The old woman awoke at the sound of footsteps, and seeing the prelate, gave a cry of surprise.

“Don Sebastian!  You here!”

“I wished to visit you,” said the cardinal with a benevolent smile, seating himself on a bench.  “It must not be always you who come to seek me.  I owe you many visits, and here I am.”

Plunging one hand into the depths of his cassock, he drew forth a small gold case and lighted a cigarette.  He stretched out his legs with the complacency of one who being always accustomed to wear the frowning brow of authority, finds himself for a few moments at liberty.

“But have you not been ill?” inquired the gardener’s widow.  “I had thought of coming round to the palace this afternoon to inquire after your health from Dona Visita.”

“Hold your tongue, you fool; I have never felt better, especially since this morning.  The slap I have given to those by not going into the choir to pray with them has put me in a splendid humour, and in order that they may thoroughly understand my meaning I have come to see you.  I wish them all to know that I am quite well, and that what is said about my illness is untrue.  I wish all in Toledo to understand that the archbishop will not see his canons, and that he does so from a sense of dignity, not from pride, as at the same time he can come down to see his old friend the gardener’s widow.”

And the terrible old man laughed like a child to think of the annoyance this visit would cause his Chapter.

“Do not believe, however, Tomasa,” he continued, “that I have come to see you solely for this reason.  I felt sad and worried in the palace this afternoon.  Visitacion was busy with some friends from Madrid, and I had that heartache I sometimes feel when I think of the past.  I felt that I must come and see you, more especially as it is always cool in the Cathedral garden, whereas outside it is as hot as an oven.  Ah!  Tomasa! how strong I see you!  So slim and so active.  You wear better than I do; you are not wrapped in fat like this sinner, and you have not the pains that disturb my nights.  Your hair is still dark, your teeth are well preserved, and you do not need like this old cardinal to have a mechanism inside your mouth; but all the same, Tomasa, you are just as old as I am.  We have very few years of life left to us, however much the Lord may wish to preserve us.  What would I not give to return to those days when I ran up to your house in my red gown in search of your father, the sacristan, and stole your breakfast.  Eh, Tomasa?”

The two old people, forgetting social differences, recalled the past with the friendly resignation of those advancing towards death.  Everything was the same as in their childhood—­the garden, the cloister; nothing about the Cathedral had changed.

His Eminence, closing his eyes, fancied himself once more the restless acolyte of fifty years before; the blue spirals from his cigarette seemed to carry his thoughts back through the interminable labyrinths of the past.