herself: “No, thank God! I have not got a life of my own! I have been able to give it to a man who is more than a man, as they say in their Quetzalcoatl language. And now it needn’t die inside me, like a bird in a cage.—Oh, yes, Señora! If he goes to Sinaloa and the west coast, my soul goes with him and takes part in it all. It does not let him go alone. And he does not forget that he has my soul with him. I know it.—No, Señora! You must not criticise me or pity me.”
“Still!” said Kate. “It still seems to me it would be better for each one to keep her own soul, and be responsible for it.”
“If it were possible!” said Teresa. “But you can no more keep your own soul inside you for yourself, without its dying, than you can keep the seed of your womb. Until a man gives you his seed, the seed of your womb is nothing. And the man’s seed is nothing to him.—And until you give your soul to a man, and he takes it, your soul is nothing to you.—And when a man has taken your whole soul.—Ah, do not talk to me about betraying. A man only betrays because he has been given a part, and not the whole. And a woman only betrays because only the part has been taken from her, and not the whole. That is all about betrayal. I know.—But when the whole is given, and taken, betrayal can’t exist. What I am to Ramón, I am. And what he is to me, he is. I do not care what he does. If he is