"Be careful, Don Jaime. You don't know the men of the island. This conversation at the forge means something. This is Saturday, courting night. I am sure they are plotting to do you harm if you come down to Can Mallorquí."
Febrer received these words with a gesture of scorn. He would be there, in spite of everything. Did they imagine they could frighten him? The only thing he regretted was that they delayed so long in attacking him.
He spent the rest of the day in a state of nervous anger, eager for night to come. He avoided approaching Can Mallorquí in his walks, gazing at it from a distance, in the hope of catching a glimpse of the slender figure of Margalida. Since he had become a suitor he could not present himself as a friend. A visit from him might prove embarrassing for Pèp's family, and also he feared that the girl might conceal herself on seeing him approach.
As soon as the sun had set and the stars appeared in the clear winter sky with the keenness of points of ice, Febrer descended from the tower.
During his brief walk to the farmhouse, recollections of the past returned again with ironic precision, as they had done on the former courting night.
"If Mary Gordon should see me!" he thought. "Perhaps she would compare me to a rustic Siegfried going forth to slay the dragon, which guards the treasure of Iviza. If certain cynical women I have known should see me!"
But his love immediately effaced these recollections. What if they should see him! Margalida was better than all the women he had ever known; she was the first, the only one. All his past life seemed to him false, artificial, like the life presented on the stage, painted and covered with tinsel beneath a deceptive light. He would never return to that world of fiction. The present was reality.
Arrived at the porch, he found all the suitors, who seemed to be talking in smothered voices. When they saw him they instantly became silent.
"Bòna nit!"
No one replied. They did not even receive him with the grunt of the other night.