“Can you not cure the blindness of their intelligence, as you have cured the eyes of Momo?” replied, with sadness, the good old woman, who remained altogether pensive.
CHAPTER VII.
THE following day Maria set off for the house of the invalid, in company with Stein and Momo, foot-equerry to his grandmother, who travelled mounted on the philosophic Golondrina. The animal, always good, gentle, and docile, trotted on the road, the head lowered, ears depressed, without making a single rough movement, except when he encountered a thistle in proximity with his nostrils.
When they were arrived, Stein was astonished to find, in the middle of this arid country, of a nature so dry and so sterile, a village so leafy and so coquettish.
The sea had formed, between two great rocks, a little circular creek, and surrounded by a coast of the finest sand, which appeared like a plateau of crystal placed on a table of gold. Several rocks showed themselves timidly, as if they wished to repose themselves, and be seated on the tranquil shore. At one of them was made fast a fisherman’s bark; balancing herself at the will of the waves, she seemed as impatient as a horse reined in.
On one side of the rocks was elevated the fort of San Cristobal, crowned by the peaks of wild figs, like the head of an old Druid adorned with green oak-leaves.
The fisherman had constructed his cabin with the wrecked remains of his vessel, which the sea had thrown on the coast; he had based all against the rocks, which formed, in some sort, three stories of the habitation. The roof was horizontal, and covered with aquatica, the first layer of which, rotted by the rains, had given growth to a great quantity of herbs and of flowers; so that in the autumn, when the dryness disappeared with the heat of summer, the cabin appeared covered as with a delicious garden.
When the persons just arrived entered the cabin, they found the fisherman sad and cast down, seated near the fire, opposite to his daughter; who, her hair in disorder, and falling down on both sides of her pale face, bent up and shivering, her emaciated limbs enveloped in a rag of brown flannel. She seemed to be not more than thirteen years of age. The invalid turned, with an expression of but little kindliness, her large, black, and sullen eyes upon the persons who entered, and instantly sank down anew in the corner of the chimney.
“Pedro,” said Maria, “you forget your friends, but they do not forget you. Will you tell me why the good God has given you a mouth? Could you not have let me known of the illness of the little girl? If you had let me known of it sooner, I had sooner come with this gentleman, who is such a doctor as is seldom seen, and who in no time will cure your daughter.”
Pedro Santalo rose brusquely, and advanced to Stein; he would speak to him, but he was so overcome with emotion that he could not articulate a single word, and he covered his face with his hands. He was a man already advanced in life, his aspect sufficiently rude, and his form colossal. His countenance, bronzed by the sun, was crowned by a gray head of hair, thick and uncombed; his breast, red as that of an Ohio Indian, was also covered with hair.