Maximina Part 63

"Is this your ultimatum in regard to the first part of my question?"

"It is."

"Very good; now we come to the second. I suppose that you will not refuse to give me reparation by means of arms...."

"I do refuse. I have injured you deeply; it would be a fine thing if I killed you besides.... And to allow you to kill me--frankly, I have just as little notion."

"There is one infallible means of making you fight: I will slap your face in public."

"I don't doubt that you would do so. I regard you as a man of courage; you would do it even though you thereby signed your own death-warrant.

Whatever weapons we should choose, you cannot be ignorant that I have ninety chances to ten of killing or wounding you...."

Miguel made a scornful gesture.

"I know that this does not terrify you; but let us reason about it: What advantage would it give you to die? Would it wipe out your sister's dishonor? It would not only not wipe it out, but it would deprive her of the only support that she has in the world. Then let us suppose--and it is much to suppose--that you killed me. Your sole advantage would be in publis.h.i.+ng the disgrace which now with a little caution can remain unknown."

Don Alfonso and Miguel both spoke in low tones, so as not to be heard from the outside; but the gestures and accent of each, and especially of the latter, were so energetic and excited, that they very well took the place of loud words. Julia sat on the sofa, motionless, and with her head bent low.

"Do you imagine that I am going to accept this logic with which you wish to avoid the unpleasantness of exposing your life? Have no such thought, even though there were one probability against a thousand of killing me, it would be a pleasure for me to face you with sword or pistol. How far the set resolution that I entertain of dying or of killing you goes to put us on an equality, you know perfectly well. Therefore drop these arguments worthy only of a coward, and be kind enough to expect to spend as painful hours as those which you have taken so much pains to make us suffer."

"I see that you mean to insult me. Do so with impunity; I grant you the privilege.... But I warn you not to let an ill-sounding word pa.s.s your lips in public."

"In private and in public I am resolved to do the same! You wretch!"

exclaimed Miguel, beside himself. "Everywhere I shall declare that you are a knave, a cowardly a.s.sa.s.sin, who fights duels only with those unable to defend themselves. In order that you may see how much fear I have of you, take this."

Saying these words, he leaped like a lion upon Saavedra, who had risen to his feet, expecting some such move. Before he could raise his hand, the Andalusian seized him by the arms, and brutally hurled him back into the middle of the room, so that he reeled. Miguel was just on the point of springing at him again; but at that instant he found himself held by more gentle arms--those of his sister, who, with her face distorted, her eyes flas.h.i.+ng, her voice choking with sobs, said:--

"No, Miguel, no; you cannot measure yourself with this man. After what I have just heard I should prefer a thousand times to die, or to spend my whole life in disgrace, rather than to marry such a monster."

"Let go of me! Let go!" cried Miguel, trying to free himself from her arms.

"No, my brother; kill me, put me into a convent, but don't expose your own life.... Remember Maximina and your little son."

Don Alfonso at the same time stretched out his hand, and said calmly:--

"Before beginning a disgusting scene, unworthy of two gentlemen, such as we are...."

"Of a gentleman like this! you are no gentleman," exclaimed Julia, giving him a furious look and clinging to her brother.

"Before beginning a scene like this," the Andalusian went on to say, making a contemptuous gesture at the interruption, "listen to one word, Miguel. I have said that I am resolved not to fight, because _I do not wish_ to run the risk of killing you, nor of dying. From here I am going directly to Paris, and probably you will never see me again in this world. If you insist on detaining me, I will meet force with force; if you insult me, as I am in a strange country where no one knows me, it will be of no great consequence to me. And if you should happen to tell the story in Madrid, besides publis.h.i.+ng your own dishonor, no one will believe you; because it is not credible that a man who has fought fourteen duels, five of them to the death, would through fear avoid a challenge from a man who scarcely knows how to hold a weapon. So then understand that my resolution is irrevocable."

"Well, then, I will kill you like a dog," said Miguel, whipping out a revolver from his pocket.

"If you kill me (which I shall take good care that you do not do),"

retorted Saavedra, drawing another revolver, "you would go from here straight to jail, and your sister would remain forsaken."

Miguel stood for a moment in doubt; then he shrugged his shoulders with a gesture of sovereign contempt, and said, as he put back the pistol:--

"You are right. The truth is, that as a knave you are quite up to the standard! Come on, Julia, come! I am ashamed to spend any more time wasting words with this _vile wretch_."

And taking his sister around the waist, he drew her from the room.

Don Alfonso watched them as they disappeared: he listened until the sound of their steps was lost; he also shrugged his shoulders, put back his revolver, and, while he arranged his necktie before the gla.s.s, previous to going out, he muttered with a diabolical smile:--

"I did not come out of it quite as well as I expected, ... but after all, this adventure has not been so bad!"

XXVII.

As soon as Miguel and his sister reached the capital, they learned of an event which grieved them intensely. Let us relate it from the beginning.

On account of the affectionate preference which Julia had shown on the evening of the party, our heroic friend Utrilla had recovered sufficient spirits to last at least half a year.

His sweet enemy made him drain the cup of triumph at one draught.

Intoxicated with love and pride, it took two consecutive months of continual rebuffs, before this glorious young fellow came clearly to understand that her humor had changed a little. It is evident that such a change was not sufficient to affect him very seriously, since he was very certain, now more than ever, of the irresistible fascination which he exercised over the beauty. That closing of the window when he pa.s.sed along the street, that turning of the eyes in the opposite direction, and not replying to his letters, were for the lad only "open strategies"

by which the girl was trying to make him fall in love with her, and keep him more than ever her slave.

As a proof of this, let us say that once, happening to be at the theatre, he took a place opposite to where she was, and not taking his eyes from her through a whole _entr'acte_, a friend, touching him on the shoulder, said:--

"_Hola_, comrade! evidently that little brunette pleases you."

"That's an old story," replied the ex-cadet, dryly and with dignity.

"And the girl; how about her?"

"Poor girl!" he exclaimed, shaking his head, and smiling compa.s.sionately.

The friend observed, however, that during the whole evening the young girl did not once turn her eyes in that direction, though she often looked toward a lower proscenium box, where there were a number of young aristocrats.

Very far, therefore, from being discouraged, Utrilla was almost happy.

He would have been entirely so if, instead of having to keep account of candles put out, he had been occupied in some more congenial business, and had had the good fortune to have killed, or at least dangerously wounded, some one in a duel. But up to the present time, unfortunately, no favorable opportunity had presented itself. Still, he was waiting anxiously for one, for, in truth, his conscience troubled him for being now eighteen years old, and "never having once been into the field."

Of late he had begun to take lessons in the use of the foils at a fencing-school, and in presence of the professor and his companions he had made allusion to some deadly project which he had conceived, and which, in our opinion could not have been anything else than the riddance of his rival Don Alfonso.

Months pa.s.sed, and at regular hours, with a constancy worthy of a more fortunate result, Utrilla wore out the heels of his boots along the sidewalks of the Calle Mayor.

Occasionally Julita would deign to greet him with a wave of the hand, in answer to the energetic way in which her suitor took off his hat to her from the street. Still, the greater number of times it happened that when the brigadier's daughter caught sight of him looming around the corner, she would hastily close the balcony, and this our young man took as a sign of exquisite modesty and timidity at his penetrating glances.

The most that he felt called upon to say in complaint was:--

"This Julita--when will she cease being a mere child!"

The unshaken faith which he had in the fascinating virtue of his smile and his genteel appearance was sufficient to sustain him in this illusion; but it must be confessed that some help was given toward it by the fact that Julita herself, though very mercifully, made use of him on occasion, to wake Saavedra's jealousy, when she was vexed with him. And sometimes at the theatre she would talk with him in the presence of the _caballero_ himself.

This was the position of affairs when the bomb exploded; that is, when Julita eloped that evening with her cousin. The first news of this that Utrilla received was communicated to him by _la brigadiera's_ door-maid, with whom he sustained cordial relations, strengthened from time to time by a chance peseta. As was to be expected, the ex-cadet resolutely refused to believe it. But when he found the evidence overwhelming, he stood like a statue--not a Greek one, however; his nostrils dropped, and his dull, myoptic eyes expressed absolutely nothing except imbecility: his Adam's apple stood out in a manner truly monstrous.

After the first shock was past, Utrilla considered what was befitting for him to do in this most extraordinary juncture. He thought of starting after the fugitives, overtaking them, and killing the seducer with one stab; but above and beyond the great difficulty of overtaking them, in what character should he present himself before them, being neither brother nor husband of the stolen damsel. This project having been rejected, it came to him clear as the day that the only thing left worthy of such a misfortune was suicide. After racking his brains for a whole day he found no other adequate solution.