PRIESTCRAFT
‘No man I fear can effect great benefits for his country without some
sacrifice of the minor virtues.’
THE Señora Barenna was a leading social light in Toledo, insomuch as she
never refused an invitation.
‘One has one’s duties towards society,’ she would say with a sigh.
‘Though the saints know that I take no pleasure in these affairs.’
Then she put on her best Seville mantilla and bustled off to some
function or another, where she talked volubly and without discretion.
Julia had of late withdrawn more and more from that life of continued and
mild festivity of which it is to be feared the existence of many women is
composed. This afternoon she sat alone in the great gloomy house in
Toledo, waiting for Larralde. For she, like thousands of her sisters,
loved an unworthy object—_faute de mieux_—with open eyes and a queer
philosophy that bade her love Larralde rather than love none. She had
lately spent a large part of her existence in waiting for Larralde, who,
indeed, was busy enough at this time, and rarely stirred abroad while the
sun was up.
‘Julia,’ said Señora Barenna to Concha, ‘is no longer a companion to me.
She does not even attempt to understand my sensitive organisation. She
is a mere statue, and thinks of nothing but politics.’
‘For her, Madame, as for all women, there would be no politics if there
were no politicians,’ the priest replied.
This afternoon Julia was more restless than ever. Larralde had not been
to see her for many days, and had only written a hurried note from time
to time in answer to her urgent request, telling her that he was well and
in no danger.
She now no longer knew whether he was in Toledo or not, but had
sufficient knowledge of the schemes in which he was engaged to be aware
of the fact that these were coming to a crisis. Esteban Larralde had
indeed told her more than was either necessary or discreet, and it was
his vanity that led him into this imprudence. We are all ready enough to
impart information which will show our neighbours that we are more
important than we appear.
After a broiling day the sun was now beginning to lose a little of his
terrific power, and, in the shade of the patio upon which the windows of
Julia’s room opened, the air was quite cool and pleasant. A fountain
plashed continuously in a little basin that had been white six centuries
ago, when the Moors had brought the marble across the Gulf of Lyons to
build it. The very sound of the water was a relief to overstrained
nerves, and seemed to diminish the tension of the shimmering atmosphere.
Julia was alone, and barely made pretence to read the book she held in
her hand. From her seat she could see the bell suspended on the opposite
wall of the courtyard, of which the deep voice at any time of day or
night had the power of stirring her heart to a sudden joy. At last the
desired sound broke the silence of the great house, and Julia stood
breathless at the window while the servant leisurely crossed the patio
and threw open the great door, large enough to admit a carriage and pair.
It was not Larralde, but Father Concha, brought hither by a note he had
received from Sir John Pleydell earlier in the afternoon.
‘I shall have the letter in a week from now,’ the Englishman had written.
‘Which will be too late,’ commented Concha pessimistically.
The señora was out, they told him, but the señorita had remained at home.
‘It is the señorita I desire to see.’
And Julia, at the window above, heard the remark with a sinking heart.
The air seemed to be weighted with the suggestion of calamity. Concha
had the manner of one bringing bad news. She forgot that this was his
usual mien.
‘Ah, my child,’ he said, coming into the room a minute later and sitting
down rather wearily.
‘What?’ she asked, her two hands at her breast.
He glanced at her beneath his brows. The wind was in the north-east, dry
and tingling. The sun had worn a coppery hue all day. Such matters
affect women and those who are in mental distress. After such a day as
had at last worn to evening, the mind is at a great tension, the nerves
are strained. It is at such times that men fly into sudden anger and
whip out the knife. At such times women are reckless, and the stories of
human lives take sudden turns.
Concha knew that he had this woman at a disadvantage.
‘What?’ he echoed. ‘I wish I knew. I wish at times I was no priest.’
‘Why?’
‘Because I could help you better. Sometimes it is the man and not the
priest who is the truest friend.’
‘Why do you speak like this?’ she cried. ‘Is there danger? What has
happened?’
‘You know best, my child, if there is danger; you know what is likely to
happen.’
Julia stood looking at him with hard eyes—the eyes of one in mortal fear.
‘You have always been my friend,’ she said slowly, ‘my best friend.’
‘Yes. A woman’s lover is never her best friend.’
‘Has anything happened to Esteban?’
The priest did not answer at once, but paused, reflecting, and dusting
his sleeve, where there was always some snuff requiring attention at such
moments.
‘I know so little,’ he said. ‘I am no politician. What can I say? What
can I advise you when I am in the dark? And the time is slipping
by—slipping by.’
‘I cannot tell you,’ she answered, turning away and looking out of the
window.
‘You cannot tell the priest—tell the man.’
Then, suddenly, she reached the end of her endurance. Standing with her
back towards him, she told her story, and Concha listened with a still,
breathless avidity as one who, having long sought knowledge, finds it at
last when it seemed out of reach. The little fountain plashed in the
courtyard below; a frog in the basin among the water-lilies croaked
sociably while the priest and the beautiful woman in the room above made
history. For it is not only in kings’ palaces nor yet in Parliaments
that the story of the world is shaped.
Concha spoke no word, and Julia, having begun, left nothing unsaid, but
told him every detail in a slow mechanical voice, as if bidden thereto by
a stronger will than her own.
‘He is all the world to me,’ she said simply, in conclusion.
‘Yes; and the happiest women are those who live in a small world.’
A silence fell upon them. The old priest surreptitiously looked at his
watch. He was essentially a man of action.
‘My child,’ he said, rising, ‘when you are an old woman with children to
harass you and make your life worth living, you will probably look back
with thankfulness to this moment. For you have done that which was your
only chance of happiness.’
‘Why do you always help me?’ she asked, as she had asked a hundred times.
‘Because happiness is so rare that I hate to see it wasted,’ he answered,
going towards the door with a grim laugh.
He passed out of the room and crossed the patio slowly. Then, when the
great door had closed behind him, he gathered up the skirts of his
cassock and hurried down the narrow street. In such thoroughfares as
were deserted he ran with the speed and endurance of a spare, hard-living
man. Woman-like, Julia had, after all, done things by half. She had
timed her confession too late.
At the hotel they told the Padre that General Vincente was at dinner and
could not be disturbed.
‘He sees no one,’ the servant said.
‘You do not know who I am,’ said Concha, in an irony which, under the
circumstances, he alone could enjoy. Then he passed up the stairs and
bade the waiter begone.
‘But I carry the General’s dessert,’ protested the man.
‘No,’ said Concha half to himself, ‘I have that.’
Vincente was indeed at table with Estella. He looked up as the priest
entered, fingering a cigarette delicately.
‘How soon can you take the road?’ asked Concha abruptly.
‘Ten minutes—the time for a cup of coffee,’ was the answer, given with a
pleasant laugh.
‘Then order your carriage.’
Vincente looked at his old friend, and the smile never left his lips,
though his eyes were grave enough. It was hard to say whether aught on
earth could disturb this man’s equanimity. Then the General rose and
went to the window which opened upon the courtyard. In the quiet corner
near the rain-tank, where a vine grows upon trellis-work, the dusty
travelling-carriage stood, and upon the step of it, eating a simple meal
of bread and dried figs, sat the man who had the reputation of being the
fastest driver in Spain.
‘In ten minutes, my good Manuel,’ said the General.
‘Bueno,’ grumbled the driver, with his mouth full—a man of few words.
‘Is it to go far?’ asked the General, turning on his heel and addressing
Concha.
‘A long journey.’
‘To take the road, Manuel,’ cried Vincente, leaning out. He closed the
window before resuming his seat.
‘And now, have you any more orders?’ he asked with a gay carelessness.
‘I counted on sleeping in a bed to-night.’
‘You will not do that,’ replied Concha, ‘when you hear my news.’
‘Ah!’
‘But first you must promise me not to make use of the information I give
you against any suspected persons—to take, in fact, only preventive
measures.’
‘You have only to name it, my friend. Proceed.’
The old priest paused and passed his hand across his brow. He was
breathless still, and looked worn.
‘It is,’ he said, ‘a very grave matter. I have not had much experience
in such things, for my path has always lain in small parochial
affairs—dealings with children and women.’
Estella was already pouring some wine into a glass. With a woman’s
instinct she saw that the old man was overwrought and faint. It was a
Friday, and in his simple way there was no more austere abstinent than
Father Concha, who had probably touched little food throughout the long
hot day.
‘Take your time, my friend; take your time,’ said the General, who never
hurried and was never too late. ‘A pinch of snuff now—it stimulates the
nerves.’
‘It is,’ said Concha at length—breaking a biscuit in his long bony
fingers and speaking unembarrassedly with his mouth full—’it is that I
have by the merest accident lighted upon a matter of political
importance.’
The General nodded, and held his wine up to the light.
‘There are matters of much political importance,’ he said, ‘in the air
just now.’
‘A plot,’ continued Concha, ‘spreading over all Spain; the devil is
surely in it, and I know the Carlists are. A plot, believe me, to
assassinate and rob and kidnap.’
‘Yes,’ said the General with his tolerant little smile. ‘Yes, my dear
Padre. Some men are so bloodthirsty; is it not so?’
‘This plot is directed against the little Queen; against the Queen
Regent; against many who are notable Royalists occupying high posts in
the Government or the army.’
He glanced at Estella, and then looked meaningly at the General, who
could scarcely fail to comprehend. ‘Let us deal with the Queen and the
Queen Regent,’ said Vincente; ‘the others are probably able to take care
of themselves.’
‘None can guard himself against assassination.’
The General seemed for a moment inclined to dispute this statement, but
shrugged his shoulders and finally passed it by.
‘The Queen,’ he said. ‘What of her?’
In response, Concha took a newspaper from his pocket and spread it out on
the table. After a brief search up and down the ill-printed columns, he
found the desired paragraph, and read aloud:
‘The Queen is in Madrid. The Queen Regent journeys from Seville to
rejoin her daughter in the capital, prosecuting her journey by easy
stages and accompanied by a small guard. Her Majesty sleeps at Ciudad
Real to-night, and at Toledo to-morrow night.’
‘This,’ said Concha, folding the newspaper, ‘is a Carlist and
revolutionary rag whose readers are scarcely likely to be interested for
a good motive in the movements of the Queen Regent.’
‘True, my dear Padre—true,’ admitted Vincente, half reluctantly.
‘Many kiss hands they would fain see chopped off. In the streets and on
the Plaza I have seen many reading this newspaper and talking over it
with unusual interest. Like a bad lawyer, I am giving the confirmation
of the argument before the argument itself.’
‘No matter—no matter.’
‘Ah! but we have no time to do things ill or carelessly,’ said the
priest. ‘My story is a long one, but I will tell it as quickly as I
can.’
‘Take your time,’ urged the General soothingly. ‘This great plot, you
say, which is to spread over all Spain—’
‘Is for to-morrow night, my friend.’