Confessions Of Con Cregan Part 75

How is a craft like this ever to take the sea, thought I, with misery and mutiny everywhere! With six feet of water in the hold, the crew are turning out for higher wages, and ready to throw overboard the man who counsels them to put a hand to the pump!

But what had I to do with all this? Nor would I allude to it here, save to mention the straits and difficulties which beset me, to account for changes that I had never antic.i.p.ated.

We dined everywhere, from that viceregal palace in a swamp, to the musty halls of the Chief Secretary in the Castle. We partook of a civic feast, a picnic at the waterfall; we had one day with the military! And here, by the way, I recognized an old acquaintance of other days, the Hon.

Captain De Courcy. He was still on the staff, and still constant to his ancient flame, who, with a little higher complexion and more profuse ringlets,--it is strange how color and hair go on increasing with years,--looked pretty much what I remembered her of yore.

"You had better wait for your groom, Mons. Le Comte," said De Courcy to me at the review, as I was dismounting to speak to some people in the crowd of carriages. "Don't trust those fellows. I once had a valuable mare stolen by one of those vagrants, and, what was worse, the rascal rode her at a steeplechase the same day."

"Pas possible!" exclaimed I, at the bare thought of such an indignity.

"What became of the young villain?"

"I forget, now, whether I let him off, or whether he was publicly whipped; but I am certain he never came to good."

I felt a flush of anger rise to my cheek at this speech, but I checked my pa.s.sion; and well I might, as I thought upon my _own_ condition and upon _his_. To have expended any interest or sympathy as to the boy, besides, would have been absurd, and I was silent. Among our invitations, was one to the house of a baronet who resided in a midland county, only a few miles from my native place. We arrived at night at Knockdangan Castle, an edifice of modern gothic style, which means a marvellously expensive residence, rendered almost uninhabitable by the necessity of having winding stairs, narrow corridors, low ceilings, and pointed windows. The house was full of company, the greater part of whom had arrived unexpectedly; still, our reception was everything that genial hospitality could dictate. One of the drawing-rooms had been already converted into a kind of barrack-room, with half-a-dozen beds in it; and now the library was to be devoted to the Prince, while a small octagon tower leading off it, about the size and shape of a tea-tray, was reserved for me. If these arrangements were attended with inconvenience, certainly nothing in the manner of either host or hostess showed it. They and their numerous family of sons and daughters seemed to take it as the most natural thing in life to be thrown into disorder to accommodate their friends; not alone their friends, but their friends' friends: for so proved more than half of the present company.

Several of "the boys," meaning the sons of the host, slept at houses in the neighborhood; we actually bivouacked in a little temple in the garden. There seemed no limit to the contrivances of our kind entertainers, either in the variety of the plans for pleasure, or the hearty good-nature with which they concurred in any suggestion of the guests. All that Spanish politeness expresses, as a phrase, was here reduced to actual practice. Everything was at the disposal of the stranger. Not alone was he at liberty to ride, drive, fish, shoot, hunt, boat, or course at will, but all his hours were at his own disposal, and his liberty unfettered, even as to whether he dined in his own apartment, or joined the general company. Nothing that the most courteous attention could provide was omitted, at the same time that the most ample freedom was secured to all. Here, too, was found a tone of cultivation that would have graced the most polished society of any European capital. Foreign languages were well understood and spoken; music practised in its higher walks; drawing cultivated with a skill rarely seen out of the hands of professed masters; subjects of politics and general literature were discussed with a knowledge and a liberality that bespoke the highest degree of enlightenment; while to all these gifts the general warmth of native character lent an indescribable charm of kindliness and cordiality that left none a stranger who spent even twelve hours beneath their roof.

The Prince was in ecstasies with everything and every one, and he himself no less a favorite with all. Every fall he got in hunting made him more popular; every misadventure that occurred to him, in trying to conform to native tastes, gave a new grace and charm to his character.

The ladies p.r.o.nounced him "a love," and the men, in less polished, but not less hearty, encomium, called him "a devilish good fellow for a Frenchman."

The habits I have already alluded to, of each guest living exactly how he pleased, gave a continual novelty to the company; sometimes two or three new faces would appear at the dinner-table or in the drawing-room, and conjecture was ever at work whether the last arrivals had been yet seen, and who were they who presented themselves at table?

"You will meet two new guests to-day, Count," said the host one day, as we entered the drawing-room before dinner: "a Spanish Bishop and his niece,--a very charming person, and a widow of nineteen! They came over to Ireland about some disputed question of property,--being originally Irish by family,--and are now, I regret to say, about to return to Spain in a few days. Hitherto a severe cold has confined the Bishop to his chamber; and his niece, not being, I fancy, a proficient in any but her native language, had not courage to face a miscellaneous party. They will both, however, favor us to-day; and as you are the only one here who can command the 'true Castilian tongue,' you will take the Countess in to dinner."

I bowed my acknowledgments, not sorry to have the occasion of displaying my Spanish and playing the agreeable to my fair countrywoman.

The drawing-room each day before dinner had no other light than that afforded by a great fire of bog deal, which, although diffusing a rich and ruddy glow over all who sat within the circle around it, left the remainder of the apartment in comparative darkness; and few, except those very intimate, were able to recognize each other in the obscurity.

Whether this was a whim of the host, or a pardonable artifice to make the splendor of the well-lighted dinner-table more effective, on the principle of orators, who begin at a whisper to create silence, I know not, but we used to jest over the broken shins and upset spider tables that each day announced the entrance of some guest less familiarized to the geography of the apartment.

On this particular occasion the party was unusually large; possibly a certain curiosity to see the new guests had added to the number, while some of the neighboring families were also present. Various were the new names announced; and at last came the Bishop, with the lady of the house upon his arm, the young widow following with one of the daughters of the house. I could only distinguish a very white head, with a small black skull-cap, a stooping figure, and a great gold cross, which, I concluded, represented the holy man; something in black, with a very long veil descending from the back of her head, being as evidently the niece.

A few formal introductions were gone through in clever pantomime, dinner was announced, and the company paired off in all stateliness, while the host, seizing my arm, led me across the room, and in a few words presented me to the fair widow, who courtesied, and accepted my arm, and away we marched in that solemn procession by which people endeavor to thaw the ice of first acquaintance.

"Your first visit to Ireland, I believe, Senhora?" said I, in Spanish, wishing to say something as we walked along.

"Yes, Senhor, and yours also, I understand?" replied she.

"Not exactly," muttered I, taken too suddenly to recover myself; "when I was a boy, a mere child--" I here by accident employed a Mexican word almost synonymous with the French "gamin." She started, and said eagerly, "How! you have been in Mexico?"

"Yes, Senhora, I have pa.s.sed some years in that country."

"I am a Mexican," cried she, delightedly. "Tell me, where have you traveiled, and whom did you know there?"

"I have travelled a good deal, but scarcely knew any one," replied I.

"At Guajuaqualla--"

"Oh, were you there? My own neighborhood,--my home," exclaimed she, fervidly.

"Then probably you know Don Estaban Olares," said I.

"My own father!"

I turned round; our eyes met; it was just at the very entrance of the dinner-room, where a blaze of light was shed on everything, and there upon my arm--her hand trembling, her cheek colorless, and her eyes swimming in tears--was Donna Maria! Neither of us spoke, neither of us could speak!--and while her eyes wandered from my face to the several decorations I wore upon my breast, and I watched with agonizing intensity the look of terror she threw down the table towards the place where her uncle was seated, I with a small black skull-cap, a stooping figure, and a great gold cross, which, I concluded, represented the holy man; something in black, with a very long veil descending from the back of her head, being as evidently the niece.

A few formal introductions were gone through in clever pantomime, dinner was announced, and the company paired off in all stateliness, while the host, seizing my arm, led me across the room, and in a few words presented me to the fair widow, who courtesied, and accepted my arm, and away we marched in that solemn procession by which people endeavor to thaw the ice of first acquaintance.

"Your first visit to Ireland, I believe, Senhora?" said I, in Spanish, wishing to say something as we walked along.

"Yes, Senhor, and yours also, I understand?" replied she.

"Not exactly," muttered I, taken too suddenly to recover myself; "when I was a boy, a mere child--"I here by accident employed a Mexican word almost synonymous with the French "gamin." She started, and said eagerly, "How! you have been in Mexico?"

"Yes, Senhora, I have pa.s.sed some years in that country."

"I am a Mexican," cried she, delightedly. "Tell me, where have you traveiled, and whom did you know there?"

"T have travelled a good deal, but scarcely knew any one," replied I.

"At Guajuaqualla--"

"Oh, were you there? My own neighborhood,-my home," exclaimed she, fervidly.

"Then probably you know Don Estaban Olares," said I.

"My own father!"

I turned round; our eyes met; it was just at the very entrance of the dinner-room, where a blaze of light was shed on everything, and there upon my arm--her hand trembling, her cheek colorless, and her eyes swimming in tears--was Donna Maria! Neither of us spoke, neither of us could speak!--and while her eyes wandered from my face to the several decorations I wore upon my breast, and I watched with agonizing intensity the look of terror she threw down the table towards the place where her uncle was seated, I saw plainly that some painful mystery was struggling within her mind.

"Do not let my uncle recognize you," said she, in a low whisper; "he is not likely to do so, for both his sight and hearing are much impaired."

"But why should I not claim him as an old acquaintance, if not a friend, Senhora, if he be the same Fra Miguel?"

"Hush! be cautious," cried she; "I will tell you all tomorrow,--to-night, if there be a fitting opportunity. Let us talk of something else, or we shall be remarked."

I tried my best to obey her, but I fear my attempt was a poor one; I was able, however, to listen to her with a certain amount of composure, and, while doing so, to remark how much she had improved in grace and beauty since we met. Years had developed the charms which girlhood then but shadowed forth, and in the full and liquid softness of her dark and long-lashed eyes, and the playful delicacy of her mouth, I saw how a consciousness of fascination had served to lend new powers of pleasing.

She spoke to me of her widowhood without any affectation of feeling grieved or sorry. So long as Don Geloso had lived, her existence had been like that of a nun in a cloister; he was too jealous to suffer her to go into the world, and, save at the Court Chapel each morning and evening, she never saw anything of that brilliant society in which her equals were moving. When her uncle was created Bishop of Seville, she removed to that city to visit him, and had never seen her husband after.

Such, in few words, was the story of a life, whose monotony would have broken the spirit of any nature less buoyant and elastic than her own.

Don Estaban was dead; and of him she spoke with deep and affectionate feeling; betraying besides that her own lot was rendered almost a friendless one by the bereavement.

That same evening, as we walked through the rooms, examining pictures and ancient armor, of which our host was somewhat vain, I learned the secret to which the Senhora had alluded at table, and divesting which of all the embarra.s.sment the revelation occasioned herself, was briefly this: The Fra, who had never, for some reasons of his own, either liked or trusted me, happened to discover some circ.u.mstances of my earlier adventures in Texas, and even traced me in my rambles to the night of my duel with the Ranchero. Hence he drew the somewhat rash and ungenerous conclusion that my character was not so unimpeachable as I affected, and that my veracity was actually open to question! An active correspondence had taken place between Don Geloso and himself about me, in which the former, after great researches, p.r.o.nounced that no n.o.ble family of my name had existed in Old Spain, and that, in plain fact, I was nothing better than an impostor! In this terrible delusion the old gentleman died; but so fearful was he of the bare possibility of injuring one in whose veins flowed the pure blood of Castile that on his death-bed he besought the Bishop to ascertain the fact to a certainty, and not to desist in the investigation till he had traced me to my birth, parentage, and country. Upon this condition he had bequeathed all his fortune to the Church, and not alone all his own wealth, but all Donna Maria's also.

The Bishop's visit to Ireland, therefore, had no other object than to look for my baptismal certificate,--an investigation, I need scarcely say, somewhat difficult and intricate!

Of course, in this confession, the fair Contessa never hesitated to regard me as an injured and calumniated individual; but so a.s.sured was she of the Bishop's desire to endow the Church with her wealth that he would have less brooked to discover me a n.o.ble of t.i.tle and rank indisputable, than to find me a poor and ign.o.ble adventurer. "Were he but to recognize you," said she, "I should be condemned to a nunnery for life!" and this terror, however little startling to _my_ ears, had too much of significance to _her_ mind to be undervalued.

Of course my present position, the companionship of me Prince, the foreign orders I wore, were more than sufficient to accredit me to her as anything I pleased to represent myself; but somehow I felt little inclination for that vein of fiction in which so often and so largely I had indulged! For the first time in my life I regarded this flow of invention as a treachery! and, when pressed by her to relate the full story of my life, I limited myself to that period which, beginning with my African campaign, brought me down to the moment of telling I was in love. Such is the simple solution of the mystery; nor can I cite a more convincing evidence of the enn.o.bling nature of the pa.s.sion than that it made me, such as I was, tenacious of the truth.

Every succeeding day brought me into closer intimacy with the Senhora, and taught me more and more to value her for other graces than those of personal beauty. The seclusion in which she had pa.s.sed her last few years had led her to cultivate her mind by a course of study such as few Spanish women ever think of, and which gave an almost serious character to a nature of more than childlike buoyancy. We talked of her own joyous land, to which she seemed longing to return, and of our first meeting beside the "Rio Colloredo," and then of our next meeting on her own marriage-day; and she wondered where, if ever, we should see each other again! The opportunity was not to be lost. I pressed her hand to my lips, and asked her never to leave me! I told her that, for me, country had no ties,--that I had neither home nor kindred. I would at that moment have confessed everything, even to my humble birth! I pledged myself to live with her amidst the sierras of the Far West, or, if she liked better, in some city of the Old World. I told her that I was rich, and that I needed not that wealth of which her uncle's covetousness would rob her. In fact, I said a great deal that was true; and when I added anything that was not so, it was simply as painters introduce a figure with a "bit of red," to heighten the landscape. I will not weary my _fair_ reader with all the little doubts, and hesitations, and fears, so natural for her to experience and express; nor will I tire my male companion by saying how I combated each in turn. Love, like a lawsuit, has but one ritual. First comes the declaration,--usually a pretty unintelligible piece of business, in either case; then come the "affidavits," the sworn depositions; then follow the cross-examinations; after which, the charge and the verdict. In my case it was a favorable one, and I was almost out of my senses with delight.

[Ill.u.s.tration: final ]