"'Listen, then,' said he, wiping the perspiration from his forehead."


III.

"'I DO not know whether it is due to some inborn fatality of imagination,
or to having heard some story or other of the kind with which children are
so rashly allowed to be frightened, but the fact is, that since my
earliest years nothing has caused me so much horror and alarm as a woman
alone, in the street, at a late hour of the night. The effect is the same
whether I actually encounter her, or simply have an image of her in my
mind.

"'You can testify that I was never a coward. I fought a duel once, when I
had to, like any other man. Just after I had left the School of Engineers,
my workmen in Despenaperros revolted, and I fought them with stick and
pistol until I made them submit. All my life long, in Jaen, in Madrid, and
elsewhere, I have walked the streets at all hours, alone and unarmed, and
if I have chanced to run upon suspicious-looking persons, thieves, or mere
sneaking beggars, they have had to get out of my way or take to their
heels. But if the person turned out to be a solitary woman, standing
still or walking, and I was also alone, with no one in sight in any
direction--then (laugh if you want to, but believe me) I would be all
covered over with goose-flesh; vague fears would assail me; I would think
about beings of the other world, about imaginary existences, and about all
the superstitious stories which would make me laugh under other
circumstances. I would quicken my pace, or else turn back, and would not
get over my fright in the least until safe in my own house.