As he entered the hotel his self-confidence returned and his spirits revived.  He felt as if he were entering port after a storm.  He found Leonora in bed, her hair spread over the pillow in waves of gold, her eyes closed, and a smile on her lips, as if he had surprised her in the middle of a dream, where she had been tasting her memories of love.  They ordered lunch in the room early, intending to set out on their journey at once.  Circumspection, prudence, until they should be once beyond the Spanish border!  They would leave that evening on the Barcelona mail for the frontier.  And calmly, tranquilly, like a married couple discussing details of house-keeping in the calm of a quiet home, they ran over the list of things they would need on the train.

Rafael had nothing.  He had fled like a fugitive from a fire, with the first clothes he laid hands on as he bounded out of bed.  He needed many indispensable articles, and he thought of going out to buy them—­a matter of a moment.

“But are you really going out?” asked Leonora with a certain anguish, as if her feminine instinct sensed a danger.  “Are you going to leave me alone?...”

“Only a moment.  I won’t keep you waiting long.”

They took leave of each other in the corridor with the noisy, nonchalant joy of passion, indifferent to the chamber-maids who were walking to and fro at the other end of the passageway.

“Good-bye, Rafael....  Another hug; just one more.”

And as, with the taste of the last kiss still fresh on his lips, he reached the square, he saw a bejewelled hand still waving to him from a balcony.

Anxious to get back as soon as possible, the young man walked hurriedly along, elbowing his way among the cab-drivers swarming in front of the great Palacio de Dos Aguas, closed, silent, slumbering, like the two giants that guarded its portals, displaying in the golden downpour of sunlight the overdecorated yet graceful sumptuousness of its roccoco facade.

“Rafael!  Rafael!...”

The deputy turned around at the sound of his name, and blanched as if he had seen a ghost.  It was don Andres, calling to him.

“Rafael!  Rafael!”

“You?...  Here?”

“I came by the Madrid express.  For two hours I’ve been hunting for you in all the hotels of Valencia.  I knew you were here....  But come, we have a great deal to talk over.  This is not just the place to do it.”

And the old Mentor glowered hatefully at the Hotel de Roma, as if he wanted to annihilate the huge edifice with everybody in it.

They walked off, slowly, without knowing just where they were going, turning corners, passing several times through the same streets, their nerves tense and quivering, ready to shout at the top of their lungs, yet using every effort to speak softly, so as not to attract attention from the passers-by who were rubbing against them on the narrow side-walks.