold the commandant threw a kiss to the girl, which she promptly returned.
VIII.
Doña Aurora was in the habit of taking her son his chocolate every morning before he was out of bed, for, old-fashioned in many other respects, the household was old-fashioned also in the matter of early rising. Those were delightful moments for the doting mother.
The boy, as she called him, felt on awakening that causeless joy peculiar to the springtime of life, that season when each new day seems to come fresh from the hands of time, golden and beautiful, and embellished with delights, before painful memories have begun to weigh down the fluttering wings of hope. Rogelio, who in the afternoon suffered from occasional fits of nervous depression, in the morning was as gay and sprightly as a bird. Even his chatter resembled the chirping of birds or the cooing of infants when they open their eyes in the morning. His mother, after removing the articles of clothing and the books lying about, would seat herself at his bed-side and hold the tray, so that the chocolate might not spill as the boy dipped the golden biscuits into it, while a glass of pure fresh milk stood beside it waiting its turn.
