Maximina Part 12

"You might better die, you great good-for-nothing! This fellow has used up more of my patience and money than he is worth!"

Afterwards came the following family scene. When he recovered from his fainting fit, he was informed that his father and brother were waiting for him in the office on the first floor. Here our young soldier had to endure a new and grievous humiliation. His father attacked him in a rage, called him an imbecile and a blunderbuss, and showed him the book in which he had kept account of his expenses.

"For so many months of tutoring in mathematics, so much; drawing lessons, so much; dress uniform, so much; every day ditto, so much,"

etc., etc.

While his _senor padre_ was lecturing him in an unnaturally high voice on this subject, his older brother was gnas.h.i.+ng his teeth like one in torment; from time to time he gave utterance to pitiful groans, as though some demon had come that very moment to throw more coal in the furnace where they were roasting him. At last, when he succeeded in getting his breath, he exclaimed in a low voice:--

"The idea of a man having to humiliate himself from morning till night engaged in handling fat and lard in order that what he earns should be wasted by a fellow like this, in folderols and gla.s.ses of cognac!"

"It shall not be so any longer, Rafael! I swear it shall not!" roared the father. "After to-day this lazybones shall help you in the factory.

There he will have a chance to learn how to earn his bread and b.u.t.ter!"

The ex-cadet was annihilated. He, a gentleman cadet in the most aristocratic corps of the army, to be suddenly transferred into the service of a candle factory! This for Utrilla was the height of degradation. He said nothing for a few moments: at last he spoke solemnly and deliberately in his deep ba.s.s:--

"If it has come to this, that my dignity must be lowered by making me a factory foreman, it would be better that I should be taken out into the field and shot down with half a dozen bullets!"

"Knocked down with half a dozen sticks; that's what you ought to have done to you, you good-for-nothing idler! Just wait! just wait!"

And the worthy manufacturer glanced angrily around the room, and seeing a reed cane leaning against the wall, he sprang to get it. But Achilles, he of the winged feet, had already darted out of the room, and in half a dozen leaps had reached his chamber.

Once across the threshold, he bolted the door with marvellous dexterity, and after listening breathlessly with his ear at the key-hole, in order to make sure that Peleus had not pa.s.sed the middle of the corridor, he felt safe to give himself up to meditation.

He began to promenade up and down, across the room, from corner to corner, with his hands in his pockets, his head sunk and his shoulders lifted, thinking seriously how ...

But his sword was constantly thumping against the furniture and getting between his legs, and making it hard for him to walk; he took it off and flung it in military disgust on the sofa.

He came to the conclusion that two courses lay before him: one was to make his escape from the house, enlist in the army, and in this way fulfil the only vocation for which he felt any call; the other was to enter the factory and work there like his brother. It was necessary to make a decisive resolution, as became his inflexible and energetic character; and in very truth our ex-cadet, with an energy that has few examples in this degenerate epoch, promptly decided to work in the candle factory.

This important point having been settled, he became calmer, and could stop long enough to roll and smoke a cigarette.

One other thing, however, remained to be done, and this was one of great importance: to wipe out the insult which the algebra professor had given him during the examination. Utrilla argued in this way:--

If he remained in the army, the affront would not have been serious, because, of course, discipline forbids the inferior to demand satisfaction for insults from a superior; but once out of the corps and transformed into a civilian, the matter put on a different aspect--"Certainly very different!" he repeated, putting on a deep frown that was very imposing. "To-morrow I will settle this point."

And in this desperate state of mind our cadet set himself to work to indite the draft of a letter which he proposed to send to the algebra teacher.

"MY DEAR SIR:--

"If you have any delicacy (which I have reason to doubt) you will perfectly understand that after the coa.r.s.e insult which you took pains to give me yesterday, enjoying the advantage of your position, it is absolutely necessary that one or the other of us should vanish from the earth. As for the proper remedy, you will be kind enough to come to an understanding with my two friends Senor---- and Senor---- (_Here will be two blanks for the names of my seconds, for I have not yet decided who they will be_). I remain, Sir, at your command, etc."

After reading this letter three or four times, it seemed to him that it was not forcible enough. He tore it up, and at one breath wrote this one:--

"SIR: You are a scoundrel. If this intentional insult is not sufficient to bring your seconds, I shall have the pleasure of flinging it in your face. Your servant, who subscribes his name,

"JACOBO UTRILLA."

Perfectly satisfied with the content and form of this last missive, the heroic lad copied it off with particular care, closed it with sealing-wax, and directed it; then he left it in his table drawer until the next day, when he proposed sending it to its destination.

By this time night had come, and he went to bed without any desire to eat supper. Sleep delayed her visit; the angel of desolation flapped her pinions over his brow, and inspired him with the most terrific plans of destruction. And doubtless at that very hour the algebra professor was tranquilly sleeping without the slightest suspicion of the misfortune overhanging him.

When this suggestion presented itself to Utrilla, he could not help smiling in a most sinister fas.h.i.+on between the sheets.

At last Morpheus succeeded in overcoming him, but with no intention of sending sweet and refres.h.i.+ng dreams; a thousand gloomy nightmares tormented him all night long; from one o'clock till six in the morning he battled with his enemy, using all the methods known at the present day, and some of his own invention. Now he beheld himself facing the hateful professor with a foil in his hand; the professor had wounded him in the right hand, but nevertheless Utrilla, without a moment's hesitation, exclaimed: "Come on. Use the left hand!" filling all the witnesses full of admiration at his coolness. And with his left hand, _zas!_ after a few thrusts he had buried the sword up to the hilt in his body!

Then they appeared each with pistol in hand; the seconds give the signal to aim; the professor fires, and his ball grazes his cheek; then he aims, and keeps aiming, and the professor, now seeing death at hand, falls on his knees and begs for his life; he grants his prayer, firing into the air, but not without first saying scornfully: "And to think of this man insulting Jacobo Utrilla!"

Divine Aurora, the G.o.ddess with the saffron veil, was already descending the heights of Guadarrama, when the stripling awoke in the same prophetic state of mind. Sad day that was now beginning to dawn for an innocent family, for the algebra professor's six children, had not Jupiter hastened to send to the hero's bolster his daughter Minerva in the form of the housekeeper.

"Jacobito, my dear, will you be peris.h.i.+ng of weakness, my child! Here I have some chocolate and spiral cakes which you like so much."

The lad rubbed his eyes, cast an excessively severe look at the chocolate which was so compa.s.sionately brought him, and made up his mind to take it, but not before he had gnashed his teeth in such a desperate fas.h.i.+on that the good Dona Adelaida was alarmed.

"Come, come, Jacobito, my son, don't grieve, don't be so much troubled, because you will be sure to fall sick.... There is no help for it....

Going to bed without taking anything was a piece of folly. Your father will come round all right, and finally everything will be settled as you want it. You certainly must have had a very bad night! You must not go on this way trifling with your stomach!... And now what are you going to do, my son? I am afraid for you with such a rash disposition as G.o.d has given you!"

When Jacobo heard this question, he for a moment suspended the hateful task of swallowing his chocolate, raised his angry face to the housekeeper, and shouted with concentrated fury:--

"What am I going to do!... You shall see, you shall see what I am going to do!"

And then he once more began to grit his teeth so terribly that Dona Adelaida was frightened out of her wits, and exclaimed:--

"Come now, calm yourself, calm yourself, Jacobito! You know that I was present when you were born, and that your sainted mother, who left you when you were a mere baby--poor woman!--charged me to have a watchful eye over you. If you should do anything desperate, you will kill me with sorrow.... Come, my son, tell me what you intend to do...."

The lad, pus.h.i.+ng away the chocolate cup with an energetic movement, and rolling his eyes frenziedly, screamed rather than said:--

"Do you want to know what I am going to do?... Then I will tell you this very instant.... I am going to the factory, I am going to put on a blouse, I am going to daub my hands with grease, pull the candle moulds, and roast my face in front of the furnaces.... And when any stranger comes to the factory, the hands will be able to say: 'This man whom you see--dirty, nasty, ill-smelling--used to be a gentleman cadet, a cadet in the Military Academy!... Ah!" he said, concluding with a m.u.f.fled voice, "Ah! no one knows, no one knows what Jacobo Utrilla is capable of!"

The housekeeper, who was expecting some desperate resolution, when she found that it was of this sort, could not refrain from a cry of joy.

"That is right, my son, that is right! That is the best way of heaping coals of fire on the heads of your father and brother, who have been pestering me to death by saying that you were of no use, that you were a lazybones...."

"But before doing that," interrupted Jacobo, extending both hands as though he were trying to hold back the avalanche which was about to fall, "it is necessary that one of us two peris.h.!.+"

"Merciful Virgin!" exclaimed Dona Adelaida. "Who is going to perish, Jacobito? For Heaven's sake, don't go lose your mind! Do you want your father to die?"

"Not him, senora, not him! I refer to my algebra professor, with whom this afternoon or to-morrow at the very latest, I am going to fight a duel!"

"And what has the algebra professor done to you? Made you fail in your examination? Now if you had studied, as your father told you to do, this would not have happened."

"Senora," cried Jacobo, in a stentorian voice so fiendish that Dona Adelaida in affright took a step or two backward, "don't you dare to speak about what you do not understand! I cannot get over my vexation that I ever had anything to do with algebra. What the professor did was to sneer at me, and this, my father's son cannot put up with! Do you understand?"

"Come, calm yourself, Jacobito; you have been very much disturbed since yesterday. Perhaps it is not as bad as you think. It may be that this gentleman did not sneer at you on purpose."

"He may not have done it intentionally, but the fact is, he insulted me, and I will not stand it; I never have yet, and I never intend to let any one insult me with impunity. You know very well that in this respect I am a peculiar man."

"I know it, Jacobito; you have the same disposition as your grandfather (peace to his soul!). What a man he was! He was as quick to flare up as gunpowder! Just think; one time when he was shaving, he heard a cry in the court; he turned his head so suddenly that he gave himself a tremendous cut in the nose.... But it is necessary, my son, to have self-restraint, and repress one's nature a little, if one would live in this world. It is my idea that if this professor made sport of you, what you ought to do is to make sport of him!"

With slight variations, such was the advice that in the early days of Greece, Minerva, the G.o.ddess of the glorious eyes, gave the divine Achilles in his famous quarrel with Agamemnon, the son of Atreus.