He received her with more kindness than she had anticipated.
His eyes glittered in their deep sockets when she related her
extremity and the priest's proposal, and his small shrunken
body quivered with excitement as he answered:
"Saints and angels! Fray Ignatius is right about Santa Anna.
We shall see that he will make caps for his soldiers out of
the skins of these infidel ingrates. But as for going into
the convent, I know not. A miserable marriage you made for
yourself, Maria. Pardon, if I say so much! I let the word
slip always. I was never one to bite my tongue. I am all old
man--very well, come here, you and your daughters, till
the days of blood are over. There is room in the house, and
a few comforts in it also. I have some power with Santa Anna.
He is a great man--a great man! In all his wars, good fortune
flies before him."
He kissed her hands as he opened the door, and then went back
to the fire, and bent, muttering, over it: "Giver of good! a
true Yturbide; a gentle woman; she is like my sister
Mercedes--very like her. These poor women who trust me, as I
am a sinner before God, I am unhappy to deceive them."
Fray Ignatius might have divined his thoughts, for he entered
at the moment, and said as he approached him:
"You have done right. The soul must be saved, if all is lost.
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