Part 25 (2/2)

I cleared up that point for him. He told me that O'Brien had the duenna called to his room that morning. Nothing had been heard outside, but the woman came out staggering, with her hand on the wall. He had terrified her. G.o.d knows what he had said to her. The widow--as Castro called her--had a son, an _escrivano_ in one of the Courts of Justice. No doubt it was that.

”There it is, Senor,” murmured Castro, scowling all round, as if every wall of the room was an enemy. ”He holds all the people in his hand in some way. Even I must be cautious, though I am a humble, trusted friend of the Casa!”

”What harm could he do you?” I asked.

”He is civil to me. _Amigo Castro_ here, and _Amigo Castro_ there. Bah!

The devil, alone, is his friend! He could deliver me to justice, and get my life sworn away. He could------_Quien sabe?_ What need he care what he does--a man that can get absolution from the archbishop himself if he likes.”

He meditated. ”No! there is only one remedy for him.” He tiptoed to my ear. ”The knife!”

He made a pa.s.s in the air with his blade, and I remembered vividly the c.o.c.kroach he had impaled with such accuracy on board the _Thames_. His baneful glance reminded me of his murderous capering in the steerage, when he had thought that the only remedy for _me_ was the knife.

He went to the loop-hole, and pa.s.sed the steel thoughtfully on the stone edge. I had not moved.

”The knife; but what would you have? Before, when I talked of this to Don Carlos, he only laughed at me. That was his way in matters of importance. Now they will not let me come in to him. He is too near G.o.d--and the Senorita--why, she is too near the saints for all the great n.o.bility of her spirit. But, _que dia-bleria_, when I--in my devotion--opened my mouth to her I saw some of that spirit in her eyes....”

There was a slight irony in his voice. ”No! Me--Castro! to be told that an English Senora would have dismissed me forever from her presence for such a hint. 'Your Excellency,' I said, 'deign, then, to find it good that I should avoid giving offence to that man. It is not my desire to run my neck into the iron collar.'”

He looked at me fixedly, as if expecting me to make a sign, then shrugged his shoulders.

”_Bueno_. You see this? Then look to it yourself, Senor. You are to me even as Don Carlos--all except for the love. No English body is big enough to receive his soul. No friend will be left that would risk his very honour of a n.o.ble for a man like Tomas Castro. Let me warn you not to leave the Casa, even if a s.h.i.+ning angel stood outside the gate and called you by name. The gate is barred, now, night and day. I have dropped a hint to Cesar, and that old African knows more than the Senor would suppose. I cannot tell how soon I may have the opportunity to talk to you again.”

He peeped through the crack of the door, then slipped out, suddenly falling at once on his hands and knees, so as to be hidden by the stone bal.u.s.trade from anybody in the _patio_. He, too, did not think himself safe.

Early in the evening I descended into the court, and Father Antonio, walking up and down the _patio_ with his eyes on his breviary, muttered to me:

”Sit on this chair,” and went on without stopping.

I took a chair near the marble rim of the basin with its border of English flowers, its splas.h.i.+ng thread of water. The goldfishes that had been lying motionless, with their heads pointing different ways, glided into a bunch to the fall of my shadow, waiting for crumbs of bread.

Father Antonio, his head down, and the open breviary under his nose, brushed my foot with the skirt of his ca.s.sock.

”Have you any plan?”

When he came back, walking very slowly, I said, ”None.”

At this next turn I p.r.o.nounced rapidly, ”I should like to see Carlos.”

He frowned over the edge of the book. I understood that he refused to let me in. And, after all, why should I disturb that dying man? The news about him was that he felt stronger that day. But he was preparing for eternity. Father Antonio's business was to save souls. I felt horribly crushed and alone. The priest asked, hardly moving his lips: ”What do you trust to?”

I had the time to meditate my reply. ”Tell Carlos I think of escape by sea.”

He made a little sign of a.s.sent, turned off towards the staircase, and went back to the sick room.

”The folly of it,” I thought. How could I think of it? Escape where? I dared not even show myself outside the Casa. My safety within depended on old Cesar more than on anybody else. He had the key of the gate, and the gate was practically the only thing between me and a miserable death at the hands of the first ruffian I met outside. And with the thought I seemed to stifle in that _patio_ open to the sky.

That gate seemed to cut off the breath of life from me. I was there, as if in a trap. Should I--I asked myself--try to enlighten Don Balthasar?

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