going to disgrace you, Miguel.... I am not used to
these things. _Virgen Maria!_ how much I would give to be like one of
those elegant and lovely ladies that you bow to in the theatres. I don't
see how you ever came to marry me, when I am neither beautiful nor able
to be compared with the ladies whom you know."

"Hush! hush!" said he, laying his fingers on her mouth. "I am prouder of
having married you than if you had been a princess of the blood."

"I know this," she replied, her eyes overflowing with love and
happiness; "I know that I am proud because I am your wife, and because
you preferred me to any handsome, elegant, and rich woman; me, a poor,
good-for-nothing...."

"Hush! hush! or I will bite you," he repeated, kissing her passionately.

During the days that followed, as had been decided, they began their
preparations and got out their cards. Miguel went in person to invite
his Uncle Manolo.

He lived in a magnificent mansion in the Calle del Pez. Since his
marriage he had changed few of his habits. It would be a great mistake
to imagine that he had in the least abandoned the solicitous cares which
he had always bestowed upon his elegant person: not at all! tinctures
and cosmetics followed in harmony with the latest advances of chemistry;
all bands and braces and the latest improvements in the science of
orthopedics; the best shoemaker in Madrid; the most skilful dentist, the
most fashionable tailor and perfumer in the city.

Uncle Manolo was a monument so admirably preserved that the Spanish
government might have taken him for a pattern for theirs.

Nevertheless, merciless Time had been making some ravages in that proud
edifice, and already some of his marks could be clearly seen on its
facade; crow's-feet and wrinkles of every sort each day grew deeper and
deeper; in spite of his shoulder-braces he bent a little more forward;
his step, also, was not half as light and firm as before. There was no
question that the least carelessness or omission in the process of his
self-preservation would bring him in ruins to the ground.

Miguel found his Aunt Ana, for variety's sake, by the chimney-corner;
and this, although it was rather early in the season for fires. In her,
as well as in her lord and master, the ravages of time were also
manifest, so much so, that it was more easy to believe that the good
lady, once married, had entirely forgotten the care and adornment of her
person, since, in so short a period,