Part 16

Miguel burst into a laugh, and laying his hand familiarly on the man's shoulder, he said:--

"That gave you a good scare, didn't it? Now I am somewhat repaid for the one that you just gave me."

"But what the deuce does this mean?..."

"Calm yourself; my houses are not mortgaged. You will have the pleasure of ruining me on the day least expected," replied the young man, with bitter irony.

The symptom of a smile seemed to be coming into Eguiburu's face, but it suddenly vanished again:--

"Are you in earnest?"

"Yes, man, yes; don't have any apprehension."

Then the smile that had vanished once more appeared, insinuating and benevolent, on the money lender's lips.

"What a joker you are, Senor de Rivera! No one can ever tell whether you are in earnest or joking."

"Then you are certainly very wrong to be so calm at this moment."

Eguiburu grew serious again:--

"No! I cannot believe that you would jest on matters so ... so...."

"So sacred, you mean?"

"That is it--so sacred."

"However, you will confess that you haven't the papers with you."

"Certainly not; you are a talented man ... and a perfect gentleman besides...."

"Come now; don't flatter me; there is no need of it."

They went to the door, talking as they went. Eguiburu felt an anxiety that he tried in vain to hide; he gave his hand three or four times to Rivera; his face and attitude changed more than a score of times, and when Miguel told him to put on his hat, he placed it, all twisted and rumpled, on the back of his head. He tried to change the conversation to prove that he was perfectly convinced of the good word of his surety. He asked him with much interest about his wife and the baby, taking great pains to inquire about the details of the occurrence. Nevertheless, when he was already on the stairway, and Miguel was just about to close the door, he asked in an indifferent and jovial tone, and yet betraying keen anxiety:--

"Then that was merely a joke, was it, Rivera?"

"Have no anxiety about it, man!" replied Miguel, laughing.

But as soon as he was left alone, the laugh died on his lips; he stood for a moment with his fingers on the latch; then he went with slow step back to his study, sat down at the table, and leaned his head on his hand, with his eyes covered. Thus he sat a long time in thought. When he got up, they were swollen and red as though he had slept too long. He went to his wife's room; as he passed through the corridor he felt a little chill.

She was still awake. Beside the bed a cot had been placed for Placida.

"Who was your visitor?" she asked.

"It was no consequence; a man came to speak with me about the paper."

There must have been something peculiar in Miguel's voice in making this simple reply, for his wife looked at him anxiously for some time. To free himself from this scrutiny, he went on to say:--

"How rested I am; I had a nap."

He kissed her forehead, then lifted the spread, contemplated for a moment his sleeping son, and touched his lips to the little head; then he kissed his wife again, and left the room. When he went to bed he shivered, and nevertheless felt that his cheeks were on fire.

For a long time he lay in bed, with his eyes wide open and the lamp lighted. A throng of melancholy thoughts passed through his mind; a thousand forebodings and fears attacked him. Like all men of keen imagination, he leaped to the worst conclusions; he saw himself ruined, obliged with his wife to leave the social circles in which they had been accustomed to move: he also remembered his son.

"My poor boy!" he exclaimed.

And he was on the point of sobbing; but he made a manly effort to control himself, saying:--

"No! weep for lost money? Such things are done only by fools and misers. A man who has a wife like mine, and a son such as she has just given me, has no right to ask anything more of God. I am young; I have good health; if worse comes to worst, I can work for them."

As he murmured these words, he gave a violent puff to the light, and had sufficient self-control to calm himself, and was soon asleep.

XVII.

On the following morning, as soon as he was dressed, and after spending by his wife's side a much shorter time than circumstances required, he left the house and hastened to Mendoza's.

Mendoza at this time was lodging at one of the best and most central hotels of Madrid. When Miguel reached there, he was still asleep. Nevertheless, he went to his room, and took it upon himself to open the shutters like a friend whose familiarity was limitless.

"_Hola!_ I see that you sleep just the same as when you were not a great man."

Mendoza rubbed his eyes, and looked at him in amazement.

"What does this mean, Miguelito? Why so early in the morning?"

"My dear Perico, the first thing that you must do is to get rid of this condescending tone. When there are people present, I am perfectly willing for you to condescend, and I will call you 'most illustrious lordship' if you like; but when we are alone, just remember that I am not your vassal."

"You are always just the same, Miguel," replied Mendoza, a little exasperated.

"That is the advantage that you have over me: I am always the same; you are always changing and playing a new and brilliant role in society. I am satisfied, however, with mine--so satisfied that the fear of having to be different is what brings me here so early in the morning to disturb your dreams of glory."

"What do you mean?"

"That having up to the present time been considered a person 'well fixed,' or, to use the expressions affected by us literary fellows, being an Hidalgo of 'ancient stock,' and having 'five hundred _sueldos_ guerdon,' I--but you don't know what this means?"

"No!" replied Mendoza, with an impatient gesture.

"Well, it is very simple. If you should give me a slap (which I am sure you will not), I should get 'five hundred _sueldos_ guerdon,' or fine. On the other hand, if I should give you one (which is perfectly possible), there would be no need of your spending a sou.... Well then, having up to the present time played this role in society, I should feel it to the bottom of my soul to be obliged to try that of the poverty-stricken or the vagabond, which I have never studied."

"I don't understand you."

"I am coming to the point. Last evening Eguiburu presented himself at my house, and without any preamble demanded of me the thirty thousand duros which have been spent on _La Independencia_, and which I guaranteed, yielding to your entreaties.... Do you understand now?"

Brutandor said nothing for several moments, remaining in an attitude of meditation; then he said, with the solemn deliberation which characterized all his remarks:--

"I believe this amount should be paid, not by you, but by the Count de Rios."

"Ah! you think so, do you? Then I am saved. As soon as Eguiburu knows this opinion, I am certain that he will not venture to ask a _cuarto_ of me."

"If it were taken from you, it would be robbery."

"I am delighted to see that the immutable principles of natural law have not vanished from your mind. But you know that the actual law is on his side; and if, perchance, it should enter into his head to make use of law instead of equity, I want to know if you would have the heart to let him ruin me."

Miguel had grown very serious, and looked at his friend with that cold and hard expression which was always in his case a sign of repressed anger. Mendoza dropped his eyes, in confusion.

"I should feel very sorry to have any misfortune happen to you, Miguel."

"The question now is not about your feelings. What I want to know this instant is, if the general is ready to pay this sum."

"I think that the general has no other desire...."

"Nor is the question about the general's desires. I want to know--do you hear?--I want to know if he will pay the thirty thousand duros, or will not pay them."

"I shall have to write him: you know he is in Germany just now."

"The point is, that if he does not pay it, I will take it into court. I have letters from him acknowledging the debt," said Miguel, striding in a state of excitement up and down the room.

Mendoza allowed him to do so for some time, and then replied:--

"It seems to me, Miguel, that you ought not to be in too great a hurry to do this or look on the dark side; you won't get ahead any that way."

"What makes you say that?" retorted the brigadier's son, halting.

"You would get nothing by taking it to court."

"Why so?"

"Because the general has no fortune: all that he has is in his wife's name."

Miguel's eyes flamed with anger.

"The villain!" he muttered under his breath; and then added: "I shall be convinced that you are as vile as he."

"Miguel, for God's sake!"

"That is what I have said. Take it as you like. I am glad that it looks worse for him."

Mendoza had no wish nor courage to reply. He let him continue his walking up and down, in the hope that his anger would calm down, and in this he showed how well he knew his man. In fact, in a few minutes he shrugged his shoulders, paused near the bed, and throwing his hands on Mendoza's shoulders with a loving gesture, he said, laughing:--

"I have been unfair. I had forgotten that you were too much of a rough diamond to be a villain."

Mendoza was not annoyed by this singular apology.

"You are so quick-tempered, Miguel, that when one least thinks about it, you 'leave a man without the blood in his veins.'"

"It would be worse to leave one without any money."

"Man alive! you haven't lost it yet. I have no doubt that the matter will be settled all right."

"Do you know what plan Eguiburu proposed to me?"

"No; what?"

"That I should also guarantee the twelve thousand duros which he had furnished besides, and then he will wait."

Mendoza made no reply. Both remained lost in thought.

"That does not seem to me such a bad plan," said the former, at length. "I tell you frankly that at present it is impossible to get the thirty thousand duros from the general; I know his affairs well, and am certain that he is not in a situation to pay down this amount. But if it does not come from his private pocket, it may be got from the public treasury. I have it on good authority that the government has already voted some money (though not any such sum as this), to be spent on newspapers, and credited to the secret funds of the Ministry of the Government. The point here is to get influence enough for the minister to get hold of it."

"I suppose that the general will use all his."

"Of course. And I will do what I can. But the general is not in Madrid, and you know as well as I do that these delicate transactions cannot be managed through correspondence, or arranged in this way, ever. We must be always on the track, worry the minister with visits, speak to all his friends, so as to keep it before his attention, and, if it were possible, threaten him with some summons to the Cortes concerning some delicate affair which he would not like to have made public."

"_Caramba!_ Perico, you have made great advances in short time. You understand wire-pulling to the last detail."

"How so?"

"Man alive! certainly; for it is not this way that it is explained and defined to us by the treatises."

Mendoza shrugged his shoulders, at the same time pressing his lips into a sign of disdain.

"Well, then you want to bring the general back to Madrid?" added Miguel.

"That is impossible."

"Then what shall we do?"

Mendoza meditated.

"If you had been elected deputy, the thing would be much easier. In that case we should be two to ask the minister, who, looking out for his future interests, would be much more careful not to go counter to us...."

"But as I am not a deputy!"

Mendoza meditated another long time, and said:--

"Still it can all be arranged. The general, when he accepted the post of ambassador, left one district vacant, that of Serin, in Galicia. They will soon be having the second elections. If the government will accept you as _candidato adicto_, you are certain of a triumph."

Rivera said nothing, and seemed also lost in thought.

"Hitherto, Perico, I have never had the least idea of being the father of my country. You know well that I am of no good for kicking my heels in the ante-chambers of ministers, that I am not one to suffer impertinences and scorn, nor have I the talent for manoeuvring plots, nor the audacity for meddling in dark intrigues. I am so constituted that a cool look wounds me, a discourteous word annoys me, any disloyalty crushes and overwhelms me. I am incapable of giving my word and not fulfilling it; I have not sufficient calmness to keep cool when brought into contact with the sympathy and love, or the aversion, which men inspire in me. I get excited and lose my head with excessive ease, and under the influence of anger I speak out the first word that comes into my mind, however dangerous it is. Moreover, I have the misfortune of always seeing the comic side of things, and I have not sufficient strength of mind to repress myself and to refrain from saying what I think. Politicians, when they are not knaves worthy of jail, seem to me, with a few honorable exceptions, a herd of vulgar, ignorant men who have taken up this occupation as the easiest and most lucrative; many of them village intriguers who come to repeat in Congress the same trickeries which they have been practising in the _Ayuntamiento_[39] or the _Diputacion_;[40] others, men who have failed in literature, the sciences, and the arts, and not getting there the notoriety that they crave, seek it in the more accessible field of politics: a young man whose drama has been hissed off the stage; another, who has tried five or six times in vain to get a professorship; another, who has written various books that remain virgins and martyrs on the publishers' shelves,--these are the ones who, making their way into the Hall of Congress, where no one is judged by his merits, and rallying under the standard of some personage who began as they did, climb to lofty destinies, and as time goes on, come to regulate the affairs of the nation.... But I have become too serious," he added, lowering his voice and smiling. "The principal argument that I bring up against dedicating myself to political life,--I will tell it to you as a secret,--is, that I detest it; I detest it from the bottom of my heart. Nevertheless, as I am threatened with ruin, I am determined to enter it to restore my fortunes, which I was foolish enough to compromise."

Brutandor looked at him with wide-opened eyes: any one can imagine, knowing the tendency of his mind, that Miguel spoke a language entirely incomprehensible to him.

When he ended, the newly elected deputy imperceptibly shrugged his shoulders and puckered his mouth into that look very common to him, one that made it hard to tell whether it meant indifference or disdain or surprise or resignation. Miguel used to maintain that his friend Mendoza was able to understand only eleven things in this world: when anything distinct from the eleven was said, instead of answering, he made the face spoken of, and gave it to be understood that there the matter ended.

"Well," said he, noticing that face, "to do this you must introduce me to the government ministry."

"I will introduce you to the President of the Council. I am better acquainted with him than with Escalante."

"I am glad of that, for Escalante is not congenial to me, and at all events I don't know the President. Do you want to go this afternoon to the Presidency?"

Mendoza looked at him in amazement.

"But don't you know that I am going to speak to-day in Congress?"

"Forgive me, dear fellow; I don't know a single word about it. And what are you going to speak about?"

"About tariff reform. It is the first speech that I shall have made. Hitherto I have only put inquiries."

"Don't be so modest, Perico; I happen to know that you have presented a report concerning the citizens of Valdeorras, without flinching or anything coming of it."

"Don't you laugh; the danger to-day is very serious."

"Terrible!... Especially for the taxes.... And when are you to be married?"

Mendoza looked down and flushed.

"On the fifteenth."

"I am delighted that you are entering into the good path," said Miguel, noticing Mendoza's mortification, and generously trying to spare him.

"Come, get up, man; it is already almost eleven o'clock."

"You will breakfast with me, won't you?"

"My dear fellow, you must know that to-day is an exceptional day for me!"

"Of course I know it; but then we will go together to Congress; and perhaps, if the session is over in time, we might go to the presidency."

This last suggestion pleased Miguel, because he saw clearly that his thirty thousand duros depended on the influence that he might gain over. After thinking a little, he said:--

"Very well; I will send a message to my wife, so that she will not be worried."

He sat down at Mendoza's table, while the latter was dressing, and dashed off a few lines to Maximina. While writing them, he could not help saying in a tone of grief:--

"Strange circumstances that oblige me to leave my wife alone on the day after she has presented me with a son! Nevertheless, it is for her and for him that I do it. If I were a bachelor, it would not make much difference if I were ruined."

After he was dressed, and before they went down into the dining-room, Mendoza showed his friend the jewels that he was going to present to his "future." They were magnificent and in the latest style. Miguel praised them as they deserved, at the same time wondering where Perico had got the money to buy them; and though he was much tempted to ask him, he had the delicacy not to do so.

Then they went down to a private room on the _entresol_ floor, where Brutandor was in the habit of breakfasting alone. The waiter served them a remarkably fine breakfast, among other things, Burgundy and champagne _frappe_ for dessert.

"This is extravagant, Perico," he said. "The next time I shall forbid your treating me in such style."

"The senorito always breakfasts like this," said the waiter, smiling with evident satisfaction.

"_Hola!_" exclaimed Miguel, in surprise. "Who could have believed, Perico, that those heavy leaders that you used to write in _La Independencia_ would have been so quickly coined into oysters, fillets of veal, and Burgundy!"

Brutandor dropped his head, and there are reasons for belief that the precursory symptoms of a smile appeared in his face. However, if any one should be inclined to deny it, there would not fail to be arguments in support of such an opinion. Mendoza's smiles always gave room for dispute.

After breakfast they betook themselves to Congress, not, however, without the Amphitryon first hurrying up to his room, and bringing down a package of documents, which proved to be notes for his speech.

"_Maria Santisima!_" cried Miguel. "How calm and undisturbed are the poor deputies who at this moment are without a thought of the coming earthquake!"

They arrived in altogether too good season. There were but few people in the _salon_ and the lobbies. Mendoza went to join a group of personages, grave and solemn like himself, and began to talk with them. When one spoke, the others maintained a courteous silence; there might be some question, however, whether they listened very attentively, but there was no room for doubt that each one listened to himself with perfect delight. Miguel joined a group of journalists where tumultuous gayety reigned.

When it was time for the session to begin, he went with them to the reporters' gallery, which in a short time was crowded. Almost all the faces to be seen there were young, and such a babel of voices and disorder constantly prevailed there that it was difficult to hear.

In vain the ushers, with a familiarity that anywhere else would have been called insolence, warned and even threatened them; the reporters paid no attention to their menaces, and when they deigned to listen, it was merely to reply with some bloodthirsty witticism: if the usher at last became really angry, there was sure to be some one who would take the wind out of his sails by throwing his arms around his neck, and promising him promotion "as soon as he came to be minister."

Some amused themselves by sharpening pencils; others, by cutting up paper into pads; others drew out from between vest and shirt enormous writing-tablets: one would think that it was an orchestra beginning to tune up. Settling themselves into absurd attitudes, they all talked, shouted, laughed, fired repartees at each other, and made witty remarks about the deputies who were now coming into the large and elegant _salon_, and casting sheep's-eyes at them, or rather the eyes of dying lambs asking mercy. As a general thing, these were the rural members. Those who lived in Madrid always had some acquaintances among the journalists, and to these they made signs and winks from below, and sometimes sent caramels, to which the reporters would respond with rhymed notes.

"Look here, my dear; do you know what uniform the sub-governors are going to wear?"

"The sub-governors won't have anything else than a sub-uniform," replied a sufficiently ill-favored reporter named Inza. This same Inza, who was in one corner arranging his pad, shortly after remarked:--

"Ah, here comes Alonso Ramirez enveloped in the skins of his clients."

The famous lawyer just at that moment came in, wearing a magnificent overcoat trimmed with fur.

This jest has since that time been credited to a politician by his friends, and they would be quite capable of claiming that he wrote the Holy Bible, if they felt like it.

Keen sallies passed from one to another in loud tones, and caused hearty laughter, and stimulated the victim to sharpen his wits so as to reply with some other joke still more piquante. Much talent and still more jollity were wasted in that incommodious gallery.

"Do you know, Juanito, that you are losing your wits?" cried one young man to another.

"What can I do about it, man; for a week ago the chief sent me to the Academy of Moral and Political Sciences?"

From time to time hot disputes came up on subjects most absurd or foreign to the profession of the disputant; for instance, about the method of loading needle-guns or driving carriages.

And they would gabble and get angry until the ushers compelled them to stop, or some opportune joke from a comrade would bring them to their senses.

The President mounted his lofty seat; instantly he was surrounded by a group of deputies, to whom he began with paternal solicitude to offer an abundant supply of caramels.

These caramels, which at that time did not cost the State more than five hundred duros a day, are an institution, the history of which has unfortunately been very much neglected. Nothing more useful can be imagined than to study the vicissitudes through which it has passed, the beneficent influence which these sweetmeats have exercised on the government of our people, and the elements of progress which they have carried with them. Its whole history might be compassed in three small volumes of easy and agreeable reading.

When they were through, or when the President no longer cared to give any more, the deputies went to their seats, and the session was opened. The first person to get the floor was an ancient republican of pale complexion, dull eyes, and a great shock of hair which made him look like the images in our churches. He got up to speak of an insurrection that had been started in Cadiz. The subject was of keen interest, and there was a great curiosity in Congress to hear this gentleman's remarks, as he was supposed to be one of the promoters of the revolution. He began in these words, or to the same effect:--