ANTIQUITIES
“Paulette,” Patty spoke from the pillows against which she lay, her
arms over her head. Her dark hair had dropped in a dusky coil over
the white covers, her eyes were full of mischief. “I’ve decided to be
generous and let you have the old don. Fancy your living in a twelfth
century palace and having precious old gold cups to drink from with
wonderful old jewelry to wear.”
“Bah!” exclaimed Paulette, “I want no old man. You are quite welcome
to your twelfth century palace. I prefer a younger house wiz a younger
man.”
“That is because you have not judgment enough to make the most of your
opportunities. It is not every day given a girl to meet a wealthy
grandee of Spain who owns more land than anyone else for miles around,
has half a dozen old palaces, coaches and such things to burn, and
who, moreover, belongs to one of the oldest families in the country. I
am surprised, Paulette. I thought I had brought you up better than to
scorn such wonderful gifts.”
“But, _ma chère_, you forget one very important sing.”
“And what may that be?”
“Suppose the gentleman prefaire my friend Pattee and do not fix the eye
upon me?”
“Then all you have to do is to make him fix the eye upon you. As if any
man turned to black hair when golden locks come within his range of
vision. Fancy a coach and four with outriders! They say that is the way
he rides about the country.”
“Oh, zey say, zey say a great many sings. I am not content to sit in ze
coach wiz ze old man; zat is not enough for me. When is he to arrive,
zis prince?”
“He isn’t a prince, he is simply a blue-blood don, and he has already
arrived. I saw the back of his head as he was about to ride away
yesterday. He didn’t come in his coach and four but on horseback. He
is rather small for his age which is somewhere near seventy, he has
dispensed with some of his hair in the course of time, but is brisk and
natty. He mounted his horse with great agility and I should say that he
was good for at least ten years.”
“He is a vidow?”
“No, my dear, he couldn’t be under any circumstances. I believe he is
a bachelor. He has invited us all to lunch to-day and then I shall see
you weaken before the wonders of his palace. They say he spends most
of his time viewing his estates and indulging a fancy for antiques;
would we were older! He has a manager or superintendent or _mayordomo_,
or whatever you may call it, with men under him, and they say he has
so much property he doesn’t recognize his own when he meets it on the
road. It must be rather nice when you drive along and remark upon some
particularly attractive place to have your agent say: ‘That belongs to
you, sire.’ It is said that often happens in Don Felipe’s case. See
how much information I have gathered for your benefit. What Tina could
not tell me Juan was able to, as the Estradas and Velascos have been
neighbors for centuries.”
“So kind you are, and how much of this information did you gather for
yourself?”
“Only so much as would make me an intelligent guest to-day when we go
to the _palacio_ to lunch. It will not be a mere _merienda_, Paulette,
but a state affair when I hope all the gold dishes will be put to use
and you will be sufficiently impressed with the magnificence of your
future _ménage_.”
“La-la-la, how you take it all for granted. So large an imagination you
have. Perhaps I spur-rn it all and desire the love in a cottage.”
“Ah-h!” Patty sprang from the bed, turned Paulette’s face toward the
light and regarded her fixedly, then she smiled. “Well, my dear, all
I know is you won’t have to live in a hovel. With your income you
could even afford something approaching what they call a palace in
this land. Yet, I hate to see the coach and four and the gold dishes
go to waste.”
“Zen vy not take zem yourself, if zey are so easy to be procured?”
“Ah, why? That is what I don’t know. I rather imagine it is because
like yourself, love in a cottage appeals to my youthful fancy more
forcibly. However, one can never tell. I may fall on my knees and
adore when I see the twelfth century palace. I almost wish you had a
decided yearning for it. A real well-established rivalry would be most
exciting, and might spur me on to use my most fetching blandishments.”
“What nonsense are you girls talking?” said Doña Martina, putting her
head in at the door.
“Oh, we’re only discussing Don Felipe.”
“Quarreling already over the possession of him?”
“Yes, but not exactly in a way which would flatter his don-ship. Each
is trying to sacrifice herself for the good of the other; I want to
give him to Paulette with my blessing while she insists that I shall
take him. Queer, isn’t it?”
“You certainly must have great confidence in your own charms. A man
who has withstood the attractions of women, young and old, for half a
century isn’t likely to succumb to two chits like you,” returned Doña
Martina, “and you might as well spare yourself further argument.”
“Now since you say that I believe I have received the necessary
impetus,” said Patty. “Conceive of the glory it would be to storm a
fort which has held out against all former assaults and to have it
surrender to you. I have decided, Polly; you can’t have him. Mine be
the palaces, the coaches, the gold and silver, the jewels rare. ‘They
say I may marry the laird if I will,’” she sang, dropping into a
Spanish dance.
“Isn’t she silly?” asked Doña Martina. “We know just how much of what
she is saying she means.”
“Wait till this afternoon,” said Patty, pausing in her dance. “I am
going to find Juan, you two can entertain one another till I get back.”
“She is not half so frivolous as she seems,” remarked Doña Martina,
when Patty left the room. “She has much good sense and you should see
her rise to an emergency.”
“She is so glad to be free of convent life; I sink it zat reason
which makes her volatile,” returned Paulette, “but I know her serious
and earnest, too. I see zat side at times. She says many sings to be
talking. As you Americans say, she speaks by ze hat.”
Doña Martina laughed. “That is quite true, Paulette.”
“She is so good company. All ze girls like her, and ze sisters look
over many sings zey will not excuse in ozzers, for she is so studious,
so alert. Zey say, ‘Ah, zat Mademoiselle Blake, she is American, she
does not know better,’ and we all smile for we understand. It is Patty
and zat is sufficient for us.”
“I can understand, too,” said Doña Martina. “I try to be severe with
her and she turns my own weapons against me. She can already wheedle
Juan into anything, and as for Tomás.”
“Ah, zat young man”--began Paulette.
“What were you going to say?” asked Doña Martina, seeing that she did
not go on.
“Only zat he is a very amiable young man, zat was all.”
Doña Martina looked puzzled but did not pursue the subject. Instead she
proposed that they join Patty and Don Juan who were sitting under the
big tree at the side of the _plaza_.
As the two passed out Matilda stopped to give them a hearty greeting in
her boisterous tones, Rosario looked up from her embroidery frame with
a shy smile, and Consuelo coming from the bakery across the way with
some little twisted loaves in a basket, fairly beamed when the ladies
gave her a word in Spanish. A large wagon drawn by mules in jingling
harness, had stopped before the door; men were unloading pigskins of
wine and were joking heartily with Matilda. Doña Martina and Paulette
waited for two creaking cow-carts to pass before they crossed the
road to the big tree. The carts were led by somber-looking men with
long goads laid across the shoulders. A touch of the goad between the
horns of the cows sufficed to guide them. The patient creatures with
a sheepskin pad to hold the yoke and a red fringe over their eyes to
protect them from insects, plodded along slowly.
“Will they ever get there?” said Patty, looking after them. “I don’t
wonder it is considered inelegant to walk briskly in this country when
even the teams creep along like that.”
“I have seen donkeys go at quite a trotting pace,” said Paulette.
“So have I, and you, too, would go at a trotting pace if you had a
hatpin jabbed into you at every step. I saw a girl this morning taking
that very means of making her poor little donkey go faster.”
“I wish I had seen her,” said Don Juan, fiercely. “I would have stopped
that business fast enough.”
“Oh, yes he would,” Doña Martina hastened to say, seeing that Patty
looked incredulous. “He would have rated her soundly. None of them dare
to practise such cruelties when Don Juan is around, I can assure you.
It is time to get ready, Patty, if we are to take the noon train.”
“Don Felipe should have sent his coach for us,” said Patty, rising to
her feet.
“The train will get us there sooner than the coach could.”
“Yes, but there is no haste in Spain, and fancy the glory of riding in
such a magnificent way. Do you prefer milk-white steeds or coal-black
ones, Polly?”
“I prefaire to go in the train,” returned Paulette, scornfully.
“Perhaps you will prefaire to come back in the coach,” said Patty,
mockingly. “Have you decided what to wear, Polly, dear?”
“Ze gown which is ze most unbecoming,” Paulette declared.
“Oh, how silly to appear in your most unbecoming gown before three men,
not to mention the _mayordomo_. I shall wear my very best and outshine
you all. You’d better wear that lovely soft green thing; you look
better in that than in anything else.”
“Perhaps I do,” returned Paulette.
It was but a short distance to the station nearest Don Felipe’s old
_palacio_ and the walk from the railway was a charming one through a
long avenue arched over by great trees. Don Felipe stood on the steps
to meet them, and with old-fashioned dignity and many compliments,
conducted them up a long flight of stone steps which led inside the
house, to the first floor. As the girls ascended, they caught sight of
several carriages on one side of the lower floor and of some half dozen
horses stamping in their stalls on the other.
“How queer,” whispered Patty to her sister. “Do they always keep their
horses and carriages in the basements of the palaces?”
“Sh!” warned Doña Martina. “He knows some English,” and Patty subsided.
They were ushered into a great hall, crowded with wonderful old
furniture, carven chests, chairs and cabinets. On the walls hung dim
but rare old pictures, in the cases in a corridor beyond they caught
sight of collections of painted fans, of jewels, of fine porcelain.
There was scarce an article to be seen which did not possess some
history or which did not represent great antiquity.
Patty flitted from one thing to another, commenting in broken Spanish
on this, going into ecstasies in English over that, pouring out in
voluble French her admiration of something else. Don Felipe spoke
French fluently, and at last this came to be the accepted language,
except when Don Tomás, looking bewildered, would ask for some
explanation or would make the remark, “Shocking! Awful badth form.”
Paulette was scarcely less vivacious than Patty, and her little French
mannerisms, her gestures and exclamations were more pronounced, so
that Don Felipe did not want for enthusiasm in his guests. He led them
from room to room, pausing at last before the floor of a spacious old
kitchen, whose black rafters and dim walls enclosed a scene which Doña
Martina declared she would like to paint. Four or five old women
hovered over the copper and brass vessels which were set over the fire
in the huge fireplace. On the floor lay a watchful dog. Perched high on
a dresser was the house cat. Baskets of vegetables and fruit lent color
to a picture which indeed was well worth painting.
“It is perfectly delightful,” declared Doña Martina for the third or
fourth time. “The whole place is perfectly charming.”
“It is yours, señora,” returned Don Felipe.
“Do you think he would give me a copper kettle, that queer one over
there?” whispered Patty to her sister, who, understanding Spanish
hospitality perfectly, did not take Don Felipe at his word, but
expressed the proper thanks and said that some time she would enjoy
making a sketch.
In the great dining-room a lunch was spread, and as Patty prophesied,
it was served from fine old plate, rare china and costly glass. At the
close of the meal, Don Felipe begged the ladies to keep their coffee
cups as souvenirs. “That you may not forget the old man who has been so
honored by your presence,” he said.
The coach with four black horses bore them home. Don Felipe, his
_mayordomo_ by his side, stood on the steps to wave a last farewell.
Patty looked back at the old gray palace, at the carved balconies,
sculptured escutcheons and windows, around which clung blossoming
vines. “I feel as if I were in a fairy tale,” she murmured. “Really,
Paulette,” she added, “I am quite jealous, for I am sure you have the
finest cup.”
“No, Doña Martina has,” Paulette insisted, and so it proved to be. Don
Felipe was nothing if not discreet in his attentions, and had tried to
show no preference.
“Though,” said Patty plaintively, “I did say he was tiresome when I
meant to ask him if he were tired. I shall never get that frightful
verb _Estar_ in the right place. It all comes of my trying to show
off and compliment Don Felipe in his own language. I shall stick to
French next time. I knew I should get into trouble with your stupid
old language,” she continued, turning to Don Tomás. “I don’t see why
one verb _to be_ isn’t enough for you anyway. I saw you grinning at my
mistake.” The truth being that Don Tomás had kept a perfectly straight
face, although it was impossible for him to hide the amusement in his
eyes. “Don’t you think it was horrid of you?” Patty went on, as if the
entire fault was due to Don Tomás.
“Shocking! Awful badth form,” returned Don Tomás with an attempt at
propitiation.
Then, having wrung this from him, and raised a laugh at his expense,
Patty was satisfied.
“It is all nonsense to pretend that Don Felipe didn’t understand that
you made a perfectly natural mistake,” Doña Martina told her sister. “I
am sure your Spanish isn’t so correct at any time that he couldn’t see
that you meant the other thing.”
“Then I must redouble my efforts to learn,” said Patty calmly. “Tomás
will have to devote more time to me.” So did she retaliate and was
immediately in a better humor.
“Who would ride in a motor car when one can set the whole population
agog by dashing into town in this style?” said Doña Martina as the
equipage rattled up the street and stopped before the _fonda_, the
observed of men, women, and children. Matilda, pleased beyond measure
at the honor, bustled out to meet her guests, the children of the
neighborhood gathered in a group at a respectful distance, while the
girls at the fountain paused in their task of scrubbing their buckets,
to gaze at this display of splendor. Don Felipe’s coach was well known,
though seldom did it stop at the door of any of the villagers.
The next day came three huge bouquets for the ladies from Don Felipe,
and no one could tell which was the more beautiful, though Patty
declared that the presence of a _clavel_ in Paulette’s meant more than
appeared to the uninitiated. “It is you, Polly, I am sure,” she told
her friend. “The _clavel_ is always the token of a young man’s regard.”
“Young man, did I hear you say?”
“Oh, pshaw! Why such distinctions? A Spaniard’s, then. A Spanish man’s
regard. Must I give up that lovely old palace just as I am beginning
to appreciate, and was planning how to make it more cleanly?”
Paulette shrugged her shoulders. “Sillee, Sillee, Sillee,” she chanted.
“There is one thing I can do,” said Patty: “I can go and buy a post
card of the place. Tomás and I saw some last evening, and I shall not
tell you where they are.”
“He will tell me.”
“Oh, will he?” Patty turned and gave Paulette a swift scrutiny.
“I believe you really would rather have the forty-dollar-a-year house
than the twelfth century palace,” she remarked. “What a pity that it
isn’t Tomás who owns the _palacio_, but then, poor old Don Felipe, what
compensation would there be for him? Really, Polly, I made no mistake
in calling him tiresome, and maybe I knew my Spanish better than I
pretended when I said _es cansado_ instead of _esta_. Now I am going to
get the post cards and I shall buy them all so there will be none left
for you.”