After many setbacks, Mr. Prudenciano, in Mexico, came to the conclusion that he had no great future as a bullfighter. He sold what little he had and, along with his wife, settled in Seville. Things didn’t go much better for him in Spain either, although at least he can spend all day doing what he likes best: doing nothing.

On March 22, four days after returning to his home in Andalusia, Luis de Vargas writes the first of his letters to his uncle and favorite professor at the seminary. He reports that his father intends to fatten him up during his vacation, to have him ready to return in the fall to finish his training for the priesthood. He mentions in passing that his father is courting a twenty-year-old, attractive widow, Pepita Jiménez; his father is fifty-five years old. Pepita had been married for only a short time to an eighty-year-old moneylender named Gumersindo. Luis is not eager to see his father marry again, but he promises his uncle not to judge Pepita before he knows her.