REMINISCENCES--ANXIETIES.
They sat down to dinner, as Pepa had said, a party of four. Happy
to find herself with friends so good and few, the millionaire’s
daughter showed her pleasure frankly but discreetly during the
meal, after which they all went together into the drawing-room
where Pepa received her more intimate acquaintance. There she had
collected various treasures of art and numberless trifles of French
workmanship, adding prettiness to splendour, and novelty to beauty,
all so skilfully arranged to surprise or delight the eye that the
palace of caprice itself could not be more delightful. They sat
together for some time till the Countess de Vera left to go to the
theatre, Don Joaquín Onésimo offering to escort her. Then the other
two were alone.
On a crimson divan, over which hung a genre picture representing a
squalid party of gypsies with their asses--fashion attributes a very
high value to this class of work just now, and pays for them their
weight in gold--while not far off, on a pedestal representing three
elephants’ heads, stood a Chinese vase in which grew a drooping
broad-leaved begonia--Pepa and Leon Roch sat side by side; she very
communicative; he gloomy, and silent.
“It all happened just as I foresaw,” said Pepita. “Federico, far
from improving at Havana, went from bad to worse. I told papa he
would, here he had got into some absurd and discreditable business,
and there ... well it would seem that distance makes men reckless. I
am ashamed when I think of it; I cannot get used to the idea that my
husband could be guilty of such dirty work. Why, out there he had to
hide and make his escape, for my father’s correspondents there would
have put him in prison ... when I think that it was my madness, my
idiotic folly, that brought this disgrace on my father’s house!...
All the mischief arose from that cursed passion for gambling; but
who could control it? It was in his blood--part and parcel of his
being. I assure you,” she added after a pause and passing her hand
across her eyes, “that I have gone through hours of intense misery
and untold struggles; for there were some things that I could not
tell papa, and at the same time I was forced to apply to him to get
out of the compromising difficulties in which my husband placed me
by his enormous losses. But you too have suffered, more than enough
Señor de Roch. I do not believe that hearts are made of flesh and
blood as anatomists tell us; they are stone and iron which cannot be
broken, or mine must have been crushed. I have shed so many tears,”
she again wiped her eyes--“that I think I can have none left to shed
if any further grief befalls me.... But how could I hope to see the
fulfilment of all the fancies and bright dreams of that bygone time?
Ah! reality tames us; we live to learn. Good heavens! when I think of
what I have gone through for mere appearances!... Indeed Leon, I have
suffered cruelly. This palace, which to others is a scene of feasting
and amusement, to me is full of sorrows; there is not an object
which does not bear the mark, as it were, of my sighs; there is not
a spot of which I could not say: ‘Here I cried on such a day; there
I thought I should die of grief.’ If I were to try to tell you all I
should never come to an end.” And Pepita waved her hand to indicate
the endlessness of what she might relate if she were not afraid of
boring her friend.
“No, no, tell me everything. Do I not know the worst, the really
incomprehensible beginning of it all: your marriage to that rascal
Cimarra? That you, with your morbid imagination--a sort of moral
atrophy in spite of your good heart--should have made such a mistake
I cannot understand; but that your father should have consented!...
To be sure, when his party came to the front and made Federico a
provincial governor, he seemed for a time to have amended his ways;
he was the model man in office. When he held a high position in
the exchequer no one could have recognised the old Cimarra in that
punctual, almost stoical functionary; he was so anxious to be thought
a judicious and important personage that it was quite ridiculous,
and I believe your father allowed himself to be taken in by the
masquerade. Besides, your father had dealings with the exchequer
in those days; I heard something of a loan on the salt tax and a
mortgage on salt mines ... but it was you, Pepa, who were to be given
in pledge and put in the power of that ruffian. I was not surprised
at the trouble that followed, but oh! how deeply I pitied you. At the
time when you married I was happy; since then ... but you see I know
the worst of your miserable story, and if there is anything I do not
know, lose no time in telling me.”
Pepa laughed; then turning to her friend with a reproachful air she
said:
“But I like your coolness; ‘tell me, tell me,’ you say? But you tell
me nothing. It is not that there is any lack of interesting chapters
in your history--nay, of grand, not to say poetic passages, but that
you are the most reticent soul alive. You can endure the bitterest
griefs without any one ever knowing it. But I am very much interested
in what goes on in your house; I know that you and María never meet
but at meals, and that not every day. You see, though you are so
prudent, your mother-in-law is not. She answers those that ask ...
and Polito; he tells tales of what occurs--and of what does not occur
as well.”
Leon sighed. Pepa hid a smile with her fan and went on:
“You have married into a delightful family!”
There was a long silence during which they both sat gazing at the
flowers in the carpet. In this hushed and solitary house, where not
a sound was to be heard, a sort of melancholy or sleepiness pervaded
the air which was conducive to meditation. Pepa rose and paced the
room as though she were racking her brain for some adequate mode of
expressing something that was stirring in her mind and that must be
said.
The reader has been told that she was not handsome, and why should
I repeat it. But there is nothing so bad as to have good in it, nor
woman so plain that she has no detail of beauty. Pepa indeed did
not lack charms, and to some she possessed them in a high degree;
her eyes were effective, small but very bright, with a sweet and
caressing glance. What was most conspicuous in her was her thick red
hair and the dead whiteness of her skin which gave her the effect
of a statue of alabaster and gold. She was tall and somewhat bony,
but this defect was qualified by her well-proportioned limbs and the
exquisite lightness of her gait, with an air of gentle confidence
that was extremely captivating. The volubility of her tongue covered
a grave and thoughtful nature; she seemed to have no pride at all,
and her manners, somewhat independent of etiquette, were most
engagingly frank and cordial. Her caprices and eccentricities were so
much changed from what they were when we first saw her at Iturburua,
that she was hardly like the same woman. Sorrow, that tames all, had
brandished her scourge over Pepita’s head, and there was little left
of her old violence beyond a rare and transitory echo. She presently
returned to her seat, and for some minutes she silently watched
the intelligent but melancholy countenance of her old friend. Leon
remained lost in thought, like a mathematician absorbed in the depths
of a calculation.
“What are you thinking of?” Pepa suddenly asked.--But it would fill
three chapters to say what Leon was thinking of at that moment.
“Of nothing,” he said with affected indifference, “of the miseries
and farces of life.”
“You cannot forget your mamma-in-law?” said Pepa laughing. “Do you
never go to her parties? She began them again with great display when
she went out of mourning for her son Luis Gonzaga, who died just
six months ago, if I remember rightly. I can keep account of the
most important events in your family. Would you believe it ... her
evenings are quite famous.”
“Oh, I believe it. They will no doubt become famous.”
“The Count de Vera tells me that she gave a capital supper the night
before last. Do not you think that your brothers-in-law must have
pledged the family standard for a good round sum? But some people
really do not know what to do with their money!”
They both laughed, but Leon suddenly turned melancholy.
“Change the subject,” he said; “it is a painful one.”
“Your mother-in-law has found the philosopher’s stone,” Pepa went on,
“you ought to be proud of having any one in your family who is so
clever in that art!... Well, I heard--servants always have the most
delightful stories, and they tell each other everything--oh! the most
amusing detail ... shall I tell you?”
“No, for pity’s sake.”
“Nonsense, let me tell you.”
“I can guess it: that on the very day of the great supper there was
nothing to eat; that there was a commotion in the house because some
purveyor or confectioner brought a bill for twenty or thirty dollars
... oh! I know it all; it is an every day dilemma.”
“But perhaps you do not know of the scandalous flirtation that the
Marquesa de San Salomó carries on with Gustavo, in his father’s
house even. Vera told me that they were always together, sitting in
a corner, whispering and cooing with an air of mystery and devotion
in the most impudent, the most audacious way!... So they say, but
perhaps it is slander; so many lies get about.”
“So many!”
“And have you heard of her poet?” Pepa went on with malicious
enjoyment. “Has not the marquis told you about him? This inspired
being whose verses are all about white doves and lilies of peace, the
Christian home, the glories of Sinai, the Virgins of the Lord, pious
aspirations, the azure empyrean, the spirits of the deep and the soul
of Virtue--this sublime Christian poet adores your mother-in-law as
his Beatrice.” Pepa could not help laughing. “It is she who inspires
him with all these divine visions and metaphysical raptures. It is a
pity you should not have seen him; he is quite a character. To talk
to him after reading his verses is like falling from the clouds into
a mud heap. You have not only dramas in your family but farces!”
“Pepita for pity’s sake do not torture me,” said Leon rising to go.
“You know that I can never get accustomed to certain things which
some people do not mind at all so long as they do not go on in their
own houses. They do not, to be sure, go on in mine; but still, I see
them in that of a man who has a right to call me his son. It crushes
me ... I feel that I cannot live here, I must leave Madrid, my mind
is quite made up; I must go....”
“Go! where?”
“Anywhere. I must find some excuse.--I can make one,” he said
with prompt determination. “I know that it is my fate to live in
isolation, to have no home, no family ... well if I must, I must. And
what can be better? A very good thing is solitude....”
“And you will leave Spain?” asked Pepa, trying to conceal her emotion.
“I do not know even that.”
“Nothing calls you abroad?”
“No ... I shall not leave the country. It might seem that after all
that has happened in my house and in the isolation in which I live
there, I could have no interest in my home; and yet, if I am far from
Madrid I feel utterly forlorn. I have friends here....”
“Stay, I can suggest a delightful retreat,” said Pepa eagerly. “Do
you know that close to Suertebella there is a charming little house
to let?”
“Close to Suertebella?” muttered Leon, on whose fancy the plan smiled
greatly. “I will think about it; I will go and see the rooms.”
“There you can devote yourself entirely to study; no one will
interrupt you. It is such a pretty place, especially just now when
the corn fields are all green, and you should see the poppies! You
can look over our grounds and those of Vista-Alegre, and beyond that
miles of lovely fields with flocks of sheep here and there. The house
is flooded with light and sunshine; you will see how cheerful it
is. Then it is so snug--just big enough for one person. A splendid
sitting-room for studying in--for fighting it out with your books,
arranging your papers, notes, and names, and thrusting pins through
your miserable insects. You will be so comfortable there. The people
of the house are quiet respectable folks, and the silence, the
stillness, the peace!...”
Pepa folded her hands devoutly to convey an idea of the peace she
described. “They will not feed you very well perhaps, but you are not
an epicure, and when you want a good dinner you can come to us. You
have only to go down into the cow-yard, open a door--two steps....”
“Two steps?” said Leon, pleased by this tempting description.
“Two steps, and you are in the cow-yard and then in the little garden
where Monina plays.”
“Where Monina plays.”
They had drawn closer together in their eager gestures as they had
become more interested in the dialogue and their hands met now and
then, like birds that flutter and coo.
“Monina may perhaps make a little noise and disturb you at your
work--but you will forgive her, will you not?” As she spoke Pepa
winked her eyelids to keep her tears from falling.
“Forgive her! Why Pepa, you may think it lucky if I do not devour her
with kisses.”
“And it is a fortnight since you saw her, you bad man!”
“I will go to see her to-morrow,” said Leon, his face as bright now
as it had before been gloomy.
“To-morrow; then I am to expect you?” said Pepa, who was half
reclining on the divan so that her elbow was buried in the pillows.
“Yes, you may expect me; did you say the child was ailing?” he added
with some anxiety.
Pepa was on the point of replying when a servant hurried into the
room who had just arrived tired and breathless from Suertebella. Pepa
gazed at him in horror. What had happened? A very simple matter. The
little girl had suddenly been taken ill--very ill indeed.
“Good God!” cried Pepa starting from her seat. “And I here, idling
... amusing myself! I must be off at once. Order the carriage ...
Lola, my cloak ... make haste! What is the matter? She coughs you
say--is choking?... Has she had a fall? or caught cold. She got
wet in the park. My poor darling. A doctor ... send at once to Dr.
Moreno.”
“I will see to that, go at once,” said Leon, not less alarmed than
the mother.
“She has been in a draught and I told them again and again to
take the greatest care ... but servants will always give a child
everything it cries for....”
“Oh go at once, do not delay. I will see that Moreno follows you in
my carriage as quickly as possible ... and perhaps it will be nothing
after all!”
Pepa started, and Leon went in search of the doctor.
We must go no farther in our story without explaining that Leon Roch
visited at the Fúcar’s house as the friend of the marquis, no less
than as a true and loyal friend of his daughter’s. Theirs was not
the only house in which he was intimate; he went to many in search
of some diversion from his melancholy in pleasant society and worthy
friendships. At the same time it must be owned that his visits to
Pepa had of late been long ones. Why? Some people would have answered
the question promptly, to his discredit; but their answer lacks
evidence. There had budded in Leon’s soul, without his dreaming of
its strength, a pure and tender passion of which more will be told
presently.