“And you read!” he said, glancing at the magazines and books.
“Ah, it is all such stupid, lifeless stuff, in the books and papers,” she said.
There was a silence. After which he said:
“But what would you like to do? As you say, you take no interest in sewing. You know the Navajo women, when they weave a blanket, leave a little place for their soul to come out, at the end: not to weave their soul into it.—I always think England has woven her soul into her fabrics, into all the things she has made. And she never left a place for it to come out. So now all her soul is in her goods, and nowhere else.”
“But Mexico has no soul,” said Kate. “She’s swallowed the stone of despair, as the hymn says.”
“Ah! You think so? I think not. The soul is also a thing you make, like a pattern in a blanket. It is very nice while all the wools are rolling their different threads and different colours, and the pattern is being made. But once it is finished—then finished it has no interest any more. Mexico hasn’t started to weave the pattern of her soul. Or she is only just starting: with Ramón. Don’t you believe in Ramón?”
Kate hesitated before she answered.
“Ramón, yes! I do! But whether it’s any good trying here in Mexico, as he is trying—” she said slowly.
“He is in Mexico. He tries here. Why should not you?”
“I?”