"My daughter,ñaltaMartayMarí you are going to be our salvation. God desires to submit the lot of many brave men to such dainty hands, and who knows if not also the triumph of His cause?"
The young woman retired to her room, where she engaged in prayer for a long time, and then she went down to her mother's apartment. Ricardo soon came in, according to his habit. After a few moments of conversation, Doña Gertrudis went off to sleep, and the two young people retired to a nook in the window to tell each other the sweet every-day secrets, which are sweeter and more delicious the more they are repeated. Maria was preoccupied; her betrothed, with the quickness of one who truly loves, instantly noticed it.
"What ails you to-day?... it seems to me that you are troubled...."
"I feel sad, Ricardo.... I feel sad, as though some misfortune were hurrying on me."
"It's your nerves, which are overtaxed, dear.... Fasts greatly weaken you. You ought to stop them for a while, as well as so many hours of prayer.... You are weakening yourself very much...."
"On the contrary, I have never felt so well as I have lately. It is not my nerves, but a genuine sadness.... It is my soul that suffers, and not my body."
"But have you any reason for being melancholy?"
Maria kept silent, and Ricardo also. It was the twilight hour; both gazed steadily out of the window, upon the great plaza of Nieva, surrounded by its arcades, where the boys who had been let out of school were amusing themselves, running and shouting. The sun was already down, leaving above the tiled roof of the town-hall[60] a wide stretch of sky slightly tinted with rose, which took bluish shades toward the zenith, and yellow toward the horizon. The people of the town were hurrying through the streets, attending to the last duties of the day, and enjoying the sweet gloaming. Such an evening was rare. The balconies of the Café de la Estrella were occupied by a few customers, who were casting their restless eyes around the plaza. On the balcony of the opposite house a little boy, with blue eyes and light, curly hair, was having a good time with a wooden pipe, blowing soap-bubbles. Several ragamuffins below, with no little chatter, caught them as they floated down, bursting them with their hats and handkerchiefs.