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But when prosperity came, and the memory of the tragedy grew dim with the years, siñá Tona showed unmistakable fondness for Tonet, a child of feline shrewdness, who treated everybody with imperious petulance, but for his mother always had the speculative fondness of a sly cat.
The old hulk, that served them as lair, was a sort of vantage point from which they were able to follow the war between the two families. "Men! Men! What fleas!" siñá Tona would say, with a glance at the picture of the patrolman, who seemed to be the presiding genius of the place. "Men! Crooks every one of them, not worth the rope to hang them with!"
Pascualo's wife, Tona, spent more than a week on the Breakwater, a suckling baby in her arms and another child, a chubby little lad, clinging to her skirts. She was sure Pascualo would come home; and every time a fresh detail of the storm was given her, she would tear her hair and renew her screams for the Holy Virgin's help.
One thing at a time, Tonet was moving all his belongings from the tavern-boat to the truckman's cabin, as though the girl were foreclosing on his property. And siñá Tona was living more and more by herself. The Rector was always off peseta-hunting, as he said, either fishing, or sometimes shipping on one of the laúds that ran to Torrevieja for salt.
Many doors were at last shut in her face, and old friends of her girlhood, who had always welcomed her with a smile, now looked the other way when she went by. But Tona was not the woman to be crushed by general ostracism. Eah! Enough of this bawling! We've got to get out of the dumps! She was a woman with two arms like any other, and two brats that could eat and eat and eat!
She had nothing left in the world but the wreck of her husband's boat, in which he had died. It lay rotting out there on the beach, high and dry, now soaked by the rains, now oozing tar under the flaming sun, the mosquitos breeding in the muck inside. Tona suddenly had an idea. That boat might be good for something. It had killed the father of those tots of hers.
With this idea of manliness, no wonder the Tahitians regarded all pale and tepid-looking Europeans as weak and feminine; whereas, a sailor, with a cheek like the breast of a roast turkey, is held a lad of brawn: to use their own phrase, a "taata tona," or man of bones.
But when Tona found this out and was inclined to encourage her, she would play truant all the time. It was only in summer that she was of any use at all.
Siñá Tona, for her part, was quite satisfied with her boy. As much of a scamp as ever, but he had himself more in hand, and it was evident that the navy discipline had done him good. The same old Tonet, but he had been taught to dress better and cleaner, and he could drink without drinking too much.
Tona was kept posted on all his adventures, and was immensely flattered at the boy's popularity and "social position." A bit too fond of brandy, yes and what a pity! but a regular fellow, quite different from that big good-natured booby of a Pascualet, who wouldn't say a word if a cart ran over him.
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