the wars. But an accident frustrated his intentions. In those days,
cavaliers of rank frequently sought the dangerous triumphs of the
bull-ring. The part of matador was performed, not, as now, by hired
bravos of the lowest class, but often by scions of the most honourable
houses. Gonsalvo had more than once distinguished himself in the bloody
arena by courage and coolness. But he tempted his fate too often. Upon
one occasion he was flung violently from his horse, and then gored by
the furious bull, whose rage had been excited to the utmost pitch by
the cruel arts usually practised. He escaped with life, but remained
a crippled invalid, apparently condemned for the rest of his days to
inaction, weakness, and suffering.
His father thought a good canonry would be a decent and comfortable
provision for him, and pressed him accordingly to enter the Church. But
the invalided youth manifested an intense repugnance to the step; and
Don Manuel hoped that the influence of Carlos would help to overcome
this feeling; believing that he would gladly endeavour to persuade his
cousin that no way of life was so pleasant or so easy as that which he
himself was about to adopt.
The good nature of Carlos led him to fall heartily into his uncle's
plans. He really pitied his cousin, moreover, and gladly gave himself
to the task of trying in every possible way to console and amuse him.
But Gonsalvo rudely repelled all his efforts. In his eyes the destined
priest was half a woman, with no knowledge of a man's aims or a man's
passions, and consequently no right to speak of them.
"Turn priest!" he said to him one day; "I have as good a mind to turn
Turk. Nay, cousin, I am not pious--you may present my orisons to Our
Lady with your own, if it so please you. Perhaps she may attend to them
better than to those I offered before entering the bull-ring on that
unlucky day of St. Thomas."
Carlos, though not particularly devout, was shocked by this language.
"Take care, cousin," he said; "your words sound rather like blasphemy."
"And yours sound like the words of what you are, half a priest
already," retorted Gonsalvo. "It is ever the priest's cry, if you
displease him, 'Open heresy!' 'Rank blasphemy!' And next, 'the Holy
Office, and a yellow Sanbenito.' I marvel it did not occur to your
sanctity to menace me with that."
The gentle-tempered Carlos did not answer; a forbearance which further
exasperated Gonsalvo, who hated nothing so much as being, on account of
his infirmities, borne with like a woman or a child. "But the saints
help the Churchmen," he went on ironically. "Good simple souls, they do
not know even their own business! Else they would smell heresy close
enough at hand. What doctrine does your Fray Constantino preach in the
great Church every feast-day, since they made him canon-magistral?"
"The most orthodox and Catholic doctrine, and no other," said Carlos,
roused, in his turn, by the attack upon his teacher; though he did
not greatly care for his instructions, which turned principally upon
subjects about which he had learned little or nothing in the schools.
"But to hear thee discuss doctrine is to hear a blind man talking of
colours."
"If I be the blind man talking of colours, thou art the deaf prating of
music," retorted his cousin. "Come and tell me, if thou canst, what
are these doctrines of thy Fray Constantino, and wherein they differ
from the Lutheran heresy? I wager my gold chain and medal against thy
new velvet cloak, that thou wouldst fall thyself into as many heresies
by the way as there are nuts in Barcelona."
Allowing for Gonsalvo's angry exaggeration, there was some truth in his
assertion. Once out of the region of dialectic subtleties, the champion
of the schools would have become weak as another man. And he could
not have expounded Fray Constantino's preaching;--because he did not
understand it.
"What, cousin!" he exclaimed, affronted in his tenderest part,
his reputation as a theological scholar. "Dost thou take me for a
barefooted friar or a village cura? Me, who only two months ago was
crowned victor in a debate upon the doctrines taught by Raymondus
Lullius!"
But whatever chagrin Carlos may have felt at finding himself utterly
unable to influence Gonsalvo, was soon effectually banished by the
delight with which he watched the success of his diplomacy with Doña
Beatriz.
Beatriz was almost a child in years, and entirely a child in mind and
character. Hitherto, she had been studiously kept in the background,
lest her brilliant beauty should throw her cousins into the shade.
Indeed, she would probably have been consigned to a convent, had not
her portion been too small to furnish the donative usually bestowed by
the friends of a novice upon any really aristocratic establishment.
"And pity would it have been," thought Carlos, "that so fair a flower
should wither in a convent garden."
He made the most of the limited opportunities of intercourse which the
ceremonious manners of the time and country afforded, even to inmates
of the same house. He would stand beside her chair, and watch the
quick flush mount to her olive, delicately-rounded cheek, as he talked
eloquently of the absent Juan. He was never tired of relating stories
of Juan's prowess, Juan's generosity. In the last duel he fought, for
instance, the ball had passed through his cap and grazed his head. But
he only smiled, and re-arranged his locks, remarking, while he did so,
that with the addition of a gold chain and medal, the spoiled cap would
be as good, or better than ever. Then he would dilate on his kindness
to the vanquished; rejoicing in the effect produced, a tribute as well
to his own eloquence as to his brother's merit. The occupation was
too fascinating not to be resorted to once and again, even had he not
persuaded himself that he was fulfilling a sacred duty.
Moreover, he soon discovered that the bright dark eyes which were
beginning to visit him nightly in his dreams, were pining all day for
a sight of that gay world from which their owner was jealously and
selfishly excluded. So he managed to procure for Doña Beatriz many a
pleasure of the kind she most valued. He prevailed upon his aunt and
cousins to bring her with them to places of public resort; and then he
was always at hand, with the reverence of a loyal cavalier, and the
freedom of a destined priest, to render her every quiet unobtrusive
service in his power. At the theatre, at the dance, at the numerous
Church ceremonies, on the promenade, Doña Beatriz was his especial
charge.
Amidst such occupations, pleasant weeks and months glided by almost
unnoticed by him. Never before had he been so happy. "Alcala was well
enough," he thought; "but Seville is a thousand times better. All my
life heretofore seems to me only like a dream, now I am awake."
Alas! he was not awake, but wrapped in a deep sleep, and cradling a
bright delusive vision. As yet he was not even "as those that dream,
and know the while they dream." His slumber was too profound even for
this dim half-consciousness.
No one suspected, any more than he suspected himself, the enchantment
that was stealing over him. But every one remarked his frank, genial
manners, his cheerfulness, his good looks. Naturally, the name of Juan
dropped gradually more and more out of his conversation; as at the same
time the thought of Juan faded from his mind. His studies, too, were
neglected; his attendance upon the lectures of Fray Constantino became
little more than a formality; while "receiving Orders" seemed a remote
if not an uncertain contingency. In fact, he lived in the present, not
caring to look either at the past or the future.
In the very midst of his intoxication, at slight incident affected him
for a moment with such a chill as we feel when, on a warm spring day,
the sun passes suddenly behind a cloud.
His cousin, Doña Inez, had been married more than a year to a wealthy
gentleman of Seville, Don Garçia Ramirez. Carlos, calling one morning
at the lady's house with some unimportant message from Doña Beatriz,
found her in great trouble on account of the sudden illness of her babe.
"Shall I go and fetch a physician?" he asked, knowing well that Spanish
servants can never be depended upon to make haste, however great the
emergency may be.
"You will do a great kindness, amigo mio," said the anxious young
mother.
"But which shall I summon?" asked Carlos. "Our family physician, or Don
Garçia's?"
"Don Garçia's, by all means,--Dr. Cristobal Losada. I would not give a
green fig for any other in Seville. Do you know his dwelling?"
"Yes. But should he be absent or engaged?"
"I must have him. Him, and no other. Once before he saved my darling's
life. And if my poor brother would but consult him, it might fare
better with him. Go quickly, cousin, and fetch him, in Heaven's name."
Carlos lost no time in complying; but on reaching the dwelling of the
physician, found that though the hour was early he had already gone
forth. After leaving a message, he went to visit a friend in the Triana
suburb. He passed close by the Cathedral, with its hundred pinnacles,
and that wonder of beauty, the old Moorish Giralda, soaring far up
above it into the clear southern sky. It occurred to him that a few
Aves said within for the infant's recovery would be both a benefit to
the child and a comfort to the mother. So he entered, and was making
his way to a gaudy tinselled Virgin and Babe, when, happening to glance
towards a different part of the building, his eyes rested on the
physician, with whose person he was well acquainted, as he had often
noticed him amongst Fray Constantino's hearers. Losada was now pacing
up and down one of the side aisles, in company with a gentleman of very
distinguished appearance.
As Carlos drew nearer, it occurred to him that he had never seen this
personage in any place of public resort, and for this reason, as well
as from certain slight indications in his dress of fashions current
in the north of Spain, he gathered that he was a stranger in Seville,
who might be visiting the Cathedral from motives of curiosity. Before
he came up the two men paused in their walk, and turning their backs
to him, stood gazing thoughtfully at the hideous row of red and yellow
Sanbenitos, or penitential garments, that hung above them.
"Surely," thought Carlos, "they might find better objects of
attention than these ugly memorials of sin and shame, which bear
witness that their late miserable wearers--Jews, Moors, blasphemers,
or sorcerers,--have ended their dreary lives of penance, if not of
penitence."
The attention of the stranger seemed to be particularly attracted
by one of them, the largest of all. Indeed, Carlos himself had been
struck by its unusual size; and upon one occasion he had even had the
curiosity to read the inscription, which he remembered because it
contained Juan's favourite name, Rodrigo. It was this: "Rodrigo Valer,
a citizen of Lebrixa and Seville; an apostate and false apostle, who
pretended to be sent from God." And now, as he approached with light
though hasty footsteps, he distinctly heard Dr. Cristobal Losada, still
looking at the Sanbenito, say to his companion, "Yes, señor; and also
the Conde de Nuera, Don Juan Alvarez."
Don Juan Alvarez! What possible tie could link his father's name with
the hideous thing they were gazing at? And what could the physician
know about him of whom his own children knew so little? Carlos stood
amazed, and pale with sudden emotion.
And thus the physician saw him, happening to turn at that moment. Had
he not exerted all his presence of mind (and he possessed a great
deal), he would himself have started visibly. The unexpected appearance
of the person of whom we speak is in itself disconcerting; but it
deserves another name when we are saying that of him or his which, if
overheard, might endanger life, or what is more precious still than
life. Losada was equal to the occasion, however. The usual greetings
having been exchanged, he asked quietly whether Señor Don Carlos had
come in search of him, and hoped that he did not owe the honour to any
indisposition in his worship's noble family.
Carlos felt it rather a relief, under the circumstances, to have to
say that his cousin's babe was alarmingly ill. "You will do us a great
favour," he added, "by coming immediately. Doña Inez is very anxious."
The physician promised compliance; and turning to his companion,
respectfully apologized for leaving him abruptly.
"A sick child's claim must not be postponed," said the stranger in
reply. "Go, señor doctor, and God's blessing rest on your skill."
Carlos was struck by the noble bearing and courteous manner of the
stranger, who, in his turn, was interested by the young man's anxiety
about a sick babe. But with only a passing glance at the other, each
went his different way, not dreaming that once again at least their
paths were destined to cross.
The strange mention of his father's name that he had overheard filled
the heart of Carlos with undefined uneasiness. He knew enough by that
time to feel his childish belief in his father's stainless virtue
a little shaken. What if a dreadful unexplained something, linking
his fate with that of a convicted heretic, were yet to be learned?
After all, the accursed arts of magic and sorcery were not so far
removed from the alchemist's more legitimate labours, that a rash
or presumptuous student might not very easily slide from one into
the other. He had reason to believe that his father had played with
alchemy, if he had not seriously devoted himself to its study. Nay, the
thought had sometimes flashed unbidden across his mind that the "El
Dorado" found might after all have been no other than the philosopher's
stone. For he who has attained the power of producing gold at will may
surely be said, without any stretch of metaphor, to have discovered a
golden country. But at this period of his life the personal feelings of
Carlos were so keen and absorbing that almost everything, consciously
or unconsciously, was referred to them. And thus it was that an intense
wish sprang up in his heart, that his father's secret might have
descended to _him_.
Vain wish! The gold he needed or desired must be procured from a
less inaccessible region than El Dorado, and without the aid of the
philosopher's stone.
VI.
Don Carlos forgets Himself still further.
"The not so very false, as falsehood goes,--
The spinning out and drawing fine, you know;
Really mere novel-writing, of a sort,
Acting, improvising, make-believe,--
Surely not downright cheatery!"
R. BROWNING
It cost Carlos some time and trouble to drive away the haunting
thoughts which Losada's words had awakened. But he succeeded at length;
or perhaps it would be more truthful to say the bright eyes and
witching smiles of Doña Beatriz accomplished the work for him.
Every dream, however, must have a waking. Sometimes a slight sound,
ludicrously trivial in its cause, dispels a slumber fraught with
wondrous visions, in which we have been playing the part of kings and
emperors.
"Nephew Don Carlos," said Don Manuel one day, "is it not time you
thought of shaving your head? You are learned enough for your Orders
long ago, and 'in a plentiful house supper is soon dressed.'"
"True, señor my uncle," murmured Carlos, looking suddenly aghast. "But
I am under the canonical age."
"But you can get a dispensation."
"Why such haste? There is time yet and to spare."
"That is not so sure. I hear the cura of San Lucar has one foot in the
grave. The living is a good one, and I think I know where to go for it.
So take care you lose not a heifer for want of a halter to hold it by."
With these words on his lips, Don Manuel went out. At the same moment
Gonsalvo, who lay listlessly on a sofa at one end of the room, or
rather court, reading "Lazarillo de Tormes," the first Spanish novel,
burst into a loud paroxysm of laughter.
"What may be the theme of your merriment?" asked Carlos, turning his
large dreamy eyes languidly towards him.
"Yourself, amigo mio. You would make the stone saints of the Cathedral
laugh on their pedestals. There you stand, pale as marble, a living
image of despair. Come, rouse yourself! What do you mean to do? Will
you take what you wish, or let your chance slip by, and then sit and
weep because you have it not? Will you be a _priest_ or a _man_? Make
your choice this hour, for one you must be, and both you cannot be."
Carlos answered him not; in truth, he dared not answer him. Every word
was the voice of his own heart; perhaps it was also, though he knew it
not, the voice of the great tempter. He withdrew to his chamber, and
barred and bolted himself in it. This was the first time in his life
that solitude was a necessity to him. His uncle's words had brought
with them a terrible revelation. He knew himself now too well; he knew
what he loved, what he desired, or rather what he hungered and thirsted
for with agonizing intensity. No; never the priest's frock for him. He
must call Doña Beatriz de Lavella his--his before God's altar--or die.
Then came a thought, stinging him with sharp, sudden pain. It was a
thought that should have come to him long ago,--"Juan!" And with the
name, affection, memory, conscience, rose up together within him to
combat the mad resolve of his passion.
Fiery passions slumbered in the heart of Carlos. Such are sometimes
found united with a gentle temper, a weak will, and sensitive nerves.
Woe to their possessor when they are aroused in their strength!
Had Carlos been a plain soldier, like the brother he was tempted to
betray, it is possible he might have come forth from this terrible
conflict still holding fast his honour and his brotherly affection.
It was his priestly training that turned the scale. He had been
taught that simple truth between man and man was a thing of little
consequence. He had been taught the art of making a hundred clever,
plausible excuses for whatever he saw best to do. He had been taught,
in short, every species of sophistry by which, to the eyes of others,
and to his own also, wrong might be made to seem right, and black to
appear the purest white.
His subtle imagination forged in the fire of his kindled passions
chains of reasoning in which no skill could detect a flaw. Juan had
never loved as he did; Juan would not care; probably by this time he
had forgotten Doña Beatriz. "Besides," the tempter whispered furtively
within him, "he might never return at all; he might die in battle."
But Carlos was not yet sunk so low as to give ear for a single instant
to this wicked whisper; though certainly he could not henceforth look
for his brother's return with the joy with which he had been wont to
anticipate that event. But, in any case, Beatriz herself should be the
judge between them. And he told himself that he knew (how did he know
it?) that Beatriz preferred _him_. Then it would be only right and kind
to prepare Juan for an inevitable disappointment. This he could easily
do. Letters, carefully written, might gradually suggest to his brother
that Beatriz had other views; and he knew Juan's pride and his fiery
temper well enough to calculate that if his jealousy were once aroused,
these would soon accomplish the rest.
Ere we, who have been taught from our cradles to "speak the truth from
the heart," turn with loathing from the wiles of Carlos Alvarez, we
ought to remember that he was a Spaniard--one of a nation whose genius
and passion is for intrigue. He was also a Spaniard of the sixteenth
century; but, above all, he was a Spanish Catholic, educated for the
priesthood.
The ability with which he laid his plans, and the enjoyment which its
exercise gave him, served in itself to blind him to the treachery and
ingratitude upon which those plans were founded.
He sought an interview with Fray Constantino, and implored from him a
letter of recommendation to the imperial recluse at San Yuste, whose
chaplain and personal favourite the canon-magistral had been. But
that eloquent preacher, though warm-hearted and generous to a fault,
hesitated to grant the request. He represented to Carlos that His
Imperial Majesty did not choose his retreat to be invaded by applicants
for favours, and that the journey to San Yuste would therefore be, in
all probability, worse than useless. Carlos answered that he had fully
weighed the difficulties of the case; but that if the line of conduct
he adopted seemed peculiar, his circumstances were so also. He believed
that his father (who died before his birth) had enjoyed the special
regard of His Imperial Majesty, and he hoped that, for his sake, he
might now be willing to show him some kindness. At all events, he was
sure of an introduction to his presence through his mayor-domo, Don
Luis Quixada, lord of Villagarçia, who was a friend of their house.
What he desired to obtain, through the kindness of His Imperial
Majesty, was a Latin secretaryship, or some similar office, at the
court of the new king, where his knowledge of Latin, and the talents he
hoped he possessed, might stand him in good stead, and enable him to
support, though with modesty, the station to which his birth entitled
him. For, although already a licentiate of theology, and with good
prospects in the Church, he did not wish to take orders, as he had
thoughts of marrying.
Fray Constantino felt a sympathy with the young man; and perhaps the
rather because, if report speaks true, he had once been himself in a
somewhat similar position. So he compromised matters by giving him a
general letter of recommendation, in which he spoke of his talents and
his blameless manners as warmly as he could, from the experience of
the nine or ten months during which he had been acquainted with him.
And although the attention paid by Carlos to his instructions had been
slight, and of late almost perfunctory, his great natural intelligence
had enabled him to stand his ground more creditably than many far more
diligent students. The Fray's letter Carlos thankfully added to the
numerous laudatory epistles from the doctors and professors of Alcala
that he already had in his possession.
All these he enclosed in a cedar box, which he carefully locked, and
consigned in its turn to a travelling portmanteau, along with a fair
stock of wearing apparel, sufficiently rich in material to suit his
rank, but modest in colour and fashion. He then informed his uncle that
before he took Orders it would be necessary for him, in his brother's
absence, to take a journey to their little estate, and set its concerns
in order.
His uncle, suspecting nothing, approved his plan, and insisted on
providing him with the attendance of an armed guard to Nuera, whither
he really intended to go in the first instance.
VII.
The Desengaño
"And I should evermore be vexed with thee
In vacant robe, or hanging ornament,
Or ghostly foot-fall lingering on the stair."
TENNYSON
The journey from the city of oranges to the green slopes of the Sierra
Morena ought to have been a delightful one to Don Carlos Alvarez. It
was certainly bright with hope. He scarcely harboured a doubt of the
ultimate success of his plans, and the consequent attainment of all his
wishes. Already he seemed to feel the soft hand of Doña Beatriz in his,
and to stand by her side before the high altar of the great Cathedral.
And yet, as days passed on, the brightness within grew fainter, and
an acknowledged shadow, ever deepening, began to take its place. At
last he drew near his home, and rode through the little grove of
cork-trees where he and Juan had played as children. When last they
were there together the autumn winds were strewing the leaves, all dim
and discoloured, about their paths. Now he looked through the fresh
green foliage at the deep intense blue of the summer sky. But, though
scarcely more than twenty, he felt at that moment old and worn, and
wished back the time of his boyish sports with his brother. Never
again could he feel quite happy with Juan.