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Updated: August 15, 2024
But after a while, under the spell of a phenomenon we may call cumulative, this charm waxes potent; it grows till some time it unexpectedly breaks forth in an enveloping, conquering passion. Now one morning it happened that Manolo Berlanga was eating breakfast in the dining-room before going to the shop. Rafaela, her back toward him, was scrubbing the floor of the hallway.
It seemed almost as if the clever little fellow had set his mind on looking like everybody who had stood near his baptismal font, so that he could win the love of them all. Zureda worshiped the boy, laughed at all his tricks and graces, and spent hours playing with him on the tiles of the passageway. Little Manolo pulled his mustache and necktie, mauled him and broke the crystal of his watch.
Now, then, in my house, right here, people are saying your wife is thick with Manolo Berlanga!" The eyes of the tavern-keeper and the engineer met. They remained fixed, so, a moment. Then the eyes of Zureda opened wide, seemed starting from their sockets. Suddenly he jumped up, and his square finger-nails fairly sank into the wood of the table.
The engineer, congratulated by everybody, wept with joy. Little Manolo was nearly three years old. He had developed into a very cunning chap, talkative and pleasant. In his small, plump, white face, that looked even whiter by contrast with the dead black of his hair, you could see distinctive characteristics of several persons.
Zureda recoiled a few steps and unsheathed his knife. The silversmith snicked open a big pocket blade. They fell violently on each other. It was a prehistoric battle, body to body, savage, silent. Manolo was killed. He fell on his back, his face white, his mouth twisted in an unforgettable grimace of pain and hate.
After greatly straining his attention, he could find nothing in the cordial frankness of their relations that seemed to pass the limits of good friendship. From the time when Berlanga had stood godfather for little Manolo, Amadeo had begged them to use "thee" and "thou" to each other, and this they had done.
It was as if her conscience had sunk away into unthinking stupor. The only thing that still remained in her, unchanged, was the maternal instinct of living and working for little Manolo, so that he, too, might live. True enough, on certain days the wretched woman drank deeply the cup of gall, as certain memories returned.
But already, even though Zureda had wanted to give him back, it was too late. Rafaela ran to the end of the platform, and there she had to stop. Pedro laughed and gesticulated from the blackness of the tender, bidding her farewell. The young woman went back home, in tears. Manolo Berlanga had just got home. He had been drinking and was in the devil's own humor. "Well, what's up now?" he demanded.
"Very small, indeed. What's your wife's name?" "Rafaela." "Yes, yes," answered Don Adolfo. "Rafaela's the woman. I know her well. As for Manolo, your son, I know him too." Amadeo Zureda trembled. He felt afraid, and cold. For a few moments he remained silent, without knowing what to say.
The very same day when Amadeo Zureda got out of jail, he received from Rafaela a letter which began thus: "Little Manolo was twenty years old, yesterday." The one-time engineer left the boat from Africa at Valencia, passed the night at an inn not far from the railroad station, and early next morning took the train which was to carry him to Ecks.
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