XXI.
By the Guadalquivir
"There dwells my father, sinless and at rest, Where the fierce murderer can no more pursue."--Schiller
Next Sunday evening the brothers attended the quiet service in DonaIsabella's upper room. It was more solemn than usual, because of thedeep shadow that rested on the hearts of all the band assembled there.But Losada's calm voice spoke wise and loving words about life anddeath, and about Him who, being the Lord of life, has conquered deathfor all who trust him. Then came prayer--true incense offered on thegolden altar standing "before the mercy-seat," which only "the veil,"still dropped between, hides from the eyes of the worshippers.[#] Butin such hours many a ray from the glory within shines through that veil.
[#] See Exodus xxx 6.
"Do not let us return home yet, brother," said Carlos, when they hadparted with their friends. "The night is fine."
"Whither shall we bend our steps?"
Carlos named a favourite walk through some olive-yards on the banks ofthe river, and Juan set his face towards one of the city gates.
"Why take such a circuit?" said Carlos, showing a disposition to turn inan opposite direction. "This is far the shorter way."
"True; but it is less pleasant."
Carlos looked at him gratefully. "My brother would spare my weakness,"he said. "But it needs not. Twice of late, when you were engaged withDona Beatriz, I went alone thither, and--to the Prado San Sebastian."
So they passed through the Puerta de Triana, and having crossed thebridge of boats, leisurely took their way beneath the walls of the grimold castle. As they did so, both prayed in silence for one who waspining in its dungeons. Don Juan, whose interest in the fate of Julianowas naturally far less intense than his brother's, was the first tobreak that silence. He remarked that the Dominican convent adjoining theTriana looked nearly as gloomy as the inquisitorial prison itself.
"I think it looks like all other convents," returned Carlos, withindifference.
They were soon in the shadow of the dark, ghost-like olive-trees. Themoon was young, and gave but little light; but the large clear starslooked down through the southern air like lamps of fire, hanging not somuch in the sky as from it. Were those bright watchers charged with amessage from the land very far off, which seemed so near to them in thehigh places whence they ruled the night? Carlos drank in the spirit ofthe scene in silence. But this did not please his less meditativebrother. "What art thou pondering?" he asked.
"'They that be wise shall shine as the brightness of the firmament, andthey that turn many to righteousness as the stars for ever and ever.'"
"Art thinking still of the prisoner in the Triana?"
"Of him, and also of another very dear to both of us, of whom I have forsome time been purposing to speak to thee. What if thou and I have been,like children, seeking for a star on earth while all the time it wasshining above us in God's glorious heaven?"
"Knowest thou not of old, little brother, that when thy parables begin Iam left behind at once? I pray thee, let the stars alone, and speak thelanguage of earth."
"What was the task to which thou and I vowed ourselves in childhood,brother?"
Juan looked at him keenly through the dim light. "I sometimes fearedthou hadst forgotten," he said.
"No danger of that. But I had a reason--I think a good and sufficientone--for not speaking to thee until well and fully assured of thysympathy."
"My sympathy? In aught that concerned the dream, the passion of mylife!--of both our young lives! Carlos, how couldst thou even doubt ofthis?"
"I had reason to doubt at first whether a gleam of light which has beenshed upon our father's fate would be regarded by his son as a blessingor a curse."
"Do not keep a man in suspense, brother. Speak at once, in Heaven'sname."
"I doubt no longer now. It will be to thee, Juan, as to me, a joyexceeding great to think that our venerated father read God's Word forhimself, and knew his truth and honoured it, as we have learned to do."
"Now, God be thanked!" cried Juan, pausing in his walk and clasping hishands together. "This indeed is joyful news. But speak, brother; how doyou know it? Are you certain, or is it only dream, hope, conjecture?"
Carlos told him in detail, first the hint dropped by Losada to De Seso;then the story of Dolores; lastly, what he had heard at San Isodro aboutDon Rodrigo de Valer. And as he proceeded with his narrative, he weldedthe scattered links into a connected chain of evidence.
Juan, all eagerness, could hardly wait till he came to the end. "Why didyou not speak to Losada?" he interrupted at last.
"Stay, brother, and hear me out; the best is to come. I have done solately. But until assured how thou wouldst regard the matter, I carednot to ask questions, the answers to which might wound thy heart."
"You are in no doubt now. What heard you from Senor Cristobal?"
"I heard that Dr. Egidius named the Conde de Nuera as one of those whobefriended Don Rodrigo. And that he had been present when that braveand faithful teacher privately expounded the Epistle to the Romans."
"There!" Juan exclaimed with a start. "There is the origin of my secondand favourite name, Rodrigo. Brother, brother, these are the besttidings I have heard for years." And uncovering his head, he utteredfervent and solemn words of thanksgiving.
To which Carlos added a heartfelt "Amen," and resumed,--
"Then, brother, you think we are justified in taking this joy to ourhearts?"
"Without doubt," cried the sanguine Don Juan.
"And it follows that his crime--"
"Was what in our eyes constitutes the truest glory, the profession of apure faith," said Juan with decision, leaping at once to the conclusionCarlos had reached by a far slower path.
"And those mystic words inscribed upon the window, the delight andwonder of our childhood--"
"Ah!" repeated Juan--
"El Dorado Yo he trovado."
But what they have to do with the matter I see not yet."
"You see not? Surely the knowledge of God in Christ, the kingdom ofheaven opened up to us, is the true El Dorado, the golden country, whichenriches those who find it for ever more."
"That is all very good," said Juan, with the air of a man not quitesatisfied.
"I doubt not that was our father's meaning," Carlos continued.
"I doubt it, though. Up to that point I follow you, Carlos; but therewe part. _Something_ in the New World, I think, my father must havefound."
A lengthened debate followed, in which Carlos discovered, rather to hissurprise, that Juan still clung to his early faith in a literal land ofgold. The more thoughtful and speculative brother sought in vain toreason him out of that belief. Nor was he much more successful when hecame to state his own settled conviction that they should never seetheir father's face on earth. Not the slightest doubt remained on hisown mind that, on account of his attachment to the Reformed faith, theConde de Nuera had been, in the phraseology of the time, quietly "putout of the way." But whether this had been done during the voyage, oron the wild unknown shores of the New World, he believed his childrenwould never know.
On this point, however, no argument availed with Juan. He seemeddetermined _not_ to believe in his father's death. He confessed,indeed, that his heart bounded at the thought that he had been asufferer "in the cause of truth and freedom." "He has suffered exile,"he said, "and the loss of all things. But I see not wherefore he maynot after all be living still, somewhere in that vast wonderful NewWorld."
"I am content to think," Carlos replied, "that all these years he hasbeen at rest with the dead in Christ. And that we shall see his facefirst with Christ when he appears in glory."
"But I am not content. We must learn something more."
"We shall never learn more. How can we?" asked Carlos.
"That is so like thee, little brother. Ever desponding, ever turnedeasily from thy purpos
e."
"Well; be it so," said Carlos meekly.
"But what _I_ determine, that I do," said Juan. "At least I will makemy uncle speak out," he continued. "I have ever suspected that he knowssomething."
"But how is that to be done?" asked Carlos. "Nevertheless, do all thoucanst, and God prosper thee. Only," he added with great earnestness,"remember the necessities of our present position; and for the sake ofour friends, as well as of our own lives, use due prudence and caution."
"Fear not, my too prudent brother.--The best and dearest brother in theworld," he added kindly, "if he had but a little more courage."
Thus conversing they hastily retraced their steps to the city, the hourbeing already late.
Quiet weeks passed on after this unmarked by any event of importance.Winter had now given place to spring; the time of the singing of birdswas come. In spite of numerous and heavy anxieties, and of _one_ sorrowthat pressed more or less upon all, it was still spring-time in many abrave and hopeful heart amongst the adherents of the new faith inSeville. Certainly it was spring-time with Don Juan Alvarez.
One Sunday a letter arrived by special messenger from Nuera, containingthe unwelcome tidings that the old and faithful servant of the house,Diego Montes, was dying. It was his last wish to resign his stewardshipinto the hands of his young master, Senor Don Juan. Juan could nothesitate. "I will go to-morrow morning," he said to Carlos; "but restassured I will return hither as soon as possible; the days are tooprecious to be lost."
Together they repaired once more to Dona Isabella's house. Don Juan toldthe friends they met there of his intended departure, and ere theyseparated many a hand warmly grasped his, and many a voice spoke kindlythe "Vaya con Dios" for his journey.
"It needs not formal leave-takings, senores and my brethren," said Juan;"my absence will be very short; not next Sunday indeed, but possibly ina fortnight, and certainly this day month I shall meet you all hereagain."
"_God willing_," said Losada gravely. And so they parted.
The Spanish Brothers: A Tale of the Sixteenth Century Page 21