"Why are you so surprised, sir? Cannot I, a girl, have a young man?"
She? A girl? Well!
"Oh, why not?" I said, "all things are possible. And has he been your young man long?"
"Six years."
"Oh, ho!" I thought. "Well, let us write your letter ..."
And I tell you plainly that I would willingly have changed places with this Bolés if his fair correspondent had been not Teresa, but something less than she.
"I thank you most heartily, sir, for your kind services," said Teresa to me, with a curtsey. "Perhaps I can show you some service, eh?"
"No, I most humbly thank you all the same."
"Perhaps, sir, your shirts or your trousers may want a little mending?"
I felt that this mastodon in petticoats had made me grow quite red with shame, and I told her pretty sharply that I had no need whatever of her services.