(2/3) The Teeth of the Gale (7 page)

"May I take this letter, Grandfather?"

"Certainly, certainly. Sleep well now—" He made the sign of the cross as I bowed and left him.

The paper, with its heavy seal, felt warm in my fingers. "Sister Felicita therefore suggested that we appeal to you for the good offices of your grandson..." How those words danced in my heart!

Tucking the letter into my jacket pocket I went to the kitchen, where Pedro was being fed a huge breakfast by his aunt Prudencia, the cook. She at once rose and gave me a great embrace.

"Glorious Virgin! How the boy has grown! I never thought you'd fill out and shoot up so! But your hair is still as yellow as a gold
duro
and your eyes blue as flax."

Annoyed with myself, I blushed. When I was younger I had hated my yellow hair, so different from that of everybody else; and I still thought that it made me seem younger than my age.

"How is everybody?" I asked quickly. "Rodrigo—Gaston—Sancho—Manuela—Maria?"

"All well, all well—all agog to see you too, only the Conde said you'd go straight off to your bed after you had eaten."

"And so I shall, only first I must go and see if old Gato is somewhere about. He is—he
is
still alive?" I asked Pedro.

"Who? Oh, the old cat, yes, he'll be somewhere out there in the stable yard, so far as I know—he was here when I left to fetch you. But very old now—so stiff he can't jump onto the mounting block any longer."

I went into the stable yard calling, "Gato! Gato!" And saw him, sitting in a patch of sun and straw, my old yellow cat. He must be an immense age for a cat now, even in human years older than I. He was one of the first things I could remember.

He stood up, stiffly, and started toward me. I saw with grief that he was lacking an eye, and that one of his ears was in tatters. He had always been a great battler, Gato. He walked very slowly indeed, stiff and skeleton-thin, with his tail straight upright, like a sword. I could see the shadows of all his bones, along his tawny side. And when he was within a yard of me, he suddenly lay down, on his side, on the dusty cobbles.

As I stooped to stroke him, I saw that he was dead. The one good eye, still yellow as amber, stared at nothing. He had waited for me as long as he possibly could.

I carried him to a far-distant corner of my grandmother's garden, took a spade from a shed, and buried him under a neglected grape arbor, wrapped up in one of my old cambric shirts. Sleep well, old fellow, I told him. Dream of mice. Rest there, in the shade. I wont forget you. Never,
never.
Once, you were my only comfort.

Suddenly my three years at Salamanca—learning, reading, talking, arguing, discussing—fell away and seemed as if they had been no more than three minutes. I was the Felix of an earlier time once more. The substance of home lapped me around. I belonged here, at Villaverde—like it or not.

Slowly, feeling all of my exhaustion now, I made my way to my room. Thoughts drifted past—Grandfather—Juana—my tired old Gato—and then, just before I slept, the memory of those two men, smothered to death under the avalanche, came into my mind. Poor devils—poor devils—had anybody dug them out yet? Very probably they might lie there for days, on such a rarely used road....

W
HEN
I woke, the room was filled with reflected sunset glow. My windows looked south—in fact they pierced clean through the town wall—toward the great snow-covered mountain range around which Pedro and I had just skirted, the Picos de Ancares. I had always loved this room, even in my loneliest, most miserable days, for its silence and security and seclusion—few members of the household ever troubled to climb up here and seek me out.

But now I was aware of a small, scrabbling sound, before I opened my eyes, as if squirrels or mice had got into the place and were searching for eatables. I rolled over and sat up, startling my great-aunts Josefina and Visitación almost to death. (Fortunately I had flung myself down with all my clothes on.)

The two old ladies huddled together, staring at me with bright beady eyes. They were like two dried-up old insects, wrapped in layers of silk, wool, and bombazine, with Manila shawls over all, enveloped in a cloud of lavender water that made me cough, hung about with little pockets and laces, with clinking sets of keys, with fans and handkerchiefs and crucifixes and beads and needle cases.

"Ah,
there
you are, Felix!" murmured Josefina.

Visitación just stared. She, apparently, during my three years' absence, had suffered a slight stroke, for her face was a little lopsided.

I said politely, "Thank you kindly for coming to wake me, Aunt Josefina, Aunt Visitación. I am glad to see you well. Can I—can I help you in any way?"

They looked at one another, then at me again. Then they both twittered together, in their high, husky voices.

"We wished to ask you—that is, we were anxious to know—"

"What did you wish to ask me, señoras?" I inquired, for they seemed to have come to a halt, and I wanted my room to myself.

"Is it
true
that you are going on this errand? Are you really going to search for that terrible man who has made away with his own children?" they said together.

And how the Devil did you learn that? I wondered. For sure, my grandfather never told you.

But I remembered that keeping any secret in this household was out of the question. The contents of a letter would be whispered around the house, almost before its owner had done reading it.

"Is your grandfather
really
in favor of such a mad, dangerous scheme? Francisco is so simple and gullible! The whole thing is a plot—a perilous, terrifying plot!"

"A plot, señoras? How can it be that?"

"Child, child, don't you see, it is a plot to involve you, and so also the Conde, in dangerous, democratic affairs. The Society of the Exterminating Angel will be after him directly, and the Military Commission. He will be a doomed man!"

"But why—I don't see—"

I knew, of course, about the Society of the Exterminating Angel. It had been founded by the Bishop of Osma and was secretly organized and most powerful. It was said that Don Carlos, the king's brother, and his wife belonged to it; that the meetings were held in the palace at Madrid, and its mission was to organize vengeance upon all the Liberals who had supported the democratic constitution.

"And
then
what will become of us?" lamented Josefina. "If your grandfather is thrown into prison—and his estates confiscated—we and your grandmother will be forced to beg in the streets! We shall starve in degradation—"

I could hardly help laughing, their fears seemed so selfish and irrational. But they were both as white as pastry and gazed at me with huge, haunted eyes. I did my best to reassure them, promised them that if I detected any evidence of such a plot as they envisaged, I would withdraw from the business; finally I succeeded in shepherding them out of my chamber.

Hen-witted old creatures, I thought, as they twittered and clattered their way down the flight of stone stairs outside my door, silly, self-absorbed old fools. All they worry about is where their next meal is coming from. As if I would let their remonstrances affect me in any way—specially in a matter such as this!

***

M
Y GRANDFATHER
had interviewed Pedro while
I
slept, and arrangements were already in preparation for our new journey. Pedro was so unaffectedly delighted at hearing he was to accompany me again that I had not the heart to let him know how contrary to my wish this had been.

"Look!" he said with pride. "The Conde has lent me this pair of pistols, which belonged to your uncle Esteban! What an honor! Are they not handsome? How far is it to Bilbao? I believe the people all speak Basque in that place. How in the world shall we make ourselves understood?"

I remembered how Juana had attempted in vain to teach me Basque, or, as it should properly be called, Euskara. It is undoubtedly a language of the Devil. In all the weeks we were together I learned only about half a dozen words:
gab-boon, egg-en-noon,
for good night, good morning,
gizon,
a man,
khatten,
to eat,
erratten,
to drink. But, they say, Euskara is the language that our father Adam spoke in Eden.

"Don't worry your head," I told Pedro. "Nearly all the Basques speak some Spanish and some French."

My grandfather sent for me after dinner and presented me with a corresponding pair of pistols that had belonged to my uncle Juan.

"I hope you will not need to use them," said he. "But it is well to be provided against danger. And they are good weapons. Besides, if de la Trava has really taken refuge in the High Pyrenees, you may need to protect yourselves against wolves or wild boar. Ha! Now your eyes begin to sparkle. Well, I hope such beasts may prove the worst perils that you have to encounter. Wolves can be easier to tackle than wicked men."

"Grandfather ... my great-aunts Josefina and Visitación seem to believe there is a plot..."

"I know," he said seriously. "Poor old ladies—they see plots in everything. Just the same, they need not be wrong. I have today heard a strange and troubling tale"—glancing at a sombrero, which for the first time I noticed lying on the large table where he kept estate maps. The sight of it surprised me, firstly, because my grandfather had almost given up going outdoors since his house arrest, even though that had now been revoked; secondly, because if he did venture out, he wore an old-fashioned tricorne, never a sombrero. "The villagers of Navia came to me, while you slept, to inform me that there had been a landslide on the road from Becerrea and that two travelers had been killed by it. The slide must have taken place after you and Pedro passed that way; I thank God that
your
lives were spared. The matter was reported to me as
Corregidor
of the district."

Now I found myself in a severe dilemma; I had not told my grandfather about the action taken by the farmer of Navia. Ought I to do so? The man would have to be tried for manslaughter—or murder—would probably be executed—

While these thoughts ran through my head, the Conde continued.

"Men from Navia dug the road clear, thus discovering the two bodies. One of them, it seems, was El Caramanchel, a notorious brigand, and one of the greatest rascals in all Spain."

I nodded. I had heard often enough, at Salamanca, of El Caramanchel and his outrageous crimes.

"There was a price upon his head, which the people of Navia intend to claim, so his end will afflict nobody and will benefit many. But the other man, who was with him, did not appear to be a robber; he had papers on him showing him to be a government clerk from Salamanca."

I glanced again toward the hat on the table. Now I knew why it was so familiar. It was the hat of Sancho the Spy!

"But what in the world," said my grandfather, "was a civil servant from Salamanca doing so far from home, in company with a notorious criminal? I do not like this, Felix. I do not like it at all. Can they have been following you?"

They can indeed, thought I, but decided not to trouble my grandfather with any further details of the matter, for it might change his views about my errand to Bilbao. And that I certainly did not wish!

"Well," said I cheerfully, "if they were following us, they will do so no longer. So we need not trouble ourselves about them."

A week later I was standing, sick and frozen with trepidation, at the top of a steep hill in Bilbao, in the pouring rain, pulling at the cord of a great brass bell that hung outside the visitors' gate of El Convento de la Encarnacion.

Nothing suspicious, or worthy of note, had occurred during our journey to Bilbao, which we had decided to make by land (since so many things may hold up a sea voyage—gales, fog, adverse tides, contrary winds). No harm befell us; we reached Bilbao on the sixth day. I delivered Grandfather's letter at the convent lodge, and received a message to return the following afternoon. So, for another night, I had to contain my impatience.

For our lodging we had chosen ourselves a small, unpretentious
fonda,
down by the waterside. Bilbao is a bustling estuary town lying along the banks of the River Nervion; great ships ply in and out laden with coal and iron ore; it is a rich, black, dirty, noisy place, crammed into a deep narrow valley. The streets are thronged with cattle, horses, and people, and excessively muddy because of the damp climate. No carts or carriages are permitted in the center of the town, because the streets are so narrow, and all goods must be carried on horse or mule-back, which adds to the congestion and foulness of the ways. The people are small, dark, busy, and surly.

On the following afternoon I left Pedro hopefully planning to try his chances with the señoritas of the city during the evening paseo. Wishing him luck (though I had a suspicion the Basque girls would not take kindly to strangers), I betook myself back up the slippery hill to the convent, which was right on the summit, and encircled by a high black wall.

At last, after I had rung and stood waiting in the rain for some time, a portress opened the massive door and beckoned me in. Ignoring a couple of beggars pleading for alms, she led the way across a courtyard. My throat tasted dry and bitter; a deep tremble ran all through my bones, from neck to ankle. Hoping that this state of terror did not show too plainly, I followed my guide along a passage into a small parlor where, it seemed, visitors were received.

There were pictures on the whitewashed walls—the martyrdom of St. Sebastian and St. Martin dividing his cloak with a beggar. Why, if he was a saint, I wondered, did he not give the beggar the whole cloak? The floor was paved with stone flags, sweating in the damp atmosphere; on them lay two shabby rush mats. Two plain benches, two plain chairs, and a worn settee with curved legs were the only furnishings. They looked as if they had been picked up cheap at street markets.