Читать книгу A Knight of Spain - Bowen Marjorie - Страница 5

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When Don Juan returned to the house of Santofimia y Munatones the thunderstorm had rolled back on its course and was again shaking the heavens.

The fierce flash and roll of it increased the young man's excitement; he waited trembling and tense before the great scrolled iron gate.

He was not in love with Doña Aña, but he was in love with life, and Doña Aña was a very beautiful part of life; also there was some danger in the adventure that made it wholly desirable.

He had brought three servants with him, who, armed on back and breast and carrying swords, kept guard in the dark streets a few paces from the gates.

It was a little past ten; now and then the domes and towers of Alcalà showed against the black heavens in the lightning gleam and the rain could be heard pattering among the oleander and syringa bushes; Don Juan felt it on his face when he looked up and on his bare hands with which he grasped the wet iron rails.

It was very hot; Juan did not remember to have ever noticed the heat so before—nor the darkness.

The small, shaded glow of a lantern wavered in the courtyard, then came nearer and disclosed the dripping boughs with their long, dark, glistening leaves and the white coif showing inside a woman's hood.

Then it came nearer still and darted its rays on to Don Juan.

The woman laughed under her breath. "So it is you," she said.

The rain was increasing, it fell like silver lances across the lantern light; Juan saw a chamber woman in a dark mantle and a linen cap who looked at him with half-curious, half-apprehensive eyes.

"You!" she repeated.

He did not answer; he remembered that he was only there indirectly, and he did not believe that Doña Aña's signal had been for him; it was out of the question that it had been for poor Carlos, but surely she had looked at Alessandro who was as fine a cavalier as any in Alcalà, nay, in Madrid.

But the woman undid the gate and Juan stepped in; he was no longer agitated, only curious; he had never known any women well save his two foster-mothers, Aña de Medina, the wife of the Emperor's musician, and Doña Magdalena de Ulloa, wife of the noble Luis Quixada. Juan loved this lady as if she had been indeed his mother. As he followed the woman and her feeble light through the dark courtyard he wondered if Doña Aña was like Doña Magdalena. He thought she must be very different. The bushes brushed his shoulders with their strong wet leaves and the wet gravel crunched beneath his feet, but very slightly, for lie walked with the instinctive secretive lightness of his race, and his graceful tread was as light as a woman's footfall.

The maid unlatched a door in the side of the house.

"The master is away," she whispered; "but all the same, come quietly if you care for my lady's honour."

"I have as soft a step and as close a tongue as any in Spain," he answered.

She took his hand, for the stairs were most dark and winding, and gently led him.

They passed windows through which the lightning flashed; the thunder rolled without and seemed to shake to the heart of the house. Don Juan was lost in a maze of corridors and stairs; he could not have found his way out unguided.

He felt a slight contempt for all this woman's mystery, though lie knew it was necessary. Would she have received Don Alessandro so—or even Carlos? How many other knights had climbed these stairs? If he was the first it was a very great honour, but if he was even the second he would be sorry to have come.

Full of this sudden thought he took his hand away from his guide's and stopped on the dark landing.

"Why does your mistress receive me?" he asked. "Is she a creature of whims and fancies?"

The woman turned the lantern so that the beams fell full on his face.

"Jesus!" she cried angrily, "does my noble lady condescend to a cavalier who asks that? You should come humbly, for my mistress grants you an honour every knight in Alcalà has asked in vain."

"Ahè!" answered Juan, "she is peerless, take me to her—"

She flashed the lantern along the walls, then pulled aside a heavy brocade curtain and stepped into a room that gloomed with a full amber light.

"Mistress," she said, "the cavalier has come," and she blew out the lantern and took off her mantle.

The room had white walls, and the open windows looked on to a balcony where the rain was splashing. A black press and a black table stood against one wall, two black chairs and a prie-Dieu against another, the floor was of red and golden tiles, inlaid in fantastic patterns; in one corner were a spinning wheel and a basket of yarn.

A coffer stood open by an inner door that was curtained in dull yellow, and out of the coffer hung silks and wools and tapestries dyed bright colours.

On a long couch inlaid with mother-o'-pearl flowers Doña Aña lay with her head on scarlet cushions.

Her full skirts, of a thin white silk edged with gold, spread, all over the couch and touched the red and yellow floor.

Over her green silk jacket a large muslin shawl was folded; in her dusky hair was a high metal comb set with gold and coral and round her throat a string of gold beads. She was very wonderful.

As Juan entered she sat up and clasped her hands together on her lap. He took off his black beaver.

"Señora," he said, "I kiss your hands."

She rose; the maid went to the window and drew the curtains.

"Who are you?" asked Doña Aña haughtily.

She was very wonderful.

As the lightning had shot and quivered into the heart of the dark house, so into the soul of Juan there sprang the new and vivid desire to be something, to do something, to have some achievement with which to answer the question of this proud creature.

His dusky fair skin burnt crimson with humility; he threw back his dun coloured mantle and went on one knee.

On the dull blue brocade of his doublet, and half concealed by the laced ends of his large white ruff, gleamed a heavy collar of links and flames in pure gold and steel, from the centre of which hung a golden fleece.

"The toison d'or!" muttered Doña Aña, recoiling a step.

He gave her his one title to distinction.

"I am the son of Carlos V," he said, and he laid his hand across the splendour on his breast, the symbol of the proudest order in Europe.

Doña Aña sat down on the end of the couch and covered her face with her two long, ringless hands.

"Jesus!" said the maid, "the rain will break the roses."

She cautiously opened the shutters and brought in a pot in each hand; the blooms hung limp and beaten, and the wet dropped from the leaves over the red and yellow floor.

Juan rose and stared at Doña Aña; the shawl had fallen from her head, and he saw that she had a blue velvet rose in the folds of her dark brown hair.

She dropped her hands and spoke; her voice was low and husky.

"Teresa," she said, "who is this you have brought me?"

The lightning darted through the open shutter as the maid brought in two more dripping pots of roses; she paused with them in her hands and gazed at Juan.

"Why, the cavalier at the gate," she answered. Then she saw the toison d'or. "Holy Lady!" she exclaimed.

"Did you not know me?" asked Juan.

"How was I to know any of the knights in Alcalà?" answered Doña Aña bitterly.

He knew she never went abroad save attended by three or four, but he had not imagined that she lived in such seclusion; it made the marvel of her more entrancing.

"Dios!" he cried, "perhaps you have had no letters, heard no serenades?"

"I have never had a letter in all my life," she answered, "and they make me sleep at the back overlooking the courtyard where I hear nothing but the fountain—and sometimes the nightingales."

Juan thought of all the go-betweens who had been bribed, of all the hired musicians who had played before the house of Santofimia y Munatones.

He laughed. Then grew grave.

"Señora," he asked, "you never meant me to come? I will go."

He thought now with scorn of Don Carlos' jests and the light manner in which he had agreed to be the Infant's substitute. She looked up at him.

"Why did you think I meant you?" she asked.

The blood crimsoned to the edge of his rich gold hair, a new and exquisite sensation filled his heart. For she was looking straight at him and in her eyes was a gleam of something wild and marvellous; it seemed to him as if the amber light that glowed from the two lamps on the wall shone through her, and that she would dissolve and vanish in a sparkle of gold.

He could not tell her that he had come carelessly.

"Was your message to me?" he asked breathlessly.

She looked away.

"I did not know that you were a prince," she said evasively.

"Don Juan of Austria!" murmured the maid. With a white cloth she was wiping up the pools of wet the four pots of roses had left on the smooth floor.

"Who were the other two cavaliers?" asked Doña Aña.

"The taller is Don Alessandro, Prince of Parma, son of Octavio of Parma and Margaret, my father's daughter—"

"And the hunchback—he must go with you for your jesting."

Juan paled.

"Jesus!" he crossed himself, "that is the Infant Don Carlos—the King's only son."

"Ahè!" cried the two women together.

"I should have known," added Doña Aña hastily, "but you have been only a short while in Alcalà."

Juan swiftly wondered what reception Carlos would have received; he was glad she had been spared the prince's wrath had she shown disgust; he knew what Carlos could be.

He sat down on one of the stiff, black chairs; he was aware that the maid was looking at him with curiosity, and Doña Aña with that wild glance of intensity that confused and agitated him.

"You sent for me?" he murmured.

"Yes." She put her hands to the coral beads round her throat. "I have seen you go past so often."

"Every knight in Alcalà is your servant," he said.

The thunder was dying away, the rain splashing with less insistence. Doña Aña leant forward, and her thin white silk skirt gave a little stiff rustle.

"You also wrote to me?" she asked. "You also serenaded me?"

"Yes," he answered, "yet I never knew how wonderful you were."

She fell back along the vermilion cushions and closed her eyes.

"Ahè!" she cried, "why did I do this? I am ill, I am possessed, my heart hurts, hurts. I suffer, suffer. Leave me, Don Juan, and forget me."

He rose and cause a step nearer; lie stared at the soft warm colour of her face against the vivid scarlet, the long ringlets confined by the glittering comb, the deep shade of her lashes, the quiver in her full lips, and the pulse beating in her round throat.

He saw that there was a soft down over her cheeks and that in her ears were long rough gold ornaments, fashioned like a head of wheat that hung and trembled on the scarlet cushions. He came to the top of the sofa and bent over her; her little jacket of stiff green silk strained at its cords over her heart, the full white skirts hid her shape down to the tiny buckled shoes.

"Señora!" he said.

She opened her eyes and he saw that tears filled them as dew fills, the cup of a flower.

A reverence and a sadness such as he had never known before touched his heart.

"Aña," he said.

She closed her eyes again and the tears over-brimmed and ran down her cheeks. "I never knew that you were a prince," she whispered.

He laid his hand on the toison d'or; he spoke the bitter truth he had never put into words before.

"I am a peasant too," he said.

Doña Aña did not answer; the departing thunder gave a last growl; the rain was over, but the water could be heard dripping from the coppice of the house.

The maid opened the shutters and showed a purple sky with black clouds rolling away from a full moon.

Don Juan seated himself on the end of the black couch; his young face was troubled and distracted.

"Till I was eleven," he said, "I lived at Liganes with the Emperor's musician, Francisquin Massi—I went barefoot across the fields to school dressed like a peasant—"

He turned his head, stiffly, for his collar and ruff came to his very ears.

"—then came a coach, to the great marvel of the villagers, and took me to Villagarcia, where Doña Magdalena was as a dear and honoured mother to me—God protect her! I was taken to Quacos, near Yuste, and in the monastery at Yuste I saw the Emperor die—God rest his soul!—and all this while I did not know what man's son I was. Then after we were back at Villagarcia, Don Luis Quixada, my guardian, took me hunting to the convent of San Pedro de la Espina, and there we met, the King who told me I was his brother, and Don Luis put me on my horse and kissed my hand. Dios! I do not know if I am glad or sorry. Carlos will be King and I am not even an Infant—"

"You are the Emperor's son," she answered, "and the King will advance you."

"The King has been very gentle with me," replied Don Juan, "and has sent me hither to Alcalà with my nephew Carlos and my nephew Alessandro—he surely does me honour—yet I am not an Infant of Castile."

He looked at her.

"Why have I spoken to you in this manner?" he cried.

"Why did you come?" she answered.

They leant nearer; she put out her hands and he took them, they were hot in his clasp; he thought that she was like a chili fruit pod, smooth and shining, transparent and delicate and within fierce flame.

"Is there any woman like you in the old world or the new?" he said, as he took her two hands and laid them on the toison d'or. "Dios! for you I could achieve great deeds."

"No," she answered, "only stay by me—that is impossible," she added swiftly. "Jesus! life is a burden! Could you love me? Could you be loyal, Don Juan?"

Her moist lips were slightly parted; they were as red as the coral that strained against her flung-back throat.

He pressed her hands on the toison d'or until the golden fleece entered her flesh, but she made no protest.

"I could love you as a man loves the Mother of God!" he answered, "and as a man loves the fairest woman on earth!"

"Could you love me better than your ambitions?" she asked.

"How did you know of my ambitions?" he flung back, startled.

"You want to be an Infant," she breathed; "you want to be a king."

His eyes flashed golden, like light on an inlaid sword.

"Yes," he said.

"Ah, love me and let that go!" she answered.

He gazed into her upturned face for a full minute, then he dropped her hands and rose.

"Dios!" he cried, "what have you done to me? What have you done to me that has changed the world?"

"Ah!" she whispered, "you suffer too! You suffer as I suffered since I saw you first, throwing the quoit on the bank of the Henares!"

She pushed back her hair, the blue rose and the comb were loosened.

The maid took the pots and put them out on the balcony again; the night was now quite clear; the moon filled the heavens with silver, and now the rain was over the splash of a fountain could be heard below.

Don Juan came to the couch and knelt down, and laid tiffs hot face on the spreading folds of leer white skirts; the perfumed silk was gracious to him as the cool of the river at noonday.

Doña Aña put her hands lightly on his hair as she bent over him in an attitude of pity and tenderness; her palms were bruised with the toison d'or, and when he looked up and covered them with kisses they smarted. The maid came from the window.

"It is late, my noble mistress. Señor, you must go."

"No, no," moaned Doña Aña. "Let him stay—leave hint with me."

Then she drew her hands away and rocked herself to and fro.

"No, now is not the time," she cried. "Go—go!"

She sprang up violently and the blue rose fell from her hair and smote Don Juan on the lips as lie gazed up at her.

"Ah, Dio!" exclaimed the maid, "will you not go, Prince?"

He got to his feet; the blue rose was clasped in his right hand.

"I may return?" he asked.

"You have my pledge," she said, and pointed to the velvet flower.

"When may I come?"

"The master returns to-morrow," said the maid; "but any letter you may leave with the old woman, Eunice, who cards yarn by the river, will reach its destination. And we will arrange a time."

"Why should I wait?" asked Don Juan imperiously. "Put your head on my shoulder and let me hiss your hair. I will marry you. It is against your honour that I should visit you like a thief."

"Alas!" Doña Aña drew back against the white walls. "The King would not listen to you."

Juan laughed.

"I am not the King's slave," he said. "Are you weeping? Weep on my heart then."

"Go now—it is death and shame if you are discovered here."

The maid picked up his mantle that had fallen to the tiled floor and flung it round his shoulders.

"I will come again," lie said, "and openly."

"Come any way," she answered, "but come. I love you without motive. Come soon, I shall be waiting."

She put her hands over her hot face; she was pressed against the wall under the lamp, and her trembling shadow was flung beside her.

"Before I go I will kiss you," said Juan, "and you will think of me until I come again."

Without moving or looking up she shook her head.

Then Juan bent and kissed the long shadow she cast over the wall; he was now nearly as pale as the little ruff of embroidered lawn that stiffly framed his face; his forehead was damp and his lips pallid.

He looked at her long, and seemed twice as if about to speak, but was silent. The maid caught his hand and led him away.

They did not need the lantern now, for the moon was streaming in through the windows on the stairs.

As they crossed the courtyard, the night-smelling flowers were filling the air with a heavy perfume, in which the sweetness of jasmine and honeysuckle was mingled with the bitter sharpness of aloe and ivy.

The fountain rose a jet of silver, and fell with a monotonous sound into the smooth round marble basin. With a fearful haste the maid hurried Juan across the courtyard and opened the gate.

"You will come back to my mistress?" she said in an eager whisper. "You will not forget her, though you are the Emperor's son?"

Juan raised his right hand, on the forefinger of which sparkled a knightly ring.

"I swear before God I will return," he said.

The maid closed the gate on him, and ran back to the silent house.