Caesar or Nothing
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The sky is blue, the air limpid, pure, and diaphanous; the transparent
atmosphere scarcely admits effects of perspective, and its ethereal
mass makes the outlines of the houses, of the belfries, of the eaves,
vibrate. The cold breeze plays at the cross-streets, and amuses itself
by twisting the stems of the geraniums and pinks that flame on the
balconies. Everywhere there is an odour of cistus and of burning broom,
which comes from the ovens where the bread is baked, and an odour of
lavender that comes from the house entries.
The town yawns and awakes; some priests pass, on their way to church;
pious women come out of their houses; and market men and women begin to
arrive from the villages nearby. The bells make that _tilin-talan_ so
sad, which seems confined to these dead towns. In the main street the
shops open; a boy hangs up the dresses, the sandals, the caps, on the
facade, reaching them up with a stick. Droves of mules are seen in front
of the grain-shops; some charcoal-burners go by, selling charcoal; and
peasant women lead, by their halters, little burros loaded with jars and
pans.
One hears all the hawksters' cries, all the clatter characteristic of
that town. The milk-vendor, the honey-vendor, the chestnut-vendor, each
has his own traditional theme. The candlestick-maker produces a sonorous
peal from two copper candlesticks, the scissors-grinder whistles on his
flute....
Then, at midday, hawksters and peasants disappear, the sun shines
hotter, and the afternoon is tiresome and enervating.
FROM THE MIRADERO
Castro Duro is situated on a hill of red earth.
One goes up to the town by a dusty highway, with the remains of little
trees which one Europeanizing mayor planted, and which all died; or else
by zigzag paths, up which saddle-animals and beasts of burden usually
go.
From the plain Castro Duro stands out in silhouette against the sky,
between two high, many-sided edifices, one of a honey yellow, old and
respectable, the church; the other white, overgrown, modern, the prison.
These two pillars of society are conspicuous from all sides, from
whatsoever point on the plain one looks at Castro Duro.
The town was an old important city, and has, from afar, a seigniorial
air; from nearby, on the contrary, it presents that aspect of caked dust
which all the Castilian cities in ruin have; it is wide, spread out,
formed for the most part of lanes and little squares, with low crooked
houses that have blackish, warped roofs.
From the promenade beside the church, which is called the Miradero, one
can see the great valley that surrounds Castro, a plain without an end,
flat and empty. At the foot of the hill that supports the city, a broad
river, which formerly kissed the old walls, marks a huge S with a sand
border.
The water of the river covers the beach in winter, and leaves it half
uncovered in summer. At intervals on the river banks grow little groves
of poplar, which are mirrored on the tranquil surface of the water. A
very long bridge of more than twenty arches crosses from one shore to
the other.
The hill that serves as pedestal for the historic city has very
different aspects; from one side it is seen terraced into steps, formed
of small parcels of land held up by rough stone walls. On these landings
there are thickets of vines and a few almond-trees, which grow even out
of the spaces between the stones.
On another part of the hill, called the Trenches, the whole ground is
broken by great cuttings, which in other days were no doubt used for the
defence of the city. Near the trenches are to be seen the remains of
battlemented walls, tiles, and ruins of an ancient settlement, perhaps
destroyed by the waters of the river which in time undermined its
foundations.
From the Miradero one sees the bridge below, as from a balloon, with
men, riding horses, and carts going over it, all diminished by the
distance. Women are washing clothes and spreading them in the sun, and
in the evening horses and herds of goats are drinking at the river
brink.
The great plain, the immense flat land, contains cultivated fields,
square, oblong, varying in colour with the seasons, from the light green
of barley to the gold of wheat and the dirty yellow of stubble. Near the
river are truck-gardens and orchards of almonds and other fruit trees.
In the afternoon, looking from the Miradero, from the height where
Castro stands, one feels overcome by this sea of earth, by the vast
horizon, and the profound silence. The cocks toss their metallic crowing
into the air; the clock-bells mark the hours with a sad, slow clang; and
at evening the river, brilliant in its two or three fiery curves, grows
pale and turns to blue. On clear days the sunset has extraordinary
magic. The entire town floats in a sea of gold. The Collegiate church
changes from yellow to lemon colour, and at times to orange; and there
are old walls which take on, in the evening light, the colour of bread
well browned in the oven. And the sun disappears into the plain, and the
Angelus bell sounds through the immense space.
THE TOWN
Castro Duro has a great many streets, as many as an important capital.
By only circling the Square one can count the Main Street, Laurel
Street, Christ Street, Merchants' Street, Forge Street, Shoemakers'
Street, Loafing Street, Penitence Wall, and Chain Street.
These streets are built with large brick houses and small adobe houses.
Pointed cobbles form the pavement, and leave a dirty open sewer in the
middle.
The large houses have two granite columns on their facades, on either
side of the door, and these columns as well as the stones of the
threshold take on a violet tinge from the lees of wine the inhabitants
have the custom of putting on the sidewalks to dry.
Many of the big houses in Castro boast a large 'scutcheon over the door,
little crazy towers with iron weather-cocks on the roof; and some of
them a huge stork's nest.
The streets remote from the centre of town have no paving, and their
houses are low, built of adobe, and continued by yards, over whose
mud-walls appear the branches of fig-trees.
These houses lean forward or backward, and they have worn-out balconies,
staircases which hold up through some prodigy of stability, and old
grills, crowned with a cross and embellished with big flowers of wrought
iron.
The two principal monuments of Castro Duro are the Great Church and the
palace.
The Great Church is Romanesque, of a colour between yellow and brown,
gilded by the sun. It stands high, at one extremity of the hill, like a
sentinel watching the valley. The solid old fabric has rows of crenels
under the roof, which shows its warlike character.
The principal dome and the smaller ones are ribbed, like almost all the
Romanesque churches of Spain.
The round apse exhibits ornamental half columns, divers rosettes, and a
number of raised figures, and masonic symbols. In the interior of the
church the most notable thing to be seen is the Renaissance altar-piece
and a Romanesque arch that gives entrance to the baptistery.
The second archeological monument of the town is the ancient palace of
the Dukes of Castro Duro.
The palace, a great structure of stone and now blackened brick, rises at
the side of the town-hall, and has, like it, an arcade on the Square. In
the central balcony there are monumental columns, and on top of them
two giants of corroded stone, with large clubs, who appear to guard the
'scutcheon; one end of the building is made longer by a square tower.
The palace wears the noble air given to old edifices by the large spread
of wall containing windows very far apart, very small, and very much
ornamented.
From the inscriptions on its various escutcheons one can gather that it
was erected by the Duke of Castro Duro and his wife, Dona Guiomar.
In the rear of the palace, like a high belvedere built on the rampart,
there appears a gallery formed of ten round arches, supported on slender
pilasters. Below the gallery are the remains of a garden, with ramps and
terraces and a few old statues. The river comes almost to the foot of
the gardens.
Today the palace belongs to Don Calixto Garcia Guerrero, Count de la
Sauceda.
Don Calixto and his family have no necessity for the whole of this big
palace to live in, and have been content to renovate the part fronting
on the Calle Mayor. They have had new belvederes built in, and have
given over the apartments looking on the Square and the Calle del Cristo
to the Courts and the school.
Another great building, which astonishes every one that stops over at
Castro Duro, by its size, is the Convent of la Merced. It has been half
destroyed by a fire. In the groins there remain some large Renaissance
brackets, and in one wing of the edifice, inhabited by the nuns, there
are windows with jalousies and a rather lofty tower terminating in a
weather-cock and a cross.
LIFE AT CASTRO
Castro Duro is principally a town of farmers and carriers. Its municipal
limits are very extensive; the plain surrounding it is fertile enough.
In winter there are many foggy days, and then the flat land looks like
a sea, in which hillocks and groves float like islands. Wine and
cultivated fruits constitute the principal riches of Castro. The wine is
sharp, badly made; there is one thick dark variety which always tastes
of tar, and one light variety which they reinforce with alcohol and
which they call aloque.
Autumn is the period of greatest animation in the town; the harvest
gets stowed away, the vintage made, the sweet almonds are gathered and
shelled in the porticoes.
Formerly in all the houses of rich and poor, the murk of the grapes
was boiled in a still and a somewhat bitter brandy thus manufactured.
Whether in consequence of the brandy, or of the unusual amount of money
about, or of both, the fact is that at that period a great passion for
gambling developed in Castro and more crimes were committed then than
during all the rest of the year.
The industrial processes in Castro are primitive; everything is made
by hand, and the Castrian people imagine that this establishes a
superiority. In the environs of the town there are an electrical plant,
a brickyard, various mills, and lime and plaster kilns.
The town's commerce is more extended than its industries, although no
more prosperous. In the Square and in the Calle Mayor, under the
arcades white goods are sold and woollens, and there are hat-shops
and silversmiths, one alongside the other. The shopkeepers hang their
merchandise in the arches, the saddlers and harness-makers decorate
their entrances with head-stalls and straps, and those that have no
archway put up awnings. In the Square there are continually stalls set
up for earthenware jars and pitchers and for articles in tin.
In the outlying streets there are inns, at whose doors five or six mules
with their heads together are almost constantly to be seen; there are
crockery stores containing brooms and every kind of jug and glazed pan;
there are little shops in doorways holding big baskets full of grain;
there are dark taverns, which are also eating-houses, to which the
peasants go to eat on market days, and whose signs are strings of dried
pimentoes and cayenne peppers or an elm branch. In the written signs
there is a truly Castilian charm, chaste and serene. At the Riojano oven
one reads: "'Bred' baked for all 'commers.'" And at the Campico inn it
says: "Wine served by Furibis herself." The shops and the inns have
picturesque names too. There is the Sign of the Moor, and the Sign of
the Jew, and the Sign of the Lion, and one of the Robbers.
The streets of Castro, especially those near the centre, where the crowd
is greater, are dirty and ill-smelling in summer. Clouds of flies hover
about and settle on the pairs of blissfully sleeping oxen; the sun
pours down his blinding brilliance; not a soul passes, and only a few
greyhounds, white and black, elegant and sad, rove about the streets...
In all seasons, at twilight, a few young gentlemen promenade in the
Square. At nine at night in the winter, and at ten in summer, begins the
reign of the watchmen with their dramatic and lamentable cry.
* * * * *
Alzugaray gave Caesar these details by degrees, while they were both
seated in the hotel getting ready to dine.
"And the type? The ethnic type? What is it, according to you?" asked
Caesar.
"A type rather thin than fat, supple, with an aquiline nose, black
eyes..."
"Yes, the Iberian type," said Caesar, "that is how it struck me too.
Tall, supple, dolichocephalic... It seems to me one can try to put
something through in this town..."
III
CAESAR'S LABOURS
FIRST STEPS
"And what have you been doing all day? Tell me."
"I think, my dear Alzugaray," said Caesar, "that I can say, like my
namesake Julius: 'Veni, vidi, vice.'"
"The devil! The first day?"
"Yes."
"Show me. What happened?"
"I left the house and entered the cafe downstairs. There was no one
there but a small boy, from whom I ordered a bottle of beer and asked if
there was a newspaper published here. He told me yes, the _Castro Mail_,
an independent weekly. I bade him fetch me a copy, even an old one, and
he brought me these two. I gave them a glance, and then, as if it didn't
interest me much, I questioned the lad about Don Calixto.
"The first impression I obtained was that Don Calixto is the most
influential person in the town; the second, that besides him, either
with him or against him, there is a Senor Don Platon Peribanez, almost
as influential as Don Calixto. Afterwards I read the two numbers of the
Castro periodical attentively, and from this reading I gathered that
there is a somewhat hazy question here about an Asylum, where it
seems some irregularities have been committed. There is a Republican
book-dealer, who is a member of the Council, and on whom the Workmen's
Club depends, and he has asked for information as to the facts from the
Municipality, and the followers of Don Calixto and of Don Platon oppose
this suggestion as an attack on the good-birth, the honour, and the
reputation of such respectable personages.
"Having verified these pieces of news, which are of interest for me, I
packed off to church and heard the whole eleven o'clock mass."
"Mighty good! You are quite a man."
"Mass ended, I went over to the Baptistery arch and stood there
examining it, as if I felt the most terrible symptoms of enthusiasm for
carved stone. Afterwards I went into the big chapel, which serves also
as a pantheon for the Dukes of Castro Duro, whose tombs you find in
the side niches of the presbytery. These niches are decorated with an
efflorescence of Gothic, which is most gay and pretty, and among all
this stone filigree you see the recumbent statues of a number of knights
and one bishop, who to judge by his sword must have been a warrior too.
"Nobody remained in the church; the priest, a nice old man, fixed his
eyes on me and asked me what I thought of the arch. And having prepared
my lesson, I talked about the Romanesque of the XII and XIII Centuries
like a professor, and then he took me into the sacristy and showed me
two paintings on wood which I told him were XV Century.
"'So they say,' the priest agreed. 'Do you think they are Italian or
German?'
"'Italian certainly, North Italian.' I might as well have said South
German, but I had to decide for something.
"'And they must be worth...? he then asked me with eagerness.
"'My dear man; according,' I told him. 'A dealer would offer you a
hundred or two hundred pesetas apiece. In London or New York, well
placed, they might be worth twenty or thirty thousand francs.'
"The 'pater' shot fire out of his eyes.
"'And what would one have to do about it?' he asked me.
"'My dear man, I think one would have to take some good photographs and
send them to various trades-people and to the museums in the United
States.'
"'Would it be necessary to write in English?'
"'Yes, it would be the most practical thing.' "'I don't think there is
anybody here that knows how....'
"'I would do it, with great pleasure.'
"'But are you going to be here for some time?'
"'Yes, it is probable.'
"He asked me what I came to Castro Duro for, and I told him that I had
no other object than to visit Don Calixto Garcia Guerrero.
"Astonishment on the priest's face.
"'You know him?'
"'Yes, I met him in Rome.'
"'Do you know where he lives?'
"'No.'
"'Then I will take you.'
"The priest and I went out into the street. He wanted to give me the
sidewalk, and I opposed that as if it were a crime. He told me he was
more accustomed than I to walking on the cobble-stones; and finally, he
on the sidewalk and I in the gutter, we arrived at Don Calixto's house."
* * * * *
"Was he at home?" asked Alzugaray.
"Yes," said Caesar. "By the way, on the road there we bowed to the
present Deputy to the Cortes, he who will be my opponent in the
approaching election, Senor Garcia Padilla."
"Dear man! What a coincidence! What sort is he?"
"He is tall, with a reddish aquiline nose, a greyish moustache, full of
cosmetic, a poor type."
"He is a Liberal?"
"Yes, he is a Liberal, because Don Calixto is a Conservative. In his
heart, nothing."
"Good. Go on."
_DON CALIXTO AT HOME_
"As I was saying, Don Calixto was at home, in a large room on the ground
floor, which serves as his office. Don Calixto is a tall, supple man,
with the blackest of hair which is beginning to turn white on the
temples, and a white moustache. He is at the romantic age of illusions,
of hopes...." "How old is he?" asked Alzugaray.
"He isn't more than fifty-four," Caesar replied, sarcastically. "Don
Calixto dresses in black, very fastidiously, and the effect is smart,
but smacks of the notary. No matter what pains he takes to appear
graceful and easy in manner, he doesn't achieve the result; he has the
inbred humility of one who has taken orders in a shop, either as a lad
or as a man.
"Don Calixto received me with great amiability, but with a certain air
of reserve, as if to say: 'In Rome I was a merry comrade to you, here I
am a personage.' We chatted about a lot of things, and before he could
ask me what I wanted, I pulled out the letter and handed it to him. The
old man put on his glasses, read attentively, and said:
"'Very good, very good; we will discuss it later.'
"The priest of course thought that he was in the way, and he left.
"When we were alone, Don Calixto said:
"'All right, Caesar, I am happy to see you. I see that you remember our
conversation in Rome. You must have lunch with me and my family.'
"'With great pleasure.'
"'I'll go and tell them to put on another place.'
"Don Calixto went out and left me alone. For a while I studied the
boss's office. On the wall, diplomas, appointments, in looking-glass
frames; a genealogical tree, probably drawn day before yesterday; in a
book-case, legal books...
"Don Calixto came back; he asked me if I was tired, and I told him no,
and when we had crossed the whole width of the house, which is huge, he
showed me the garden. My boy, what a wonderful spot! It hangs over the
river and it is a marvel. The highest part, which is the part they keep
up, isn't worth much; it is in lamentable style; just imagine, there is
a fountain which is a tin negro that spurts out water from all parts.
"However, the old part of the garden, the lower part, is lovely. There
is a big tower standing guard over the river, now converted into a
belvedere, with pomegranates, rose-bushes, and climbing plants all
around it, and above all, there is an oleander that is a marvel...; it
looks like a fire-work castle or a shower of flowers."
* * * * *
"Leave that point," said Alzugaray. "You are talking like a poor
disciple of Ruskin's."
"You are right. But when you see those gardens, you will be
enthusiastic, too."
"Get ahead."
* * * * *
THE POLITICAL POWERS OF CASTRO
"During our promenade Don Calixto talked to me of the immense good he
has done for the town and of the ingratitude he constantly receives for
it.
"While I listened, I recalled a little periodical in Madrid which had no
other object than to furnish bombs at reasonable prices, and which said,
speaking of a manufacturer in Catalonia: 'Senor So-and-so is the most
powerful boss in the province of Tarragona, and even at that there are
those who dispute his bossdom.'
"Don Calixto is astonished that when he has done the Castrians the
honour to make them loans at eighty or ninety percent, they are not fond
of him. After the garden we saw the house; I won't tell you anything
about it, I don't want you to accuse me again of being a Ruskinian.
"When we reached the dining-room Don Calixto said: 'I am going to
present you to my family.'
"Thereupon, entrance, ceremonies, bows on my part, smiles ... _toute
la lyre_. Don Calixto's wife is an insignificant fat woman; the two
daughters insipid, ungainly, not at all pretty; and with them was a
little girl of about fifteen or sixteen, a niece of Don Calixto's, a
veritable little devil, named Amparo. This Amparo is a tiny, flat-faced
creature, with black eyes, and extraordinarily vivacious and
mischievous. During dinner I succeeded in irritating the child.
"I talked gravely with Don Calixto and his wife and daughters about
Madrid, about the theatrical companies that come to this town, about
their acquaintances at the Capital.
"The child interrupted us, bringing us the cat and putting a little bow
on him, and then making him walk on the key-board of the piano.
"At half-past one we went to the dining-room. Dinner was kilometres
long; and the conversation turned on Rome and Paris. Don Calixto drank
more and more, I, too; and at the end of the meal there was a bit of
toasting, from which my political intentions were made manifest.
"The elder daughter, whose name is Adela, asked me if I liked music. I
told her yes, almost closing my eyes, as if deliriously, and we went
into the drawing-room. Without paying attention, I listened, during
the horrors of digestion, to a number of sonatas, now and then saying:
'Magnificent! How wonderful that is!'
"The father was enchanted, the mother enchanted, the sister likewise;
the little girl was the one who stared at me with questioning black
eyes. She must have been thinking: 'What species of bird is this?' I
believe the damned child realized that I was acting a comedy.
"About four the ladies and I went out into the garden. Don Calixto has
the habit of taking an afternoon nap, and he left us. I succeeded in
bringing myself to, in the open air. Don Calixto's wife showed me over
an abandoned part of the house, in which there is an old kitchen as big
as a cathedral, with a stone chimney like a high altar, with the arms
of the Dukes of Castro. We chatted, I was very pleasant to the mother,
courteous to the daughters, and coldly indifferent with the little
niece. I was bored, after having exhausted all subjects of conversation,
when Don Calixto reappeared and carried me off to his office.
"The conference was important; he explained the situation of the
Conservative forces of the district to me. These forces are represented,
principally, by three men: Don Calixto, a Senor Don Platon, and a friar.
Don Calixto represents the modern Conservative tendency and is, let us
say, the Canovas of the district; with him are the rich members of the
Casino, the superior judge, the doctors, the great proprietors, etc.
Don Platon Peribanez, a silversmith in the Calle Mayor, represents the
middle-class Conservatives; his people are less showy, but more in
earnest and better disciplined; this Platonian or Platonic party is made
up of chandlers, silversmiths, small merchants, and the poor priests.
The friar, who represents the third Conservative nucleus, is Father
Martin Lafuerza. Father Martin is prior of the Franciscan monastery,
which was established here after the Order was expelled from Filinas.
"Father Martin is an Ultramontanist up to the eyes. He directs priests,
friars, nuns, sisters, and is the absolute master of a town nearby
called Cidones, where the women are very pious.
"Despite their piety, the reputation of those ladies cannot be very
good, because there is a proverb, certainly not very gallant: 'Don't get
either a wife or a mule at Cidones; neither a wife nor a mule nor a pig
at Grinon.'
"Opposed to these three Conservative nuclei are the friends of the
present Deputy, who amount to no more than the official element, which
is always on the ruling side, and a small guerilla band that meets in
the Workingmen's Casino, and is composed principally of a Republican
bookseller, an apothecary who invents explosives, also Republican, an
anarchist doctor, a free-thinking weaver, and an innkeeper whom they
call Furibis, who is also a smuggler and a man with hair on his chest."
_DON PLATON PERIBANEZ_
"After having given me these data, Don Calixto told me that by counting
on Senor Peribanez, the election was almost sure; and since the quicker
things go the better, he proposed that we should go to see him, and I
immediately agreed.
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