Poor Folk in Spain Part 17

"Well, fifty-five pesetas. Not a penny less and no more bargaining."

Jan, to cut the scene short, agreed. The instrument was wrapped up in a paper bag. While Jan was paying over the money, Blas said:

"And you will give five pesetas to this gentleman, who is a poor man: and five pesetas to me also."

He seized five pesetas of the money from the counter and pressed them on the little Professor. The latter, with girlish giggles, refused; but Blas, with the insistence of a drunkard, pressed his desire until, to quieten him, the little Professor slipped the money into his waistcoat pocket. Blas then demanded his own commission, saying that as he had been Jan's Professor, and as Jan had once mentioned the subject of the laud to him, he was fully ent.i.tled to his claim. But Jan, outwardly calm, inwardly annoyed with Blas, would not give him a halfpenny. At last Blas was begging:

"Well, at least give me a peseta to get a drink with."

"You have had enough drink already," said Jan.

He picked up the laud, and with farewells to Emilio, his wife and the little Professor we walked out of the shop, pushing our way through the crowd which had gathered at the shop door.

On the following day we returned to Emilio's shop to apologize for the contretemps. We found both Emilio and his wife very disturbed by what had happened. They said that their regrets were eternal, and that it would have been better had we deferred the business matter until a better occasion.

"It was a disgraceful affair," said Emilio, "disgraceful; and to cap it all, after you had gone, Blas was most outrageous. We had actually to pay him two pesetas to go away."

"We were afraid for our lives," said Mrs. Emilio. "He is a bad man, and one never knows what rogues he might have brought upon us."

Though Jan did not believe much in the active danger of Blas, yet the terror of Emilio and of his wife was quite evident. So in the end he disbursed the five pesetas given to the little Professor as well as the two given to Blas. So that our laud actually cost us sixty-two pesetas, instead of the sixty for which we might have bought it without any bargaining.

With the little Professor we had made an engagement for the afternoon.

He was to give me a lesson on which I could study while we were away at Jijona. He came, feeling his way up our staircase. He shook hands with us and said that the affair of last night had greatly oppressed his spirit.

"I felt it much in my heart," he said.

We explained to him that we were going away for a month, but that we would return to Murcia later, and that when we returned I would take lessons from him.

"My price," he exclaimed (all his speech was exclamation), "is one duro a month. I am not one of those villains who charge one price to one person and a different price to another. No, my price is fixed and unalterable. One duro, five pesetas, a month."

Now, although this little man was probably as good a teacher as could be found in the town of Murcia, his price averaged about _twopence a lesson_.

We discovered later that the laud suffers not only from a ban of "bad taste," but also from a moral one. To-day its use in Spain is almost limited to the playing of dance music in houses of bad fame.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 19: Lovers.]

CHAPTER XX

ALICANTE

Our second experience in Spanish village life was to be at Jijona, a small town in the country near Alicante. Our friend had what he called a studio there, and this was at our service. Luis said that there was furniture in the studio but no cooking utensils or bed. After our packing-case bed in Verdolay, we determined to take with us nothing but a mattress and either to sleep on the floor or to buy planks locally. So we had packed our trunk with painting materials, crockery and clothes.

We had also made up a large roll of bedclothes and mattress such as emigrants travel with. Having risen with the dawn, our preparations were complete by the time at which the donkeyman who peddled drinking-water about the streets of Murcia called for us with his long cart. He was not quite satisfied with our roll, and with expert hands repacked it in a professional manner. But his long water-cart would only take our trunk and the rolled mattress, so, burdened with rucksacks, camera, guitar, thermos flasks and a rush basket containing crockery which would not pack into the trunk, and the laud, we walked the quarter of a mile to the station. Thus burdened, we expected more staring and laughter than before from the Murcianos, but, to our amazement, the people looked upon us with kindly eyes and wished us G.o.d-speed. Thus Spain reverses the manner of England.

[Ill.u.s.tration]

Jan took his place in the ticket queue while I, a.s.sisted by a friendly porter, looked for seats in a third-cla.s.s carriage. The carriages were full enough despite the fact that we were in good time. Large numbers of children seemed to be travelling, and many of the pa.s.sengers were stretched out on the wooden seats, taking a snooze before the train should start. The divisions between the compartments were only breast high, and already animated conversations had begun between the pa.s.sengers who, from different compartments, shouted remarks to each other. In our compartment were a sandalled peasant stretched at full length, a bearded man with a huge bra.s.s plate on his breast and a shot-gun, evidently a gamekeeper, and a smart young man with patent leather boots and a straw hat. The last was reading a hook. On the platform we noted an important priest striding about, his black soutane covered with a silk dust-coat, and an old woman with a posy of bright flowers about twice as big as her head. The train was the centre of an excited crowd, the carriage full almost to bursting-point. As the time for departure came near most of those we had imagined to be our fellow pa.s.sengers got slowly down on to the platform; all the children disappeared. They had merely been taking advantage of the train's presence in the station to take a rest.

The three strokes on the bell, which denote the starting of the train, had sounded when our carriage door was flung open and a panting bundle of humanity was thrust upwards and amongst us. As the train moved out, it resolved itself into a small woman, very loquacious, carrying in her arms three babies. Talking very excitedly, she laid her brood out on a wooden seat. The woman was-black-haired and her jet eyes sparkled with excitement.

"They are bandits," she exclaimed. "Yes, bandits they are, rushing about like that. I was with my children in Uncle Pepe's donkey-cart. Then they come along. Of course the bullocks in the stone waggon in front wouldn't move quick enough, and so they come tearing across the road, flip us under the axle, and over we all go into the dust. Uncle Pepe strained his wrist and the shaft is broken. And that's the way they treat us just after my poor husband has died of smallpox. It's lucky that n.o.body was killed and that I didn't lose the train. Murderers, that's what they are."

We noted that she and her babies were covered with dust, and that she was dressed all in black even to her alpagatas. While she had been talking so volubly she had been unpacking a basket which, with the bundles, had been thrust in after her. She got out a bottle of water and a piece of rag. With a moistened rag she tried to wash the babies, but made rather a smeary mess of it. The occupants of the other compartments were leaning over sympathizing with her mishap. But, as she had omitted the cause of the mishap, somebody questioned her.

"Why, motors, of course," she snapped. "It's murderous the way they go rushing about. Not caring for any one, and not waiting to see what damage they have done."

As most of the carriage occupants seemed to be peasantry, they agreed with her. Somebody went on:

"And are those all you have?"

The young woman drew herself up with pride. "No," she answered, "I've got four, and all men too."

The train was rolling with a determined manner down the Murcian valley.

On one side the bills drew closer, on the other they were receding. We noted that all the carriage doors were left swinging wide open to admit as much air as possible. Presently there was a noise outside and the ticket-collector scrambled into the carriage. He examined all the tickets in our coach, and swung himself again out on to the footboard, making his way slowly forward. Some of the pa.s.sengers, too, who had friends in other carriages made visits _en route_, scrambling along the moving train. And the carriage doors had notices on them saying: "It is dangerous to put the head out of the window."

After an hour or more of sedate travel, we came to Orihuela, which boasts a huge monastery on the hill and a broad zigzag road which looked like an engineering feat. The station was like a flower shop. Vendors were running up and down the train thrusting elaborate bouquets into the windows. Some women dressed in royal blue satin came into our carriage, they stuffed unfortunate live poultry and rabbits, with feet tied up, under the seat and covered the wooden bench of the compartment with magnificent flowers. During the rest of the journey, the monotonous flip, click of their fans as they were opened and shut punctuated the conversation.

We pa.s.sed through the famous date palm groves of Elche and at last came in sight of the sea at Alicante, which was our terminus. The journey of about forty-five miles had taken us nearly four hours, and we were almost an hour and a half late. Time-tables are more or less ornamental in Spain.

Outside the station at Alicante there was a horde of omnibuses surrounded by a fringe of touts. They were conducting their chaffering for pa.s.sengers with a reasonable quietness, until they espied us. But perceiving that we were English and, therefore, fair prey, pandemonium broke out. Gradually the omnibuses filled and the babel, for babel it was, consisting of Spanish, Valenciano, bad French and worse English, died down. Two omnibus touts, however, persisted, and at last, in order to prevent battle between them, we chose our man for his looks. He promised to take us to the fonda from which started the motor service to Jijona.

We had been warned by our English friend that it was often difficult to get seats on the motor, because the conveyance started from Jijona and many of the pa.s.sengers booked return tickets. The omnibus tout added to this that there was a fiesta at Jijona, and that many people were going there. However, he said:

"If there are no seats in the motor, we will surely get them on the lorry, which will do just as well and is cheaper."

The omnibus was full with an unsmiling family, but we were crushed in.

We were dragged along beneath a magnificent avenue of date palm trees which bordered the deep blue expanse of the Mediterranean, and then into streets of modern and of bad architecture. The family got out and paid the driver. Jan strained his eyes to see how much was the price, for we had foolishly made no bargain with the driver. As far as he could see most was paid in coppers. We then pa.s.sed up into narrow and steep streets and halted before a wide door. The tout got down, but returned almost immediately, saying that the motor was full for two days.

"The motor-lorry is better," he said.

With some difficulty the bus was turned round in the narrow street and we went downhill again, coming at length to the entrance of another fonda. We pa.s.sed through its broad entrance and at a small office window interviewed an old man who said that there was room in the lorry but that he did not know when it was going. So we deposited our luggage in the wide entrance, amongst packing-cases, sacks of flour, mattresses and j.a.panned boxes. We then asked the price of the bus from the tout.

"Seven pesetas," he said.

The whole drive had not taken twenty minutes, and Jan was sure that the other family of four had not paid more than two pesetas for the lot.

After some argument and much blasphemy from the driver, we paid five pesetas, and the bus drove off vomiting curses at us from both driver and tout. (On the return journey from Jijona we happened on the same bus, but we made our bargain beforehand. The same trip then cost us two pesetas, and was accomplished with smiles instead of curses, and both driver and tout clapped us on the shoulder and wished us: "Vaya con dios.")

This fonda was a typical peasant inn. The entrance door which pierced through a block of buildings was big enough to admit a full-sized traction engine, had there been such a thing in Alicante. This wide pa.s.sage led into a big courtyard open to the skies. On each side of the courtyard a staircase led to balconies from which opened the doors of the bedrooms, below were the dark stables, and the courtyard itself was filled with the large two-wheeled tilted carts which, dragged by from two to eight draught animals, keep up communications in Spain wherever the railway does not penetrate. To the right of the entrance was the fonda restaurant, and also a huge kitchen with several cooking fires at which the traveller, if he wished, could cook his own meals, and a long dining-table at which he could eat them. We went into the restaurant, for we were hungry. To our table came an old couple. They were at once friendly and told us that they had come from Africa. They were Spanish but had lived more than thirty years in North Africa, and though the old man could neither read nor write he could speak several African dialects quite well. They were making a pleasure tour of the south of Spain for a short holiday. They told us that the fonda was quite clean, and that we could take a room in it without fear. They added that though Murcia was but "a dirty village" the fonda there had been clean also, but that at Guadix they had been eaten alive.

Our dinner finished, we sat ourselves down on a bench in the entrada and looked about us.

To one side of the entrance was a small stall which sold iced drinks.

Men and women were sitting in after-lunch ease amid the boxes and sacks which lined the opposite wall, on low chairs, or on the bench with us. A dog, shaved all over its body, partly because of the heat, partly to keep off the fleas with which all Spanish animals are infested, was asleep on our mattress. The proprietor of the fonda was standing in a lordly manner in the middle of the floor. He was dressed in white shirt and flannel trousers, and must have weighed almost sixteen stone, although quite young. He looked as if he had been inflated with air.