STRUCK DOWN.
Lucius endeavoured so to time the hour of his return to Seville that
he might re-enter the town when the result of the bull-fight might be
known. He proposed calling at the mansion in the Calle de San Jose on
his way back to his lodging, with the hope, if not of seeing Alcala,
at least of hearing tidings of his safety.
The sun was still some height above the western horizon when Lucius
entered the deserted street. The glare reflected back from the high
dead wall was oppressive.
"I am too early; I have been too impatient," thought the young
Englishman, as he laid his hand on the bell which hung in the shadow
of the archway. He marked that the grating of the patio was ajar. Inez
had forgotten to lock it after receiving from the muleteer the note
from Alcala which crushed her last hope. The unprotected state of the
house mattered, however, little; there was no great danger of thieves
invading a place in which they would find no plunder.
Lucius rang softly, as one who would by no loud summons disturb a
house of mourning; but the bell was instantly answered. The grating at
the end of the vestibule was thrown hastily back, and the trembling
Inez herself hurried through the opening, and along the arched
passage. Her dark eyes were dilated with fear, her pale lips trembled.
She knew not whom she was addressing, but her whole soul appeared to
flow forth in the question, "Bring you tidings from the Plaza de
Toros?"
"I come to ask for them, senorita," began Lucius. But the eyes of Inez
rested on him no longer, they were turned wistfully in another
direction. Her ear, quickened by fear, had caught a sound which Lucius
had heard not, and breathless with expectation she gazed up the
street. In another moment a crowd of persons appeared emerging from
the entrance of a lane which crossed the Calle de San Jose. They came
not with shout or mirth, as if escorting a victor home, but slowly,
like a throng who follow a funeral procession. There was no noise,
save the tramping of feet, and ever and anon the wail of a woman.
Lucius glanced at Inez, and read despair in her face. An icy numbness
was creeping over her frame; she had no power to go forward to meet
the corpse of her brother. Soon the crowd reached the entrance of the
dwelling of Aguilera; in the midst of the throng was seen a litter
borne by men. On that litter lay stretched a motionless form. Pale and
ghastly, with garments blood-stained and torn, Alcala de Aguilera was
borne back to the home of his fathers.
Lucius intuitively took the place of a brother. "Back--back!" he
exclaimed in a tone of authority to the crowd who pressed round the
litter,--"none but the bearers shall enter. Who will go for a
surgeon?"
"I--I," replied several voices, and the crowd dispersed in various
directions, whilst the litter was borne through the arched passage.
"Show the way to his room," said Lucius to Teresa, whom he recognized,
as she followed her master closely, crying and wringing her hands.
The litter was carried across the patio, and through a long spacious
corridor, at the end of which lay the cavalier's apartment. Alcala's
wound had already been roughly bound up at the circus, the flowing
blood had been stanched. He was, with the help of Lucius and Inez,
gently lifted from the litter and placed on his bed, to await the
surgeon's arrival.
"Water--bring water!" cried Lucius. Teresa hurried to obey the
command, but her young mistress had forestalled her. In this emergency
the energy of Inez had returned. But not a word had she uttered, not a
tear had she shed; her anguish had sealed her lips, her terror had
dried up her tears. Kneeling beside her brother's low bed, Inez
sprinkled with water his corpse-like face; Lucius, gently supporting
his head, put a cup to his lips.
"Oh, Heaven be praised!--he drinks! there is life in him still!"
exclaimed Inez.
"He's dying--he's dying--last of his race! Oh, woe's me! woe's me!"
moaned Teresa.
Lucius dismissed the bearers, satisfying their demands with the
coin--it was but little--that he chanced to have on his person. They
had scarcely left the place ere the anxiously expected surgeon
arrived.
The surgeon removed the bandages from the insensible Alcala, and
examined his ghastly wound. There was a deep gash in the left
shoulder, from which there had been a great effusion of blood. The
full extent of the injury sustained by the unfortunate cavalier could
not be ascertained at once.
"He was crushed up against the barrier,--I saw it with my own
eyes,--oh that I should have lived to see it!" cried Teresa, with
passionate gestures. "The bull charged, and in a moment man and horse
were down in the dust. Campeador never rose again, the horns of the
savage--"
"Be silent, woman!" said Lucius sternly; "does not your lady already
suffer enough?"
Teresa stared in angry surprise at this unexpected rebuke from the
stranger, who had assumed a post of command in the house of his friend
by the tacit consent of its mistress; for Inez felt as if, in her
sorest need, a helper and supporter had been sent to her by Heaven.
The old woman dared not reply, but muttering something between her
teeth about "insolent heretic," busied herself with the bandages
required for the wound.
When the surgeon had finished his work, Lucius accompanied him out of
the room, that his question, "Do you think that there is hope?" might
not be heard by Inez.
"It is impossible to give any decided opinion as yet, senor," answered
the surgeon. "Fever will probably ensue; let some one sit up with the
caballero during the night."
As the surgeon crossed the patio, it was entered by a priest. In this
stout personage, swathed in long black robe with rosary and crucifix
dependent; with plump, dark, close-shaven face, and tonsured head from
which the huge flapped hat was now removed, Lucius recognized the
priest who had touched him on the shoulder on the previous evening.
There was no word spoken between the two men; the family confessor
needed no guide to the room of Alcala. But the eyes of the Spaniard
and the Englishman met, and each read in the glance of the other, "I
shall find an opponent in you."
From motives of delicacy, Lucius did not follow the priest into
Alcala's apartment, but remained waiting in the lofty corridor. He
would not by his presence disturb the visit of a spiritual director.
The door was closed between them; no ordinary conversation could
therefore be heard by one standing outside, who had no wish or
intention to listen. The priest, however, probably purposely, spoke
loudly enough in the chamber of sickness for a word or two
occasionally to reach the ear of Lucius.
"Not at confession for the last year,--bad
influence--heretic--Protestant," such were the words which the raised
tone in which they were spoken rendered audible,--though an indistinct
murmur was all that was otherwise heard of the voice of the
ecclesiastic through the closed door.
"Would that I had better deserved the priest's suspicions!" thought
Lucius, with some self-reproach.
When the priest left Alcala's apartment he was followed by Inez and
Teresa, though the former went but a few steps beyond the door. Her
hands were clasped; a look of entreaty was on her pale face.
"You will not refuse my brother the last rites of the Church?" she
said faintly.
"I will come again to-morrow, and hear his confession, if Don Alcala
be then able and willing to confess," was the sternly uttered reply.
"I hope that I shall find him a true son of the Church;" the hope was
expressed in a tone that was more suggestive of doubt. Inez bowed low
with submissive reverence, and returned to her post.
As Father Bonifacio--such was the name of the priest--passed Lucius,
again his eyes rested on the young Englishman with an expression of
dislike and suspicion. The glance was calmly returned.
Teresa accompanied the priest to the outer arch, while Lucius went
back to the room of his friend.
"I knew that there was something wrong," muttered Teresa, when
Bonifacio had passed out into the street. "Don Alcala has been too
much with those vile blasphemers of the saints and the blessed Virgin.
If all the bulls that graze on the Sierra Nevada had come against him,
the arm of an Aguilera would have prevailed, had his lance but been
sprinkled with holy water. Had the caballero been to mass and
confession in the morning, he would never have rolled in the dust at
noon. If I had my will, that English heretic should never come near or
look at him again!"
But Teresa had not her will, at least on the night which followed that
anxious day. Lucius shared with Inez the long sad watch by the
sufferer's pillow. As his presence certainly did not seem to be
unwelcome to the sister of his friend, he remained at his post until
dawn.
How often the scene in that sick-room afterwards returned to the
recollection of Lucius, its most trifling accessories imprinted
indelibly on his mind! The large and lofty but scantily-furnished
apartment, so dimly lighted by one small lamp that its further corners
were left in almost absolute darkness; the walls, on which the plaster
was cracked and peeling; while square-shaped marks and projecting
nails showed that pictures had once been hung where they no longer
remained to bear witness to the wealth and taste of their late
possessors. One family portrait alone was left, evidently painted by
the hand of a master; but it had apparently served as a pistol target
in the time when the French were quartered in Seville, as it was
drilled with several holes. The ceiling had once been richly painted
and gilded; but the gold had long since lost all trace of brightness,
and the faded painting showed in the dull light like mere undefined
stains of various hues. There was no carpet on the floor; this was not
necessarily a sign of poverty in a climate so warm as that of
Andalusia, but the boards themselves were time-worn, and in some
places seemed going to decay.
The part of the scene on which interest centred was that where Alcala
lay, on his bed of pain, with countenance so pale that it looked as if
it belonged to a monumental recumbent figure chiselled out of marble.
Almost as pale and as still, his sister sat watching beside him,
scarcely ever raising her long dark lashes, so fixed was her gaze on
the face of Alcala. Inez seemed scarcely to be aware of the presence
of a stranger, save when Lucius helped her to change the position of
the sufferer, or placed the fever-draught in her hand. Inez would then
thank him by a mute and scarcely perceptible gesture.
Hour after hour passed away, whilst the only sounds that broke the
stillness were the rustle of Teresa's dress, or the crack of one of
the old boards under her heavy tread. The old servant flitted about
uneasily, like a bird whose nest is invaded. It was against all the
duenna's ideas of propriety, as well as the devotee's prejudiced views
of religion, that the English heretic should remain in the sick-room,
which nothing would persuade Donna Inez to quit. But Teresa dared not
speak out her mind in the presence of Lucius Lepine, above all in
that still and solemn apartment. Even Teresa could hardly help seeing,
though she would not have openly acknowledged the fact, that the
services of the young stranger could not, on that night, have been
well dispensed with. No one would ever have introduced Chico into a
sick-room; and before the long night was over, Teresa's own eyelids
were closed in sleep. The old servant was worn out with the fatigue,
excitement, and distress of the day.
Alcala gave few signs of life during the long weary hours of darkness.
Occasionally he clutched his hand, sometimes his lips slightly moved
and his brow was contracted with pain. Once a few scarcely articulate
words escaped him: "Not a convent--no, not a convent!" Towards
morning, however, the wounded man sank into quiet sleep; and Lucius
felt that he could now leave him with a more easy mind.
"It is dawn--you had better depart; thanks, thanks for your kindness
to him," murmured Inez, as a slight sound of movement made her aware
that Lucius had risen from his seat. The Englishman bent his head to
whisper a word of comfort to the poor watcher before he quitted her
side.
"Senorita, trust in the mercy of God, and hope. I believe that your
brother will be spared to you yet."