Their Son; The Necklace Part 12

The wounded man had hardly strength enough to press his hand a very little.

"Good-by, Adolfo," he stammered. "Now I know what I--had to know. You told me, but I--couldn't believe it. But now I know you--were right.

Manolo was not--my son----"

THE NECKLACE

The first act was finished. Enrique Darles went down to the foyer. His provincial curiosity drew him thither. He felt an eagerness to absorb the vast, motley spirit of the city. He wanted to behold many things, to school himself, strengthen himself with all these new impressions. Above all he wanted to feel the life-currents of Madrid beating about his migratory feet.

A few minutes before he had been sitting up there in the "peanut gallery" of the Teatro Real. And from that vulgar place he had beheld the theater with its vast ranges of seats and its boxes all drenched under the blinding dazzle of hundreds of electric lights. The theater had looked to him like some rare and beautiful garden; or maybe it had been a kind of gigantic nosegay, where the sparkling diamonds on women's throats had seemed dew-drops caught on great silk petals, on glossy velvets, on white, bare shoulders.

So entirely absorbed had he been in this spectacle that he had hardly paid any attention at all to what the orchestra and the actors had been about. Every other emotion had been shut from his soul by these dazzling sight-impressions, that had never wearied him. The wonderful, human garden spread out below him had exhaled rare perfumes. A sensual and soporific kind of vapor had risen all about him--an incense blent of the odors of new-mown hay, of jasmine, musk and Parmesan violets, of daintily-bathed women's flesh, of wonderful lingerie. And he had studied all this luminous picture, resplendent as the climax of a brilliant play. Above all he had studied the women, with their sensuous bodies; their unashamed bosoms that had been the targets of a.n.a.lytical eagerness through many opera-gla.s.ses; their gay and laughing faces, whereof the beauty had been enhanced by the placid security of wealth. He had observed their deftly combed and curled little heads, their jewel-laden hands--hands that had waved big feather-fans to and fro over the gauzy stuff of their gowns.

Enrique wanted to see all this wonderful world at close range, so he went down to the foyer. And there he stopped, just a bit ashamed of himself. For the first time he was beginning to realize that his out-of-date slouch hat, his skimpy black suit that made him look like a high-school boy, and his old boots that needed a s.h.i.+ne were greatly out of place. He felt that his flowing necktie, which he had tried to knot up with student-like carelessness, was just as ugly as all the rest of him. Correctly dressed men were pa.s.sing all about him, with elegant frock-coats that bore flowers in their b.u.t.tonholes and with impeccable Tuxedos. Women were regally trailing grosgrain and watered-silk skirts over the soft, red carpet. It all seemed a majestic symphony of silks, brocades and splendid furs, of wonderful ankles glimpsed through the perverse mystery of open-work stockings, of fascinating adornments, of bracelets whose bangles tinkled their golden song on the ermine whiteness of soft arms.

Abashed, feeling himself wholly out of place, young Darles self-consciously strolled over to look at a bust of Gayarre--a bronze bust that showed the man with short, up-tossed hair. Its energy made one think of Oth.e.l.lo. Quite at once, a hand dropped familiarly on Darles'

shoulder. The young man turned.

"Don Manuel! You? What a surprise!"

Don Manuel was a man of middle height, thick-set and just a trifle bald.

He looked about fifty. A heavy, curling red beard covered his full-blooded, fleshy, prosperous cheeks and chin. He wore evening-dress.

His short, thick, epicurean nose supported gold-bowed spectacles.

"Well, my boy," he exclaimed. "You, here?"

Enrique blushed violently, without exactly understanding why, as he answered:

"Yes, I came to--to see----"

Hardly knowing what he was about, he took off his hat, with that respect we learn even as children, when confronted by our parents' friends. Now he stood there, holding the hat with both hands across his breast. Don Manuel, you know, was a deputy in the National a.s.sembly. The great man made Enrique put his hat on, again.

"What are you doing in Madrid?" asked he.

"Studying."

"Law?"

"No, sir. Medicine."

"That's a first-rate profession. What year are you in?"

"Freshman," answered Darles, and smiled in a shamefaced sort of way. He knew his answers were short and clumsy, and the feeling of shabbiness oppressed him more than ever. Don Manuel glanced about him, with a kind of arrogant ease. Two or three times he murmured: "I'm waiting for somebody." Then he began to talk to the student again, asking him about his father and the political boss of the home town. Darles kept on answering every question just the same way:

"No change, down there. Everything's all right."

And again the conversation was broken off by Don Manuel's expectant glancing about for the friend he was to meet.

The deputy asked, after a minute or two:

"You're living in a boarding-house, aren't you?"

"No, sir."

"Where, then?"

"In Calle Ballesta. I've rented a little inside room, on the fourth floor. It costs me thirteen pesetas a month, and I eat at a little tavern on the same street."

"I see you know how to rub along. You can save money, if you're willing to fight with landladies. After you've got thoroughly used to Madrid, nothing can make you ever go back home. Madrid is wonderful! With money, a clever man can have all kinds of amus.e.m.e.nt here."

Don Manuel added, using that confidential air with which fools and parvenus try to impress people they think beneath them:

"See here! You're not a boy, any more. And I--hang it all!--you can't call me old, yet. I don't see my friend showing up, anywhere, so we can have a little talk. I've got--I've got something bothering me. You understand?"

Enrique nodded.

"You know her? Alicia Pardo?"

"No, sir."

"She's very popular, in the gay set. A beauty! At the Casino we call her 'Little Goldie'."

His whole expression suddenly changed. His eyes began to gleam, with joyful gluttony. The congested redness of his cheeks grew deeper, and he turned round, stroking his beard and straightening up his top-hat with the vanity of a fool who thinks people are admiring him.

The long, sharp trilling of electric bells announced that the second act was about to begin. Everybody began crowding back into the theater; and now, in the solitude of the foyer, the bust of Gayarre seemed higher.

Don Manuel exclaimed:

"Come along with me. I'll introduce you to Alicia."

Don Manuel noticed the student's dismayed look, and added:

"That's all right about your not having a dress-suit on. You can stay in the rear of the box."

He started off with a firm step, trying to a.s.sume the ease and grace of youth. Enrique followed him without a word. He felt both happy and afraid.

They reached the outer box, that Don Manuel judged good enough for the young fellow. The deputy murmured:

"This is all right, isn't it? I'll see you later. You can see everything, here."

Enrique made no answer. The play was already going on, and in the religious stillness of the theater the chorus of the piece was rising in triumphal harmony. It was one of those pleasant Italian operas, freighted for all of us with memories of youth. Darles ventured to raise one of the heavy curtains just a little, that shut the outer box off from the inner one. A young woman was sitting there, with her back to him and her elbows on the railing of the box. She was all in white. He could see the tempting outlines of her firm hips, beneath the childish insufficiency of her girdle. Her shoulders were plump and of flawless perfection. On the snow of her bare neck her blonde hair, tinged with red, shadowed tawny reflections. Two splendid emeralds trembled, green as drops of absinthe, in the rosy lobes of her small, fine ears.

Don Manuel was beside her. Darles noted that Alicia and the deputy had very little to say to each other. Suddenly she turned her head with an inquisitive air, graceful and fascinating; and the student received full in the eyes the shock of two large, green, luminous pupils--living emeralds, indeed. Her scrutiny of him was short, searching and curious; it changed to an expression of scorn.