AVE CONCHA IMPERATRIX!
Thus ended the princely Abbey and its inmates. And so it stands unto
this day, a desolation of charred beams, desecrated altars, fire-scarred
walls roofless and weed o'ergrown, to witness if I lie. Time hath
scarcely yet set its least finger-mark upon it. Under the white-hot
southern sun and in that dry upland air, Montblanch may remain with
scarce a change for many a hundred years. Ezquerra's hammer strokes are
plain on the stones. The crowbar holes wherewith El Sarria drove out the
flagstones over the torture chamber--once called the Place of the Holy
Office--these any man may see who chooses to journey thither on
mule-back, jolting _tartana_, or by the plain-song office of
heel-and-toe.
As to the brethren, they had had, thanks to Rollo Blair, due and
sufficient warning. They mounted their white mules and rode over the
mountains into France, by a secret way long settled upon and laid with
friendly relays of food and equipage.
Only the Father-Confessor, the gloomy and fanatic Anselmo, was found
dead in his bed, whether from the excitement of reviving his ancient
functions of Inquisitor-in-Chief, or from poison self-administered was
never rightly known or indeed inquired into. Men had other things to
think of in those days.
His body was hastily huddled into a grave in the cloister, where,
equally with those of mitred priors and nobles of twenty descents, you
may see the wild roses clambering about it in the spring.
On the day which followed the great spoliation, a man limped painfully
and slowly along the ravine beneath the still smouldering turrets and
gables of Montblanch. From the despoiled Abbey a thin blue reek
disengaged itself lazily into the air far above him. The man was
following a path which passed along the side of the deep cleft. His
method of advance was at once skulking and arrogant.
Thirty yards or so beneath him he saw a congregation of vultures, the
national and authorised scavengers of Spain. So thickly did these unholy
fowls cluster that the man, being evidently curious, was compelled to
throw several stones among them, before he could induce them to move
that he might catch a glimpse of their quarry.
Then having made his observation, he said, "Ah, brother Luis, you that
were so clever and despised poor Tomas, giving him ever the rough word
and the bitter jest, hath not that same poor Tomas somewhat the best of
it now? He at least shall not be meat for vultures yet awhile. No, he
will drink many good draughts yet--that is, when he hath sold the
freehold of the mill and disposed of any outlying properties that are
left. Luis liked red wine, I liked white--and _aguardiente_. Ha, ha,
Luis will never again taste the flavour of the _Val-de-penas_ he was so
fond of, and so the more will be left for Tomas!"
He stood and meditated awhile. Then he struck his pockets lugubriously.
"I wish I had a cup of good _aguardiente_ now," he muttered. Anon his
face brightened, as he looked at the dark object among the vulture folk.
"_Caramba!_ I have it. It will help me over a difficulty. Brother Luis's
pockets were always well lined. The birds have no need of golden ounces
nor do they carry off silver _duros_. Besides, there is the key of the
strong box hidden in the ravine! Ah, I remember that he carried it about
his neck. These can do no good now to Luis, or indeed, for the matter of
that, to any vulture alive. It were only kind and fraternal to take such
things for a keepsake. I ever loved Luis. He was my favourite brother!"
So saying, Don Tomas descended slowly and painfully to the body--for
indeed he had been roughly used by the mob before they brought him to El
Sarria, that the outlaw might do with him as with his brother. For they
wanted to see the sight.
The vultures slowly and reluctantly withdrew on heavily flapping
pinions.
"Ah," meditated Tomas, as he went placidly about his gruesome business,
"what a fine thing it is to be known for a man quiet and harmless. For
Ramon Garcia said to me with a wave of his hand, 'There is the door! Get
through it hastily and let me see your face no more!' Then to the robber
crew he said, 'Without his brother, senors, this fellow is as a serpent
without the fangs, harmless as a blade of grass among the stones which
the goats nibble as they wag their beards.'"
So after a pause this most respectable man finished his task and went
his way, jingling full pockets and pleasing himself with meditations
upon the abiding usefulness of a good character and of being in all
things blameless, humble, and a man of peace.
* * * * *
There dwells an old peasant now at Montblanch who will act as your guide
for a _real_, and points you out the place before the great altar where
Ramon Garcia, sometime called El Sarria, cast himself down. Then he
shows you where the Abbot stood when he stopped the pursuit of the
outlaw to his own ultimate undoing.
"Yes, Excellency," he says, in a voice like green frogs croaking in the
spring, "true it is as the sermon preached last Easter Day. For these
dim old eyes saw it--also the chamber of the relics I will show you, and
the cloisters with the grave of the Father-Confessor Anselmo.
"And truly the devil's own work I have to keep that same reverend and
undefiled, for Anselmo was a man much hated. Yet as I think unjustly,
being mad and at the last not rightly responsible for his acts. But only
a stout stick will convince these young demons of the village that
thrice-blessed ground is not a draught-house wherein to play their evil
cantrips! I declare to the Virgin I have worn out an entire plantation
of saplings chasing them forth of the holy place."
Last of all (but this will cost another _real_ and is worth the money)
the peasant-guide shows you the Place of the Holy Office. That black
stain against the wall is where they burnt the last rack in Spain. One
or two great wooden wheels with scarce a spoke remaining, loom up,
imagined rather than seen, in the dusky shadows above.
"This way along a passage (take care of your honourable head!) and I
will show you the window from which Luis Fernandez was cast forth like
the evil spawn he was."
"And was anything ever heard thereafter of the Prior or the Brethren?"
you ask, looking around on all the wasted splendour.
The old man shakes his head, but there is something in his eye which, if
you are wise, causes you to slip him a piece of silver.
"Nothing more," he says, "nothing!"
Then looking about him cautiously, he adds, "But upon a certain evening
near the time of sundown there came one all clad in poor garments of
leather, worn and frayed. He wore a broad hat and the names of many holy
places were cut on his staff--altogether such a wandering pilgrim the
man was, as you may see at any fair in Spain. And very humbly the
penitent asked permission of me to view the ruins. So knowing him for a
pilgrim and thinking that perchance he desired to say a prayer in peace
before the great altar (and also because I had no expectations of a
gift), I let him go his way unattended, and so forgat about him. But
when I came up out of my vegetable garden a little after sunset to close
the great gate, such being the order of the Governor of the Province who
pays me a yearly stipend (four duros it is, and very little, but I
depend upon the generous charity of those who like your Excellency come
hither!)--well, as I say, coming out of my pottage garden I remembered
of this pilgrim. I went in search of him, and lo! he stood weeping in
the place where the Abbot's great chair had been.
"Then looked I full in his face and all at once I knew him. It was Don
Baltasar Varela--of a surety the last Abbot of Montblanch. There was no
mistake. For many years I had known him as well as I knew my old dame.
And through his tears he also knew that I knew him. So he said
presently, 'Reveal not that I came hither, and I will give
thee--this--together with my blessing!' And with one hand he gave me a
golden ounce worth sixty _pesetas_ and more in these bad times. And with
the other, as I kneeled down (for I am a good Christian), he bestowed
upon me his episcopal blessing with two fingers outstretched, being as
you remember a bishop as well as an Abbot! Then after he had stood
awhile and the sun was quite gone down, Baltasar Varela, Abbot of
Montblanch--the last they say of eighty-four, went out into the
darkness, weeping very bitterly."
* * * * *
With the after history of the Queens Maria Cristina and Isabel the
Second, this historian is not concerned. Nor is it his to tell how,
greatly wronged and greatly tempted, the daughter followed all too
closely in the footsteps of her mother. Such things belong to history,
and especially to Spanish history--which, because of its contradictions
and pitiful humanities, is the most puzzling in the world. His business
is other and simpler.
For a moment only he must lift the curtain, or rather a corner of
it--like one who from the stage desires to see how the house is filling,
or perchance to give the carpet a final tug for the characters to pair
off upon and make their farewell bows.
* * * * *
In another southern province far enough from the village of Sarria,
there is a white house with sentinels before it. They do not slouch as
they walk nor lean bent-backed against a pillar when nobody is looking,
as is the wont of Spanish sentries elsewhere. It is the house of the
Governor of the once turbulent province of Valencia. The Governor is
one General Blair, Duke of Castellon del Mar, and twice-hatted grandee
of Spain, but he is still known from Murcia even to Tarragona as "Don
Rollo." For he has cleared the southern countries of Carlists, put down
the Red Republicans of Valencia and Cartagena with jovial good humour,
breaking their heads affectionately with his stout oak staff when they
rioted. They had grown accustomed to being shot in batches, and rather
resented the change at first, as reflecting on their seriousness.
However, they have since come to understand the firebrand General and to
like him. Usually they favour him with a private message a day or two
before they intend to make a revolution. Whereupon Rollo goes himself
into the woods and cuts himself a new stick of satisfactory proportions.
In this manner he has survived an abdication, two dictatorships, and a
restoration with undiminished credit, chiefly by holding his province
easily and asking from Madrid neither reinforcements of soldiers nor of
money.
His wife is not receiving to-day, but in English fashion there are a few
friends who drop in for dinner, _habitues_ of the house, beloved
comrades of Don Rollo's with whom (for the Senora is the old Concha
still) his wife flirts a little, chats a great deal, and gives the best
advice in return for boundless admiration and delight in her beauty and
wit.
"Dolores," she says to a friend who has arrived and sits patiently
folding her little hands on a sofa, "it was pretty of you to come in
such a lovely gown--just to please those poor old bachelors. Here,
Etienne, hold the baby, and be sure not to drop him, sir. There--what
did I tell you? You have made him cry! Monster! Well, he shall be sent
away, sweetest pet, that he shall! He is a buffalo of the _marisma_, a
tiger of the jungle, an ogre out of a story book--that he is, sweetest!
There, La Giralda, take the darling away! Oh, and give him--but stay--I
too will come, else the little villain may howl till midnight."
She continues to talk quickly as she goes toward the door.
"What a voice--just like his father's when he is in the place of arms
and the men do not please him! There--sweetest" (she goes behind the
curtain), "there----!"
And, contented, the young man stills that parade voice of his into
gentle murmurings like those of a bee within the bell of a flower.
Presently a tall young man comes striding in, in a plain uniform with
the starred shoulder-straps of the highest rank. Behind him is a
broad-chested, deep-bearded veteran, his chest blazing with decorations.
The younger man, whose hair gives promise of early threads of grey,
enters with swift impetuosity, dashing a chance servitor out of the way
and opening the inner door as if a gust of wind had come rioting through
the corridors.
"Where is Concha?" he cries as soon as he enters.
"Here!" replies a voice, a little muffled, it is true, from a
neighbouring room; "no, stay where you are! I shall be back in a
moment."
"Ah, Etienne--John, how are you? Have they given you any breakfast?
Etienne, any more loves? There are four pretty girls in the Plaza
Villarasa. I saw them on the balcony as I rode through with the Sagunto
regiment the other day----"
"Trust him for that!" comes the voice from behind the curtain.
"My Lord Duke," says Etienne in a master-of-ceremonies' voice, "so long
as I am permitted daily to gaze upon the beauty of your incomparable
wife, how can this heart turn from that to the admiration of any meaner
object?"
"What nonsense is he talking now?" asks Concha, returning demurely. "I
know at least three girls of this city of Valencia who have the best
reasons for expecting M. de Saint Pierre to make proposals for the
honour of their hands. But what can you expect of such a wretch?"
"Well, Master Etienne," says Rollo, "you will now have a chance to
forget Mistress Concha and make some fair Castilian happy. For I must
send you immediately with these despatches to Madrid. You will stay a
week and return with the answers. That will give such a lady-killer
ample time to bring matters to a head with the most hard-hearted of the
senoritas of the capital."
"Ah," sighs Etienne, kissing a hand to Concha, as he prepares to take
his leave, "your husband wrongs me. He who hath so much, misjudges me
who have so little! Truly, I shall be soon able to say, turning about
the old catch:
"'_My soul is in Valencia,
My body is in Madrid!_'"
"Well, John, this is great seeing," said Rollo, when Etienne had
departed to busy himself about horses and an escort; "what in the world
has brought you hither? Surely your father cannot want you to make
another thousand pounds in order that you may have the right to attend
his twirling spindles from 8.30 every morning to 5.30 every night?"
"Oh, I am a partner now," Mortimer answered, "even though the old boy
insisted upon pocketing every penny of the profit on the Abbot's
_Priorato_. Strict man of business, my father! He said it would teach me
in the future to be spry about getting my goods shipped. And when I
explained, he only said that what had been possible for him there in
England, sitting at ease in his arm-chair, ought to have been possible
for me on the spot and with money in my pocket!"
"And what did you do?" asked Rollo, smiling.
"Well, at any rate, I struck him for a commission on my having secured
the order, and the Convent onions were good for the rest. So now I am a
partner in the firm with a good quarter interest."
"And what are you doing here? More onions?" laughed his friend.
John blushed and looked down at the carpet. They had a carpet at the
Governor's house--though in her heart Concha always wants to have it up
when any one comes in lest they should tread upon it.
"No," he said slowly, "the fact is I think you spoiled me a bit for
staying at home, mill hours--and that sort of thing. So now I am to be
foreign agent and buyer. I've been taking lessons in the language, and
if you can put any business in my way, I shall be glad."
Rollo took him to the window by the arm.
"Do you see those fellows?" he demanded.
As he spoke he pointed to a detail of the wiry little Valencian
soldiers in their white undress blouses and _bragas_.
"Now, John," he went on, "I can't get stuff here that won't tear the
first time they do the goose-step or even sneeze extra hard. The
contractors are thieves every man Jack. What can you do for me? I have
twenty thousand of these fellows and lots more coming on, down in the
_huertas_ and rice fields!"
"Heavens!" cried John Mortimer, "this is an order indeed. Wait! I will
let you know my best possible in a moment!"
And he pulled out a notebook crammed with figures.
"I can give you very good terms indeed," he said after a moment.
Concha jumped to her feet and clapped her hands.
"Oh," she cried joyously, "and I know Senor de Mendia, the head of the
Customs. And oh, Rollo, you and he can arrange about getting it through,
and all my dress materials as well. It will be quite an addition to our
income, if Don Juan sells you the stuff cheap!"
For an instant Rollo looked a little indignant and then went up to his
wife and kissed her.
"My dear," he said, "you can never understand! We don't do these things
in our country!"
At which John grinned incredulously.
"I have done business in Glasgow," he said suggestively.
"At any rate," said Rollo, nettled, "_I_ don't do them."
Here Concha pouted adorably, and with her slippered toe kicked a
footstool which certainly was not doing her any harm.
"I am sure we are very poor!" she cried. "I wish that wretch Ezquerra,
whom they have made a General of, had given us much more than he did. I
think you should write to him, Rollo!"
"Better keep friends with Ezquerra," laughed the Governor; "you and I
are rich enough, Concha, and baby shall have an ivory ring to cut his
teeth upon. You shall have one new dress a year, and there are always
enough vegetables in the garden with which to toss you up a salad. Oh,
we shall live, spoilt one, we shall live!"
And he kissed her, not heeding the others.
"But why must we keep in with Ezquerra?" said Concha, still unsatisfied;
"he was an executioner once."
"Well," said Rollo, "the fellow has been at his old trade again, it
seems. He may be Dictator any day now. They say he has ended the war in
the north--murdered fourteen of his own brother Generals and bought
fourteen of the other side. Bravo, Ezquerra, I always knew he would do
something in the fine old style one of these days! But fourteen at a
time is epic, even for Spain!"
"And so the war is ended--well, that is always one good thing anyway!"
said Concha, careless of the means; "come, Dolores, let us go and look
at the babes! These people ache to talk politics. They don't want us. It
is easy to see that!"
So taking the arm of Dolores Garcia (who had glanced once at her husband
when he came in and never looked at him again), little Concha walked to
the door sedately as became a matron and the wife of a grandee. Then in
her old flashing manner she turned about swiftly and from her
finger-tips blew the company a dainty collective kiss.
The curtain closed, leaving the three men all staring after her.
But in another moment it was put aside and Concha's pretty head peeped
out.
"Rollo," she said, softly, "you can come up when you like--when you have
quite finished your politics--just to look at baby. He has not seen you
since morning."