And he proceeded to pronounce a eulogium on the President. He was one of our greatest orators, he affirmed; his abilities were extraordinary, his language a model of style.
He was doubtless about to begin a dissertation on politics; but Luiza crossed over to the Church of the Martyrs, raising her dress a little on account of the mud, and paused, smiling, at the door.
“I am going to say a prayer, and I do not wish to make you wait. Good-by, Counsellor,” she said, closing her parasol and extending her hand.
“How, Senhora! I will wait if you do not stay too long; I am in no hurry;” and he added, with an air of respect, “such piety is very praiseworthy.”
Luiza entered the church, desperate. She remained standing under the choir, thinking,—
“I shall stay here; he will get tired of waiting and go away.”
The windows above gleamed softly; the church was filled with a diffused and mellow light. The white walls, the freshly-painted woodwork of the vestry, and the stone balustrades at each side formed a background against which stood out the gilding of the chapel, the red fronts of the pulpits, the interior of the confessionals, of a darker red, and under a violet canopy the gilding of the chief altar. In front of the baptistery a boy was washing the floor, with a zinc pail at his side. Here and there before the altars devotees were kneeling, their bent shoulders covered with shawls; an old man in a jacket knelt in the middle of the church, muttering his prayers in a melancholy sing-sing voice, his bald head and the enormous soles of his shoes standing clearly forth out of the shadow as he fervently beat his breast at short and regular intervals. Luiza went up to the chief altar. Of a certainty Bazilio would be desperate. She timidly asked a sacristan who was passing by what time it was. The man raised a face the color of a lemon towards one of the windows, and said, glancing askance at her,—
“It is almost two.”
Two o’clock! Bazilio might grow tired of waiting for her. She was filled with the fear of not seeing him, and glanced confusedly at the images of the saints, at the virgins transfixed by swords, at the Christs pierced by wounds, full of a voluptuous impatience. Nevertheless she waited; she hoped to tire out the counsellor, to compel him at last to go away. When she thought he had gone, she went slowly towards the door of the church. There he stood in the doorway, erect, his hands clasped behind his back, reading the list of jurors. He began to commend her piety; he had not entered with her, he said, in order not to disturb her devotions; but her conduct had his approval. Want of religion was the cause of the prevailing immorality.
“Besides,” he added, “it is good form. You may notice that all the nobility comply with their religious obligations.”