Part 10 (1/2)
”For some time I have been anxious to tell you a thought that has filled my mind, but I have not had the courage. I know your nature well: you are extremely impetuous, and thus many times, instead of reflecting on my words and trying to understand their meaning, you would flare up like gunpowder, spoil everything, and frighten me terribly, as on the evening when we celebrated mamma's fete-day. Accordingly, after much vacillation, I have decided to tell you by letter and not by word of mouth.
”The thought that disturbs me of late is to ask you to postpone our wedding still a little longer. Don't get angry, Ricardo mio, and read on calmly. I am sure that the first thought that will occur to your mind is that I don't love you. How mistaken you would be to think such a thing!
If you could read in my soul, you would see that love holds my conscience in its sway, and this I deplore bitterly. But that is not the question now.
”Are you sure, Ricardo, that you and I are properly trained to enter upon a state which entails so many and such serious responsibilities?
Have you thought well of what the sacrament of marriage means? Is there not in our hearts rather an unreflecting inclination, mixed, perhaps, with carnal impulses, than a serious desire to undertake an austere, religious life, becoming in a Christian family, educating our children in the fear of G.o.d and in the practice of virtue? If you reflect a little on how frivolous. .h.i.therto our love has been, and on the sins which we are constantly committing, you cannot but agree with me that two young people, so wanting in gravity and genuine virtue, are not authorized by G.o.d to bring up and direct a family. I should feel a great smiting of the conscience if I were married now (and you ought to feel the same), and I believe that G.o.d could not bless or make our union happy. If it is to be blessed, we must make ourselves worthy of celebrating it, by leaving forever behind us our frivolous, worldly manner of loving, for another, more lofty and spiritual, by refraining absolutely from certain earthly manifestations to which we are impelled by our great love, and by making preparations for it, during a few months at least, by a virtuous and devout life, by performing a few sacrifices and works of charity, and by constantly imploring G.o.d to illumine our minds, and give us power to fulfil the duties imposed upon us by the new state.
”There is an example in history which ought to encourage us greatly in doing what I propose. The beloved Saint Isabel of Hungary had been betrothed from early youth to the Duke Luis of Thuringen, but the nuptials were not celebrated until both reached the proper age. After the betrothal was celebrated, Isabel and Luis did not separate, but lived in the same palace, as though they had been brother and sister, until, by the will of G.o.d, they became husband and wife. The pious sentiments of the lovers, together with the austere education which was given them, made their affection always pure and upright, founding the unchangeable union of their hearts, not on the ephemeral sentiments of a purely human attraction, but on a common faith and the stern observance of all the virtues inculcated by this faith. Until they were united by the indissoluble bond of matrimony, they always called each other brother and sister; and even after they were married, they frequently used to apply this sweet name to each other.
”I confess, Ricardo, that the spectacle of those n.o.ble and holy young people has an unspeakable attraction for me. Love sanctified in such a way is a thousand times more beautiful, and bestows upon the heart purer and loftier pleasures. Why should we not follow, as far as possible, the steps of that ill.u.s.trious husband and wife, the pattern of abnegation and tenderness, as well as of purity and fidelity? Why should you not imitate, my beloved Ricardo, the stern virtue of the young Duke of Thuringen, the n.o.bleness and dignity of all his actions, the innocence and modesty of his soul, never found guilty of falsehood,--virtues which in no respect were opposed to the valor and boldness of which he always gave eminent proofs? For my part, I promise you to imitate, according to the measure of my feeble strength, the tenderness, the obedience, and the faithfulness of his saintly spouse Isabel, living subject to the law of G.o.d, within the affection which I profess for you.
”This is what I propose to you, and desire to do. Don't get angry, for G.o.d's sake, dear Ricardo; reflect over what I have just said, and you will see how right I am. Doubt not that I love you much, much,--I, who am, for the time being,
”Your sister,
”MARIA.”
CHAPTER V.
THE ROAD TO PERFECTION.
The letter which we have just read led to a very important crisis in the lives of our lovers. Ricardo at first was furious, and wrote a long answer to his betrothed, announcing the end of their acquaintance, but he did not send it. Then he held a consultation with her in which he overwhelmed her with recriminations and insults, saving that all she had written in her letter was nothing but a tissue of follies and absurdities, manufactured on purpose to hide her treachery; that she might have dismissed him in some way not so grotesque; that although he had no claim upon her love, at least he might and ought to demand the frankness and loyalty which he had always shown; that for a long time back he had noticed her coldness and indifference, but he could never have believed that she would make use of a pretext so ridiculous and so absurd for breaking the tie that united them, etc., etc. Maria received this storm of contumely with great humility, a.s.suring him with gentle words of persuasion, when he left her a moment's chance to speak, that she still loved him with all her soul; that he might put her love to the test as often as he pleased, since she was ready to make whatever sacrifice he demanded, except what went against her conscience; that his suspicions of her untruth and treachery cut her to the heart, but she forgave him because she was aware of his excited state of mind; that she likewise felt it keenly that he should call the motives of her resolution grotesque and ridiculous when she found them so worthy; and, in fine, that she begged him to calm himself.
After the young marquis had thoroughly vented his ill feeling without result, he began to get off of his high horse and try the effect of skilful reasoning, and then he changed to entreaties, but without any better results. He employed all the device of genius and all the tender and expressive words dictated by his honorable heart, in order to convince her that neither of them was fortunately under the necessity of mourning for their sins like two criminals; since if they were not better than the average of humanity, they were at least as good; and as for their skill and judgment in governing themselves and their children in matrimony, he believed that they were no less fitted than the rest, and that in the end they would come out as well as other people. All was useless. The young woman met argument with argument, and her lover's prayers, sprinkled with endearments, with a firm and obstinate silence.
Ricardo, in a state of tribulation which Father Rivadeneira does not take account of as a matter of merit in his treatise, went straight to Don Mariano, whom he loved like a father, to tell him the state of things, and ask his aid and advice. The latter was highly surprised and disturbed when he read his daughter's letter. He read it over many times as though he could not get the key of it, and at each new reading he found it more obscure and inexplicable. Finally he handed it back with a gesture of dismay, signifying that his daughter must have lost her wits, for he could not understand any such nonsense.
In point of fact, Don Mariano was a sincere believer, fulfilling scrupulously the moral precepts of religion, but he looked upon the things which relate to wors.h.i.+p with some coolness, if not with scorn. He had never doubted the religious truths learned in his childhood, but he had never made much account of ma.s.ses and sermons, and he never went to church more than was strictly necessary. He could make a distinction, when these subjects were up for discussion, between religion and the priest, professing for these latter a decided Voltairian hostility, which came from inheritance, according to Dona Gertrudis, since his grandfather, the Mexican, had kept up friendly relations and a voluminous correspondence with a member of the French Convention. He had an insuperable faith in modern progress, and he made use of the inventions constantly realized by human industry, in order to combat and crush the fragile arguments of his constant enemies, the partisans of tradition, among whom not the least obstinate and vexatious was his wife. If, for example, a telegram from any relation or friend was received in the house, Don Mariano, after reading it, would hold it out to his wife with a triumphal smile, saying,--
”Here, this miserable modern invention brings us word that your brother has reached Paris safely.”
He delighted in making humorous conjectures on the fright that would seize our forefathers if they were suddenly put in a railroad car, or were told that they could communicate whenever they pleased with a friend residing in Havana. Whenever he found in the papers a notice of any wonderful invention, the audacious man hastened to read it to his wife, and he kept the paper so as to read it also to the many conservatives who frequented his house. If the invention was not costly, he had the machine sent him, although it was not of the slightest use to him; and so he kept the house stored with curious manufactures, almost all of them covered with dust, and out of order by want of use,--ice-making machines, churns, cider-mills, organs, etc., parlor telegraphs, stereopticons, pans for cooking meat with a piece of paper, life-preservers, canes with chairs and guns, waterproof umbrellas with tent arrangement, and an endless array of strange articles. When the machine did not work, Don Mariano was disgusted and felt humiliated, and fearing lest the glory of modern science should be diminished in consequence, he did not speak of the apparatus before his senora; or if he were obliged to do so, he escaped the difficulty on a tangent, as he used to say, by always attributing the unfortunate result to his own stupidity, and not the quality of the machine. This eager love which he professed for the incredible advances of the present age, and the struggle which he waged both in his house and out of it with the friends of tradition, occasionally impelled him to employ forbidden weapons, as for example to exaggerate the power of modern industry, giving fict.i.tious accounts of the beginning of stupendous new enterprises which had never as yet entered into the mind of man. One day he startled his friends by a.s.suring them that it was seriously intended to establish a floating bridge between Europe and America, over which one could travel by rail to the New World; another time he astonished them by declaring that a telescope was in construction, which would bring the moon within half a league of the earth, so that we could discover whether that satellite had inhabitants. Again, he filled them with wonder by informing them that in the United States a whole cathedral had been moved at once from one town to another by means of hydraulic pressure.
In regard to mechanical advances, Don Mariano had more imagination than Shakespeare. National politics engaged his attention little in comparison with the incessant and sublime progress realized by humanity, and he detested the exaggerations which in his view tended to hinder it.
His affiliations were with the liberal conservative party.
With these peculiarities, it is easy to imagine the effect made upon him by his daughter's letter. He looked upon it as one of those many extravagant hobbies which she had pa.s.sed through in her life, and he solemnly promised Ricardo to make her desist from such folly. But after he had called her to his room and spent about two hours closeted with her, he began to suspect that the thing was not so easy as it appeared at first sight. Neither by turning her austere plan into ridicule by his jests, nor by showing that he was annoyed, nor by descending to entreaties, was our worthy caballero able to accomplish anything. Maria met these attacks like her lover's, with a humble but resolute att.i.tude impossible to overcome. No other way was left them but to resign themselves, and this they both did perforce with the secret hope that the girl would very soon change of her own accord when once her caprice was satisfied. Accordingly the wedding was indefinitely postponed, and poor Ricardo began to play his part as Duke of Thuringen almost as ill as a Spanish actor. From that time forth his interviews with Maria became less frequent and familiar. The girl seemed to shun him and to avoid opportunities of talking confidentially with him as she used.
Ricardo eagerly sought them, sometimes employing them in bitter expostulations, at others in softly whispering a thousand pa.s.sionate phrases. She always appeared sweet and affectionate, but endeavored to turn the conversation to serious subjects. Ricardo still caressed her whenever he had an opportunity, but he no longer obtained from her the usual reciprocation in spite of the incredible efforts which he made to obtain it. And not only he did not obtain this grace, but little by little the girl came to avoid his familiarities by always talking with him in the presence of others. One day when he found her alone in the dining-room, he said to himself with inward delight, ”She is mine.” And creeping up behind her carefully, he gave her a ringing kiss on her neck. Maria sprang suddenly from her chair and said, with a certain sweetness not free from severity,--
”Ricardo, don't do that again!”
”Why not?”
”Because I don't like it.”
”How long since?”
”I never did; don't be foolish.” She said these words with asperity, and another unpleasant stage in Ricardo's love was signalized. Almost absolutely ceased those happy moments of fond raptures, sweet and delicious as the pleasures of the angels in which the poesy of spirit and matter is indistinguishable, the prospect of which kindles and stirs the deepest roots of our being, and their remembrance throws over all our lives, even for the most prosaic of men, a vague and poetical melancholy helping us to endure the rebuffs of existence and to contemplate without envy the felicity of others. The most that the young marquis obtained grudgingly from his sweetheart was the permission to give her a brotherly kiss on the forehead from time to time. And there is no need of telling my experienced readers, for they must be able to imagine it, that with this enforced fast the young man's love far from growing less, increased and became violent beyond all power of words.