The Conservatives had come into power; the time to change the town
government was approaching. It was customary at Castro, as in all rural
districts in Spain, that in a period of Liberal administration the
majority of the councillors elected should be Liberal, and at a time of
Conservative government, they should be Conservative.
The former Liberal, García Padilla, had gone over to the Conservative
camp, and one was now to see whether he would get his friends into the
Municipality so as to prepare for his own election as Deputy later.
It was the first time there was going to be a real election at Castro
Duro. Moncada’s candidates were almost all persons of good position.
Dr. Ortigosa and a Socialist weaver figured among the candidates, as
representing the revolutionary tendency. The Liberals felt and showed an
unusual activity and anxiety. Cæsar started a newspaper which he named
Liberty, Dr. Ortigosa was the soul of this paper, whose doctrines ran
from Liberal Monarchy to Anarchy, inclusive. As the election drew
nearer, the agitation increased.
In the two electoral headquarters established by Moncada’s party, the
coming and going never stopped; some enthusiastic Moncadists came to
headquarters every fifteen minutes, to bring rumours going about and to
get news.
Don So-and-So had said this; Uncle What’s-His-Name was thinking of doing
that; it was nothing but conferences and machinations. The painter had
painted for them gratis a big poster expressing cheers for Liberty,
for Moncada, Dr. Ortigosa, and the Liberal candidates. The café keeper
brought chairs, without any one’s asking him; somebody else brought a
brasier for the clerks; everybody was anxious to do something. The stock
phrase, an electoral battle, was not for them a political commonplace
but a reality. The most trivial things served as a motive for very
long discussions. Such was their identification with the Idea, that
it succeeded in wiping out selfish ends. They all felt honoured and
enthusiastic, at least while it lasted.
People dreamed of the election.
When Cæsar arrived at the electoral headquarters, it was always a
series of exclamations, of embracing, of advice, that never ended.
“Don Cæsar, such a thing is... Don Cæsar, don’t trust So-and-So.”
“We must get rid of them.”
“Not one of them ought to be left.”
He used to smile, because finding himself really loved by the people had
cleansed him of his habitual bitterness and his loss of spirits. When he
had finished receiving recommendations and congratulations, he would
go to an inside room, and there, in the company of a candidate or a
secretary, would read letters and arrange what they had to do.
The most active of the candidates was Dr. Ortigosa.
Ortigosa was a narrow-minded, tenacious man. His chief hatred was for
Catholicism and he directed all his attacks at the religion of his
forefathers, as he ironically termed it.
He had founded a Masonic lodge, named the “Microbe,” and whose principal
characteristic was anti-Catholicism.
Ortigosa carried his propaganda everywhere. He stopped at every corner
to speechify, to talk of his plans.
Cæsar used his motor-car to go about among the villages in the
district. They would go to four or five and talk from balconies, or very
often from the car, like itinerant patent-medicine venders.
In the little villages these reunions produced a great effect. What was
said served as a topic of conversation for a month.
Cæsar had developed a clear, insinuating eloquence. He knew how to
explain things admirably. Padilla’s followers were not asleep; but, as
was natural, they took up the work in another way. They went from shop
to shop, making the shopkeepers see the harmfulness of the Moncadist
politics, promising them advantages. They threatened workmen with
dismissal. There was no great enthusiasm; their campaign was less noisy,
but, in part more certain.
All the Liberal element of Castro was wrought up, from the temperate
Liberals, who remembered Espartero, to the Anarchists. “Whiskers” and
“Furibis” were the only ones who got together in a tavern to talk about
bombs and dynamite, and one could be sure that neither of them was
capable of anything. Those two had nothing more to do with Ortigosa,
considering him a deserter.
“You are imbeciles,” the doctor told them, with his habitual fury.
“This fight is waking the people up. They are beginning to show their
instincts, and that makes a man strong. The longer and more violent this
fight is, the better; progress will be so much quicker.”
“Agitation, agitation is what we need,” cried the doctor; and he himself
was as agitated as a man condemned.
The Liberals won a great victory; they obtained eight places out of ten
vacancies.