ONE morning twin boys were discovered in the foundlings' basket before
the door of the Convent of Santa María Rosa de las Rosas. Names were
found for them almost before the arrival of the wet-nurse, but the names
were not as useful to them as our names are to most of us, for no one
ever succeeded in telling the boys apart. There was no way of knowing
who their parents were, but Limean gossips, noticing as the boys grew
older how straight they held themselves and how silent and sombre they
were, declared them to be Castilian and laid them in turn at all sorts
of crested doorways. The person in the world who came nearest to being
their guardian was the Abbess of the Convent. Madre María del Pilar had
come to hate all men, but she grew fond of Manuel and Esteban. In the
late afternoon she would call them into her office, send for some cakes
from the kitchen, and tell them stories about the Cid and Judas
Maccabeus and the thirty-six misfortunes of Harlequin. She grew to love
them so, that she would catch herself gazing deep into their black and
frowning eyes, looking for those traits that would appear when they grew
to be men, all that ugliness, all that soullessness that made hideous
the world she worked in. They grew up about the convent until they were
a little past the age when their presence began to be a slight
distraction to the dedicated sisters. From thence they became vaguely
attached to all the sacristies in town: they trimmed all the cloister
hedges; they polished every possible crucifix; they passed a damp cloth
once a year over most of the ecclesiastical ceilings. All Lima knew them
well. When the priest rushed through the streets carrying his precious
burden into a sickroom either Esteban or Manuel was to be seen striding
behind him, swinging a censer. As they grew older, however, they showed
no desire for the clerical life. They gradually assumed the profession
of the scribe. There were few printing presses in the New World and the
boys soon made a fair living transcribing comedies for the theatre,
ballads for the crowds, and advertisements for the merchants. Above all
they were the copyists of the choirmasters and made endless parts of the
motets of Morales and Vittoria.
[Illustration]
Because they had no family, because they were twins, and because they
were brought up by women, they were silent. There was in them a curious
shame in regard to their resemblance. They had to live in a world where
it was the subject of continual comment and joking. It was never funny
to them and they suffered the eternal pleasantries with stolid patience.
From the years when they first learned to speak they invented a secret
language for themselves, one that was scarcely dependent on the Spanish
for its vocabulary, or even for its syntax. They resorted to it only
when they were alone, or at great intervals in moments of stress
whispered it in the presence of others. The Archbishop of Lima was
something of a philologist; he dabbled in dialects; he had even evolved
quite a brilliant table for the vowel and consonant changes from Latin
into Spanish and from Spanish into Indian-Spanish. He was storing up
notebooks of quaint lore against an amusing old age he planned to offer
himself back on his estates outside Segovia. So when he heard one day
about the secret language of the twin brothers, he trimmed some quills
and sent for them. The boys stood humiliated upon the rich carpets of
his study while he tried to extract from them their _bread_ and _tree_
and their _I see_ and _I saw_. They did not know why the experience was
I so horrible to them. They bled. Long shocked silences followed each of
the Archbishop's questions, until finally one or the other mumbled an
answer. The priest thought for a while that they were merely in awe
before his rank and before the luxury of his apartment, but at last,
much perplexed, he divined the presence of some deeper reluctance and
sadly let them go.
This language was the symbol of their profound identity with one
another, for just as resignation was a word insufficient to describe the
spiritual change that came over the Marquesa de Montemayor on that night
in the inn at Cluxambuqua, so _love_ is inadequate to describe the tacit
almost ashamed oneness of these brothers. What relationship is it in
which few words are exchanged, and those only about the details of food,
clothing and occupation; in which the two persons have a curious
reluctance even to glance at one another; and in which there is a tacit
arrangement not to appear together in the city and to go on the same
errand by different streets? And yet side by side with this there
existed a need of one another so terrible that it produced miracles as
naturally as the charged air of a sultry day produces lightning. The
brothers were scarcely aware of it themselves, but telepathy was a
common occurrence in their lives, and when one returned home the other
was always aware of it when his brother was still several streets away.
Suddenly they discovered that they were tired of writing. They went down
to the sea and found an occupation in loading and unloading vessels, not
ashamed of working side by side with Indians. They drove teams across
the provinces. They picked fruit. They were ferrymen. And always they
were silent. Their sombre faces took on from these labors a male and
gypsy cast. Their hair was seldom cut and under the dark mat their eyes
looked up suddenly surprised and a little sullen. All the world was
remote and strange and hostile except one's brother.
But at last the first shadow fell across this unity and the shadow was
cast by the love of women. They had returned to the city and resumed the
copying of parts for the theatre. One night the manager, foreseeing a
thinning house, gave them a free admission. The boys did not like what
they found there. Even speech was for them a debased form of silence;
how much more futile is poetry which is a debased form of speech. All
those allusions to honour, reputation, and the flame of love, all the
metaphors about birds, Achilles and the jewels of Ceylon were fatiguing.
In the presence of literature they had the same darkling intelligence
that stirs for a time behind the eyes of a dog, but they sat on
patiently, gazing at the bright candles and the rich clothes. Between
the acts of the comedy the Perichole stepped out of her rôle, put on
twelve petticoats and danced before the curtain. Esteban had some
copying still to do, or pretended so, and went home early; but Manuel
stayed on. The red stockings and shoes of the Perichole had made their
impression.
Both brothers had fetched and carried their manuscripts up and down the
dusty stairs behind the stage. There they had seen an irritable girl in
a soiled bodice mending her stockings before a mirror while her stage
director read aloud her lines for memorization. She had let fall upon
the boys for a moment the detonation of her amazing eyes, immediately
dissipated in her amused recognition that they were twins. Forthwith she
had dragged them into the room and placed them side by side. Carefully,
amusedly and remorselessly she had peered into every square inch of
their faces, until finally laying one hand on Esteban's shoulder she had
cried out: "This one is the younger!" That had been several years before
and neither brother had thought of the episode again.
Henceforth all Manuel's errands seemed to lead him past the theatre.
Late at night he would drift about among the trees beneath her
dressing-room window. It was not the first time that Manuel had been
fascinated by a woman (both brothers had possessed women, and often,
especially during their years at the waterfront; but simply, latinly),
but it was the first time that his will and imagination had been thus
overwhelmed. He had lost that privilege of simple nature, the
dissociation of love and pleasure. Pleasure was no longer as simple as
eating; it was being complicated by love. Now was beginning that crazy
loss of one's self, that neglect of everything but one's dramatic
thoughts about the beloved, that feverish inner life all turning upon
the Perichole and which would so have astonished and disgusted her had
she been permitted to divine it. This Manuel had not fallen in love
through any imitation of literature. It was not of him, at all events,
that the bitterest tongue in France had remarked only fifty years
before: that many people would never have fallen in love if they had not
heard about it. Manuel read little; he had only been once to the theatre
(where above all there reigns the legend that love is a devotion) and
the Peruvian tavern-songs that he might have heard, unlike those of
Spain, reflected very little of the romantic cult of an idealized woman.
When he said over to himself that she was beautiful and rich and
fatiguingly witty and the Viceroy's mistress, none of these attributes
that made her less obtainable had the power to quench his curious and
tender excitement. So he leaned against the trees in the dark, his
knuckles between his teeth, and listened to his loud heart-beats.
But the life that Esteban was leading had been full enough for him.
There was no room in his imagination for a new loyalty, not because his
heart was less large than Manuel's, but because it was of a simpler
texture. Now he discovered that secret from which one never quite
recovers, that even in the most perfect love one person loves less
profoundly than the other. There may be two equally good, equally
gifted, equally beautiful, but there may never be two that love one
another equally well. So Esteban sat up in their room by a guttering
candle, his knuckles between his teeth, and wondered why Manuel was so
changed and why the whole meaning had gone out of their life.
One evening Manuel was stopped on the street by a small boy who
announced to him that the Perichole wished him to call upon her at once.
Manuel turned in his path and went to the theatre. Straight, sombre and
impersonal, he entered the actress's room and stood waiting. Camila had
a service to ask of Manuel and she thought a few preliminary
blandishments were necessary, but she scarcely paused in combing a blond
wig that was dressed upon the table before her.
"You write letters for people, don't you? I want you to write a letter
for me, please. Please come in."
He came forward two steps.
"You never pay me the least visit either of you. That's not Spanish of
you."--meaning 'courteous.'--"Which are you, Manuel or Esteban?"
"Manuel."
"It doesn't matter. You are both unfriendly. Neither of you ever comes
to see me. Here I sit learning stupid lines all day and no one ever
comes to see me but a lot of peddlers. It is because I am an actress,
no?"
This was not very artful, but for Manuel it was unspeakably complicated.
He merely stared at her from the shadows of his long hair and left her
to improvise.
"I am going to engage you to write a letter for me, a very secret
letter. But now I can see that you don't like me and that to ask you to
write a letter would be as good as reading it aloud in all the
wine-shops. What does that look mean, Manuel? Are you my friend?"
"Yes, señora."
"Go away. Send me Esteban. You do not even say _Yes, señora_ as a
friend would say it."
Long pause. Presently she raised her head: "Are you still there,
Unfriendly?"
"Yes, señora ... you can trust me to do anything for you ... you can
trust ..."
"If I ask you to write one letter for me, or two letters, you promise
never to mention to a human being what is in them, or even that you
wrote them?"
"Yes, señora."
"What do you promise by?--by the Virgin Mary?"
"Yes, señora."
"And by the heart of Saint Rose of Lima?"
"Yes, señora."
"Name of the Name, Manuel, anyone would think you were as stupid as an
ox. Manuel, I am very angry with you. You are not stupid. You don't look
stupid. Please don't say just _Yes, señora_ again. Don't be stupid or
I'll send for Esteban. Is anything the matter with you?"
Here Manuel cast himself upon the Spanish language and exclaimed with
unnecessary vigor: "I swear by the Virgin Mary and the heart of St. Rose
of Lima that all that has to do with the letter will be secret."
"Even from Esteban," prompted the Perichole.
"Even from Esteban."
"Well, that's better." She motioned him to sit down at a table where
writing materials were already laid out. As she dictated she strode
about the room, frowning, swinging her hips. With her arms akimbo, she
hugged her shawl about her shoulders defiantly.
"_Camila Perichole kisses the hands of Your Excellency and says_--No,
take another piece of paper and begin again. _The señora Micaela
Villegas, artist, kisses the hands of Your Excellency and says that,
being the victim of the envious and lying friends that Y. E.'s goodness
permits about Him, she can no longer endure Y. E.'s suspicions and
jealousy. Y. E.'s servant has always valued Y. E.'s friendship and has
never committed, nor even thought, an offense against it, but she can no
longer fight against the calumnies that Y. E. believes so readily.
Señora Villegas, artist, called the Perichole, therefore returns
herewith such of Y. E.'s gifts as have not been placed beyond recall,
since without Y. E.'s confidence, Y. E.'s servant can take no pleasure
in them_."
Camila continued walking about the room for several minutes, consumed by
her thoughts. Presently without so much as glancing at her secretary,
she commanded: "Take another leaf. _Have you gone mad? Do not ever think
of eating another bull to me again. It has caused a frightful war.
Heaven protect you, my colt. Friday night, the same place, the same
time. I may be a little late, for the fox is wide-awake_. That will be
all."
Manuel rose.
"You swear that you have made no errors?"
"Yes, I swear."
"There is your money."
Manuel took the money.
"I shall want you to write me more letters from time to time. My uncle
Pio generally writes my letters; these I do not wish him to know about.
Good night. Go with God."
"Go with God."
Manuel descended the stairs and stood for a long time among the trees,
not thinking, not moving.
Esteban knew that his brother was continually brooding over the
Perichole, but he never suspected that he saw her. From time to time
during the next two months a small boy would approach him in great haste
and ask whether he were Manuel or Esteban, and being informed that he
was only Esteban, the boy would add that Manuel was wanted at the
theatre. Esteban assumed that the call was for copyist's work and was
therefore utterly unprepared for a visit that they received one night in
their room.
It was almost midnight. Esteban had gone to bed, and lay gazing out from
under the blanket at the candle beside which his brother was working.
There was a light tap at the door and Manuel opened to admit a lady
heavily veiled, out of breath and nervous. She threw back the scarf from
her face and said hurriedly:
"Quick, ink and paper. You are Manuel, yes? You must do a letter for me
at once."
For a moment her glance fell on the two bright eyes that glared at her
from the edge of the cot. She murmured: "Eu ... you must excuse me. I
know it is late. It was necessary ... I must come." Then turning to
Manuel, she whispered into his ear: "Write this: _I Perichole, am not
accustomed to wait at a rendez-vous_. Have you finished that? _You are
only a cholo, and there are better matadors than you, even in Lima. I am
half Castilian and there are no better actresses in the world. You shall
not have the opportunity_--Have you got that?--_to keep me waiting
again, cholo, and I shall laugh the last, for even an actress does not
grow old as fast as a bullfighter_."
To Esteban in the shadows the picture of Camila leaning over his
brother's hand and whispering into his ear was complete evidence that a
new congeniality had formed such as he would never know. He seemed to
shrink away into space, infinitely tiny, infinitely unwanted. He took
one more glance at the tableau of love, all the paradise from which he
was shut out, and turned his face to the wall.
Camila seized the note the moment it was done, pushed a coin along the
table and in a last flurry of black lace, scarlet beads and excited
whispers left the room. Manuel turned from the door with his candle. He
sat down, put his hand over his ears, his elbows on his knees. He
worshipped her. He murmured to himself over and over again that he
worshipped her, making of the sound a sort of incantation and an
obstacle to thought.
He emptied his mind of everything but a singsong, and it was this
vacancy that permitted him to become aware of Esteban's mood. He seemed
to hear a voice that proceeded from the shadows saying: "Go and follow
her, Manuel. Don't stay here. You'll be happy. There's room for us all
in the world." Then the realization became even more intense and he
received a mental image of Esteban going a long way off and saying
good-bye many times as he went. He was filled with terror; by the light
of it he saw that all the other attachments in the world were shadows,
or the illusions of fever, even Madre María del Pilar, even the
Perichole. He could not understand why Esteban's misery should present
itself as demanding a choice between him and the Perichole, but he could
understand Esteban's misery, as misery. And at once he sacrificed
everything to it, if it can be said we ever sacrifice anything save what
we know we can never attain, or what some secret wisdom tells us it
would be uncomfortable or saddening to possess. To be sure there was
nothing on which Esteban could base a complaint. It was not jealousy,
for in their earlier affairs it had never occurred to either of them
that their loyalty to one another had been diminished. It was merely
that in the heart of one of them there was left room for an elaborate
imaginative attachment and in the heart of the other there was not.
Manuel could not quite understand this and, as we shall see, he
nourished a dim sense of being accused unjustly. But he did understand
that Esteban was suffering. In his excitement he groped for a means of
holding this brother who seemed to be receding into the distance. And at
once, in one unhesitating stroke of the will, he removed the Perichole
from his heart.
He blew out the candle and lay down on his bed. He was trembling. He
said aloud with exaggerated casualness: "Well, that's the last letter I
write for that woman. She can go and find a pander somewhere else. If
ever she calls here or sends for me when I'm out, tell her so. Make it
plain. That's the last I have to do with her," and with that he began
reciting his evening psalm aloud. But he had hardly reached _A sagitta
volante in die_ when he became aware that Esteban had risen and was
lighting the candle.
"What's the matter?" he asked.
"I'm going out for a walk," replied Esteban sombrely, fastening his
belt. After a moment, he broke out with an assumption of anger: "You
don't have to say ... what you just said, for me. I don't care whether
you write her letters or not. You don't have to change for me. I haven't
anything to do with that."
"Go to bed, you fool. God, you're a fool, Esteban. What made you think I
said that, for you? Don't you believe I mean it when I say I'm through
with her? Do you think I want to write any more of her dirty letters and
get paid for them like that?"
"It's all right. You love her. You don't have to change because of me."
"'_Love_ her?' _Love_ her? You're crazy, Esteban. How could I love
her? What chance would there be for me? Do you suppose she'd give me
those letters to write if there were any chance? Do you suppose she'd
push a piece of money across the table every time.... You're crazy,
Esteban, that's all."
There was a long pause. Esteban would not go to bed. He sat by the
candle in the middle of the room, tapping with his hand on the edge of
the table.
"Go to bed, you fool," shouted Manuel, rising on one elbow under the
blanket. He was talking in their secret language and the new pain at his
heart, gave a greater ring of reality to his assumption of rage. "I'm
all right."
"I won't. I'm going out for a walk," replied Esteban picking up his
coat.
[Illustration]
"You can't go out for a walk. It's two o'clock. It's raining. You can't
go and walk about for hours like that. Look, Esteban, I swear to you
there's nothing left to all that. I don't love her. I only did for a
time."
By now Esteban stood in the dark of the open door. In the unnatural
voice with which we make the greatest declarations of our lives, he
muttered: "I'm in your way," and turned to go.
Manuel leapt out of his bed. His head seemed to be full of a great din,
a voice crying out that Esteban was going away forever, was leaving him
alone forever. "In the name of God, in the name of God, Esteban, come
back here."
Esteban came back and went to bed and the matter was not mentioned again
for many weeks. The very next evening Manuel had an opportunity of
declaring his position. A messenger arrived from the Perichole and was
told harshly to inform the actress that Manuel would write no more
letters for her.
One evening Manuel tore open the flesh on his knee against a piece of
metal.
Neither brother had ever been ill for as much as a day in his life, and
now Manuel, utterly bewildered, watched his leg swell and felt the waves
of pain rise and fall in his body. Esteban sat by and stared at his face
trying to imagine what great pain was. At last one midnight Manuel
remembered that the signboard of a certain hairdresser in the city
described the proprietor as an experienced barber and surgeon. Esteban
ran through the streets to fetch him. He pounded on the door. Presently
a woman leaned out of a window and announced that her husband would be
back in the morning. During the fearful hours that followed, they told
one another that when the doctor had seen the leg all would be well. He
would do something about it, and Manuel would be out around the town in
a day or two, even in a day perhaps, even less than a day.
The barber arrived and prescribed various draughts and ointments.
Esteban was instructed to lay cold cloths on his brother's leg every
hour. The barber withdrew and the brothers sat down to wait for the pain
to subside. But while they continued staring into one another's face
waiting for the miracle of science the pain grew worse. Hour after hour
Esteban approached with his dripping towel and they discovered that the
moment of its application was the worst of all. With all the fortitude
in the world Manuel could not prevent himself from shouting and from
flinging himself about upon the bed. Night came on and still Esteban
stolidly waited and watched and worked. Nine, ten, eleven. Now when the
time drew near to apply the cloths (the hour struck so musically from
all those towers) Manuel would plead with Esteban not to do his work. He
would resort to guile and declare that he scarcely felt it. But Esteban,
his heart bursting with pain and his lips a line of iron, would roll
back the blanket and bind the towel fiercely in its place. Manuel
gradually became delirious and under this application all the thoughts
he did not permit himself in his right mind would burst magnified from
his mouth.
Finally at two o'clock, out of his mind with rage and pain, and flinging
himself half out of the bed until his head struck the floor, Manuel
cried: "God condemn your soul to the hottest hell there is. A thousand
devils torture you forever, Esteban. God condemn your soul, do you
hear?" At first, the air gone out of his body, Esteban went out into the
hall and leaned against the door, his mouth and eyes wide open. Still he
heard from within: "Yes, Esteban, may God damn your beastly soul
forever, do you hear that? For coming between me and what was mine by
right. She was mine, do you hear, and what right had you...." and he
would go off into an elaborate description of the Perichole.
These outbursts recurred hourly. It was some time before Esteban was
able to realize that his brother's mind was not then clear. After some
moments of horror, in which his being a devout believer had its part, he
would return to the room and go about his duties with bent head.
Towards dawn his brother became serener. (For what human ill does not
dawn seem to be an alleviation?) It was in one of these intervals that
Manuel said quite calmly:
"God's son! I feel better, Esteban. Those cloths must be good after all.
You'll see. I'll be up and around tomorrow. You haven't slept for days.
You'll see I won't cause you any more trouble, Esteban."
"It's no trouble, you fool."
"You mustn't take me seriously when I try and stop you putting on the
old cloths, Esteban."
A long pause. At last Esteban brought out, barely audible:
"I think ... don't you think it would be fine if I sent for the
Perichole? She could just come and see you for a few minutes, I
mean...."
"Her? You still thinking about her? I wouldn't have her here for
anything. No."
But Esteban was not content yet. He dragged up a few more phrases from
the very centre of his being:
"Manuel, you still feel, don't you, that I came between you and the
Perichole and you don't remember that I told you it was all right with
me. I swear to you I'd have been glad if you'd gone away with her, or
anything."
"What are you bringing that up for, Esteban? I tell you, in God's own
name, I never think of that. She's nothing to me. When are you going to
forget that, Esteban? I tell you I'm glad things are as they are. Look,
I got to get angry when you keep going back to that."
"Manuel, I wouldn't speak of it again, only when you get angry at me
about the cloths ... you, you get angry at me about that, too. And you
talk about it and you ..."
"Look, I'm not responsible what I say. My old leg hurts then, see."
"Then you don't damn me to hell because ... it looks like I came between
you and the Perichole?"
"Damn you to ...? What makes you say that? You're going crazy, Esteban;
you're imagining things. You haven't had any sleep, Esteban. I been a
curse to you and you're losing your health because of me. But you'll
see, I won't trouble you much more. How could I damn you to hell,
Esteban, when you're all I've got? Understand, see, that when the cold
cloths go on, I just lose myself, see. You know. Don't think about it
twice. It's time to put them on now. I won't say a word."
"No, Manuel, I'll skip this time. It won't do you any harm, I'll just
skip this time."
"I've got to get well, Esteban. I've got to get up soon, you know. Put
them on. But one minute--give me the crucifix. I swear by the blood and
body of Christ that if I say anything against Esteban, I don't mean it
and it's just the foolish words when I'm dreaming because of the pain in
my leg. God make me well again soon, amen. Put it back. There. Now I'm
ready."
"Look, Manuel, it won't hurt if I skip just this once, see. It'll be
good for you, sure, to not get it all stirred up just this once."
"No, I've got to get well. The doctor said it had to be done. I won't
say a word, Esteban."
And it would begin all over again.
During the second night a prostitute in the next room started beating on
the wall, outraged at such language. A priest in the room on the other
side would come out into the hall and beat on the door. The whole floor
would gather before the room in exasperation. The innkeeper came up the
stairs, loudly promising his guests that the brothers would be dumped
into the street the very next morning. Esteban, holding his candle,
would go into the hall and permit them to rage at him for as long as
they pleased; but after that he took to pressing his hand firmly over
his brother's mouth during the moments of greatest stress. This
increased Manuel's personal rage at him and he would babble all through
the night.
On the third night, Esteban sent for the priest and amidst the enormous
shadows Manuel received the sacrament, and died.
Thereafter Esteban refused to come near the building. He would start off
upon long walks, but presently drifting back, would hang about, staring
at passers-by, within two streets of where his brother lay. The
innkeeper failing to make any impression upon him and remembering that
the boys were brought up at the Convent of Santa María Rosa de las
Rosas, sent for the Abbess. Simply and soundly she directed all that was
to be done. At last she went down to the street corner and spoke to
Esteban. He watched her approach him, a glance mixed of longing and
distrust. But when she stood near him he turned sideways and looked
away.
"I want you to help me. Won't you come in and see your brother? Won't
you come in and help me?"
"No."
"You won't help me!" A long pause. Suddenly as she stood there full of
her helplessness there flashed through her mind an incident of many
years before: the twin brothers about fifteen years old were sitting at
her knee and she was telling them the story of the crucifixion. Their
large grave eyes were fixed upon her lips. Suddenly Manuel had cried out
loudly: "If Esteban and I had been there we would have prevented it."
"Well, then, if you won't help me, will you tell me which you are?"
"Manuel," said Esteban.
"Manuel, won't you come and sit with me up there for just a short time?"