Paula the Waldensian | Page 4

not answer as we knew very little about her. They had told me that Paula lived in the Waldensian Valley--a country where the inhabitants fed on black bread and lived in homes that were like stables. I had no idea just exactly where the mountains of Piedmont were. I had searched the map without being able to find the region, but I supposed it must be somewhere between France, Italy and Switzerland.
There was another thing I had found out; namely, that Paula was about my own age. What happiness! This fact I repeated over and over until Louis told me to keep quiet. This attitude on his part I put down as discontent because Paula wasn't a boy, so I kept repeating, "Paula's the same as me!"
"For mercy's sake, will you keep quiet, Lisita? Besides you have your grammar twisted as usual. It doesn't surprise me in the least that you're always at the foot of the class, if that's the way you study."
"You can talk to me as you like," I answered, "but when Paula gets here I'll never speak to you again, and I'll tell her not to say a word to you either. I am mighty glad that Paula's a girl and not a disagreeable boy like you."
"Oh, keep your Paula, much do I care!" replied Louis.
"Come, come," exclaimed Rosa, "what's the good of fighting over this poor girl Paula whom neither of you have ever seen!"
"It's Louis' fault!"
"No, it's Lisita's!"
"It's the two of you! If Paula could see the way you quarrel I'm sure she would not want to come. I hope she will love us all and we must all of us love her also, because she's not only an orphan, but she's a niece of our poor dear, dead mother."
Rosa knew well how to bring about peace. One word about our mother was enough.
"See here, Lisita," and Rosa drew me toward her, "I see that you haven't the slightest desire to study tonight, so close your book, and if you get up early tomorrow morning I'll help you. Do you know what I would do now if I were you."
"What?"
"I'd go and see Catalina, You know that she does not like to be alone all of the afternoon, and I think Teresa has gone out If I didn't have so much to do I'd see her myself. Now, look out you don't make too much noise. Catalina has a terrible headache today."
"All right. I'm off!" I said.
The idea of visiting my oldest sister never made me very happy in those days. In fart, I hardly ever entered her room because it bored me terribly to be in the company of such a disagreeable invalid.
I remembered the time when Catalina was the liveliest and happiest person in the whole house, but unfortunately all this had changed in an instant. One day three years before, Catalina had fallen from the top of a high cherry-tree which she had climbed against the advice of Teresa. She was unconscious when we picked her up, and it seemed at first as if she would die as a result of the fall. After six months of cruel suffering, however, her youth had triumphed over death; but the big sister who had always been as happy and as lively as a bird was gone from us, and in her place remained a forlorn, unhappy girl with a poor twisted body, who at rare intervals sallied from her room a few steps with the aid of her crutches. Unfortunately her character had also suffered severely, for in spite of the tenderness and solicitude of my father who sought to satisfy her slightest desire, and in spite of the untiring care of Teresa and the patience and sweetness of Rosa, Catalina's life was one long complaint. Her room, with its white bed adorned with blue curtains and its magnificent view of the fields and mountains, was the most beautiful in the whole house. A pair of canaries sang for her in their respective corners; the finest fruits were always for her; and as she was a great reader, new books were continually brought in; but nothing seemed to have power to put a smile of satisfaction on her thin, wasted face.
Poor Catalina! It was certainly true--I didn't love her very much. I was so accustomed to see my sister in her invalid state that her pitiful condition didn't seem to move me, and she was always in such a bad humor that I only went to see her on rare occasions.
However, on this particular afternoon, I had, of course, a great desire to carry her the news of our cousin's coming, and so I gladly went to visit her; but forgetting all the warnings of Rosa I burst open the door like a