"The ungentle sport that oft invites
The Spanish maid and cheers the Spanish swain."
One of Alvar's first occupations was to find a lodging for the
Stanforths, and for one of the Miss Westons, whom they brought with
them, and he succeeded in obtaining a flat in a _casa de pupillos_ or
_pension_, not far from the De la Rosa's, in a picturesque street, with
a pleasant shady sitting-room, where Mr Stanforth could paint. There
was a delightful landlady, Senora Catalina, who went to mass with the
greatest regularity every morning, but afterwards was ready to spend any
part of the day in escorting the ladies wherever they wished to go, only
objecting to Gipsy's dislike to allow her dress to trail on the
pavement, a point on which neither could convince the other, Spanish
ladies considering the looping of the dress improper, and Gipsy not
being able to reconcile herself to the normal condition of the pavements
of Seville. Mr Stanforth, however, frequently accompanied them, and
they did a vast amount of sight-seeing, in which they were joined by the
two Lesters so far as Cheriton's strength would permit; and as sketching
often made Mr Stanforth stationary, Cherry liked to sit by him,
enjoying a great deal of discursive talk on things in general, and
entering with vivid interest into the novelty and beauty around. Cherry
asked a great many more questions about Moorish remains, and
ecclesiastical customs, than Alvar was at all able to answer; and as his
Spanish improved, endeavoured to pick the brains of every one with whom
he came in contact; was so intelligent and so inquisitive about the
arrangement of the different churches, that old Padre Tome, the ladies'
confessor, looked upon him as a possible convert, and though solemnly
warned by Alvar never to talk politics with any one, could not always
resist teasing him by hovering round the subject. He got on very well
with Don Guzman, and listened to a great deal of prosing about the best
way of breeding young bulls for the ring, and about all the varieties of
game to be found on the old gentleman's country estate, and soon
perceived that he had considerably underrated the sporting capacities of
the peninsula. He was not a favourite with Don Manoel, who suspected
himself of being laughed at; and though Dona Luisa was very kind to him,
he was hardly allowed to exchange a word with the young ladies, and to
his great amusement perceived that he was considered likely to follow
his father's example, and make love to them. Little Dolores, however,
was less in bondage to propriety, and became very fond of him, making
vain endeavours to pronounce "Cherry," and teaching him a great deal of
Spanish. Miss Weston, who was a hearty enthusiastic woman, with rather
an overpowering amount of conversation, approved of what she called his
spirit of inquiry, and was possibly not insensible to his good looks and
winning manners. He did not now shrink from home letters, and indeed
spent more time than Alvar thought good for him in replying to Jack's
voluminous disquisitions on his first weeks of Oxford. Alvar thought
that he had entirely recovered his spirits, and indeed Cheriton was one
whose "mind had a thousand eyes," and they let in a good deal of surface
light, though he was himself well aware of colder, darker depths whose
sun had set for ever, and which could only be reached by the slowly
penetrating rays of a far intenser light. Though no word of direct
confidence ever passed between him and Mr Stanforth, the latter knew
perfectly well that mental as well as physical change had been sought in
the sunny south. His health improved considerably, though with many ups
and downs, he felt fairly well, and did not attempt to try the extent of
his powers.
He was very anxious not to be a restraint on Alvar's intercourse with
his friends or on his natural occupations; but except that he sometimes
went to evening parties which Cheriton avoided, Alvar generally
preferred escorting Gipsy and Miss Weston to the tops of all the
buildings which Mr Stanforth sketched from below, or into every corner
of the Alcazar, and every chapel of the cathedral, both of which places
had a wonderful charm for Cheriton.
Miss Stanforth was allowed to make friends with Alvar's cousins. Carmen
and Isabel. She had once gone to a fancy ball, dressed in a mantilla,
and had been told that she looked "very Spanish," with her dark eyes and
hair; a delusion from which she awoke the first time she saw her new
friends dressed for church (they did not wear mantillas often on secular
occasions); and great was their amusement at Gipsy's vain endeavour to
give exactly the becoming twist to the black lace, and to flirt her fan
in the approved style. Gipsy was a bit of a mimic, but she could not
satisfy herself or them.
"It is of no use, Miss Stanforth," said Cheriton, when she complained to
him of her difficulties. "Alvar does not like walking out with me in an
`Ulster' when the wind is cold, so he endeavoured to teach me to wear
one of those marvellous cloaks which they all throw about their
shoulders; but I can only get it over my head, and under my feet, and
everywhere that it ought not to be."
"Well," said Alvar, "you would not let me go to Hazelby in my cloak; you
said that the little boys would laugh at me."
"But a great coat," said Cherry, "is a rational kind of garment that
can't look odd anywhere."
"That is as you think," said Alvar; "but I do not care what you wear, if
you like it. You will not certainly look like a Spaniard even in the
cloak."
"A great coat," said Mr Stanforth, "is one of those graceful garments
which have commended themselves to all ages. I do not know what early
tradition was followed by the inventors of Noah's Arks in the case of
that patriarch--"
"Now, Mr Stanforth, that is too hard," interrupted Cherry. "At least
it has pockets."
"So many," said Alvar, "that what you want is always in another one."
"Alvar, that cloak is your one weakness. You clung to it in England,
and you put it on the moment you landed in Spain."
"Cheriton thinks it is a seal-skin," said Mr Stanforth smiling.
"Seal-skin," said Alvar. "No, it is cloth and silk."
"Did you never hear of the fisherman who married a mermaid, and she
lived happily on shore till she fell in with a seal-skin; when she put
it on, and, forgetting her husband and children, jumped into the sea,
and never came up any more?"
"Ah, no!" said Alvar. "It is only that I want Cherry to be comfortable
while he is down among the fishes."
"I will take to it some day, for the sake of astonishing Jack," said
Cherry. "But, Alvar, those friends of yours last night were very much
interested in my travelling coat, and asked me if it was a Paris
fashion. They put it on, and I tried to get Don Manoel into it; but he
thought it was a heretical sort of affair."
"Cherry, if you laugh at Manoel, he will think you insult him. He hates
Englishmen, and our father especially. He was angry because you gave
the jessamine to Isabel--and--we are polite here to each other; but if
there is what you call a row, it is worse than when every one is sulky
all at once at Oakby."
Cherry looked as if the temptation to provoke this new experience was
nearly irresistible; but Alvar continued to Mr Stanforth,--
"I am glad that Cherito should laugh once more as he used to do; but my
cousin does not understand."
"My dear Alvar, I will content myself with laughing at you; you always
understand a joke, don't you?"
"I do not care if I understand or no. When I see you laughing," said
Alvar simply, "that is good."
Something in this speech so touched Cheriton that his laughter softened
away into a very doubtful smile, and he changed the subject; but he
tried afterwards to propitiate Don Manoel by the most courteous
treatment. The Spaniard did not respond, and he perceived that
contending elements were discordant in Seville as well as in England.
Carmen and Isabel found novelty less distasteful. It is true that they
thought Gipsy's free intercourse with their cousin Alvar and with the
English stranger shocking; but they preferred them to any other subject
of conversation, and Isabel in particular made quite a romance of the
incident of the Cape Jessamine, and how Don Cherito had looked at her
when he gave it to her.
"But why shouldn't he pick a bit of jessamine for you, if you couldn't
reach it for yourself?" asked Gipsy.
"Oh, Manoel said it was an attention."
"Oh dear no," said Gipsy, rather cruelly, "we shouldn't think anything
of it in England. Don Manoel needn't be afraid."
"Oh, but Manoel is terrible. He swore before Don Cherito came that he
would poniard us if we, like our Aunt Maria, listened to a heretic, a
stranger. For Don Giraldo was a wild wicked Englishman, but beautiful
in the extreme; they have no religion, and no morals."
"Isabel!"
"Ah, I tell you what Manoel says. He came, he pretended an accident,
and then Dona Maria married him. Now, he says it is the same with Don
Cherito. An illness--"
"Any one can see that Cheriton Lester is really ill, at any rate."
"Well--Manoel was angry with my grandfather for letting him come, and he
has told Alvar that it should be death before such a marriage. Alvar
told him he knew nothing of his English brother, who loved an English
lady. But Manoel says that what happened once might again happen."
"Isabel," said her sister, "it is wrong to talk of this. If Zingara
repeats it, there will be a quarrel."
"I shall not repeat it," said Gipsy; "but it is all nonsense, I assure
you."
"Ah," said Isabel, "Manoel knows not. He knows not that I love one whom
I have seen at mass, though I know not his name. But with my fan I can
show him--"
"Isabel!" again said the grave Carmen; while Gipsy, who was far too well
bred and well brought up to have made signs in church with anything,
thought that "mass" and "a signal with a fan" sounded interesting, and
that what would have been highly unladylike at home was rather romantic
in Seville.
On their side, Carmen and Isabel thought Gipsy hardly used in being kept
away from the bull-fights, though she was too loyal to her nationality
to express any wish to see them.
Don Manoel was a great lover of the ring, and as certain young bulls
from Don Guzman's estate were to be brought forward at the last
_corrida_ of the season, there was a great desire that the Englishmen
should be present. Mr Stanforth intended to avail himself of the
chance of seeing such a spectacle, and Cheriton, Don Guzman said, might
see one contest, and go away before the other bulls were brought
forward, if he found the fatigue too much for him. They would get seats
on the shady side of the bull-ring, the great amphitheatre said to be
capable of holding ten thousand spectators.
Cheriton, who went against Alvar's wish, did not stay for the end, and
Mr Stanforth went to see if he had repented of the rather perverse
desire to prove himself capable of enduring the spectacle. He found
him, still full of excitement, resting on a sofa in the _patio_; while
Alvar sat near him, smoking, and looking cool and bored, as if the
bull-fight had been a croquet party.
Mr Stanforth's entrance was rather inopportune, for Cherry was still
too full of his impressions not to talk of them, and, in answer to Mr
Stanforth's question, said eagerly,--
"Oh, the heat has tired me--that is nothing. But it made one feel like
a fiend. I felt all the fascination of it--even the horror had a
dreadful sort of attraction. I could not have come away if Alvar had
not pulled me out when I was too dizzy to resist him."
"Very unwholesome fascination," said Mr Stanforth.
"Unwholesome! I should think so! It is abominable that such things
should be. I tell Alvar that in his place I never would encourage an
appeal to the worst passions of human nature."
"Well, you would go, _mi caro_. I told you you would not like it," said
Alvar coolly.
"You should set an example of indignation!"
"I? I do not care what they do to amuse themselves. It does not
interest me, as much, I think, as it did you, my brother."
"No," said Cherry slowly, "I understand a good many things by this. I
should be as bad as any of them. But when a country encourages and
allows such `amusements,' when women look on and like it, one cannot
wonder at Spanish cruelties. It appeals to everything that is bad in
one."
"You insult my country and your hosts! Don Cherito, such language is
unpardonable!" exclaimed an unexpected voice; and Don Manoel came
suddenly forward from one of the curtained doorways, close at hand.
"What right have you, senor, to speak of our ancient customs in terms
like these?"
"I beg your pardon," said Cheriton, after a moment's pause of amazement,
"if I have said anything to annoy you; but--I was not aware that you
were present. I was speaking to my brother."
"Would you insinuate that I disguised my presence?" cried the Spaniard,
with real rage in his tones, and a determination to show it.
Then Alvar fired up with the sudden passion that had always startled his
English kindred.
"How dare you so address my brother! He shall say what he chooses!"
"He shall not--nor you either! You call yourself Spaniard--Andaluz--you
claim rights in Seville, and listen with complacence to the cowardly
scruples--"
Here Alvar broke in with much too rapid Spanish for the Englishmen to
follow, interrupted as it was by Manoel's rejoinder, and by furious
gestures as if the disputants were going to fly at each other's throats,
while Mr Stanforth's mild attempts at interposing with--"Come--come
now; what nonsense! What is all this about?" were entirely unheard.
Meanwhile, Cheriton's previous excitement cooled down completely. He
got up from the sofa, and stepped between them, laying his hand on
Alvar's arm.
"Excuse me, Alvar," he said, in his slow, careful Spanish, "this seems
to be my affair. Senor Don Manoel, will you have the goodness to tell
me why you are offended with me?"
"He called you a coward--you, my brother!"
"My dear fellow, be quiet, don't be an ass." (This in English for
Alvar's benefit.) "Would you tell me what has provoked you?"
"Senor Don Cherito," said Manoel, forced to answer civilly by Cheriton's
coolness--"first, did you mean to insinuate that I listened to your
conversation with my cousin?"
"By no means," said Cherry. "I merely meant to say that I had not seen
you."
"Then I ask you, senor, to repeat or to withdraw the remarks you made
about the bull-fight," said Don Manoel, with the air of delivering an
ultimatum.
"He will not withdraw them!" cried Alvar. "He is no coward!"
"I hope," said Cheriton, "I did nothing to offend. Were I in Don
Manoel's place I should feel, I am sure, as he does. I, too, am
attached to the customs of my country. It is no doubt difficult for a
stranger to judge. If I said the sport was cruel, I did not for a
moment mean to imply that--that--those who see it must be cruel. Excuse
my bad Spanish. I cannot express myself, but--pray let us shake hands."
He smiled, and held out his hand.
"Well, senor, you are Don Guzman de la Rosa's guest. If this is meant
for an apology--"
"For having offended you--yes. Being Don Guzman's guest, I could not
quarrel with his nephew."
"I accept, the apology," said Don Manoel, with much solemnity, and
accepting Cherry's hand.
"But," said Alvar, "you applied an expression to my brother."
"Oh, nonsense, Alvar; you know we never think of `expressions' when we
are angry; and I'm not aware of having had any opportunity of showing
either cowardice or courage."
"H'm," said Mr Stanforth, in English, "a tolerably cool head, I think."
Don Manoel, who appeared to have made up his mind to be magnanimous,
remarked that his expression had been used too hastily to a stranger;
but that a true Spaniard would look on any scene with equanimity.
Cherry's lip curved a little, as if he thought this a doubtful
advantage; but he answered with a laugh,--
"I _am_ a stranger, senor; and besides, I was fatigued."
"Ah," said Manoel, "that amounts to an entire excuse. The expression is
withdrawn."
And with a profound bow to Cheriton, he went away, and Cherry burst out
laughing.
"What in the world did all that mean?" he said. "Did I really offend
his national pride by turning sick at the dying horses?"
"That is not all," said Alvar hurriedly; "he hates the English and us
all; he would like to kill me."
"Ah, ha, Alvar, it is my turn to talk about `excitement' now."
"Well, I do not understand you. When you came home you could not be
still; you seemed crazy. And now, when any gentleman would be enraged,
you laugh."
"Oh, I hate quarrels. And besides," shrugging his shoulders, "why in
the world should I care for such mock-heroics as that?"
"Ah, Cherry," said Mr Stanforth, "there spoke the very essence of
English scorn."
Cheriton coloured.
"True," he said, candidly, "Don Manoel had a right to be angry with me,
after all. But I don't mean it. I dare say he isn't half a bad
fellow."
"Ah, you are coughing. You will be tired out; and I am sure that you
will not sleep," said Alvar. "Come, you shall not talk any more about
anything."
"Very wise advice," said Mr Stanforth, "especially as Gipsy has
persuaded the whole party to come to-morrow to see my sketches, and
drink English `afternoon tea.' So rest now in preparation."
Cheriton paid for his day's work by a bad night and much weariness. Don
Manoel made very polite inquiries after him; but there was something in
the atmosphere that, to quote Alvar, Cherry "did not understand."