She would remain as a buffer between these two whose eyes were too hard when they looked at each other.
"It seems a pity that young men nowadays cannot contain themselves without quarreling," sighed the senora, acting upon the theory that anger is most dangerous when it is silent, and so giving the conversational ball a push.
"Is there no way, Senor, in which you might avert this trouble?
Truly it saddens me to think of it, for Jose has been as my own son.

His mother and I were as twin sisters, Senor, and his mother prayed me to watch over him when she had gone.

'Si, madre mia' would he tell me, when I gave him the good counsel.

And now he comes no more, and he wants to fight the duelo! Is there no way, Senor ?" The hardness left Jack's lips but not his eyes, while he looked from her to the don, smoking imperturbably his cigar beside her.
"There is no way, Senora, except for a coward.

I have done what I could; I know that Jose's skill is great with riatas, and the choice was mine.
I might have said pistols," he reminded her gently, but with meaning.
The plump hands of the senora went betrayingly into the air and her earrings tinkled with the horror that shook her cushiony person.