The wife was always silent when her husband was present.  She was used to rising in the middle of the night in order to oversee the breakfasts of the peons, the distribution of biscuit, and the boiling of the great black kettles of coffee or shrub tea.  She looked after the chattering and lazy maids who so easily managed to get lost in the nearby groves.  In the kitchen, too, she made her authority felt like a regular house-mistress, but the minute that she heard her husband’s voice she shrank into a respectful and timorous silence.  Upon sitting down at table, the China would look at him with devoted submission, her great, round eyes fixed on him, like an owl’s.  Desnoyers felt that in this mute admiration was mingled great astonishment at the energy with which the ranchman, already over seventy, was continuing to bring new occupants to live on his demesne.

The two daughters, Luisa and Elena, accepted with enthusiasm the new arrival who came to enliven the monotonous conversations in the dining room, so often cut short by their father’s wrathful outbursts.  Besides, he was from Paris.  “Paris!” sighed Elena, the younger one, rolling her eyes.  And Desnoyers was henceforth consulted in all matters of style every time they ordered any “confections” from the shops of Buenos Aires.

The interior of the house reflected the different tastes of the two generations.  The girls had a parlor with a few handsome pieces of furniture placed against the cracked walls, and some showy lamps that were never lighted.  The father, with his boorishness, often invaded this room so cherished and admired by the two sisters, making the carpets look shabby and faded under his muddy boot-tracks.  Upon the gilt centre-table, he loved to lay his lash.  Samples of maize scattered its grains over a silk sofa which the young ladies tried to keep very choice, as though they feared it might break.

Near the entrance to the dining room was a weighing machine, and Madariaga became furious when his daughters asked him to remove it to the offices.  He was not going to trouble himself to go outside every time that he wanted to know the weight of a leather skin! . . .  A piano came into the ranch, and Elena passed the hours practising exercises with desperate good will.  “Heavens and earth!  She might at least play the Jota or the Perican, or some other lively Spanish dance!” And the irate father, at the hour of siesta, betook himself to the nearby eucalyptus trees, to sleep upon his poncho.

This younger daughter whom he dubbed La Romantica, was the special victim of his wrath and ridicule.  Where had she picked up so many tastes which he and his good China never had had?  Music books were piled on the piano.  In a corner of the absurd parlor were some wooden boxes that had held preserves, which the ranch carpenter had been made to press into service as a bookcase.

“Look here, Frenchy,” scoffed Madariaga.  “All these are novels and poems!  Pure lies! . . .  Hot air!”