Caesar or Nothing Part 49

"To the Espana!"

"Whose coach is this one?" asked Caesar, pointing to the less dirty of the two.

"The Comercio's."

"All right, then we are going to the Comercio."

The coach, in spite of being the better of the two, was a rickety, worn-out old omnibus, with its windows broken and spotted. It was drawn by three skinny mules, full of galls. Caesar and Alzugaray got in and waited. The coachman, with the whip around his neck, and a young man who looked a bit like a seminarian, began to chat and smoke.

At the end of five minutes' waiting, Caesar asked:

"Well, aren't we going?"

"In a moment, sir."

The moment stretched itself out a good deal. A priest arrived, so fat that he would have filled the vehicle all alone; then a woman from the town with a basket, which she held on her knees; then the postman got in with his bag; the driver closed the little window in the coach door, and continued joking with the young man who looked a bit like a seminarian and with one of the station men.

"We are in a hurry," said Alzugaray.

"We are going now, sir. All right. Good-bye!"

"Good-bye!" answered the station man and the seminarian.

The driver got up on his seat, cracked his whip, and the vehicle began to move, with a noisy swaying and a trembling of all its wood and gla.s.s.

A very thick cloud of dust arose in the road.

"Ya, ya, Coronela!" yelled the driver. "Why do you keep getting where you oughtn't to get? d.a.m.n the mule! Montesina, I am going to give you a couple of whacks. Get on there, Coronela! Get up, get up.... All right!

All right!... That's enough.... That's enough.... Let it alone, now! Let it alone, now!"

"What an amount of oratory that man is wasting," exclaimed Caesar; "he must think that the mules are going to go better for the efforts of his throat. It would be an advantage if he had stronger beasts, instead of these dying ones."

The other travellers paid no attention to his observation, and Alzugaray said:

"These drivers drip oratory."

While the shabby coach was going along the highway which encircles Castro hill, to the sound of the bells and the cracking of the whip, it was possible to remain seated in the vehicle with comparative ease; but on reaching the town's first steep, crooked, rough-cobbled street, the swinging and tossing were such that the travellers kept falling one upon another.

The first street kept getting rapidly narrower, and as it grew narrower, the crags in its paving were sharper and more prominent. At the highest part of the street, in the middle, stood a two-wheeled cart blocking the way. The coachman got down, from his seat and started a long discussion with the carter, as to who was under obligations to make way.

"What idiots!" exclaimed Caesar, irritated; then, calmer, he murmured, addressing Alzugaray, "The truth is, these people don't care about doing anything but talk."

As the discussion between the coachman and the carter gave signs of never ending, Caesar said:

"Come along," and then, addressing the man with the bag, he asked him, "Is it far from here to the inn?"

"No; it is right here, in the house where the cafe is." THE INN

Sure enough, the inn was only a step away. They went into the damp, dark entrance, up the crooked stairs, and down the corridor to the kitchen.

"Good morning, good morning!" they shouted.

n.o.body appeared.

"Might it be on the second floor?" asked Alzugaray.

"Let's go see."

They went up to the next floor, entered by a gallery of red brick, which was falling to pieces, and called several times. An old woman, from inside a dark bedroom where she was sweeping, bade them go down to the dining-room, where she would bring them breakfast.

The dining-room had balconies toward the country, and was full of sun; the bedrooms they were taken to, on the other hand, were dark, gloomy, and cavernous. Alzugaray requested the old woman to show them the other vacant chambers, and chose two on the second floor, which were lighter and airier.

The old woman told them she hadn't wanted to take them there, because there was no paper on the walls.

"No doubt, in Castro, the prospect of bed-bugs is an agreeable prospect," said Caesar.

After he had washed and dressed, Caesar started out to find and capture Don Calixto, and Alzugaray went to take a stroll around the town. It was agreed that they should each explore the region in his own way.

II. CASTRO DURO

THE MORNING

In these severe old Castilian towns there is one hour of ideal peace and serenity. That is the early morning. The c.o.c.ks are still crowing, the sound of the church bells is scattered on the air, and the sun begins to penetrate into the streets in gusts of light. The morning is a flood of charity that falls upon the yellowish town.

The sky is blue, the air limpid, pure, and diaphanous; the transparent atmosphere scarcely admits effects of perspective, and its ethereal ma.s.s makes the outlines of the houses, of the belfries, of the eaves, vibrate. The cold breeze plays at the cross-streets, and amuses itself by twisting the stems of the geraniums and pinks that flame on the balconies. Everywhere there is an odour of cistus and of burning broom, which comes from the ovens where the bread is baked, and an odour of lavender that comes from the house entries.

The town yawns and awakes; some priests pa.s.s, on their way to church; pious women come out of their houses; and market men and women begin to arrive from the villages nearby. The bells make that _tilin-talan_ so sad, which seems confined to these dead towns. In the main street the shops open; a boy hangs up the dresses, the sandals, the caps, on the facade, reaching them up with a stick. Droves of mules are seen in front of the grain-shops; some charcoal-burners go by, selling charcoal; and peasant women lead, by their halters, little burros loaded with jars and pans.

One hears all the hawksters' cries, all the clatter characteristic of that town. The milk-vendor, the honey-vendor, the chestnut-vendor, each has his own traditional theme. The candlestick-maker produces a sonorous peal from two copper candlesticks, the scissors-grinder whistles on his flute....

Then, at midday, hawksters and peasants disappear, the sun shines hotter, and the afternoon is tiresome and enervating.

FROM THE MIRADERO

Castro Duro is situated on a hill of red earth.

One goes up to the town by a dusty highway, with the remains of little trees which one Europeanizing mayor planted, and which all died; or else by zigzag paths, up which saddle-animals and beasts of burden usually go.

From the plain Castro Duro stands out in silhouette against the sky, between two high, many-sided edifices, one of a honey yellow, old and respectable, the church; the other white, overgrown, modern, the prison.

These two pillars of society are conspicuous from all sides, from whatsoever point on the plain one looks at Castro Duro.