The Lovely Lady and other stories [antikvár]

The Lovely Lady Pauline Attenborough was seventy-two, but sometimes, in the half-light, she seemed thirty. She really was a wonderful woman. Her clothes were always fashionable, and she had a good figure. She had pretty curved cheeks, a well-shaped nose, and good teeth. Her skin was smooth, and only her eyes showed her age. When she was tired, there were little lines at the corners. Her niece Cecília was perhaps the only person in the world who knew that Pauline could make those lines disappear. When Pauline's son Róbert came home, her eyes became young and bright and shining. Then she really was a lovely lady; she was a picture painted by Leonardo, a Mona Lisa. Pauline didn't always look young, of course. She was too clever. When she was with Cecilia, Pauline didn't try. Cecilia, said Pauline, didn't notice things. Cecilia wasn't pretty. Cecilia was thirty; she had no money; and she was in love with Róbert. Cecilia didn't matter. Cecilia, called by her aunt and cousin just 'Ciss', was a big, dark, rather silent young woman. Her father and mother and uncle were all dead. And Aunt Pauline had been in charge of Ciss for five years.