On the last evening spent in Madrid by DoÑa Aurora and her son, before setting out for their native place, a great many friends came to bid them good-by, and there was a pleasant informal reception at the house. It was now the end of June, and the most enjoyable hour for a social gathering was really between ten and eleven at night, when a fresh and healthy breeze blows even through the heated streets of old Madrid, the Madrid which is not shaded by trees and which enjoys little of the benefit of the municipal watering. The neighbors on the second floor, nieces of a brigadier, came down, and they were also joined by the Marchioness de Andrade, a compatriot of DoÑa Aurora, a handsome and elegant woman who moved in aristocratic circles, and was consequently accustomed to keep late hours. SeÑora de PardiÑas, finding herself surrounded by visitors, gave herself up to the task of entertaining them to the best of her ability, without seeking to guide the conversation, which soon drifted to subjects connected with the country to which she was about to return after an absence of so many years. The Marchioness, who was of a vain and lively disposition, said that she thought of going to Vigo soon, displaying at the same time a new bracelet of sapphires and diamonds, with an air of mystery. “She is evidently thinking of marrying again,” thought DoÑa Aurora. “Who may her intended be? God grant she may choose well.”

Rogelio had quietly slipped away without saying a word to any one. His retreat did not pass unnoticed by his mother, but, besides there being no remedy for it, she discovered other reasons for resignation. “Bad luck is not always going to follow us, and, at the worst, we are going away to-morrow,” she thought. (Esclavita still foreboded danger and trouble, but far in the distance.) “To-morrow at this hour we shall be near Avila. When shall I hear the whistle of the train?”

Rogelio retired to his study, impelled by a vague hope of seeing the girl, explaining to her his attitude during these days, and the impossibility of his acting differently, of rebelling and refusing to go with his mother. He foresaw that Esclavita, availing herself of the occasion, would soon join him, and to attract her attention he lighted a lamp, striking a great many matches in the operation, and walking about the room noisily; he opened the drawers and made the door creak two or three times. He did not venture to call her, through fear of his mother’s keen ear, for, according to his paradoxical and hyperbolical expression, she could hear better than the deaf CandÁs.

He was not obliged to wait long. After ten minutes or so he heard a knock at the door, and before he had time to say, “Come in,” Esclavita entered. The light of the lamp standing on the table of the study which communicated with the bedroom and dressing-room of the student, fell full on the girl’s face, and Rogelio suddenly realized how thin and pale her face had grown during the last fortnight, presenting now a spiritual and refined type of beauty that might have served as a model for one of those waxen images which are used to inclose the bones of unknown martyrs.

Rogelio went up to Esclavita and took her hand in his—it was burning with fever.

Without exchanging a word, they involuntarily looked around for a seat where they could sit down side by side. There was none in the study, which was furnished with a high stool and half a dozen chairs, and without reflecting they went into the inner room, where Rogelio, putting his arm around the girl’s neck drew her toward the couch and made her sit down beside him. They remained silent for a space of five minutes or so, Rogelio pressing and stroking the girl’s hand, hardened somewhat by labor, the fingers marked by the pricking of the needle, as if to communicate to it the coolness of his palms and draw from it its fever. But he could think of nothing to say except the commonplaces usual on parting, and at last, unwilling to remain silent any longer, he resolved to avail himself of that poor resource.

“SuriÑa, silly girl, don’t be like that,” he began. “See, I have been thinking a great deal; this has troubled me more than you. Nothing would be gained by opposing mamma now. We should afflict her greatly. She might even become ill on account of it, but she would not change her resolution. Have patience. Within three months, or even less, we shall be back here again, and we shall see each other, for you will enjoy a great deal more liberty at SeÑor Febrero’s than here. You know already that I shall always love you, foolish girl. Don’t desert me for the tender NuÑo Rasura. There, silly girl, there, my dove, don’t look like that. If you do, you will make me very unhappy.”

Esclavita only answered by shaking her head with persistent melancholy. After a while she responded in a tolerably firm voice;

“Gay I cannot be; but I am not sad, either. Don’t be troubled on my account. Only my head is—as if there was something wrong going on inside.”

“SuriÑa! child!”

“It is as I say. I am here, eh? I am listening to you? I answer you? Well, it is as if I were listening to some person—far away, from the other world, talking to me.”

“Good heavens!” exclaimed the student shuddering. “I would rather see you cry. If you cried you would not have such wild notions, Sura. Cry and give way to your grief; but don’t say those dreadful things.”

“I cry inwardly, not with my eyes. I cannot shed a tear. I was the same way once before, when my father died,” responded the girl quietly, without either of them taking notice of the word father, which, perhaps, for the first time in her life, Esclavita uttered without mystery or circumlocution.

“Child, you seem to me to be ill. Ah! you have fever. Promise me that you will go to-morrow to see Sanchez del Abrojo.”

“No, it isn’t sickness. I was never better in my life. It is a warning.”

“Sura, be silent, for Heaven’s sake! You are talking wildly——”

He bent toward the girl and kissed her cold cheek; she made no resistance. She seemed to be more resigned, and it was in a tone that was natural and almost confidential that she uttered the following extravagances:

“Rogelio, there are certain things that the dead warn the living about; don’t doubt it. Three days before my father’s death I saw a large black bird at the foot of my bed. Yesterday I saw the same bird again. He flew so fast that I couldn’t see where he disappeared to, but I saw him as surely as that we are here now. I shall never go home again, never. Time will show, and then you will see that what I tell you is true and you will say, ‘Esclavita was right.’ If I was as sure of having a million ounces I should be considering now where to hide them so that they should not be stolen from me. Last night——”

She lowered her voice and whispered to Rogelio:

“A dog in the next house howled till morning, and that means that some one is going to die.”

“Heavens! SuriÑa,” for the second time exclaimed Rogelio, now superstitiously affected by this strange conversation, “you are crazy! Don’t you know, SuriÑa, that scores of people die or are at the point of death every night in Madrid? Just imagine; if the dogs have to announce all those deaths they have enough to do. There would be announcements enough to fill an extra sheet of La Correspondencia. The fact is, Sura, that you feel badly because we are going away and you remain behind. I, too, have been troubled for some time past about the trip. I have had some frightful moments. Afterward I reflected—and—I think it is better to be resigned to things as they are, for if we rebel it will only make matters worse. In three months, SuriÑa—in ninety days (and perhaps even less) you will have me here again. My first visit shall be to DoÑa Sura. Come, don’t look like that. I love you dearly, believe it. We shall be able in time to win mamma over. You haven’t yet told me to-day that you care for me. Come!”

With the gesture of a child asking for a caress he approached his cheek to Esclavita’s lips, and the latter, without protest, as if she were performing an accustomed act, pressed her lips to it. Like her palms, they were hot and dry, and it seemed to Rogelio as if they burned his flesh, causing him a sensation that was painful rather than pleasant. Only, caresses were a resource to render this last painful interview a little less intolerable, and the student, in default of arguments by which to console the poor deserted girl, had recourse to caresses, without being influenced by a motive less pure or noble....

“SuriÑa, SuriÑa, I think I hear the marchioness saying good-by in the hall. If she is going, it is because every one else has gone. Mamma will be here directly, I am certain. Try to slip away without being seen. Good-by; go quietly so that no one may hear you.”

The girl obeyed with the same passiveness she had shown throughout, in her utter submissiveness, not even claiming the last embrace. Rogelio lighted the lamp again, carefully straightening the wick. He then closed the bedroom window, and standing before his bureau glass, brushed his hair and parted it with a little comb. Then putting his hands into his trousers pockets he stood for a while studying carefully, with eager curiosity, his own countenance, questioning his own eyes in the mirror, as if to convince himself that, after this vertigo had passed away, he still preserved his individuality, and that there did not remain in him a something belonging to another individuality, a something which could not be effaced and which would betray him. Then the thought of his mother came again to oppress his heart. But this feeling, suddenly gave way to a burst of joy, and running to the window he threw it open, allowing the pure night air to blow in upon him and, grasping the window bars, drew a long, deep breath.