Part 25

"No, my Maximina; if I kissed the boy, it was solely because I came in thinking about him and anxious about his fate."

Then, without being able to speak another word, he threw himself into a chair and sobbed.

Maximina stood as though she had seen the house fall down before her eyes. When the first instant of amazement was past, she ran to him and kissed him.

"Miguel, Miguel, light of my life, what is the matter?"

"Misfortune hangs over us, Maximina," he replied, with his face in his hands. "I have stupidly ruined you--you and my son!"

"Don't cry, Miguel, don't cry!" exclaimed the little wife, pressing her lips to her husband's face. "I had nothing; how could you ruin me?"

When he had grown a little calmer he explained to her what had taken place. Eguiburu had summoned him for the following day, to recognize his endorsements; and he expected him immediately to enforce his legal claim.

"Do you remember that day when, after I had guaranteed the thirty thousand duros for the paper, so that it might go on, I asked your opinion? You did not dare to tell me that I had not done well, and you gave me an evasive answer. How wise you were!"

"No, Miguel, no; you are mistaken," she answered, trying to spare her husband the mortification of having acted with less sense than a woman. "What did I know about such things? If you did wrong, I should have done much worse.... But, after all, what has happened is not worth your being so troubled. We haven't any money left: well, and what of that? We will work for our living, as so many others do. I am used to it; I am not a senorita; I can live very economically, and not suffer any. You shall see how little I will spend! And our darling, when he gets old enough, will work too, and become a useful man--see if that isn't so! Perhaps if he knew that he would not be obliged to work, he would be dissipated, like so many other rich young men. And above all, he, and I too, will care for nothing else than to have his papa happy, with or without money."

Oh, how sweet sounded those words in the troubled Miguel's ears!

"You are my good angel, Maximina!" he exclaimed, kissing her hands. "I don't know what magic your words have to sweeten my sorrows instantaneously, to soothe me and calm me as though I had taken an aromatic bath.... Where did you learn this lovely eloquence, my life," he added, seating her on his knee. "You need not tell me! It all comes from here!"

And he kissed her just above her heart.

The husband and wife conversed a long time, calm, cheerful, drinking in with mouth and eyes the divine nectar of conjugal love. Extraordinary thing! In spite of being on the eve of a great calamity, Miguel could not remember having spent a happier hour in his life. And though the events that took place within a few days sobered him, yet, thanks to this cheering balsam, they could not wholly dishearten him.

Eguiburu at last sprang down upon his prey. The legal claim was sustained. Miguel's two houses in the Calle del Arenal and on the Cuesta de Santa Domingo were sold by auction for forty-eight thousand duros. If the sale had not been forced, there is no doubt that he would have received much more for them. Purchasers naturally took advantage of the occasion.

The total amount of our hero's debt, with interest and expenses, reached fifty thousand duros. Consequently there remained a trifle to make up. Miguel sold a part of his furniture and some of his jewels so as to clear himself entirely. This having been done, he sought for a cheap tenement at the extreme outskirts of Madrid. He found in the Chamberi a rather pretty third-story apartment in a house recently built, at the moderate rent of twelve duros a month. He immediately moved there, and settled down with some degree of comfort with the rest of his furniture. The house was small; but through Maximina's endeavors, it was soon converted into a quite pleasant residence. The largest room was reserved for Miguel, since, as they had no expectation of society calls, they had no need of a parlor.

Of the servants they kept only Juana, who offered to act as cook. The other girls, on learning that they were to be dismissed, began to weep passionately; Placida above all was inconsolable.

"Senorita, for Heaven's sake, take me with you! With you I would go anywhere and eat potatoes, and not ask any pay."

Maximina was touched, and consoled her by saying that they were not going to leave Madrid, and that they could easily see each other.

The marvellous baby, whose rapid progress of late had reached the truly incredible point of raising his hands to heaven whenever he heard her sing the song--

_Santa Maria, que mala esta mi tia!_

was the object of many tender embraces on the part of the domestics, who between them squeezed him almost to death.

When they were fairly settled, Miguel naturally set himself about finding some occupation, so as to earn enough for living, though in a very modest manner. Politics were detestable to him; the same was true of journalism, although it was the only profession to which he was accustomed. He knew that there were going to be a few competitive offices vacant in the Council of State, and he made up his mind that he would try for one of them. In his love for his wife and baby, and in his sense of duty which had never entirely abandoned him, and which, amid his misfortunes, now arose in full strength in his mind, he found the stimulus and power not only to devote himself zealously to studies that were distasteful to him, but also to conquer his pride.

A young man who had shone in Madrid society, who had been the editor-in-chief of a newspaper and within a hair's breath of being deputy, could not help feeling some mortification in passing through a public examination for a place worth only twelve or fourteen thousand reals. He devoted himself ardently to the study of administrative law with such zeal that he hardly went out of the house, except a little while in the evening to rest his brain.

The very little money that they had left he spent with exceeding care so that it might hold out until the time of the competition, which was to be held after the summer, toward October or November.

Maximina in this respect was a model. Not only did she spend nothing on her person, for she had clothes enough, but also in the household expenses she performed prodigies of skill to reduce them to the smallest terms. Miguel was grieved, and almost shed tears secretly when he saw her making soap herself because it would be a few centimos cheaper than at the shop, and many times taking charge of the kitchen while Juana was gone to a distant store where potatoes were a real cheaper, and ironing the nicer linen herself, etc.

But she seemed happy; perhaps happier than when they were in the midst of opulence. The luxuriance of their apartment on the Plaza de Santa Ana had a certain depressing influence upon her. As she never dusted or arranged the furniture herself, they seemed to her hardly to be hers. Now everything was the opposite; she had put them in their places after serious perplexities; she dusted them every day, she swept and brushed the carpet, she polished with stag-horn powder all the metal arrangements, she kept the window in her husband's room carefully washed; in fact, she took entire charge of all the details of the household.

It was for Miguel a pleasure not free from melancholy to see her mornings, with a silk handkerchief wrapped around her head in the Biscaian manner and in a woollen apron, gracefully waving the feather duster and lightly humming some sentimental _zorcico_ of her country.

But Maximina understood to the last detail the economy that referred to herself. This from time to time caused Miguel deep pain. Without his knowing it she had given up her chocolate in the afternoon. When he discovered it he became furious.

"Who would ever have thought of it! The idea of cutting down your food when you are nursing a baby! It is senseless and almost a sin! I forbid you to do such a thing! do you hear me? Rather than let you deny yourself what you needed to eat, I would go and break stones in the street, or beg! You know that I would!"

"Don't scold me, Miguel, for Heaven's sake! It was because I did not care for chocolate these days."

"Then you ought to have taken something else."

"I did not want anything."

"Come, come, Maximina, quit such foolishness.... And don't let it happen again."

Though the little wife tried to keep her feet hidden in his presence, he found another time that her shoes were worn through.

"What does this mean?" he demanded. "Why don't you buy another pair of shoes?"

"I will some time."

"You must buy them this very day. Yours are badly worn."

"All right. I will send for them to-day." And she managed to attract his attention to something else.

After five or six days had passed, he found that she was wearing the same ones.

"What a girl you are!" he exclaimed, in vexation.

"Don't scold me, Miguel! don't scold me!" the little wife hastened to say, throwing her arms around him, and smiling in mortification. A harsh word from Miguel was for her the severest of misfortunes.

"How can I help scolding you if you do not obey me?"

"Forgive me!"

"I am going to take your measure, and this very day bring you a pair of shoes."

"Oh no!" she said hurriedly. "Don't trouble yourself; I will send right out for some."

The reason for this was that she was afraid that her husband might buy more expensive ones than she wanted.

Miguel, on his side, likewise practised some personal economies, though he did not go to such lengths. But Maximina could not endure this. When she saw him put on a _hongo_ and a silk handkerchief around his neck, so as to save his silk hat and the good clothes that he had, she grew vexed.

"How you _do_ look; I don't like you so, Miguel!"

"It's because I don't care to dress up. I am only going on an errand, and shall be right back."

If at the end of any given time she found the same money in his vest, she would say sadly:--

"You don't spend anything, Miguel. Don't you lunch at the cafe? Why don't you go to the theatre?"

"Because I am very busy now. I will go as soon as the examinations are over. Besides, we must be a little economical for the present."

"How bad it makes me feel not to have you spend as you used to do!" she exclaimed, giving him a hug. "You are making this sacrifice for my sake! If you were alone, you would live much better."

"Come, come, don't be absurd, Maximina. Without you I should live neither well nor ill.... I should die," he replied, laughing.

Although excited by the prospect of the examinations, and working for them perhaps harder than he ought, our hero was not unhappy. When there is peace and love by the fireside, family life is the best sedative for mental sufferings. This on one side, and on the other the confidence which he had in his forces made living, up to a certain point, delightful.

There came a day, however, in which happiness and relative calmness disappeared at the announcement that the examinations for which he was working were indefinitely postponed, possibly till the next year.

All his plans fell to the ground. As he had not for some time thought of any other way of escape from his difficulties, he felt annihilated. He had strength enough, nevertheless, to hide it from his wife, and to appear at home serene and happy as usual. Redoubled by the surprise, the energies of his soul were awakened to new vigor.

"It is necessary, at all events, to seek for work," he said to himself. He had money enough to last only for a month. Still he allowed his wife to spend as before, certain that she could not economize more than she did at the time without undergoing serious privations. The first thought that occurred to him was to seek for employment with some private firm. He called on a number of friends, and all cheered him with good words.

Nevertheless a month passed, and no employment appeared. He found himself obliged to pawn his watch in order to pay his landlord and store account; he told his wife that he had left it to be regulated.

A second month passed, and still nothing turned up. One day Maximina, dead with mortification, said to him, as though she were confessing some crime:--

"Miguel, the shopkeeper down street has sent me his bill, and as I have not a cuarto, I can't pay it."

The brigadier's son trembled; but hiding it as well as he could, he replied, with affected indifference:--

"Very well; I will see that it is paid when I go out. How much is it?"

"Two hundred and twenty-four reals."

"Do you need any more money?"

Maximina dropped her eyes and blushed.

"I owe Juana her wages."

"I will bring it this afternoon."

He said these words without knowing what he said. Where was he to get it? His Uncle Bernardo had been sent some months before to a private mad-house in Paris. Dona Martina and her family had also gone there to look after him. Enrique was not in the condition to lend it to him. His step-mother was out of town, and she had barely enough to live decently; moreover, it caused him an invincible repugnance to ask back what he had once given. No one of the family was left of whom he could ask it, except his Uncle Manolo.

To him he went.

Uncle Manolo, a grave man and of excellent charity, although he knew about his nephew's ruin, had not realized that it was so complete. He stood with his mouth open at hearing his request. He took out of his drawer the forty duros which he had requested and handed them to him. Miguel, through certain words that escaped him, perceived that he was undergoing a greater sacrifice than any one could have imagined. He suspected, or rather he felt, almost certain, that his uncle was subjected to a shameful servitude. _La intendenta_ apparently had no thought of abandoning the care of her property, and she allowed him each month a certain sum of money for his private wants, which were, as always, large and perfectly indispensable.

Accordingly, Miguel went away greatly disturbed at the interview, and convinced that to borrow money of Uncle Manolo in such circumstances was equivalent to giving him a very great annoyance.

After this episode, convinced that he had no right to expect aid from his relatives, he put forth double zeal in his search for work of any kind. But all his attempts met with the bad luck which pitilessly followed him. In some places there was no vacancy; in others, finding that he was a senorito, and had never been in any counting-house, they distrusted him.

At the editorial offices he was most kindly received; but, as at that time, and even now, the pecuniary affairs of the press were rather upset, willing as the directors would have been, they did not find it easy to give him a position. The most that any of them promised was to give him a place as soon as there was a vacancy. But what he needed now, at this very moment, was some money to buy food, and the days were passing, and it did not come. Without Maximina knowing about it, he pawned a set of gold studs and a ring which had belonged to his father.

Finally the owner of an afternoon paper gave his absolute promise that he should have forty duros a month, as soon as a month was past: during the actual month, on account of certain difficulties in the business office, he could not pay it down. Our hero worked a whole month for nothing. At the beginning of the next, as it was absolutely necessary for him to pay certain sums, Miguel asked him to let him have some money.

Then the owner and manager, adopting that air half complaining and half diplomatic, which all assume who are about to refuse a just but unwelcome claim, painted in the darkest colors the business situation of the daily, the difficulty of collecting certain sums that were due him, the necessity which all editors have of "putting their shoulders to the wheel in order to sustain a young enterprise," etc., etc.

"Friend Huerta," replied Miguel, very much dissatisfied, "hunger has made me altogether too weak to be able to put my shoulder to any new enterprise; on the contrary, _I_ need to be propped up myself so as not to fall."

It was impossible to get a penny from him. Our hero took his leave, full of indignation, the more because he happened to know that all the money taken in went straight into the director's private box, and that he used it to lead the life of a prince.

Now began for the young pair a gloomy and trying time. Miguel was unable any longer to hide his necessities. One by one the few objects of value which they had in the house went to the pawn-shop, where they brought scarcely the fifth part of their value. Oftentimes the young man despaired and cursed his lot, and even spoke of going and firing a shot at the Count de Rios and another at Mendoza.

Maximina, in these painful crises, consoled him, cheered him with new hope, and when this resource failed, she succeeded in softening him with her tears and driving away from him all his evil thoughts. Always serene and cheerful, she made heroic attempts to divert him, calling to her aid the little one, when worst came to worst; she carefully concealed the toil which in his absence she undertook so as not to let him see that there was anything at fault when he came.

Poverty, nevertheless, was pressing closer and closer around them each day. At last the day came that actually they had not a peseta in the house and knew not where to get another. At the grocery store they were not willing to let them have goods on credit.

Miguel, without his wife's knowledge, took one of his coats, wrapped it up in paper and carried it to a pawn-shop: they would give only two duros for it. On his return, as he was meditating how to escape from this miserable situation, and seeing no way of finding work, he suddenly adopted a violent resolution: namely, that of undertaking manual labor. With his face darkened by an expression of pain he said to himself as he walked along:--

"Rather than my wife starve to death I am ready to do anything.... Anything! even to commit robbery. I am going to try the last resort."

Near his house was a printing-office where on days of depression, when he had just received some rebuff, he often spent long hours watching the compositors at their work or trying himself to spell out some easy task. The proprietor was an excellent man, and very cordial relations had sprung up between them. He went in there and calling him aside, he said:--

"Don Manuel, I find myself without means of getting food; in spite of all my efforts during these last months I have not been able to obtain a situation. Would you be willing to take me as an apprentice in your office, giving me a little something on account of future work?"

The printer looked at him with an expression of sadness.

"Are you so bad off as all that, Don Miguel?"

"In the last depths of poverty."

The owner of the printing-office considered a few moments, and said:--

"Before you could learn how to set type with any degree of rapidity, a long time would pass. Besides, it is not right that a _caballero_ should soil his hands with ink. The only thing that you can do here is to help the proof-reader. Do you object?"

"I am ready to do whatever you order."

He spent that day, in fact, reading proofs. At night the proprietor told him that he would give him three pesetas a day salary until he dismissed the present proof-reader, who was a great drunkard. As he started to leave, he thrust into his hand a ten-duro bill as advance pay.

"Thanks, Don Manuel," he said, deeply touched. "In you, who are a workingman, I have found more generosity than in all the _caballeros_ whom I have been to see up to the present time."

For several days he worked as well as he could, conscientiously fulfilling his task. It was hard and monotonous to the last degree; it kept him busy from early in the morning till night. Moreover, the very insignificant pay scarcely sufficed to buy potatoes; and although the proprietor was anxious to send away the proof-reader and give him the place, Miguel opposed it because he also was the father of a family, and had no other means of livelihood.

XXIX.

While they were in this destitute and most melancholy situation, it came to pass one afternoon just as he had come in from the printing-office that the bell rang. Juana announced that a very old _caballero_ wanted to speak with him. He sent word for him to come in, and instantly there appeared in his study the old apothecary Hojeda.

"Don Facundo!" he cried, with genuine joy.

"It is I, Miguelito; it is I. I am perfectly furious! Can't you see it by my face? I must give you a regular scolding. Who would have thought that you, degenerate scion, should be tramping through this blessed world of ours, hunting for a situation, and never have remembered an old friend like me! I know very well that I am a poor old man who is not good for anything."

"That is not so, Don Facundo; that is not so.... It is because our professions are so unlike.... Besides, I was afraid that mamma would find out...."

He could not give an excuse. The truth was that he had forgotten the saintly old man.

"No use, my dear fellow, no use; you were ungrateful.... You forget those who love you, and go and ask favors of men who did not even know your father."

"You are right...."

"Well, then, I have scolded you sufficiently. Let us come to what interests us more closely at present. I have come to offer you a place in the bank of Andalucia. For more than a month I have been begging it for you. At last, this very day, they put it at my disposition. Salary, sixty duros a month. Will you take it?"

Miguel's only answer was to squeeze his hand violently. After a moment he exclaimed, with his eyes full of tears:--

"If you only knew, Don Facundo, how opportunely this comes!"

"Haven't you any money?"

"Not a peseta!"

"Haven't you found anything to do?"

"Yes; that of assistant proof-reader in the printing-office just below here."

"How much salary?"

"Three pesetas a day."

"Jesus! Jesus!" exclaimed the apothecary, raising his hands to his head and remaining in a thoughtful attitude.

He had the delicacy not to ask him a question about his ruin. Nevertheless, Miguel of his own accord told him all, even to the smallest particulars. When Don Facundo had heard the whole story, he said:--

"See here, Miguel, I am going to ask a favor of you."

"You shall!"

"I want you to accept these six thousand reals[62];" and he laid the bills on the table. "I am an old bachelor: the money that I have is amply sufficient."

"Don Facundo, I cannot...."

"I demand it in the name of the friendship that bound me to your father."

There was no way of declining it.

"Besides, you must give me your word that if the sixty duros a month are not sufficient for your living expenses, and you find yourself in a tight place, you will come to me first of all.... I will not leave the house unless you promise me."

The brigadier's son gave the promise. Then he called in Maximina, and the three talked a long time about various matters. Don Facundo seemed to lose his wits over the baby. When it came the time for him to take his departure, Miguel seized him by the hand, and said with emotion:--

"Don Facundo, I give up trying to tell you what is passing through my heart at this moment. I will simply repeat what I said once before: _You are a great personage_."

"Miguelito, if you persist in saying these foolish things, I will never come to your house again."

"Then what name do you want us to give those who come only when there is some misfortune to alleviate?"