IN BARCELONA
In spite of Amparo's pleadings and Doña Prudencia's urgings that they
extend their stay at least another week, nothing would deter Mrs.
Beltrán from starting at once for Barcelona. "You are a mother," she
said to Doña Prudencia; "you know my heart yearns to find my child. I
cannot wait. We might miss him by a day, an hour. No, no, I must go on."
"But you will return," begged Amparo; "say you will return. After your
journeyings you will need a rest."
"Our home is yours," Doña Prudencia told Mrs. Beltrán. "I beg that you,
your son and your daughter will remain with us so long as it may please
you. I do not urge you further at present, but I say return."
Doña Benilda and Rodrigo, no less hospitably inclined, at last insisted
upon accompanying their cousins part way upon the journey, and they
left the little village of Cuesta with good wishes following them.
"_Hasta luego! Hasta que vuelva! Adios! Voy ustedes con Dios!_" were
the last words they heard as they set out upon their walk back to the
little city. From thence they were to return to their inn to pack.
Anselmo was prompt in sending the address he promised, and the next
day they set their faces toward Barcelona. As far as Santander would
Doña Benilda and Rodrigo see them, and then on alone to Barcelona,
through wild mountain scenery, up steep grades, down into picturesque
valleys, across mountain torrents, glimpses of blue sea on one side,
mighty peaks crowned with ancient churches or monasteries on the other.
A different Spain indeed from that of Madrid's brown Castilian plains,
more exciting, more impressive, Anita thought it.
"Shall we find him? Shall we come back?" were the questions which
constantly presented themselves as they sped on. There were long
silences between the mother and daughter during the hours they were
shut in a railway compartment alone. There was so much to wonder at in
the outside world through which they were passing, so much to remember,
so much meat for introspection, that the time passed rapidly. "It seems
incredible that we should have learned to love those dear cousins so
well in such a short time. Were ever such hospitable and truly kind
people? Don't you love them?" said Anita as they turned from waving
adieux to Doña Benilda and Rodrigo.
"I do indeed love them," replied her mother. "My own sisters could not
have shown greater kindness than Benilda and Prudencia."
"One thing puzzles me," Anita spoke after a pause, during which she was
watching from the window to see if she could catch another glimpse of
a tenth-century church perched high on a mountain peak.
"And what is that?" inquired her mother.
"Why did Pilar--it was she of course--why did she write you that she
knew nothing of a Pepé Beltrán from America? That was a number of years
ago, wasn't it? Before he could have been of much assistance? Why
should she not have been willing to give him up?"
"It could not have been more than five years ago that I wrote. It was
only then that I gave up hope of finding him and my husband in America.
It is evident from what we know of Pilar, that she clung tenaciously
to her belief that I had wantonly left my home, and that she was
not disposed to give the slightest information which might lead to
restoring my children to me."
"Dear madre," Anita lifted her mother's hand and kissed it. "How could
anyone who ever knew you believe that you would be so heartless? Do you
think my father really believed you had actually deserted him and us?"
"Not exactly. I cannot believe he thought that much evil of me, but he
probably did really think that I cared no more for him, that I pined
for my own country, my people, even for the companionship of my old
sweetheart. In his pitiful jealousy he wanted to punish me. Oh, I don't
know, I don't know. I scarcely can believe he had any other design.
He was wild in his imaginings, would get worked up into a frenzy of
suspicion against others beside myself. He was never what one might
call a well-balanced person, and at that time was surely not normal.
Jealousy makes one abnormal for the time being."
"That wicked Pilar! If she had but told you the truth, you would have
come right here. You would have found Pepé long ago."
"And have missed finding my daughter."
"Oh, mother, yes, that is a dreadful thought. I wonder if it is wrong
to be glad you found me first."
"My darling, of course not. You must remember that my finding you led
the way for further discovery, led us to this search for Pepé. You
furnished information. You have inspired me with confidence. Your
steadfast belief that we shall find him has given me fresh courage."
"And now, and now," cried Anita exultantly, "we are on our way to him.
Don't you feel that we are?"
"I do have fuller faith than ever before, dear daughter. My baby boy!
He is a grown man, Anita, twenty-one by now. I wonder if he has been
taught to hate me."
"If he has, he will soon do the opposite," returned Anita staunchly.
"Let me but get hold of him, and he will soon understand. Oh, you
precious darling." She flung herself on her mother with ardent
caresses. "It hurts me, it always hurts me to think of what you have
suffered so unjustly. Is there no end to suffering in this life?"
"No end," replied her mother gravely. "We are saved through suffering.
That is its lesson. And great joy and peace comes from endurance, from
strength acquired."
Anita sighed. From her youthful outlook it was hard to realize that
suffering could be else than an evil. She changed the subject. "Do you
know where we are to stop in Barcelona?"
"I have the address of a good and quiet boarding place which that good
Benilda procured for me from one of her friends. It is not in the heart
of the city but in one of the suburbs, is quite Spanish and not high
priced. If we need to be in the city for any length of time it will
be a safe and comfortable harborage, for from there we can pursue our
investigations, and feel that we are not at undue expense."
"Suppose we find Pepé at once, that same day?"
Mrs. Beltrán covered her eyes. "Somehow I cannot believe we shall. It
would be almost too dazzling a prospect."
Again Anita was quiet for some time while she gazed out of the car
window at the changing scene. After a while she turned around again.
"I have been thinking that it would be dreadful to be disappointed
in Pepé. He didn't have very refined associations, did he, there at
uncle's?"
"Don Marcos must have been a man of some refinement," replied Mrs.
Beltrán thoughtfully. "He came of good stock, not of the nobility, but
of good substantial people, land owners and people of education who had
their coat of arms and who held themselves proudly. His wife, no. She
came of the poorer peasantry. You know they told us that her mother was
a servant in your great grandfather's house. I do not care, however,
what my boy may be so long as he is good and honorable. He is young
enough to learn polish, but character is a thing which must have good
stuff to start with."
"Anselmo, that nice Anselmo, is very gentlemanly. All those I met were
the same. They were all well mannered, so probably Pepé will not be
less so. Do you suppose he is just a common workman, mother?"
"Probably he is. He has had no training for anything else."
Anita sighed. Brought up as she had been she could but look down
upon the laboring man. It was another shock to her this idea of a
coarse-mannered, hard-handed workman for a brother. She would like him
to be a distinguished _caballero_; in fact she had always pictured him
as a proud, fine-looking person. She followed out her thought in her
next remark: "Just think, mother, we don't know in the least what he
looks like, whether he is tall or short, whether he has bushy curly
hair like Rodrigo's or reddish locks like Anselmo's. We might meet him
face to face and never know him."
"That is one of the sad things about it. He was rather a fair child,
blue-eyed and with light brown hair, but his hair may be dark by now,
his father's was. He was fairly tall for his age, Anselmo said, but he
has probably grown in the five years since they met."
"Was my father one of these little scraps of men like so many we have
seen?"
"No, he was rather a good height."
"And you are not short. He will probably be tall, then, with blue
eyes." Anita was trying to visualize him, but gave it up. She could not
adapt him to any special type.
The train sped on, winding around incredible heights, rushing through
a limitless number of tunnels. All day they were travelling to reach
Zaragoza at night.
"And he walked all the way," quavered Mrs. Beltrán, as she looked from
the window of their small hotel. "Poor, weary little lad. Oh, Anita, we
must find him. We must make up to him for all the love he had missed,
for all the loneliness of his childhood." She dropped down upon a chair
weeping, but checked herself almost immediately. "Forgive me, dear,"
she said, wiping her eyes. "I do not often give way, do I? but all
day long, each mile of the way I have followed my boy's poor tired
feet, toiling on so bravely day after day to finally reach--what? Oh,
daughter, it is harder to bear now that he has become so much more of
a reality. I used to see him as a baby boy; now he appears a tired,
hopeless, homeless lad thrust out by unkindness into the world to fight
his way alone."
"Oh, mother dear, mother dear," said Anita caressingly, "don't, don't
feel that way. You are all tired out with the long journey, and it
seems more to you than it should. You remember that Anselmo told us
that he had many lifts by the way, and he was not so tired, perhaps as
you believe. Remember that we have better reason to think we shall find
him than ever before. To-morrow, it is probable that we shall be in the
same city."
"For that very reason I am so fearful, so near and then to miss him; to
come so far and then not find him!"
The possibility of this had not missed consideration by Anita but she
did not say so. "Well, madre," she tried to comfort, "suppose he is
not to be found at the very first, there will be much better chance in
Barcelona than anywhere else, and we need not be discouraged even if we
have to spend weeks or months hunting him up."
"I realize that." Mrs. Beltrán wiped her eyes. "I must buckle on my
armor and not be such a lackadaisical mother. I am ashamed of myself."
"You are always so strong and calm," Anita returned, "that it is a pity
if you cannot be allowed to indulge yourself in a few tears once in a
while."
This way of putting it amused Mrs. Beltrán and she laughed. "Well,
dear, that is one way of curing me of my doldrums. Come, we must
freshen up a bit and get something to eat, then we shall feel more fit.
What a wonderful old town this is. We must get out and see what we can
of it while we have the chance."
But even the ancient cathedral of La Seo and the marvels of the Virgen
del Pilar did not serve to detain them beyond the next morning which
saw them on the final stage of their journey to Barcelona, and by night
they were established in a modest pension away from the rush and welter
of the city, and in the pretty suburb of Le Gracia.
Even the excitement, the suspense, the expectation arising from the
thought of why they had come did not prevent Anita from taking note of
those whom she met at the evening meal. A half dozen or so, of boarders
were all there were. Her vis-a-vis was an art student, American, of
uncertain age, rather attractive if she had been clean, apparently
something of a poseur, and very confident of herself. A young Russian,
with tense face and deep-set eyes, looking as if he might be an
anarchist, sat next. On the other side of the American was a young
Spanish student at the University. He had fine eyes which he used upon
all occasions especially on the art student. Two ladies who were once
young, and who bravely made desperate efforts to keep up the delusion
that they were still youthful, were next in order. Their name was
Perley, and were plainly American from one of the New England states.
A man and his wife, of whom Anita could not get a good view, because
they sat at her side the table, completed the number at table. Anita
wondered how long she would be in daily contact with these persons; if
she would ever come to know any of them well and if so which it would
be. The girl was disposed to be friendly. The Perley sisters were
feverishly gay in their effort to appear enthusiastic. The Russian
glowered. The Spanish student cast languishing glances. Anita thought
them all rather amusing. The meal was good, though simple. Their
hostess, a bright-eyed, stout little woman, evidently superintended the
cooking herself, and was anxious to please. The house was attractively
set in a garden with views of mountains right and left, villages
dropped in between the green, and a nearer outlook upon the villas of
the suburb.
"I think we shall like it," Anita said, looking out from the window
of their room upon the lights of the city. There was more life in
this place than in the pastoral villages they had just left. As she
listened to the distant rumble, saw the stacks of various factories
belching forth columns of smoke, or sending up a sudden glare from
inward fires, she felt that here life's issues loomed bigger, problems
appeared vaster, hopes more illusive. She had less certainty about
attaining the ends for which they had come. The future seemed a vague
and shimmering thing whose outlines eluded her perceptions.
However she awoke the next morning confident of purpose as was the
shining day and went forth with her mother feeling all the excitement
of an adventure.
Leaving pleasant Gracia they set their faces toward the old town in
one of whose tortuous streets they hoped to find some news of Pepé.
Through the squalor and dirt of a winding lane-like course they picked
their way, passing groups of men whose evil eyes looked after them,
raising the curiosity of children who paused for a moment in their rope
skipping to the monotonous measure of "_Arroz, con leche, con canela,
con limon_," or who, dancing with fervid abandon to the wheezing of a
hand organ, suddenly glanced up from under dark lashes at the strangers.
At last they stopped palpitatingly before one of the meaner of the
mean houses in this ancient part of the town whose narrow twisting
streets housed the poorer classes. "Poor little lad, poor little lad,"
murmured Mrs. Beltrán, looking around and gathering her skirt from
contact with the door before she knocked.
A slattern, over-stout woman came to the door, but she knew no such
person as Pepé Beltrán, and her dialect was so unfamiliar to the two
inquirers that it was some time before they could make out what she
said. Mrs. Beltrán suggested that some one else in the house might know
of a Pepé or José Beltrán and finally the woman moved off clumsily,
though whether to take a message or not they could not be sure.
"What language is it she speaks?" whispered Anita, as the woman moved
away. "Surely it isn't Spanish."
"It is Catalan. It is the language most spoken here you will soon
learn, and is quite different from the Castilian."
"I shall never want to learn it," Anita said with conviction. "I
certainly am glad that Benilda sent us to some one who speaks pure
Spanish."
"That is one reason, the chief one, why she did send us to Doña Carmen.
She is an Asturian, though doubtless she speaks this dialect too."
They heard the stout woman's voice trailing along the stairway.
"Emilia! Emilia," and presently they heard heels clicking down the
stair. A younger woman appeared before them.
"We are looking for a young man called Pepé, or José Beltrán," began
Mrs. Beltrán.
The woman looked at her stolidly.
"Can you tell us if a young man by that name lives now in this house or
has ever lived here?"
"I have not lived in this house very long," the woman at last replied.
"There was one who lately moved away who lived many years here she told
me, but I," she shook her head, "No, I do not know such person."
"Where has the woman gone who did live here so long?" asked Mrs.
Beltrán.
"I think she moved up the street. Wait, I ask." She clattered out
to the street, looked up and down, then called shrilly: "Faquita,
Faquita!" A woman standing in a group turned her head, then walked
slowly toward her who summoned. After a few moments of rapid
conversation Faquita returned with the woman called Emilia. She paused
to look the strangers over, but was perfectly silent till addressed.
Mrs. Beltrán repeated her questions.
"A _joven, muy joven_?" inquired Faquita.
"Yes, a mere lad," Mrs. Beltrán assured her.
Faquita seemed trying to remember. "There was one such here. He worked
in one of the factories. The others called him José. Perhaps he might
be the one for whom you look."
"Ask her if he had a violin," said Anita eagerly.
"Did he have a violin? Did he play upon it?" Mrs. Beltrán scanned the
woman's face eagerly.
A sudden look of intelligence passed over it. "Ah, _si, señora_? I
remember. It is he. He played the violin. He would play; we would
dance. I remember. But he is no longer living here."
"Do you know where he went?"
"I cannot say. There are many changes in three years."
"Do you remember where he worked?"
The woman shook her head. "In one of the factories. I cannot say which
one."
"But do you not know who his companions were? Are none of them here?"
"I do not know, señora. They come and go; one cannot tell where they go
or where they come from. He played the violin, yes, he played. He was a
very quiet lad, and sad, not merry like some. He played, he worked in
a factory. He has gone." She made a large gesture as if to dismiss the
subject. She could tell no more.
But Mrs. Beltrán was insistent. "Can you not tell me how long ago it
was that he left?" she asked.
The woman tried to think. "I cannot say exactly. So much goes on. One
cannot keep track of time."
"One year? Was he here one year ago?"
Faquita shook her head. "No, not then."
"Two? Three?"
"Three years, yes, but not two, for two years ago, my man was hurt and
he was not here then, for if he had been I should have asked him to
come and play his violin to ease my man. So impatient he was and always
hard to amuse. Yes, I would have had José and his violin." And this was
the last word, so after thanking the two women and leaving them staring
curiously, the mother and daughter wound their way back to where the
cathedral invited an entrance. They went in and sat down on a bench
near the door, both thoughtful and subdued.
"We didn't gain much, did we mother?" said Anita.
"Not much, but still something. We know he worked in a factory."
"What are you going to do next?"
"I am going to visit the factories," said the mother with decision,
"but first we shall go to see Señor Garriguez at the bank. He may be
able to give us some advice. I have a letter to him from a friend in
America." Then through the crowded streets they went on to the bank.