I BID YOU STAY.
"You have been here a month, Monsieur Nigel, living in close intimacy with
Angela and myself," said the abbé, as we sat on the veranda sipping our
morning coffee. "You have mixed with our people, seen our country, and
inspected the great _azequia_ in its entire length. Tell me, now, frankly,
what do you think of us?"
"I never passed so happy a month in my life, and--"
"I am glad to hear you say so, very glad. My question, however, referred
not to your feelings but your opinion. I will repeat it: What think you of
Quipai and its institutions?"
"I know of but one institution in Quipai, and I admire it more than I can
tell."
"And that is?"
"Yourself, Monsieur l'Abbé."
The abbé smiled as if the compliment pleased him, but the next moment his
face took the "pale cast of thought," and he remained silent for several
minutes.
"I know what you mean," he said at length, speaking slowly and rather
sadly. "You mean that I am Quipai, and that without me Quipai would be
nowhere."
"Exactly, Monsieur l'Abbé. Quipai is a miracle; you are its creator, yet I
doubt whether, as it now exists, it could long survive you. But that is a
contingency which we need not discuss; you have still many years of life
before you."
"I like a well-turned compliment, Monsieur Nigel, because in order to be
acceptable it must possess both a modicum of truth and a _soupçon_ of wit.
But flattery I detest, for it must needs be insincere. A man of ninety
cannot, in the nature of things, have many years of life before him. What
are even ten years to one who has already lived nearly a century? This is
a solemn moment for both of us, and I want to be sincere with you. You
were sincere just now when you said Quipai would perish with me. And it
will--unless I can find a successor who will continue the work which I
have begun. My people are good and faithful, but they require a prescient
and capable chief, and there is not one among them who is fitted either by
nature or education to take the place of leader. Will you be my successor,
Monsieur Nigel?"
This was a startling proposal. To stay in Quipai for a few weeks or even a
few months might be very delightful. But to settle for life in an Andean
desert! On the other hand, to leave Quipai were to lose Angela.
"You hesitate. But reflect well, my friend, before denying my request.
True, you are loath to renounce the great world with its excitements,
ambitions, and pleasures. But you would renounce them for a life free from
care, an honorable position, and a career full of promise. It will take
years to complete the work I have begun, and make Quipai a nation. As I
said when you first came, Providence sent you here, as it sent Angela, for
some good end. It sent the one for the other. Stay with us, Monsieur
Nigel, and marry Angela! If you search the world through you could find no
sweeter wife."
My hesitation vanished like the morning mist before the rising sun.
"If Angela will be my wife," I said, "I will be your successor."
"It is the answer I expected, Monsieur Nigel. I am content to let Angela
be the arbiter of your fate and the fate of Quipai. She will be here
presently. Put the question yourself. She knows nothing of this; but I
have watched you both, and though my eyes are growing dim I am not blind."
And with that the abbé left me to my thoughts. It was not the first time
that the idea of asking Angela to be my wife had entered my mind. I loved
her from the moment I first set eyes on her, and my love has become a
passion. But I had not been able to see my way. How could I ask a
beautiful, gently nurtured girl to share the lot of a penniless wanderer,
even if she could consent to leave Quipai, which I greatly doubted. But
now! Compared with Angela, the excitements and ambitions of which the abbé
had spoken did not weigh as a feather in the balance. Without her life
would be a dreary penance; with her a much worse place than Quipai would
be an earthly paradise.
But would she have me? The abbé seemed to think so. Nevertheless, I felt
by no means sure about it. True, she appeared to like my company. But that
might be because I had so much to tell her that was strange and new; and
though I had observed her narrowly, I had detected none of that charming
self-consciousness, that tender confusion, those stolen glances, whereby
the conventional lover gauges his mistress's feelings, and knows before he
speaks that his love is returned. Angela was always the same--frank, open,
and joyous, and, except that her caresses were reserved for him, made no
difference between the abbé and me.
"A _chirimoya_ for your thoughts, señor!" said a well-known voice, in
musical Castilian. "For these three minutes I have been standing close by
you, with this freshly gathered chirimoya, and you took no notice of me."
"A thousand pardons and a thousand thanks, señorita!" I answered, taking
the proffered fruit. "But my thoughts were worth all the chirimoyas in the
world, delicious as they are, for they were of you."
"We were thinking of each other then."
"What! Were you thinking of me?"
"_Si, señor._"
"And what were you thinking, señorita?"
"That God was very good in sending you to Quipai."
"Why?"
"For several reasons."
"Tell me them."
"Because you have done the abbé good. Aforetime he was often sad. You
remember his saying that he had cares. I know not what, but now he seems
himself again."
"Anything else?"
"_Si, señor._ You have also increased my happiness. Not that I was unhappy
before, for, thanks to the dear abbé, my life has been free from sorrow;
but during the last month--since you came--I have been more than happy, I
have been joyous."
"You don't want me to go, then?"
"O señor! Want you to go! How can you--what have I done or said?"
exclaimed the girl, impetuously and almost indignantly. "Surely, sir, you
are not tired of us already?"
"Heaven forbid! If you want me to stay I shall not go. It is for you to
decide. _Angela mia_, it depends on you whether I go away soon--how or
whither I know not--or stay here all my life long."
"Depends on me! Then, sir, I bid you stay."
"Oh, Angela, you must say more than that. You must consent to become my
wife; then do with me what you will."
"Your wife! You ask me to become your wife?"
"Yes, Angela. I have loved you since the day we first met; every day my
love grows stronger and deeper, and unless you love me in return, and will
be my wife, I cannot stay; I must go--go at once."
"_Quipai, señor_," said Angela, archly, at the same time giving me her
hand.
"Quipai! I don't quite understand--unless you mean--"
"Quipai," she repeated, her eyes brightening into a merry smile.
"Unless you mean--"
"Quipai."
"Oh, how dull I am! I see now. Quipai--rest here."
"_Si, señor._"
"And if I rest here, you will--"
"Do as you wish, señor, and with all my heart; for as you love me, so I
love you."
"Dearest Angela!" I said, kissing her hand, "you make me almost too happy.
Never will I leave Quipai without you."
"And never will I leave it without you. But let us not talk of leaving
Quipai. Where can we be happier than here with the dear abbé? But what
will he say?"
"He will give us his blessing. His most ardent wish is that I should be
your husband and his successor."
"How good he is? And I, wicked girl that I am, repay his goodness with
base ingratitude. Ah me! How shall I tell him?"
"You repay his goodness with base ingratitude? You speak in riddles, my
Angela."
"Since the waves washed me to his feet, a little child, the abbé has
cherished me with all the tenderness of a mother, all the devotion of a
father. He has been everything to me; and now you are everything to me. I
love you better than I love him. Don't you think I am a wicked girl?" And
she put her arm within mine, and looking at me with love-beaming eyes,
caressing my cheek with her hand.
"I will grant you absolution, and award you no worse penance than an
embrace, _ma fille cherie_," said the abbé, who had returned to the
veranda just in time to overhear Angela's confession. "I rejoice in your
happiness, _mignonne_. To-day you make two men happy--your lover and
myself. You have lightened my mind of the cares which threatened to darken
my closing days. The thought of leaving you without a protector and Quipai
without a chief was a sore trouble. Your husband will be both. Like Moses,
I have seen the Promised Land, and I shall be content."
"Talk not of dying, dear father or you will make me sad," said Angela,
putting her arms round his neck.
"There are worse things than dying, my child. But you are quite right;
this is no time for melancholy forebodings. Let us be happy while we may;
and since I came to Quipai, sixty years ago, I have had no happier day
than this."
As the only law at Quipai was the abbé's will, and we had neither
settlements to make, trousseaux to prepare, nor house to get ready (the
abbé's house being big enough for us all), there was no reason why our
wedding should be delayed, and the week after Angela and I had plighted
our troth, we were married at the church of San Cristobal.
The abbé's wedding-present to Angela was a gold cross studded with large
uncut diamonds. Where he got them I had no idea, but I heard
afterward--and something more.
All this time nothing, save vague generalities, had passed between us on
the subject of religion--rather to my surprise, for priests are not wont
to ignore so completely their _raison d'être_, but I subsequently found
that Balthazar, albeit a devout Christian, was no bigot. Either his early
training, his long isolation from ecclesiastical influence, or his
communings with Nature had broadened his horizon and spiritualized his
beliefs. Dogma sat lightly on him, and he construed the apostolic
exhortations to charity in their widest sense. But these views were
reserved for Angela and myself. With his flock he was the Roman
ecclesiastic--a sovereign pontiff--whom they must obey in this world on
pain of being damned in the next. For he held that the only ways of
successfully ruling semi-civilized races are by physical force, personal
influence, or their fear of the unseen and the unknown. At the outset
Balthazar, having no physical force at his command, had to trust
altogether to personal influence, which, being now re-enforced by the
highest religious sanctions, made his power literally absolute. Albeit
Quipai possessed neither soldiers, constables, nor prison, his authority
was never questioned; he was as implicitly obeyed as a general at the head
of an army in the field.
I have spoken of the abbé's communings with Nature. I ought rather to have
said his searchings into her mysteries; for he was a shrewd philosopher
and keen observer, and despite the disadvantages under which he labored,
the scarcity of his books, and the rudeness of his instruments, he had
acquired during his long life a vast fund of curious knowledge which he
placed unreservedly at my disposal. I became his pupil, and it was he who
first kindled in my breast that love of science which for nearly
three-score years I have lived only to gratify.