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Updated: May 22, 2025
"For mischief and deviltry you can't beat Conchita Salazar." It was thus that Renovales heard her name for the first time. Then when the artist and his wife had moved from Venice to Madrid, he learned that she had changed her name to that of the Countess of Alberca by marrying a man who might have been her father.
One afternoon at the Alberca woman's house, after one of their daring meetings with which they defied the holy calm of the noble, who had now returned from his trip, the painter spoke timidly of his wife. "I shall have to come less; don't be surprised. Josephina is very ill." "Very?" asked Concha.
He was a doctor of science and was waiting for a chair at Madrid to be declared vacant, that he might become a candidate for it. The Countess of Alberca had him under her high protection, talking about him enthusiastically to all the important gentlemen who exercised any influence in University circles. She would break out into the most extravagant praise of the doctor in Renovales' presence.
Beyond, through half-veiling draperies, might be seen the great court of the Alberca, whose peristyles were hung with flowers; while, in the centre, the gigantic basin, which gives its name to the court, caught the sunlight obliquely, and its waves glittered on the eye from amidst the roses that then clustered over it.
This intimacy quite disconcerted people, for they could no longer tell with certainty which one was the Alberca woman's master and which the aspirant, even going so far as to believe that by a mutual agreement they all three lived in an ideal world. Monteverde admired the master and the latter, from his years and the superiority of his fame, assumed a paternal authority over him.
"But whom are you talking about? Who is it?" She, as if she were only waiting for his question, sat up in bed, got onto her knees, looking at him fixedly, shaking her head on her delicate neck, so that the short, straight locks of hair whirled around it. "Whom do you suppose? The Alberca woman. That peacock! Look surprised! You don't know what I mean! Poor thing!"
The noble Count of Alberca was unceasing in his sympathy. Poor friend! Deprived of his companion! And by his expression he shared the horror he felt at the possibility of being left a widower, without that wife who made him so happy. At the beginning of winter Renovales returned to his house.
The Countess of Alberca succeeded in making her way, one afternoon, to the master's studio. The servant saw her arrive as usual in a cab, cross the garden, come up the steps, and enter the reception room with the hasty step of a resolute woman who goes straight ahead without hesitating.
A mere trifle, nervousness on the part of poor Josephina, who saw the dark side of everything in her illness. She had referred during the luncheon to the Alberca woman and her portrait. She did not seem to be very fond of her, in spite of the fact that she had been her companion in boarding-school. She felt as other women did; the countess was an enemy, who inspired them with fear.
There was a fire once more in the fireplace in the drawing-room of the Countess of Alberca, where all the gentlemen who formed her coterie gathered to keep warm on days when she was "at home," not having a meeting to preside over or calls to make. When Renovales came one afternoon, he spoke enthusiastically of the view of Moncloa, covered with snow.
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