“Because it shows the kind of childhood I had.”
“Come on, Prudencia, tell me. Meg?”
“No.”
“Amy?”
“No.”
“Not poor Beth?”
“No.”
“Surely not Aunt March?”
“No, not Aunt March. Mrs. March.”
“Mrs. March? Really? Why?”
Miss Prim pondered a moment. It had something to do with the personality of her own mother, a sensitive, artistic woman but quite unlike the mother of the March girls. She bore not the slightest resemblance to the strong and steady, sweet and understanding woman in the novel. The librarian had often thought that if she had to choose an adjective to describe her mother it would beconsolable.
“Consolable?”
“My mother’s always been a highly dramatic person. She’s the kind of woman who demands emotional support even when misfortune befalls others, not her. When my father lost his job a few years ago, it was she who shut herself up for days crying and wailing. He sat alone, quietly, in the living room, head bowed. When I lost my university scholarship she wouldn’t come to the dinner table for two weeks. It was the same when my older sister’s husband left her. Virginia couldn’t cry because beside her she had a woman in sackcloth and ashes, bemoaning her misfortune.”
Herminia placed her hands over Miss Prim’s.
“I’m so sorry, Prudencia. But why Mrs. March? Wouldn’t it have been more logical to identify with one of the daughters?”
Miss Prim squeezed her hostess’s hands.
“I’ve always been a realistic woman, Herminia, and realistic women were once realistic little girls. I was very young when I read the book. At the time I didn’t like my mother, but I knew I had one. I couldn’t pretend I didn’t have one, but I could imagine the kind of mother I’d be when I grew up. And that mother was Marmee.”
The editor of the San Ireneo newspaper stood up, went to her bookshelves, and took down a small brown volume with its title embossed in gold letters on the spine.
“I’m sure there’s a reasonable explanation for all of this,” she sighed.
“There is,” said Miss Prim. “There’s no woman in the house. None at all.”
After reflecting for a moment, Herminia approached Prudencia and resolutely held out to her the book, an 1893 edition ofLittle Women.
“You say there’s no woman in the house? I think there is, Prudencia. Now there is.”
Miss Prim had just left Herminia Treaumont at the newspaper office when she heard a pleasant, familiar voice behind her.
“Prudencia, I’ve been meaning to call you for days. How are you? It seems incredible in a place as small as this, but I’d completely lost track of you.”
She turned to find a smiling Horacio Delàs, dressed in a red scarf and shabby navy-blue coat and loaded down with parcels.
“I was expecting you to kiss my hand, Horacio, but I see that’s not possible,” she joked.
He bowed courteously, indicating all the parcels with a nod of his head.
“I’d like nothing more than to kiss your hand, my dear, and would do so if I weren’t burdened with a terrible chore.”
“Chore?”
“What would you call the task of buying useless gifts for fifteen children and a dozen adults?”
