The Spanish Brothers: A Tale of the Sixteenth Century

by Deborah Alcock

  XXX.

  The Captive.

  "Ay, but for _me_--my name called---drawn Like a conscript's lot from the lap's black yawn He has dipped into on the battle dawn. Bid out of life by a nod, a glance, Stumbling, mute mazed, at Nature's chance With a rapid finger circling round, Fixed to the first poor inch of ground To fight from, where his foot was found, Whose ear but a moment since was free To the wide camp's hum and gossipry-- Summoned, a solitary man, To end his life where his life began, From the safe glad rear to the awful van."--R. Browning

  On the night of his arrest, when Don Carlos Alvarez was left alone inhis dungeon, he stood motionless as one in a dream. At length he raisedhis head, and began to look around him. A lamp had been left with him;and its light illumined a cell ten feet square, with a vaulted roof.Through a narrow grating, too high for him to reach, one or two starswere shining; but these he saw not. He only saw the inner door sheathedwith iron; the mat of rushes on which he was to sleep; the stool thatwas to be his seat; the two earthen pitchers of water that completed hisscanty furniture. From the first moment these things looked strangelyfamiliar to him. He threw himself on the mat to think and pray. Hecomprehended his situation perfectly. It seemed as if he had been allhis life expecting this hour; as if he had been born for it, and led upto it gradually through all his previous experience. As yet he did notthink that his fate was terrible; he only thought that it wasinevitable--something that was to come upon him, and that in due coursehad come at last. It was his impression that he should always remainthere, and never more see anything beyond that grated window and thatiron door.

  There was a degree of unreality about this mood. For the pastfortnight, or more, his mind had been strained to its utmost tension.Suspense, more wearing even than sorrow, had held him on the rack.Sleep had seldom visited his eyes; and when it came, it had been brokenand fitful.

  Now the worst had befallen him. Suspense was over; certainty had come.This brought at first a kind of rest to the overtaxed mind and frame.He was as one who hears a sentence of death, but who is taken off therack. No dread of the future could quite overpower the presentunreasoning sense of relief.

  Thus it happened that an hour afterwards he was sleeping the dreamlesssleep of exhaustion. Well for him if, instead of "death'stwin-brother," the angel of death himself had been sent to open theprison doors and set the captive free! And yet, after all, _would_ ithave been well for him?

  So utter was his exhaustion, that when food was placed in his cell thenext morning, he only awaked for a moment, then slept again as soundlyas before. Not till some hours later did he finally shake off hisslumber. He lay still for some time, examining with a strange kind ofcuriosity the little bolted aperture which was near the top of his door,and watching a solitary broken sunbeam which had struggled through thegrating that served him for a window, and threw a gleam of light on theopposite wall.

  Then, with a start, he asked himself, "_Where am I?_" The answerbrought an agony of fear, of horror, of bitter pain. "Lost! lost! Godhave mercy on me! I am lost!" As one in intense bodily anguish, hewrithed, moaned--ay, even cried aloud.

  No wonder. Hope, love, life--alike in its noblest aims and itscommonest joys--all were behind him. Before him were the dreary dungeondays and nights--it might be months or years; the death of agony andshame; and, worst of all, the unutterable horrors of the torture-room,from which he shrank as any one of us would shrink to-day.

  Slowly and at last came the large burning tears. But very few of themfell; for his anguish was as yet too fierce for many tears. All thatday the storm raged on. When the alcayde brought his evening meal, helay still, his face covered with his cloak. But as night drew on herose, and paced his narrow cell with hasty, irregular steps, like thoseof a caged wild animal.

  How should he endure the horrible loneliness of the present, themaddening terror of all that was to come? And this life was to _last_.To last, until it should be succeeded by worse horrors and fierceranguish. Words of prayer died on his lips. Or, even when he utteredthem, it seemed as if God heard not--as if those thick walls and grateddoors shut him out too.

  Yet one thing was clear to him from the beginning. Deeper than allother fears within him lay the fear of denying his Lord. Again and againdid he repeat, "When called in question, I will at once confess all."For he knew that, according to a law recently enacted by the HolyOffice, and sanctioned by the Pope, no subsequent retractation couldsave a prisoner who had once confessed--he must die. And he desiredfinally and for ever to put it out of his own power to save his life andlose it.

  As every dreary morning dawned upon him, he thought that ere its sun sethe might be called to confess his Master's name before the solemntribunal. At first he awaited the summons with a trembling heart. Butas time passed on, the delay became more dreadful than the anticipatedexamination. At last he began to long for _any_ change that might breakthe monotony of his prison-life.

  The only person, with the exception of his gaoler, that ever entered hiscell, was a member of the Board of Inquisitors, who was obliged by theirrules to make a fortnightly inspection of the prisons. But theDominican monk to whom this duty was relegated merely asked the prisonera few formal questions: such as, whether he was well, whether hereceived his appointed provision, whether his warder used him withcivility. To these Carlos always answered prudently that he had nocomplaint to make. At first he was wont to inquire, in his turn, whenhis case might be expected to come on. To this it would be answered,that there was no hurry about the matter. The Lords Inquisitors hadmuch business on hand, and many more important cases than his to attendto; he must await their leisure and their pleasure.

  At length a kind of lethargy stole over him; though it was brokenfrequently by sharp bursts of anguish. He ceased to take note of time,ceased to make fruitless inquiries of his gaoler, who would never tellhim anything. Upon one occasion he asked this man for a Breviary, sincehe sometimes found it difficult to recall even the gospel words that heknew so well. But he was answered in the set terms the Inquisitorstaught their officials, that the book he ought now to study was the bookof his own heart, which he should examine diligently, in order to theconfession and repentance of his sins.

  During the morning hours the outer door of his cell (there were two) wasusually left open, in order to admit a little fresh air. At such timeshe often heard footsteps in the corridors, and doors opening andshutting. With a kind of sick yearning, not unmixed with hope, helonged that some visitant would enter his cell. But none ever came.Some of the Inquisitors were keen observers and good students ofcharacter. They had watched Carlos narrowly before his arrest, and theyhad arrived at the conclusion that utter and prolonged solitude was thebest remedy for his disease.

  Such solitude has driven many a weary tortured soul to insanity. Butthat divine compassion which no dungeon walls or prison bars avail toshut out, saved Carlos from such a fate.

  One morning he knew from the stir outside that some of hisfellow-captives had received a visit. But the deep stillness thatfollowed the dying away of footsteps in the corridor was broken by amost unwonted sound. A loud, clear, and even cheerful voice sang out,--

  "Vencidos van los frailes; vencidos van! Corridas van los lobos; corridos van!"

  [There go the friars; there they run! There go the wolves, the wolves are done!][#]

  [#] Everything related of Juliano Hernandez is strictly true.

  Every nerve and fibre of the lonely captive's heart thrilled responsiveto that strain. Evidently the song was one of triumph. But from whoselips? Who could dare to triumph in the abode of misery, the very seatof Satan?

  Carlos Alvarez had heard that voice before. A striking peculiarity inthe dialect rivetted this fact upon his mind. The words were neitherthe pure sonorous Castilian that he spoke himself, nor the soft glidingsibilant Andaluz that he heard in Seville, nor yet the pato
is of theManchegan peasants around his mountain home. In such accents one, andone alone, had ever spoken in his hearing. And that was the man whosaid, "For the joy of bringing food to the perishing, water to thethirsty, light to those that sit in darkness, rest to the weary andheavy-laden, I have counted the cost, and I shall pay the price rightwillingly."

  Whatever men had done to the body, it was evident that Juliano Hernandezwas still unbroken in heart, strong in hope and courage. A fettered,tortured captive, he was yet enabled, not only to hold his own faithfast, but actually to minister to that of others. His rough rhymeintimated to his fellow-captives that "the wolves" of Rome were leavinghis cell, vanquished by the sword of the Spirit. And that, as heovercame, so might they also.

  Carlos heard, understood, and felt from that hour that he was not alone.Moreover, the grace and strength so richly given to his fellow-suffererseemed to bring Christ nearer to himself. "Surely God is in thisplace--even here," he said, "and I knew it not." And then, bowing hishead, he wept--wept such tears as bring help and healing with them.

  Up to this time he had held Christ's hand indeed, else had he "utterlyfainted." But he held it in the dark. He clung to him desperately, asif for mere life and reason. Now the light began to dawn upon him. Hebegan to see the face of Him to whom he had been clinging. His good andgracious words--such words as, "Let not your heart be troubled," "Mypeace I give unto you"--became again, as in old times, full of meaning,instinct with life. He "remembered the years of the right hand of theMost High;" he thought of those days that now seemed so long ago, when,with such thrilling joy, he received the truth from Juliano's book. Andhe knew that the same joy might be his even in that dreary prison,because the same God was above him, and the same Lord was "rich unto allthat call upon him."

  On the next occasion when Juliano raised his brave song of victory,Carlos had the courage to respond, by chanting in the vulgar tongue,"The Lord hear thee in the day of trouble; the name of the God of Jacobdefend thee. Send thee help from the sanctuary, and strengthen thee outof Zion."

  But this brought him a visit from the alcayde, who commanded him to"forbear that noise."

  "I only chanted a versicle from one of the Psalms," he explained.

  "No matter. Prisoners are not permitted to disturb the Santa Casa,"said Gasper Benevidio, as he quitted the cell.

  The "Santa Casa," or Holy House, was the proper style and title of theprison of the Holy Inquisition. At first sight the name appears ahideous mockery. We seem to catch in it an echo of the laughter offiends, as in that other kindred name, "The Society of Jesus." Yet,just then, the Triana was truly a holy house. Precious in the sight ofthe Lord were those who crowded its dismal cells. Many a lonely captivewept and prayed and agonized there, who, though now forgotten on earth,shall one day shine with a brightness eclipsing kings and conquerors--"astar for ever and ever."