It is an intolerable torment. My life will be
calmer if I do not see you."
"You will not go away," said Concha quietly, certain of her power. "You
will remain beside me just as you always have, if you really like me,
and I shall have in you my best friend. Don't be a baby, master, you
will see that there is something charming about our friendship that you
do not understand now. I shall give you something that the rest do not
know,--intimacy, confidence."
And as she said this, she put one hand on the painter's arm and drew
closer to him, searching him with her eyes in which there was a strange,
mysterious light.
A horn sounded near them; there was swift rush of heavy wheels. An
automobile shot past them at full speed, following the highroad.
Renovales tried to make out the figures in the car, hardly larger than
dolls in the distance. Perhaps it was Lopez de Sosa, who was driving,
perhaps his wife and daughter were those two little figures, wrapped in
veils, who occupied the seats.
The possibility of Josephina's having passed through the background of
the landscape without seeing him, without noticing that he was there,
forgetful of everything, an imploring lover, overcame him with the sense
of remorse.
They remained motionless for a long while in silence, leaning on the
rough wooden railing, watching through the colonnade of the trees the
bright, cherry-red sun, as it sank, lighting up the horizon with a blaze
of fire. The leaden clouds, seeing it on the point of death, assailed it
with treacherous greed.
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