Gabriel wished to give up his pillow; the Grandma opposed it, saying she had two, and that one would suffice for her. During these preparations some one knocked loud at the door, and continued to knock.
“Here is Manuel,” said the young woman. “Come with me, mother; I do not wish to be alone with him, when he learns that we have admitted a stranger.”
The mother-in-law followed the steps of her daughter.
“God be praised! Good evening, mother; good evening, wife,” said, on entering, a strong and powerfully constructed man. He seemed to be thirty-eight to forty years old, and was followed by a child of about thirteen years.
“Come, Momo!2 unlade the ass and lead him to the stable; the poor beast is tired.”
Momo carried to the kitchen, where the family was accustomed to assemble, a supply of large loaves of white bread, some very plump woodcock, and his father’s cloak.
Dolores went and closed the door and then rejoined her husband and her mother in the kitchen.
“Have you brought my ham and my starch?” she asked.
“Here there are.”
“And my flax?”
“I had almost a desire to forget it,” answered Manuel, smiling, and handing some skeins to his mother.
“Why, my son?”
“Because I recollected that villager who went to the fair, and whom all the neighbors loaded with commissions: Bring me a hat, said one; Bring me a pair of gaiters, said another; a cousin asked for a comb; an aunt wished for some chocolate; and for all these commissions no one gave him a cuarto. He had already bestrode his mule, when a pretty little child came to him and said: ‘Here are two cuartos for a flageolet, will you bring me one?’ The child presented his money, the villager stooped, took it, and replied, ‘You shall be flageoleted.’ And in fact when he returned from the fair, of all the commissions they had given him he brought only the flageolet.”
“Be it so! it is well,” said the mother: “why do I pass every day in sewing? Is it not for thee and thy children? Do you wish that I imitate the tailor who worked for nothing, and furnished the thread below the cost?”
At this moment Momo reappeared on the threshold of the kitchen; he was small and fat, high shouldered; he had, besides, the bad habit to raise them without any cause, with an air of scorn and carelessness, almost to touch his large ears which hung out like fans. His head was enormous, his hair short, lips thick. Again – he squinted horribly.
“Father,” said he, with a malicious air, “there, is a man asleep in the chamber of brother Gabriel.”
“A man in my house!” cried Manuel, throwing away his chair. “Dolores, what does this mean?”
“Manuel, it is a poor invalid. Your mother would that we receive him: it was not my opinion: she insisted, what could I do?”
“It is well; but however she may be my mother, ought she for that to lodge here the first man that comes along?”
“No – he should be left to die at the door like a dog, is it not so?”
“But, my mother,” replied Manuel, “is my house a hospital?”
“No. It is the house of a Christian; and if you had been here you would have done as I did.”
“Oh! certainly not,” continued Manuel; “I would have put him on our ass and conducted him to the village, now there are no more convents.”
“We had not our ass here, and there was no one to take charge of this unfortunate man.”
“And if he is a robber?”
“Dying men do not rob.”
“And if his illness is long, who will take care of him?”
“They have just killed a fowl to make broth,” said Momo, “I saw the feathers in the court.”
“Have you lost your mind, mother!” cried Manuel furiously.
“Enough, enough,” said his mother, in a severe tone. “You ought to blush for shame to dare to quarrel with me because I have obeyed the law of God. If your father were still living, he would not believe that his son could refuse to open his door to the unfortunate, ill, without succor, and dying.”
Manuel bowed his head: there was a moment of silence.
“It is well, my mother,” he said, at last. “Forget that I have said any thing, and act according to your own judgment. We know that women are always right.”
Dolores breathed more freely.
“How good he is!” she said joyously to her mother-in-law.
“Could you doubt it?” she replied, smiling, to her daughter, whom she tenderly loved; and in rising to go and take her place at the couch of the invalid, she added:
“I have never doubted it, I who brought him into the world.”
And in passing near to Momo, she said to him:
“I already knew that you had a bad heart; but you have never proved it as you have to-day. I complain of you: you are wicked, and the wicked carry their own chastisement.”
“Old people are only good for sermonizing,” growled Momo, in casting a side look at his grandmother.
But he had scarcely pronounced this last word, when his mother, who had heard him, approached and applied a smart blow.
“That will teach you,” she said, “to be insolent to the mother of your father; towards a woman who is twice your mother.”
Momo began to cry, and took refuge at the bottom of the court, and vented his anger in bastinadoing the poor dog who had not offended him.
CHAPTER III
THE grandma and the brother Gabriel took the best care of the invalid; but they could not agree upon the method which should be adopted to cure him.
Maria, without having read Brown, recommended substantial soups, comforts, and tonics, because she conceived that Stein was debilitated and worn out.
Brother Gabriel, without ever having heard the name of Broussais pronounced, pleaded for refreshments and emollients, because, in his opinion, Stein had a brain fever, the blood heated and the skin hot.
Both were right, and with this double system, which blended the soups of the grandma with the lemonade of brother Gabriel, it happened that Stein recovered his life and his health the same day that the good woman killed the last fowl, and the brother divested the lemon-trees of their last fruit.
“Brother Gabriel,” said the grandma, “to which State corps do you think our invalid belongs? Is he military?”
“He must be military,” replied brother Gabriel, who, except in medical or horticultural discussions, had the habit of regarding the good woman as an oracle, and to be guided wholly by her opinion.
“If he were military,” continued
Brief name for Geronimo, in Andalusia.
