Castro went ahead. It was a narrow passage; our elbows touched the sides
all the way. He struck at his flint regularly, sparks streamed down from
his hand; we felt a freshness, a sense of space, as though we had come
into another world. His voice directed us to turn to the left, then
cried in the dark, “Stand still.” A blue gleam darted after us, and
retired without having done anything against the tenebrous body of
gloom, and the thunder rolled far in, unobstructed, in leisurely,
organ-like peals, as if through an amazingly vast emptiness of a temple.
But where was Castro? We heard snappings, rustlings, mutters; sparks
streamed, now here, now there. We dared not move. There might have been
steep ridges--deep holes in that cavern. And suddenly we discovered him
on all-fours, puffing out his cheeks above a small flame kindled in a
heap of dry sticks and leaves.
It was an abode of darkness, enormous, without sonority. Feeble currents
of air, passing on our faces, gave us a feeling of being in the open air
on a night more black than any known night had been before. One’s voice
lost itself in there without resonance, as if on a plain; the smoke of
our blaze drove aslant, scintillating with red sparks, and went trailing
afar, as if under the clouds of a starless sky. Ultimately, it must have
escaped through some imperceptible crevices in the roof of rock. In
one place, only, the light of the fire illuminated a small part of the
rugged wall, where the shadows of our bodies would surge up, repeating
our movements, and suddenly be gone from our sight. Everywhere else,
pressing upon the reflection of the flames, the blind darkness of the
vault might have extended away for miles and miles.
Castro thought it probable. He made me observe the incline of the floor.
It sloped down deep and far. For miles, no doubt. Nobody could tell;
no one had seen the end of it. This cavern had been known of old.
This brushwood, these dead leaves, that would make a couch for her
Excellency, had been stored for years--perhaps by men who had died
long ago. Look at the dry rot. These large piles of branches were found
stacked up when he first beheld this place. _Caramba!_ What toil! What
fatigue! Let us thank the saints, however.
Nevertheless, he shook his head at the strangeness of it. His cloak,
spread out wide, was drying in the light, while he busied himself with
his hat, turning it before the blaze in both hands, tenderly; and his
tight little figure, lit up in front from head to foot, steamed from
every limb. His round, plump shoulders and gray-shock head smoked
quietly at the top. Suddenly, the fine mesh of wrinkles on his face ran
together, shrinking like a torn cobweb; a spasmodic sound, quite new to
me, was heard. He had laughed.
The warmth of the fire had penetrated our chilled bodies with a feeling
of comfort and repose. Williams’ flask was empty; and this was a new
Castro, mellowed, discoursive, almost genial. It was obvious to me that,
had it not been for him, we two, lost and wandering in the storm, should
have died from exposure and exhaustion--from some accident, perhaps.
On the other hand I had indubitably saved his life, and he had already
thanked me in high-flown language; very grave, but exaggerating the
horrors of his danger, as a woman might have done for the better
expression of gratitude. He had been greatly shocked. Spaniards, as a
race, have never, for all their conquests, been on intimate terms with
the sea. As individuals I have often observed in them, especially in the
lower classes, a sort of dread, a dislike of salt water, mingled with
contempt and fear.
Castro, lifting up his right arm, protested that I had given a proof
of very noble devotion in rushing back for an old man into that black
water. Ough! He shuddered. He had given himself up--_por Dios!_ He
hinted that, at his age, he could not have cared much for life; but
then, drowning in the sea was a death abhorrent to an old Christian. You
died brutally--without absolution, and unable, even, to think of your
sins. He had had his mouth filled with horrid, bitter sand, too. Tfui!
He gave me a thousand thanks. But these English were wonderful in their
way.... Ah! _Caramba!_ They were....
A large protuberance of the rocky floor had been roughly chipped into
the semblance of a seat, God only knows by what hands and in what
forgotten age. Seraphina’s inclined pose, her torn dress, the wet
tresses lying over her shoulders, her homeless aspect, made me think of
a beautiful and miserable gipsy girl drying her hair before a fire. A
little foot advanced, gleamed white on the instep in front of the ruddy
glare; her clasped fingers nursed one raised knee; and, shivering no
longer, her head drooping in still profile, she listened to us, frowning
thoughtfully upon the flames.
In the guise of a beggar-maid, and fair, like a fugitive princess of
romance, she sat concealed in the very heart of her dominions. This
cavern belonged to her, as Castro remarked, and the bay of the sea, and
the earth above our heads, the rolling upland, herds of cattle, fields
of sugar-cane--even as far as the forest away there; the forest itself,
too. And there were on that estate, alone, over two hundred Africans,
he was able to tell us. He boasted of the wealth of the Riegos. Her
Excellency, probably, did not know such details. Two hundred--certainly.
The estate of Don Vincente Salazar was on the other side of the river.
Don Vincente was at present suffering the indignity of a prison for
a small matter of a quarrel with another _caballero_--who had died
lately--and all, he understood, through the intrigues of the prior of
a certain convent; the uncle, they said, of the dead _caballero_. Bah!
There was something to get. These fat friars were like the lean wolves
of Russia--hungry for everything they could see. Never enough, _Cuerpo
de Bios!_ Never enough! Like their good friend who helped them in their
iniquities, the Juez O’Brien, who had been getting rich for years on the
sublime generosity of her Excellency’s blessed father. In the greatness
of his nobility, Don Balthasar of holy memory had every right to be
obstinate.... _Basta!_ He would speak no more; only there is a saying in
Castile that fools and obstinate people make lawyers rich....
“_Vuestra Señoria_,” he cried, checking himself, slapping his breast
penitently, “deign to forgive me. I have been greatly exalted by the
familiarity of the two last men of your house--allowed to speak freely
because of my fidelity.... Alas! Alas!”
Seraphina, on the other side of the fire, made a vague gesture, and took
her chin in her hand without looking at him.
“Patience,” he mumbled to himself very audibly. “He is rich, this
picaro, O’Brien. But there is, also, a proverb--that no riches shall
avail in the day of vengeance.”
Noticing that we had begun to whisper together, he threw himself before
the fire, and was silent.
“Promise me one thing, Juan,” murmured Seraphina.