'Well, Miguel,' says I, 'this is about as nice a place for
a falls as ever I see,' but--"
"Miguel!" cried Euphemia. "Is that your husband's name?"
"Well, no," said Pomona, "it isn't. His given name is Jonas, but I
hated to call him Jonas, an' on a bridal trip, too. He might jus'
as well have had a more romantic-er name, if his parents had 'a'
thought of it. So I determined I'd give him a better one, while we
was on our journey, anyhow, an' I changed his name to Miguel, which
was the name of a Spanish count. He wanted me to call him Jiguel,
because, he said, that would have a kind of a floating smell of his
old name, but I didn't never do it. Well, neither of us didn't
care to stay about no dry falls, so we went back to the hotel and
got our supper, and begun to wonder what we should do next day. He
said we'd better put it off and dream about it, and make up our
minds nex' mornin', which I agreed to, an', that evenin', as we was
sittin' in our room I asked Miguel to tell me the story of his
life. He said, at first, it hadn't none, but when I seemed a
kinder put out at this, he told me I mustn't mind, an' he would
reveal the whole. So he told me this story:
"'My grandfather,' said he, 'was a rich and powerful Portugee, a-
livin' on the island of Jamaica. He had heaps o' slaves, an' owned
a black brigantine, that he sailed in on secret voyages, an', when
he come back, the decks an' the gunnels was often bloody, but
nobody knew why or wherefore.
Pages:
153
154
155
156
157
158
159
160
161
162
163
164
165
166
167
168
169
170
171
172
173
174
175
176
177