The Marquis of Bolibar (14 page)

"Or," cried Günther, drawing a deep breath, "I shall compel you to give me satisfaction in a manner that will render you unfit to continue to wear an officer's uniform."

Donop and I opened our mouths to intervene, but it was already too late.

"Very well," Eglofstein said easily, "if you insist." He turned to his orderly, who was seated in the trench not far from us, mending an empty sandbag.

"Martin," he called in a dispassionate tone, "have a brace of pistols and some hot coffee ready at six tomorrow morning."

We were alarmed, knowing that Eglofstein had spoken in earnest. As adept with a pistol as he was with a sword, he had dispatched two opponents and shattered another's arm in the course of the previous year alone.

Günther had turned pale, for although he acquitted himself tolerably well in action, he became unmanned by the sight of a pistol trained on him. Realizing that his quick temper and ill- humour had placed him in an awkward position, he strove to extricate himself.

"Rest assured," he said coldly, "that I shall meet you when and wherever you choose."

"In that case," said Eglofstein, "it only remains for us to make the necessary arrangements."

"Unfortunately," Günther went on, "Soult has forbidden duels in the face of the enemy. I have no alternative, therefore, but to postpone the settlement of this matter until a more suitable time."

We said nothing, for Günther was within his rights. Soult had indeed issued such an order to the officers of his corps some time before. Eglofstein bit his lip and turned to go, but the present outcome was not to Brockendorf's taste.

"Günther," he said, "this whole affair is no concern of mine, nor has Eglofstein requested me to act for him, but the guerrillas are lying low. I hear no shots, I see no movement on their part. They are not comporting themselves like enemies, so to my mind —"

"The guerrillas," Günther broke in, "are only awaiting the Marquis of Bolibar's next signal to storm this outwork. He gave the first on Sunday last, and if the next comes today or tomorrow, as I suspect it will, the first dance will be mine."

I could not but admire his effrontery. We both knew that the Marquis of Bolibar was dead, just as we both knew who had given the signal with the smouldering straw, but he calmly held my gaze, confident that I would say nothing.

Eglofstein shrugged his shoulders and stared past him with an air of contempt.

"If that's how matters stand," said Brockendorf, "I suggest we go back and attend to the inner man. Why wait? The 'Blood of Christ' inn is serving pancakes and fried bacon today, and a brown cabbage soup to start with. Let's be off."

He took Eglofstein by the arm and we walked away, leaving the outwork in Günther's charge.

When we reached the Mon Cœur lunette, which commanded a view of the spot we had just left, Eglofstein suddenly paused, seized me by the shoulder, and pointed.

"Look at him, the cowardly, prating braggart!" he exclaimed, his pent-up anger bursting forth. "First he quakes with fear, and now he seeks to show us what a daredevil he is!"

We could see Günther swaggering up and down the entrenchment as if deliberately courting a hail of bullets from the guerrillas. He knew as well as we that the Spanish musket balls would not carry so far, and that the rebels would not bring their ordnance to bear until they received Bolibar's signal. Eglofstein angrily shook his fist.

"I wish," he said, "that the Marquis of Bolibar would take it into his head to give the signal at this particular moment."

He savoured the thought for a while, chuckling to himself.

"Hell's teeth," he went on, "what fun it would be! Think of it: Günther would be down from that parapet and into the trench quicker than a frog into a pond."

We walked on.

"By the way," Donop said casually, "where does the Marquis keep his organ?"

"In the chapel of St Daniel's Convent," Brockendorf replied, "which we've fitted out as a workshop for drying powder and filling shells. I commanded the guard there last night. Pay it a visit if you're so inclined. You could try the instrument for yourself and see if it has a passable tone."

A FORGATHERING OF SAINTS

We left the inn flushed with wine, and, almost before we had donned our cloaks and set off down the street, fell to arguing how we should spend the afternoon. Donop, who said he was very weary, proposed to return to his billet to read and sleep awhile. Brockendorf suggested that Eglofstein should set up a faro bank — he had received some inherited money at Perpignan some weeks before, through Durand's the bankers — but Eglofstein pleaded that he had no time and must repair to his office for an hour to attend to the day's business.

Brockendorf, turning peevish, made no secret of his contempt for paper-work in general and the duties of a regimental adjutant in particular.

"No one," he declared, "could sharpen as many quills in a day as you wear out in an hour. You fill innumerable sheets of paper, and all they're good for is grocer's cornets of cinnamon, ginger or pepper."

"Unless I write out vouchers for you all today," said Eglofstein, "you'll get no money tomorrow. The paymaster will give you nothing without my signature."

We walked on, keeping to the middle of the street to avoid the melted snow that trickled from the eaves. A cat was playing with a cabbage stalk, patting it back and forth in the noonday sun. Two sparrows were squabbling over a grain of maize with ruffled feathers and a deal of angry twittering. Water splashed over our boots at every step.

At the corner of the narrow lane our path was barred by a mule which, though handsomely decked out in little bells and coloured ribbons, the latter being braided with its mane, was striving to throw off its pack-saddle by rolling about in a puddle of melted snow. The muleteer stood alongside, cursing and cajoling it by turns, thrashing it with his stick and holding dried maize leaves under its nose, calling it the love of his life and an offspring of the devil - in short, doing all he could, for better or worse, to persuade the beast to get up and move on. We watched the spectacle with amusement, while the mule paid as little heed to its master's endeavours as if a flea had coughed or a louse cried murder.

All at once Donop gave an exclamation of surprise, and we saw Monjita, who had failed to notice us, hurrying down a side street.

She had a small basket in one hand and, in the other, the fan with which she was for ever toying. There was a mantilla about her shoulders and a fine silken fillet over her hair. As I watched her tiptoe around the puddles and gather up her gown to avoid them, I fancied for a moment that Françoise-Marie was flitting past in a huff, without bestowing so much as a glance on me, because I had neglected to keep her company for so long.

"She's homeward bound," said Eglofstein, "taking her father whatever is left from the colonel's table. She does so every day, I'm told."

We left the cursing owner of the obdurate mule to his own devices and set off slowly in Monjita's wake.

Delighted that our path should have chanced to cross that of the colonel's lovely mistress, we resolved to visit her father's house and pay court to her on the pretext of examining his pictures and purchasing one of his archangels or apostles.

Brockendorf, who was wary of this plan, uttered threats and reproaches the whole way there.

"I'll tell you this much," he growled. "I'll buy no St Epiphanius or Portiunculus, not even if it's to be had for two groschen. Paintings of saints or pumpkin leaves are all the same to me. You won't catch me out a second time as you did in Barcelona, where I joined you in that wretched tavern for the sake of comradeship and a pretty face. I had to drink up four whole bottles of poor Cape wine by myself, and all because you chose to fall in love with the landlord's niece."

He was still grumbling and calling himself the world's most arrant fool for coming with us when we entered Don Ramon de Alacho's work-room.

Peering through the open door into the next room, we saw the object of our visit standing there. She had draped her mantilla over the back of a chair and was busy setting the table with platters of cold meat, bread, butter and cheese. Don Ramon came out from behind one of his paintings, bowed in the ludicrous fashion already familiar to us, and declared himself surprised to see us there.

When we explained that we had come to choose one of his pictures, he welcomed us courteously and with evident delight.

"My house is yours. Remain for as long as you please and make yourselves at home."

There were another two persons in the room — odd-looking figures both. The first, a young man with an artless face, was standing there stiffly with his thin arms raised in entreaty, like a stone seraph, and one could see that the sleeves of his jacket, which were much too short, reached no further than his bony elbows. The old woman seated on a stool beside him was wringing her hands in despair, or so it seemed. Her face was set in a dolorous expression, and she twisted and turned her head incessantly like a scaup-duck.

Don Ramon fetched two of his paintings.

"Here," he said, "you see St Antony surrounded by more than a dozen demons of whom some have assumed the guise of cats, others of bats."

He deposited the picture on the floor and held up another.

"This painting portrays St Clement in the very act of performing a miracle, to wit, curing a splenetic by touching him with his foot."

Brockendorf closely examined St Clement, who was depicted complete with his papal insignia.

"If that's a miracle," he said at length, "I myself am a saint and never knew it till now. I've often performed miracles of that kind. Many's the time I've brought a malingerer to his feet with a hearty kick on the rump."

"It's a good piece," said Don Ramon, "but you can have it for a sum that will cover my expenditure on canvas, oil and pigment with a little to spare."

He brought out the remainder of his paintings, one after another, and we were soon surrounded by a whole congregation of martyrs and doctors of the Church, apostles and penitents, popes and patriarchs, prophets and evangelists. Holding monstrances, chalices, missals, censers, crucifixes and pyxes in their hands, they regarded us with stern solemnity, as if they had fathomed the worldly motives that had prompted us to join their saintly band.

The painter offered to sell Brockendorf a picture of St Leocadia, the Toledan martyr. Depicted on a blue ground, she wore a red robe sprinkled with stars and held an open book in her hands.

"This saint," Don Ramon declared, "has the features of my daughter, who is even now in the room next door, spreading slices of bread with cold meat and cheese. The Señor Coronel keeps a good table and is generous." He raised his voice. "Not too much cheese, my girl! You know it overwhelms the more delicate flavour of the cold roast meat." In the same breath, he went on, "I give all the female saints my daughter's face, likewise the Holy Virgin."

Don Ramon deposited the martyred Leocadia on the floor with the other pictures.

"If you visit the church of Nuestra Señora del Pilar, you will find another painting of mine, a portrayal of the seraphic nun, Theresa, on the right-hand wall behind the second column. That holy woman, too, has my daughter's features — indeed, the resemblance is very marked. It is because the picture shows her wearing the habit of the Discalced Carmelites that the people of this town call my daughter Monjita, or 'little nun', though she received the name Paolita at her baptism."

Brockendorf studied the saints' pictures with a close attention that surprised me.

"Do you also have a picture of St Susanna?" he asked at length.

"This is she, if you refer to the saint who was beheaded in the time of Emperor Diocletian because she refused to marry his son."

"I know nothing of that," said Brockendorf. "I was speaking of another St Susanna."

"I know of no second saint by that name," the painter exclaimed in great agitation. "Laurentius Surius and Petrus Ribadeira make no mention of any such, nor do Simeon Metaphrastes, Johannes Trithenius and Sylvanus a Lapide. Who was this Susanna? Where did she live, where was she put to death, and which pope elevated her to the rank of saint?"

"What!" Brockendorf said indignantly. "Can you possibly be ignorant of St Susanna? You amaze me. Susanna is the saint whom the two Jews surprised in the bath — it's a well-known story."

"I have never painted that scene, and besides, your Susanna was no saint. She was a Jewess from the city of Babylon."

"Jewess or no Jewess," Brockendorf said firmly, with a very eloquent glance in Monjita's direction, "you should also have painted the young lady as Susanna bathing."

"Don Ramon!" the youth with the upraised arms cried suddenly. "How much longer do you mean to keep me standing here like this for a real-and-a-half? My arms are stiff and crooked enough as it is."

The hunchback took up his brush at once and swiftly vanished behind his easel. For a while, nothing could be seen of him but his brick-red leggings.

"These two persons," we heard him say, "are of service to me in my work. I am painting an
Entombment of Christ.
The young man represents Joseph of Arimathea and this lady here one of the pious women from Jerusalem. Both, as you gentlemen can see, are lamenting the Redeemer's death."

Joseph of Arimathea and the pious woman of Jerusalem bowed to us without in any way relaxing their expressions of bitter reproach and mute despair.

"The señora," Don Ramon pursued from behind his easel, "is an actress of repute. In the morality play we gave last year, here in La Bisbal, she enacted the allegorical figure of Christian Confession. She won great acclaim and was as conversant with her role as she is with the Paternoster."

"In Madrid," the woman announced, "I have also played queens and ladies-in-waiting."

Brockendorf eyed her closely for a while. Then he said, "I have a pair of woollen stockings spoiled by melted snow. I'm looking for someone to wash them."

"Give them to me!" said the impersonator of queens and ladies-in-waiting, and her features momentarily lost their air of grief-stricken resignation. "You'll have no cause for complaint, I assure you."