La Gaviota

“Listen, Don Frederico,” replied Marisalada: “I comprehend that this superiority ought to serve to place me above others, but not below them.”

“God help me, Mariquita! is it thus you change things? Superiority teaches us not to be proud of our qualities, and not to revolt against injustices opposed to us. But,” added he smiling, “these are the faults of your youth, and of the vivacity of your southern blood. You will know all that when you have gray hairs, as I have. Have you remarked, Mariquita, that I have gray hairs?”

“Yes,” she replied.

“See then, I am very young, but sufferings have made my head like that of an aged man. My heart has remained pure, Mariquita, and I offer you the flowers of spring, if you do not believe you will be alarmed at the symbols of winter which circle my forehead.”

“It is true,” replied the Gaviota, who could not restrain the natural ejaculation, “that a lover with gray hairs would not please me.”

“I have thought it would be thus,” said Stein with sadness. “My heart is loyal, and the good Maria, when she assured me that my happiness was still possible, instilled in my heart some hope, but which is as the flowers of the air without roots, and as the breath of the breeze.”

Mariquita, who saw that she had wounded, with her accustomed rudeness, a soul too delicate to insist, and a man so modest as to persuade himself that this sole objection annulled the other advantages, immediately said —

“If a lover with gray hairs pleases me not, a husband with such hair would not frighten me.”

Stein was taken by surprise at this brusque remark of Mariquita, and above all at the decision and impassibility with which she had enunciated it. Soon he smiled at Marisalada, and said to her —

“And then you will marry me, beautiful child of nature?”

“Why not?”

“Mariquita, she who accepts a man for a husband, and unites herself to him to pass her life, or, the better to express it, to make of two existences one only, as in a torch two lights blended make but one flame, such a person, I say, accords to this man a greater favor than she who accepts him for a lover.”

“And of what use,” replied the young girl with a mixture of innocence and indifference, “of what use are the guitarists, who sing badly and play badly, if not to frighten away the cats?”

They had arrived at the beach, and Stein begged Mariquita to sit beside him on a rock. On the part of both there was a long silence. Stein was profoundly agitated. The young girl with stoical indifference had taken a stick, and traced figures on the sand.

“How nature speaks in the heart of a man!” at last exclaimed Stein. “What sympathy reigns in all that God has created! A pure life is like a serene day; a life of unloosed passions resembles a tempestuous day. See those sombre clouds which slowly approach to interpose between the earth and the sun, they are such as should interpose between a heart and an illicit love, and let fall on the heart their cold but pure emanations. Happy the land on which they fall not! But our felicity will be unalterable like the sky in May, because you will always love me. Is it not so, Mariquita?”

This girl, whose rude and untutored soul comprehended neither the poetry nor the elevated sentiments of Stein, did not care to answer; but as she could not withdraw herself from this obligation, she wrote upon the sand the word siempre (always) with the stick which distracted her idleness.

Stein, whose emotion increased, mistook ennui for modesty.

“Look,” pursued he, “look at the sea! Listen to the murmur of the waves, murmurs so full of charms and of terrors! ’Tis said they confine grave secrets in an unknown language. The waves, Mariquita, are those dangerous and perfidious sirens, personified by the flowery and fantastic imagination of the Greeks; creatures of a rare beauty, but without hearts, as seductive as terrible, and whose sweet voices attract men to their perdition. But thy sweet voice, Mariquita, seduces not to deceive; you attract like the siren, you will not be perfidious like her. Is it not true, Mariquita, you will never be ungrateful?”

Nunca (never), wrote Mariquita on the sand. And the rising waves amused themselves in effacing the word the young girl had written, as if they would parody the waves of time, which flowing on efface in the heart what is sworn to endure thereon forever.

“Why does not thy voice reply to me, Mariquita?”

“What would you, Don Frederico? I cannot say to a man that I love him. I am unfeeling and unnatural, Maria says, who, however, does not the less love me. I am, like my father, economical in words.”

“If you were like him, I could desire nothing more, because the good Pedro – I say my father, Mariquita – has a heart the most loving that has ever beaten in the breast of a man; such hearts belong to angels, and to a few chosen men!”

“My father a superior man!” thought Mariquita, repressing with difficulty a mocking laugh. “So be it! so much the better, if he has the air of one.”

“Mariquita,” said Stein in approaching her, “let us offer to God our pure and holy love; let us promise Him to render ourselves acceptable by our fidelity, and by the discharge of those duties which will be imposed on us when this love shall have been consecrated at the divine altar. Now let me embrace you as my wife and companion.”

“No!” cried Mariquita, drawing back suddenly, and knitting her eyebrows. “No person shall touch me.”

“It is well, my pretty fugitive,” answered Stein with sweetness, “I respect all your delicacy, and submit myself to your will. Is it not appropriate to say, with one of our ancient and sublime poets, that the greatest of all felicities is, to ‘obey in loving?’ ”

CHAPTER XII

THE gratitude which the fisherman felt for him who had saved Marisalada, was complete when he saw him so attached to his daughter: an impassioned friendship which could only be compared to the admiration excited in him by the brilliant qualities of Stein.

From thence they were devoted to each other: the brusque mariner and the man of science sympathized, because men of kindred natures and gifted with good sentiments feel, when they come in contact, such an attraction, that, scorning the distance which separates their positions, they meet as brothers.

It thus happened when Stein offered himself as the old man’s son-in-law: the good father could not articulate a word, so much was he overcome with the joy which filled his heart. He besought Stein only, when taking his hand, to come and live in his cabin. Stein cordially assented. The fisherman appeared then to recover all his strength and all the agility of his youth, to employ them in ameliorating and embellishing his habitation. He cleared away the little garret to make there his personal lodging, leaving the first story for his children; he whitened and ornamented the walls; he levelled the ground, and covered it with a precious mat of palms, which he weaved for that purpose; he engaged Maria to make up for him a trousseau for the bride in character with the simplicity of his dwelling.

Great was the news caused by the rumored approaching marriage of Stein, to all those who knew and loved him. Old Maria was so joyous that she passed three nights without sleep. She predicted that when Don Frederico permanently established himself in the country none of the inhabitants would die except from old age. Brother Gabriel manifested so much contentment and such pleasure in seeing Maria so sprightly, that he entered into the feelings of his protectress, and ventured to say a witty thing, the first and the last in all his life; he said in a loud voice, “that the cura had forgotten the De profundis.”

This remark became of some consequence, inasmuch as Maria, for fifteen days, was earnest in reporting, after the usual compliments, the famous forgetfulness of the De profundis, which remark she considered as the glory and honor of her protégé. He himself was so embarrassed with the success attendant upon his innocent wit, that he vowed never again to succumb to a similar temptation.

Don Modesto was of opinion that the Gaviota had gained the first prize in the lottery, and the people of the village the second: “Because,” said he, “I would never have been maimed if I had met at Gaëte a surgeon as skilful as Stein.”

Dolores added, that if the fisherman had twice given life to his daughter, the will of God had twice given her happiness, in conferring on her such a father and such a husband.

Manuel observed, that there was in Heaven a cake reserved for husbands who never repented of their marriage, and which, up to this moment, no one had yet put his teeth into.

His wife said, it was because husbands never entered there!

As to Momo, he concluded that since the Gaviota had found a husband, the Plague need not lose hope of finding one also.

Rosa Mistica took the affair differently. Mariquita had, by a recent act, increased her list of evil deeds; some devotees were assembled to sing, in honor of the Virgin, couplets accompanied by a wretched harpsicord, played by an old blind man. Rosita presided at this ceremony. Not being able to ignore the aptitude of Marisalada, she silenced her ancient resentments, and thought, by the mediation of Don Modesto, to induce the fisherman’s daughter to take part in the pious concert.

Don Modesto took his cane, and set out on his campaign. Marisalada replied to the old commandant a dry “No,” without prologue or epilogue.

This monosyllable frightened Modesto more than a discharge of artillery; the negotiator knew not what to do. Don Modesto was one of those men who are sufficiently good-hearted to desire the good of their friends, but who want strength to achieve it, and imagination to find the means of obtaining it.

“Pedro,” said he to the fisherman, after this peremptory refusal, “do you know I tremble in all my limbs? What will Rosita say? What will all the village say? Can you not then influence her?”

“If she will not, what can I do?” replied the fisherman.

And the poor Don Modesto resigned himself to report this ungracious message, which would not only offend, but scandalize the mysticism of his hostess.

“I would prefer a thousand times,” said he, in returning to Villamar, “to present myself before all the batteries of Gaëte, than before Rosita with a no on my lips. In what a state she will be!”

And Don Modesto was right; for it was in vain that he essayed to ornament her answer by an exordium which merely insinuated, to comment by vague hints, to embellish by verbose paraphrases: he did not less keenly offend Rosita, who cried out in a loud tone —

“They who would not employ in the service of God the gifts they have received of Him, merit perdition.”

Also, when she learned the project of marriage, she sighed, and raised her eyes to Heaven:

“Poor Don Frederico!” she said.

Momo, according to his bad habits, took pleasure in conveying the news of this marriage to Ramon Perez.

“Really!” cried the barber, in consternation.

“You are sad; I am much more sad in seeing that there are people who ought to be beaten for the absurdity of their tastes. See a little! To be smitten of this saucebox! but Don Frederico proves the proverb, ‘Late married, badly married.’ ”

“I am not sad,” replied Ramon Perez, “because Marisalada is loved by Don Frederico, but because she loves this stranger who has hair of hemp and fishes’ eyes. Why does not the ingrate recollect this sentence, ‘Who marries late becomes either a dupe or a deceiver.’ ”

“It will not be he who will be the first to deceive. For as to Don Frederico, he is a brave man, nothing can be said to the contrary; but this vixen has bewitched him with her singing, which lasts from the rising to the setting sun. I have already said to him: Don Frederico, listen to the proverb, ‘Take a house with a hearth: take a wife who knows how to spin.’ He has not attended to either: it is a misfortune. As to thee, Ramon Perez, they have simply made a great mistake.”

“That is easily seen,” replied the barber, giving so hasty a turn to the key of his guitar that the treble-string broke: “he whom we would drive from our house must be a stranger. But you ought to know, Momo, that I care for very little. The year will finish one day, and if the king is dead, long live the king!”

Then he commenced to strike his guitar with rage, singing with bombastic voice:

“Cold creature! what of thy contempts,My heart, no longer irate, is now cured;Stains which no mulberry exempts,By the mulberry green are no longer endured.* * * *“Love is fled! three pirouettes, and then —Crack! and my happy days return;I have gold to please young girls I ween,To purchase other loves I’ll learn.”

CHAPTER XIII

THE marriage of Stein and the Gaviota was celebrated in the church of Villamar. The fisherman, instead of a red flannel shirt, wore a white shirt, irreproachably starched, and a vest of dark blue cloth. In this gala costume he was so embarrassed that he could hardly move.

Don Modesto, one of the witnesses, presented himself in all the éclat of his old uniform, rendered threadbare by constant brushing, and become too large by reason of his having grown so thin. The nankeen pantaloons which Rosita had washed for the thousandth time, had shrunken so as to descend only half way down his legs. His epaulets had become copper-colored. The cocked hat, which had survived eight lustres, and had not altered its pride, occupied dignifiedly its elevated position. But in the mean time there sparkled on the honorable breast of the poor soldier the cross of honor, valiantly gained on the field of battle, as shines a pure diamond in a fine setting. The women, according to custom, assisted, all dressed in black during the ceremony, but they changed their toilets for the fête.

Marisalada was all in white. The dresses which Maria and Dolores had received as presents from Stein on the occasion, were made of wove cotton smuggled into Gibraltar. The design was called scarfs of iris, because of the assemblage of colors the most opposite and the least harmonizing. One would believe the manufacturer wished to mock his Andalusian customers. In fine, everybody thought them handsome, except Momo, who would not put himself out on this occasion, and dressed himself to look as eccentric as possible.

“This is well for you, bad droll fellow. ‘The ape, though dressed in silk, is nothing but an ape.’ ”

“You cut a figure! You, who to be the wife of the doctor have ceased to be the Gaviota, and dress yourself in new clothes to render yourself handsomer! Oh! yes – white becomes you so well! Put a red cap on your head, and you will resemble a phosphoric match.”

Then he began to sing in a false voice —

“Oh! oh!Like a crow —You are pretty, girl, all in white,Coquettish, like hunger, you siren;Like wax with clear color at night.And in bulk like a thread of iron.”

Marisalada immediately replied —

“Thy mouth, ugly ape,Like a basket in shape,Therein linen to lie;This you cannot deny.And thy teeth can tell,They’ve no parallel!And thine ear-rings, I know.But three pendants can show.”

After this compliment she turned her back on him.

Momo, who was never behindhand when he meditated insolence and sallies, replied bravely —

“Go – go; when they give thee the benediction, it will be the first time thou hast received it during thine whole life, and I predict that it will be the last.”

The marriage was held in the village, at the house of Maria, the cabin of the fisherman being too small to contain all the assembly. Stein, who, in the exercise of his profession, had saved some money, although in most cases he gave his services gratuitously, desired to do the thing in grand style, and not to restrict the invitations. He had abundance of wine, lemonade, biscuits, and cakes, and three guitars. The guests sang, danced, screamed, without omitting wit and pleasantry, joyous and gay.

Maria came and went, served the refreshments, played the part of godmother of the wedding, and never ceased to repeat, “I am as content as if I were the bride;” to which brother Gabriel invariably added, “I am as content as if I were the husband.”

“Mother,” said Manuel to Maria, on seeing her pass near him, “the color of this dress is very gay for a widow.”

“Hold your tongue,” replied the mother. “Every thing ought to be gay on a day like this. Besides, ‘we must not look a gift horse in the mouth.’ Brother Gabriel, come along, take this glass of lemonade and this cake, and drink to the health of the newly married couple, before returning to the convent.”

“I drink to the health of the new-married couple before I return to the convent,” said brother Gabriel.

The good monk emptied his glass, and escaped before any one, except Maria, remarked his absence.

The reunion became animated by degrees.

“Bomba!” cried the sacristan, a little humpbacked man, crooked and lame, “Bomba!” (This is the exclamation which announces ordinarily in Spain at a dinner or at fête, a little excited, that a guest is about to propose a toast.)

Every one was silent at this signal.

“I drink,” said the sacristan, “to the health of the bride and groom, and to this honorable company, and to the repose of all Christian souls!”

“Bravo! let us drink! and long live La Mancha! who gives us wine in lieu of water.”

“In your turn, Ramon Perez, sing a couplet, and do not keep your voice for a better occasion.”

Ramon sang —

“A happy future – all good wishesTo the pretty wife!And to her husband I’ve no speciesOf envy or of strife.”

“Bravo! well sung!” cried all the assembly. “Now the fandango and the ball!”

After the prelude to this eminently national dance, a man and a woman rose simultaneously, and placed themselves face to face. Their graceful movements accomplished, so to speak, an elegant balancing of bodies, to the sound of their gay castinets.

In an instant the two dancers yielded their places to two others, who placed themselves in front, while the first couple retired. This divertisement, according to the usages of the country, was often repeated.

The guitarist had again his song —

“To him who weds a beauteous bride,And to the holy temple hied:She has sworn, and now stands with wedded heart:She enters free – in irons must depart.”

“Bomba!” soon cried one of the most expert in matters of toasts. “I drink to this excellent doctor, whom God sent to our country that we might attain a greater age than Methuselah! But I add one condition, that in case of longevity to me, he will not prolong either the life of my wife, or my purgatory.”

This toast provoked an explosion of applause.

“What do you say to all this?” demanded all the guests at the wedding of Manuel.

“What do I say? That I say nothing.”

“Badly answered! Get along – wake up, and propose a toast.”

Manuel took a glass of lemonade, and said —

“I drink to the newly married, to our friends, to our commandant, and to the resurrection of Fort St. Cristobal!”

“Long live the commandant!” cried all present. “And you, Manuel, who know how to compose couplets, sing something.”

Manuel sang the following couplet:

“Of these allurements men take care,Hymen’s intoxication sweet:’Tis done! and ’till old age, beware,The fright will ne’er thy bosom quit.”

After some other couplets had been sung, the greatest orator of the assembly said to Manuel:

“These people only sing trifles without head or tail. You who know how to say good things, above all when the wine gets a little in your head, make a stanza of ten lines in honor of the newly married, and take this glass of wine to loosen your tongue.”

Manuel took the glass of wine, and commenced:

“Bomba!  Viva!Sweet vanquisher of secret pains,Physician gay of blackest dreams,I’ve seen thee born between green leaves,And, pressed, thy bosom madly heaves:Give to my voice the needful force,To the bride and groom I’d raise my voice!Here’s Hymen! let’s our glasses drain,To bride and groom, again, again.”

“It is your turn, Ramon the devil. Has the liquor obstructed your throat? You are more insipid than a salad of tomatoes.”

Ramon took his guitar and sang:

“She to the church and sacrifices bold,Herself surrenders, and I am consoled;My lips with kisses delicately hushed,Press the green grass which her small feet have pressed.”

This couplet having been followed by another of little value, Maria approached Stein and said to him:

“Don Frederico, the wine commences to tell on our guests. It is midnight, and the poor children are alone in the house with Momo and brother Gabriel. I fear Manuel raises his elbow too often. Pedro is asleep in the corner, and I think it will not be bad to sound the retreat. Our asses are harnessed, will you that we take ‘French leave?’ ” An instant after, the three women, mounted on their asses, were on their way to the convent. The men accompanied them on foot, while Ramon, in a fit of jealousy and of chagrin, on seeing the married couple depart, struck his guitar with an insolent air and bellowed rather than sang:

“Thou the calabash hast given me;Or rather, I my congé see;Great good this congé does meeting,The tomatoes I have eaten!In thy family, at which I dine,Admitted once, revenged I am.”

“What a beautiful night!” said Stein to his wife, raising his eyes towards heaven. “See the starry firmament! See the evening star shining in its magnificence like the brightness of my happiness! My heart has now no want unsupplied, and I have nothing to regret.”

“And I who amused myself so much,” replied Marisalada, impatiently, “I do not see why we have left the fête so soon.”

“Good Maria,” said Pedro Santalo, “now we can die in peace.”

“Yes,” replied the old woman, “but we can as well live in joy; that would be much better.”

“How is it that you do not know how to restrain yourself when you have the glass in your hand?” said Dolores to her husband. “From the moment you slacken sail, there is not a cable that could bring you up.”

“Caramba!” replied Manuel: “I am here, what would you more? Still, one word more – I live on the brim and I return to the fête.”

The cries of the drinkers being continually heard, Dolores held her tongue, fearing that Manuel would put his threats into execution.

“José,” said Manuel to his brother-in-law, who had also been to the wedding, “is the moon full?”

“Certainly,” replied the shepherd. “Can you not see with your eyes? Do you not know what it is?”

“It should be a tear,” said Manuel, laughing.

“It is not a tear; it is a man.”

“A man!” exclaimed Dolores, altogether convinced by what her brother had said. “And what is this man?”

“I do not know – but I know his name.”

“And how is he called?”

“He is called Venus,” replied José.

Manuel began to laugh: he had drank more than usual, and, as they said, he was gay.

“Don Frederico,” said Manuel to the new-made husband, “shall I give you a piece of advice, in my quality of being older than you in this grand Confederacy?”

“Hold your tongue, for God’s sake, Manuel!” said Dolores.

“Will you leave me in peace? Listen, Don Frederico; to begin – with a wife and a dog, the bread in one hand, and a stick in the other.”

“Manuel!” repeated Dolores.

“Will you leave me tranquil? or I return to the wedding.”

Dolores thought it prudent to hold her peace.

“Don Frederico,” pursued Manuel, “wives or slaves, women are the most powerful enemies.”

“Do me the favor to hold your tongue, Manuel,” interrupted his mother.

“This is odd,” grumbled Manuel; “we were told we were assisting at an entertainment.”

“Do you not know, Manuel,” remarked the shepherd, “that these witticisms of thine are not to the taste of Don Frederico?”

“Señor,” said Manuel, in taking leave of the married pair, who proceeded towards the cabin, “when you repent of what you have done we will be united again, and we will together sing the same complaint.”

And he continued his route towards the convent. In the silence of night he was heard singing, in his clear and sonorous voice —

“Alas, poor wife and cherished horse!Who the same hour died:I sorely weep, but for which loss?My poor horse shall decide.”

“Go to bed, Manuel, and nimbly,” his mother said to him, when they arrived at home.