________________________________________________
_ WHEN General Barrios stopped to address Mrs. Gould, Antonia
raised negligently her hand holding an open fan, as if to shade
from the sun her head, wrapped in a light lace shawl. The clear
gleam of her blue eyes gliding behind the black fringe of
eyelashes paused for a moment upon her father, then travelled
further to the figure of a young man of thirty at most, of medium
height, rather thick-set, wearing a light overcoat. Bearing down
with the open palm of his hand upon the knob of a flexible cane,
he had been looking on from a distance; but directly he saw
himself noticed, he approached quietly and put his elbow over the
door of the landau.
The shirt collar, cut low in the neck, the big bow of his cravat,
the style of his clothing, from the round hat to the varnished
shoes, suggested an idea of French elegance; but otherwise he was
the very type of a fair Spanish creole. The fluffy moustache and
the short, curly, golden beard did not conceal his lips, rosy,
fresh, almost pouting in expression. His full, round face was of
that warm, healthy creole white which is never tanned by its
native sunshine. Martin Decoud was seldom exposed to the
Costaguana sun under which he was born. His people had been long
settled in Paris, where he had studied law, had dabbled in
literature, had hoped now and then in moments of exaltation to
become a poet like that other foreigner of Spanish blood, Jose
Maria Heredia. In other moments he had, to pass the time,
condescended to write articles on European affairs for the
Semenario, the principal newspaper in Sta. Marta, which printed
them under the heading "From our special correspondent," though
the authorship was an open secret. Everybody in Costaguana, where
the tale of compatriots in Europe is jealously kept, knew that it
was "the son Decoud," a talented young man, supposed to be moving
in the higher spheres of Society. As a matter of fact, he was an
idle boulevardier, in touch with some smart journalists, made
free of a few newspaper offices, and welcomed in the pleasure
haunts of pressmen. This life, whose dreary superficiality is
covered by the glitter of universal blague, like the stupid
clowning of a harlequin by the spangles of a motley costume,
induced in him a Frenchified--but most
un-French--cosmopolitanism, in reality a mere barren
indifferentism posing as intellectual superiority. Of his own
country he used to say to his French associates: "Imagine an
atmosphere of opera-bouffe in which all the comic business of
stage statesmen, brigands, etc., etc., all their farcical
stealing, intriguing, and stabbing is done in dead earnest. It is
screamingly funny, the blood flows all the time, and the actors
believe themselves to be influencing the fate of the universe. Of
course, government in general, any government anywhere, is a
thing of exquisite comicality to a discerning mind; but really we
Spanish-Americans do overstep the bounds. No man of ordinary
intelligence can take part in the intrigues of une farce macabre.
However, these Ribierists, of whom we hear so much just now, are
really trying in their own comical way to make the country
habitable, and even to pay some of its debts. My friends, you had
better write up Senor Ribiera all you can in kindness to your own
bondholders. Really, if what I am told in my letters is true,
there is some chance for them at last."
And he would explain with railing verve what Don Vincente Ribiera
stood for--a mournful little man oppressed by his own good
intentions, the significance of battles won, who Montero was (un
grotesque vaniteux et feroce), and the manner of the new loan
connected with railway development, and the colonization of vast
tracts of land in one great financial scheme.
And his French friends would remark that evidently this little
fellow Decoud connaissait la question a fond. An important
Parisian review asked him for an article on the situation. It was
composed in a serious tone and in a spirit of levity. Afterwards
he asked one of his intimates--
"Have you read my thing about the regeneration of Costaguana--une
bonne blague, hein?"
He imagined himself Parisian to the tips of his fingers. But far
from being that he was in danger of remaining a sort of
nondescript dilettante all his life. He had pushed the habit of
universal raillery to a point where it blinded him to the genuine
impulses of his own nature. To be suddenly selected for the
executive member of the patriotic small-arms committee of Sulaco
seemed to him the height of the unexpected, one of those
fantastic moves of which only his "dear countrymen" were capable.
"It's like a tile falling on my head. I--I--executive member!
It's the first I hear of it! What do I know of military rifles?
C'est funambulesque!" he had exclaimed to his favourite sister;
for the Decoud family--except the old father and mother--used
the French language amongst themselves. "And you should see the
explanatory and confidential letter! Eight pages of it--no less!"
This letter, in Antonia's handwriting, was signed by Don Jose,
who appealed to the "young and gifted Costaguanero" on public
grounds, and privately opened his heart to his talented god-son,
a man of wealth and leisure, with wide relations, and by his
parentage and bringing-up worthy of all confidence.
"Which means," Martin commented, cynically, to his sister, "that
I am not likely to misappropriate the funds, or go blabbing to
our Charge d'Affaires here."
The whole thing was being carried out behind the back of the War
Minister, Montero, a mistrusted member of the Ribiera Government,
but difficult to get rid of at once. He was not to know anything
of it till the troops under Barrios's command had the new rifle
in their hands. The President-Dictator, whose position was very
difficult, was alone in the secret.
"How funny!" commented Martin's sister and confidante; to which
the brother, with an air of best Parisian blague, had retorted:
"It's immense! The idea of that Chief of the State engaged, with
the help of private citizens, in digging a mine under his own
indispensable War Minister. No! We are unapproachable!" And he
laughed immoderately.
Afterwards his sister was surprised at the earnestness and
ability he displayed in carrying out his mission, which
circumstances made delicate, and his want of special knowledge
rendered difficult. She had never seen Martin take so much
trouble about anything in his whole life.
"It amuses me," he had explained, briefly. "I am beset by a lot
of swindlers trying to sell all sorts of gaspipe weapons. They
are charming; they invite me to expensive luncheons; I keep up
their hopes; it's extremely entertaining. Meanwhile, the real
affair is being carried through in quite another quarter."
When the business was concluded he declared suddenly his
intention of seeing the precious consignment delivered safely in
Sulaco. The whole burlesque business, he thought, was worth
following up to the end. He mumbled his excuses, tugging at his
golden beard, before the acute young lady who (after the first
wide stare of astonishment) looked at him with narrowed eyes, and
pronounced slowly--
"I believe you want to see Antonia."
"What Antonia?" asked the Costaguana boulevardier, in a vexed and
disdainful tone. He shrugged his shoulders, and spun round on his
heel. His sister called out after him joyously--
"The Antonia you used to know when she wore her hair in two
plaits down her back."
He had known her some eight years since, shortly before the
Avellanos had left Europe for good, as a tall girl of sixteen,
youthfully austere, and of a character already so formed that she
ventured to treat slightingly his pose of disabused wisdom. On
one occasion, as though she had lost all patience, she flew out
at him about the aimlessness of his life and the levity of his
opinions. He was twenty then, an only son, spoiled by his adoring
family. This attack disconcerted him so greatly that he had
faltered in his affectation of amused superiority before that
insignificant chit of a school-girl. But the impression left was
so strong that ever since all the girl friends of his sisters
recalled to him Antonia Avellanos by some faint resemblance, or
by the great force of contrast. It was, he told himself, like a
ridiculous fatality. And, of course, in the news the Decouds
received regularly from Costaguana, the name of their friends,
the Avellanos, cropped up frequently--the arrest and the
abominable treatment of the ex-Minister, the dangers and
hardships endured by the family, its withdrawal in poverty to
Sulaco, the death of the mother.
The Monterist pronunciamento had taken place before Martin Decoud
reached Costaguana. He came out in a roundabout way, through
Magellan's Straits by the main line and the West Coast Service of
the O.S.N. Company. His precious consignment arrived just in
time to convert the first feelings of consternation into a mood
of hope and resolution. Publicly he was made much of by the
familias principales. Privately Don Jose, still shaken and weak,
embraced him with tears in his eyes.
"You have come out yourself! No less could be expected from a
Decoud. Alas! our worst fears have been realized," he moaned,
affectionately. And again he hugged his god-son. This was indeed
the time for men of intellect and conscience to rally round the
endangered cause.
It was then that Martin Decoud, the adopted child of Western
Europe, felt the absolute change of atmosphere. He submitted to
being embraced and talked to without a word. He was moved in
spite of himself by that note of passion and sorrow unknown on
the more refined stage of European politics. But when the tall
Antonia, advancing with her light step in the dimness of the big
bare Sala of the Avellanos house, offered him her hand (in her
emancipated way), and murmured, "I am glad to see you here, Don
Martin," he felt how impossible it would be to tell these two
people that he had intended to go away by the next month's
packet. Don Jose, meantime, continued his praises. Every
accession added to public confidence, and, besides, what an
example to the young men at home from the brilliant defender of
the country's regeneration, the worthy expounder of the party's
political faith before the world! Everybody had read the
magnificent article in the famous Parisian Review. The world was
now informed: and the author's appearance at this moment was
like a public act of faith. Young Decoud felt overcome by a
feeling of impatient confusion. His plan had been to return by
way of the United States through California, visit Yellowstone
Park, see Chicago, Niagara, have a look at Canada, perhaps make a
short stay in New York, a longer one in Newport, use his letters
of introduction. The pressure of Antonia's hand was so frank, the
tone of her voice was so unexpectedly unchanged in its approving
warmth, that all he found to say after his low bow was--
"I am inexpressibly grateful for your welcome; but why need a man
be thanked for returning to his native country? I am sure Dona
Antonia does not think so."
"Certainly not, senor," she said, with that perfectly calm
openness of manner which characterized all her utterances. "But
when he returns, as you return, one may be glad--for the sake of
both."
Martin Decoud said nothing of his plans. He not only never
breathed a word of them to any one, but only a fortnight later
asked the mistress of the Casa Gould (where he had of course
obtained admission at once), leaning forward in his chair with an
air of well-bred familiarity, whether she could not detect in him
that day a marked change--an air, he explained, of more excellent
gravity. At this Mrs. Gould turned her face full towards him with
the silent inquiry of slightly widened eyes and the merest ghost
of a smile, an habitual movement with her, which was very
fascinating to men by something subtly devoted, finely
self-forgetful in its lively readiness of attention. Because,
Decoud continued imperturbably, he felt no longer an idle
cumberer of the earth. She was, he assured her, actually
beholding at that moment the Journalist of Sulaco. At once Mrs.
Gould glanced towards Antonia, posed upright in the corner of a
high, straight-backed Spanish sofa, a large black fan waving
slowly against the curves of her fine figure, the tips of crossed
feet peeping from under the hem of the black skirt. Decoud's
eyes also remained fixed there, while in an undertone he added
that Miss Avellanos was quite aware of his new and unexpected
vocation, which in Costaguana was generally the speciality of
half-educated negroes and wholly penniless lawyers. Then,
confronting with a sort of urbane effrontery Mrs. Gould's gaze,
now turned sympathetically upon himself, he breathed out the
words, "Pro Patria!"
What had happened was that he had all at once yielded to Don
Jose's pressing entreaties to take the direction of a newspaper
that would "voice the aspirations of the province." It had been
Don Jose's old and cherished idea. The necessary plant (on a
modest scale) and a large consignment of paper had been received
from America some time before; the right man alone was wanted.
Even Senor Moraga in Sta. Marta had not been able to find one,
and the matter was now becoming pressing; some organ was
absolutely needed to counteract the effect of the lies
disseminated by the Monterist press: the atrocious calumnies, the
appeals to the people calling upon them to rise with their knives
in their hands and put an end once for all to the Blancos, to
these Gothic remnants, to these sinister mummies, these impotent
paraliticos, who plotted with foreigners for the surrender of the
lands and the slavery of the people.
The clamour of this Negro Liberalism frightened Senor Avellanos.
A newspaper was the only remedy. And now that the right man had
been found in Decoud, great black letters appeared painted
between the windows above the arcaded ground floor of a house on
the Plaza. It was next to Anzani's great emporium of boots,
silks, ironware, muslins, wooden toys, tiny silver arms, legs,
heads, hearts (for ex-voto offerings), rosaries, champagne,
women's hats, patent medicines, even a few dusty books in paper
covers and mostly in the French language. The big black letters
formed the words, "Offices of the Porvenir." From these offices a
single folded sheet of Martin's journalism issued three times a
week; and the sleek yellow Anzani prowling in a suit of ample
black and carpet slippers, before the many doors of his
establishment, greeted by a deep, side-long inclination of his
body the Journalist of Sulaco going to and fro on the business of
his august calling. _
Read next: PART SECOND - THE ISABELS: CHAPTER IV
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