NELA DECIDES THAT SHE MUST GO.
Nela wandered about alone all day, and at night she prowled round
the house at Aldeacorba, creeping as near to it as she dared without
running the risk of being discovered; whenever she heard footsteps
she stole away like a thief. Then she went down into the crater of La
Terrible, whose grewsome aspect somehow suited her gloomy mood; she
lingered there some time looking up at the stone giants that stood
round it, and then she climbed up one of them to see the lights of
Aldeacorba. There they were, sparkling above the slopes of the mine
against the dark background of earth and sky. After gazing at them for
a while as if her hungry eyes had never seen lights before, she quitted
La Terrible and went towards La Trascava. But before she reached it she
heard footsteps, and turning round, she saw Master Celipin coming along
the path at a brisk determined pace. He had a small bundle hanging
from a stick over his shoulder, and his step, as well as his air and
attitude, announced a full determination never to stop till he should
have paced the whole circumference of the globe.
“Celipe!--Where are you going?” cried Nela, detaining him.
“Nela ... you out here! We thought you were with Señorita Florentina,
eating ham, and turkey, and partridges all day long, and drinking
lemonade and syrups. What are you doing here?”
“And you--where are you off to?”
“You ask me that, now? Why do you ask me since you know quite well,”
answered the boy, jerking the stick and bundle. “You know very well
that I am going to learn all I can and make money. Did I not tell you
it would be to-night?--And here I am, as glad as can be--a little
sorry, too, when I think that father and mother will cry. You see,
Nela, the Blessed Virgin favored us to-night, for father and mother
began to snore sooner than usual; and I had my bundle ready, and I
climbed up to the window and got out of it.--Now are you coming or not?”
“Yes, I am coming,” said Nela with sudden decision, taking the arm of
the adventurous Celipin.
“We will take the train, and we will go in the train as far as we can,”
said Celipin with liberal enthusiasm. “And then we must beg till we get
to Madrid, where the King of Spain lives; and when once we have got
there, you can go as a servant in the house of some Marquis or Count,
and I will go into another, and at the same time I can study, and you
can have a heap of fine things. And I can teach you a little of all I
learn--only a little, not too much; for you women have no need to be as
learned as we doctors must be.”
Before Celipin had ended his speech, they had set out on their road,
trotting on as fast as though they already saw in the distance the
turrets of the city “where the King of Spain lives.”
“Let us get out of the regular path,” said Celipin, his practical
talents rising to the occasion: “If they see us they will lay hands
upon us and give us a good thrashing.”
But Nela drew her hand away from her fellow-adventurer’s, and sitting
down on a stone, she said: “I am not going.”
“Nela! what a little fool you are! You have not a brave heart like
mine; a heart as big as the rocks in La Terrible!” said Celipin, with a
braggart air. “What the devil are you afraid of? Why will you not come?”
“I--oh!--why should I?”
“Do not you know that Don Golfin said that the work here is turning us
all to stones? I do not want to be a stone--not I.”
“I--why should I go?” repeated Nela with disconsolate bitterness. “You
have time enough--for me, it is too late.”
And Nela’s head sunk on her breast and she sat for some time insensible
to the persuasive eloquence of the Hippocrates of the future. The idea
that she was about to cross the boundary of the spot of earth where
she had lived so long, and where her mother slept the sleep of the
dead, made her feel as if she were being torn up by the roots. The
beauty of the place in all its variety seemed to claim her by a sort
of relationship; the rare and fleeting joys, nay, the very misery she
had known there; the memory of her friend and of the happy hours when
they had walked in the woods or sat by the spring at Saldeoro; all
the feelings of admiration or of sympathy, of love or of gratitude,
which had grown and blossomed in her soul among these scenes--these
flowers--these clouds--these rustling trees--these frowning
rocks--inseparable as it were from the loveliness or the grandeur,
the progress and the immutability of all these works of nature, were
so many roots from her heart, and dragging them up from the soil was
bitter anguish.
“No--I am not going,” she repeated.
And Celipin argued and talked as if, having by some miracle reached the
goal of his career, he belonged to all the academies present and to
come.
“You are going home then?” he asked, seeing that his oratory was as
unavailing as that of the academies themselves commonly is.
“No.”
“You are going to Aldeacorba?”
“No; not there either.”
“Then you will go to where Señora Florentina lives.”
“No, no--not there.”
“The devil’s in it--but where are you going then?”
Nela did not answer; she sat looking at the ground with an expression
of dismay, as if she saw there the fragments of the most beautiful and
precious thing on earth--fallen and lying broken at her feet.
“Well then, Nela,” said Celipin, exhausted with his long harangue, “I
must leave you and be off, for they might follow me, and find me. Would
you like me to give you a _peseta_ as a parting gift to-night?”
“No, Celipin, I want nothing.--Go, you will be a rich man yet. Take
care of yourself and do not forget Socartes and your father and mother.”
The traveller had a sensation highly improper in a man of so much
importance and dignity--a strong disposition to cry; but swallowing
down this inopportune emotion, he said:
“How should I ever forget Socartes? You need not have said that--I
shall never forget my father and mother, nor you, for you helped me to
do this.--Good-bye, Nelilla--hark! I hear footsteps!”
Celipin shouldered his staff with a resolution that symbolized his
courage to defy all the dangers of the wide world; but his valorous
display was wasted, for a dog only came running up to them.
“It is Choto,” said Nela, trembling all over.
“A bad sign!” muttered Celipin, setting forward; and he disappeared in
the darkness.
A stone was lost to geology, and the world would be the richer by a
great man!
Nela shivered as the dog leaped upon her and caressed her. The
affectionate creature, after jumping round and round her, whining and
barking with so much expression that it was almost like speaking,
set off running as fast as he could towards Aldeacorba. You might
have thought he was in chase of some wild game. Choto--unlike some
orators--seemed to speak when he barked.
* * * * *
Just at this time Teodoro Golfin was coming away from the Penáguilas’.
He was met by Choto, who, with voluble haste, told him--I know not
what. It was a fervent, fitful address, delivered between his gasps
for breath and gushes of eager anxiety. Golfin, though he understood
several languages, was not strong in the canine tongue, and paid no
particular heed. Choto leaped up and round him, jerking out barks
from his moist jaws, some short and sharp as insults, others soft and
coaxing, and then again threats. Teodoro meanwhile stood still, his
attention was struck by the dog’s manner; and Choto, seeing that he had
made himself understood to a certain extent, began to run in a contrary
direction to Golfin’s homeward road. The doctor followed him. “Very
well,” he muttered, “that way then.”
Choto retraced his steps, as if to make sure that Golfin was following
him, and then he trotted on again. At some little distance from the
house Golfin heard a voice saying:
“Well, Choto, what is it you want?”
He suspected at once that it was Nela. He paused and listened, hidden
in the shadow of a beech-tree, and soon perceived a little figure
standing out from the stone wall and walking very slowly. The shadows
of the brambles prevented his seeing her very distinctly. He set out
to follow her at some little distance, quitting the path and walking
on the turf, so as to make no noise. Beyond a doubt it was Nela. He
recognized her perfectly when they got upon open ground, where there
were no dark shadows cast by trees or shrubs.
The girl now went faster and faster; at last she began to run, and
Golfin ran too. After this unequal race had gone on for some distance,
Nela sat down on a stone. At her feet was the sloping basin of La
Trascava, black and hideous in the gloom. Golfin waited a moment; then
he very softly went nearer to the girl. Choto was seated in front of
her, squatted on his hind quarters, with his fore paw stretched out,
and gazing at her with the gravity of a sphinx. Nela stared into the
depths below, and suddenly starting to her feet she began to go quickly
down the slope--slipping rather than running. With one bound Teodoro
stood by the abyss, roaring in stentorian tones: “Nela! Nela!”
He looked down, but could see nothing in the dark chasm; he could hear
Choto whining as he ran round and round the ridge, lower and lower in
spirals, as if he were being sucked in by some eddy in the dreadful
gulf. Teodoro thought of going down himself and cautiously took a step
or two; then he called again, and a voice from below answered: “Señor.”
“Come up this minute.”
No answer.
“Come up, I say.”
Presently he could just see the child’s face in the lowest visible
depths of the horrible chasm. Choto, after snuffing at the opening,
came up again, round and round the basin as before; Nela too was
climbing up, but very slowly. Indeed, she stopped, and repeated feebly:
“Señor?...”
“I tell you come up. What are you doing here?”
Nela came a little further.
“Come--quickly. I have something to tell you.”
“To tell me?”
“Yes--something I must tell you at once.”
Nela crawled up; but Teodoro did not feel sure that he had triumphed
till he had seized her hand and held it tightly to lead her away with
him.