Part 10
precautions; and even if it were, to try to prevent them from seeing each other alone was like putting doors to an open field. A device then occurred to her by means of which to clear up her doubts and measure the magnitude of the danger. She had a key secretly made for the door of the apartment; and, provided with this, she drove out one morning in one of her “equipages”--that of Martin, it chanced to be--and dismissing it shortly afterward, returned home on foot, opened the door noiselessly with her key, and made her way softly to the lion’s den, where she supposed she should find Esclavita, nor was she mistaken. She found her quietly seated at her sewing, as usual, with that pensive and absorbed air which characterized her.
“Where is the Señorito?” Doña Aurora asked her suddenly, with the intention of taking her off her guard.
The girl, raising her serene or rather melancholy countenance, answered:
“I believe he is studying in his room. How did you get in, Señora? I did not hear the bell.”
“Fausta was going out,” hurriedly explained Doña Aurora, feeling as if she herself had been caught in the snare she had laid. She even felt her cheeks grow red. This was what might be called a take-in! So much secrecy about having the key made only to find that nothing particular was going on at the house, and that when she expected to surprise them in a stolen meeting she found everything going on in its usual routine. And yet she was not convinced. No, indeed. Let Satan convince himself. “Can this girl be slyer than I had imagined?” she thought. “Can she be deceiving me without my knowing it? Are they both laughing at me? For the glances and the whispered words when they meet and the unwillingness the boy shows to leave the house--no one can make me lose sight of all that; I have seen it, and what I see I see, and not all the preaching of all the bare-footed friars in the world would make me believe anything else. Instead of this failure reassuring me, I believe it will put me more on my guard than ever. No, I am not to be so easily hoodwinked as that. To protect my son I shall do everything in human power to do. They shall find me prepared--whatever may happen. That girl makes me afraid. She looks--I don’t know how--but I am not pleased with her. She is a true Galician: she keeps everything to herself, and one can never be sure of her, for she never lets you see what is passing in her mind. Well, then, against deceit greater deceit. Wait, wait for awhile; I shall find a way to get rid of you, and to get rid of you decently, in a way that will give you no room for complaint; on the contrary, you will be obliged to say that you are contented. And now--one nail drives out another, and boys will be boys--I am going to provide Rogelio with an amusement. I am going to give you a rival. Wait, girl; against wiles, counter-wiles. I have found a rival who shall supplant you.”
XX.
And in effect, before twenty-four hours had passed, Señora de Pardiñas had arranged an interview between her son and Esclavita’s rival. The place of rendezvous was the abode of the aforesaid rival, an obscure abode and not a very odorous one, as is apt to be the case with the dwellings of individuals of her class; for which reason, in order that Rogelio should make himself acquainted with the bearing and the figure of his new sweetheart, she was brought out into the yard unadorned, her graceful form was covered only by an old blanket, which Augustin Cuero, the proprietor of the livery stable, hastened to take off, so that not a single one of her charms should remain hidden from view.
She was a beautiful Andalusian pony, sorrel, with black feet, with a small, thin head, sinewy legs, curved and shining hoofs, a coat dazzlingly bright, dilated and sensitive nostrils, and an eye full of fire and sweetness; she was young, gentle, graceful, spirited, one of those animals which do honor to the race of Spanish horses by the beauty of their appearance, by their intelligence, and by their noble and generous natures. Augustin Cuero was lavish in his praises of the animal, affecting to be grieved at parting from so precious a treasure.
“I assure you, Señora, that a finer horse is not to be seen to-day on the Castellana. She has not a single blemish. And she is a saint--a skein of silk; an infant could manage her. Spirited as she is, she is incapable of playing a trick. So that a man becomes attached to her, and when one sells her, it is like parting, one might almost say, with one of the family.”
“Yes,” answered Señora Pardiñas, who had an eye for a bargain, “but you won’t attempt to deny that this kind of horse is not now in fashion. The horses that are in style now have a neck a mile long, and are shaped like a tooth-pick.”
“Yes, the English horses; a ridiculous fashion, like a great many others. And those are for a certain kind of young gentlemen and certain circumstances. For the hippodrome and that sort of nonsense. A pony like this will always be of use. Anxious enough the _Baraterin_, is to buy her from me; only we can’t come to an agreement about the price. The Señorito there can tell you so.”
“That is true, mamma,” affirmed Rogelio, stroking the silky coat of the gentle animal. “I can bear witness to it. Augustin asked him the same price that he has asked you, and the bull-fighter offers him two ounces less; he is wild about her; he is all the time hanging around her; he makes her more visits!”
“Let him give up hanging around her then, for she is yours,” exclaimed the mother, with decision, enjoying the sight of the happiness depicted on the countenance of her son, who, on hearing those heavenly words, with a spontaneous movement threw his arms around the neck of the pony and planted a hearty smack on her soft black nose.
The price and the time of payment being agreed upon, Doña Aurora proposed to leave the pony in the care of Augustin for the present. But Rogelio, almost wild with delight, would not hear of this or of any other definite arrangement being made. “You know nothing about it, mamma,” he cried. “I will take charge of that, leave it all to me. Likely, indeed, that I should spend a whole day without knowing how my pony goes! Every morning and evening I must have a look at my lady pony. Leave it all to me, I say.” Doña Aurora ended by acceding to his wishes, and investing him with full powers in the matter, saying, “Very well, arrange it to suit yourself, then.” When the question arose as to a name for the pony, the young man said, smiling, “I will call it ‘Suriña.’”
The cardinal affections of the human soul are at times marvelously clear-sighted counselors. Señora de Pardiñas had divined, enlightened by maternal affection, that with a young man of twenty--and one young for his age--a woman can have no more dangerous rival than a fine horse. The horse is not merely a distraction for a couple of hours daily, but an occupation and a preoccupation from sunrise to sunset. To make investigations with regard to what it has eaten, and whether it has been robbed of its feed; to see if it has been rubbed down, and if all the operations of its toilet have been performed--and the toilet of a fine horse occupies almost as much time as the toilet of a beautiful woman; then the affectionate understanding that establishes itself between the horseman who for the first time enjoys the possession of a horse, and the animal; the tenderness that springs from ownership, the exchange of caresses, the sugar robbed from the breakfast table to take to it; the fresh bread put away in the waistcoat pocket, the pleasure produced by the joyful whinny of the animal when its keen sense of smell and its delicate perception tell it that its master is approaching with the dainty. Then the anxieties regarding its health--a horse gives as much anxiety in this respect as a child. “Señorito, I don’t know what is the matter with the pony, it hasn’t eaten its feed to-day. I notice that its eyes look dull--” “Señorito, to-day the pony has not--” But who can enumerate the ailments from which a pony may suffer. With all these cares, there are others of a different order, having relation to what may be called the wedding-finery of horsemanship--the saddle of the best pig-skin, small, fanciful, that crackles at the touch; the saddle-cloth of handsome felt, adorned with English ciphers; the steel stirrup, the fine head stall that gives free play to the graceful movements of the slender head; and for the rider, the whip with its chased silver handle, the Tyrolese gloves, the cravat with white horseshoes on a gray ground. All is excitement, all is delight in the enchanting honeymoon of the young man and his pony. And what emotion when it is brought out of the stable! What pride in displaying it before his friends! What ineffable joy to ride up and down the shady walks of Moncloa, seated on its back; to see a carriage approach in which some black-robed beauty reclines, and under the fascinating gaze of the beautiful unknown to make it rear and prance and show off its grace and spirit until it is covered with foam and sweat! What delight to put it through all its paces,--passing from the measured pace to the quick trot, then to the fiery gallop, and, as he strokes with his palm the neck of the obedient brute, to hear it snort with pleasure, thrilling through all its sensitive nerves and its vigorous and sinewy muscles like a young girl when the arm of her agile partner encircles her waist as he leads her to the dance!
There was not a doubt but that the idea of the pony had been a happy one, suggested as it was by experience, and infinitely superior to that commonplace artifice of taking a sweetheart, which had suggested itself to the innocent mind of Rogelio as a sovereign remedy against his incipient love-sickness. His mother did not need now to ask him to accompany her on her expeditions or to invent excuses to get him out of the house. Of his own accord the young man spent his time between his house and the stall of his favorite. The weather was now growing milder. The closing days of March, notwithstanding the bad reputation of that variable month, were clear, calm, and pleasant, and every afternoon, at three o’clock, Rogelio rode out to enjoy the first warm airs of spring, now alone, again with some friend, and again with the riding-master, to return home at dusk healthily tired, intoxicated with the pure air, strengthened and exhilarated, and his mind free from enervating thoughts. Between this vein of activity which his mother had discovered, and study no longer to be avoided, as the examinations were approaching with alarming swiftness, how or when could he find time to devote to Esclavita?
His mother did not on this account relax her vigilance, however, or abandon her well-considered plan of defense. One day Don Gaspar Febrero, having gone somewhat earlier than usual to Doña Aurora’s, found himself alone with her, and, according to his custom, turned the conversation on Esclavita, praising her so extravagantly that his companion at last began to grow impatient.
“Now that you speak of the girl,” she said, when the old man allowed her to get in a word, “I wish to say something to you about her. But promise me first that you will answer me with the frankness due to our long-standing friendship.”
“Can you doubt it? Why of course I shall, my dear Aurora. In what way can I serve you?”
“You shall hear. It is something that I have been thinking of sitting here alone in the mornings when the boy is at college. As you will be very lonely, no doubt, when Felisa starts on her long voyage to the Philippines, I have thought--so that you might not miss so greatly the attentions to which you have been accustomed--what do you think?”
“Let us hear--let us hear. Since the idea is yours--you always reason very judiciously, my dear friend----”
“As you have often told me that you thought Esclavita so excellent a servant----”
The sprightly old man made a quick movement of delighted surprise, settled his spectacles on his nose, and eagerly and tremulously, in disjointed phrases, exclaimed:
“My dear friend! my dear friend! what is it you are saying? what is it you are saying? Have you considered well before speaking? To part with that treasure! that treasure! You overwhelm me with this proof of your goodness. Yes, indeed, but in conscience no, I cannot accept. Now I see of what friendship is capable, Aurora! No, it would be too selfish on my part. You have not thought well over the matter. Are you speaking in earnest? in earnest?”
Señora de Pardiñas felt the pricking of remorse at this spontaneous effusion of gratitude, and hastened to add:
“Listen and you will see that it would be for my own advantage as well as for yours. There is something of selfishness in the offer, too, Don Gaspar, it is not all a kindness. As I am thinking of taking Rogelio on a visit to our native place this year----”
“A reason the more, my friend; a reason the more. You cannot dispense with the services of such a girl, traveling. The times are bad. With the Higinias that are going, who would part with an Esclavita? And an Esclavita of that stamp! Have you thought seriously over the matter, I mean _seriously_?”
As he spoke thus, Nuño Rasura jumped up and down in his chair, twirling his crutch between his palms. His eyes sparkled, his form straightened itself like a boy’s, and his breast rose and fell with his agitated breathing.
“Heaven help us!” thought Doña Aurora, “I shall have to lift the man up from the floor with a spoon.” And as she remained silent, affecting to be considering the good man’s arguments, the latter added quickly and energetically, like a child who pretends to be yielding to persuasion in accepting a toy:
“That is to say--of course I know from the very fact of your proposing it to me that you have thought well over it. I see that you are right in what you say; very right, very right, Aurora. Traveling, one is better alone; the boy and his mother, of course, of course. As for me, it is enough that you should propose it; I accept, I accept; do you hear, my friend? I accept.”
“It is true,” reflected Doña Aurora, “that that slippery Don Nicanor, who is stuffed full of malice and who is capable of thinking evil of his own mother, irritates one at times; but these simpletons, too, who can never understand a hint--well, there are days when they keep one’s nerves on the stretch like the strings of a guitar.”
Don Gaspar’s scruples being thus vanquished, he himself arranged a plan of action, which he laid before Doña Aurora--as soon as his daughter should go away, he would take Esclavita as his housekeeper. The octogenarian added, rubbing his hands:
“Don’t let Candás know anything about the matter. I don’t want to be made the subject of annoying jests.”
XXI.
This domestic conspiracy was kept a profound secret. Doña Aurora was silent, for women know how to keep a secret when they resolve to do so, especially if their affections are concerned, and Don Gaspar did not open his lips because he dreaded more than the cholera the jokes and insinuations of the Crown Solicitor, and no less--if we must betray the secrets of his household--the anger of his daughter Felisa. The latter, suspicious as a wife, distrusting the sociable and gallant disposition of the old man, had made it her business to provide him with the ugliest, most ignorant, and worst-tempered Maritornes to be found, for she always saw in the distance the menacing shadow of a stepmother. Until Felisa should have started on her voyage to the fifth division of the globe, the old man did not dare even to hint at his desire of taking into his service the gentle and pretty Esclavita. It was with the greatest difficulty that he was able to control his impatience and wait for this event, for his old age was a second childhood. Capricious and impatient as a child, if he yielded to his impulses, he would stamp upon the floor whenever anything interfered with the gratification of his desires. The outlet he sought for his impatience was a _tête-à-tête_ with Doña Aurora before the arrival of the other visitors, when he would talk to her ramblingly, as old people are wont to talk, of his plans for the future, of the comfort he should enjoy with Esclavita to wait upon him, of the favors he would heap upon her, of how easy it would be to wait on an old man like him, without any family, and many other things of the same kind. And when the good man, owing to the presence of others, was unable to dilate on his favorite theme, he gave his excellent friend glances and winks of intelligence. He smiled at her without any cause, and, in short, sought to give vent to his exuberant and boyish gayety. “Heaven grant he may keep his reason,” said Señora de Pardiñas to herself. “I don’t know why we should wonder at the craziness of youth, when old men can act in this way. No boy could be more deeply smitten. I declare, if he is not wild for his daughter to take herself off, so that he may get Esclavita at once. If I did not know that he is a really excellent man and that the girl, on her part, is incapable of laying a trap for him, I should be a little uneasy, for no one can tell where these things will end, and if he should take it into his head to marry!--” The idea of Don Gaspar marrying a girl of twenty-five was so absurd that Señora de Pardiñas laughed to herself, and the monologue ended by the good lady scratching her head with her knitting-needle, and saying, as a corollary of her reflections: “It won’t be my fault if anything extraordinary should happen. To find a good situation for a good servant is not a crime. All I am sorry for is that that tiresome Felisa Febrero keeps forever putting off her departure for the Philippines.”
It was true, indeed, that Don Gaspar’s daughter delayed her journey in a way to make the blood boil in the veins of a more patient person than Doña Aurora. What made the latter wild was that the time for the examinations to take place was now drawing near, after which she had resolved to take a trip to Galicia, and to leave Esclavita behind or to take her with her seemed equally impracticable. Don Gaspar kept her informed of the news regarding his daughter’s departure, looking more and more joyful as the time drew nearer. “They are packing the trunks.” “They have made inquiries concerning the dates of sailing of the steamers.” “On Thursday, or at furthest on Saturday, they will be on their way to Cadiz.” At last he came one day with a face looking more radiant, more Olympic than usual, under the aureole of his beautiful white curls. “Friend Aurora,” he said, “they are to leave us this afternoon.” It was agreed that for appearance’s sake a few days should be allowed to pass before giving warning to the ignorant and slatternly Estremaduran who waited on Don Gaspar, and informing Esclavita of her change of situation. “Friend Aurora, do you take charge of that,” said the octogenarian. But although he thus laid all the responsibility on the shoulders of Doña Aurora, he could not resist the temptation, as he was passing the
confectionary of La Pajarita when he was taking his constitutional on the following day in the Puerta del Sol, to enter the shop and buy half a pound of caramels and bonbons. He hid his purchase in an inside pocket of his coat and when, stopping at the house of Señora de Pardiñas, Esclavita opened the door for him, he glanced around furtively, put his hand into his pocket, and drawing out the cartridge slipped it into her palm as if it were a _billet doux_. “Fresh,” was the only word his pleasing agitation allowed him to utter, as he put the gift into her hand.
Very reluctantly, and with much hemming and hawing, Doña Aurora set about performing her disagreeable task of getting rid of Esclavita. She would have felt less embarrassed if she had been called upon to break to her the news of some great misfortune, such as the death of some one dear to her, or some pecuniary loss, for, after all, in such a case she would have none of the responsibility nor would she be in any way to blame, while in merely announcing to her the impending change of abode and of employers, she felt, with her natural sense of right, to which nothing but her maternal affection could blind her, that there was something of harshness and cruelty in her conduct, although this was dictated by motives such as no prudent mother could disregard. “It is even a matter of conscience with me,” she said to herself, to fortify her courage. “I was thoughtless in bringing temptation within Rogelio’s reach. Felisa Febrero has shown more knowledge of the world than I, for, old as her father is, she would not put him in danger’s way. The boy has more sense than could have been expected, not to have lost his head completely. No, no, it is better to blush once than to turn pale a hundred times. To-day I will get rid of her. As soon as Rogelio goes to college----”
There are in the tones of the human voice mysterious notes of warning which in certain situations reveal our inmost thoughts before we have put them into words. The simple words, “Come here, Esclavita,” words such as a servant hears innumerable times in the course of a day, echoed on this occasion with an ominous sound in the soul of the young Galician. All the blood in her body rushed to her heart, and when she entered the room where her mistress was awaiting her she already knew by intuition the purport of what she was about to hear.
Doña Aurora was seated, not in the dining-room, but in her son’s study, where she was in the habit of going, in his absence, to write a note, to make up her accounts, or the like, and perhaps also to satisfy that instinctive and restless curiosity characteristic of an absorbing affection when it reaches the height of a passion. She made Esclavita sit down in a chair beside her and began to speak, without looking at her, occupying herself in taking the pens, one by one, from a little pen-box and placing them symmetrically, side by side, upon the table--On account of the trip to Galicia, there was nothing else to be done--To travel with three people was not the same as to travel with only two, that required no explanation--A situation in the house of Señor de Febrero was the best thing a girl like her could possibly desire; it was a great piece of good fortune. She would be, not a servant, but the housekeeper. She would be treated with every kind of consideration. The labor of waiting on one person only would not kill her; by taking a little trouble to please that excellent gentleman she would be in heaven--almost as if she were in her own house. Finally, Don Gaspar, too, was from Galicia. There would be no cause for her to feel lonesome there, as she had felt in the house of the Señoritas Romera.
When she had brought forward all these arguments she felt her mind relieved and, still apparently intent on the symmetrical arrangement of the rows of pens, gave a side glance at the girl. Esclavita remained motionless in her seat, her hands folded in her lap, her feet side by side, her eyes cast down; she, too, was little prone to throw open those windows of the soul to prying eyes.
“Well, what do you say?” asked Señora de Pardiñas at last, beginning to grow impatient, as she always did when she was met by a passive resistance.
“What should I say?” asked Esclavita in husky tones, but with apparent calmness.
“Say yes or no; say whether you like the situation I propose to you, or whether you would prefer to look for another, which should be more to your taste.”
There was an interval of silence, and then the girl answered in a voice deprived of all expression by her effort to render it calm: