Feeling very much elated, I strolled along the sunny streets, gaily swinging my cane, when, turning a corner near Doña Isidora's house, I suddenly came face to face with Don Hilario. This unexpected encounter threw us both off our guard, he recoiling two or three paces backwardand turning as pale as the nature of his complexion would allow. I recovered first from the shock. So far I had been able to baffle him, and knew, moreover, many things of which he was ignorant; still, he was there in the town with me and had to be reckoned with, and I quickly resolved to meet him as a friend, affecting entire ignorance of his object in coming to Montevideo. “Don Hilario--you here! Happy the eyes that behold you,” I exclaimed, seizing and shaking his hand, pretending to be overjoyed at the meeting. In a moment he recovered his usual self-possessed manner, and when I asked after Doña Demetria he answered after a moments hesitation that she was in very good health. “Come, Don Hilario,” I said, “we are close to my aunt Isidora's house, where I am staying, and it will give me great pleasure to present you to my wife, who will be glad to thank you for your kindness to me at the _estancia_.” “Your wife, Don Ricardo! Do you tell me that you are married?” he exclaimed in amazement, thinking probably that I was already the husband of Demetria. “What, did I not tell you before!” I said. “Ah, I remember speaking to Doña Demetria about it. Strange that she has not mentioned it to you. Yes, I was married before coming to this country--my wife is an Argentine. Come with me and you shall see a beautiful woman, if that is an inducement.” He was without doubt astonished and mystified, but he had recovered his mask, and was now polite, collected, watchful. When we entered the house I presented him to Doña Isidora, who happened to be in the way, and left her to entertain him. I was very glad to do so, knowing that he would seize the opportunity to try and discover something from the garrulous old lady, and that he would discover nothing, since she had not been let into our secrets. I found Paquíta lying down in her room having a siesta; and while she arrayed herself at my express desire in her best dress--a black velvet which set off her matchless beauty better than anything else, I told her how I wished her to treat Don Hilario. She knew all about him, of course, and hated him with all her heart, looking on him as a kind of evil genius from whose castle I had carried off the unhappy Demetria; but I made her understand that our wisest plan was to treat him graciously. She readily consented, for Argentine women can be more charmingly gracious than any other women on the globe, and what people do well they like to be called on to do.