lovable, showing great concern
for her health and promising to call on her soon. And the master was
restrained, tormented by remorse, not daring to make any new advances,
until his discomfort had disappeared.

He continued to visit the countess, as before. He felt that he must see
her; he had grown accustomed to her enthusiastic praise of his artistic
merits.

Sometimes the impetuous nature of his youthful days awakened and he
longed to rid himself of this shameful chain. The woman had bewitched
him; she sent for him without any reason, she seemed to delight in
making him suffer, she needed him for a plaything. She spoke of
Monteverde and their love with quiet cynicism, as if the doctor were her
husband. She had to confide the secrets of her life to some one, with
that imperious naivete that forces the guilty to confess. Little by
little she let the master into the secret of her passion, telling him
unblushingly of the most intimate details of their meetings, which were
often in her own house. They took advantage of the blindness of the
count, who seemed almost stunned by his failure to receive the Fleece;
they took a morbid delight in the danger of being surprised.

"I tell you this, Mariano, I don't know why it is I feel as I do toward
you; I like you as a brother. No, not as a brother, rather as a
confidential woman friend."

When Renovales was alone, he despised Concha's frankness. It was just as
people believed; she was very attractive, very pretty, but absolutely
lacking in scruples. As for himself, he heaped insults on himself in the
slang of his Bohemian days, comparing himself with all the horned
animals he could think of.

"I won't go there again. It's disgraceful. A pretty part you are
playing, master!"

But he had hardly been absent two days when Marie, the Countess's French
maid, appeared with the scented letter, or it arrived in the mail, where
it stood out scandalously among the other envelopes of the master's
correspondence.

"Curse that woman!" exclaimed Renovales, hastening to hide the showy
note. "What a lack of prudence. One of these fine days, Josephina will
discover these letters."

Cotoner, in his blind devotion to his idol whom he considered
irresistible, supposed that the Alberca woman was madly in love with the
master and shook his head sadly.

"This will have a bad end, Mariano. You ought to break with her. The
peace of your home! You are piling up trouble for yourself."

The let