(2/3) The Teeth of the Gale (20 page)

Pilar began to look very dejected; her underlip protruded farther and farther as we wandered about finding nobody. And I began to grow anxious. The clouds were turning blacker and blacker; the way down was going to be far more difficult than the ascent had been; and where were Don Manuel and the other children? Had they left the place?

"I don't see—" Pilar began, when I said, "hush!" again.

Most of the castle ruins ended not far above ground level; but one portion of the central keep had a second, even a third story. From a window of the second floor I believed I had heard the sound of a voice; most improbably, it seemed, somebody was singing.

I discovered a wooden door that led into this portion of the castle; but it was closed. Softly I tried it, and found it barred. Pilars underlip stuck out even farther. Scowling, she looked as if she intended to hammer on the door. Laying my forefinger warningly on her lip, I pointed to a tree that had thrust its way up to a considerable height alongside the building. Its branches were thick and tangled; there would be no difficulty in climbing up them.

Pilar nodded her delighted comprehension, ran at once to the tree, and flung herself confidently into the branches. I followed close behind, and we were soon high enough to be able to see without difficulty into the windows of the second-floor chamber.

The scene that met our eyes was unexpected, to say the least.

On an open hearth blazed a fire of pine branches, giving a ruddy illumination to the room, which was not large and contained no furniture at all.

In the middle of the room, a man was dancing. He held a child in his arms. He danced very slowly, gravely, and correctly. As he danced, he sang an air; and the child—she was a girl—sang softly with him. Nearby a boy, standing, solemnly clapped his hands in time to the beat.

I found this tableau inexpressibly sad.

The man's dignity, his absorption in what he was doing, the attentive and fond looks directed at him by both children, the visible trust and love that they felt for him, and he for them, so totally contradicted the picture Conchita had painted of a ruffianly madman and two terrified prisoners that I wondered how I could ever have swallowed her version for so much as a moment.

But of course I had not known Conchita when I first heard the tale.

Now everything fell into place.

Don Manuel had taken his children because he loved them and wished to see them. He had left little Pilar behind because he knew she was none of his.

And Conchita, afraid that this damaging fact would come to light, had instructed her lover, Don Amador, to keep Pilar out of sight until a rescue could be arranged and the children all presented together, while her unsatisfactory husband was somehow disposed of.

As these thoughts slipped rapidly through my head, Pilar, characteristically, made her own dispositions.

Agile as a squirrel, she climbed to a higher bough, which bent under her weight and carried her within a hand's breadth of the stone windowsill; then, with great intrepidity she flung herself across the gap and tumbled into the room, shouting exultantly.

"Weeza! Nico! I found you, I found you! I
found
you!" she clamored, and ran to hug the boy, who looked startled out of his wits, but stooped to embrace her affectionately enough; to my relief I saw (following Pilar with less agility but as quickly as I could) that she was accepted with affection and good nature by her siblings; they did not exclude her as, it seemed, Don Manuel had done.

Indeed he did not, now, greet her with unkindness, though I could see that he was shocked, astonished, and not at all happy at her arrival.

"
Madre de Diosl
Pilar! How in the world did you get here, child?"

"I climbed! I climbed up all by myself!"

Then Don Manuel turned and saw me and his face stiffened.

When he was younger, I thought, he must have resembled a god. Even now, thin, worn, dusty, his clothes in tatters, his hair untrimmed, blind in one eye, a stubble of several days' growth on his chin, he was the most handsome and imposing man I had ever seen, and looked as if he might well be descended from the ancient kings of Aragon. Over the blind eye he wore a black patch, held in place by a black silk ribbon; the other eye was large, deep-set, sparkling, and formidable. His finely chiseled lips were set strongly together; he did not scowl, but regarded me with ferocious intensity as if, should he think it necessary, he would toss me out the window without the least hesitation. And he could probably have done so; he was at least a head taller than I, and seemed built of nothing but bone and muscle.

"
Vaya!
We have another guest, it seems. And who may you be, my young señor?"

"My name is Felix Brooke," I said quickly. "I—I am acquainted with your friend Don Mariano Jose de Larra. I am working with him, indeed. And I have a letter, concerning the children, from Señorita Juana Esparza—or Sister Felicita, as she is now called. May I give it to you?"

With—I must acknowledge—a slightly shaking hand, I pulled the letter from my pouch and extended it.

Don Manuel still bent on me that deep, dark, penetrating and mistrustful eye.

"You do not come from my wife—from Doña Conchita?"

I hesitated, then said, "Señor, I was called in by her at the start. I admit it. But I am not—I am not of her party. Please read the letter. I am sure Señorita Esparza puts the whole story much more clearly than I can.
She is
my real friend in this matter."

I said this, I suppose, proudly, and Don Manuel's look became a fraction less hostile and suspicious.

He said, "Anybody befriended by Doña Juana has a friend indeed. I have met that young lady once or twice and have a high opinion of her goodness and integrity."

"Is the letter really from Cousin Juana, Papa?" demanded the little girl he had been carrying. He had put the child down to receive the paper. She was, I judged, three or four years older than Pilar, a round-faced child, not pretty, but with a look of great simplicity and sweetness. The boy, aged about nine, was thin, dark, haunted-looking, with a strong resemblance to his father but lacking his beauty. Both children eyed me warily, mirroring their father's mistrust.

"So it seems, Luisa. Quiet, now, while I read it." He unfolded the paper and gave it his attention. I noticed that his hands were terribly scarred, as if they had been burned with hot irons. Tales of the fearsome fortress of Montjuich, where he had been imprisoned, came back to me, of how prisoners there had put an end to their lives, rather than endure the cruelties practiced by the jailors. Escapes were almost unknown.

Yet, having got away from that dread place, Don Manuel had not made his way out of Spain and into freedom and safety; he had gone to see his children.

"Is the letter truly from Cousin Juana?" repeated Luisa when he had read it.

"Judge for yourself,
querida.
She has drawn you an owl."

"Oh yes, yes, that is one of Juana's owls!" exclaimed the boy, looking over his sister's shoulder. "And she has put in a verse of that song we used to sing with her:

Zankhoua mehe eta
Buria pelatu;
Hori duzu senale
Zirela Zahartu.
Zahartu izan eta
Ezorano conzatu
Oficiotto hori
Beharduzu kitatu.

And a line of our secret language."

"What does it say?" inquired Don Manuel.

"It says, 'You can trust this friend, he is a good man.'"

"I am happy to hear it." Don Manuel did not look at all happy, however. He continued to regard me with fixed gravity. "So," he demanded, "what is your proposal, Señor Brooke? Why are you here?"

"Well, señor," said I with diffidence, "I have had a little conversation with Señor Jose de Larra. He, I understand, has plans to convey you to other lands where you may continue to work for the Liberal cause in freedom and safety. After all, you cannot stay in this refuge forever. But"—I glanced at Nico and Luisa—"what I have to say is perhaps better said between ourselves, señor."

"Anything you have to say can be said in front of these children," he answered quickly and calmly.

The boy looked up at him at once in deep anxiety.

"You are not going away—are you, Papa? If you go, can we go too?"

Don Manuel's look met mine over Nico's head.

"I hope so, indeed, my son. We shall have to see."

Little Pilar at once began to dance around her brother and sister and Don Manuel, frantically clamoring, "Do not go away from us, dear Papa, do
not!
I love you much better than Mama and Guillermina and Abuelo Escaroz and Uncle Dor-Dor, who says he is my papa; but
I
think that
you
are my
real
papa. I do not
wish
you to go away, I do not, I do not!"

"Hush,
chiquita,
" said Luisa, seeing that Pilar was starting to work herself up into a frenzy. "Tell me about where you have been, all these weeks." Luisa seemed to have much greater skill in managing her little sister than did fat Don Amador. Pilar quieted down at once and began a long excited rigmarole about horses, carriages, and posadas.

"I regret that I cannot offer you any refreshment, Señor Brooke," said Don Manuel, with great courtesy. "But I fear that we have not a scrap of food or drink about the place. My friend de Larra was to have brought us further supplies—I wonder what can have become of him, by the way? I expected him here by now."

A shade of anxiety crossed his brow.

"Pray do not trouble yourself, señor. In fact—now I come to think of it—
I
have a loaf of bread about me, to which the children are more than welcome—"

I had bought a small loaf myself, at the bakers, thinking we might be glad of it along the way. Now I pulled it out of my pouch and offered it to Luisa, whose eyes lit up. Her father, however, said quickly, "Thank the young señor, Luisa, but we have a little ritual here that we always perform before eating. We share our rations with the birds."

He took a morsel of the bread, crumbled it, and spread the crumbs on the sill of one of the several large unglazed windows, through which swallows, mountain doves, and other small birds had, from time to time, been flitting in and out. On the western side of the room the windows looked directly over the cliff; the drop from them was formidable.

I saw the children's eyes widen, as if they were surprised by what their father did. His "little ritual," then, was
not
always performed, but was new to them? After a cluster of birds had found the crumbs, pecked at them, and quickly demolished them, he relaxed, smiled, and said, "
Vaya!
Enjoy your dinner, children."

Did he, perhaps, suspect poison? Knowing Conchita, I supposed, he might not consider that possibility wholly out of the question. It was a bad thought.

"While the children ate, sharing out the bread with scrupulous fairness, I said in a low voice, "Don Manuel: I believe that Señor Jose de Larra told you it might not be practicable for you to take the children with you on this present journey? Later on, perhaps, when you are established safely overseas, it may be that you can send for them—?"

He answered quickly and firmly.

"Understand this, Señor Brooke. In
no
circumstances will I consent to leave my children in the care of that—that viperess and her fat slug of a lover. Are you aware that it was
they
who denounced me—that it was they who, on a set of false charges, had me consigned to Montjuich prison? Do you think that I would leave these good, innocent children with such a pair as that? Do you think Conchita Escaroz is a proper person to have the care of young ones? Why, she has never looked after them for a single day in her life. She is lazy, spoiled, self-absorbed, malicious, and a liar. Would you leave a child of yours with her?"

I thought about it. The news that it was Conchita herself who had denounced her husband did not, by now, entirely surprise me; it bore out various observations I had made myself. I could imagine her perfectly capable of such an act, if she had good reason for wishing to rid herself of an inconvenient tie. As for taking care of the children—no, I could not imagine that she had ever felt that responsibility very deeply. After all, she had cast off little Pilar into the care of fat Don Amador negligently enough. Despite her tears and occasional exclamations about her "little ones" she had not, in general, displayed any particular anxiety about them; had eaten well, slept well, judging by her looks, and devoted rather more attention to her own comfort than to anything else.

"No," I answered slowly, "I must confess that I would not..."

The children having eaten, Luisa, in a motherly way, was attempting to put her little sister to rights. With a comb from her own hair she had laboriously straightened Pilar's tangled locks, had gently and carefully cleaned her numerous grazes with a handkerchief dipped in a cup of water, and was now doing her best to brush and straighten the tattered blue dress.

"But what is this,
hija
? What is this packet here, in your petticoat pocket—you have brought us some candy, perhaps, some
turron
?"

"Oh, no; it is only a book. I forgot about it. It is a book that Mama said I might bring to Papa—the one he was asking for when he was in prison," Pilar said carelessly. "Sing me 'Tragala, tragala,' Nico!"

"Hush! We must sing that only when there is nobody to hear."

"Well, there is no one here but Papa and Yellow-hair. And
he
is not bad. He made me a necklace."

To my surprise she pulled from under her collar the circlet of plaited thongs with a blue bead that I had lightheartedly dropped over her head when we were in Zamora; which, it seemed, she had worn ever since.

Very softly Nico and Luisa began singing. I recognized the words: they were the battle hymn of those who wished to reestablish the Constitution.

Si los euros ye frailes supieran
La paliza que los vamos a dar
Se pondrian en eoro gritando
Libertad! Libertad! Libertad!

Tragala, tragala, tragala
Cara de morron
Ne queremos reina bruja
Ni queremos rey follon
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