“It was to be feared, it was to be feared. Yes, we knew she was very ill. But so suddenly, good heavens!--it does not seem possible.”
As for Perico, he hid his face in his hands, and murmured more than thirty times in succession, “Good heavens! Good heavens! What a misfortune! What a misfortune!” And I must add, in honor of the sensibility of the illustrious schemer, that he even changed countenance perceptibly, and that he made desperate attempts to shed, and did at last succeed in shedding a few of those drops called by poets the dew of the soul. I have not wished to omit these details lest it might be thought that Perico was heartless, the fact being that curious and minute statistical researches show him to have been less so than two-thirds of the progeny of Adam. Sorrowful and dejected in very truth, he allowed Miranda to lead him to his room, and it has also been ascertained for a fact that in the whole course of that day no other nourishment passed his lips than two cups of tea and a boiled egg, which at nightfall extreme debility obliged him to swallow.
Father Arrigoitia and Doctor Duhamel, in union with Miranda, empowered by telegraph by the sorrowing family of Gonzalvo, provided the dead girl with all that she now needed--a shroud and a coffin. Pilar, arrayed in the robe of a Carmelite nun, was placed in the casket which was laid on the bed she had occupied when living. Candles were lighted and the body left, in accordance with the Spanish custom, in the chamber of death, the French custom being to place the corpse, surrounded by lighted candles, at the entrance to the room, in order that every one who passes the door may sprinkle it with holy water, using for the purpose a sprig of box floating in a vessel standing near by. The funeral services and the interment were to take place on the following day.
The arrangements for these were soon made, and at about three in the afternoon, Father Arrigoitia was already reading from his breviary, beside the open window in the chamber of death (from which all traces of disorder had disappeared), the prayers for the dead, Lucía answering “Amen” between her sobs. The flame of the tapers, paled by the glorious brightness of the sun, showed like a reddish point of light, with the black line of the wick strongly marked in the center. The rumbling of approaching and receding carriage wheels could be heard, causing the windows to rattle as they passed by; and above the noises of the street the voice of the Jesuit father, saying: