Rafael thought he did. As he went back in his memory, the picture of an
old wrinkled woman rose before his mind, a woman round-shouldered, bent
with age, but with a kindly face smiling with simple-mindedness and good
nature. He could see her now, with a rosary usually in her hand, a
camp-stool under her arm, and her _mantilla_ drawn down over her face.
As she passed the Brull door on her way to church, she would greet his
mother; and doña Bernarda would remark in a patronizing way: "Doña Pepa
is a very fine woman; one of God's own souls.... The only decent person
in her family."

"Yes; I remember; I remember doña Pepa," said Rafael.

"Well, your 'foreigner,'" don Andrés continued, "is doña Pepa's niece,
daughter of her brother, the doctor. The girl has been all over the
world singing grand opera. You were probably too young to remember
Doctor Moreno, who was the scandal of the province in those days...."

But Rafael certainly did remember Doctor Moreno! That name was one of
the freshest of his childhood recollections, the bugaboo of many nights
of terror and alarm, when he would hide his trembling head under the
clothes. If he cried about going to bed so early, his mother would say
to him in a mysterious voice:

"If you don't keep quiet and go right to sleep I'll send for Doctor
Moreno!"

A weird, a formidable personage, the Doctor! Rafael could see him as
clearly as if he were sitting there in front of him; with that huge,
black, curly beard; those large, burning eyes that always shone with an