Of Love and Shadows by Isabel Allende Read Free Book Online Page B

frothing at the mouth and surrounded by broken cups and plates.
    The terrified mother resorted to the first remedy that came to her mind: she emptied a bucket of cold water over the girl, but far from calming her, the alarming signs grew worse. The froth turned into a rosy slobber when the girl bit her tongue; her eyes rolled backward in her head, lost in infinity; she shook in shuddering convulsions, and the room was impregnated with anguish and the smell of excrement. The tension was so high that the thick adobe walls seemed to vibrate as if a secret trembling were coursing through their entrails. Digna Ranquileo hugged Jacinto close, covering his eyes to spare him that dreadful sight.
    The attack lasted several minutes and left Evangelina drained, the mother and the brother terrorized, and the house turned upside down. When Hipólito and the other children returned from watching the convention of frogs, it was all over; the girl was resting in her chair and the mother was picking up the broken pottery.
    â€œShe was stung by a black widow spider” was the father’s diagnosis when they told him about it.
    â€œI’ve gone over her from head to foot. It wasn’t a bite.”
    â€œThen she must have had a fit.”
    But Digna knew the symptoms of epilepsy, and she knew that it did not wreak havoc with the furniture. That very afternoon she made the decision to take Evangelina to don Simón, the healer.
    â€œBetter take her to a doctor,” Hipólito counseled.
    â€œYou know what I think of hospitals and doctors,” his wife replied, sure that if there was a cure for the girl, don Simón would know it.
    This Saturday it would be five weeks since the first attack, and up till now nothing had helped her. There stood Evangelina helping her mother wash the earthenware dishes while the morning sped by and the dreaded hour approached.
    â€œGet out the mugs for the flour water, daughter,” Digna directed.
    Evangelina began to sing as she lined up aluminum and enameled-tin receptacles on the table. Into each she measured a couple of tablespoons of toasted flour and a little honey. Later they would add fresh water to offer to the visitors who arrived at the hour of the trance in hopes of being benefited by some minor miracle.
    â€œAfter tomorrow I’m not going to give them a thing,” grumbled Digna. “They’re going to ruin us.”
    â€œDon’t talk like that, woman,” Hipólito replied. “After all, people are coming out of affection. A little flour isn’t going to make us any poorer,” and she bowed her head because he was the man and was always right.
    Digna was on the verge of tears; she realized her nerves had taken all they could, and she went in search of a few linden flowers to brew herself some calming tea. These last weeks had been a calvary. This strong and long-suffering woman, who without a single complaint had borne such great sorrow and survived poverty, hard work, and the travails of childbirth, felt that in the face of the bewitchment that was consuming her home she had come to the end of her tether. She was sure that she had tried everything that might cure her daughter; she had even taken her to the hospital, breaking her oath never to set foot there again. But it had all been in vain.
    *  *  *
    As he rang the doorbell, Francisco hoped that it would not be Beatriz Alcántara who answered. He felt diminished in her presence.
    â€œMother, this is my compañero Francisco Leal,” Irene had said when she first introduced him several months earlier.
    â€œColleague, you say?” her mother replied, unable to tolerate the revolutionary implications of the word compañero.
    Following that meeting, each knew what to expect from the other; they tried, nevertheless, to be amiable, more from habitual good manners than from any desire to please the other. Beatriz quickly found out that Francisco came from a family of