CHAPTER X.

DON FABRIQUE.

We were awake betimes in the morning, and breakfasted early, in the true Spanish style, on good stiff chocolate with fried eggs, purple wine, and snow-white bread; but no hostile message came from Don Joaquim. The hours stole on, and the sunlit streets threw the shadows of their picturesque façades against each other. The events of the last night, and their probable consequences, had given us a decided distaste for prowling about the streets of Seville. We were both somewhat thoughtful, and said little, or conferred only on the nearest route by which we could reach Gibraltar, in coming from which, we had made somewhat of a détour; and Jack hinted that we should probably have some more brawls with alcaldes, rows at posadas, skirmishes with banditos, and other pleasant adventures, before we reported ourselves "as just arrived" at head quarters.

"A letter for El Señor Capitano Don Ricardo," said the waiter, approaching.

"A letter for you, Dick," said Slingsby.

"So it has come at last," said I, breaking the seal.

"Will it be an affair of knives or pistols?"

"Hush!" said I, as the waiter retired.

"Slugs in a saw-pit, and all that sort of thing--a triangular duel, eh? But an officer should have brought it."

"Yes, had it been that for which you seem so very anxious."

"Anxious! not I, believe me."

"Well, this is from a lady."

"The deuce--you quite interest me. I can perceive that it is penned on pink paper, a little flourished, but without signature. It is from Paulina, poor girl! I can imagine her writing it, and as Byron says--

"'How tremulously gentle, her small hand--'"

"How can you run on thus?" I asked, imploringly. "Fie upon you, Jack, after all the misery we have wrought to these poor people."

"Well, perhaps you are right and I am wrong. I beg pardon; but the letter--what is it about?"

"Only the safety of our lives."

"Our lives--indeed--how so?"

"Read it."

The note ran thus:--

"SENOR DON RICARDO.

"In the name of the Blessed Mother of God, I implore you and your friend to leave Seville on receipt of this, and to take the nearest road for San Lucar de Barameda, where you can reach a steamer, which sails direct for Gibraltar. Don Joaquim vows to have a terrible revenge for the death of our dear brother Hernan; and, last night, was seen in conference with Fabrique de Urquija on the old Alameda. The road you came will be beset--his band are, doubtless, now in hire to waylay you. El santo de los Santos, forgive you the misery you have caused to those who never wronged you, and may it deliver you from the snares of death that lie in your homeward path."

"More melodramatic than pleasant," said Jack.

"It is from Paulina, no doubt.--how considerate!"

"Kind and gentle too," added Jack. "Well, all things duly considered, I think we should take her advice--mount, and be off."

"Poor--poor Paulina!"

"Deuce take it, Dick, don't be faint-hearted. 'T will be all one when the route comes for the Crimea, and sell or sail is the word."

"Not among "Ours," I hope."

"The San Lucar road be it."

"Then the sooner we leave the better, for we have much to lose and nothing to gain by lingering here."

"For there is neither law, justice, nor honour among these Spaniards," said Slingsby, making a smart application to the bell-rope.

"What! you say so in the face of this charming letter?"

"Charming, indeed, to be told that a captain of robbers--a picturesque ruffian in a steeple-crowned hat and red garters, has been bribed to cut your throat--to 'do' for you in the flower of your youth for a hundred pistoles."

The letter raised a glow of sad, of kind, and regretful emotions within me; but I stifled them all, and, calling for the bill, settled with the landlord in person.

"What manner of magistrates have you here in Seville?" asked the unwary Jack.

"How, señor?"

"When they permit thieves to prowl about your streets at night."

"Thieves, señor--Ave Maria!"

"Yes, thieves, señor patron. Fabrique de Urquija was on the old Alameda last night with a well-known bravo from Portugal."

"Don Fabrique," reiterated our host, aghast at the name; "ah, he is too great a man to be easily arrested, señor."

"Is he not a mere ladrone?"

"True, Caballero; but then his band is numerous. Yes, señor; Ave Maria purissima!--tiene con exercito de 10,000 hombres--all determined men, and armed to the teeth."

"Ten thousand men--nonsense! A hundred, more probably."

The host felt his veracity impugned, and he called upon all the saints in the calendar to witness the truth of his assertions; and while we had a decanter of wine before starting, he told us a vast number of anecdotes, descriptive of the cruel and unscrupulous character of the so-called Don Fabrique. Two of these occurred to me as being peculiarly diabolical in their nature.

On one occasion he plundered the house of a wealthy merchant near Estephana, a town on the Grenada coast; and because the unfortunate proprietor would not yield up the alleged treasures of his strong box, and sign bills on his bankers in Seville, Fabrique snatched up a camphine lamp from a marble side-table, and, with a dreadful oath, poured the contents over the hair and whiskers of his prisoner. He then deliberately applied a lighted candle thereto, and in a moment the whole face and head of the miserable man were enveloped in flames. His skull was roasted like a large castano, and he died in great misery--his head being literally burned off!

Another amiable little trait of Don Fabrique was the strange way he took to remove his predecessor from the command of the troop. This was a rough old guerilla, who in his youth had fought in the campaigns of Wellington, under Don Julian Sanchez, the famous Captain Harelip, as our soldiers named him, and latterly in the service of the Carlists, under the banished Conde de Morella.

The robber captain--Gomes el Guerilla--having incurred the animosity of Fabrique, that worthy procured some gun-cotton (which our patron believed to be a preparation by the devil himself), from a drug-chest, when investigating the shop of a botarico (apothecary) at Castellar; and some of this he placed in the folds of Gomes' neckcloth in the night, and for three days the old and unsuspecting sinner wore this dreadful thing under his well-bearded chin. On the third, Fabrique, who began to lose patience, and vow to have vengeance on the botarico, said, "Come, señor, let us make up a little cigar;" so the cigar was made, and they proceeded to smoke, until some sparks fell on the breast of the old guerilla; and then, Madre de Dios! there was a dreadful flash and explosion like that of a cannon; and to the consternation of all his band, the head of Gomes was blown right off his shoulders, and not a vestige of it was ever seen again.

"The noble Caballeros," continued our host, "have no doubt heard of the great robber-chief, Manuel de Cordova, who in January, 1853, killed the commandant of the civic guard of Bute?"

"No."

"He was betrayed by Don Fabrique, and shot to death by a platoon of infantry, in the Plaza of Cordova. Oh, señor, the saints deliver us from the devil and Don Fabrique!"

"So say I," added Jack, as the landlord left us, and thus, being impressed alike by these communications and that of Donna Paulina, we resolved to change our route and avoid this formidable personage who took such an interest in our proceedings.

To deceive any person who might be watching about the hotel, or be bribed by Fabrique, or the major, we made particular inquiries of the patron, the waiters, and stable-boys concerning the road to Gibraltar by the way of Puerto Serrano; and having, as Jack said, "completely thrown dust in their eyes," we took the route to San Lucar and left Seville at a rapid trot about an hour after noon, pausing only to give a peseta to a poor Franciscan who begged from us at the city gate.

I looked back to Seville as we galloped away.

The tower of La Giralda and all its spires were sinking in the sunny haze and lessening in the distance.

"So ends an intimacy that might have ripened into something better," thought I.