Vendetta in Spain

by Dennis Wheatley

  2

  The aftermath

  The state of mute despair in which François de Vendôme had found de Quesnoy had certainly given the young man grounds to fear for his friend’s reason, but, in fact, the Count was much too well-balanced for even so terrible a shock to affect him permanently. Nevertheless it was not until several days after Angela’s funeral that his manner again became anything approaching normal.

  During them he spent most of his time in a small sitting-room that de Cordoba had offered him as a sanctum; and in order not to depress the other guests, had asked to have his meals served there. De Vendôme had brought Father Tomaso, the Cordobas’ chaplain, to see him and urge upon him the consolations of religion, but he had politely declined them on the grounds that, although nominally a Catholic, he had long since ceased to be a practising one. However, Angela had become a convert to the Roman faith before her first marriage, so he willingly accepted the good Father’s offer to make arrangements for her burial.

  The bomb had killed thirty people and wounded over a hundred. On the afternoon of his wedding the King had visited the injured in hospital and he had then ordered that a State funeral should be given to the dead. The majority were conveyed to the cemetery on nine enormous hearses through weeping crowds, but a few of the bereaved families preferred to arrange private interments, among them that of the Marquésa de Tolosa. She had been seated on the second floor balcony of the house from which the bomb had been thrown and, as her family were friends of the Cordobas, Father Tomaso arranged that a Requiem Mass should be celebrated for the Marquésa and Angela together.

  While de Quesnoy remained mainly in seclusion he found his greatest solace in his host, who devoted much time to sitting with him. The backgrounds of the two men could hardly have been less similar. De Quesnoy’s had been an open-air life of travel, soldiering, war and sport, whereas the Conde had never been outside Europe, neither hunted, fished nor shot, and spent most of his time immersed in his banking activities, his only outdoor interest being as a naturalist with the finest collection of butterflies in the country. Yet they had certain things in common. Both of them came from ancient families and were passionately convinced Monarchists; both were well read and particularly interested in history and ancient religions; and both had a wide knowledge of international relations. So, after a day or two, by coaxing de Quesnoy to discuss these subjects, the Conde found that for a while he could take his guest’s mind off his bereavement.

  At the end of the week’s wedding celebrations the Cordobas’ other guests left for their homes and de Quesnoy raised the matter of his own departure; but, as he had not been able to bring himself to make any plans, the Conde insisted that he should stay on, at least for another week or two, and he gladly accepted.

  It was no small part of his affliction that with the loss of Angela he had become completely rootless. When writing to break the news of her death to her parents he had also written to his agents instructing them to break off negotiations for the house near Berkeley Square as, now that he had become a widower, it would have been much too large for him. Moreover, although his relations with her family were pleasant enough and he knew they would willingly continue to accept him as a member of it, he found most of them distinctly dull, and without her to make it tolerable he felt most averse to condemning himself to the pointless social life they led.

  Thirteen years had elapsed since he had left his boyhood home in Russia, and during them he had been back there only once. It lay in the heart of Central Europe, on the river Pruth near the little town of Jvanets and the best part of 400 miles from the nearest cities: Kiev, Budapest, Bucharest and Odessa; so the only diversion it could offer was hunting. He knew that his father would be pleased to see him, so he might go there for a visit of a month or two, but to settle down there with only the affairs of the estate to occupy him would soon bore him to distraction.

  Vienna was the city that he loved best, and he could be sure of a welcome there from many old friends with whom in the past he had painted the town red. But at this juncture the thought of nights spent with Wine, Women and Song appealed to him even less than the more staid social life of London. There remained the possibility of reviving his plan for offering his services as a soldier to one of the South American Republics; but as yet he still felt quite incapable of making any definite decision about his future.

  Apart from an intolerable ache caused by the finality of his loss of Angela, only one emotion stirred him repeatedly; it was a fierce craving to see justice done on those responsible for her death. Daily he spoke of this to the Conde, who kept him informed about the progress the police were making in their investigations.

  The name of the assassin was Mateo Morral and he was on the police files as an agitator, but had done nothing before throwing the bomb which might have justified his arrest. He had come from Barcelona and was a Catalan of superior type; his bearded face had a mild expression, his hands were well cared-for and he had a general air of middle-class respectability.

  The old house from which the bomb had been thrown had been divided up into apartments, and it was Morral’s unsuspicious appearance which had enabled him to rent a room on its third floor without anyone suspecting that he might be an anarchist. But when the room had been broken into, it had been found that, in addition to chemicals left over from compounding the explosives for the bomb, there were others that indicated he had been treating himself for syphilis.

  Immediately he had thrown the bomb he had rushed downstairs, mingled with the crowd in the street, and succeeded in reaching the office of a Don José Nakens, who was the editor-proprietor of a Republican weekly journal called The Mutiny. Nakens had provided him with a change of clothes and found him shelter for the night. He had then managed to escape unrecognised from the city and gone into temporary hiding with another associate at a village on the road to the Escorial. Next day he attempted to board a train at Torréjon de Ardoz, but by then his description had been circulated throughout the length and breadth of Spain, and at the station he was identified. A rural guard who was present had tried to arrest him but Morral had shot him dead with a Browning pistol, and had then used the pistol to kill himself.

  Further investigations disclosed that had the anarchists’ original plot matured it would have had infinitely more hideous results. A gallery in the church in which the wedding Mass was to be celebrated had been allotted to the Press. With forged credentials Morral had succeeded in obtaining a pass to it and had intended to throw his bomb down into the body of the church at the moment when the King and Queen received the Sacrament. Had he done so the two hundred fragments into which it splintered must have killed not only them but half-a-hundred other royalties, priests and officials grouped about the high altar.

  By a dispensation attributable only to God this ghastly slaughter had been prevented by an eleventh-hour alteration of arrangements. It had been suggested that little four-year-old Don Alfonso Maria—who as the son of the King’s deceased sister was Heir Apparent to the Throne—was too young to be expected to sit quietly through the long ceremony in the body of the church; so it was decided that he and his attendants should sit in the gallery with his cousin, the fourteen-year-old Princess Pilar, next to him to keep him from becoming restless. The Press then having been relegated to a position that would have made the aiming of the bomb more chancy, Morral had elected to hurl it from his room in the Calle Mayor.

  It was on learning this that de Quesnoy burst out:

  ‘What infamy! The imagination reels at the thought of such a massacre. It seems incredible that any human being, let alone an educated man like this Morral, could become so obsessed with vindictiveness against the ruling caste as to plan the murder of men, women and even innocent children indiscriminately. Yet one cannot doubt that he would have turned the church into a shambles had he had the chance. Hell is too good for such Devil’s spawn.’

  ‘The disease from which he was suffering had probably affected his brain,’ sugge
sted the Conde.

  ‘Perhaps; but what of the others who aided and abetted him—the editor who got him out of Madrid, and the man who hid him in the country? Besides, these anarchists are becoming an ever-increasing menace to established order. In Russia during the past twenty years nihilists have murdered scores of Provincial Governors and other high officials. In France, Italy or Belgium every few months they commit some appalling outrage. Look, too, at the toll they are taking of Europe’s rulers. In ’94 one of them assassinated President Carnot in Lyons, in ’98 another stabbed to death the Empress Elizabeth of Austria, and in 1900 yet another killed King Humbert of Italy. A dozen other rulers have been wounded or had narrow escapes. Not one of them today can wake up in the morning without the thought that he may be murdered before evening.’

  The Conde nodded. ‘It is not the first attempt on Don Alfonso, either. Just a year ago a bomb was thrown during his State visit to Paris, while he was driving through the streets with President Loubet. He gave fine proof of his courage on that occasion by leaning out of the carriage window and crying, “Vive la France!” Then he turned with a smile to the President and asked, “Was that intended for you or for me?” The President rose to the occasion and replied, “This is the land of equality, Sir.” But you are right. These anarchists are a hideous menace. Among their victims that you omitted to name was President McKinley of the United States. His assassination a few years ago shows that their organisation must be world-wide.’

  ‘Exactly; and they cannot all be mad, at least not in the accepted sense which would make them medically certifiable.’

  ‘No, they are fanatics; mostly, I think, embittered men who have brooded upon imagined wrongs so long that they have lost all moral sense and are prepared to go to any lengths to avenge themselves upon society.’

  ‘They are responsible for their actions!’ de Quesnoy exclaimed harshly. ‘And nothing—nothing—can excuse this deliberate treacherous warfare they are waging on unsuspecting people. They should be stamped out like poisonous reptiles. I only wish to God that I knew a way to set about it.’

  ‘I understand how you must feel, and you are right,’ the Conde agreed. ‘But you may be sure that the police are doing everything possible to that end. Regarding yourself, though, Count; permit me to remark that now eight days have elapsed since your personal tragedy I do feel that you should make an effort to cease brooding upon it. Will you not try to put these villainous anarchists out of your mind and engage it with new interests?’

  De Quesnoy sighed. ‘I suppose that I ought to, and since you wish it I will make the endeavour; but I fear it will prove a hard task. You see at the moment there is nothing in which I feel I could interest myself.’

  ‘You are interested in art and history.’

  ‘I am, but I have visited the Prado many times and have already seen most of the sights of Madrid.’

  ‘Of course; but I gather you have never been in Southern Spain. Andalusia is the loveliest part of my country and in its cities are some of the most beautiful buildings in the world. The Moors left us finer examples of their great civilisation than any that are to be found in North Africa.’

  ‘Were I in a normal state I am sure I should find them fascinating, but at the moment I really could not face a sight-seeing tour on my own.’

  The Conde smiled. ‘My dear friend, we should not dream of allowing you to do so. I have already discussed this proposal with François and he was delighted at the idea of acting as your companion and guide.’

  ‘How good of you both;’ de Quesnoy raised a faint smile in reply. ‘In that case it would be churlish of me to refuse.’

  That evening de Vendôme came up to discuss the trip with him and the places he proposed they should visit. His plan was to go south to Cordoba, across to Seville, then through Jerez de la Frontera to Cadiz; from there down to Algeciras, inland to Ronda, across to the Mediterranean coast at Malaga, inland again to Granada, return to the sea at Alicante, up the coast to Valencia, and so back to Madrid, stopping a few nights or longer, if they felt so inclined, in each of these places.

  ‘But such a tour could take up to two months,’ de Quesnoy protested.

  ‘What matter,’ the young Prince shrugged. ‘Neither of us has any duties to claim him; and among these places there are several that I have never been to myself. Like you, after becoming an exile from France I decided to change my nationality, and I am now a Spaniard. So the more I can see of what is now always to be my country, the better.’

  De Quesnoy shook his head. ‘That is a plausible excuse, dear boy, and it is charming of you to make it; but you will have many opportunities to visit these places in more cheerful company than mine. I really cannot allow you to saddle yourself with me for more than a couple of weeks. However hard I try not to show my grief it is certain that I shall be moody and preoccupied for a good part of the time.’

  ‘I don’t mean to give you the chance to be. We are going by road in my new automobile and whenever you show signs of depression I intend to make you drive it.’

  ‘What!’ exclaimed the Count, sitting up with a jerk. ‘But I’ve never driven an automobile in my life. I hate the damn’ smelly unreliable things.’

  The Prince laughed. ‘Being, like yourself, a lover of horses, until quite recently I shared your prejudice. But soon everyone will be driving one; so you’ll have to learn sooner or later, and this is an excellent opportunity. The new models don’t break down like the early types, either; at least not every few miles, and having to keep your mind on the machine will keep it off everything else.’

  Next day, the 9th of June, they set out. De Vendôme’s car was a six cylinder Hispano Suiza and capable of doing sixty miles an hour on the flat; but horses were still apt to shy at cars, so their progress was slow through the city and suburbs of Madrid, and it was not until tea-time that they reached the little town of Aranjuez, which is in miniature to Madrid what Versailles is to Paris. The Prince’s mother had a villa there so it was one of his homes, in which he had his own suite. They garaged the car there and he ordered beds to be made up, but only caretaker servants were in residence so they dined at a restaurant on the south bank of the Tagus. The river there ran through woods that formed a charming setting, and for dessert they had a great bowl of freshly-picked strawberries.

  On the 10th the road, curving south-eastward across the plain of New Castile, proved a dreary stretch and was almost deserted, but it could hardly have been bettered as a place for the Prince to give de Quesnoy his first lessons in driving. By nightfall they reached Manzanares, and on the 11th covered another long, flat stretch until late afternoon when they entered more picturesque hilly country. So far the surface of the roads had been far from good, but now to the ruts and potholes were added sudden twists and unexpected gullies that could be negotiated well enough by muleteers and ox carts, but presented most unpleasant traps for motorists. The high-sprung chassis with its narrow tyres bucked alarmingly from side to side and it took all de Vendôme’s newly acquired skill to get them that night to Linares. Their last lap to Cordoba ran through the Sierra Morena and for most of the way followed the course of the Guadalquivir. The mountain scenery was magnificent, but it proved a gruelling drive and they were both heartily glad to reach the white city from which at one time a Caliph had ruled all Spain.

  In its oldest part lay the ancestral home of the Condes de Cordoba, a rambling two-storey house with airy, sparsely-furnished rooms built round three carefully tended gardens. Jasmin, bougainvillaea and climbing geraniums covered their walls, the fronds of tall palms rustled high above, orange, lemon and loquat trees were enclosed by low-clipped hedges, there were roses in great profusion with many other flowers and fountains that tinkled faintly into lily pools. It was typical of several such Casas that de Quesnoy was to see in the next ten days.

  They spent three days there while de Vendôme took his guest to see the Cathedral, once a magnificent Mosque—with its nineteen aisles of Moorish arches and amazing
labyrinth of nearly a thousand columns made from different coloured marbles—several fine Casas and Renaissance Churches, the statue of the Grand Captain, Gonzalo González—upon the bronze charger and body of which a white marble head sits so incongruously—and the thousand year old Synagogue in the narrow maze-like streets of the old Jewish quarter.

  On the 16th they did the eighty-seven miles to Seville, the most fascinating of all the Spanish cities, and there they remained five days. De Quesnoy was impressed with the Cathedral, which he thought even finer than that at Toledo, and intrigued by the amazing collection of bejewelled chalices and reliquaries in its treasury. The Alcázar Palace, with its perfectly proportioned halls and courts of Moorish stonework carved to appear as delicate as lace, walls of tiles patterned by time to the most roseate hues and lovely gardens in which grew a profusion of jacarandas, oleanders and rare flowering shrubs, all delighted him so much that he paid it three visits. But by the end of five days he was surfeited with the sight of Baroque altars, charming patios glimpsed through iron grilles, Spanish old masters, Moorish fountains and the endless fine tapestries that graced the walls of the big private Casas.

  Sensing his boredom de Vendôme suggested that they should push on to Jerez, so on the 22nd they took the road south through a smiling countryside of rolling downs across which well-husbanded plantations of olive trees alternated with fields of corn. While in Seville they had occupied a private suite in the palatial Alfonso XII Hotel, and de Vendôme had tactfully declined invitations from the Albas and other of his acquaintances who lived in the city, because he knew that de Quesnoy was still averse to going into society. But he had never before been to Jerez, and if they were to see anything of the wine industry, of which that charming little town is the centre, there was no escape from accepting the hospitality of the Sherry Barons.

  For two days Williams, Domeques and Gonzelez in turn initiated them into the mysteries: took them to see vineyards and presses and over vast Bodegas in which were stacked tens of thousands of casks of sherry. As a lover of fine wine de Quesnoy enjoyed sampling the rare Manzanillas, Amontillados, and very old rich Olorosos, and he seemed at last a little more like his normal self. But when de Vendôme suggested going on to Cadiz he shook his head.