prove his position. He was no longer allowed to
eat in the administration building, the proprietor insisting imperiously
that henceforth Desnoyers should sit at his own table, and thus he was
admitted into the intimate life of the Madariaga family.

The wife was always silent when her husband was present. She was used to
rising in the middle of the night in order to oversee the breakfasts
of the peons, the distribution of biscuit, and the boiling of the great
black kettles of coffee or shrub tea. She looked after the chattering
and lazy maids who so easily managed to get lost in the nearby groves.
In the kitchen, too, she made her authority felt like a regular
house-mistress, but the minute that she heard her husband's voice she
shrank into a respectful and timorous silence. Upon sitting down at
table, the China would look at him with devoted submission, her great,
round eyes fixed on him, like an owl's. Desnoyers felt that in this mute
admiration was mingled great astonishment at the energy with which the
ranchman, already over seventy, was continuing to bring new occupants to
live on his demesne.

The two daughters, Luisa and Elena, accepted with enthusiasm the new
arrival who came to enliven the monotonous conversations in the dining
room, so often cut short by their father's wrathful outbursts. Besides,
he was from Paris. "Paris!" sighed Elena, the younger one, rolling her
eyes. And Desnoyers was henceforth consulted in all matters of style
every time they ordered any "confections" from the shops of Buenos
Aires.

The interior of the house reflected the different tastes of the two
generations. The girls had a parlor with a few handsome pieces of
furniture placed against the cracked walls, and some showy lamps that
were never lighted. The father, with his boorishness, often invaded this
room so cherished and admired by the two sisters, making the carpets
look shabby and faded under his muddy boot-tracks. Upon the gilt
centre-table, he loved to lay his lash. Samples of maize scattered
its grains over a silk sofa which the young ladies tried to keep very
choice, as though they feared it might break.

Near the entrance to the dining room was a weighing machine, and
Madariaga became furious when his daughters asked him to remove it to
the offices. He was not going to trouble himself to go outside every
time that he wanted to know the weight of a leather skin! . . . A piano
came into the ranch, and Elena passed the ho