CHAPTER XXVII

IN WHICH A COUNTESS, A PROFESSIONAL BANDIT, AND A MAN OF ACTION HAVE A TALK

ONE afternoon a few days later, Quentin knocked at the Countess’ door.

“May I come in?”

“Come!”

Quentin opened the door and entered. The room was large, whitewashed, with a very small window divided into four panes, the floor paved with red bricks, and blue rafters in the ceiling. Everything was as clean as silver; in the centre was a table covered with white oil-cloth, upon which was a glass bottle converted by the Countess into a flower stand full of wild flowers.

“My lady,” announced Quentin, “I came to find out if you wanted anything in Cordova.”

“Are you going there?”

“Yes, my lady. If you are bored, we’ll take you in the carriage whenever you wish.”

“No, I’m not bored. To the contrary.”

“Then, why don’t you stay here?”

“No, I cannot.—When do you go?”

“I was thinking of going today, but if you want me to go with you, I’ll wait until tomorrow.”

“Very well, we’ll wait until tomorrow.”

The Countess had made friends at the farm. Late in the afternoon she would take her sewing to the door, and, sitting in the shade, would work among the women[274] of the house. They told her about their lives and their troubles, and she listened with great interest. Quentin and Pacheco used to join the group and chat until the farm bell signalled the labourers, and night fell, and the flocks of goats returned with a great tinkling of bells.

The labourers’ children used to play in front of the doorway; three of them had made friends with the Countess. They were three children who had been left motherless; Miguel, the eldest, was seven, Dolores, the second, was five, and Carmen, the third, was three.

The eldest was very lively, already a little rascal; the second had a tangled mass of blond hair, sad, blue eyes, and a sun-burned face; she wore one of her father’s vests, a dirty apron, stockings around her ankles, and a pair of huge shoes. The littlest one spent hour after hour with her finger thrust into her mouth.

These three children, accustomed to being alone, were content to play with each other; they played around, striking and throwing each other about the ground, and never cried.

“She bosses ’em all,” said one of the old wives to the Countess, pointing to the second child.

“Poor girl. What is your name?”

“Dolores.”

The Countess looked at the child, who lowered her eyes.

“Would you like to come with me, Dolores?” she asked.

“No.”

“I’ll give you pretty dresses, dolls—Will you come?”

“No.”

The Countess kissed the girl, and every afternoon the[275] three children came, waiting for her to give them some money....

“Look there,” said the Countess to Quentin, pointing to a hen that was strutting along the barnyard with her still featherless chicks—“I envy her.”

“Do you?” asked Quentin. “You are more romantic than I thought you were.”

“Romantic, my friend? Why? That is Truth, Nature.”

“Ah! But do you believe in the goodness of Nature?”

“Don’t you?”

“No, I do not. Nature is a farce.”

“You are the farce!” said the Countess. “I could never live with a man like you, Quentin.”

“Couldn’t you?”

“No. If I had married you, we would have ended badly.”

“Would we have beaten each other?”

“Probably.”

“Look here; two things would have pleased me,” replied Quentin. “To allow myself to be struck by you would have been magnificent, but to give you a drubbing would also have been good.”

“Would you have dared?” said the Countess with a slight flush in her cheeks, and her eyes shining.

“Yes, if I were your husband,” answered Quentin calmly.

“Don’t pay any attention to this fellow,” said Pacheco, “for all that is just idle fancy.”

Pacheco manifested a respectful enthusiasm toward the Countess, but at times he wondered if Quentin, with his wild ideas and outbursts, might not interest the Countess more....[276]

... And as they chatted, the afternoon advanced; the sun poured down, its reflected rays were blinding as they fell on stones and bushes; and the air, quivering in the heat, made the outlines of the mountain and the distant landscape tremble.

“Would you like to take a ride, my lady?” said Pacheco.

“Yes, indeed.”

“Shall I saddle your horse?”

“Fine!”

The Countess mounted, followed by Pacheco and Quentin, and the three made their way toward the top of the mountain by a broad path that ran between stout evergreens.

It was late Autumn; the days were sweltering, but as soon as the sun set, the air became very refreshing.

The mountain was splendid that afternoon. The dry, clean air was so transparent that it made even the most distant objects seem near; the trees were turning yellow and shedding their dried leaves; the harvested meadows had not yet begun to turn green. In the highways and byways, brambles displayed their black fruit, and the dog-rose bushes their carmine berries among their thorny branches.

“What are you thinking of doing, Quentin? What have you up your sleeve?” asked the Countess suddenly.

“Everybody knows,” replied Pacheco—“that he’s a lively fish.”

“Ca, man,” answered Quentin. “Why, I’m an unhappy wretch. Just now, I admit, I am capable of doing anything to get money and live well.”

“He contradicts himself at every turn!” exclaimed[277] the Countess, somewhat irritated. “I’m beginning to disbelieve everything he says; whether he tells me that he is bad, or whether he assures me that he is unhappy.”

“You see I’m not to be classified by common standards. One half of me is good, and the other half bad. Sometimes it seems as if I were a demagogue, and I turn out to be a reactionary. I have all sorts of humility and all sorts of arrogance within me. For example, if you were to say to me tomorrow: ‘By selling all the inhabitants of Cordova into slavery, you can make a fortune,’ I would sell them.”

“A lie!” replied the Countess. “You would not sell them.”

“No, I would not sell them if you told me not to.”

“Really, now!”

“Do you know what I used to think of doing when I was in England?” said Quentin.

“What?” asked Pacheco.

“Of putting up a money box. You must have seen one of them in Madrid, I think in the Calle del Fuencarral; people throw lots of money into it. Well, I saw it on my way through the city, and in school I was always thinking: ‘When I get to Spain, I’m going to set up four or five money boxes, and take all the money that’s thrown into them.’”

“What ideas you do have!” said the Countess.

“I have always thought that the first thing to do was to get rich.”

“Why not work?”

“One can never make one’s self rich by working. I have two aphorisms that rule my life; they are: first, be it yours or another’s, you will never get on without[278] money; second, laziness has always its reward, and work its punishment.”

“You are a faker, and one cannot talk to you,” said the Countess. “What about you, Pacheco?”

“He? Why, he’s another romanticist,” replied Quentin.

“Really?” asked the woman.

“Yes, somewhat,” replied the bandit with a sigh.

“Some fine day,” added Quentin, “you will hear that Pacheco has done something either very foolish, or very heroic.”

“May God hear you,” murmured the bandit.

“Do you see?”

“Isn’t it better to do something famous, than to live in a hole like a toad all your life?”

“What would you like to do?” asked the Countess with curiosity.

“I?—Take part in a battle; lead it if possible.”

“Then you want to be a soldier.”

“You mean a general,” interrupted Quentin with a laugh.

“And why not, if he has good luck?”

“What does one need to be a general?” asked Pacheco. “To have a soul, to be valiant, and to be ready to give up your life every minute.”

“And furthermore, to have a career,” replied Quentin ironically ... “to have good recommendations.”

“But you always look upon everything as small and niggardly!” exclaimed the bandit hotly.

“And you, my friend, hope to encounter great and strong things in a mean society. You are deceived.”

Pacheco and Quentin fell silent, and the Countess[279] contemplated the two men as they rode quietly along....

It was late afternoon. The dry earth, warmed by the sun, exhaled the aroma of rosemary and thyme and dried grass. Upon the round summit of the mountain, trees, bushes, rocks, stood out in minutest detail in the diaphanous air.

The sun was sinking. The naked rocks, the thickets of heather and furze, were reddened as if on the point of bursting into flame. Here and there among the yellow foliage of the trees, appeared the white and smiling walls of farmhouses....

Soon night began to fall; bands of deep violet crept along the hillsides; one could hear in the distance the crowing of cocks and the tinkling of bells, which sounded louder than usual in that peaceful twilight; the air was tranquil, the sky azure.... Herds of cattle spread over the fields, which were covered with dry bushes; and along the damp pathways, bordered by huge, grey century-plants, a torrent of sheep and goats flowed, followed by their shepherd and his great, gentle-eyed, white mastiff.

When they returned to the farmhouse, Tío Frasquito said to Pacheco:

“We have been waiting for you.”

“Why, what’s up?”

“They just baptized a baby in the farm next to ours, and are having a little dance. If you people would like to go....”

“Shall we go?” Pacheco asked the Countess.

“Why not?”

“Then we’ll have supper right away, and be there in a moment.[280]”

They ate their supper; and on foot and well cloaked, as it was rather cool, they walked along paths and across fields to the neighbouring farm.

As they drew near, they could hear the murmur of conversation and the strumming of a guitar. The entryway in which the fiesta was being celebrated was large and very much whitewashed. It had a wide, open space in the centre, with two columns; suspended from the beams of the ceiling, were two big lamps, each with three wicks. Seated upon benches and rope chairs were several young girls, old women, sun-blackened men, and children who had come to witness the baptism.

In the centre was a space left free for the dancers. Seated near a small table, which held a jug and a glass, an old man was strumming a guitar, a man with a face and side-whiskers that just begged for a gun.

The entrance of the Countess and her escorts was greeted with loud acclaim; one of the farm hands asked, and it was not easy to tell whether in jest or in all seriousness, if that lady was the Queen of Spain.

The caretaker of the farm, after installing the three guests in the most conspicuous place, brought them some macaroons and glasses of white wine.

Boleras and fandangos alternated, and between times they drank all the brandy and wine they wanted. The Countess went to see the mother of the baptized child.

“Aren’t you going to dance, Pacheco?” asked Quentin.

“Are you?”

“Man alive, I’m not graceful enough. I’ll play the guitar. You ask the Countess to dance with you.”

“She won’t do it.”

“Do you want me to ask her for you?[281]”

“Good idea.”

Quentin did so when she returned. She burst out laughing.

“Well, will you do it?”

“Of course, man.”

“Hurrah for all valiant women. Ladies and gentlemen,” said Quentin, turning to the bystanders, “the Se?ora is going to dance with Pacheco; I shall play the guitar, and I want the best singer here to stand by me.”

Quentin sat in the chair where the old man had been, and near him stood a little dark-haired girl with large eyes. He tuned the guitar, turning one key and then another, and then began a devilish preparatory flourish. Little by little this uncouth flourish grew smoother, changing into a handling of the strings that was finesse itself.

“Go ahead,” cried Quentin. “Now for the little highlander!”

The Countess arose laughing heartily, with her arms held high; Pacheco, very serious, also arose and stood before her. An old woman, a mistress of the art, began to click her castanets with a slow rhythm.

“Girlie,” said Quentin to the singer, “let’s hear what you can do.”

In almost a whisper, the girl sang:
“Con abalorios, cari?o,
con abalorios.”

(With glass beads, love, with glass beads.)

The dancers made their start rather languidly.

The girl went on:[282]
“Con abalorios,
tengo yo una chapona,
tengo yo una chapona,
cari?o! con abalorios.”

(With glass beads, I have a dressing sack, I have a dressing sack, love! with glass beads.)

The dancers were a little more lively in the “parade,” the castanets clicked louder, and the high, treble voice of the girl increased in volume:
“Están bailando
el clavel y la rosa,
están bailando
el clavel y la rosa,
ay! están bailando!”

(They are dancing, the pink and the rose, they are dancing, the pink and the rose; Ah! they are dancing!)

This last phrase, which was somewhat sad, was accompanied by a ferocious sound of castanets, as if the player wished to make the dancers forget the melancholy of the song.

The girl went on:
“Porque la rosa
entre más encarnada,
Porque la rosa
entre más encarnada
ay! es más hermosa!”

(For the rose, the more she blushes, for the rose, the more she blushes, Ah! the more beautiful she becomes.)

Then the castanets clicked wildly, while all the bystanders cheered the dancers on. Pacheco pursued his partner with open arms, and she seemed to provoke him and to flee from him, keeping out of his reach when he[283] was about to conquer her. In these changes and movements, the Countess’ skirts swished back and forth and folded about her thighs, outlining her powerful hips. The whole room seemed filled with an effluvia of life.

Quentin enthusiastically continued to strum the guitar. The singer had offered him a glass of white wine, and without ceasing to play, he had stretched out his lips and drained it.

The dance was repeated several times, until the dancers, worn out, sat down.

“Splendid! Magnificent!” exclaimed Quentin with tears in his eyes.

Suddenly the little girl who had sung told him she was going.

“Why?”

“Because some joker is going to put out the lights.”

Quentin put down the guitar and went over to the Countess.

“You’d better go,” he told her, “they are going to put out the lights.”

She got up, but did not have time to go out. Two big youths put out the lamps with one blow, and the entryway was left in darkness. Quentin led the Countess to a corner, and stood ready to protect her in case there was need. There was a bedlam of shrill shrieks from the women, and laughter, and voices, and all started for the door which was purposely barred. Quentin felt the Countess by his side, palpitant.

“That’ll do,” said the landlord, “that’s enough of the joke,” and he relit the lamps.

The fiesta became normal once more, and soon after, all began to file out.

The following was the day fixed upon for the de[284]parture. Pacheco had, as he said, reasons for not going to Cordova, so he did not go. Quentin sat upon the box and drove off with the Countess. At nightfall, they were on the Cuesta de Villaviciosa. From that height, by the light of the half-hidden sun, they could see Cordova; very flat, very extensive, among fields of yellow stubble and dark olive orchards. A slight mist rose from the river bed. In the distance, very far away, rose the high and sharp-peaked Sierra of Granada.

Carts were returning along the road, jolting and shaking; they could hear the Moorish song of the carters who were stretched out upon sacks, or skins of olive oil; riders on proud horses passed them, seated upon cowboy saddles, their shawls across their saddle bows, and their guns at their sides....

When they entered Cordova, night had already fallen; the sky was sprinkled with stars; on either side of the road, which now ran between the houses, great, many-armed century plants shone in the darkness.

Quentin drove the carriage to the Countess’ palace, and jumped from the box, much to the astonishment of the porter.

“Good-bye, my lady,” said he, holding out his hand and assisting her from the carriage.

“Good-bye, Quentin,” she said rather sadly.