One Sunday morning SeÑora de PardiÑas awoke her son with the following intimation: “To-day we must make some visits; there is no help for it; we owe visits to everybody. I sent to Augustin’s livery stable for the landau; he says it will be at the door punctually at two o’clock. Ah, and what do you think? I shall go dressed so that if I look at myself in the glass I won’t know myself. The dressmaker brought me my black velvet gown, trimmed with jet and lace, yesterday; the hat to match is ready, too. I shall put on all my finery. You must stop in at the barber’s after breakfast; your hair needs cutting.”

Rogelio grumbled not a little; he declared that he had two or three indispensable tasks to perform that day, but all in jest, for he saw very well that SeÑora PardiÑas was resolved not to go to bed that night without having laid a grand sacrifice on the altar of social duty. At a quarter before two Rogelio had finished fastening the first row of buttons of his English frock-coat, before his bureau glass. Fortunately it was Sunday, when the neighborhood of the University is of all places the one where a student is least likely to be met with. For a pretty teasing he would have to stand if any of his college companions should chance to meet him in his present guise, dressed like a gentleman, with gloves and a silk hat. Accustomed to the cloak and the low, broad-brimmed hat, he felt at first as if to wear a frock-coat were like going disguised. There lay the silk hat, shining and resplendent, on the table of the study, and beside it the gloves, the cane, the Russian leather card-case and the handkerchief with its handsome embroidered initial. He took note of all these articles, placed his hat a little to one side, over his carefully smoothed hair, and was proceeding to draw on his gloves with the ill humor that was habitual to him when performing this operation, when his mother entered.

“Heavens! mater admirabilis!” he exclaimed. “How magnificent you look! Ho! for our handsome women, our stately and aristocratic dames.”

What DoÑa Aurora really looked was very uncomfortable, with all this finery, which only on state occasions could she bring herself to wear. She never wanted anything better than her comfortable mantle, her merino gown, and her large fur cape. All this frippery was enough to put one out of temper. The weight of the hat, with its high bows, obliged her to bend her head; the steels of the skirt impeded her movements. But there was nothing for it but to submit to this tyranny of fashion at least twice a year. She, like Rogelio, carried a card-case, and a list of the houses where she owed visits. Peeping out from her mink muff was a handsome lace handkerchief, perfumed with some delicate extract, and in her ears were two fine solitaires—the modest elegance of a lady who aspires only to dress in a style suited to her station. And yet such is the power of the arts of the toilet and of dress that DoÑa Aurora seemed to have left ten of her fifty odd years inside the door of her dressing-room; her face glowed with pleasurable animation, and in her bearing there was an unaccustomed dignity.

Esclavita stood behind with her wrap, which she was to take in the carriage lest the afternoon should turn cold, busying herself—with that admiring interest which attached servants display when they see their masters or mistresses in gala dress—in giving a touch here and there to her gown, smoothing out its folds and brushing off some almost imperceptible speck of dust from the bottom of the flounce. Suddenly the girl raised her eyes and exclaimed, casting a glance of frank admiration at Rogelio:

“Our Lady of the Hermitage! how fine the SeÑorito is!”

“He looks like a fashion-plate, does he not? Turn round, Rogelio, turn round—so. The coat looks as if it grew upon you.”

“Mamma!” protested Rogelio. But he was obliged to allow himself to be examined and re-examined by Esclavita, and even to consent to her giving the collar of his coat a touch with the brush. The girl’s eyes told him with innocent speech that he looked well. She arranged his cuffs and when they were going downstairs, she even called after him:

“There! There is a bit of the wool of the carpet on the right leg of your trousers.”

The first visit was to the house of Don Gaspar Febrero, to see the daughter of the worthy dean, who was on the eve of her departure for the Philippine Islands with her husband, a staff-officer, who had been ordered to Manilla. They talked about the voyage, the climate, the hurricanes, the clearness of living there, and of the old gentleman, who was to be left behind alone. Fortunately, he had never been in better health, never more animated nor more gay. Only a moment before, taking advantage of the pleasant weather, he had gone out, leaning on his crutch, for a little walk in the sun. Gratified by this satisfactory account, they left the abode of NuÑo Rasura, and proceeded to make other visits more or less of the same ceremonious nature. At some of the houses they merely left cards, and these were the most pleasing visits for Rogelio, who, as he approached each door, repeated under his breath the customary aspiration: “I pray the saints they be not in!”

But his desperation reached its height when his mother announced to him that they were now going for a moment to the house of the SeÑoritas Pascuala and Mercedes de Romera.

“Mother mine, if it be possible, spare me this sacrifice!” he cried. “Carapuche, as our friend of the ear-trumpet says, don’t you know that I shall be obliged to pinch myself to keep from falling asleep at that house?”

“So nice as you look and you don’t want to make a good impression on the pretty girls? Come, come, give the direction—Calle del Barquillo.”

The house of the old maids had a surprise in store for the student, in the person of the sprightly girl who came out to receive the visitors and show them into the parlor, saying that her aunts would come immediately. In saying this she practiced a thousand witcheries with her features and her eyes, which were black, small, sparkling, and very expressive. The niece of the de Romeras wore a rather short dress, a token that she had not yet reached the dignity of the mantilla, and an apron with a bib, with a bright-colored embroidered border. A blue ribbon, tied in a bow, fastened the end of her short braid, and her shoes, worn at the toes, gave evidence of the restlessness of the small feet with their arched insteps within. Pascuala, the elder of the old maids, soon came into the parlor, sniffling and coughing, declaring that her sister was unable to leave her room, as she was suffering from a cold still worse than her own, which made it necessary for her to avoid a change of temperature. “And to keep my sister in-doors is like giving her a stab,” she added. Presently she presented her niece as she might have presented a frisky little dog who disturbed the drowsy quietude of that peaceful abode. “This is my god-daughter, Inocencia, the second eldest girl of my brother Sebastian, who resides in Loja. He has left the poor thing with us because she requires to have her teeth attended to; she has a tooth growing over another, and it will have to be extracted. She is very lively and can’t remain still for a moment; there is no kind of shoe that is strong enough for her; that is why you see her so badly shod.” These explanations being made, it was in order to speak of Esclavita; and in view of the fact that the matter could not be discussed before a child, and as Mercedes, besides, wished to enjoy the society of DoÑa Aurora, the two ladies went into the dressing-room, leaving Rogelio and Inocencia alone. “Go show him the albums and the views of Granada, child,” was the order the girl received from her aunt as the latter left the parlor.

Inocencia obeyed—playing off all her coquettish arts as she walked over to the table—and cried precipitately and with an affected lisp:

“Come here, come here, and look at the pictures Aunt Pascua told me to show you! They are lovely!”

Although the idea of looking at pictures was little to the taste of the gentleman with frock-coat and silk hat, ashamed to refuse, he went and seated himself beside the girl who, as she opened the album, darted at him, with all the boldness of fourteen, an incendiary glance—a glance impossible to be misunderstood. When he found himself alone with the girl, it occurred to the student that there could not be a more propitious occasion to provide himself with a sweetheart than the present one. His vanity was a little piqued, it is true, at the thought that she was so young; a sweetheart of eighteen or twenty would have done him some credit, while this would look like playing at lovers; but when he was beside her, and looked at her more closely, with her well-formed little figure, developed with Southern precocity, and her full upper lip, slightly raised by the projecting tooth, she seemed to him a woman in miniature, and he thought to himself:

“I will declare myself now!”

He declared himself accordingly, without further preamble or preface, with high-sounding phrases culled from farces and comedies, magazines and college jests. The girl, without manifesting the slightest surprise, listened with a serious air, rolling between her thumb and finger an end of the ribbon tying her braid, which she had brought forward to show off the beauty of her hair, putting in practice at the same time all the airs and graces of a finished coquette. The student raising his voice a little, the girl whispered:

“Hshh! They are in the dressing-room there!”

Rogelio lowered his voice and redoubled his entreaties, although he began to feel a strong inclination to burst out laughing. After making three or four gestures in the negative, the girl all at once, and without further preface, said yes.

“Give me a token of your love!” implored Rogelio; and without waiting for permission he bent his head and kissed her on the cheek, feeling as if he were kissing the painted cheek of a doll—smooth, rosy, and insensible. Inocencia betrayed no emotion whatever—neither pleasure nor coyness—at receiving the kiss; on the contrary, seizing the student by the lapel of his coat, she declared, with an air of conviction:

“I think we ought to say thou to each other. All my girl friends and their sweethearts do.”

“Very well, I will say thou to thee. See, I am doing so now!”

She continued, with the same decision and eagerness:

“We ought to write to each other every day, too; every day, without missing a single one. My sister Lucia’s sweetheart writes a letter that long to her every morning; and another, every afternoon, that is longer still.”

“Very well; we will write to each other, too. I will make arrangement with the servant to carry our letters.”

“And you must give me your likeness. Have you a photograph? My parents would not let me have mine taken until I have my tooth drawn, but I can give you some of my hair for a locket. Shall I cut you some now?” she added, playing with the curly ends of her braid.

“No, it will be time enough when I give you my likeness.”

The girl rose quickly and walked on tiptoe to the door of the room where the grown people were chatting. She returned with the same caution, a look of satisfaction on her face.

“I thought god-mother was coming,” she said. “But I was mistaken; they are having a great chat.”

She resumed her seat beside the student, and three or four minutes passed without either speaking. The girl waited, surprised that her lover should have nothing to say to her; but the young man, ransack his brain as he would, could not find a word to say. All he felt was a wild desire to laugh, and to keep from doing so he covered his mouth with his handkerchief. His sweetheart, looking at the handkerchief, observed the richly-embroidered initial, and asked quickly:

“What letter is that?”

“R. My name is Rogelio.”

“I was going to ask you what your name was. How shall I address your letters? SeÑor Don Rogelio——”

“PardiÑas.”

“PardiÑas, PardiÑas, PardiÑas.” The girl repeated the name several times to herself as if afraid of forgetting it, and then, looking the student straight in the face, she said to him, in solemn accents:

“Are we to be married?”

Here Rogelio could no longer restrain his hysterical inclination to laugh. He laughed with his mouth, with his eyes, with his whole body, holding his sides, that ached with the violence of his laughter; and throwing himself back in his chair, he sighed:

“Ah, I shall die! I shall die!”

“What are you laughing at?” asked the girl, a little offended. “You act like a fool. Tell me whether we are to be married or not.”

“Of course we are to be married. Only I can’t help laughing. Let me laugh or I shall become ill.”

As soon as his laughter had exhausted itself, Inocencia whispered in his ear:

“Will you pass by the house to-morrow at nine? I will be at the window. At that time I always stand at the window to see the mounted artillery pass. It is a very pretty sight. What are you going to be?”

“A lawyer.”

“That’s a pity; then you won’t wear a uniform.”