Benito PErez Galdos

THE MOTHER.

What a night they passed. Nothing happened, and yet it was as full of interest as the years of an eventful life. Pepa was in such a state of nervous excitement that her brain seemed to be affected; she laughed while she cried, and her broken sentences, often incoherent and irrelevant, betrayed that her mind was tossed between despair and hope. She would sit trembling like an old woman, and again, flit restlessly about the room like a child that does not know what it wants.

Monina’s skin was still warm and moist—that moisture was as a dew from Heaven. The deadly greyness of her face gave way to a faint pink tinge; it was a joy to watch the frail flowers of life blossoming again where, so lately, had been a desert of death. Her breathing grew easy, and on her silent and slightly parted lips dawned the sweetest charm of infancy, a happy smile. It was impossible to look at her and not to hope; and it was impossible to refuse to listen to that hope which seemed an inspiration from Heaven.

The dawn was breaking when Moreno Rubio once more addressed Pepa:

“I can now pronounce a definite opinion.”

“Yes? My little girl....”

“The child is out of danger,” said the doctor, clasping the mother’s hand. “This favourable reaction has saved her. Leon wanted me to try tracheotomy.... But the treasure we thought we had lost is restored to us.”

Pepa kissed his hands, bathing them in tears.

“It is none of my doing, SeÑora, but Nature’s, helped by tartar emetic and the caustic solution ... nay, Nature’s only; or, to speak truly, God’s. Now it is time that I should get a little rest.”

And after giving a few instructions he left.

Pepa could not speak; she was dumb with joy; she knelt down and remained absorbed in prayer for more than half an hour. Leon sat by the child’s bed, his head sunk between his hands. Suddenly he heard a voice close to him; he looked up and saw Pepa.

“What a night you have had,” she said. “Hours of anxiety—death and then joy! You have no children; if you had, how happy your children would be! The interest you have shown in this little one—a friend’s child only, not related to you....”

“It is an irresistible passion,” he said, “that I cannot account for; it is a strange folly indeed.”

“A folly! Oh, no! I like you to love my child. If I were to live for a thousand years, Leon, I should never forget the hours during which my heart and brain went through so much suffering; and the last thing I should forget would be the moment which was to me the most solemn and critical of all, and the words I heard and which are stamped on my mind as if they had been burnt in.”

“I do not know what you are talking about.”

“Nor I, either, I believe,” she answered, leaning over him. “Joy has turned my brain, I think, I feel a sort of aberration or bewilderment.... Can it be true that I have my little one? That this angel is still left to comfort me in my loneliness?”

She looked at the child and bending over her, kissed her forehead very softly, so as not to disturb her sleep. When she looked up again at her friend he noted a strange light in her eyes.

“You are too much excited,” he said. “You ought to go to bed and sleep for some time. Poor little mother! You have gone through a great deal since the night before last.”

“Yes,” replied Pepa, “a great deal; but not only now; before that too; I am familiar with misery.”

“Be calm, you are half delirious.”

“And as I was saying,” she went on with an air of sudden recollection, and a bright smile, “I shall never forget your words: ‘Spare her life. She is what I love best in the world.’” Leon looked down. “But I am glad, so glad, that you are so fond of her,” said Pepa on the point of crying. “For then I am not the only creature to love her. You are a good old friend, a friend of my childhood. I have always valued you, and now more than ever, when I see what an interest you take in Monina, a true warm interest.—Leon, I feel that I must break a silence that is killing me and tell you a secret that I cannot bear to keep....”

Her head drooped on Leon’s shoulder; she wept copiously, and he did not speak. He felt the weight of her head, the warmth of her breath, and the moisture of her tears, and he sat silent—stern and self-controlled. Pepa might have been shedding her tears on a rock. Suddenly a sense of dignity and modesty sprang up in Pepa’s soul; she lifted her head, crimson with blushes and gave a little cry of dismay.

“Pepa,” said Leon, taking her hand in a firm, kind grasp, “your child is safe. I am going now.”

At this instant they were both startled by hearing a sweet, silvery voice—an angel’s voice speaking from Heaven—which said:

“Mamma, Mamma!”

Pepa covered her with kisses. Monina sat up and began to ask for everything: she wanted meat, and fish, beef, sugar-plums, bread and butter—all at once, altogether and a great deal, more, more ... and then not knowing words enough for her desires, she asked for ‘things,’ a comprehensive word, representing in a child’s vocabulary its insatiable desire for possession; epitomising its instincts of craving and greed.