“You here again?” groaned the Gaviota.
“It is because the señor Pepe Vera wishes to see you.”
“Let him enter.”
Pepe Vera entered without ceremony, opened the blinds, threw himself on a chair, without abandoning his cigarette, and gazed at Maria, whose inflamed cheeks and swollen eyes indicated a serious illness.
“How beautiful you are!” he said to her “and your husband?”
“He has gone out.”
“So much the better! and may he follow his path like the wandering Jew until the last day. I come, Mariquita, on my way to visit the bull destined for the course this afternoon. They will give this corrida to annoy me. There is one bull which they call Medianoche (midnight), who has already killed a man in the pasture.”
“Do you wish to frighten me, and render me still more ill? Close the blinds, I cannot stand this glare of light.”
“Nonsense!” replied Pepe. “Pure childishness! the duke is not here, my dear, so that you might fear that too much light may glare on you; nor your mata sanos of a husband, to dread a draft of air on his beloved. One inhales here the infernal odors of musk, lavender, and all the stench of perfumery; these are the drugs which make you ill. Let the air into your room, that will do you good. Tell me, my dear, do you go this evening to the corrida?”
“I am perhaps in a state to go!” replied Maria. “Shut that window, Pepe, I pray you; the cold and the light make me ill.”