THE
WOMAN WHO HAD TWO NAVELS
453
her hand; I wouldn't touch her; I wanted her to feel my fury-but
she seemed to feel nothing, sitting there with her hands folded on her
lap and her painted face a blank and that repulsive dress making her
look like a cheap taxi-dancer on a dull night.
"Neither her father nor I had ever punished her before but when
we got home I made her father give her a good old-fashioned spanking.
I was dreadfully frightened: she might have fallen into worse hands.
I resolved to marry her off, after a long trip abroad. She still refused
to return to school anyway and seemed willing enough to be married."
"Is her husband her age?" asked Pepe Monson.
"He's thirty-but a very young thirty."
"And she's happy with him?"
"She
was
happy with him."
"Oh."
"There's a bandleader here-Texaco or something."
"Paco Texeira?"
"Do you know him?"
"He's a Hong Kong boy. We were in grade school together."
"Well, he was playing recently in Manila and Connie became very
infatuated with him.
If
she's here now it's to chase him some more ..."
Her vexation had revived and she did not care who saw it. As she
launched into a spirited account of her daughter's affair with the band–
leader, Pepe vainly sought amidst the cold glitter of white furs and bar–
baric earrings the sentimental old woman he had almost begun to like.
When he protested: "But Paco's married-" she leaned away and
her amused eyes considered him ironically, her gold coins swinging.
He thought of Mary Texeira, who was tall and brown-haired: a
great walker and mountain climber; an expert watercolorist (she or–
ganized outdoor classes in drawing during the summers); and the de–
voted mother of three. Dear good Mary might have no chic but he
could not imagine her just fading away beside women like the senora
de Vidal and her daughter. He could not, in fact, imagine Mary beside
those women at all; it seemed so improper his cheeks burned.
Smiling, the senora averted polite eyes from his blush. She said,
"It's all very shocking, isn't it?" She added that she was glad some
people still took marriage seriously . . .
Still thinking of the Texeiras, he saw the clean table of their mar–
riage being approached at the edges by ominous furs, pearls and gold
coins-as though a rustic altar were drawing pilgrimages. And what
with pilgrims dropping in all day-the senora now, her daughter this
morning- he had begun to feel like a wayside inn himself.
