“I am going to open the door; it is the Señora.”
XXII.
When Señora de Pardiñas observed that her son looked pale and preoccupied that evening at dinner, and even answered her shortly when she spoke to him, she thought to herself at once, “We are in for it now. That jewel has given him her news.” She intercepted, too, furtive glances, frightened and eloquent, between them, but she bore it all in silence, saying to herself, “According to Don Nicanor one must pretend to be a fool for a quarter of an hour every day in this world. But more than that falls to my share, for I must pretend to be a fool for months to come.” She pretended to be a fool then, acting as if she did not notice anything unusual in her son’s manner, asking him with a great show of interest about the pony, the stable, his companions in his rides. When the table-cloth was removed she introduced another subject of conversation, very timely, and of immediate and vital importance, namely, the examinations. “I think your turn will come about Wednesday or Thursday, child,” she began, “so that this week I shall have my hands full. For the fact is, that with those gentlemen one never knows what course to take. If they were all like Contreras! He knows how to be reasonable. Only Contreras won’t be your professor this year. With the others one doesn’t know what course to pursue; if one were to listen to this one and that one, it would be enough to make one crazy. Lastra wants people to bow down before him, to pay him the compliment of begging him, to be indebted to him. Ruiz del Monte seems to be just the opposite; if he is spoken to in behalf of a boy, he takes a dislike to him and torments the life out of him. You know whether that is so or not; it was your friend Diaz, the one who writes verses, who told me so. Of Albirán they tell a different story—that he does not disregard intercession, but in rule and measure; according to whom it comes from. The safest thing would be for you to study, child.”
“I do study, mamma,” answered the student laconically.
During the whole of the evening it was impossible to draw another word from him. He turned over the illustrated papers, he took them up and laid them down, he changed his seat, passing from the chair to the sofa and from the sofa to the chair; he sighed profoundly, and, in short, gave every possible sign of distress, making no effort to conceal this distress, but, on the contrary, seeming to desire that his mamma should notice it. At last, when the latter said to him, “Are you not going for a while to the theater to-night?” he answered, in a hard and resolute tone:
“He sighed profoundly and, in short, gave every possible sign of distress.”
“No, I am going to bed. My head aches a little.”
And he left the room and walked noisily through the hall to his study, which he entered, slamming the door behind him.
“It is as I said; we are in for it now,” she said to herself. “I have made a great mistake. I should have waited to settle this affair until the examinations were over, a few days before our departure. It was a piece of stupidity on my part. Well, you see, I wanted to get out of the mess quickly; but I was wrong. There are things that it is better to go slowly about. I must only see if I can remedy matters now by putting off the girl’s departure; otherwise the boy will be all upset when he most needs to keep a cool head. We must wait a while. I must see if I can persuade Don Gaspar to wait. I shouldn’t wonder if it would be harder to make the old man listen to reason than the boy. What complications! That perfidious Rita Pardo was right. One ought to consider well whom one receives into one’s house.”