Speranza
CHAPTER III
"I was born," Don Jose said, "at Elizondo, in the valley of Baztan.
My
name is Don Jose Lizzarrabengoa, and you know enough of Spain, sir, to know at
once, by my name, that I come of an old Christian and Basque stock.
I call
myself "don", because I have a right to it, and if I were at Elizondo I could show
you my parchment genealogy.
My family wanted me to go into the church, and made
me study for it, but I did not like work. I was too fond of playing tennis, and
that was my ruin. When we Navarrese begin to play tennis, we forget everything
else. One day, when I had won the game, a young fellow from Alava picked a
quarrel with me. We took to our maquilas,* and I won again. But I had to leave
the neighbourhood. I fell in with some dragoons, and enlisted in the Almanza
Cavalry Regiment. Mountain folks like us soon learn to be soldiers. Before long
I was a corporal, and I had been told I should soon be made a sergeant, when, to
my misfortune, I was put on guard at the Seville Tobacco Factory. If you have
been to Seville you have seen the great building, just outside the ramparts,
close to the Guadalquivir; I can fancy I see the entrance, and the guard room
just beside it, even now. When Spanish soldiers are on duty, they either play
cards or go to sleep. I, like an honest Navarrese, always tried to keep myself
busy. I was making a chain to hold my priming-pin, out of a bit of wire: all at
once, my comrades said, 'there's the bell ringing, the girls are coming back to
work.' You must know, sir, that there are quite four or five hundred women
employed in the factory. They roll the cigars in a great room into which no man
can go without a permit from the Veintiquatro,** because when the weather is hot
they make themselves at home, especially the young ones. When the work-girls
come back after their dinner, numbers of young men go down to see them pass by,
and talk all sorts of nonsense to them. Very few of those young ladies will
refuse a silk mantilla, and men who care for that sort of sport have nothing to
do but bend down and pick their fish up. While the others watched the girls go
by, I stayed on my bench near the door. I was a young fellow then—my heart was
still in my own country, and I didn't believe in any pretty girls who hadn't
blue skirts and long plaits of hair falling on their shoulders.*** And besides,
I was rather afraid of the Andalusian women. I had not got used to their ways
yet; they were always jeering one—never spoke a single word of sense. So I was
sitting with my nose down upon my chain, when I heard some bystanders say, 'Here
comes the gitanella!' Then I lifted up my eyes, and I saw her! It was that very
Carmen you know, and in whose rooms I met you a few months ago.
*
Iron-shod sticks used by the Basques.
** Magistrate in charge of
the municipal police
arrangements, and local government
regulations.
*** The costume usually worn by peasant women in
Navarre and
the Basque Provinces.
"She was wearing a very short
skirt, below which her white silk stockings—with more than one hole in them—and
her dainty red morocco shoes, fastened with flame-coloured ribbons, were clearly
seen. She had thrown her mantilla back, to show her shoulders, and a great bunch
of acacia that was thrust into her chemise. She had another acacia blossom in
the corner of her mouth, and she walked along, swaying her hips, like a filly
from the Cordova stud farm. In my country anybody who had seen a woman dressed
in that fashion would have crossed himself. At Seville every man paid her some
bold compliment on her appearance. She had an answer for each and all, with her
hand on her hip, as bold as the thorough gipsy she was. At first I didn't like
her looks, and I fell to my work again.
********************************
But Carmen, like all women and cats, who
won't come if you call them, and do come if you don't call them, stopped short
in front of me, and spoke to me.
************************
"'Compadre,' said she, in the Andalusian
fashion, 'won't you give me your chain for the keys of my strong box?'
"'It's for my priming-pin,' said I.
"'Your priming-pin!' she cried, with
a laugh. 'Oho! I suppose the gentleman makes lace, as he wants pins!'
"Everybody began to laugh, and I felt myself getting red in the face, and
couldn't hit on anything in answer.
"'Come, my love!' she began again, 'make
me seven ells of lace for my mantilla, my pet pin-maker!'
"And taking the
acacia blossom out of her mouth she flipped it at me with her thumb so that it
hit me just between the eyes. I tell you, sir, I felt as if a bullet had struck
me. I didn't know which way to look. I sat stock-still, like a wooden board.
When she had gone into the factory, I saw the acacia blossom, which had fallen
on the ground between my feet. I don't know what made me do it, but I picked it
up, unseen by any of my comrades, and put it carefully inside my jacket. That
was my first folly.
"Two or three hours later I was still thinking about
her, when a panting, terrified-looking porter rushed into the guard-room. He
told us a woman had been stabbed in the great cigar-room, and that the guard
must be sent in at once. The sergeant told me to take two men, and go and see to
it. I took my two men and went upstairs. Imagine, sir, that when I got into the
room, I found, to begin with, some three hundred women, stripped to their
shifts, or very near it, all of them screaming and yelling and gesticulating,
and making such a row that you couldn't have heard God's own thunder. On one
side of the room one of the women was lying on the broad of her back, streaming
with blood, with an X newly cut on her face by two strokes of a knife. Opposite
the wounded woman, whom the best-natured of the band were attending, I saw
Carmen, held by five or six of her comrades. The wounded woman was crying out,
'A confessor, a confessor! I'm killed!' Carmen said nothing at all. She clinched
her teeth and rolled her eyes like a chameleon. 'What's this?' I asked. I had
hard work to find out what had happened, for all the work-girls talked at once.
It appeared that the injured girl had boasted she had money enough in her pocket
to buy a donkey at the Triana Market. 'Why,' said Carmen, who had a tongue of
her own, 'can't you do with a broom?' Stung by this taunt, it may be because she
felt herself rather unsound in that particular, the other girl replied that she
knew nothing about brooms, seeing she had not the honour of being either a gipsy
or one of the devil's godchildren, but that the Senorita Carmen would shortly
make acquaintance with her donkey, when the Corregidor took her out riding with
two lackeys behind her to keep the flies off. 'Well,' retorted Carmen, 'I'll
make troughs for the flies to drink out of on your cheeks, and I'll paint a
draught-board on them!'* And thereupon, slap, bank! She began making St.
Andrew's crosses on the girl's face with a knife she had been using for cutting
off the ends of the cigars.
* Pintar un javeque, "paint a xebec," a
particular type of
ship. Most Spanish vessels of this description have
a
checkered red and white stripe painted around them.
"The case was
quite clear. I took hold of Carmen's arm. 'Sister mine,' I said civilly, 'you
must come with me.' She shot a glance of recognition at me, but she said, with a
resigned look: 'Let's be off. Where is my mantilla?' She put it over her head so
that only one of her great eyes was to be seen, and followed my two men, as
quiet as a lamb. When we got to the guardroom the sergeant said it was a serious
job, and he must send her to prison. I was told off again to take her there. I
put her between two dragoons, as a corporal does on such occasions. We started
off for the town. The gipsy had begun by holding her tongue. But when we got to
the Calle de la Serpiente—you know it, and that it earns its name by its many
windings—she began by dropping her mantilla on to her shoulders, so as to show
me her coaxing little face, and turning round to me as well as she could, she
said:
"'Oficial mio, where are you taking me to?'
"'To prison, my poor
child,' I replied, as gently as I could, just as any kind-hearted soldier is
bound to speak to a prisoner, and especially to a woman.
"'Alack! What will
become of me! Senor Oficial, have pity on me! You are so young, so
good-looking.' Then, in a lower tone, she said, 'Let me get away, and I'll give
you a bit of the bar lachi, that will make every woman fall in love with you!'
"The bar lachi, sir, is the loadstone, with which the gipsies declare one
who knows how to use it can cast any number of spells. If you can make a woman
drink a little scrap of it, powdered, in a glass of white wine, she'll never be
able to resist you. I answered, as gravely as I could:
"'We are not here to
talk nonsense. You'll have to go to prison. Those are my orders, and there's no
help for it!'
"We men from the Basque country have an accent which all
Spaniards easily recognise; on the other hand, not one of them can ever learn to
say Bai, jaona!*
* Yes, sir.
"So Carmen easily guessed I was from
the Provinces. You know, sir, that the gipsies, who belong to no particular
country, and are always moving about, speak every language, and most of them are
quite at home in Portugal, in France, in our Provinces, in Catalonia, or
anywhere else. They can even make themselves understood by Moors and English
people. Carmen knew Basque tolerably well.
"'Laguna ene bihotsarena, comrade
of my heart,' said she suddenly. 'Do you belong to our country?'
"Our
language is so beautiful, sir, that when we hear it in a foreign country it
makes us quiver. I wish," added the bandit in a lower tone, "I could have a
confessor from my own country."
After a silence, he began again.
"'I
belong to Elizondo,' I answered in Basque, very much affected by the sound of my
own language.
"'I come from Etchalar,' said she (that's a district about
four hours' journey from my home). 'I was carried off to Seville by the gipsies.
I was working in the factory to earn enough money to take me back to Navarre, to
my poor old mother, who has no support in the world but me, besides her little
barratcea* with twenty cider-apple trees in it. Ah! if I were only back in my
own country, looking up at the white mountains! I have been insulted here,
because I don't belong to this land of rogues and sellers of rotten oranges; and
those hussies are all banded together against me, because I told them that not
all their Seville jacques,** and all their knives, would frighten an honest lad
from our country, with his blue cap and his maquila! Good comrade, won't you do
anything to help your own countrywoman?'
* Field, garden.
** Bravos, boasters.
"She was lying then, sir, as she has always lied. I
don't know that that girl ever spoke a word of truth in her life, but when she
did speak, I believed her—I couldn't help myself. She mangled her Basque words,
and I believed she came from Navarre. But her eyes and her mouth and her skin
were enough to prove she was a gipsy. I was mad, I paid no more attention to
anything, I thought to myself that if the Spaniards had dared to speak evil of
my country, I would have slashed their faces just as she had slashed her
comrade's. In short, I was like a drunken man, I was beginning to say foolish
things, and I was very near doing them.
"'If I were to give you a push and
you tumbled down, good fellow-countryman,' she began again in Basque, 'those two
Castilian recruits wouldn't be able to keep me back.'
"Faith, I forgot my
orders, I forgot everything, and I said to her, 'Well, then, my friend, girl of
my country, try it, and may our Lady of the Mountain help you through.'
"Just at that moment we were passing one of the many narrow lanes one sees
in Seville. All at once Carmen turned and struck me in the chest with her fist.
I tumbled backward, purposely. With a bound she sprang over me, and ran off,
showing us a pair of legs! People talk about a pair of Basque legs! but hers
were far better—as fleet as they were well-turned. As for me, I picked myself up
at once, but I stuck out my lance* crossways and barred the street, so that my
comrades were checked at the very first moment of pursuit. Then I started to run
myself, and they after me—but how were we to catch her? There was no fear of
that, what with our spurs, our swords, and our lances.
* All Spanish
cavalry soldiers carry lances.
"In less time than I have taken to tell you
the story the prisoner had disappeared. And besides, every gossip in the quarter
covered her flight, poked scorn at us, and pointed us in the wrong direction.
After a good deal of marching and countermarching, we had to go back to the
guard-room without a receipt from the governor of the jail.
"To avoid
punishment, my men made known that Carmen had spoken to me in Basque; and to
tell the truth, it did not seem very natural that a blow from such a little
creature should have so easily overthrown a strong fellow like me. The whole
thing looked suspicious, or, at all events, not over-clear. When I came off
guard I lost my corporal's stripes, and was condemned to a month's imprisonment.
It was the first time I had been punished since I had been in the service.
Farewell, now, to the sergeant's stripes, on which I had reckoned so surely!
"The first days in prison were very dreary. When I enlisted I had fancied I
was sure to become an officer, at all events. Two of my compatriots, Longa and
Mina, are captains-general, after all. Chapalangarra was a colonel, and I have
played tennis a score of times with his brother, who was just a needy fellow
like myself. 'Now,' I kept crying to myself, 'all the time you served without
being punished has been lost. Now you have a bad mark against your name, and to
get yourself back into the officers' good graces you'll have to work ten times
as hard as when you joined as a recruit.' And why have I got myself punished?
For the sake of a gipsy hussy, who made game of me, and who at this moment is
busy thieving in some corner of the town. Yet I couldn't help thinking about
her. Will you believe it, sir, those silk stockings of hers with the holes in
them, of which she had given me such a full view as she took to her heels, were
always before my eyes? I used to look through the barred windows of the jail
into the street, and among all the women who passed I never could see one to
compare with that minx of a girl—and then, in spite of myself, I used to smell
the acacia blossom she had thrown at me, and which, dry as it was, still kept
its sweet scent. If there are such things as witches, that girl certainly was
one.
"One day the jailer came in, and gave me an Alcala roll.*
*
Alcala de los Panaderos, a village two leagues from
Seville, where the
most delicious rolls are made. They are
said to owe their quality to the
water of the place, and
great quantities of them are brought to Seville
every day.
"'Look here,' said he, 'this is what your cousin has sent you.'
"I took the loaf, very much astonished, for I had no cousin in Seville. It
may be a mistake, thought I, as I looked at the roll, but it was so appetizing
and smelt so good, that I made up my mind to eat it, without troubling my head
as to whence it came, or for whom it was really intended.
"When I tried to
cut it, my knife struck on something hard. I looked, and found a little English
file, which had been slipped into the dough before the roll had been baked. The
roll also contained a gold piece of two piastres. Then I had no further doubt—it
was a present from Carmen. To people of her blood, liberty is everything, and
they would set a town on fire to save themselves one day in prison. The girl was
artful, indeed, and armed with that roll, I might have snapped my fingers at the
jailers. In one hour, with that little file, I could have sawn through the
thickest bar, and with the gold coin I could have exchanged my soldier's cloak
for civilian garb at the nearest shop. You may fancy that a man who has often
taken the eaglets out of their nests in our cliff would have found no difficulty
in getting down to the street out of a window less than thirty feet above it.
But I didn't choose to escape. I still had a soldier's code of honour, and
desertion appeared to me in the light of a heinous crime. Yet this proof of
remembrance touched me. When a man is in prison he likes to think he has a
friend outside who takes an interest in him. The gold coin did rather offend me;
I should have very much liked to return it; but where was I to find my creditor?
That did not seem a very easy task.
"After the ceremony of my degradation I
had fancied my sufferings were over, but I had another humiliation before me.
That came when I left prison, and was told off for duty, and put on sentry, as a
private soldier. You can not conceive what a proud man endures at such a moment.
I believe I would have just as soon been shot dead—then I should have marched
alone at the head of my platoon, at all events; I should have felt I was
somebody, with the eyes of others fixed upon me.
"I was posted as sentry on
the door of the colonel's house. The colonel was a young man, rich,
good-natured, fond of amusing himself. All the young officers were there, and
many civilians as well, besides ladies—actresses, as it was said. For my part,
it seemed to me as if the whole town had agreed to meet at that door, in order
to stare at me. Then up drove the colonel's carriage, with his valet on the box.
And who should I see get out of it, but the gipsy girl! She was dressed up, this
time, to the eyes, togged out in golden ribbons—a spangled gown, blue shoes, all
spangled too, flowers and gold lace all over her. In her hand she carried a
tambourine. With her there were two other gipsy women, one young and one old.
They always have one old woman who goes with them, and then an old man with a
guitar, a gipsy too, to play alone, and also for their dances. You must know
these gipsy girls are often sent for to private houses, to dance their special
dance, the Romalis, and often, too, for quite other purposes.
"Carmen
recognised me, and we exchanged glances. I don't know why, but at that moment I
should have liked to have been a hundred feet beneath the ground.
"'Agur
laguna,'* said she. 'Oficial mio! You keep guard like a recruit,' and before I
could find a word in answer, she was inside the house.
* Good-day,
comrade!
"The whole party was assembled in the patio, and in spite of the
crowd I could see nearly everything that went on through the lattice.* I could
hear the castanets and the tambourine, the laughter and applause. Sometimes I
caught a glimpse of her head as she bounded upward with her tambourine. Then I
could hear the officers saying many things to her which brought the blood to my
face. As to her answers, I knew nothing of them. It was on that day, I think,
that I began to love her in earnest—for three or four times I was tempted to
rush into the patio, and drive my sword into the bodies of all the coxcombs who
were making love to her. My torture lasted a full hour; then the gipsies came
out, and the carriage took them away. As she passed me by, Carmen looked at me
with those eyes you know, and said to me very low, 'Comrade, people who are fond
of good fritata come to eat it at Lillas Pastia's at Triana!'
* In most
of the houses in Seville there is an inner court
surrounded by an arched
portico. This is used as a sitting-
room in summer. Over the court is
stretched a piece of tent
cloth, which is watered during the day and
removed at night.
The street door is almost always left open, and the
passage
leading to the court (zaguan) is closed by an iron
lattice
of very elegant workmanship.
"Then, light as a kid, she
stepped into the carriage, the coachman whipped up his mules, and the whole
merry party departed, whither I know not.
"You may fancy that the moment I
was off guard I went to Triana; but first of all I got myself shaved and brushed
myself up as if I had been going on parade. She was living with Lillas Pastia,
an old fried-fish seller, a gipsy, as black as a Moor, to whose house a great
many civilians resorted to eat fritata, especially, I think, because Carmen had
taken up her quarters there.
"'Lillas,' she said, as soon as she saw me.
'I'm not going to work any more to-day. To-morrow will be a day, too.* Come,
fellow-countryman, let us go for a walk!'
* Manana sera otro dia.—A
Spanish proverb.
"She pulled her mantilla across her nose, and there we were
in the street, without my knowing in the least whither I was bound.
"'Senorita,' said I, 'I think I have to thank you for a present I had while
I was in prison. I've eaten the bread; the file will do for sharpening my lance,
and I keep it in remembrance of you. But as for the money, here it is.'
"'Why, he's kept the money!' she exclaimed, bursting out laughing. 'But,
after all, that's all the better—for I'm decidedly hard up! What matter! The dog
that runs never starves!* Come, let's spend it all! You shall treat.'
*
Chuquel sos pirela, cocal terela. "The dog that runs
finds a
bone."—Gipsy proverb.
"We had turned back toward Seville. At the entrance of
the Calle de la Serpiente she bought a dozen oranges, which she made me put into
my handkerchief. A little farther on she bought a roll, a sausage, and a bottle
of manzanilla. Then, last of all, she turned into a confectioner's shop. There
she threw the gold coin I had returned to her on the counter, with another she
had in her pocket, and some small silver, and then she asked me for all the
money I had. All I possessed was one peseta and a few cuartos, which I handed
over to her, very much ashamed of not having more. I thought she would have
carried away the whole shop. She took everything that was best and dearest,
yemas,* turon,** preserved fruits—as long as the money lasted. And all these,
too, I had to carry in paper bags. Perhaps you know the Calle del Candilejo,
where there is a head of Don Pedro the Avenger.*** That head ought to have given
me pause. We stopped at an old house in that street. She passed into the entry,
and knocked at a door on the ground floor. It was opened by a gipsy, a
thorough-paced servant of the devil. Carmen said a few words to her in Romany.
At first the old hag grumbled. To smooth her down Carmen gave her a couple of
oranges and a handful of sugar-plums, and let her have a taste of wine. Then she
hung her cloak on her back, and led her to the door, which she fastened with a
wooden bar. As soon as we were alone she began to laugh and caper like a
lunatic, singing out, 'You are my rom, I'm your romi.'****
* Sugared
yolks of eggs.
** A sort of nougat.
*** This king, Don
Pedro, whom we call "the Cruel," and whom
Queen Isabella, the Catholic,
never called anything but "the
Avenger," was fond of walking about the
streets of Seville
at night in search of adventures, like the Caliph
Haroun al
Raschid. One night, in a lonely street, he quarrelled with
a
man who was singing a serenade. There was a fight, and the
king killed the amorous caballero. At the clashing of
their swords, an
old woman put her head out of the window
and lighted up the scene with a
tiny lamp (candilejo) which
she held in her hand. My readers must be
informed that King
Don Pedro, though nimble and muscular, suffered from
one
strange fault in his physical conformation. Whenever he
walked his knees cracked loudly. By this cracking the old
woman easily
recognised him. The next day the veintiquatro
in charge came to make his
report to the king. "Sir, a duel
was fought last night in such a
street—one of the
combatants is dead." "Have you found the murderer?"
"Yes,
sir." "Why has he not been punished already?" "Sir, I
await
your orders!" "Carry out the law." Now the king had just
published a decree that every duellist was to have his head
cut off, and
that head was to be set up on the scene of the
fight. The veintiquatro
got out of the difficulty like a
clever man. He had the head sawed off a
statue of the king,
and set that up in a niche in the middle of the
street in
which the murder had taken place. The king and all the
Sevillians thought this a very good joke. The street took
its name from
the lamp held by the old woman, the only
witness of the incident. The
above is the popular tradition.
Zuniga tells the story somewhat
differently. However that
may be, a street called Calle del Candilejo
still exists
in Seville, and in that street there is a bust which is
said
to be a portrait of Don Pedro. This bust, unfortunately, is
a modern production. During the seventeenth century the old
one had
become very much defaced, and the municipality had
it replaced by that
now to be seen.
**** Rom, husband. Romi, wife.
"There I stood in
the middle of the room, laden with all her purchases, and not knowing where I
was to put them down. She tumbled them all onto the floor, and threw her arms
round my neck, saying:
"'I pay my debts, I pay my debts! That's the law of
the Cales.'*
* Calo, feminine calli, plural cales. Literally
"black," the name the gipsies apply to themselves in their
own
language.
"Ah, sir, that day! that day! When I think of it I forget what
to-morrow must bring me!"
For a moment the bandit held his peace, then, when
he had relighted his cigar, he began afresh.
"We spent the whole day
together, eating, drinking, and so forth. When she had stuffed herself with
sugar-plums, like any child of six years old, she thrust them by handfuls into
the old woman's water-jar. 'That'll make sherbet for her,' she said. She smashed
the yemas by throwing them against the walls. 'They'll keep the flies from
bothering us.' There was no prank or wild frolic she didn't indulge in. I told
her I should have liked to see her dance, only there were no castanets to be
had. Instantly she seized the old woman's only earthenware plate, smashed it up,
and there she was dancing the Romalis, and making the bits of broken crockery
rattle as well as if they had been ebony and ivory castanets. That girl was good
company, I can tell you! Evening fell, and I heard the drums beating tattoo.
"'I must get back to quarters for roll-call,' I said.
"'To quarters!'
she answered, with a look of scorn. 'Are you a negro slave, to let yourself be
driven with a ramrod like that! You are as silly as a canary bird. Your dress
suits your nature.* Pshaw! you've no more heart than a chicken.'
* Spanish
dragoons wear a yellow uniform.
"I stayed on, making up my mind to the
inevitable guard-room. The next morning the first suggestion of parting came
from her.
"'Hark ye, Joseito,' she said. 'Have I paid you? By our law, I
owed you nothing, because you're a payllo. But you're a good-looking fellow, and
I took a fancy to you. Now we're quits. Good-day!'
"I asked her when I
should see her again.
"'When you're less of a simpleton,' she retorted, with
a laugh. Then, in a more serious tone, 'Do you know, my son, I really believe I
love you a little; but that can't last! The dog and the wolf can't agree for
long. Perhaps if you turned gipsy, I might care to be your romi. But that's all
nonsense, such things aren't possible. Pshaw! my boy. Believe me, you're well
out of it. You've come across the devil—he isn't always black—and you've not had
your neck wrung. I wear a woollen suit, but I'm no sheep.* Go and burn a candle
to your majari,** she deserves it well. Come, good-by once more. Don't think any
more about La Carmencita, or she'll end by making you marry a widow with wooden
legs.'***
* Me dicas vriarda de jorpoy, bus ne sino braco.—A
gipsy
proverb.
** The Saint, the Holy Virgin.
*** The gallows, which is the widow of the last man hanged
upon
it.
"As she spoke, she drew back the bar that closed the door, and once we
were out in the street she wrapped her mantilla about her, and turned on her
heel.
"She spoke the truth. I should have done far better never to think of
her again. But after that day in the Calle del Candilejo I couldn't think of
anything else. All day long I used to walk about, hoping I might meet her. I
sought news of her from the old hag, and from the fried-fish seller. They both
told me she had gone away to Laloro, which is their name for Portugal. They
probably said it by Carmen's orders, but I soon found out they were lying. Some
weeks after my day in the Calle del Candilejo I was on duty at one of the town
gates. A little way from the gate there was a breach in the wall. The masons
were working at it in the daytime, and at night a sentinel was posted on it, to
prevent smugglers from getting in. All through one day I saw Lillas Pastia going
backward and forward near the guard-room, and talking to some of my comrades.
They all knew him well, and his fried-fish and fritters even better. He came up
to me, and asked if I had any news of Carmen.
"'No,' said I.
"'Well,'
said he, 'you'll soon hear of her, old fellow.'
"He was not mistaken. That
night I was posted to guard the breach in the wall. As soon as the sergeant had
disappeared I saw a woman coming toward me. My heart told me it was Carmen.
Still I shouted:
"'Keep off! Nobody can pass here!'
"'Now, don't be
spiteful,' she said, making herself known to me.
"'What! you here, Carmen?'
"'Yes, mi payllo. Let us say few words, but wise ones. Would you like to
earn a douro? Some people will be coming with bundles. Let them alone.'
"'No,' said I, 'I must not allow them through. These are my orders.'
"'Orders! orders! You didn't think about orders in the Calle del Candilejo!'
"'Ah!' I cried, quite maddened by the very thought of that night. 'It was
well worth while to forget my orders for that! But I won't have any smuggler's
money!'
"'Well, if you won't have money, shall we go and dine together at
old Dorotea's?'
"'No,' said I, half choked by the effort it cost me. 'No, I
can't.'
"'Very good! If you make so many difficulties, I know to whom I can
go. I'll ask your officer if he'll come with me to Dorotea's. He looks
good-natured, and he'll post a sentry who'll only see what he had better see.
Good-bye, canary-bird! I shall have a good laugh the day the order comes out to
hang you!'
"I was weak enough to call her back, and I promised to let the
whole of gipsydom pass in, if that were necessary, so that I secured the only
reward I longed for. She instantly swore she would keep her word faithfully the
very next day, and ran off to summon her friends, who were close by. There were
five of them, of whom Pastia was one, all well loaded with English goods. Carmen
kept watch for them. She was to warn them with her castanets the instant she
caught sight of the patrol. But there was no necessity for that. The smugglers
finished their job in a moment.
"The next day I went to the Calle del
Candilejo. Carmen kept me waiting, and when she came, she was in rather a bad
temper.
"'I don't like people who have to be pressed,' she said. 'You did me
a much greater service the first time, without knowing you'd gain anything by
it. Yesterday you bargained with me. I don't know why I've come, for I don't
care for you any more. Here, be off with you. Here's a douro for your trouble.'
"I very nearly threw the coin at her head, and I had to make a violent
effort to prevent myself from actually beating her. After we had wrangled for an
hour I went off in a fury. For some time I wandered about the town, walking
hither and thither like a madman. At last I went into a church, and getting into
the darkest corner I could find, I cried hot tears. All at once I heard a voice.
"'A dragoon in tears. I'll make a philter of them!'
"I looked up. There
was Carmen in front of me.
"'Well, mi payllo, are you still angry with me?'
she said. 'I must care for you in spite of myself, for since you left me I don't
know what has been the matter with me. Look you, it is I who ask you to come to
the Calle del Candilejo, now!'
"So we made it up: but Carmen's temper was
like the weather in our country. The storm is never so close, in our mountains,
as when the sun is at its brightest. She had promised to meet me again at
Dorotea's, but she didn't come.
"And Dorotea began telling me again that she
had gone off to Portugal about some gipsy business.
"As experience had
already taught me how much of that I was to believe, I went about looking for
Carmen wherever I thought she might be, and twenty times in every day I walked
through the Calle del Candilejo. One evening I was with Dorotea, whom I had
almost tamed by giving her a glass of anisette now and then, when Carmen walked
in, followed by a young man, a lieutenant in our regiment.
"'Get away at
once,' she said to me in Basque. I stood there, dumfounded, my heart full of
rage.
"'What are you doing here?' said the lieutenant to me. 'Take yourself
off—get out of this.'
"I couldn't move a step. I felt paralyzed. The officer
grew angry, and seeing I did not go out, and had not even taken off my forage
cap, he caught me by the collar and shook me roughly. I don't know what I said
to him. He drew his sword, and I unsheathed mine. The old woman caught hold of
my arm, and the lieutenant gave me a wound on the forehead, of which I still
bear the scar. I made a step backward, and with one jerk of my elbow I threw old
Dorotea down. Then, as the lieutenant still pressed me, I turned the point of my
sword against his body and he ran upon it. Then Carmen put out the lamp and told
Dorotea, in her own language, to take to flight. I fled into the street myself,
and began running along, I knew not whither. It seemed to me that some one was
following me. When I came to myself I discovered that Carmen had never left me.
"'Great stupid of a canary-bird!' she said, 'you never make anything but
blunders. And, indeed, you know I told you I should bring you bad luck. But
come, there's a cure for everything when you have a Fleming from Rome* for your
love. Begin by rolling this handkerchief round your head, and throw me over that
belt of yours. Wait for me in this alley—I'll be back in two minutes.
*
Flamenco de Roma, a slang term for the gipsies. Roma
does not stand for
the Eternal City, but for the nation of
the romi, or the married folk—a
name applied by the
gipsies to themselves. The first gipsies seen in
Spain
probably came from the Low Countries, hence their name of
Flemings.
"She disappeared, and soon came back bringing me a striped cloak
which she had gone to fetch, I knew not whence. She made me take off my uniform,
and put on the cloak over my shirt. Thus dressed, and with the wound on my head
bound round with the handkerchief, I was tolerably like a Valencian peasant,
many of whom come to Seville to sell a drink they make out of 'chufas.'* Then
she took me to a house very much like Dorotea's, at the bottom of a little lane.
Here she and another gipsy woman washed and dressed my wounds, better than any
army surgeon could have done, gave me something, I know not what, to drink, and
finally made me lie down on a mattress, on which I went to sleep.
* A
bulbous root, out of which rather a pleasant beverage is
manufactured.
"Probably the woman had mixed one of the soporific drugs of
which they know the secret in my drink, for I did not wake up till very late the
next day. I was rather feverish, and had a violent headache. It was some time
before the memory of the terrible scene in which I had taken part on the
previous night came back to me. After having dressed my wound, Carmen and her
friend, squatting on their heels beside my mattress, exchanged a few words of
'chipe calli,' which appeared to me to be something in the nature of a medical
consultation. Then they both of them assured me that I should soon be cured, but
that I must get out of Seville at the earliest possible moment, for that, if I
was caught there, I should most undoubtedly be shot.
"'My boy,' said Carmen
to me, 'you'll have to do something. Now that the king won't give you either
rice or haddock* you'll have to think of earning your livelihood. You're too
stupid for stealing a pastesas.** But you are brave and active. If you have the
pluck, take yourself off to the coast and turn smuggler. Haven't I promised to
get you hanged? That's better than being shot, and besides, if you set about it
properly, you'll live like a prince as long as the minons*** and the coast-guard
don't lay their hands on your collar.'
* The ordinary food of a Spanish
soldier.
** Ustilar a pastesas, to steal cleverly, to
purloin
without violence.
*** A sort of volunteer
corps.
"In this attractive guise did this fiend of a girl describe the new
career she was suggesting to me,—the only one, indeed, remaining, now I had
incurred the penalty of death. Shall I confess it, sir? She persuaded me without
much difficulty. This wild and dangerous life, it seemed to me, would bind her
and me more closely together. In future, I thought, I should be able to make
sure of her love.
"I had often heard talk of certain smugglers who travelled
about Andalusia, each riding a good horse, with his mistress behind him and his
blunderbuss in his fist. Already I saw myself trotting up and down the world,
with a pretty gipsy behind me. When I mentioned that notion to her, she laughed
till she had to hold her sides, and vowed there was nothing in the world so
delightful as a night spent camping in the open air, when each rom retired with
his romi beneath their little tent, made of three hoops with a blanket thrown
across them.
"'If I take to the mountains,' said I to her, 'I shall be sure
of you. There'll be no lieutenant there to go shares with me.'
"'Ha! ha!
you're jealous!' she retorted, 'so much the worse for you. How can you be such a
fool as that? Don't you see I must love you, because I have never asked you for
money?'
"When she said that sort to thing I could have strangled her.
"To shorten the story, sir, Carmen procured me civilian clothes, disguised
in which I got out of Seville without being recognised. I went to Jerez, with a
letter from Pastia to a dealer in anisette whose house was the smugglers'
meeting-place. I was introduced to them, and their leader, surnamed El Dancaire,
enrolled me in his gang. We started for Gaucin, where I found Carmen, who had
told me she would meet me there. In all these expeditions she acted as spy for
our gang, and she was the best that ever was seen. She had now just returned
from Gibraltar, and had already arranged with the captain of a ship for a cargo
of English goods which we were to receive on the coast. We went to meet it near
Estepona. We hid part in the mountains, and laden with the rest, we proceeded to
Ronda. Carmen had gone there before us. It was she again who warned us when we
had better enter the town. This first journey, and several subsequent ones,
turned out well. I found the smuggler's life pleasanter than a soldier's: I
could give presents to Carmen, I had money, and I had a mistress. I felt little
or no remorse, for, as the gipsies say, 'The happy man never longs to scratch
his itch.' We were made welcome everywhere, my comrades treated me well, and
even showed me a certain respect. The reason of this was that I had killed my
man, and that some of them had no exploit of that description on their
conscience. But what I valued most in my new life was that I often saw Carmen.
She showed me more affection than ever; nevertheless, she would never admit,
before my comrades, that she was my mistress, and she had even made me swear all
sorts of oaths that I would not say anything about her to them. I was so weak in
that creature's hands, that I obeyed all her whims. And besides, this was the
first time she had revealed herself as possessing any of the reserve of a
well-conducted woman, and I was simple enough to believe she had really cast off
her former habits.
"Our gang, which consisted of eight or ten men, was
hardly ever together except at decisive moments, and we were usually scattered
by twos and threes about the towns and villages. Each one of us pretended to
have some trade. One was a tinker, another was a groom; I was supposed to peddle
haberdashery, but I hardly ever showed myself in large places, on account of my
unlucky business at Seville. One day, or rather one night, we were to meet below
Veger. El Dancaire and I got there before the others.
"'We shall soon have a
new comrade,' said he. 'Carmen has just managed one of her best tricks. She has
contrived the escape of her rom, who was in the presidio at Tarifa.'
"I was
already beginning to understand the gipsy language, which nearly all my comrades
spoke, and this word rom startled me.
"What! her husband? Is she married,
then?' said I to the captain.
"'Yes!' he replied, 'married to Garcia el
Tuerto*—as cunning a gipsy as she is herself. The poor fellow has been at the
galleys. Carmen has wheedled the surgeon of the presidio to such good purpose
that she has managed to get her rom out of prison. Faith! that girl's worth her
weight in gold. For two years she has been trying to contrive his escape, but
she could do nothing until the authorities took it into their heads to change
the surgeon. She soon managed to come to an understanding with this new one.'
* One-eyed man.
"You may imagine how pleasant this news was for me.
I soon saw Garcia el Tuerto. He was the very ugliest brute that was ever nursed
in gipsydom. His skin was black, his soul was blacker, and he was altogether the
most thorough-paced ruffian I ever came across in my life. Carmen arrived with
him, and when she called him her rom in my presence, you should have seen the
eyes she made at me, and the faces she pulled whenever Garcia turned his head
away.
"I was disgusted, and never spoke a word to her all night. The next
morning we had made up our packs, and had already started, when we became aware
that we had a dozen horsemen on our heels. The braggart Andalusians, who had
been boasting they would murder every one who came near them, cut a pitiful
figure at once. There was a general rout. El Dancaire, Garcia, a good-looking
fellow from Ecija, who was called El Remendado, and Carmen herself, kept their
wits about them. The rest forsook the mules and took to the gorges, where the
horses could not follow them. There was no hope of saving the mules, so we
hastily unstrapped the best part of our booty, and taking it on our shoulders,
we tried to escape through the rocks down the steepest of the slopes. We threw
our packs down in front of us and followed them as best we could, slipping along
on our heels. Meanwhile the enemy fired at us. It was the first time I had ever
heard bullets whistling around me and I didn't mind it very much. When there's a
woman looking on, there's no particular merit in snapping one's fingers at
death. We all escaped except the poor Remendado, who received a bullet wound in
the loins. I threw away my pack and tried to lift him up.
"'Idiot!' shouted
Garcia, 'what do we want with offal! Finish him off, and don't lose the cotton
stockings!'
"'Drop him!' cried Carmen.
"I was so exhausted that I was
obliged to lay him down for a moment under a rock. Garcia came up, and fired his
blunderbuss full into his face. 'He'd be a clever fellow who recognised him
now!' said he, as he looked at the face, cut to pieces by a dozen slugs.
"There, sir; that's the delightful sort of life I've led! That night we
found ourselves in a thicket, worn out with fatigue, with nothing to eat, and
ruined by the loss of our mules. What do you think that devil Garcia did? He
pulled a pack of cards out of his pocket and began playing games with El
Dancaire by the light of a fire they kindled. Meanwhile I was lying down,
staring at the stars, thinking of El Remendado, and telling myself I would just
as lief be in his place. Carmen was squatting down near me, and every now and
then she would rattle her castanets and hum a tune. Then, drawing close to me,
as if she would have whispered in my ear, she kissed me two or three times over
almost against my will.
"'You are a devil,' said I to her.
"'Yes,' she
replied.
"After a few hours' rest, she departed to Gaucin, and the next
morning a little goatherd brought us some food. We stayed there all that day,
and in the evening we moved close to Gaucin. We were expecting news from Carmen,
but none came. After daylight broke we saw a muleteer attending a well-dressed
woman with a parasol, and a little girl who seemed to be her servant. Said
Garcia, 'There go two mules and two women whom St. Nicholas has sent us. I would
rather have had four mules, but no matter. I'll do the best I can with these.'
"He took his blunderbuss, and went down the pathway, hiding himself among
the brushwood.
"We followed him, El Dancaire and I keeping a little way
behind. As soon as the woman saw us, instead of being frightened—and our dress
would have been enough to frighten any one—she burst into a fit of loud
laughter. 'Ah! the lillipendi! They take me for an erani!'*
* "The
idiots, they take me for a smart lady!"
"It was Carmen, but so well disguised
that if she had spoken any other language I should never have recognised her.
She sprang off her mule, and talked some time in an undertone with El Dancaire
and Garcia. Then she said to me:
"'Canary-bird, we shall meet again before
you're hanged. I'm off to Gibraltar on gipsy business—you'll soon have news of
me.'
"We parted, after she had told us of a place where we should find
shelter for some days. That girl was the providence of our gang. We soon
received some money sent by her, and a piece of news which was still more useful
to us—to the effect that on a certain day two English lords would travel from
Gibraltar to Granada by a road she mentioned. This was a word to the wise. They
had plenty of good guineas. Garcia would have killed them, but El Dancaire and I
objected. All we took from them, besides their shirts, which we greatly needed,
was their money and their watches.
"Sir, a man may turn rogue in sheer
thoughtlessness. You lose your head over a pretty girl, you fight another man
about her, there is a catastrophe, you have to take to the mountains, and you
turn from a smuggler into a robber before you have time to think about it. After
this matter of the English lords, we concluded that the neighbourhood of
Gibraltar would not be healthy for us, and we plunged into the Sierra de Ronda.
You once mentioned Jose-Maria to me. Well, it was there I made acquaintance with
him. He always took his mistress with him on his expeditions. She was a pretty
girl, quiet, modest, well-mannered, you never heard a vulgar word from her, and
she was quite devoted to him. He, on his side, led her a very unhappy life. He
was always running after other women, he ill-treated her, and then sometimes he
would take it into his head to be jealous. One day he slashed her with a knife.
Well, she only doted on him the more! That's the way with women, and especially
with Andalusians. This girl was proud of the scar on her arm, and would display
it as though it were the most beautiful thing in the world. And then Jose-Maria
was the worst of comrades in the bargain. In one expedition we made with him, he
managed so that he kept all the profits, and we had all the trouble and the
blows. But I must go back to my story. We had no sign at all from Carmen. El
Dancaire said: 'One of us will have to go to Gibraltar to get news of her. She
must have planned some business. I'd go at once, only I'm too well known at
Gibraltar.' El Tuerto said:
"'I'm well known there too. I've played so many
tricks on the crayfish*—and as I've only one eye, it is not overeasy for me to
disguise myself.'
* Name applied by the Spanish populace to the
British
soldiers, on account of the colour of their uniform.
"'Then I
suppose I must go,' said I, delighted at the very idea of seeing Carmen again.
'Well, how am I to set about it?'
"The others answered:
"'You must
either go by sea, or you must get through by San Rocco, whichever you like the
best; once you are in Gibraltar, inquire in the port where a chocolate-seller
called La Rollona lives. When you've found her, she'll tell you everything
that's happening.'
"It was settled that we were all to start for the Sierra,
that I was to leave my two companions there, and take my way to Gibraltar, in
the character of a fruit-seller. At Ronda one of our men procured me a passport;
at Gaucin I was provided with a donkey. I loaded it with oranges and melons, and
started forth. When I reached Gibraltar I found that many people knew La
Rollona, but that she was either dead or had gone ad finibus terroe,* and, to my
mind, her disappearance explained the failure of our correspondence with Carmen.
I stabled my donkey, and began to move about the town, carrying my oranges as
though to sell them, but in reality looking to see whether I could not come
across any face I knew. The place is full of ragamuffins from every country in
the world, and it really is like the Tower of Babel, for you can't go ten paces
along a street without hearing as many languages. I did see some gipsies, but I
hardly dared confide in them. I was taking stock of them, and they were taking
stock of me. We had mutually guessed each other to be rogues, but the important
thing for us was to know whether we belonged to the same gang. After having
spent two days in fruitless wanderings, and having found out nothing either as
to La Rollona or as to Carmen, I was thinking I would go back to my comrades as
soon as I had made a few purchases, when, toward sunset, as I was walking along
a street, I heard a woman's voice from a window say, 'Orange-seller!'
*
To the galleys, or else to all the devils in hell.
"I looked up, and on a
balcony I saw Carmen looking out, beside a scarlet-coated officer with gold
epaulettes, curly hair, and all the appearance of a rich milord. As for her, she
was magnificently dressed, a shawl hung on her shoulders, she'd a gold comb in
her hair, everything she wore was of silk; and the cunning little wretch, not a
bit altered, was laughing till she held her sides.
"The Englishman shouted
to me in mangled Spanish to come upstairs, as the lady wanted some oranges, and
Carmen said to me in Basque:
"'Come up, and don't look astonished at
anything!'
"Indeed, nothing that she did ought ever to have astonished me. I
don't know whether I was most happy or wretched at seeing her again. At the door
of the house there was a tall English servant with a powdered head, who ushered
me into a splendid drawing-room. Instantly Carmen said to me in Basque, 'You
don't know one word of Spanish, and you don't know me.' Then turning to the
Englishman, she added:
"'I told you so. I saw at once he was a Basque. Now
you'll hear what a queer language he speaks. Doesn't he look silly? He's like a
cat that's been caught in the larder!'
"'And you,' said I to her in my own
language, 'you look like an impudent jade—and I've a good mind to scar your face
here and now, before your spark.'
"'My spark!' said she. 'Why, you've
guessed that all alone! Are you jealous of this idiot? You're even sillier than
you were before our evening in the Calle del Candilejo! Don't you see, fool,
that at this moment I'm doing gipsy business, and doing it in the most brilliant
manner? This house belongs to me—the guineas of that crayfish will belong to me!
I lead him by the nose, and I'll lead him to a place that he'll never get out
of!'
"'And if I catch you doing any gipsy business in this style again, I'll
see to it that you never do any again!' said I.
"'Ah! upon my word! Are you
my rom, pray that you give me orders? If El Tuerto is pleased, what have you to
do with it? Oughtn't you to be very happy that you are the only man who can call
himself my minchorro?'*
* My "lover," or rather my "fancy."
"'What
does he say?' inquired the Englishman.
"'He says he's thirsty, and would
like a drink,' answered Carmen, and she threw herself back upon a sofa,
screaming with laughter at her own translation.
"When that girl begins to
laugh, sir, it was hopeless for anybody to try and talk sense. Everybody laughed
with her. The big Englishman began to laugh too, like the idiot he was, and
ordered the servant to bring me something to drink.
"While I was drinking
she said to me:
"'Do you see that ring he has on his finger? If you like
I'll give it to you.'
"And I answered:
"'I would give one of my fingers
to have your milord out on the mountains, and each of us with a maquila in his
fist.'
"'Maquila, what does that mean?' asked the Englishman.
"'Maquila,' said Carmen, still laughing, 'means an orange. Isn't it a queer
word for an orange? He says he'd like you to eat maquila.'
"'Does he?' said
the Englishman. 'Very well, bring more maquila to-morrow.'
"While we were
talking a servant came in and said dinner was ready. Then the Englishman stood
up, gave me a piastre, and offered his arm to Carmen, as if she couldn't have
walked alone. Carmen, who was still laughing, said to me:
"'My boy, I can't
ask you to dinner. But to-morrow, as soon as you hear the drums beat for parade,
come here with your oranges. You'll find a better furnished room than the one in
the Calle del Candilejo, and you'll see whether I am still your Carmencita. Then
afterwards we'll talk about gipsy business.'
"I gave her no answer—even when
I was in the street I could hear the Englishman shouting, 'Bring more maquila
to-morrow,' and Carmen's peals of laughter.
"I went out, not knowing what I
should do; I hardly slept, and next morning I was so enraged with the
treacherous creature that I made up my mind to leave Gibraltar without seeing
her again. But the moment the drums began to roll, my courage failed me. I took
up my net full of oranges, and hurried off to Carmen's house. Her
window-shutters had been pulled apart a little, and I saw her great dark eyes
watching for me. The powdered servant showed me in at once. Carmen sent him out
with a message, and as soon as we were alone she burst into one of her fits of
crocodile laughter and threw her arms around my neck. Never had I seen her look
so beautiful. She was dressed out like a queen, and scented; she had silken
furniture, embroidered curtains—and I togged out like the thief I was!
"'Minchorro,' said Carmen, 'I've a good mind to smash up everything here,
set fire to the house, and take myself off to the mountains.' And then she would
fondle me, and then she would laugh, and she danced about and tore up her
fripperies. Never did monkey gambol nor make such faces, nor play such wild
tricks, as she did that day. When she had recovered her gravity—
"'Hark!'
she said, 'this is gipsy business. I mean him to take me to Ronda, where I have
a sister who is a nun' (here she shrieked with laughter again). 'We shall pass
by a particular spot which I shall make known to you. Then you must fall upon
him and strip him to the skin. Your best plan would be to do for him, but,' she
added, with a certain fiendish smile of hers, which no one who saw it ever had
any desire to imitate, 'do you know what you had better do? Let El Tuerto come
up in front of you. You keep a little behind. The crayfish is brave, and skilful
too, and he has good pistols. Do you understand?'
"And she broke off with
another fit of laughter that made me shiver.
"'No,' said I, 'I hate Garcia,
but he's my comrade. Some day, maybe, I'll rid you of him, but we'll settle our
account after the fashion of my country. It's only chance that has made me a
gipsy, and in certain things I shall always be a thorough Navarrese,* as the
proverb says.
* Navarro fino.
"'You're a fool,' she rejoined, 'a
simpleton, a regular payllo. You're just like the dwarf who thinks himself tall
because he can spit a long way.* You don't love me! Be off with you!'
*
Or esorjle de or marsichisle, sin chisnar lachinguel.
"The promise of a
dwarf is that he will spit a long way."—A
gipsy proverb.
"Whenever
she said to me 'Be off with you," I couldn't go away. I promised I would start
back to my comrades and wait the arrival of the Englishman. She, on her side,
promised she would be ill until she left Gibraltar for Ronda.
"I remained at
Gibraltar two days longer. She had the boldness to disguise herself and come and
see me at the inn. I departed, I had a plan of my own. I went back to our
meeting-place with the information as to the spot and the hour at which the
Englishman and Carmen were to pass by. I found El Dancaire and Garcia waiting
for me. We spent the night in a wood, beside a fire made of pine-cones that
blazed splendidly. I suggested to Garcia that we should play cards, and he
agreed. In the second game I told him he was cheating; he began to laugh; I
threw the cards in his face. He tried to get at his blunderbuss. I set my foot
on it, and said, 'They say you can use a knife as well as the best ruffian in
Malaga; will you try it with me?' El Dancaire tried to part us. I had given
Garcia one or two cuffs, his rage had given him courage, he drew his knife, and
I drew mine. We both of us told El Dancaire he must leave us alone, and let us
fight it out. He saw there was no means of stopping us, so he stood on one side.
Garcia was already bent double, like a cat ready to spring upon a mouse. He held
his hat in his left hand to parry with, and his knife in front of him—that's
their Andalusian guard. I stood up in the Navarrese fashion, with my left arm
raised, my left leg forward, and my knife held straight along my right thigh. I
felt I was stronger than any giant. He flew at me like an arrow. I turned round
on my left foot, so that he found nothing in front of him. But I thrust him in
the throat, and the knife went in so far that my hand was under his chin. I gave
the blade such a twist that it broke. That was the end. The blade was carried
out of the wound by a gush of blood as thick as my arm, and he fell full length
on his face.
"'What have you done?' said El Dancaire to me.
"'Hark ye,'
said I, 'we couldn't live on together. I love Carmen and I mean to be the only
one. And besides, Garcia was a villain. I remember what he did to that poor
Remendado. There are only two of us left now, but we are both good fellows.
Come, will you have me for your friend, for life or death?'
"El Dancaire
stretched out his hand. He was a man of fifty.
"'Devil take these love
stories!' he cried. 'If you'd asked him for Carmen he'd have sold her to you for
a piastre! There are only two of us now—how shall we manage for to-morrow?'
"'I'll manage it all alone,' I answered. 'I can snap my fingers at the whole
world now.'
"We buried Garcia, and we moved our camp two hundred paces
farther on. The next morning Carmen and her Englishman came along with two
muleteers and a servant. I said to El Dancaire:
"'I'll look after the
Englishman, you frighten the others—they're not armed!'
"The Englishman was
a plucky fellow. He'd have killed me if Carmen hadn't jogged his elbow.
"To
put it shortly, I won Carmen back that day, and my first words were to tell her
she was a widow.
"When she knew how it had all happened—
"'You'll always
be a lillipendi,' she said. 'Garcia ought to have killed you. Your Navarrese
guard is a pack of nonsense, and he has sent far more skilful men than you into
the darkness. It was just that his time had come—and yours will come too.'
"'Ay, and yours too!—if you're not a faithful romi to me.'
"'So be it,'
said she. 'I've read in the coffee grounds, more than once, that you and I were
to end our lives together. Pshaw! what must be, will be!' and she rattled her
castanets, as was her way when she wanted to drive away some worrying thought.
"One runs on when one is talking about one's self. I dare say all these
details bore you, but I shall soon be at the end of my story. Our new life
lasted for some considerable time. El Dancaire and I gathered a few comrades
about us, who were more trustworthy than our earlier ones, and we turned our
attention to smuggling. Occasionally, indeed, I must confess we stopped
travellers on the highways, but never unless we were at the last extremity, and
could not avoid doing so; and besides, we never ill-treated the travellers, and
confined ourselves to taking their money from them.
"For some months I was
very well satisfied with Carmen. She still served us in our smuggling
operations, by giving us notice of any opportunity of making a good haul. She
remained either at Malaga, at Cordova, or at Granada, but at a word from me she
would leave everything, and come to meet me at some venta or even in our lonely
camp. Only once—it was at Malaga—she caused me some uneasiness. I heard she had
fixed her fancy upon a very rich merchant, with whom she probably proposed to
play her Gibraltar trick over again. In spite of everything El Dancaire said to
stop me, I started off, walked into Malaga in broad daylight, sought for Carmen
and carried her off instantly. We had a sharp altercation.
"'Do you know,'
said she, 'now that you're my rom for good and all, I don't care for you so much
as when you were my minchorro! I won't be worried, and above all, I won't be
ordered about. I choose to be free to do as I like. Take care you don't drive me
too far; if you tire me out, I'll find some good fellow who'll serve you just as
you served El Tuerto.'
"El Dancaire patched it up between us; but we had
said things to each other that rankled in our hearts, and we were not as we had
been before. Shortly after that we had a misfortune: the soldiers caught us, El
Dancaire and two of my comrades were killed; two others were taken. I was sorely
wounded, and, but for my good horse, I should have fallen into the soldiers'
hands. Half dead with fatigue, and with a bullet in my body, I sought shelter in
a wood, with my only remaining comrade. When I got off my horse I fainted away,
and I thought I was going to die there in the brushwood, like a shot hare. My
comrade carried me to a cave he knew of, and then he sent to fetch Carmen.
"She was at Granada, and she hurried to me at once. For a whole fortnight
she never left me for a single instant. She never closed her eyes; she nursed me
with a skill and care such as no woman ever showed to the man she loved most
tenderly. As soon as I could stand on my feet, she conveyed me with the utmost
secrecy to Granada. These gipsy women find safe shelter everywhere, and I spent
more than six weeks in a house only two doors from that of the Corregidor who
was trying to arrest me. More than once I saw him pass by, from behind the
shutter. At last I recovered, but I had thought a great deal, on my bed of pain,
and I had planned to change my way of life. I suggested to Carmen that we should
leave Spain, and seek an honest livelihood in the New World. She laughed in my
face.
"'We were not born to plant cabbages,' she cried. 'Our fate is to live
payllos! Listen: I've arranged a business with Nathan Ben-Joseph at Gibraltar.
He has cotton stuffs that he can not get through till you come to fetch them. He
knows you're alive, and reckons upon you. What would our Gibraltar
correspondents say if you failed them?'
"I let myself by persuaded, and took
up my vile trade once more.
"While I was hiding at Granada there were
bull-fights there, to which Carmen went. When she came back she talked a great
deal about a skilful picador of the name of Lucas. She knew the name of his
horse, and how much his embroidered jacket had cost him. I paid no attention to
this; but a few days later, Juanito, the only one of my comrades who was left,
told me he had seen Carmen with Lucas in a shop in the Zacatin. Then I began to
feel alarmed. I asked Carmen how and why she had made the picador's
acquaintance.
"'He's a man out of whom we may be able to get something,'
said she. 'A noisy stream has either water in it or pebbles. He has earned
twelve hundred reals at the bull-fights. It must be one of two things: we must
either have his money, or else, as he is a good rider and a plucky fellow, we
can enroll him in our gang. We have lost such an one an such an one; you'll have
to replace them. Take this man with you!'
"'I want neither his money nor
himself,' I replied, 'and I forbid you to speak to him.'
"'Beware!' she
retorted. 'If any one defies me to do a thing, it's very quickly done.'
"Luckily the picador departed to Malaga, and I set about passing in the
Jew's cotton stuffs. This expedition gave me a great deal to do, and Carmen as
well. I forgot Lucas, and perhaps she forgot him too—for the moment, at all
events. It was just about that time, sir, that I met you, first at Montilla, and
then afterward at Cordova. I won't talk about that last interview. You know more
about it, perhaps, than I do. Carmen stole your watch from you, she wanted to
have your money besides, and especially that ring I see on your finger, and
which she declared to be a magic ring, the possession of which was very
important to her. We had a violent quarrel, and I struck her. She turned pale
and began to cry. It was the first time I had ever seen her cry, and it affected
me in the most painful manner. I begged her to forgive me, but she sulked with
me for a whole day, and when I started back to Montilla she wouldn't kiss me. My
heart was still very sore, when, three days later, she joined me with a smiling
face and as merry as a lark. Everything was forgotten, and we were like a pair
of honeymoon lovers. Just as we were parting she said, 'There's a fete at
Cordova; I shall go and see it, and then I shall know what people will be coming
away with money, and I can warn you.'
"I let her go. When I was alone I
thought about the fete, and about the change in Carmen's temper. 'She must have
avenged herself already,' said I to myself, 'since she was the first to make our
quarrel up.' A peasant told me there was to be bull-fighting at Cordova. Then my
blood began to boil, and I went off like a madman straight to the bull-ring. I
had Lucas pointed out to me, and on the bench, just beside the barrier, I
recognised Carmen. One glance at her was enough to turn my suspicion into
certainty. When the first bull appeared Lucas began, as I had expected to play
the agreeable; he snatched the cockade off the bull and presented it to Carmen,
who put it in her hair at once.*
* La divisa. A knot of ribbon, the
colour of which
indicates the pasturage from which each bull comes.
This
knot of ribbon is fastened into the bull's hide with a sort
of hook, and it is considered the very height of gallantry
to snatch it
off the living beast and present it to a woman.
"The bull avenged me. Lucas
was knocked down, with his horse on his chest, and the bull on top of both of
them. I looked for Carmen, she had disappeared from her place already. I
couldn't get out of mine, and I was obliged to wait until the bull-fight was
over. Then I went off to that house you already know, and waited there quietly
all that evening and part of the night. Toward two o'clock in the morning Carmen
came back, and was rather surprised to see me.
"'Come with me,' said I.
"'Very well,' said she, 'let's be off.'
"I went and got my horse, and
took her up behind me, and we travelled all the rest of the night without saying
a word to each other. When daylight came we stopped at a lonely inn, not far
from a hermitage. There I said to Carmen:
"'Listen—I forget everything, I
won't mention anything to you. But swear one thing to me—that you'll come with
me to America, and live there quietly!'
"'No,' said she, in a sulky voice,
'I won't go to America—I am very well here.'
"'That's because you're near
Lucas. But be very sure that even if he gets well now, he won't make old bones.
And, indeed, why should I quarrel with him? I'm tired of killing all your
lovers; I'll kill you this time.'
"She looked at me steadily with her wild
eyes, and then she said:
"'I've always thought you would kill me. The very
first time I saw you I had just met a priest at the door of my house. And
to-night, as we were going out of Cordova, didn't you see anything? A hare ran
across the road between your horse's feet. It is fate.'
"'Carmencita,' I
asked, 'don't you love me any more?'
"She gave me no answer, she was sitting
cross-legged on a mat, making marks on the ground with her finger.
"'Let us
change our life, Carmen,' said I imploringly. 'Let us go away and live somewhere
we shall never be parted. You know we have a hundred and twenty gold ounces
buried under an oak not far from here, and then we have more money with
Ben-Joseph the Jew.'
"She began to smile, and then she said, 'Me first, and
then you. I know it will happen like that.'
"'Think about it,' said I. 'I've
come to the end of my patience and my courage. Make up your mind—or else I must
make up mine.'
"I left her alone and walked toward the hermitage. I found
the hermit praying. I waited till his prayer was finished. I longed to pray
myself, but I couldn't. When he rose up from his knees I went to him.
"'Father,' I said, 'will you pray for some one who is in great danger?'
"'I pray for every one who is afflicted,' he replied.
"'Can you say a
mass for a soul which is perhaps about to go into the presence of its Maker?'
"'Yes,' he answered, looking hard at me.
"And as there was something
strange about me, he tried to make me talk.
"'It seems to me that I have
seen you somewhere,' said he.
"I laid a piastre on his bench.
"'When
shall you say the mass?' said I.
"'In half an hour. The son of the innkeeper
yonder is coming to serve it. Tell me, young man, haven't you something on your
conscience that is tormenting you? Will you listen to a Christian's counsel?'
"I could hardly restrain my tears. I told him I would come back, and hurried
away. I went and lay down on the grass until I heard the bell. Then I went back
to the chapel, but I stayed outside it. When he had said the mass, I went back
to the venta. I was hoping Carmen would have fled. She could have taken my horse
and ridden away. But I found her there still. She did not choose that any one
should say I had frightened her. While I had been away she had unfastened the
hem of her gown and taken out the lead that weighted it; and now she was sitting
before a table, looking into a bowl of water into which she had just thrown the
lead she had melted. She was so busy with her spells that at first she didn't
notice my return. Sometimes she would take out a bit of lead and turn it round
every way with a melancholy look. Sometimes she would sing one of those magic
songs, which invoke the help of Maria Padella, Don Pedro's mistress, who is said
to have been the Bari Crallisa—the great gipsy queen.*
* Maria Padella
was accused of having bewitched Don Pedro.
According to one popular
tradition she presented Queen
Blanche of Bourbon with a golden girdle
which, in the eyes
of the bewitched king, took on the appearance of a
living
snake. Hence the repugnance he always showed toward the
unhappy princess.
"'Carmen,' I said to her, 'will you come with me?' She
rose, threw away her wooden bowl, and put her mantilla over her head ready to
start. My horse was led up, she mounted behind me, and we rode away.
"After
we had gone a little distance I said to her, 'So, my Carmen, you are quite ready
to follow me, isn't that so?'
"She answered, 'Yes, I'll follow you, even to
death—but I won't live with you any more.'
"We had reached a lonely gorge. I
stopped my horse.
"'Is this the place?' she said.
"And with a spring she
reached the ground. She took off her mantilla and threw it at her feet, and
stood motionless, with one hand on her hip, looking at me steadily.
"'You
mean to kill me, I see that well,' said she. 'It is fate. But you'll never make
me give in.'
"I said to her: 'Be rational, I implore you; listen to me. All
the past is forgotten. Yet you know it is you who have been my ruin—it is
because of you that I am a robber and a murderer. Carmen, my Carmen, let me save
you, and save myself with you.'
"'Jose,' she answered, 'what you ask is
impossible. I don't love you any more. You love me still, and that is why you
want to kill me. If I liked, I might tell you some other lie, but I don't choose
to give myself the trouble. Everything is over between us two. You are my rom,
and you have the right to kill your romi, but Carmen will always be free. A
calli she was born, and a calli she'll die.'
"'Then, you love Lucas?' I
asked.
"'Yes, I have loved him—as I loved you—for an instant—less than I
loved you, perhaps. But now I don't love anything, and I hate myself for ever
having loved you.'
"I cast myself at her feet, I seized her hands, I watered
them with my tears, I reminded her of all the happy moments we had spent
together, I offered to continue my brigand's life, if that would please her.
Everything, sir, everything—I offered her everything if she would only love me
again.
"She said:
"'Love you again? That's not possible! Live with you?
I will not do it!'
"I was wild with fury. I drew my knife, I would have had
her look frightened, and sue for mercy—but that woman was a demon.
"I cried,
'For the last time I ask you. Will you stay with me?'
"'No! no! no!' she
said, and she stamped her foot.
"Then she pulled a ring I had given her off
her finger, and cast it into the brushwood.
"I struck her twice over—I had
taken Garcia's knife, because I had broken my own. At the second thrust she fell
without a sound. It seems to me that I can still see her great black eyes
staring at me. Then they grew dim and the lids closed.
"For a good hour I
lay there prostrate beside her corpse. Then I recollected that Carmen had often
told me that she would like to lie buried in a wood. I dug a grave for her with
my knife and laid her in it. I hunted about a long time for her ring, and I
found it at last. I put it into the grave beside her, with a little
cross—perhaps I did wrong. Then I got upon my horse, galloped to Cordova, and
gave myself up at the nearest guard-room. I told them I had killed Carmen, but I
would not tell them where her body was. That hermit was a holy man! He prayed
for her—he said a mass for her soul. Poor child! It's the calle who are to blame
for having brought her up as they did."
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