Calderon the Courtier, a Tale

In the royal chamber, before a table covered with papers, sat the King and his secretary. Grave, sullen, and taciturn, there was little in the habitual manner of Philip the Third that could betray to the most experienced courtier the outward symptoms of favour or caprice. Education had fitted him for the cloister, but the necessities of despotism had added acute cunning to slavish superstition. The business for which Calderon had been summoned was despatched, with a silence broken but by monosyllables from the king, and brief explanations from the secretary; and Philip, rising, gave the signal for Calderon to retire. It was then that the king, turning a dull but steadfast eye upon the marquis, said, with a kind of effort, as if speech were painful to him,

“The prince left me but a minute before your entrance—have you seen him since your return?”

“Your majesty, yes. He honoured me this morning with his presence.”

“On state affairs?”

“Your majesty knows, I trust, that your servant treats of state affairs only with your August self, or your appointed ministers.”

“The prince has favoured you, Don Roderigo.”

“Your majesty commanded me to seek that favour.”

“It is true. Happy the monarch whose faithful servant is the confidant of the heir to his crown!”

“Could the prince harbour one thought displeasing to your majesty, I think I could detect and quell it at its birth. But your majesty is blessed in a grateful son.”

“I believe it. His love of pleasure decoys him from ambition—so it should be. I am not an austere parent. Keep his favour, Don Roderigo; it pleases me. Hast thou offended him in aught?”

“I trust I have not incurred so great a misfortune.”

“He spoke not of thee with his usual praises—I noticed it. I tell thee this that thou mayest rectify what is wrong. Thou canst not serve me more than by guarding him from all friendships save with those whose affection to myself I can trust. I have said enough.”

“Such has ever been my object. Bat I have not the youth of the prince, and men speak ill of me, that, in order to gain his confidence, I share in his pursuits.”

“It matters not what they say of thee. Faithful ministers are rarely eulogised by the populace or the court. Thou knowest my mind: I repeat, lose not the prince’s favour.” Calderon bowed low, and withdrew. As he passed through the apartments of the palace, he crossed a gallery, in which he perceived, stationed by a window, the young prince and his own arch-foe, the Duke d’Uzeda. At the same instant, from an opposite door, entered the Cardinal-Duke de Lerma; and the same unwelcome conjunction of hostile planets smote the eyes of that intriguing minister. Precisely because Uzeda was the duke’s son was he the man in the world whom the duke most dreaded and suspected.

Whoever is acquainted with the Spanish comedy will not fail to have remarked the prodigality of intrigue and counter-intrigue upon which its interest is made to depend. In this, the Spanish comedy was the faithful mirror of the Spanish life, especially in the circles of a court. Men lived in a perfect labyrinth of plot and counter-plot. The spirit of finesse, manoeuvre, subtlety, and double-dealing pervaded every family. Not a house that was not divided against itself.

As Lerma turned his eyes from the unwelcome spectacle of such sudden familiarity between Uzeda and the heir-apparent—a familiarity which it had been his chief care to guard against—his glance fell on Calderon. He beckoned to him in silence, and retired, unobserved by the two confabulators, through the same door by which he had entered. Calderon took the hint, and followed him. The duke entered a small room, and carefully closed the door.

“How is this, Calderon?” he asked, but in a timid tone, for the weak old man stood in awe of his favourite. “Whence this new and most ill-boding league?”

“I know not, your eminence; remember that I am but just returned to Madrid: it amazes me no less than it does your eminence.”

“Learn the cause of it, my good Calderon: the prince ever professed to hate Uzeda. Restore him to those feelings thou art all in all with his highness! If Uzeda once gain his ear, thou art lost.”

“Not so,” cried Calderon, proudly. “My service is to the king; I have a right to his royal protection, for I have a claim on his royal gratitude.”

“Do not deceive thyself,” said the duke, in a whisper. “The king cannot live long: I have it from the best authority, his physician; nor is this all—a formidable conspiracy against thee exists at court. But for myself and the king’s confessor, Philip would consent to thy ruin. The strong hold thou hast over him is in thy influence with the Infanta—influence which he knows to be exerted on behalf of his own fearful and jealous policy; that influence gone, neither I nor Aliaga could suffice to protect thee. Enough! Shut every access to Philip’s heart against Uzeda.” Calderon bowed in silence, and the duke hastened to the royal cabinet.

“What a fool was I to think that I could still wear a conscience!” muttered Calderon, with a sneering lip; “but, Uzeda, I will baffle thee yet.”

The next morning, the Marquis de Siete Iglesias presented himself at the levee of the prince of Spain.

Around the favourite, as his proud stature towered above the rest, flocked the obsequious grandees. The haughty smile was yet on his lip when the door opened and the prince entered. The crowd, in parting suddenly, left Calderon immediately in front of Philip; who, after gazing on him sternly for a moment, turned away, with marked discourtesy, from the favourite’s profound reverence, and began a low and smiling conversation with Gonsalez de Leon, one of Calderon’s open foes.

The crowd exchanged looks of delight and surprise; and each or the nobles, before so wooing in their civilities to the minister, edged cautiously away.

His mortification had but begun. Presently Uzeda, hitherto almost a stranger to those apartments, appeared; the prince hastened to him, and in a few minutes the duke was seen following the prince into his private chamber. The sun of Calderon’s favour seemed set. So thought the courtiers: not so the haughty favourite. There was even a smile of triumph on his lip—a sanguine flush upon his pale cheek, as he turned unheeding from the throng, and then entering his carriage, regained his home.

He had scarcely re-entered his cabinet, ere, faithful to his appointment, Fonseca was announced.

“What tidings, my best of friends?” exclaimed the soldier.

Calderon shook his head mournfully.

“My dear pupil,” said he, in accents of well-affected sympathy, “there is no hope for thee. Forget this vain dream—return to the army. I can promise thee promotion, rank, honours; but the hand of Beatriz is beyond my power.”

“How?” said Fonseca, turning pale and sinking into a seat. “How is this? Why so sudden a change? Has the queen—”

“I have not seen her majesty; but the king is resolved upon this matter: so are the Inquisition. The Church complains of recent and numerous examples of unholy and im politic relaxation of her dread power. The court dare not interfere. The novice must be left to her own choice.”

“And there is no hope?”

“None! Return to the excitement of thy brave career.”

“Never!” cried Fonseca, with great vehemence. “If, in requital of all my services—of life risked, blood spilt, I cannot obtain a boon so easy to accord me, I renounce a service in which even fame has lost its charm. And hark you, Calderon, I tell you that I will not forego this pursuit. So fair, so innocent a victim shall not be condemned to that living tomb. Through the walls of the nunnery, through the spies of the Inquisition, love will find out its way; and in some distant land I will yet unite happiness and honour. I fear not exile; I fear not reverse; I no longer fear poverty itself. All lands, where the sound of the trumpet is not unknown, can afford career to the soldier, who asks from Heaven no other boon but his mistress and his sword.”

“You will seek to abstract Beatriz, then?” said Calderon, calmly and musingly. “Yes—it may be your best course, if you take the requisite precautions. But can you see her? can you concert with her?”

“I think so. I trust I have already paved the way to an interview. Yesterday, after I quitted thee, I sought the convent; and, as the chapel is one of the public sights of the city, I made my curiosity my excuse. Happily, I recognised in the porter of the convent an old servitor of my father’s; he had known me from a child—he dislikes his calling—he will consent to accompany our flight, to share our fortunes: he has promised to convey a letter from me to Beatriz, and to transmit to me her answer.”

“The stars smile on thee, Don Martin. When thou hast learned more, consult with me again. Now, I see a way to assist thee.”

CHAPTER VI. WEB UPON WEB

The next day, to the discomfiture of the courtiers, Calderon and the Infant of Spain were seen together, publicly, on the parade; and the secretary made one of the favoured few who attended the prince at the theatre. His favour was greater, his power more dazzling than ever it had been known before. No cause for the breach and reconciliation being known, some attributed it to caprice, others to the wily design of the astute Calderon for the humiliation of Uzeda, who seemed only to have been admitted to one smile from the rising sun in order more signally to be reconsigned to the shade.

Meanwhile, Fonseca prospered almost beyond his hopes. Young, ardent, sanguine, the poor novice had fled from her quiet home and the indulgence of her free thoughts, to the chill solitude of the cloister, little dreaming of the extent of the change. With a heart that overflowed with the warm thoughts of love and youth, the ghostlike shapes that flitted round her, the icy forms, the rigid ceremonials of that life, which is but the mimicry of death, appalled and shocked her. That she had preserved against a royal and most perilous, because unscrupulous suitor, her fidelity to the absent Fonseca, was her sole consolation.

Another circumstance had combined with the loss of her protectress and the absence of Don Martin to sadden her heart and dispose her to the cloister. On the deathbed of the old woman, who had been to her as a mother, she had learned a secret hitherto concealed from her tender youth. Dark and tragic were the influences of the star which had shone upon her birth, gloomy the heritage of memories associated with her parentage. A letter, of which she now became the guardian and treasurer—a letter, in her mother’s hand-woke tears more deep and bitter than she had ever shed for herself. In that letter she read the strength and the fidelity, the sorrow and the gloom, of woman’s love; and a dreary foreboding told her that the shadow of the mother’s fate was cast over the child’s. Such were the thoughts that made the cloister welcome, till the desolation of the shelter was tried and known. But when, through the agency of the porter, Fonseca’s letter reached her, all other feelings gave way to the burst of natural and passionate emotion. The absent had returned, again wooed, was still faithful. The awful vow was not spoken—she might yet be his. She answered; she chided; she spoke of doubt, of peril, of fear for him, of maiden shame; but her affection coloured every word, and the letter was full of hope. The correspondence continued; the energetic remonstrances of Fonseca, the pure and fervent attachment of the novice, led more and more rapidly and surely to the inevitable result. Beatriz yielded to the prayer of her lover; she consented to the scheme of escape and flight that he proposed.

Late at evening Fonseca sought Calderon. The marquis was in the gardens of his splendid mansion.

The moonlight streamed over many a row of orange-trees and pomegranates—many a white and richly sculptured vase, on its marble pedestal—many a fountain, that scattered its low music round the breathless air. Upon a terrace that commanded a stately view of the spires and palaces of Madrid stood Calderon, alone; beside him, one solitary and gigantic aloe cast its deep gloom of shade and his motionless attitude, his folded arms, his face partially lifted to the starlit heavens, bespoke the earnestness and concentration of his thoughts.

“Why does this shudder come over me?” said, he, half aloud. “It was thus in that dismal hour which preceded the knowledge of my shame—the deed of a dark revenge—the revolution of my eventful and wondrous life! Ah! how happy was I once! a contented and tranquil student; a believer in those eyes that were to me as the stars to the astrologer. But the golden age passed into that of iron. And now,” added Calderon, with a self-mocking sneer, “comes the era which the poets have not chronicled; for fraud, and hypocrisy, and vice, know no poets!”

The quick step of Fonseca interrupted the courtier’s reverie. He turned, knit his brow, and sighed heavily, as if nerving himself to some effort; but his brow was smooth, and his aspect cheerful, ere Fonseca reached his side.

“Give me joy—give me joy, dear Calderon! she has consented. Now, then, your promised aid.”

“You can depend upon the fidelity of your friendly porter?

“With my life.”

“A master key to the back-door of the chapel has been made?”