"Can you not suggest anything?" asked Matilde, at last, gazing at him somewhat scornfully. "After all, this is your fault. You have dragged me into this ruin with you."
"I know, I know," he repeated in a low voice. "But we cannot do it now—with that woman there."
"No. It is impossible now." Matilde's tones sank to a whisper.
She looked down at her strong hands that had grown thinner during the past days, but were strong still. Gregorio waited a few moments and then roused himself and bent over his papers again.
"You cannot see any way out of it, can you?" asked his wife at last. "Is there no possibility of keeping afloat until things go better?"
"No," answered Macomer, not looking up. "There is nothing to go better. You know it all. There is only that one way. Failing that, I must go mad. One can recover from madness, you know."
"Yes," said Matilde, thoughtfully. "But it is a very difficult thing to do well. They have expert doctors, who know the real thing from the imitation."
Gregorio looked up suddenly.
"She could not go mad, could she?" he asked, a quiver of cunning intelligence making his stony mask quiver. "Are there not things—is there not something—you know—something that produces that? What is all this talk, nowadays, about hypnotic suggestion?"
"Fairy tales!" exclaimed Matilde, incredulously. "The other is sure. This is no time for experiments. There are thirteen days left in this year. If we are to do it at all, we must do it quickly."