LITMIR.BIZ

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use of denying it? Charles is a working lad: once he is convinced that he can't be a planter unless he lays aside his gloves and umbrella first, he must do well. He still makes fun of me for lassoing, and making a fence, and barbequing mule; but he's got to do the same or go bust. Haven't you seen him?

      –No.

      –Do you think he doesn't go to the river to bathe when the sun is strong, and if they don't saddle his horse he won't ride, just so he won't get a tan and get his hands dirty? As for the rest, he's a gentleman, that's for sure: it wasn't eight days ago that he got me out of a jam by lending me two hundred patacones that I needed to buy some heifers. He knows he doesn't let it go to waste; but that's what you call serving in time. As for his marriage… I'll tell you one thing, if you offer not to scorch yourself.

      –Say, man, say what you want.

      –In your house they seem to live with a great deal of tone; and it seems to me that one of those little girls brought up among soots, like the ones in fairy tales, needs to be treated like a blessed thing.

      He laughed and continued:

      –I say that because that Don Jerónimo, Carlos's father, has more shells than a siete-cueros, and he's as tough as a chili pepper. My father can't see him since he's got him involved in a land dispute and I don't know what else. The day he finds him, at night we have to put some yerba mora ointment on him and give him a rub of aguardiente with malambo.

      We had arrived at the rodeo site. In the middle of the corral, in the shade of a guásimo tree and through the dust raised by the moving bulls, I discovered Don Ignacio, who approached me to greet me. He was riding a pink and coarse quarter horse, harnessed with a tortoiseshell whose lustre and decay proclaimed his merits. The meagre figure of the rich owner was decorated as follows: shabby lion's pauldrons with uppers; silver spurs with buckles; an unplacked jacket of cloth and a white ruana overloaded with starch; crowning it all was an enormous Jipijapa hat, the kind they call when the wearer gallops: Under its shadow, Don Ignacio's big nose and small blue eyes played the same game as in the head of a stuffed paletón, the garnets that he wears for pupils and the long beak.

      I told Don Ignacio what my father had told me about the cattle they were to fatten together.

      –He replied, "It's all right," he said, "You can see that the heifers can't get any better: they all look like towers. Don't you want to come in and have some fun?

      Emigdio's eyes were going wild watching the cowboys at work in the corral.

      –Ah tuso! -he shouted; "beware of loosening the pial.... To the tail! To the tail!

      I excused myself to Don Ignacio, thanking him at the same time; he continued:

      –Nothing, nothing; the Bogotanos are afraid of the sun and the fierce bulls; that's why the boys are spoiled in the schools there. Don't let me lie to you, that pretty boy, son of Don Chomo: at seven o'clock in the morning I met him on the road, bundled up with a scarf, so that only one eye was visible, and with an umbrella!.... You, as far as I can see, don't even use such things.

      At that moment, the cowboy shouted, with the red-hot brand in his hand, applying it to the paddle of several bulls lying and tied up in the corral: "Another… another".... Each of these shouts was followed by a bellow, and Don Ignacio would use his penknife to make one more notch on a guasimo stick that served as a foete.

      As the cattle could be dangerous when they got up, Don Ignacio, after having received my farewell, got to safety by going into a neighbouring corral.

      Emigdio's chosen spot on the river was the best place to enjoy the bathing that the waters of the Amaime offer in the summer, especially at the time we reached its banks.

      Guabos churimos, on whose flowers fluttered thousands of emeralds, offered us dense shade and cushioned leaf litter where we spread out our ruanas. At the bottom of the deep pool that lay at our feet, even the smallest pebbles were visible and silver sardines frolicked. Down below, on the stones that were not covered by the currents, blue herons and white egrets fished peeping or combed their plumage. On the beach in front, beautiful cows were lying on the beach; macaws hidden in the foliage of the cachimbo trees were chattering in a low voice; and lying on the high branches, a group of monkeys slept in lazy abandonment. The cicadas were everywhere resounding their monotonous songs. A curious squirrel or two peeped through the reeds and disappeared swiftly. Further into the jungle we heard from time to time the melancholy trill of the chilacoas.

      –Hang your tights away from here," I said to Emigdio, "or else we'll come out of the bath with a headache.

      He laughed heartily, watching me as I placed them on the fork of a distant tree:

      –Do you want everything to smell like roses? The man must smell like a goat.

      –Surely; and to prove that you believe it, you carry in your tights all the musk of a goatherd.

      During our bath, whether it was the night and the banks of a beautiful river that made me feel inclined to confide in him, or whether it was because I had given myself traces for my friend to confide in me, he confessed to me that after having kept the memory of Micaelina as a relic for some time, he had fallen madly in love with a beautiful ñapanguita, a weakness that he tried to hide from the malice of Don Ignacio, since the latter would try to thwart him, because the girl was not a lady; And in the end he reasoned thus:

      –As if it could be convenient for me to marry a lady, so that I should have to serve her instead of being served! And gentleman as I am, what on earth could I do with a woman of that sort? But if you knew Zoila? Man! I don't weary you; you'd even make verses of her; what verses! your mouth would water: her eyes could make a blind man see; she has the slyest laugh, the prettiest feet, and a waist that....

      –Slowly," I interrupted him: "You mean you're so frantically in love that you'll drown if you don't marry her?

      –I'm getting married even if the trap takes me!

      –With a woman of the village? Without your father's consent? I see: you are a man of beards, and you must know what you are doing. And has Charles any news of all this?

      –God forbid! God forbid! In Buga they have it in the palms of their hands and what do you want in their mouths? Fortunately Zoila lives in San Pedro and only goes to Buga every few days.

      –But you would show it to me.

      –It's a different matter for you; I'll take you any day you like.

      At three in the afternoon I parted from Emigdio, apologising in a thousand ways for not eating with him, and four o'clock would be when I got home.

      Chapter XX

      My mother and Emma came out into the corridor to meet me. My father had ridden out to visit the works.

      Soon after I was called to the dining-room, and I did not delay in going, for there I expected to find Maria; but I was deceived; and as I asked my mother for her, she answered me:

      As the gentlemen are coming to-morrow, the girls are busy making some sweets, and I think they have finished them, and will come now.

      I was about to get up from the table when José, who was coming up from the valley to the mountain herding two mules loaded with cane-brava, stopped on the high ground overlooking the interior, and shouted at me:

      –Good afternoon! I can't get there, because I'm carrying a chúcara, and it's getting dark. I'll leave you a message with the girls. Be very early to-morrow, for the thing is sure to happen.

      –Well," I replied, "I'll come very early; say hello to everybody.

      –Don't forget the pellets!

      And waving his hat at me, he continued up the stairs.

      I went to my room to prepare the shotgun, not so much because she needed cleaning as because I was looking for an excuse not to stay in the dining room, where at last Maria did not show up.

      I had a box of pistons open in my hand when I saw Maria coming towards me, bringing me the coffee, which she tasted with the spoon before she saw me.

      The pistons spilled all over the floor as soon as it came near me.

      Without

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