up
in the corners denouncing the forgetfulness of their enchanting breath.

"Take it! Take it!"

And she sprinkled the precious perfumes as though they were water on
Ferragut's hair, over his curled beard, advising the sailor to close
his eyes in order not to be blinded by this crazy baptism.

Anointed and fragrant as an Asiatic despot, the strong Ulysses would
sometimes revolt against this effeminateness. At others, he would
accept it with the delight of a new pleasure.

Suddenly a window-shutter would seem to swing open in his imagination,
and, passing by this luminous square, he would see the melancholy
Cinta, his son Esteban, the bridge of his vessel and Toni at the helm.

"Forget!" cried the voice of his evil counselor, blotting out the
vision. "Enjoy the present!... There is plenty of time to go in search
of them."

And again he would sink himself in his refined and artificial luxurious
state with the selfishness of the satrap who, after ordering various
cruelties, locks himself in his harem.

The very finest linens, scattered by chance, enveloped his body or
served as cushions. They were her lingerie, stray petals of her beauty,
that still kept the warmth and perfume of her body. If Ferragut needed
any object belonging to him, he had to hunt for it through sheaves of
skirts, silk petticoats, white negligees, perfumes and portraits, all
scattered over the furniture or tossed in the corners. When Freya,
tired of dancing in the center of the salon, was not curling herself up
in his arms she took delight in opening a box of sandalwood. In this
she used to keep all her jewels, taking them out again and again with a
nervous restlessness, as though she feared they might have evaporated
in their enclosure. Her lover had to listen to the gravest explanations
accompanying the display of her treasures.

"Kiss it," she said, offering him the string of pearls almost always on
her neck.

These grains of moonlight splendor were to her little living beings,
little creatures that she needed in contact with her skin. She was
impregnated with the essence of all that she wore; she drank their
life.

"They have slept upon me so many nights," she would murmur,
contemplating them amorously. "This light amber tone I have given them
with the warmth of my body."

They were no longer a piece of jewelry, they formed a part of her
organism. They might grow pale and die if they were to pass many days
forgotten in the depths of