“Señor Don Jerónimo,” said the old woman, “do not go out! The cold of the night is bad for you, and it is not worth risking your lungs to see where the bomb has fallen. It is enough that it has not meddled with this house. If that one which passed did not fall into the house of that barbarian of an official, another will fall tomorrow. The French have a good handful. Now, your honor, go to rest. I will stay up and look after the house.”
Candiola changed his mind about going out, it seemed, in accordance with the good counsels of his servant, and, shutting the window, he was heard no more during all the rest of the night. But although he disappeared, the lovers did not break the silence, fearful of being overheard. And not until the old woman came to tell us that the señor was snoring like a peasant was the interrupted dialogue continued.
“My father wished that the bombs would fall upon the house of his enemy,” said Mariquilla. “I should not like to see them fall anywhere; but if at any time one could wish ill-fortune to a neighbor, it would be now, do you not think so?”
Augustine made no answer.
“You went away. You did not see how that man, the most cruel, the most cowardly of all who came, knocked him down in his blind fury, and trampled upon him. The fiends will kick his soul in hell like that, won’t they?”
“Yes,” replied the young man, laconically.