Instantly she shot out a hand towards me. The edges of the fur cloak fell apart. A wave of the faintest possible scent floated into my nostrils.
“Let me have it,” she said imperiously.
“You can’t have it. It’s all in my head. No woman will read it. I suspect it was something that could never have been written. But what a farewell! And now I suppose we shall say good-bye without even a handshake. But you are safe! Only I must ask you not to come out of this room till I tell you you may.”
I was extremely anxious that Señor Ortega should never even catch a glimpse of Doña Rita, never guess how near he had been to her. I was extremely anxious the fellow should depart for Tolosa and get shot in a ravine; or go to the Devil in his own way, as long as he lost the track of Doña Rita completely. He then, probably, would get mad and get shut up, or else get cured, forget all about it, and devote himself to his vocation, whatever it was—keep a shop and grow fat. All this flashed through my mind in an instant and while I was still dazzled by those comforting images, the voice of Doña Rita pulled me up with a jerk.
“You mean not out of the house?”
“No, I mean not out of this room,” I said with some embarrassment.
“What do you mean? Is there something in the house then? This is most extraordinary! Stay in this room? And you, too, it seems? Are you also afraid for yourself?”
“I can’t even give you an idea how afraid I was. I am not so much now. But you know very well, Doña Rita, that I never carry any sort of weapon in my pocket.”
“Why don’t you, then?” she asked in a flash of scorn which bewitched me so completely for an instant that I couldn’t even smile at it.
“Because if I am unconventionalized I am an old European,” I murmured gently. “No, Excellentissima, I shall go through life without as much as a switch in my hand. It’s no use you being angry. Adapting to this great moment some words you’ve heard before: I am like that. Such is my character!”