As he opened it, several newspapers fell out, containing notices
marked by a cross of the volume of poems just published, entitled
"Songs of Absence," this being the name chosen by Segundo for his
volume of rhymes.
These were accompanied by a letter of four pages from Roberto.
What it might contain was of such vital importance to Segundo, so
great the influence it might exercise over his future, that he laid
it aside fearing, he knew not why, to read it, wishing to defer what
he so eagerly desired. The letter lay open before him and certain
names, certain words frequently repeated, caught his eye. The name of
the widowed Señora de Comba was often mentioned in it. To calm his
agitation, which was purely nervous, he took up the newspapers,
resolving to read first the marked paragraphs. He traversed the _via
crucis_, in the fullest signification of the words.
_El Imperial_ gave a noisy boom to Galicia and, as a proof that
the country produced poets in the same abundance as it produced
exquisite peaches and beautiful flowers mentioned, without naming
him, the author of "Songs of Absence," a beautiful volume just
published. And not a line more, not a word of criticism, nothing to
indicate that anybody in the office of the popular daily had taken
the trouble even to cut the leaves of the book. _El Liberal_, better
informed, declared, in three lines, that "Songs of Absence" gave
evidence of the author's great facility in versification. _La Epoca_,
in the most obscure corner of its department, "New Books," eulogized
the typographical elegance of the book; disapproved of the romantic
savor of the title and of the title-page, and deplored in trenchant
phrases that the poet should have sought inspiration in the barren
theme of absence when there were so many wholesome, cheerful and
fruitful subjects on which to write. _El Dia_----
Ah, as for _El Dia_, it gave Segundo a castigation in style: not
one of those angry, predetermined, energetic castigations, in which
the lash is taken up with both hands to crush a powerful and
dangerous adversary, but a contemptuous cut of the whip, a flick with
the nail, as it were, as one might brush away a troublesome insect;
one of those summary criticisms in which the critic does not take the
trouble to adduce proof or argument in support of his criticisms,
whose justice he deems so evident as not to require demonstration; an
execution by a few jests, but jests of a kind that extinguish a new
author, crush him, relegate him forever to the limbo of obscurity.
The critic said that now when verses of supreme merit lacked readers
it was greatly to be deplored that the press should be made to groan
with rhymes of an inferior quality; that now when Becquer had been
placed in the pantheon of the immortals it was a crime to treat him
with the disrespect of stupidly imitating him, mutilating and
counterfeiting his best thoughts; and finally, that it was to be
regretted that estimable young men, endowed, perhaps, with admirable
capabilities for trade, or for the career of an apothecary or a
notary, should spend their parents' money in costly editions of
verses which no one would either buy or read.
Underneath this philippic Roberto Blanquez had written: "Pay no
attention to this ass. Read my article."
And indeed in an obscure, insignificant sheet, one of those
innumerable periodicals that see the light in Madrid without Madrid
ever seeing them, Blanquez poured forth the gall of his wounded
friendship and patriotism--taking the critic to task, eulogizing
Segundo's book and declaring him the worthy compeer of Becquer, with
the difference that the former was a little sweeter, a little more
dreamy, a little more melancholy, as being the son of a land as
beautiful as it was unfortunate, and which was fairer than Andalusia,
than Switzerland, or than any other country on the face of the globe;
ending by saying that if Becquer had been born in Galicia he would
feel, think, and write like _The Swan of Vilamorta_.
Segundo seized the bundle of newspapers and, after looking at
them for a moment fixedly and with a gloomy brow, tore them into
pieces, large at first, then small, then smaller still, which he
threw out of the window to hover for a moment in the air like
butterflies or like the silvery petals of the flower of illusion, and
then fall into the nearest pool. Segundo smiled bitterly. "There goes
fame," he said to himself. "Now I think I am calmer. Let us see what
the letter says."
Of this letter we need cite here only certain passages,
supplementing them with the comments made on them in his mind by the
reader.
"According to your request I went to the house of Señora de Comba
to deliver to her the copy, so carefully wrapped up and sealed, which
you sent me for that purpose."--Of course. It contained an
inscription which I did not want her to think that you might have
read.--"She has a beautiful house, hangings and natural flowers
everywhere."--Everything pertaining to her is like that, beautiful
and refined.--"But I was obliged to return several times before she
would receive me, the moment was always inopportune."--She does not
receive indiscriminately all who may chance to present
themselves.--"At last she received me, after innumerable ceremonies
and formalities. She is very beautiful close by, more beautiful,
even, than at a distance, and it seems impossible that she should
have a daughter twelve years old; she looks at most twenty-four or
twenty-five."--What news Roberto has to tell me.--"The moment I told
her I had come on your part"--Let us hear--"she became--what shall I
say?"--red--"displeased and annoyed, my boy, and in addition so
serious, that I was quite taken aback, and did not know what to
do."--Infamous! Infamous!--"She was afraid that I"--Let us hear; let
us finish, let us finish.--"She refused to receive the book, in spite
of my urgent entreaties"--but this is inconceivable. Ah, what a
woman!--"because she says it would remind her too forcibly of that
place and of the death of her husband, whom God keep in his glory;
and consequently she begs you to excuse her"--wretch!--"from opening
the package and reading your verse, for which she thanks you."--Ha!
ha! ha!--Bravo! What an actress!
"Notwithstanding all this, as you had charged me explicitly to
deliver it to her, I determined not to take the book back with me
and, taking up my hat and saluting her, I laid your package on a
table. On the following morning, however, it came back to me
unopened, with all its seals intact."--And I did not throw her into
the Avieiro that day when our lips--the more fool I! Well, let us
finish.
"In view of the little widow's conduct I imagine that you must
have invented all that about the window and the precipice; you must
have told it to me to fool me or, as you are so imaginative, you
dreamed that it happened and you took the dream for reality."--He
does well to mock me.--"At all events, my boy, if you were interested
in the widow, think no more about her. I know to a certainty, through
my cousins, who have it for a fact from their father, that at the
expiration of the period of her mourning she is to marry a certain
Marquis de Cameros who represented at one time a district in
Lugo."--Yes, yes, I understand.--"The thing is serious, for,
according to what my cousins say, the house linen is being
embroidered already with the coronet of a marchioness."
The letter was torn still more slowly and into still smaller
pieces than the newspapers. With the fragments Segundo made a ball
which he threw far into the middle of the pool. "Such is love," he
said to himself, laughing bitterly.
He began to walk up and down the room, at first with a certain
monotonous regularity, then restlessly and with fury. Clara, the
eldest of his sisters, half opened the door of the room, saying:
"Aunt Gáspara says you are to come."
"What for?"
"Dinner is ready."
Segundo took his hat and rushing into the street walked toward
the river, filled with that species of fury which one who has just
received some mental shock, some bitter disappointment, is apt to
feel at being called on to take part in any of the ordinary concerns
of life.