SUING OR DEFIANT?
The marquesa begged her daughter to go to bed, and María gladly obeyed,
for she was very weary. She slowly divested herself of the handsome
garments which had so unexpectedly resuscitated the beautiful young
woman she had once been, and retired to her alcove. She was shivering
with cold and had sunk into a fit of deep melancholy. After a long
silence, during which she lay watching her mother with anxious eyes,
she turned her face to the images, pictures, and relics which made her
alcove a sort of oratory, and began to pray. The marquesa, who could
also on great occasions make a due display of fervour, knelt kissing
the feet of a crucifix.
“Give me my rosary, mamma,” said María; and the marquesa took her the
beads which hung at the foot of the cross.
“Now you can leave me,” said her daughter. “I am sleepy, and when I
have said my prayers I shall fall asleep.”
The marquesa fixed the hour at which they were to set out next day. It
was agreed that they should both go and that the mother should remain
in the carriage while María went in to see her husband.
“My heart tells me that we shall do great things, perhaps effect a
reconciliation,” said the marquesa, kissing her daughter. “Now go to
sleep and do not worry yourself with matters of conscience. You see the
consequences of your obstinacy; honestly, my dear child, I put myself
in a husband’s place--any husband’s; it is not that I wish to blame
devotion, true devotion. Am not I a pious and sincere Catholic, though
an unworthy one? Do I fail in my religious exercise? You should have
thought of this mania for sanctity before you married and took up other
duties.”
“One thing strikes me,” said María showing clearly that she was not
worrying herself about matters of conscience, “I ought to have some
jewelry to-morrow--a brooch, bracelets, earrings--you can bring me
anything you think proper out of the case I gave you to take care of.”
“Very well,” said her mother with some embarrassment. “But almost all
your trinkets wanted mending--I sent them to Ansorena. But I will
see....”
“Rafaela tells me that you took away all the plate yesterday.”
“Yes, all of it. My dear child, I am always in a fright at your living
alone in this great house. There are so many robberies.”
“I do not want the plate--but tell me, did you not take the silk
curtains too, and my lace, and the inlaid ink-stand and card case--oh!
and those two vases, and the Sêvres jars, and the fan painted by
Zamacois and the water-colour by Fortuny, and several other things?”
“You have a remarkably good memory,” said the marquesa, laughing to
conceal her annoyance. “Yes, I took them away. Such treasures ought not
to be left in danger of robbery. Do you know that Madrid is swarming
with burglars?”
“Then bring me my watch,” said María turning over in bed, “I had better
know the time to a minute.”
“Very well--but I remember it is gone to be mended. It did not go.”
“Then I must do without it; goodnight, mamma.”
“To-morrow at ten. I will be here in time to dress you. Goodnight, my
darling.”
But María could not sleep. For the first time in her life she realised
one of her earliest dreams of pious mortification; she had imagined
the possibility of lying on a bed of brambles, so that her body
being tormented to the great edification of the soul, she might the
better emulate the penitent saints whose lives she had read with such
enthusiasm. That night her bed was a bed of thorns, till it became a
bed of burning coals, and seemed to scorch her limbs. She felt like
St. Laurence on his gridiron, or St. John in his cauldron; she could
generally get to sleep by repeating her prayers, but to-night they hung
buzzing on her lips, like bees at the door of a hive, while her brain
seemed on fire, writhing like some soul in the depths of hell, nipped
and stung by Satan’s ministers. She could bear it no longer; in her
ears was a continual hissing like frying; it bewildered her brain; her
very eyes ached in the dark. She sprang out of bed and struck a light.
“Now,” she said to herself, as she slipped some clothes on. “Now, this
minute!”
Without stopping to put on her shoes and stockings she went to look
at the clock in her boudoir, her heart sank when she saw that it only
marked one. Still so early! She calculated how long it would be till
sunrise; then she shut herself into her boudoir. Who can tell what she
did there? In the silence of the night and of empty rooms the clocks,
with their regular ticking, like breathing, seem to live and watch.
Perched on the chimney-shelves, these bronze personages, with faces
like masks with twelve eyes, would make us believe that they can hear
and understand by the same internal organs which produce that ceaseless
and rythmical beat. The clock in María’s boudoir was the only witness
to her proceedings; the portrait of Leon even knew nothing about them,
for it hung with its face to the wall. The clock heard her, then, as
she opened and shut various trunks; heard the pleasant splash of water
as it flowed into the marble bath and over the rounded limbs of a human
statue, dancing and rippling like the waters of a fountain in which
alabaster tritons and nymphs disport themselves among translucent jets,
cascades, and clouds of spray. The impudent rogue of a clock chuckled
to itself as it steadily snapped its hundred teeth; it was long since
it had heard such music. Then it smelt the faint, sweet savour of
perfumes--it was long since that scent had been used there.
María returned to the boudoir carrying the light with her, and her
first glance was at the dial near which she placed the candle. A
quarter past two. Oh, what a bore is a clock that insists on telling
you that it is very early! She had wrapped herself in an ample white
sheet like a cloak, which helped to produce a reaction after the cold
bath; her face was a little blue, but none the less charming, and her
small hands clutched the wrapper to gather it round her, as a dove
folds her grey wings over her white breast. The reaction from cold
water is rapid and complete. She soon felt warm again, and then, as
the reversed portrait caught her eye, she raised her arms to take it
down--but it was too high. She mounted on a chair to reach it, and we
have it on the authority of the clock that his mistress in her light
attire was a charming figure which he opened his twelve eyes wide to
gaze at.
María unhooked the portrait and, turning it round, set it upon a
chair. There, as if he were present in the flesh, were the manly bust,
the clever head, the deep honest eyes of Leon Roch; it was like the
sudden entrance of a living person. María was strangely startled; all
her blood rushed to her heart, leaving her veins empty and chill;
breathless and rigid, she looked at the picture as though it were
the apparition of some one long dead, or the embodiment of a face in
a dream. It did not frown at her but gazed with a serene and kind
expression--the natural expression of a warm and loyal nature. María
stooped forward; her face was close to the portrait--then she drew
back; with her hand she wiped off a little dust, and having done
this, she kissed her husband--once, twice, thrice, on different parts
of his face. At that instant she heard a dull, smothered chuckle--it
was the clock, taking a deeper breath with the hoarse effort that is
preparatory to its striking.
Three o’clock! the creature was growing more amiable and was getting
the better of its mania for asserting that it was early. The house,
as has been said, was on the outskirts of the city, and she could
hear the cocks crowing to proclaim the end of this miserable, dreary,
never-ending night.
“It will soon be day,” thought María. “As soon as it is day I will set
out.”
Then she proceeded to dress. All the things that Pilar had brought
were lying on the chairs, and, but that there were on the walls three
several pictures of St. Joseph, the room might have been taken for that
of a woman of the world after a night of dissipation.
María examined the colours of the silk stockings and finally selected
the blue pair which she pulled over the rosy feet. Shoes were a more
difficult matter; she tried the boots and shoes--happily her friend’s
foot seemed to be the twin brother to her own--but she doubted as to
the particular pair--boots or shoes? A question as important as the
greater alternative: Heaven or Hell?
After much hesitation the boots were definitely discarded and she
decided on the shoes--high shoes of bronze kid, Louis XV. shape, and
embroidered with steel--gems in their way. María looked at them for
a long time and then put them on. She had very pretty feet--prettiest
of all when bare--still, she must have shoes on as a social necessity,
though it was not _de rigeur_ in the days of Venus; and María looked
down with satisfaction at the artificial beauties of feet with which
not Daphne herself could have run, but which, nevertheless, were
pretty enough to behold. She placed her foot firmly on the ground,
contemplating the ankle; she turned on her heel and moved the pointed
toe, almost like a thimble; the foot as well as the face has an
expression of its own. María was satisfied and gave her mind to other
matters.
Stays; coiffure; two important matters which could not be attended to
together. The first is sometimes a question of strength; the second
a sublime work of art. María began with the more serious matter, and
it needed no hydraulic pressure to imprison her slender waist. The
hair-dressing was a greater difficulty. She seated herself at the
dressing-table in a meditative attitude, with her hands raised like
a priest who pauses to pray before touching some sacred object, and
at length, after various attempts she succeeded in restoring to some
extent the structure that Juana had achieved the previous evening--a
perfectly simple knot, as it had to be in the absence of various
articles of the toilet. But it was becoming, and that was the main
point. No puffs or padding.
The rest of her toilet was on the lines of last night’s rehearsal:
the black silk dress, with its linings and trimmings of straw colour;
the hat, which might have been the creation of fairy hands....
Nothing could be better or more bewitching. María gazed at herself in
astonishment; she was a different woman! It could not be she who was
so beautiful. It was magic. Nay, a good Catholic could not believe in
magic! It was a special mercy of Heaven, a providential interposition,
to enable her to carry out a meritorious purpose. It could be none
other than God who had lent her such exceptional beauty and such
brilliant and becoming attire. Superstition clung to her soul as a
limpet sticks by suction to a rock.
“God consents, it is God’s will--” she said to herself, eagerly seizing
on the idea.
Then she looked at herself once more--in front, in profile--yes, she
looked well. How slender and well-formed she was, how gracefully her
head was poised on her shoulders! The misty veil slightly shaded her
pale face, as it might be the shadow of a bird flying by and pausing
to admire so sweet a picture. There was a sort of symbolical passion
in the depths of the black velvet with lights of straw-coloured silk;
in that sombre nimbus with sulphurous gleams framing her delicate
complexion there was a perfect harmony; and in those melancholy
sea-blue eyes, that looked as if a threat lurked under their sadness, a
revenge under their pain, under their tenderness a dagger.
“Gloves!” she exclaimed, “where are they? How provoking if Pilar should
have forgotten to leave them.”
She found them however, and put them on.
“I have no trinkets, but that is of no consequence--I have my virtue,”
she added to herself, “that is the only thing that really matters.”
After another glance in the mirror she went on: “Yes, I am handsome--if
only I can say just what I feel.... If I can find the right words....”
She pulled the bell, startling all the household. The servants were
some time getting up, but at last they appeared. Her maid, who came
sleepy and stupid into her room, was astounded at seeing her mistress
ready dressed--and so beautifully dressed! María desired her to send
Señor Pomares to her at once. The worthy man, who had been recalled
after Leon’s departure, presently made his appearance, with a puffy,
stupid face and tottering with the bewildered air of a man who has been
roused from his deepest and sweetest slumbers. But María did not look
at him.
“Order the carriage to be got ready at once,” she said. The steward
looked blank with astonishment.
“But--you forget,” he said, “you forget...?”
“What?”
“That the carriage is gone.”
“To be sure, very true,” said María. “I had forgotten. Well, send for a
hired carriage, a landau.”
“At this hour?”
“Is it not daylight?”
“Dawn is only just breaking.”
“What has that to do with it? It seems to me that you want to make
difficulties ... you are of no use at all--”
Pomares was dumbfounded. So hasty ... so violent.... His mistress must
be mad.
“Well, why do you not stir, in Heavens name?” she exclaimed, “why do
you stand staring at me? A carriage, and at once, at any cost!”
“Very good, Señora; I will go and see.”
“At once; as quickly as possible. I want to be off as soon as it is
light.”
After infinite trouble Pomares, dragging his weary limbs from one place
to another, succeeded in hiring a carriage; but not till the day was
somewhat far advanced. María burning with impatience, waited in her
room. She took a cup of black coffee, and then alternately paced the
room and paused to pray, or sat sunk in thought.
When at length the landau was announced she started up, and going
straight to a pretty little cupboard she took out a bottle of not
remarkably pure water. Her lips moved, muttering no doubt a prayer,
while she poured part of the contents into a silver cup; then,
carefully lifting her veil she drank that water which was from the
sacred Grotto at Lourdes.