II. CASTRO DURO
THE MORNING
In these severe old Castilian towns there is one hour of ideal peace and serenity. That is the early morning. The cocks are still crowing, the sound of the church bells is scattered on the air, and the sun begins to penetrate into the streets in gusts of light. The morning is a flood of charity that falls upon the yellowish town.
The sky is blue, the air limpid, pure, and diaphanous; the transparent atmosphere scarcely admits effects of perspective, and its ethereal mass makes the outlines of the houses, of the belfries, of the eaves, vibrate. The cold breeze plays at the cross-streets, and amuses itself by twisting the stems of the geraniums and pinks that flame on the balconies. Everywhere there is an odour of cistus and of burning broom, which comes from the ovens where the bread is baked, and an odour of lavender that comes from the house entries.
The town yawns and awakes; some priests pass, on their way to church; pious women come out of their houses; and market men and women begin to arrive from the villages nearby. The bells make that tilín-talán so sad, which seems confined to these dead towns. In the main street the shops open; a boy hangs up the dresses, the sandals, the caps, on the façade, reaching them up with a stick. Droves of mules are seen in front of the grain-shops; some charcoal-burners go by, selling charcoal; and peasant women lead, by their halters, little burros loaded with jars and pans.
One hears all the hawksters’ cries, all the clatter characteristic of that town. The milk-vendor, the honey-vendor, the chestnut-vendor, each has his own traditional theme. The candlestick-maker produces a sonorous peal from two copper candlesticks, the scissors-grinder whistles on his flute....
Then, at midday, hawksters and peasants disappear, the sun shines hotter, and the afternoon is tiresome and enervating.
FROM THE MIRADERO
Castro Duro is situated on a hill of red earth.
One goes up to the town by a dusty highway, with the remains of little trees which one Europeanizing mayor planted, and which all died; or else by zigzag paths, up which saddle-animals and beasts of burden usually go.
From the plain Castro Duro stands out in silhouette against the sky, between two high, many-sided edifices, one of a honey yellow, old and respectable, the church; the other white, overgrown, modern, the prison.
These two pillars of society are conspicuous from all sides, from whatsoever point on the plain one looks at Castro Duro.
The town was an old important city, and has, from afar, a seigniorial air; from nearby, on the contrary, it presents that aspect of caked dust which all the Castilian cities in ruin have; it is wide, spread out, formed for the most part of lanes and little squares, with low crooked houses that have blackish, warped roofs.
From the promenade beside the church, which is called the Miradero, one can see the great valley that surrounds Castro, a plain without an end, flat and empty. At the foot of the hill that supports the city, a broad river, which formerly kissed the old walls, marks a huge S with a sand border.
The water of the river covers the beach in winter, and leaves it half uncovered in summer. At intervals on the river banks grow little groves of poplar, which are mirrored on the tranquil surface of the water. A very long bridge of more than twenty arches crosses from one shore to the other.
The hill that serves as pedestal for the historic city has very different aspects; from one side it is seen terraced into steps, formed of small parcels of land held up by rough stone walls. On these landings there are thickets of vines and a few almond-trees, which grow even out of the spaces between the stones.
On another part of the hill, called the Trenches, the whole ground is broken by great cuttings, which in other days were no doubt used for the defence of the city. Near the trenches are to be seen the remains of battlemented walls, tiles, and ruins of an ancient settlement, perhaps destroyed by the waters of the river which in time undermined its foundations.
From the Miradero one sees the bridge below, as from a balloon, with men, riding horses, and carts going over it, all diminished by the distance. Women are washing clothes and spreading them in the sun, and in the evening horses and herds of goats are drinking at the river brink.
The great plain, the immense flat land, contains cultivated fields, square, oblong, varying in colour with the seasons, from the light green of barley to the gold of wheat and the dirty yellow of stubble. Near the river are truck-gardens and orchards of almonds and other fruit trees.
In the afternoon, looking from the Miradero, from the height where Castro stands, one feels overcome by this sea of earth, by the vast horizon, and the profound silence. The cocks toss their metallic crowing into the air; the clock-bells mark the hours with a sad, slow clang; and at evening the river, brilliant in its two or three fiery curves, grows pale and turns to blue. On clear days the sunset has extraordinary magic. The entire town floats in a sea of gold. The Collegiate church changes from yellow to lemon colour, and at times to orange; and there are old walls which take on, in the evening light, the colour of bread well browned in the oven. And the sun disappears into the plain, and the Angelus bell sounds through the immense space.
THE TOWN
Castro Duro has a great many streets, as many as an important capital. By only circling the Square one can count the Main Street, Laurel Street, Christ Street, Merchants’ Street, Forge Street, Shoemakers’ Street, Loafing Street, Penitence Wall, and Chain Street.
These streets are built with large brick houses and small adobe houses. Pointed cobbles form the pavement, and leave a dirty open sewer in the middle.
The large houses have two granite columns on their facades, on either side of the door, and these columns as well as the stones of the threshold take on a violet tinge from the lees of wine the inhabitants have the custom of putting on the sidewalks to dry.
Many of the big houses in Castro boast a large ‘scutcheon over the door, little crazy towers with iron weather-cocks on the roof; and some of them a huge stork’s nest.
The streets remote from the centre of town have no paving, and their houses are low, built of adobe, and continued by yards, over whose mud-walls appear the branches of fig-trees.
These houses lean forward or backward, and they have worn-out balconies, staircases which hold up through some prodigy of stability, and old grills, crowned with a cross and embellished with big flowers of wrought iron.
The two principal monuments of Castro Duro are the Great Church and the palace.
The Great Church is Romanesque, of a colour between yellow and brown, gilded by the sun. It stands high, at one extremity of the hill, like a sentinel watching the valley. The solid old fabric has rows of crenels under the roof, which shows its warlike character.
The principal dome and the smaller ones are ribbed, like almost all the Romanesque churches of Spain.
The round apse exhibits ornamental half columns, divers rosettes, and a number of raised figures, and masonic symbols. In the interior of the church the most notable thing to be seen is the Renaissance altar-piece and a Romanesque arch that gives entrance to the baptistery.
The second archeological monument of the town is the ancient palace of the Dukes of Castro Duro.
The palace, a great structure of stone and now blackened brick, rises at the side of the town-hall, and has, like it, an arcade on the Square. In the central balcony there are monumental columns, and on top of them two giants of corroded stone, with large clubs, who appear to guard the ‘scutcheon; one end of the building is made longer by a square tower.
The palace wears the noble air given to old edifices by the large spread of wall containing windows very far apart, very small, and very much ornamented.
From the inscriptions on its various escutcheons one can gather that it was erected by the Duke of Castro Duro and his wife, Doña Guiomar.
In the rear of the palace, like a high belvedere built on the rampart, there appears a gallery formed of ten round arches, supported on slender pilasters. Below the gallery are the remains of a garden, with ramps and terraces and a few old statues. The river comes almost to the foot of the gardens.
Today the palace belongs to Don Calixto García Guerrero, Count de la Sauceda.
Don Calixto and his family have no necessity for the whole of this big palace to live in, and have been content to renovate the part fronting on the Calle Mayor. They have had new belvederes built in, and have given over the apartments looking on the Square and the Calle del Cristo to the Courts and the school.
Another great building, which astonishes every one that stops over at Castro Duro, by its size, is the Convent of la Merced. It has been half destroyed by a fire. In the groins there remain some large Renaissance brackets, and in one wing of the edifice, inhabited by the nuns, there are windows with jalousies and a rather lofty tower terminating in a weather-cock and a cross.
LIFE AT CASTRO
Castro Duro is principally a town of farmers and carriers. Its municipal limits are very extensive; the plain surrounding it is fertile enough. In winter there are many foggy days, and then the flat land looks like a sea, in which hillocks and groves float like islands. Wine and cultivated fruits constitute the principal riches of Castro. The wine is sharp, badly made; there is one thick dark variety which always tastes of tar, and one light variety which they reinforce with alcohol and which they call aloque.
Autumn is the period of greatest animation in the town; the harvest gets stowed away, the vintage made, the sweet almonds are gathered and shelled in the porticoes.
Formerly in all the houses of rich and poor, the murk of the grapes was boiled in a still and a somewhat bitter brandy thus manufactured. Whether in consequence of the brandy, or of the unusual amount of money about, or of both, the fact is that at that period a great passion for gambling developed in Castro and more crimes were committed then than during all the rest of the year.
The industrial processes in Castro are primitive; everything is made by hand, and the Castrian people imagine that this establishes a superiority. In the environs of the town there are an electrical plant, a brickyard, various mills, and lime and plaster kilns.
The town’s commerce is more extended than its industries, although no more prosperous. In the Square and in the Calle Mayor, under the arcades white goods are sold and woollens, and there are hat-shops and silversmiths, one alongside the other. The shopkeepers hang their merchandise in the arches, the saddlers and harness-makers decorate their entrances with head-stalls and straps, and those that have no archway put up awnings. In the Square there are continually stalls set up for earthenware jars and pitchers and for articles in tin.
In the outlying streets there are inns, at whose doors five or six mules with their heads together are almost constantly to be seen; there are crockery stores containing brooms and every kind of jug and glazed pan; there are little shops in doorways holding big baskets full of grain; there are dark taverns, which are also eating-houses, to which the peasants go to eat on market days, and whose signs are strings of dried pimentoes and cayenne peppers or an elm branch. In the written signs there is a truly Castilian charm, chaste and serene. At the Riojano oven one reads: “‘Bred’ baked for all ‘commers.’” And at the Campico inn it says: “Wine served by Furibis herself.” The shops and the inns have picturesque names too. There is the Sign of the Moor, and the Sign of the Jew, and the Sign of the Lion, and one of the Robbers.
The streets of Castro, especially those near the centre, where the crowd is greater, are dirty and ill-smelling in summer. Clouds of flies hover about and settle on the pairs of blissfully sleeping oxen; the sun pours down his blinding brilliance; not a soul passes, and only a few greyhounds, white and black, elegant and sad, rove about the streets...
In all seasons, at twilight, a few young gentlemen promenade in the Square. At nine at night in the winter, and at ten in summer, begins the reign of the watchmen with their dramatic and lamentable cry.
Alzugaray gave Cæsar these details by degrees, while they were both seated in the hotel getting ready to dine.
“And the type? The ethnic type? What is it, according to you?” asked Cæsar.
“A type rather thin than fat, supple, with an aquiline nose, black eyes...”
“Yes, the Iberian type,” said Cæsar, “that is how it struck me too. Tall, supple, dolichocephalic... It seems to me one can try to put something through in this town...”
III. CÆSAR’S LABOURS
FIRST STEPS
“And what have you been doing all day? Tell me.”
“I think, my dear Alzugaray,” said Cæsar, “that I can say, like my namesake Julius: ‘Veni, vidi, vice.’”
“The devil! The first day?”
“Yes.”
“Show me. What happened?”
“I left the house and entered the café downstairs. There was no one there but a small boy, from whom I ordered a bottle of beer and asked if there was a newspaper published here. He told me yes, the Castro Mail, an independent weekly. I bade him fetch me a copy, even an old one, and he brought me these two. I gave them a glance, and then, as if it didn’t interest me much, I questioned the lad about Don Calixto.
“The first impression I obtained was that Don Calixto is the most influential person in the town; the second, that besides him, either with him or against him, there is a Señor Don Platón Peribáñez, almost as influential as Don Calixto. Afterwards I read the two numbers of the Castro periodical attentively, and from this reading I gathered that there is a somewhat hazy question here about an Asylum, where it seems some irregularities have been committed. There is a Republican book-dealer, who is a member of the Council, and on whom the Workmen’s Club depends, and he has asked for information as to the facts from the Municipality, and the followers of Don Calixto and of Don Platón oppose this suggestion as an attack on the good-birth, the honour, and the reputation of such respectable personages.
“Having verified these pieces of news, which are of interest for me, I packed off to church and heard the whole eleven o’clock mass.”
“Mighty good! You are quite a man.”
“Mass ended, I went over to the Baptistery arch and stood there examining it, as if I felt the most terrible symptoms of enthusiasm for carved stone. Afterwards I went into the big chapel, which serves also as a pantheon for the Dukes of Castro Duro, whose tombs you find in the side niches of the presbytery. These niches are decorated with an efflorescence of Gothic, which is most gay and pretty, and among all this stone filigree you see the recumbent statues of a number of knights and one bishop, who to judge by his sword must have been a warrior too.
“Nobody remained in the church; the priest, a nice old man, fixed his eyes on me and asked me what I thought of the arch. And having prepared my lesson, I talked about the Romanesque of the XII and XIII Centuries like a professor, and then he took me into the sacristy and showed me two paintings on wood which I told him were XV Century.
“‘So they say,’ the priest agreed. ‘Do you think they are Italian or German?’
“‘Italian certainly, North Italian.’ I might as well have said South German, but I had to decide for something.
“‘And they must be worth...? he then asked me with eagerness.
“‘My dear man; according,’ I told him. ‘A dealer would offer you a hundred or two hundred pesetas apiece. In London or New York, well placed, they might be worth twenty or thirty thousand francs.’
“The ‘pater’ shot fire out of his eyes.
“‘And what would one have to do about it?’ he asked me.
“‘My dear man, I think one would have to take some good photographs and send them to various trades-people and to the museums in the United States.’
“‘Would it be necessary to write in English?’
“‘Yes, it would be the most practical thing.’ “‘I don’t think there is anybody here that knows how....’
“‘I would do it, with great pleasure.’
“‘But are you going to be here for some time?’
“‘Yes, it is probable.’
“He asked me what I came to Castro Duro for, and I told him that I had no other object than to visit Don Calixto García Guerrero.
“Astonishment on the priest’s face.
“‘You know him?’
“‘Yes, I met him in Rome.’
“‘Do you know where he lives?’
“‘No.’
“‘Then I will take you.’
“The priest and I went out into the street. He wanted to give me the sidewalk, and I opposed that as if it were a crime. He told me he was more accustomed than I to walking on the cobble-stones; and finally, he on the sidewalk and I in the gutter, we arrived at Don Calixto’s house.”
“Was he at home?” asked Alzugaray.
“Yes,” said Cæsar. “By the way, on the road there we bowed to the present Deputy to the Cortes, he who will be my opponent in the approaching election, Señor García Padilla.”
“Dear man! What a coincidence! What sort is he?”
“He is tall, with a reddish aquiline nose, a greyish moustache, full of cosmetic, a poor type.”
“He is a Liberal?”
“Yes, he is a Liberal, because Don Calixto is a Conservative. In his heart, nothing.”
“Good. Go on.”
DON CALIXTO AT HOME
“As I was saying, Don Calixto was at home, in a large room on the ground floor, which serves as his office. Don Calixto is a tall, supple man, with the blackest of hair which is beginning to turn white on the temples, and a white moustache. He is at the romantic age of illusions, of hopes....” “How old is he?” asked Alzugaray.
“He isn’t more than fifty-four,” Cæsar replied, sarcastically. “Don Calixto dresses in black, very fastidiously, and the effect is smart, but smacks of the notary. No matter what pains he takes to appear graceful and easy in manner, he doesn’t achieve the result; he has the inbred humility of one who has taken orders in a shop, either as a lad or as a man.
“Don Calixto received me with great amiability, but with a certain air of reserve, as if to say: ‘In Rome I was a merry comrade to you, here I am a personage.’ We chatted about a lot of things, and before he could ask me what I wanted, I pulled out the letter and handed it to him. The old man put on his glasses, read attentively, and said:
“‘Very good, very good; we will discuss it later.’
“The priest of course thought that he was in the way, and he left.
“When we were alone, Don Calixto said:
“‘All right, Cæsar, I am happy to see you. I see that you remember our conversation in Rome. You must have lunch with me and my family.’
“‘With great pleasure.’
“‘I’ll go and tell them to put on another place.’
“Don Calixto went out and left me alone. For a while I studied the boss’s office. On the wall, diplomas, appointments, in looking-glass frames; a genealogical tree, probably drawn day before yesterday; in a book-case, legal books...
“Don Calixto came back; he asked me if I was tired, and I told him no, and when we had crossed the whole width of the house, which is huge, he showed me the garden. My boy, what a wonderful spot! It hangs over the river and it is a marvel. The highest part, which is the part they keep up, isn’t worth much; it is in lamentable style; just imagine, there is a fountain which is a tin negro that spurts out water from all parts.
“However, the old part of the garden, the lower part, is lovely. There is a big tower standing guard over the river, now converted into a belvedere, with pomegranates, rose-bushes, and climbing plants all around it, and above all, there is an oleander that is a marvel...; it looks like a fire-work castle or a shower of flowers.”
“Leave that point,” said Alzugaray. “You are talking like a poor disciple of Ruskin’s.”
“You are right. But when you see those gardens, you will be enthusiastic, too.”
“Get ahead.”
THE POLITICAL POWERS OF CASTRO
“During our promenade Don Calixto talked to me of the immense good he has done for the town and of the ingratitude he constantly receives for it.
“While I listened, I recalled a little periodical in Madrid which had no other object than to furnish bombs at reasonable prices, and which said, speaking of a manufacturer in Catalonia: ‘Señor So-and-so is the most powerful boss in the province of Tarragona, and even at that there are those who dispute his bossdom.’
“Don Calixto is astonished that when he has done the Castrians the honour to make them loans at eighty or ninety percent, they are not fond of him. After the garden we saw the house; I won’t tell you anything about it, I don’t want you to accuse me again of being a Ruskinian.
“When we reached the dining-room Don Calixto said: ‘I am going to present you to my family.’
“Thereupon, entrance, ceremonies, bows on my part, smiles... toute la lyre. Don Calixto’s wife is an insignificant fat woman; the two daughters insipid, ungainly, not at all pretty; and with them was a little girl of about fifteen or sixteen, a niece of Don Calixto’s, a veritable little devil, named Amparo. This Amparo is a tiny, flat-faced creature, with black eyes, and extraordinarily vivacious and mischievous. During dinner I succeeded in irritating the child.
“I talked gravely with Don Calixto and his wife and daughters about Madrid, about the theatrical companies that come to this town, about their acquaintances at the Capital.
“The child interrupted us, bringing us the cat and putting a little bow on him, and then making him walk on the key-board of the piano.
“At half-past one we went to the dining-room. Dinner was kilometres long; and the conversation turned on Rome and Paris. Don Calixto drank more and more, I, too; and at the end of the meal there was a bit of toasting, from which my political intentions were made manifest.
“The elder daughter, whose name is Adela, asked me if I liked music. I told her yes, almost closing my eyes, as if deliriously, and we went into the drawing-room. Without paying attention, I listened, during the horrors of digestion, to a number of sonatas, now and then saying: ‘Magnificent! How wonderful that is!’
“The father was enchanted, the mother enchanted, the sister likewise; the little girl was the one who stared at me with questioning black eyes. She must have been thinking: ‘What species of bird is this?’ I believe the damned child realized that I was acting a comedy.
“About four the ladies and I went out into the garden. Don Calixto has the habit of taking an afternoon nap, and he left us. I succeeded in bringing myself to, in the open air. Don Calixto’s wife showed me over an abandoned part of the house, in which there is an old kitchen as big as a cathedral, with a stone chimney like a high altar, with the arms of the Dukes of Castro. We chatted, I was very pleasant to the mother, courteous to the daughters, and coldly indifferent with the little niece. I was bored, after having exhausted all subjects of conversation, when Don Calixto reappeared and carried me off to his office.
“The conference was important; he explained the situation of the Conservative forces of the district to me. These forces are represented, principally, by three men: Don Calixto, a Señor Don Platón, and a friar. Don Calixto represents the modern Conservative tendency and is, let us say, the Cánovas of the district; with him are the rich members of the Casino, the superior judge, the doctors, the great proprietors, etc. Don Platón Peribáñez, a silversmith in the Calle Mayor, represents the middle-class Conservatives; his people are less showy, but more in earnest and better disciplined; this Platonian or Platonic party is made up of chandlers, silversmiths, small merchants, and the poor priests. The friar, who represents the third Conservative nucleus, is Father Martin Lafuerza. Father Martin is prior of the Franciscan monastery, which was established here after the Order was expelled from Filinas.
“Father Martin is an Ultramontanist up to the eyes. He directs priests, friars, nuns, sisters, and is the absolute master of a town nearby called Cidones, where the women are very pious.
“Despite their piety, the reputation of those ladies cannot be very good, because there is a proverb, certainly not very gallant: ‘Don’t get either a wife or a mule at Cidones; neither a wife nor a mule nor a pig at Griñón.’
“Opposed to these three Conservative nuclei are the friends of the present Deputy, who amount to no more than the official element, which is always on the ruling side, and a small guerilla band that meets in the Workingmen’s Casino, and is composed principally of a Republican bookseller, an apothecary who invents explosives, also Republican, an anarchist doctor, a free-thinking weaver, and an innkeeper whom they call Furibis, who is also a smuggler and a man with hair on his chest.”
DON PLATÓN PERIBÁÑEZ
“After having given me these data, Don Calixto told me that by counting on Señor Peribáñez, the election was almost sure; and since the quicker things go the better, he proposed that we should go to see him, and I immediately agreed.
“Don Platón Peribáñez has a silver-shop fitted up in the old style; a small show-window, full of rattles, Moorish anklets, necklaces, little crosses, et cetera; a narrow, dark shop, then a long passage, and at the rear, a workroom with a window on a court.
“As his assistant in the silver-shop, Don Platón has a boy who is a nonsuch. I believe that if you took him to London and exhibited him, saying beforehand: ‘Bear in mind, gentlemen, that this is not a monkey or an anthropoid, but a man,’ you would rake in a mad amount of pounds sterling.
“We went into Don Platón’s little shop, we asked the young macaco for him, and we passed on into the workshop.
“Señor Peribáñez is a man of medium stature, dressed in black, with a trimmed white beard, grey eyes, and modest manners. He speaks coldly, thinks closely of what he is saying; he has a monotonous, slow voice, and nothing escapes him.
“Don Calixto presented me to him; the silversmith gave me his hand as if with a certain repugnance, and the boss explained who I was and what I was after.
“Don Platón said that he could not reply categorically without consulting with his friends and with Father Martín. The Father has other candidates; one the Duke of Castro himself; and the other a rich farmer of the town.
“The Duke of Castro presents no other drawback than that he has been arrested in Paris for an insignificant swindle he has committed; but it seems that a rich Cuban wants to get him out of his difficulties on condition that he will marry his daughter.
“If he comes out of jail and gets married, then they will nominate him as Deputy from here.
“I said to Don Platón, in case the worthy Duke does not come out of jail, would he have difficulties over my being his candidate. He replied that I am very young, and after many circumlocutions he said flatly that he doesn’t know if I would be accepted or not as a candidate by his followers; but in case I were, the conditions precedent would be: first, that I would not interfere in any way in the affairs of the district, which would be ventilated in the town, as previously; secondly, that I should bear the costs of the election, which would amount approximately to some ten thousand pesetas.
“Don Calixto looked at me questioningly, and I smiled in a way to make it understood that I agreed, and after extracting a promise from Don Platón that he will give us a definite answer this week, we took leave of him and went to the Casino.
“There I was introduced to the judge, an Andalusian who has a spotless reputation for veniality, and to the mayor, who is a rich farmer; and the most important persons of the town being thus gathered at one table, we chatted about politics, women, and gambling.
“I told them a number of tales; I told them that I once lost ten thousand dollars at Monte Carlo, playing with two Russian princes and a Yankee millionairess; I talked to them about the mysteries and crimes of gambling houses and of those great centres of pleasure, and I left them speechless. At half-past nine, with a terrible headache, I came back here. I think I have not lost a day, eh?”
“No! The devil! What speed!” exclaimed Alzugaray.
“But you are not eating any supper. Don’t you intend to take anything?”
“No. I am going to see if I can sleep. Listen, day after tomorrow we are both invited to dine at Don Calixto’s.”
“Me, too?”
“Yes; I told them that you are a rich tourist, and they want to know you.”
“And what am I to do there?”
“You can study these people, as an entomologist studies insects. Listen, it wouldn’t do any harm if you took a walk to that town near here, named Cidones, to see if you can find out what sort of bird this Father Martin is.”
“All right.”
“And if you don’t mind, go into that Republican bookseller’s shop, under any pretext, and talk to him.”
“I will do so.”
“Then, till tomorrow!”
“You are going now?”
“Yes.”
“Goodnight, then.”
Cæsar left his room and marched off to sleep.
IV. THE BOOKSELLER AND THE ANARCHISTS
The following day, very early in the morning, Alzugaray went to a livery-stable which they had directed him to at the hotel, and asked to hire a horse. They brought him a large, old one; he mounted, and crossed the town more slowly than if he had been on foot, and set out for Cidones.
On reaching that town, he left the horse at a blacksmith’s and went up through the narrow lanes of Cidones, which are horribly long, dark, and steep.
Then he ascended to la Peña, the rock on which the Franciscan monastery stands; but was unable to obtain any fresh information about Father Martin and his friars. The people with whom he talked were not disposed to unbosom themselves, and he preferred not to insist, so as not to be suspected.
Afterwards he went down to Cidones again and returned to Castro Duro. Cæsar was still in bed. Alzugaray went into his room.
“Don’t you intend to get up?” he asked him.
“No.”
“Don’t you intend to eat, either?”
“Neither.”
“Are you sick?”
“No.”
“What is the matter with you? Laziness?”
“Something like that.”
Alzugaray ate alone, and after he had had coffee, he directed his steps to the bookstore of the Republican councilman, of whom Cæsar had spoken to him. He found it in a corner of the Square; and it was at the same time a stationer’s shop and a newsdealer’s. Behind the counter were an old man and a lad.
Alzugaray went in. He bought various Madrid periodicals from the lad, and then addressing the old man, asked him:
“Haven’t you some sort of a map of the province, or of the neighbourhood of Castro Duro?”
“No, sir, there isn’t one.”
“Nor a guidebook, perhaps?”
“Nor that either. At the townhall we have a map of the town....”
“Only of the part built up?”
“Yes.”
“Then it would do me no good.”
“You want a map for making excursions, eh?”
“That’s it. Yes.”
“Well, there is none. We are very much behind the times.”
“Yes, that’s true. It wouldn’t cost very much, and it would be useful for ever, both to the people here and to strangers.”
“Just tell that to our town government!” exclaimed the old bookseller. “Whatever is not for the advantage of the rich and the clerical element, there is no hope of.”
“Those gentlemen have a great deal of influence here?” asked Alzugaray.
“Uf! Enormous. More every day.”
“But there don’t appear to be many convents.”
“No, there are not many convents; but there is one that counts for a hundred, and that is the one at Cidones.”
“Why is that?”
“Because it has a wild beast for a prior. Father Martín Lafuerza. He is famous all through this region. And he is a man of talent, there’s no denying it, but despotic and exigent. He is into everything, catechizes the women, dominates the men. There is no way to fight against him. Here am I with this bookshop, and I have my pension as a lieutenant, which gives me enough to live very meanly, and with what little I get out of the periodicals I scrape along. Besides, I am a Republican and very liberal, and I like propaganda. If I didn’t, I should have left all this long ago, because they have waged war to the death on me, an infamous sort of war which a person that lives in Madrid cannot understand; calumnies that come from no one knows where, atrocious accusations, everything....”
Alzugaray stared at the bookseller’s grey eyes, which were extraordinarily bright. The old man was tall, stooped, grizzled, with a prominent nose and a beard trimmed to a point.
“But you have stuck firmly to your post,” said Alzugaray.
“Having been a soldier must do something for a man,” replied the bookseller. “He learns not to draw back in the face of danger. And this is my life. Now I am a councillor and I work at the town hall as much as I can, even though I know I shall accomplish nothing. Grafting goes on before my face, I know it exists, and yet it is impossible to find it. Six months ago I informed the judge of irregularities committed in a Sisters’ Asylum, things I had proof of.... The judge laid my information on the table, and things went on as if nothing had happened.”
“Spain is in a bad way. It is a pity!” exclaimed Alzugaray.
“You people in Madrid, and I don’t say this to irritate you, do not understand what goes on in the small towns.”
“My dear man, I have never taken any part in political affairs.”
“Well, I think that everybody ought to take part in politics, because it is for the general interest.”
At this moment two persons entered the bookshop. Alzugaray was going to leave, but the bookseller said to him:
“If you have nothing to do, sit down for a while.”
Alzugaray sat down and examined the new arrivals. One of them was a skinny man, with bushy hair and whiskers; the other was a smooth-shaven party, short, cross-eyed, dressed in copper-coloured cloth edged with broad black braid.
“The Rebel hasn’t come?” asked the whiskered one.
“No,” replied the bookseller. “It didn’t come out this week.”
“They must have reported it,” said the whiskered one. “Yes, probably.”
“Has the doctor been in?” the shaven, little man with the black braid asked in his turn.
“No.”
“All right. Let’s go see if we can find him in the club. Salutations!”
“Good-bye.”
“Who are those rascals?” asked Alzugaray, when they had gone out.
“They are two anarchists that we have here, who accuse me of being a bourgeois... ha... ha.... The shaven one is the son of the landlady of an inn who is called Furibis, and they call him that too. He used to be a Federalist. They call the other one ‘Whiskers,’ and he came here from Linares, not long ago.”
“What do they do?”
“Nothing. They sit in the club chatting, and nowadays the doctor we have here runs with them, Dr. Ortigosa, who is half mad. He will be in soon. Then you will see a type. He is a very bad-tempered man, and is always looking for an excuse to quarrel. But above all, he is an enemy of religion. He never says Good-bye, but Salutations or Farewell. In the same way, he doesn’t say Holy Week, but Clerical Week. His great pleasure is to find a temperament of a fibre like his own; then his eyes flash and he begins to swear. And if he is hit, he stands for it.”
“He is an anarchist, too?”
“How do I know? He doesn’t know himself. Formerly, for four or five months, he got out a weekly paper named The Protest, and sometimes he wrote about the canalization of the river, and again about the inhabitants of Mars.”
The bookseller and Alzugaray chatted about many other things, and after some while the bookseller said:
“Here is Dr. Ortigosa. He is coming in.”
The door opened and a slim individual appeared, worn and sickly, with a black beard and spectacles. His necktie was crooked, his suit dirty, and he had his hat in his hand. He stared impertinently at Alzugaray, cast a glance at a newspaper, and set to shouting and talking ill of everything.
“This is a town full of dumb beasts,” he said from time to time, with the energy of exasperation.
Then, supposing Alzugaray to come from Madrid, he started to speak ill of the Madrileños.
“They are a collection of fools,” he said roundly, various times. “They know nothing, they understand nothing, and still they talk authoritatively about everything.”
Alzugaray put up with the downpour as if it had no reference to him, looking over a newspaper; and when the doctor was in the thick of his discourse, Alzugaray got up, shook hands with the bookseller, thanked him, and left the shop.
The doctor looked at him over his glasses with fury, and began to walk up and down in the bookstore.
Alzugaray went to the hotel, arranging in his memory the data collected.
Cæsar was feeling well, and the two of them talked of the bookseller and his friends and of Father Martin Lafuerza.
“I am going to jot down all these points,” said Cæsar. “It wouldn’t be a bad idea for you to go on cultivating the bookseller.”
“I am going to.”
“Tomorrow, you know,” said Cæsar. “Grand dinner at Don Calixto’s. The practical manoeuvres begin.”
“Very good.”