The Velvet Glove Part 20

"It is my old military cloak."

"And this is my wedding dress!" she said, with a breathless laugh. "And Perro is my bridesmaid."

They turned sharply to the left and in a moment stood on the deserted ramparts close under the shadow of the Episcopal Palace. Below them was darkness. To the right, beneath them, the white falls of the river gleamed dimly above the bridge, and the roar of it came to their ears like the roar of the sea.

Far across the plain, the Pyrenees rose, range behind range, a white wall in the moonlight. At their feet the walls of the ramparts, bastion below bastion, broken and crenelated, a triumph of mediaeval fortification, faded into the shadow where the river ran.

"There is a snow-drift in this corner," whispered Marcos. "It is piled up against the rampart by the north wind. I will drop you over the wall on to it and then follow you. You remember how to hold to my hand?"

"Yes," she answered, very quick and alert. There was good blood in her veins, which was astir now, in the presence of danger. "Yes--as we used to do it in the mountains--my hand round your wrist and your fingers round mine."

They were standing on the wall now. She knelt down and looked over; then she turned, still on her knees, and clasped her right hand round his wrist while he held hers in his strong grip. She leant forward and without hesitation swung out, suspended by one arm, into the darkness. He stooped, then knelt, and finally lay face downwards on the wall, lowering her all the while.

"Go!" he whispered. And she dropped lightly on to the snow-slope beaten by the wind into an icy b.u.t.tress against the wall. A moment later he dropped beside her.

"My father is at the bridge," he said, as they scrambled down to the narrow path that runs along the river bank beneath the walls. "He is waiting for us there with a carriage and a priest."

Juanita stopped short.

"Oh, I wish I had not come!" she exclaimed.

"You can go back," said Marcos slowly; "it is not too late. You can still go back if you want to."

But Juanita only laughed at him.

"And know for the rest of my life that I am a miserable coward. And it is of cowards that nuns are made; no, thank you. I will carry it through now. Come along. Come and get married."

She gave a laugh as she led the way. When they reached the road they were in the full moonlight, and for the first time could see each other.

"What is the matter?" said Juanita suddenly. "Your face looks white; there is something I do not understand in it."

"Nothing," answered Marcos. "Nothing. We must be quick."

"You are sure you are keeping nothing back from me?" she asked, glancing shrewdly at him as she walked by his side.

"Nothing," he answered, for the first time, and very conscientiously telling her an untruth. For he was keeping back the crux of the whole affair which he thought she was too young to be told or to understand.

The carriage was waiting on the high road just across the old Roman bridge. Sarrion came forward in the moonlight to meet them. Juanita ran towards him, kissed him and clung to his arm with a little movement of affection.

"I am so glad to see you," she said. "It feels safer. They almost made me a nun, you know. And that horrid old Sor Teresa--oh, I beg your pardon! I forgot she was your sister."

"She is hardly my sister," answered Sarrion with a cynical laugh. "It is against the rules you know to permit oneself any family affection when one is in religion."

"You mustn't blame her for that," said Juanita. "One never knows. You cannot tell why she went into religion. Perhaps she never meant to. You do not understand."

"Oh, yes I do," answered Sarrion bitterly.

They were hurrying towards the carriage and a man waiting at the open door took a step forward and raised his hat, showing in the moonlight a high bald forehead and a clean shaven face. He was slight and neat.

"This is an old school friend of mine," said Sarrion by way of introduction. "He is a bishop," he added.

And Juanita knelt on the road while he laid his hand on her hair with a smile half amused and half pathetic. He looked twenty years younger than Sarrion, and laying aside his sacerdotal manner as suddenly as he had a.s.sumed it on Juanita's instinctive initiation, he helped her into the carriage with a grave and ceremonious courtesy.

"This is your own carriage," she said when they were all seated.

"Yes--from Torre Garda," answered Sarrion. "And it is Pietro who is driving. So you are among friends."

"And dear old Perro running at the side," exclaimed Juanita, jumping up and putting her head out of the window to encourage Perro with a greeting. Her mantilla flying in the wind blew across the bishop's face which that youthful-looking dignitary endured with patience.

"And there is a hot-water tin for our feet. I feel it through my slippers; for my feet are wet with the snow. How delightful!"

And Juanita stooped down to warm her hands.

"You have thought of everything--you and Marcos," she said. "You are so kind to me. I am sure I am very grateful ... to every one."

She turned towards the bishop, kindly including him in this expression of thanks; which she could not do more definitely because she did not know his name. It was obvious that she was not a bit afraid of him seeing that he had no vestments with him.

"At one time, on the ramparts, I was sorry I had come," she explained in a friendly way to him, "but now I am not. Of course it is all very well for me. It is great fun. But for you it is different; on such a cold night. I do not know why everybody takes so much trouble about me."

"Half of Spain is taking trouble about you, my child," was the answer.

"Ah! that is about my money. That is quite different. But Marcos, you know, and Uncle Ramon are the only people who take any trouble about me, for myself you understand."

"Yes, I understand," answered the great man humbly, as if he were trying to, but was not quite sure of success.

Marcos sat silently in his corner of the carriage. Indeed Juanita exercised the prerogative of her s.e.x and led the conversation, gaily and easily. But when the carriage stopped beneath some trees by the roadside she suddenly lapsed into silence too.

She stood on the road in the bright moonlight and looked about her. She had thrown back the hood of Marcos' military cloak and now set her mantilla in order. Which was all the preparation this light-hearted bride made for the supreme moment. And perhaps she never knew all that she had missed.

"I see no church and no houses," said Juanita to Marcos. "Where are we?"

"The chapel is above us in the darkness," replied Marcos. And he led the way up a winding path.

The little chapel stood on a sort of table-land looking out over the plain that lay to the south of it. In front of it were twelve pines planted in a row at irregular intervals. The shadow of each tree in succession fell upon a low stone cross set on the ground before the door at each successive hour of the twelve; a fantasy of some holy man long dead.

The chapel door stood open and just within it a priest in his short white surplice awaited their arrival. Juanita recognised the sunburnt old cura of Torre Garda.

But he only had time to bow rather formally to her; for a bishop was behind.

"I have only lighted one candle," he said to Marcos. "If we make an illumination they can see it from Pampeluna."

The bishop followed the old priest into the sacristy where the one candle gave a flickering light. There they could be heard whispering together.

Sarrion, Marcos and Juanita stood near the door. The moonlight gleamed through the windows and a certain amount of reflected light found its way through the open doorway.

Suddenly Juanita gave a start and clutched at Marcos' arm.

"Look," she said, pointing to the right.

A kneeling figure was there with something that gleamed dully at the shoulders.