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Updated: June 18, 2025
He could not bring himself to sell the ranch and flee from the scene of his disappointment, for he was young enough to take a morbid pleasure in the very theatre of his failure. He did not see Delfina again for three years. By that time she had three children and had begun to grow stout. But she was still very beautiful, and John kept out of her way for several years more.
It was a long room, severely furnished in the old style, and facing the door was a painting of Delfina Carillo. Talbot rarely allowed his eyes to wander to this portrait. Had he dared he would have asked for its removal. The grass was long above the grave, but there were such things as ghosts. The Señora was sitting in a corner of the dim cool room, and rose at once to greet him.
She wore a soft white wrapper with much lace about the throat; and she looked twenty-six, and beautiful, wreck as she was. "Delfina!" he articulated. "Delfina!" And then he sat down, for his knees were shaking. The blood seemed rushing through his brain, and after that first terrible but ecstatic moment of recognition, he was conscious of a poignant regret for the loss of his brown old friend.
They were pretty creatures, and John loved them, for each had in her face a morsel of Delfina Carillo's lost beauty; and if they recalled the pain of his youth they recalled its sweetness too. The Señora recalled neither. For the last year she had been quite alone. Two of her daughters lived in the city of Mexico. One had married a Spanish Consul and returned with him to Spain.
Enrique's gratitude for Talbot knew no bounds; he pressed the hospitality of Los Olivos upon him, and in time the two became fast friends. Ortega and Delfina had jogged along very comfortably. She was an exemplary wife, a devoted mother, and as excellent a housekeeper as became her traditions.
He wrenched at his collar, and in truth he felt as if the very mountain were trembling. Delfina had thrown back her head. "Ay!" she remarked. Then she laughed. She had no desire to be cruel, but her manifest amusement brought the blood down from John's head, and he shook from head to foot. His white face showed plainly in this fringe of the forest, and she ceased laughing and spoke kindly.
"That is Delfina Carillo," said the girl beside him, following his gaze. "She go to marry with Enrique, I theenk. He is very devot, and I think she like him, but no will say."
<b>FORTIN DE COOL, DELFINA.</b> Third-class medal, Madrid, 1864, for the following works reproduced on porcelain: the "Conception" of Murillo, the "Magdalen" of Antolinez, and the portrait of Alonso Cano by Velazquez; also a portrait on ivory of a young girl. This artist, who was French by birth, was a pupil of her father.
He was twenty and the ranch was his when he met Delfina Carillo. Don Roberto Ortega had opportunely died before gambling away more than half of his estate, and his widow, who was delicate, left the ranch near Monterey, where they had lived for many years, and came to bake brown in the hot suns of the South.
This last tint was reflected in the water immediately below the ridge, and farther out there were lakelets of pale green, as if the islands, too, had the power to mirror themselves when the sea itself was glass. Santiago, Davidov, Carolina Xime'no, Delfina Rivera, Concha and Rezanov, had climbed to the ridge.
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