Читать книгу The Flute of the Gods - Marah Ellis Ryan - Страница 20

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Of the many godly enterprises set afoot for exploration and conquest in New Spain of the sixteenth century, not all have chronicles important enough for the historian to make much of. But there were goings and comings of which no written record reached the archives. Things forbidden did happen even under the iron heel of Castilian rule, and one of the hidden enterprises grew to be a part of the life of the P[=o]-s[=o]n-gé valley for a time.

Not that it was unchronicled, but there was a good reason why the records were not published for the Spanish court.

It was a pretty romantic reason also––and the usual one, if we may trust the world’s judgment of the foundation of all trouble. But a maid tossing a blossom from a Mexic balcony could not know that the stranger from Seville to whom it was thrown was the son of an Eminence, instead of the simple gentleman named Don Ruy Sandoval in a royal letter to the Viceroy. With him travelled his tutor whose tutelage was past, and the position a difficult one for even the Viceroy to comprehend.

Since the youth rebelled at the habit of a monk––he had been given a space for adventure under godly surveillance. The godly surveillance limped a trifle at times. And because of this did Don Ruy walk again in the moonlight under the balcony and this 64 time more than a blossom came to him––about the stem of a scarlet lily was a flutter of white! The warm light of the Mexic moon helped him to decipher it––a page from Ariosto––the romance of Doña Bradamante––and the mark of a pen under words uttered by the warrior-maid herself––words to warm a cooler youth than this one from over seas:––“Why seek I one who flies from me?––Why implore one who deigns not to send me reply?”

Whereupon there was no further delay as to reply––there was found an open gate to a garden where only stars gave light, where little hands were held for a moment in his––soft whispers had answered his own––and he was held in thrall by a lace wrapped señorita whose face he had not even looked on in the light. All of Castile could give one no better start in a week than he had found for himself in three days in the new world of promise.

For there were promises––and they were sweet. They had to do with a tryst two nights away––then the lady, whom he called “Doña Bradamante” because of the page torn from that romance, would enlighten him as to her pressing need of the aid of a gentleman, and courage would be hers to tell him why a marked line and a scarlet lily had been let fall in his path––and why she had trusted his face at first sight––though he had not yet seen her own––and why––

It was the usual thing––the page of a poem and a silken scarf as a guerdon of her trust.

He found the place of the tryst with ease for a stranger in the Mexic streets, but a glimmer of white robe was all he saw of his unknown “Doña Bradamante.” Others were at the tryst, and their staves and arms lacked no strength. He heard a woman 65 scream, then he heard her try again to scream and fail because of a hand on her throat, and beyond that he knew little for a night or two, and there was not much of day between.

Monkly robes were the next thing in his range of vision––one face in particular, sallow and still with eyes glancing sideways, seeing all things;––divining much! soft steps, and bandages, and out of silence the excited shrillness of Don Diego Maria Francisco Brancadori the tutor:––the shepherd who had lost track of his one rather ruffled lamb.

Pious ejaculation––thanks to all the saints he could think of––horror that the son of an Eminence should be thus abused––prophecies of the wrath to come when the duchess, his mother––At this Don Ruy groped for a sword, and found a boot, and flung it, with an unsanctified word or two, in the direction of the lamentation.

“You wail worse than a dog of a Lutheran under the yoke,” he said in as good a voice as he could muster with a cut in his lip. “What matter how much Eminence it took to make a father for me––or how many duchesses to make a mother? I am labelled as plain Ruy Sandoval and shipped till called for. If you are to instruct my youth in the path it should tread––why not start in with a lesson on discretion?”

At this hopeful sign of life from the bundle of bandages on the monk’s bed, Maestro Diego approached and looked over his illustrious charge with a careful eye.

“Discretion has limped far behind––enterprise, else your highness would cut a different figure by now––and––”

To Don Ruy, a Message in the Moonlight Page 63

66

“Choke back your infernal highnesses!” growled the younger man. “I know well what your task is to be here in this new land:––it is to send back reports of duty each time I break a rule or get a broken head. Now by the Blood, and the Cross, if you smother not your titles, and let me range free, I tell you the thing I will do:––I will send back a complaint against you to Seville––and to make sure that it goes, no hand shall carry it but your own. Ere they can find another nurse maid for my morals, I’ll build me a ship and go sailing the South seas for adventure––and your court tricksters will have a weary time in the chase! I like you better than many another godly spy who might have been sent, and I promise myself much joy in the journal of strange travels it is in your mind to write. But once for all, remember, we never were born into the world until a week ago!”

“But your Excellency––

“By the Great Duke of Hell! Will you not bridle your tongue when the damned monks are three deep at the key hole?”

By which it will be seen that the travels of the pious Don Diego were not all on paths of roses.

A little later the still faced priest of the stealthy glances came in, and Don Ruy sat on the side of the bed, and looked him over.

“You are the one who picked me up––eh? And the gentlemen of the streets had tossed me into a corner after discreetly starting my soul on its travels! Warm trysts your dames give to a stranger in this land––when you next confess the darlings, whisper their ears to be less bloodthirsty towards youth innocence!”

The man in the robe smiled.

“That unwise maid will make no more trysts,” he 67 said quietly,––“not if she be one important enough to cause an assault on your Highness.”

“Did they––?”

“No––no––harm would not be done to her, but her destiny is without doubt a convent. The men who spoiled your tryst earn no purses as guard for girls of the street,––sacred walls will save them that trouble for a time––whether maid or wife I dare promise you that! It is as well you know. Time is wasted seeking adventure placed beyond mortal reach.”

“Convent––eh? Do your holy retreats teach the little tricks the lady knew? And do they furnish their vestals with poems of romance and silks and spices of Kathay?”

He drew from an inner pocket a little scarf of apple green with knotted fringes, and butterflies, various colored in dainty broidery. As the folds fell apart an odor of sweetness stole into the shadowy room of the monastery, and the priest was surprised into an ejaculation at sight of such costly evidence, but he smothered it hastily in a muttered prayer.

After that he listened to few of the stranger’s gibes and quips, but with a book of prayers on his knee he looked the youth over carefully, recalled the outburst of Don Diego as to origin, and the adventurer’s own threat to build a ship and sail where chance pointed. Plainly, this seeker of trysts, or any other thing promising adventure, had more of resource than one might expect from a battered stranger lifted out of the gutter for the last rites.

The priest––who looked a good soldier and who was called Padre Vicente “de los Chichimecos” (of the wild tribes) read further in his book of hours, and then spoke the thing in his mind.