Elena

Elena Mariana Inez Cordoba y Leal did not want to marry. She was tired of all it took to get a good man. First, she had to be educated. Having been born into one of the wealthiest families in Argentina - banking empire on her father's side and 2,000 heads of cattle on her mother's - she had had a tight and tailored education. French, English, mathematics, history, literature, religion, poetry, pottery, and piano. But, she'd rather ride horses than study. Second, she had to be pretty. "Everyone says I am," she would say with a shrug if the subject came up. Amongst her female cousins with their elaborate dresses and hair, the subject came up all the time. She found beauty in nature - trees, rocks, salt formations, cracked earth, fresh fallen snow - and nowhere else. Elena was the only girl in a family of brothers. This was a problem, too. A husband had to be trustworthy and all of her suitors, she rightly suspected, didn't want to marry her. They wanted to marry the banking empire and the 2,000 heads of cattle. For these reasons, Elena Mariana Inez Cordoba y Leal had no desire to marry. And with absolute certaintly, she knew one day soon she would.