The Spanish Brothers Part 46

"How long in thralldom's grasp I lay I knew not; for my soul was black, And knew no change of night or day."--Campbell.

Carlos was sleeping tranquilly in his dungeon on the following night, when the opening of the door aroused him. He started with sickening dread, the horrors of the torture-room rising in an instant before his imagination. Benevidio entered, followed by Herrera, and commanded him to rise and dress immediately. Long experience of the Santa Casa had taught him that he might as well make an inquiry of its doors and walls as of any of its officials. So he obeyed in silence, and slowly and painfully enough. But he was soon relieved from his worst fear by seeing Herrera fold together the few articles of clothing he had been allowed to have with him, preparatory to carrying them away. "It is only, then, a change of prison," he thought; "and wherever they bring me, heaven will be equally near."

His limbs, enfeebled by two years of close confinement, and lame from the effects of one terrible night, were sorely tried by what he thought an almost interminable walk through corridors and down narrow winding stairs. But at last he was conducted to a small postern door, which, greatly to his surprise, Benevidio proceeded to unlock. The kind-hearted Herrera took advantage of the moment when Benevidio was thus occupied to whisper,--

"We are bringing you to the Dominican prison, senor; you will be better used there."

Carlos thanked him by a grateful look and a pressure of the hand. But an instant afterwards he had forgotten his words. He had forgotten everything save that he stood once more in G.o.d's free air, and that G.o.d's own boundless heaven, spangled with ten thousand stars, was over him, no dungeon roof between. For one rapturous moment he gazed upwards, thanking G.o.d in his heart. But the fresh air he breathed seemed to intoxicate him like strong wine. He grew faint, and leaned for support on Herrera.

"Courage, senor; it is not far--only a few paces," said the under-gaoler, kindly.

Weak as he was, Carlos wished the distance a hundred times greater. But it proved quite long enough for his strength. By the time he was delivered over into the keeping of a couple of lay brothers, and locked by them into a cell in the Dominican monastery, he was scarcely conscious of anything save excessive fatigue.

The next morning was pretty far advanced before any one came to him; but at last he was honoured with a visit from the prior himself. He said frankly, and with perfect truth,--

"I am glad to find myself in your hands, my lord."

To one accustomed to feel himself an object of terror, it is a new and pleasant sensation to be trusted. Even a wild beast will sometimes spare the weak but fearless creature that ventures to play with it: and Don Fray Ricardo was not a wild beast; he was only a stern, narrow, conscientious man, the willing and efficient agent of a terrible system.

His brow relaxed visibly as he said,--

"I have always sought your true good, my son."

"I am well aware of it, father."

"And you must acknowledge," the prior resumed, "that great forbearance and lenity have been shown towards you. But your infatuation has been such that you have deliberately and persistently sought your own ruin.

You have resisted the wisest arguments, the gentlest persuasions, and that with an obstinacy which time and discipline seem only to increase.

And now at last, as another Auto-da-fe may not be celebrated for some time, my Lord Vice-Inquisitor-General, justly incensed at your contumacy, would fain have thrown you into one of the underground dungeons, where, believe me, you would not live a month. But I have interceded for you."

"I thank your kindness, my lord. But I cannot see that it matters much how you deal with me now. Sooner or later, in one form or other, it must be death; and I thank G.o.d it can be no more."

While a man might count twenty, the prior looked silently in that steadfast sorrowful young face. Then he said,--

"My son, do not yield to despair; for I come to thee this day with a message of hope. I have also made intercession for thee with the Supreme Council of the Holy Office; and I have succeeded in obtaining from that august tribunal a great and unusual grace."

Carlos looked up, a sudden flush on his cheek. He hoped this unusual grace might be permission to see some familiar face ere he died; but the prior's next words disappointed him. Alas! it was only the offer of escape from death on terms that he might not accept. And yet such an offer really deserved the name the prior gave it--a great and unusual grace. For, as has been already intimated, by the laws of the Inquisition at that time in force, the man who had _once_ professed heretical doctrines, however sincerely he might have retracted them, was doomed to die. His penitence would procure him the favour of absolution--the mercy of the garotte instead of the stake; that was all.

The prior went on to explain to Carlos, that upon the ground of his youth, and the supposition that he had been led into error by others, his judges had consented to show him singular favour. "Moreover," he added, "there are other reasons for this course of action, upon which it would be needless, and might be inexpedient, to enter at present; but they have their weight, especially with me. For the preservation, therefore, both of your soul and your body--upon which I take more compa.s.sion than you do yourself--I have, in the first place, obtained permission to remove you to a more easy and more healthful confinement, where, besides other favours, you will enjoy the great privilege of a companion, constant intercourse with whom can scarcely fail to benefit you."

Carlos thought this last a doubtful boon; but as it was kindly intended, he was bound to be grateful. He thanked the prior accordingly; adding, "May I be permitted to ask the name of this companion?"

"You will probably find out ere long, if you conduct yourself so as to deserve it,"--an answer Carlos found so enigmatical, that after several vain endeavours to comprehend it, he gave up the task in despair, and not without some apprehension that his long imprisonment had dulled his perceptions. "Amongst us he is called Don Juan," the prior continued.

"And this much I will tell you. He is a very honourable person, who had many years ago the great misfortune to be led astray by the same errors to which you cling with such obstinacy. G.o.d was pleased, however, to make use of my poor instrumentality to lead him back to the bosom of the Church. He is now a true and sincere penitent, diligent in prayer and penance, and heartily detesting his former evil ways. It is my last hope for you that his wise and faithful counsels may bring you to the same mind."

Carlos did not particularly like the prospect. He feared that this vaunted penitent would prove a noisy apostate, who would seek to obtain the favour of the monks by vilifying his former a.s.sociates. Nor, on the other hand, did he think it honest to accept without protest kindnesses offered him on the supposition that he might even yet be induced to recant. He said,--

"I ought to tell you, senor, that my mind will never change, G.o.d helping me. Rather than lead you to imagine otherwise, I would go at once to the darkest cell in the Triana. My faith is based on the Word of G.o.d, which can never be overthrown."

"The penitent of whom I speak used such words as these, until G.o.d and Our Lady opened his eyes. Now he sees all things differently. So will you, if G.o.d is pleased to give you the inestimable benefit of his divine grace; for it is not of him that willeth, nor of him that runneth, but of G.o.d that showeth mercy," said the Dominican, who, like others of his order, ingeniously managed to combine strong predestinarian theories with the creed of Rome.

"That is most true, senor," Carlos responded.

"But to resume," said the prior; "for I have yet more to say. Should you be favoured with the grace of repentance, I am authorized to hold out to you a well-grounded hope, that, in consideration of your youth, your life may even yet be spared."

"And then, if I were strong enough, I might live out ten or twenty years--like the last two," Carlos answered, not without a touch of bitterness.

"It is not so, my son," returned the prior mildly. "I cannot promise, indeed, under any circ.u.mstances, to restore you to the world. For that would be to promise what could not be performed; and the laws of the Holy Office expressly forbid us to delude prisoners with false hopes.[#]

But this much I will say, your restraint shall be rendered so light and easy, that your position will be preferable to that of many a monk, who has taken the vows of his own free will. And if you like the society of the penitent of whom I spoke anon, you shall continue to enjoy it."

[#] But these laws were often broken or evaded.

Carlos began to feel a somewhat unreasonable antipathy to this penitent, whose face he had never seen. But what mattered the antipathies of a prisoner of the Holy Office? He only said, "Permit me again to thank you, my lord, for the kindness you have shown me. Though my fellow-men cast out my name as evil, and deny me my share of G.o.d's free air and sky, and my right to live in his world, I still take thankfully every word or deed of pity and gentleness they give me by the way. For they know not what they do."

The prior turned away, but turned back again a moment afterwards, to ask--what for the credit of his humanity he ought to have asked a year before--"Do you stand in need of any thing? or have you any request you wish to make?"

Carlos hesitated a moment. Then he said, "Of things with in your power to grant, my lord, there is but one that I care to ask. Two brethren of the Society of Jesus visited me the day before yesterday. I spoke hastily to one of them, who was named Fray Isodor, I think. Had I the opportunity, I should be glad to offer him my hand."

"Now, of all mysterious things in heaven or earth," said the prior, "a heretic's conscience is the most difficult to comprehend. Truly you strain at a gnat and swallow a camel. But as for Fray Isodor, you may rest content. For good and sufficient reasons, he cannot visit you here. But I will repeat to him what you have said. And I know well that his own tongue is a sharp weapon enough when used in the defence of the faith."

The prior withdrew; and shortly afterwards one of the monks appeared, and silently conducted Carlos to a cell, or chamber, in the highest story of the building. Like the cells in the Triana, it had two doors--the outer one secured by strong bolts and bars, the inner one furnished with an aperture through which food or other things could be pa.s.sed.

But here the resemblance ceased. Carlos found himself, on entering, in what seemed to him more like a hall than a cell; though, indeed, it must be remembered that his eye was accustomed to ten feet square. It was furnished as comfortably as any room needed to be in that warm climate; and it was tolerably clean, a small mercy which he noted with no small grat.i.tude. Best perhaps of all, it had a good window, looking down on the courtyard, but strongly barred, of course. Near the window was a table, upon which stood an ivory crucifix, and a picture of the Madonna and child.

But even before his eye took in all these objects, it turned to the penitent, whose companions.h.i.+p had been granted him as so great a boon.

He was utterly unlike all that he had expected. Instead of a fussy, noisy pervert, he saw a serene and stately old man, with long white hair and beard, and still, clearly chiselled, handsome features. He was dressed in a kind of mantle, of a nondescript colour, made like a monk's cowl without the hood, and bearing two large St. Andrew's crosses, one on the breast and the other on the back; in fact, it was a compromised sanbenito.

As Carlos entered, he rose (showing a tall, spare figure, slightly stooped), and greeted his new companion with a courteous and elaborate bow, but did not speak.

Shortly afterwards, food was handed through the aperture in the door; and the half-starved prisoner from the Triana sat down with his fellow-captive to what he esteemed a really luxurious repast. He had intended to be silent until obliged to speak, but the aspect and bearing of the penitent quite disarranged his preconceived ideas. During the meal, he tried once and again to open a conversation by some slight courteous observation.

All in vain. The penitent did the honours of the table like a prince in disguise, and never failed to bow and answer, "Yes, senor," or "No, senor," to everything Carlos said. But he seemed either unable or unwilling to do more.

As the day wore on, this silence grew oppressive to Carlos; and he marvelled increasingly at his companion's want of ordinary interest in him, or curiosity about him. Until at length a probable solution of the mystery dawned upon his mind. As he considered the penitent an agent of the monks deputed to convert him, very likely the penitent, on his side, regarded him in the light of a spy commissioned to watch his proceedings.

But this, if it was true at all, was only a small part of the truth.

Carlos failed to take into account the terrible effect of long years of solitude, crus.h.i.+ng down all the faculties of the mind and heart. It is told of some monastery, where the rules were so severe that the brethren were only allowed to converse with each other during one hour in the week, that they usually sat for that hour in perfect silence: they had nothing to say. So it was with the penitent of the Dominican convent.

He had nothing to say, nothing to ask; curiosity and interest were dead within him--dead long ago, of absolute starvation.

Yet Carlos could not help observing him with a strange kind of fascination. His face was too still, too coldly calm, like a white marble statue; and yet it was a n.o.ble face. It was, although not a thoughtful face, the face of a thoughtful man asleep. It did not lack expressiveness, though it lacked expression. Moreover, there was in it a look that awakened dim, undefined memories--shadowy things, that fled away like ghosts whenever he tried to grasp them, yet persistently rose again, and mingled with all his thoughts.

He told himself many times that he had never seen the man before. Was it, then, an accidental likeness to some familiar face that so fixed and haunted him? Certainly there was something which belonged to his past, and which, even while it perplexed and baffled, strangely soothed and pleased him.

At each of the canonical hours (which were announced to them by the tolling of the convent bells), the penitent did not fail to kneel before the crucifix, and, with the aid of a book and a rosary, to read or repeat long Latin prayers, in a half audible voice. He retired to rest early, leaving his fellow-prisoner supremely happy in the enjoyment of his lamp and his Book of Hours. For it was two years since the eyes of the once enthusiastic young scholar had rested on a printed page, or since the kindly gleam of lamp or fire had cheered his solitude. The privilege of refres.h.i.+ng his memory with the pa.s.sages of Scripture contained in the Romish book of devotion now appeared an unspeakable boon to him. And although, accustomed as he was to a life of unbroken monotony, the varied impressions of the day had produced extreme weariness of mind and body, it was near midnight before he could prevail upon himself to close the volume, and lie down to rest on the comfortable pallet prepared for him.

He was just falling asleep, when the midnight bell tolled out heavily.

He saw his companion rise, throw his mantle over his shoulders, and betake himself to his devotions. How long these lasted he could not tell, for the stately kneeling figure soon mingled with his dreams--strange dreams of Juan as a penitent, dressed in a sanbenito, and with white hair and an old man's face, kneeling devoutly before the altar in the church at Nuera, but reciting one of the songs of the Cid instead of _De Profundis_.