Dona Perfecta Part 31

CHAPTER XXV

UNFORESEEN EVENTS--A Pa.s.sING DISAGREEMENT

The scene changes. We see before us a handsome room, bright, modest, gay, comfortable, and surprisingly clean. A fine matting covers the floor, and the white walls are covered with good prints of saints and some sculptures of doubtful artistic value. The old mahogany of the furniture s.h.i.+nes with the polish of many Sat.u.r.day rubbings, and the altar, on which a magnificent Virgin, dressed in blue and silver, receives domestic wors.h.i.+p, is covered with innumerable pretty trifles, half sacred, half profane. There are on it, besides, little pictures in beads, holy-water fonts, a watch-case with an Agnes Dei, a Palm Sunday palm-branch, and not a few odorless artificial flowers. A number of oaken bookshelves contain a rich and choice library, in which Horace, the Epicurean and Sybarite, stands side by side with the tender Virgil, in whose verses we see the heart of the enamored Dido throbbing and melting; Ovid the large-nosed, as sublime as he is obscene and sycophantic, side by side with Martial, the eloquent and witty vagabond; Tibullus the impa.s.sioned, with Cicero the grand; the severe t.i.tus Livius with the terrible Tacitus, the scourge of the Caesars; Lucretius the pantheist; Juvenal, who flayed with his pen; Plautus, who composed the best comedies of antiquity while turning a mill-wheel; Seneca the philosopher, of whom it is said that the n.o.blest act of his life was his death; Quintilian the rhetorician; the immoral Sall.u.s.t, who speaks so eloquently of virtue; the two Plinys; Suetonius and Varro--in a word, all the Latin letters from the time when they stammered their first word with Livius Andronicus until they exhaled their last sigh with Rutilius.

But while making this unnecessary though rapid enumeration, we have not observed that two women have entered the room. It is very early, but the Orbajosans are early risers. The birds are singing to burst their throats in their cages; the church-bells are ringing for ma.s.s, and the goats, going from house to house to be milked, are tinkling their bells gayly.

The two ladies whom we see in the room that we have described have just come back from hearing ma.s.s. They are dressed in black, and each of them carries in her right hand her little prayer-book, and the rosary twined around her fingers.

"Your uncle cannot delay long now," said one of them. "We left him beginning ma.s.s; but he gets through quickly, and by this time he will be in the sacristy, taking off his chasuble. I would have stayed to hear him say ma.s.s, but to-day is a very busy day for me."

"I heard only the prebendary's ma.s.s to-day," said the other, "and he says ma.s.s in a twinkling; and I don't think it has done me any good, for I was greatly preoccupied. I could not get the thought of the terrible things that are happening to us out of my head."

"What is to be done? We must only have patience. Let us see what advice your uncle will give us."

"Ah!" exclaimed the other, heaving a deep and pathetic sigh; "I feel my blood on fire."

"G.o.d will protect us."

"To think that a person like you should be threatened by a ----. And he persists in his designs! Last night Senora Dona Perfecta, I went back to the widow De Cuzco's hotel, as you told me, and asked her for later news. Don Pepito and the brigadier Batalla are always consulting together--ah, my G.o.d! consulting about their infernal plans, and emptying bottle after bottle of wine. They are a pair of rakes, a pair of drunkards. No doubt they are plotting some fine piece of villany together. As I take such an interest in you, last night, seeing Don Pepito having the hotel while I was there, I followed him----"

"And where did you go?"

"To the Casino; yes, senora, to the Casino," responded the other, with some confusion. "Afterward he went back to his hotel. And how my uncle scolded me because I remained out so late, playing the spy in that way!

But I can't help it, and to see a person like you threatened by such dangers makes me wild. For there is no use in talking; I foresee that the day we least expect it those villains will attack the house and carry off Rosarito."

Dona Perfecta, for she it was, bending her eyes on the floor, remained for a long time wrapped in thought. She was pale, and her brows were gathered in a frown. At last she exclaimed:

"Well, I see no way of preventing it!"

"But I see a way," quickly said the other woman, who was the niece of the Penitentiary and Jacinto's mother; "I see a very simple way, that I explained to you, and that you do not like. Ah, senora! you are too good. On occasions like this it is better to be a little less perfect--to lay scruples aside. Why, would that be an offence to G.o.d?"

"Maria Remedios," said Dona Perfecta haughtily, "don't talk nonsense."

"Nonsense! You, with all your wisdom, cannot make your nephew do as you wish. What could be simpler than what I propose? Since there is no justice now to protect us, let us do a great act of justice ourselves.

Are there not men in your house who are ready for any thing? Well, call them and say to them: 'Look, Caballuco, Paso Largo,' or whoever it may be, 'to-night disguise yourself well, so that you may not be recognized; take with you a friend in whom you have confidence, and station yourself at the corner of the Calle de Santa Faz. Wait a while, and when Don Jose Rey pa.s.ses through the Calle de la Triperia on his way to the Casino,--for he will certainly go to the Casino, understand me well,--when he is pa.s.sing you will spring out on him and give him a fright.'"

"Maria Remedios, don't be a fool!" said Dona Perfecta with magisterial dignity.

"Nothing more than a fright, senora; attend well to what I say, a fright. Why! Do you suppose I would advise a crime? Good G.o.d! the very idea fills me with horror, and I fancy I can see before my eyes blood and fire! Nothing of the sort, senora. A fright--nothing but a fright, which will make that ruffian understand that we are well protected. He goes alone to the Casino, senora, entirely alone; and there he meets his valiant friends, those of the sabre and the helmet. Imagine that he gets the fright and that he has a few bones broken, in addition--without any serious wounds, of course. Well, in that case, either his courage will fail him and he will leave Orbajosa, or he will be obliged to keep his bed for a fortnight. But they must be told to make the fright a good one. No killing, of course; they must take care of that, but just a good beating."

"Maria," said Dona Perfecta haughtily, "you are incapable of a lofty thought, of a great and saving resolve. What you advise me is an unworthy piece of cowardice."

"Very well, I will be silent. Poor me! what a fool I am!" exclaimed the Penitentiary's niece with humility. "I will keep my follies to console you after you have lost your daughter."

"My daughter! Lose my daughter!" exclaimed Dona Perfecta, with a sudden access of rage. "Only to hear you puts me out of my senses. No, they shall not take her from me! If Rosario does not abhor that ruffian as I wish her to do, she shall abhor him. For a mother's authority must have some weight. We will tear this pa.s.sion, or rather this caprice, from her heart, as a tender plant is torn out of the ground before it has had time to cast roots. No, this cannot be, Remedios. Come what may, it shall not be! Not even the most infamous means he could employ will avail that madman. Rather than see her my nephew's wife, I would accept any evil that might happen to her, even death!"

"Better dead, better buried and food for worms," affirmed Remedios, clasping her hands as if she were saying a prayer--"than see her in the power of--ah, senora, do not be offended if I say something to you, and that is, that it would be a great weakness to yield merely because Rosarito has had a few secret interviews with that audacious man. The affair of the night before last, as my uncle related it to me, seems to me a vile trick on Don Jose to obtain his object by means of a scandal.

A great many men do that. Ah, Divine Saviour, I don't know how there are women who can look any man in the face unless it be a priest."

"Be silent, be silent!" said Dona Perfecta, with vehemence. "Don't mention the occurrence of the night before last to me. What a horrible affair! Maria Remedios, I understand now how anger can imperil the salvation of a soul. I am burning with rage--unhappy that I am, to see such things and not to be a man! But to speak the truth in regard to the occurrence of the night before last--I still have my doubts. Librada vows and declares that Pinzon was the man who came into the house. My daughter denies every thing; my daughter has never told me a lie!

I persist in my suspicions. I think that Pinzon is a hypocritical go-between, but nothing more."

"We come back to the same thing--that the author of all the trouble is the blessed mathematician. Ah! my heart did not deceive me when I first saw him. Well, then senora! resign yourself to see something still more terrible, unless you make up your mind to call Caballuco and say to him, 'Caballuco, I hope that--'"

"The same thing again; what a simpleton you are!"

"Oh yes! I know I am a great simpleton; but how can I help it if I am not any wiser? I say what comes into my head, without any art."

"What you think of--that silly and vulgar idea of the beating and the fright--is what would occur to any one. You have not an ounce of brains, Remedios; to solve a serious question you can think of nothing better than a piece of folly like that. I have thought of a means more worthy of n.o.ble-minded and well-bred persons. A beating! What stupidity!

Besides, I would not on any account have my nephew receive even so much as a scratch by an order of mine. G.o.d will send him his punishment through some one of the wonderful ways which he knows how to choose. All we have to do is to work in order that the designs of G.o.d may find no obstacle. Maria Remedios, it is necessary in matters of this kind to go directly to the causes of things. But you know nothing about causes--you can see only trifles."

"That may be so," said the priest's niece, with humility. "I wonder why G.o.d made me so foolish that I can understand nothing of those sublime ideas!"

"It is necessary to go to the bottom--to the bottom, Remedios. Don't you understand yet?"

"No."

"My nephew is not my nephew, woman; he is blasphemy, sacrilege, atheism, demagogy. Do you know what demagogy is?"

"Something relating to those people who burned Paris with petroleum; and those who pull down the churches and fire on the images. So far I understand very well."

"Well, my nephew is all that! Ah! if he were alone in Orbajosa--but no, child. My nephew, through a series of fatalities, which are trials, the transitory evils that G.o.d permits for our chastis.e.m.e.nt, is equivalent to an army; is equivalent to the authority of the government; equivalent to the alcalde; equivalent to the judge. My nephew is not my nephew; he is the official nation, Remedios--that second nation composed of the scoundrels who govern in Madrid, and who have made themselves masters of its material strength; of that apparent nation--for the real nation is the one that is silent, that pays and suffers; of that fict.i.tious nation that signs decrees and p.r.o.nounces discourses and makes a farce of government, and a farce of authority, and a farce of every thing. That is what my nephew is to-day; you must accustom yourself to look under the surface of things. My nephew is the government, the brigadier, the new alcalde, the new judge--for they all protect him, because of the unanimity of their ideas; because they are chips of the same block, birds of a feather. Understand it well; we must defend ourselves against them all, for they are all one, and one is all; we must attack them all together; and not by beating a man as he turns a corner, but as our forefathers attacked the Moors--the Moors, Remedios. Understand this well, child; open your understanding and allow an idea that is not vulgar to enter it--rise above yourself; think lofty thoughts, Remedios!"

Don Inocencio's niece was struck dumb by so much loftiness of soul. She opened her mouth to say something that should be in consonance with so sublime an idea, but she only breathed a sigh.

"Like the Moors," repeated Dona Perfecta. "It is a question of Moors and Christians. And did you suppose that by giving a fright to my nephew all would be ended? How foolish you are! Don't you see that his friends support him? Don't you see that you are at the mercy of that rabble?

Don't you see that any little lieutenant can set fire to my house, if he takes it into his head to do so? But don't you know this? Don't you comprehend that it is necessary to go to the bottom of things? Don't you comprehend how vast, how tremendous is the power of my enemy, who is not a man, but a sect? Don't you comprehend that my nephew, as he confronts me to-day, is not a calamity, but a plague? Against this plague, dear Remedios, we shall have here a battalion sent by G.o.d that will annihilate the infernal militia from Madrid. I tell you that this is going to be great and glorious."

"If it were at last so!"

"But do you doubt it? To-day we shall see terrible things here," said Dona Perfecta, with great impatience. "To-day, to-day! What o'clock is it? Seven? So late, and nothing has happened!"

"Perhaps my uncle has heard something; he is here now, I hear him coming upstairs."

"Thank G.o.d!" said Dona Perfecta, rising to receive the Penitentiary. "He will have good news for us."

Don Inocencio entered hastily. His altered countenance showed that his soul, consecrated to religion and to the study of the cla.s.sics, was not as tranquil as usual.

"Bad news!" he said, laying his hat on a chair and loosening the cords of his cloak.

Dona Perfecta turned pale.

"They are arresting people," added Don Inocencio, lowering his voice, as if there was a soldier hidden under every chair. "They suspect, no doubt, that the people here would not put up with their high-handed measures, and they have gone from house to house, arresting all who have a reputation for bravery."

Dona Perfecta threw herself into an easy chair and clutched its arms convulsively.

"It remains to be seen whether they have allowed themselves to be arrested," observed Remedios.