The Spanish dancer : being a translation from the original French by Henry L. Williams of Don Caesar de Bazan (9 page)

Cjs'sar was rising in a somewhat threatening attitude^ iwhich had caused the soldiers to stop short

"That cursed decree!" muttered Bazan, recollecting. "Oh, blind mortality, which blusters when but a sheet of parchment is the buckler betwixt him and the itching eword! If it were not the blessed diabolical week when one must not carry out the dictates of humanity!" He became calm by a powerful effort. "Captain, my noble don, why object to your collecting the lamb into the fold! Pretty field where the flock are this kind of war wolf I But, let that pass! and let it pass that there shall be no ignominous blows, eh? no cuts of the cord, only fit for criminals who join the flagellating monks! That boy has the heart of a soldier and will make his mark yet I How glad you will be to have spared him!"

"Spared nothing—a flogged soldier takes care not to let the enemy see his back," returned the martinet, chuckling, like 'a rusty hinge, at his own stern joke.

"You should pardon!" He caught him by the cloak as he whirled around, contemptuously, "You must pardon my page!"

"Hands off! Do not infect me with the reek of the glietto!" cried the other, testily and facing the shuddering, cowering boy, who seemed to be praying.

"Remember the edict!" hissed Don Jose in his cousin's ear, as he glided toward him. "You must bear his taunts, too!"

Caesar shook him off and'took two steps, which placed him between soldiers and commander and their object of pursuit.

"You offended me, sir, by turning a deaf ear I You insult me by diverting your eye when I address you! You are a soldier and by rank a nobleman—so am I! I no longer throw my cloak over this boy as a pleader for the general assistance ag-ainst a bully and a butcher, but as my page, since I have no doubt he will enter into my service 1 Now "

"Your page? You who have not the wherewithal td ciothe your back, keep a boy?"

"Nay, I can keep my back firom being scored by a sword cut and my page's from your stirrup strap! I h'ave pledged my honor to protect this lad, mind you, and I am now imploring or suing for you to forgive and release!"

"What on earth are you going to do?"

"What I solicit in vain, it is my regular course to compel !" was the forlorn gentleman's curt and tranquil answer.

"There will certainly be a thrashing for the hawk-busher!" muttered Pacolo, in his retreat.

"You are mightily insolent, consort of the banned andl exorcised!"

"Bandy no more words. The decree against dueling d'oes not include my correcting a brutal dog who presumes upon wearing the royal collar! In spite of all, with death my portion, you must, if truly Don Octavio Herrcno, make me the honorable amends!"

"Defiance from a beggar!"

"Who would not ask the alms of his life from y

"It is a name trailed in the gutter," returned the captain, although sobered.

"I am, moreover, head of the Counts of Garofa." He put on his hat with so lofty an air that it became the newest shape in the finest felt and the feather repaired its crack and its curl, and he appeared like a favorite of the king.

The Garofas had the signal privilege of wearing their hats in the royal presence—that is, were the equal of kings. A Garofa used to say: "I and the king 1"

I ""It was I who stooped in suing to you, merely a viscount of purchased creation, and by forcing me to apply my sword to you in correction is due the misdemeanor of infringing the royal decree!"

"A challenge to a king's officer at the front of his men ?" faltered the old soldier, almost frothing with rage.

"In front of your men, accept, or retire with them in shame!"

"Oh, it is not meet that even you should doubt the mettle of the king's officers. If you will follow me where we will not have the cathedral walls to shadow us, or holy ground to be defiled, I will prove that my manhood is not of yesterday if my letters of nobility are."

Confident that the Count of Garofa, however degraded by association with the lees of the capital, would not flinch thus committed, he cried to his men:

"File! By single file, march!" and the troop disap-p'eared in the court to the south of the great religious edifice and were absorbed to the last glitter of steel in the intense gloom.

"Oh, no, you must not waste your life for such as me!" cried the cause of this strife. "I would rather return to my master and let this browbeating captain wreak his spite to the full!"

"Oh, no, not since you will be my page! You might, if you prefer no change of service, run to that lieutenant who would have spared you the shame of a whipping— and let him know that there will be a vacancy for his prc>-motion before morning!"

Then nodding to Paoolo, who softly came out of his shelter, he confided the youth to him, and, whistling a m'arching tune, he plunged into the same mass of murki-ness which seemed the entrance to the pit of darkness.

iAt the same time he saw at the other end of this

passage, wher-e it debouched upon a little square edged with young trees, a spread of ruddy light.

"That is not the moon," said he, striding on, and shivering, for his clothes were like lacework and the wind was chill, "but the glare of the hearth of the Next Sovereign ! What an excellent idea, since the loser can pass away, with a good glass of wine to start him on the long journey, and the winner can drink without fear that he is taking his last drop! Dash that edict! 'the last drop)* I jest too truly, perchance!"

He quickened his gait and soon arrived at the famous dueling ground.

The Minor Cathedral square, called familiarly "the Dandiprats' walk," was the favorite stalking-ground of the "bucks and the deer." It was full of shops, or rathec booths, since the building of solid structures was prohibited on church land, where it would have recalled the traffic in the Temple, and citizens and courtiers mingled with the odd serenity born of implacable classification.

As coaches could not get into the inclosure, all were on foot and the red heel was knocked against by the clumsy bark sandal of the peasant and the trooper's heav^j high boot.

But at night, especially if the moon shone with the fullness of lustre known in that sunny clime, it was the site of encounters to decide by force of arms current questions. Under the hardened eyes of the persons up at the house windows, gallants died as coolly for a ribbon, a political question or a family feud. iBy the police closing the eye in the Minor plaza, this was the only safe place where one could, without interruption, hazard the life on a sword point

Sometimes the idlers would see all the ladies of fame! by day on this field of honor, which wias also a court of beauty; at night the same lookers-on might see all thfll

gallants watching a duel, not always sing-le but of two or three pairs.

Ais a military man, Captain Octavio was well acquainted with the spot.

'It was even said that he did not lose in the purse by choosing this rendezvous, since it was a relative of his, and an old wardog, too, who had served in the French campaigns under his flag, who kept the eating-house with the singular title.

But it was not unreasonable; it was witty, as wit was Judged then.

This hostel, where there were no beds, since its busiest lime was after dark and its gamblers atid carousers came not there to sleep, was illumined handsomely; out of all Small windows poured the light, and out of the ground-ifloor doorway, large enough to admit a coach, shone the tremendous glare from a furnace and an open fire, before which the spit revolved.

All this brightness shot across the square, where the jpromenaders wore off the grass, and enabled one to use a knife and fork or a sword, as one feasted or fought, jvithout wishing for the day.

The old soldier, having learned to cook the provisions stolen by the foragers, since armies were miserably provisioned, had all the arts at his spoon-end. He had Ba:uces which tickled the jaded palate, pies which delighted the epicures, and, lastly, wines which never paid the city dues, but were, they say, brought back in the empty bier every time there was a military funeral out of the garrison and palace.

To be sure, the rumor being circulated that the king bad more strictly than heretofore prohibited settlement of Hifferences between sword wearers with their side companion, a gloom should have fallen on the Next Sov-

ereign, but she did not lessen by a jot the triumphanl smile with which she was depicted on the signboard.

This board did not swing on a rod at a posit, for tfie wind came down furiously from the north sometimes, and mine host would have bitterly regretted a three-bottle guest being flattened by the sign.

It was set in the front over the door of lozenge shape, like a funeral panel of a great house.

"The Next Sovereign," as we should have explained*, was simply a portrait of a beauty, not identifiable, but woman in the general. Considering that whenever there is la king there is a woman in the background, if not by, his iside, and that to her are attributed all the acts from the throne which incur comment, the sarcasm in presenting her as the ruler in posse was good enough to laugh at.

But then, those who feasted at the Sovereign were easily made to laugh. Always omitting the duelist, who never left the ground to enter the tavern.

As the challenger had surmised, here was where he' found his antagonist awaiting him; he had consoled 'himself for losing the apprentke gunsmith by exhausting the flagon of wine brought out. He had dismissed his troop, we know, but retained a sub-officer and pressed into service as a second a civilian acquaintance upon the ground, who thanked him for the diversion.

'"Capital site!" said Don Caesar, critically, as if he had not known the spot before. "Over there is a leather-bottle maker's stall. It has been found so handy to sew up a slash when a bungler has been at work, and did not kill his man neatly!"

This was not very encouraging, but the Captain of Arquebusiers was tough. The host nodded to the tattered nobleman as if he knew him of old, and without sending a waiter to get his order, went on his fat legs to bring out a bottle of Tetuan wine, which, growing on soil

impregnated with magnetic iron, was reckoned to suit fighting men.

"It is the fortifier, my lord," said 'he. "You will pink your man in the first bout, if you drink one glass! You will pierce him in the second, if you drink two; and if you finish the flask, you will finish him!"

"Halloa!" cried the errant knight, astounded, "he is your own officer, and set you up here! You astonish me as much as if you presented your bill."

"Oh, I do not mind the score! You will have your rights soon, and your steward will settle your long account! A gypsy foretold that!"

"But," went on Don Caesar, drinking and approving, "this does not explain why you should desire me to be the better in crossing steel with your old captain?"

"Well, he owes me considerable, and I understand that he will pay tavern bills while he lives!"

"Oh, the family have 'his estate under their control, poor infant!" sighed the broken noble. "After all, he may be set free by my boring him in the midriff!"

Between proven swordsmen, the preliminaries were brief.

A sort of ring was formed of the spectators. The seconds planted their men, for Csesar's reputation had promptly produced two adherents, especially as the landlord promised to regale them, and the blades were soon grating in that first testing which precedes all scientific combats.

The Arquebusier Captain was redoubtable and famous in the capital and all his garrison towns for his feats.

But varied as had been his experiences, they were as an A B C book to the lexicon of private warfare in which our hero was as proficient. Consider that it is given to few in a short lifetime to have been conspicuous at court, prisoner with the Algerine corsairs, and participant in

those medleys when gypsies, smugglers, bandit* and the scum of the cities intermingled and employed without any rules weapons so diverse as the dagger, the knife and the stiletto. It may be stated that almost every province of Spain boasted a brand of knife, and each knife had its school of fence proper to it. In all of these, by actual encounter, Don Caesar had learned lessons. W'hile not fitting him for handling the gentleman's arm, it gave him suppleness of wrist, quickness in defense, and rapidity of the thought to direct the thrust which sadly nonpulsed the arquebusier.

In the first bout, his sword was detached from his grasp by a trick more familiar to wielders of the scimetar than the long sword, but it succeeded. The captain protested a mishap, alleging that he had slipped in the "maybutter," a playful name for a flowering plant; he was allowed to repeat the charge. This time Don Caesar received him with a ward and a reply lunge out of the old French school, when victory was attained by poking as with a spear. The blade entered the upper sword-arm, and would have penetrated the chest to boot, but the don was not persistent; he called out "blood!" and the seconds agreed that he ought to cease then, as their man was unable to continue the conflict. But the obstinate captain, desiring to continue with a change of hand, Don Caesar hughingly assented, saying that he was ambidex-ter, and that his antagonist would lose nothing.

But the seconds would not assent. They nobly regarded honor as satisfied, and threatened to charge the captain if he did not put up his blade.

It was then inquired, according to usage, if anything in the course of the sword play—pretty play !—'had offended "the witnesses." It was perfectly in the rules for ihem to carry on the quarrel. But the odor from the roasts was so appetizing that they were nearly drowned by the