At the hour of breakfast she appeared in the dining-room, looking cool and fresh in her white morning-gown; Juliana hastened to close the blinds. She waited on her at table with tenderness, and seeing that she was eating a great many figs, said to her, almost with tears in her eyes,—
“They will hurt you, Senhora.”
She hovered noiselessly around her, a servile smile on her lips. She seemed to regard her with pride, as if she were a dear and precious being, all her own, her little mistress; while in her mind she said, glancing askance at her,—
“Ah, you cunning fox!”
Luiza threw herself on the sofa after breakfast to look over the “Diario de Noticias,” but she could not read. Remembrances of the night before surged up in her soul at every moment. She remained motionless, her humid gaze fixed, feeling those remembrances vibrate slowly and softly along the chords of her memory. The recollection of Jorge had not yet abandoned her; his spirit had hovered over her since the night before, but it neither tormented nor frightened her. It was there, but motionless, causing her neither fear nor remorse. It was as if he had died, or as if he were so far away that he could not return, or had abandoned her. She was terrified to find herself so tranquil; but she grew impatient at perceiving that this idea remained constant in her spirit, impassable, with the obstinacy of a spectre; and she instinctively nought to justify herself. Then she thought of Bazilio. She resolved to answer his letter, and went to the study. On entering it her glance fell on Jorge’s portrait, life size, in its black enamelled frame. A shudder passed through her; she felt chilled to the heart, as if she had suddenly descended into a vault out of the warm sunshine; she let her eyes dwell on his waving locks, on his black beard, on his dotted necktie, on the two swords placed crosswise over the portrait. If he were to know of it he would kill her!
She turned pale; she looked vaguely around her; his gun hung on the wall; the rug in which he wrapped his feet lay folded in a corner; on a table at the farther end of the room were his large sheets of drawing-paper, his tobacco-canister, and his pistol-case. He would assuredly kill her! The room was so pervaded by Jorge’s personality that she felt as if he might return at any moment and enter it. What if he should return without writing to let her know! It was three days since she had received a letter from him, and perhaps now, while she was here writing to her lover, the other might appear before her and surprise her at her task. But it was folly to think it. The steamer from Barreiro did not arrive till five o’clock; and besides, he had Said in his last letter that he would probably remain in Alemtejo a month longer. She sat down at the table, took a sheet of paper, and began to write, in her somewhat large hand, “MY ADORED BAZILIO.”
But an importunate terror seized upon her; she felt something like a presentiment that Jorge would come home and suddenly appear before her in the study. She rose, went slowly to the parlor, and sat down on the sofa; then, as if the recollections of the night before had inspired her with the courage of a guilty love, she returned with decision to the library, and wrote rapidly:—
“You cannot imagine with what joy I received your letter this morning—”
The rusty pen refused to write. She dipped it once more in the ink and shook it, making, through the trembling of her hand, a dark blot on the paper This disturbed her, for it seeming to her a bad omen. She hesitated a moment, and resting her elbows on the table, leaned her head in her hands, listening to Juliana as she swept the pavement outside, humming the “Carta Adorada.” Finally she tore up the letter with impatience into little bits; and threw them into a varnished box with two metal handles which stood beside the table, and into which Jorge threw old and useless papers; they called it the sarcophagus. Juliana was certainly careless in emptying it, Luiza thought, for it was overflowing with papers. She took another sheet and began again:—
“MY ADORED BAZILIO,—You cannot imagine what I felt when I received your letter this morning on rising—”