Luis love me. He declared it to me with his eyes. Yes, his love is as
profound, as ardent as mine. His virtues, his aspirations toward
heavenly things, his manly energy, have all urged him to conquer this
insensate passion. I sought to prevent this. One day, at the end of many
days during which he had stayed away, he came to see me, and found me
alone. When he gave me his hand, I wept; I could not speak, but hell
inspired me with an accursed, mute eloquence that told him of my grief
that he had scorned me, that he did not return my love, that he
preferred another love--a love without stain--to mine. Then he was
unable to resist the temptation, and he approached his lips to my face
to kiss away my tears. Our lips met. If God had not willed that you
should approach at that moment, what would have become of me?"
"How shameful! my child, how shameful!" said the reverend vicar.
Pepita covered her face with both hands and began to sob like a
Magdalen. Her hands were, in truth, beautiful, more beautiful even than
Don Luis had described them to be in his letters. Their whiteness, their
pure transparency, the tapering form of the fingers, the roseate hue,
the polish and the brilliancy of the pearl-like nails, all were such as
might turn the head of any man.
The virtuous vicar could understand, notwithstanding his eighty years,
the fall, or rather the slip, of Don Luis.
"Child!" he exclaimed, "don't cry so! It breaks my heart to see you.
Calm yourself; Don Luis has no doubt repented of his sin; do you repent
likewise, and nothing more need be said. God will pardon you both, and
make a couple of saints of you. Since Don Luis is going away the day
after to-morrow, it is a sure sign that virtue has triumphed in him, and
that he flies from you, as he should, that he may do penance for his
sin, fulfill his vow, and return to his vocation."
"That is all very well," replied Pepita; "fulfill his vow, return to his
vocation, after giving me my death-wound! Why did he love me, why did he
encourage me, why did he deceive me? His kiss was a brand, it was as a
hot iron with which he marked me and stamped me as his slave. Now that I
am marked and enslaved, he abandons and betrays and destroys me. A good
beginning to give to his missions, his preachings, and gospel triumphs!
It shall not be! By Heaven, it shall not be!"
This outbreak of anger and scorned love confounded the reverend vicar.
Pepita had risen. Her attitude, her gesture, had something in them of
tragic animation. Her eyes gleamed like daggers; they shone like two
suns. The vicar was silent, and regarded her almost with terror. She
paced with hasty steps up and down the apartment. She did not now seem
like a timid gazelle, but like an angry lioness.
"What!" she said, once more facing the vicar, "has he nothing to do but
laugh at me, tear my heart to pieces, humiliate it, trample it under
foot, after having cheated me out of it? He shall remember me! He shall
pay me for this! If he is so holy, if he is so virtuous, why did he,
with his glance, promise me everything? If he loves God so much, why
does he seek to hurt one of God's poor creatures? Is this charity? Is
this religion? No; it is pitiless selfishness."
Pepita's anger could not last long. After she had spoken the last words,
it turned to dejection. She sank into a chair, weeping bitterly, and
abandoning herself to an anguish heart-breaking to witness.
The vicar's heart was touched with pity; but he recovered himself on
seeing that the enemy gave signs of yielding.
"Pepita, child," he said, "be reasonable; don't torment yourself in this
way. Console yourself with the thought that it was not without a hard
struggle he was able to conquer himself; that he has not deceived you;
that he loves you with his whole soul, but that God and his duty come
first. This life is short, and soon passes. In heaven you will be
reunited, and will love each other, as the angels love. God will accept
your sacrifice; he will reward you, and repay you with interest. Even
your self-love ought to be satisfied. How great must be your merit, when
you have caused a man like Don Luis to waver in his resolution, and even
to sin! How deep must be the wound you have made in his heart! Let this
suffice you. Be generous! be courageous! Be his rival in firmness. Let
him depart; cast out from your heart the fire of impure love; love him
as your neighbor, for the love of God. Guard his image in your memory,
but as that of the creature, reserving to the Creator the noblest part
of your soul. I know not what I am saying to you, my child, for I am
very much troubled; but you have a great deal of intelligence and a
great deal of common sense, and you will understand what I mean.
Besides, there are powerful worldly reasons against this absurd love,
even if the vocation and the vow of Don Luis were not opposed to it. His
father is your suitor. He aspires to your hand, even though you do not
love him. Does it look well that the son should turn out now to be the
rival of his father? Will not the father be displeased with the son for
loving you? See how dreadful all this is, and control yourself for the
sake of Jesus and his blessed Mother."
"How easy it is to give advice!" returned Pepita, becoming a little
calmer. "How hard for me to follow it, when there is a fierce and
unchained tempest, as it were, raging in my soul! I am afraid I shall go
mad."
"The advice I give you is for your own good. Let Don Luis depart.
Absence is a great remedy for the malady of love. In giving himself up
to his studies, and consecrating himself to the service of the altar, he
will be cured of his passion. When he is far away, you will recover your
serenity by degrees, and will preserve in your memory only a grateful
and melancholy recollection of him that will do you no harm. It will be
like a beautiful poem whose music will harmonize your existence. Even if
all your desires could be fulfilled--earthly love lasts, after all, but
a short time. The delight the imagination anticipates in its
enjoyment--what is it in comparison with the bitter dregs that remain
behind, when the cup has been drained to the bottom? How much better is
it that your love, hardly yet contaminated, hardly despoiled of its
purity, should be dissipated, and exhale itself now, rising up to heaven
like a cloud of incense, than that, after it is once satisfied, it
should perish through satiety! Have the courage to put away from your
lips the cup while you have hardly tasted of its contents. Make of them
a libation and an offering to the Divine Redeemer. He will give you, in
exchange, the draught he offered to the Samaritan--a draught that does
not satiate, that quenches the thirst, and that produces eternal life."
"How good you are, father! Your holy words lend me courage. I will
control myself; I will conquer myself. It would be shameful--would it
not?--that Don Luis should be able to control and conquer himself, and
that I should not be able to do so? Let him depart. He is going away the
day after to-morrow; let him go with God's blessing. See his card. He
was here with his father to take leave of me, and I would not receive
him. I do not even want to preserve the poetical remembrance of him of
which you speak. This love has been a nightmare; I will cast it away
from me."
"Good! very good! It is thus that I want to see you--energetic,
courageous."
"Ah, father, God has cast down my pride with this blow. I was insolent
in my arrogance, and the scorn of this man was necessary to my
self-abasement. Could I be more humbled or more resigned than I am now?
Don Luis is right: I am not worthy of him. However great the efforts I
might make, I could not succeed in elevating myself to him and
comprehending him, in putting my spirit into perfect communication with
his. I am a rude country girl, unlearned, uncultured; and he--there is
no science he does not understand, no secret of which he is ignorant, no
region of the intellectual world, however exalted, to which he may not
soar. Thither on the wings of his genius does he mount; and me he leaves
behind in this lower sphere, poor, ignorant woman that I am, incapable
of following him even in my hopes or with my aspirations."
"But, Pepita, for Heaven's sake don't say such things, or think them!
Don Luis does not scorn you because you are ignorant, or because you are
incapable of comprehending him, or for any other of those absurd reasons
that you are stringing together. He goes away because he must fulfill
his obligation toward God; and you should rejoice that he is going away,
for you will then forget your love for him, and God will reward you for
the sacrifice you make."
* * * * *
Pepita, who had left off crying, and had dried her tears with her
handkerchief, answered quietly:
"Very well, father; I shall be very glad of it; I am almost glad now
that he is going away. I long for to-morrow to pass, and for the time to
come when Antoñona shall say to me on wakening, 'Don Luis is gone.' You
shall see then how peace and serenity will spring up again in my heart."
"God grant it may be so!" said the reverend vicar; and, convinced that
he had wrought a miracle and almost cured Pepita's malady, he took leave
of her and went home, unable to repress a certain feeling of vanity at
the thought of the influence he had exercised over the noble spirit of
this charming woman.
Pepita, who had risen as the reverend vicar was about to take his leave,
after she had closed the door, stood for a moment immovable in the
middle of the room, her gaze fixed on space, her eyes tearless. A poet
or an artist, seeing her thus, would have been reminded of Ariadne, as
Catullus describes her, after Theseus has abandoned her on the island
of Naxos. All at once, as if she had but just succeeded in untying the
knot of a cord that was strangling her, Pepita broke into heart-rending
sobs, let loose a torrent of tears, and threw herself down on the tiled
floor of her apartment. There, her face buried in her hands, her hair
unbound, her dress disordered, she continued to sigh and moan.
She might have remained thus for an indefinite time if Antoñona had not
come to her. Antoñona had heard her sobs from without and hurried to her
apartment. When she saw her mistress extended on the floor, Antoñona
gave way to a thousand extravagant expressions of fury.
"Here's a pretty sight!" she cried; "that sneak, that blackguard, that
old fool, what a way he has to console his friends! I shouldn't wonder
if he has committed some piece of barbarity--given a couple of kicks to
this poor child, perhaps; and now I suppose he has gone back to the
church to get everything ready to sing the funeral chant, and sprinkle
her with hyssop, and bury her out of sight without more ado."
Antoñona was about forty, and a hard worker--energetic, and stronger
than many a laborer. She often lifted up, with scarcely more than the
strength of her hand, a skin of oil or of wine, weighing nearly ninety
pounds, and placed it on the back of a mule, or carried a bag of wheat
up to the garret where the grain was kept. Although Pepita was not a
feather, Antoñona now lifted her up in her arms from the floor as if she
had been one, and placed her carefully on the sofa, as though she were
some delicate and precious piece of porcelain that she feared to break.
"What is the meaning of all this?" asked Antoñona. "I wager anything
that drone of a vicar has been preaching you a sermon as bitter as
aloes, and has left you now with your heart torn to pieces with grief."
Pepita continued to weep and sob without answering.
"Come, leave off crying, and tell me what is the matter. What has the
vicar said to you?"
"He said nothing that could offend me," finally answered Pepita.
Then, seeing that Antoñona was waiting anxiously to hear her speak, and
feeling the need of unburdening herself to some one who could sympathize
more fully with her, and, humanly speaking, could better comprehend her
than the vicar, Pepita spoke as follows:
"The reverend vicar has admonished me gently to repent of my sins; to
allow Don Luis to go away; to rejoice at his departure; to forget him. I
have said yes to everything; I have promised him to rejoice at Don
Luis's departure; I have tried to forget him, and even to hate him. But
look you, Antoñona, I can not; it is an undertaking superior to my
strength. While the vicar was here, I thought I had strength for
everything; but no sooner had he gone than, as if God had let go his
hold of me, I lost my courage, and fell, crushed with sorrow, on the
floor. I had dreamed of a happy life at the side of the man I love; I
already saw myself elevated to him by the miraculous power of love; my
poor mind in perfect communion with his sublime intellect; my will one
with his; both thinking the same thought; our hearts beating in unison.
And now God has taken him away from me, and I am left alone, without
hope or consolation. Is not this frightful? The arguments of the
reverend vicar are just and full of wisdom; for the time, they convinced
me. But he has gone away, and all those arguments now seem to me
worthless--a tissue of words, lies, entanglements, and sophistries. I
love Don Luis, and this argument is more powerful than all other
arguments put together. And if he loves me in return, why does he not
leave everything and come to me, break the vows he has taken, and
renounce the obligations he has contracted? I did not know what love
was; now I know; there is nothing stronger on earth or in heaven. What
would I not do for Don Luis? And he--he does nothing for me! Perhaps he
does not love me. No; Don Luis does not love me. I have deceived
myself; I was blinded by vanity. If Don Luis loved me, he would
sacrifice his plans, his vows, his fame, his aspirations to be a saint
and a light of the Church, he would sacrifice all to me. God forgive me,
what I am about to say is horrible, but I feel it here in the depths of
my heart, it burns here in my fevered brow: for him I would give even
the salvation of my soul!"
"Holy Virgin!" exclaimed Antoñona.
"It is true; may our blessed Lady of Sorrows pardon me--I am mad--I know
not what I say. I blaspheme!"
"Yes, child; you are talking indeed a little naughtily. Heaven help us!
To think how this cox-comb of a theologian has turned your head! Well,
if I were in your place, I would not take Heaven to task, which is in no
wise to blame, but this jackanapes of a collegian, and I would have it
out with him, or never again call myself Pepita Ximenez. I should like
to go hunt him up, and bring him here to you by the ear, and make him go
down on his knees before you, and beg your pardon."
"No, Antoñona; I see that my madness is contagious, and that you are
raving, too. There is, in fact, nothing left for me to do but what the
reverend vicar advises. And I will do it, even though it should cost me
my life. If I die for him, he will then love me; he will cherish my
image in his memory, my love in his heart; and God, who is so good, will
permit me to see him again in heaven with the eyes of the soul, and will
let our spirits mingle together and love each other there."
Antoñona, although of a rugged nature, and not at all sentimental, on
hearing these words felt the tears start to her eyes.
"Good gracious, child!" she said; "do you want to make me take out my
handkerchief and begin to bellow like a calf? Calm yourself, and don't
talk about dying, even in jest. I can see that your nerves are very much
excited. Shan't I bring you a cup of linden tea?"
"No, thanks; leave me; you see how calm I am now."
"I shall close the window, then, to see if you can sleep. How should you
feel well, when you have not slept for days? The devil take that same
Don Luis, with his fancy for making himself a priest! A nice price you
are paying for it!"
Pepita had closed her eyes; she was calm and silent, weary now of her
colloquy with Antoñona.
The latter, either thinking she was asleep, or hoping her to be so, bent
over Pepita, imprinted a kiss softly and slowly on her white forehead,
smoothed oat the folds of her dress, arranged the windows so as to leave
the room in semi-obscurity, and went out on tiptoe, closing the door
behind her without making the slightest noise.
* * * * *
While these things were taking place at the house of Pepita, Don Luis de
Vargas in his was neither happier nor more tranquil than was she
herself.
His father, who scarcely let a day pass without riding out into the
country, had to-day wished to take Don Luis with him; but, with the
pretext of a headache, he had excused himself, and Don Pedro had gone
without him. Don Luis had spent the whole morning alone, delivered up to
his melancholy thoughts, and continuing firm as a rock in his resolution
of blotting from his soul the image of Pepita, and of consecrating
himself wholly to God.
Let it not be supposed, however, that he did not love the young widow.
We have already, in his letters, seen the proof of the vehemence of his
passion for her, but he continued his efforts to curb it by means of the
devout sentiments and elevated reflections of which he has given us in
his letters so extended a specimen, and of which we may here omit a
repetition, in order not to appear prolix.
Perhaps, if we examine into this matter closely, we shall find that the
reasons which militated in the breast of Don Luis against his love for
Pepita were not only his vow to himself, which, though unconfirmed, was
binding in his eyes, or the love of God, or respect for his father,
whose rival he did not wish to be, or, finally, the vocation which he
felt himself to have for the priesthood. There were other reasons of a
more doubtful character than these.
Don Luis was stubborn; he was obstinate; he had that quality of soul
which, well directed, constitutes what is called firmness of character,
and there was nothing that lowered him more in his own eyes than to feel
himself obliged to change his opinions or his conduct. The purpose of
his life, a purpose which he had declared and maintained on all
occasions, his moral ideal, in a word, was that of an aspirant to
holiness, of a man consecrated to God, of one imbued with the sublimest
religious teachings. All this could not fall to earth, as it would fall,
if he allowed himself to be carried away by his love for Pepita, without
great discredit. Although the price, indeed, was in this case
incomparably higher, yet Don Luis felt that, should he yield to his
passion, he would be following the example of Esau, selling his
birthright and bringing opprobrium on his name.
Men, as a rule, allow themselves to be the plaything of circumstances;
they let themselves be carried along by the current of events, instead
of devoting all their energies to one single aim. We do not choose our
part in life, but accept and play the part allotted us, that which blind
fortune assigns to us. The profession, the political faith, the entire
life of many men depend on chance circumstances, on what is fortuitous,
on the caprice and the unexpected turns of fate.
Against all this the pride of Don Luis rebelled with titanic power. What
would be thought of him, and above all, what would he think of himself
if the ideal of his life, the new man that he had created in his soul,
if all his plans of virtue, of honor, and even of holy ambition, should
vanish in an instant, should melt away in the warmth of a glance, at the
fugitive flame of a pair of beautiful eyes, as the hoar-frost melts in
the yet mild ray of the morning sun?
These and other reasons of a like egotistic nature also militated, in
the breast of Don Luis, side by side with more weighty and legitimate
ones, against the widow; but every argument clothed itself in the same
religious garb, so that Don Luis himself was unable to recognize and
distinguish between them, believing to be the love of God not only what
was in truth the love of God, but also self-love. He recalled to mind,
for instance, the examples of many saints who had resisted greater
temptations than his, and he did not wish to be less than they. And he
recalled to mind, above all, the notable firmness of St. Chrysostom, who
was able to disregard the caresses of a tender and good mother, and her
tears and gentle entreaties, and all the eloquent and touching words she
spoke to him, in the very room where he was born, to the end that he
might not abandon her and become a priest. And, after reflecting on
this, Don Luis could not tolerate in himself the weakness of being
unable to scorn the entreaties of a woman who was a stranger to him,
whom he had known for so short a time, and of still wavering between his
duty and the attractions of one who was, perhaps, after all, rather than
enamored of him, merely a coquette.
Don Luis then reflected on the supreme elevation of the sacerdotal
dignity to which he was called, regarding it in his thoughts as superior
to all the dignities and unsatisfying honors of the world; since it was
founded, neither by any mortal man, nor by the caprice of the variable
and servile populace, nor by the irruption or invasion of barbarians,
nor by the violence of rebellious armies urged on by greed, nor by angel
nor archangel, nor by any created power, but by the Paraclete himself.
How, for a motive so unworthy, for a mere woman, for a tear or two,
feigned, perhaps, scorn that august dignity, that authority that was not
conceded by God even to the archangels nearest to his throne? How
should he descend to be confounded among the obscure people, and become
one of the flock--he who had dreamed of being the shepherd, tying and
untying on earth what God should tie and untie in heaven, pardoning
sins, regenerating the people by water and by the spirit, teaching them
in the name of an infallible authority, pronouncing judgments that
should be ratified and confirmed by the Lord of the heavens--he, the
instructor and the minister in tremendous mysteries inscrutable by human
reason, calling down from heaven, not, like Elias, the flame that
consumes the victim, but the Holy Spirit, the Word made flesh, the river
of grace that purifies hearts and makes them clean like unalloyed gold?
When Don Luis let his mind dwell on these thoughts, his spirit took
wings and soared up above the clouds into the empyrean, and poor Pepita
Ximenez remained below, far away, and hardly within sight.
But the wings of his imagination soon drooped, and the spirit of Don
Luis touched earth again. Again he saw Pepita, so graceful, so young, so
ingenuous, and so enamored. Pepita combated in his soul his firmest and
most deep-seated resolutions, and Don Luis feared that in the end she
would put them all to flight.
In this way was Don Luis allowing himself to be tormented by opposing
thoughts, that made war on each other, when Currito, without asking
leave or license, entered his room.
Currito, who had held his cousin in very slight esteem so long as he was
only a student of theology, now regarded him with wonder and veneration,
looking upon him, from the moment when he had seen him manage Lucero so
skillfully, as something more than human.
To know theology, and to be ignorant of horsemanship, was something
unflattering to Don Luis in the eyes of Currito; but when Currito saw
that, in addition to his learning, and to all those other matters of
which he himself knew nothing, although he supposed them to be difficult
and perplexing, Don Luis knew, besides, how to keep his seat so
admirably on the back of a fiery horse, his veneration and his affection
for his cousin knew no bounds. Currito was an idler, a good-for-nothing,
a very block of wood, but he had an affectionate and loyal heart.
To Don Luis, who was the idol of Currito, happened what happens to all
superior natures when inferior persons take a liking to them. Don Luis
permitted himself to be loved, that is to say, he was governed
despotically by Currito in matters of little importance. And, as for men
like Don Luis there are hardly any matters of importance in common
daily life, the result was that Don Luis was led about by Currito like a
little dog.
"I have come for you," the latter said, "to take you with me to the
club-house, which is full of people to-day, and presents a very animated
appearance. What is the use of sitting here longer, gazing into vacancy,
as if you were waiting to catch flies?"
Don Luis, without offering any resistance, and as if these words were a
command, took his hat and cane, and saying, "Let us go wherever you
wish," followed Currito, who led the way, very well pleased with the
influence he exercised over his cousin.
The club-house was full of people, owing to the festivities of the
morrow, which was St. John's day. Besides the gentry of the village,
many strangers were there, who had come in from the neighboring villages
to be present at the fair and the vigil in the evening.