“Now it’s your turn,” I said to the younger one.

“Go with him,” said the elder, “Don Jaime is as honest a man as you will find in Spain.”

There was really not much to be done to the younger sister, her disguise being simply a mask and domino, but as I wanted to keep Ignazia a long time I made her put on white stockings, change her kerchief, and a dozen other trifles.  When she was ready I brought her forth, and Donna Ignazia noticing that she had changed her stockings and kerchief, asked her whether I were as expert at dressing a lady as at turning a lady into a gentleman.

“I don’t know,” she replied, “I did everything for myself.”

Next came the turn of Don Diego’s daughter, and as soon as I had her in the closet I did my pleasure on her, she submitting with an air that seemed to say, “I only give in because I can’t resist.”  Wishing to save her honour I withdrew in time, but in the second combat I held her for half an hour to my arms.  However, she was naturally of a passionate disposition, and nature had endowed her with a temperament able to resist the most vigorous attacks.  When decency made us leave the closet, she remarked to her cousins,

“I thought I should never have done; I had to alter the whole fit of the domino.”

I admired her presence of mind.

At nightfall we went to the ball, at which the fandango might be danced ad libitum by a special privilege, but the crowd was so great that dancing was out of the question.  At ten we had supper, and then walked up and down, till all at once the two orchestras became silent.  We heard the church clocks striking midnight the carnival was over, and Lent had begun.

This rapid transition from wantonness to devotion, from paganism to Christianity, has something startling and unnatural about it.  At fifty-nine minutes past eleven the senses are all aglow; midnight sounds, and in a minute they are supposed to be brought low, and the heart to be full of humble repentance; it is an absurdity, an impossibility.

I took the three girls to my house to take off their dominos, and we then escorted the two cousins home.  When we had left them for a few minutes Donna Ignazia told me that she would like a little coffee.  I understood her, and took her to my house, feeling sure of two hours of mutual pleasure.

I took her to my room, and was just going out to order the coffee when I met Don Francisco, who asked me plainly to let him come up, as he had seen Donna Ignazia go in with me.  I had sufficient strength of mind to conceal my rage and disappointment, and told him to come in, adding that his mistress would be delighted at this unexpected visit.  I went upstairs, and he followed me, and I shewed him into the room, congratulating the lady on the pleasant surprise.

I expected that she would play her part as well as I had played mine, but I was wrong.  In her rage she told him that she would never have asked me to give her a cup of coffee if she had foreseen this piece of importunity, adding that if he had been a gentleman he would have known better than to intrude himself at such an hour.