Calderon the Courtier, a Tale

“See, I have it.”

“And Beatriz can contrive to secrete herself in the confessional at the hour of the night prayers?”

“There is no doubt of her doing so with safety. The number of the novices is so great, that one of them cannot well be missed.”

“So much, then, for your part of the enterprise. Now for mine. You know that solitary house in the suburbs, on the high road to Fuencarral, which I pointed out to you yesterday? Well, the owner is a creature of mine. There, horses shall be in waiting; there, disguises shall be prepared. Beatriz must necessarily divest herself of the professional dress; you had better choose meaner garments for yourself. Drop those hidalgo titles of which your father is so proud, and pass off yourself and the novice as a notary and his wife, about to visit France on a lawsuit of inheritance. One of my secretaries shall provide you with a pass. Meanwhile, to-morrow, I shall be the first officially to hear of the flight of the novice, and I will set the pursuers on a wrong scent. Have I not arranged all things properly, my Fonseca?”

“You are our guardian angel!” cried Don Martin, fervently. “The prayers of Beatriz will be registered in your behalf above—prayers that will reach the Great Throne as easily from the open valleys of France as in the gloomy cloisters of Madrid. At midnight, to-morrow, then, we seek the house you have described to us.”

“Ay, at midnight, all shall be prepared.”

With a light step and exulting heart, Fonseca turned from the palace of Calderon. Naturally sanguine and high-spirited, visions of hope and joy floated before his eyes, and the future seemed to him a land owning but the twin deities of Glory and Love.

He had reached about the centre of the streets in which Calderon’s abode was placed, when six men, who for some moments had been watching him from a little distance, approached.

“I believe,” said the one who appeared the chief of the band, “that I have the honor to address Senior Don Martin Fonseca?”

“Such is my name.”

“In the name of the king we arrest you. Follow us.”

“Arrest! on what plea? What is my offence?”

“It is stated on this writ, signed by his Eminence the Cardinal-Duke de Lerma. You are charged with the crime of desertion.”

“Thou liest, knave! I had the general’s free permission to quit the camp.”

“We have said all—follow!”

Fonseca, naturally of the most impetuous and passionate character, was not, in that moment, in a mood to calculate coldly all the consequences of resistance. Arrest—imprisonment—on the eve before that which was to see him the deliverer of Beatriz, constituted a sentence of such despair, that all other considerations vanished before it. He set his teeth firmly, drew his sword, dashed aside the alguazil who attempted to obstruct his path, and strode grimly on, shaking one clenched hand in defiance, while, with the other, he waved the good Toledo that had often blazed in the van of battle, at the war-cry of “St. Iago and Spain!”

The alguazils closed round the soldier, and the clash of swords was already heard; when suddenly torches borne on high threw their glare across the moonlit street, and two running footmen called out, “Make way for the most noble the Marquis de Siete Iglesias!” At that name, Fonseca dropped the point of his weapon; the alguazils themselves drew aside; and the tall figure and pale countenance of Calderon were visible amongst the group.

“What means this brawl in the open streets at this late hour?” said the minister, sternly.

“Calderon!” exclaimed Fonseca; “this is indeed fortunate. These caitiffs have dared to lay hands on a soldier of Spain, and to forge for their villany the name of his own kinsman, the Duke de Lerma.”

“Your charge against this gentleman?” asked Calderon, calmly, turning to the principal alguazil, who placed the writ of arrest in the secretary’s hand. Calderon read it leisurely, and raised his hat as he returned it to the alguazil: he then drew aside Fonseca.

“Are you mad?” said he, in a whisper. “Do you think you can resist the law? Had I not arrived so opportunely you would have converted a slight accusation into a capital offence. Go with these men: do not fear; I will see the duke, and obtain your immediate release. To-morrow I will visit and accompany you home.”

Fonseca, still half beside himself with rage, would have replied, but Calderon significantly placed his finger on his lip and turned to the alguazils.

“There is a mistake here: it will be rectified to-morrow. Treat this cavalier with all the respect and worship due to his birth and merits. Go, Don Martin, go,” he added, in a lower voice; “go, unless you desire to lose Beatriz for ever. Nothing but obedience can save you from the imprisonment of half a life!”

Awed and subdued by this threat, Fonseca, in gloomy silence, placed his sword in its sheath, and sullenly followed the alguazils. Calderon watched them depart with a thoughtful and absent look; then, starting from his reverie, he bade his torchbearers proceed, and resumed his way to the Prince of Spain.

CHAPTER VII. THE OPEN COUNTENANCE, THE CONCEALED THOUGHTS

The next day, at noon, Calderon visited Fonseca in his place of confinement. The young man was seated by a window that overlooked a large dull court-yard, with a neglected and broken fountain in the centre, leaning his cheek upon his hand. His long hair was dishevelled, his dress disordered, and a gloomy frown darkened features naturally open and ingenuous. He started to his feet as Calderon approached. “My release—you have brought my release—let us forth!”

“My dear pupil, be ruled, be calm. I have seen the duke: the cause of your imprisonment is as I suspected. Some imprudent words, overheard, perhaps, but by your valet, have escaped you; words intimating your resolution not to abandon Beatriz. You know your kinsman, a mail of doubts and fears,—of forms, ceremonies, and scruples. From very affection for his kindred and yourself he has contrived your arrest; all my expostulations have been in vain. I fear your imprisonment may continue, either until you give a solemn promise to renounce all endeavor to dissuade Beatriz from the final vows, or until she herself has pronounced them.”

Fonseca, as if stupefied, stared a moment at Calderon, and then burst into a wild laugh. Calderon continued:

“Nevertheless, do not despair. Be patient; I am ever about the duke; nay, I have the courage, in your cause, to appeal even to the king himself.”

“And to-night she expects me—to-night she was to be free!”

“We can convey the intelligence of your mischance to her: the porter will befriend you.”

“Away, false friend, or powerless protector, that you are! Are your promises of aid come to this? But I care not; my case, my wrongs, shall be laid before the king; I will inquire if it be thus that Philip the Third treats the defenders of his crown. Don Roderigo Calderon, will you place my memorial in the hands of your royal master? Do this, and I will thank you.”

“No, Fonseca, I will not ruin you; the king would pass your memorial to the Duke de Lerma. Tush! this is not the way that men of sense deal with misfortune. Think you I should be what I now am, if, in every reverse, I had raved, and not reflected? Sit down, and let us think of what can now be done.”

“Nothing, unless the prison door open by sunset!”

“Stay, a thought strikes me. The term of your imprisonment ceases when you relinquish the hope of Beatriz. But what if the duke could believe that Beatriz relinquished you? What, for instance, if she fled from the convent, as you proposed, and we could persuade the duke that it was with another?”

“Ah! be silent!”

“Nay, what advantages in this scheme—what safety! If she fly alone, or, as supposed, with another lover, the duke will have no interest in pursuit, in punishment. She is not of that birth that the state will take the trouble, very actively, to interfere: she may reach France in safety; ay, a thousand times more safely than if she fled with you, a hidalgo and a man of rank, whom the state would have an interest to reclaim, and to whom the Inquisition, hating the nobles, would impute the crime of sacrilege. It is an excellent thought! Your imprisonment may be the salvation of you both: your plan may succeed still better without your intervention; and, after a few days, the duke, believing that your resentment must necessarily replace your love, will order your release; you can join Beatriz on the frontier, and escape with her to France.”

“But,” said Fonseca, struck, but not convinced, by the suggestion of Calderon, “who will take my place with Beatriz? who penetrate into the gardens? who bear her from the convent?”

“That, for your sake, will I do. Perhaps,” added Calderon, smiling, “a courtier may manage such an intrigue with even more dexterity than a soldier. I will bear her to the house we spoke of; there I know she can lie hid in safety, till the languid pursuit of uninterested officials shall cease, and thence I can easily find means to transport her, under safe and honourable escort, to any place it may please you to appoint.”

“And think you Beatriz will fly with you, a stranger? Impossible! Your plan pleases me not.”

“Nor does it please me,” said Calderon, coldly; “the risks I proposed to run are too imminent to be contemplated complacently: I thank you for releasing me from my offer; nor should I have made it, Fonseca, but from this fear, what if to-morrow the duke himself (he is a churchman, remember) see the novice? what if he terrify her with threats against yourself? what if he induce the abbess and the Church to abridge the novitiate? what if Beatriz be compelled or awed into taking the veil? what if you be released even next week and find her lost to you for ever?”

“They cannot—they dare not!”

“The duke dares all things for ambition; your alliance with Beatriz he would hold a disgrace to his house. Think not my warnings are without foundation—I speak from authority; such is the course the Duke de Lerma has resolved upon. Nothing else could have induced me to offer to brave for your sake all the hazard of outraging the law and braving the terrors of the Inquisition. But let us think of some other plan. Is your escape possible? I fear not. No; you must trust to my chance of persuading the duke into prosecuting the matter no further; trust to some mightier scheme engrossing all his thoughts; to a fit of good-humour after his siesta; or, perhaps, an attack of the gout, or a stroke of apoplexy. Such, after all, are the chances of human felicity, the pivots on which turns the solemn wheel of human life.”

Fonseca made no reply for some moments; he traversed the room with hasty and disordered strides, and at last stopped abruptly.

“Calderon, there is no option; I must throw myself on your generosity, your faith, your friendship. I will write to Beatriz; I will tell her, for my sake, to confide in you.”

As he spoke, Don Martin turned to the table, and wrote a hasty and impassioned note, in which he implored the novice to trust herself to the directions of Don Roderigo Calderon, his best, his only friend; and, as he placed this letter in the hands of the courtier he turned aside to conceal his emotions. Calderon himself was deeply moved: his cheek was flushed, and his hand seemed tremulous as it took the letter.

“Remember,” said Fonseca, “that I trust to you my life of life. As you are true to me, may Heaven be merciful to you!”

Calderon made no answer, but turned to the door. “Stay,” said Fonseca; “I had forgot this—here is the master key.”

“True; how dull I was! And the porter—will he attend to thy proxy?”

“Doubt it not. Accost him with the word, ‘Grenada.’ But he expects to share the flight.”