CHAPTER III
During the winter months, when Gallardo was not at La Rinconada, a party of his friends gathered every evening in his dining-room after supper.
The first to arrive were always the saddler and his wife, two of whose children lived in the espada's house. Carmen, as though she wished to forget her own sterility, and felt the silence of the big house oppress her, kept her sister-in-law's two youngest children with her. These children, from natural affection and also probably by their parents' express orders, were perpetually petting their beautiful aunt and their generous and popular uncle, kissing them and purring on their knees like kittens.
Encarnacion, now almost as stout and heavy as her mother, her figure deformed by the birth of her numerous children, while advancing years were bringing a slight moustache to her upper lip, smiled cringingly at her sister-in-law, apologizing for the trouble her children gave.
But before Carmen could reply the saddler broke in:
"Leave them alone, wife! They are so fond of their uncle and aunt! The little girl especially, she cannot live without her 'titita'[67] Carmen."
So the two children lived there as if it were their own house, guessing, with their infantile cunning, what was expected of them by their parents, exaggerating their caresses and pettings of those rich relations, of whom they heard everyone speak with respect.
As soon as supper was ended, they kissed the hands of Señora Angustias and of their father and mother, threw their arms round the necks of Gallardo and his wife, and then left the room to go to bed.