The Splendid Idle Forties: Stories of Old California

The next day Eulogia was sitting on her window-seat, her chin resting on her knees, a volume of Dumas beside her, when the door was cautiously opened and her Aunt Anastacia entered the room.  Aunt Anastacia was very large; in fact she nearly filled the doorway; she also disdained whalebones and walked with a slight roll.  Her ankles hung over her feet, and her red cheeks and chin were covered with a short black down.  Her hair was twisted into a tight knot and protected by a thick net, and she wore a loose gown of brown calico, patterned with large red roses.  But good-nature beamed all over her indefinite features, and her little eyes dwelt adoringly upon Eulogia, who gave her an absent smile.

“Poor little one,” she said in her indulgent voice.  “But it was cruel in my sister to throw ashes on thy lover.  Not but what thou art too young for lovers, my darling,—­although I had one at twelve.  But times have changed.  My little one—­I have a note for thee.  Thy mother is out, and he has gone away, so there can be no harm in reading it—­”

“Give it to me at once”—­and Eulogia dived into her aunt’s pocket and found the note.

“Beautiful and idolized Eulogia.—­Adios!  Adios!  I came a stranger to thy town.  I fell blinded at thy feet.  I fly forever from the scornful laughter in thine eyes.  Ay, Eulogia, how couldst thou?  But no!  I will not believe it was thou!  The dimples that play in thy cheeks, the sparks that fly in thine eyes—­Dios de mi vida!  I cannot believe that they come from a malicious soul.  No, enchanting Eulogia!  Consolation of my soul!  It was thy mother who so cruelly humiliated me, who drives me from thy town lest I be mocked in the streets.  Ay, Eulogia!  Ay, misericordia!  Adios!  Adios!

“JUAN TORNEL.”

Eulogia shrugged her shoulders.  “Well, my mother is satisfied, perhaps.  She has driven him away.  At least, I shall not have to go to the convent.”

“Thou art so cold, my little one,” said Aunt Anastacia, disapprovingly.  “Thou art but fifteen years, and yet thou throwest aside a lover as if he were an old reboso.  Madre de Dios!  In your place I should have wept and beaten the air.  But perhaps that is the reason all the young men are wild for thee.  Not but that I had many lovers—­”

“It is too bad thou didst not marry one,” interrupted Eulogia, maliciously.  “Perhaps thou wouldst”—­and she picked up her book—­“if thou hadst read the Señor Dumas.”

“Thou heartless baby!” cried her indignant aunt, “when I love thee so, and bring thy notes at the risk of my life, for thou knowest that thy mother would pull the hair from my head.  Thou little brat! to say I could not marry, when I had twenty—­”

Eulogia jumped up and pecked her on the chin like a bird.  “Twenty-five, my old mountain.  I only joked with thee.  Thou didst not marry because thou hadst more sense than to trot about after a man.  Is it not so, my old sack of flour?  I was but angry because I thought thou hadst helped my mother last night.”

“Never!  I was sound asleep.”

“I know, I know.  Now trot away.  I hear my mother coming,” and Aunt Anastacia obediently left her niece to the more congenial company of the Señor Dumas.