CHAPTER X
THISBEIt was the custom in the convent school on the Torrero-hill to receivevisitors on Thursdays. This festivity farther extended to the evening,when the girls were allowed to walk for an hour in the garden and talk.Talking, it must be remembered, as an indulgence of the flesh, isconsidered in religious communities to be a treat only permitted atcertain periods. It is, indeed, only by tying the tongue that tyranny canhope to live.
"These promenades are not without use," the Mother Superior once said toEvasio Mon, one of the lay directors of this school. "One discovers whatfriendships have been formed."
But the Mother Superior, like many cunning persons, was wrong. For aschoolgirl's friendship is like the seed of grass, blown hither andthither; while only one or two of a sowing take root in some hiddencorner and grow.
Juanita's bosom friend of the red hair had recovered her lost position.Her hair was, in fact, golden again. They were walking in the garden atsunset, and waiting for the clock of San Fernando to strike seven.Juanita had told her friend of the chocolates--all soft inside--whichwere to come through the hole in the wall; and the golden haired girl hadconfided in Juanita that she had never loved her as she did at thatmoment. Which was, perhaps, not unnatural.
The garden of the convent school is large, and spreads far down the slopeof the hill. There are many fruit-trees and a few cypress. Where thestream runs there are bunches of waving bamboos, and at the lower end,where the wall is broken, there is a little grove of nut trees, where thenightingales sing.
"It must be seven; come, let us go slowly towards the trees," saidJuanita. They both looked round eagerly. There were two nuns in thegardens, gravely walking side by side, casting demure and not unkindlyglances from time to time towards their gay charges. Juanita and herfriend had, as elder girls, certain privileges, and were allowed to walkapart from the rest. They were heiresses, moreover, which makes adifference even in a convent school that shuts the world out withforbidding gates.
Juanita bade her friend keep watch, and ran quickly among the trees. Thewall was old and overgrown with wild roses and honeysuckle. She found thehole, and, hastily turning back her sleeve, thrust her arm through. Herhand came out through the flowers with an inconsequent, childish flourishof the fingers close by the grave face of Marcos. He was essentially aman of his word; and she jerked her hand away from his lips with a gaylaugh.
"Marcos," she said, "the packets must be small or they will not comethrough."
"I have had them made small on purpose," he said. But she seemed to haveforgotten the chocolates already, for her hand did not come back.
"I'm trying to see through," she explained, after a moment. "I can seenothing, only something black. I see. It is your horse; you are onhorseback. Is it the Moor? Have you ridden the dear old Moor up here tosee me? Please bring his nose near so that I can stroke it."
And her fingers came through the flowers again, feeling the empty air.
"I wonder if he knows my hand," she said. "Oh, Marcos! is there no one totake me away from here? I hate the place; and yet I am afraid. I amafraid of something, Marcos, and I do not know what it is. It was allright when papa was alive. For I felt that he would certainly come someday and take me away, and all this would be over."
"All--what?" inquired Marcos, the matter-of-fact, at the other side ofthe wall.
"Oh, I don't know. There is a sort of strain and mystery which I cannotdefine. I am not a coward, you know, but sometimes I am afraid and feelalone in the world. There is Leon, of course; but Leon is no good, ishe?"
"No, he is no good," replied Marcos.
"And, Marcos, do you think it is possible to be in the world and yet besaved; to be quite safe, I mean, for the next world, like Sor Teresa?"
"Yes, I do."
"Does Uncle Ramon think so?"
"Yes," replied Marcos.
"What a bother one's soul is," she said, with a sigh. "I'm sure mine is.I am never allowed to think of anything else."
"Why?" asked Marcos, who was a patient searcher after remedies, and neverdiscussed matters which could not be ameliorated by immediate action.
"Oh! because it seems that I am more than usually wicked. No one seems tothink it possible that I can save my soul unless I go into religion."
"And you do not want to do that?"
"No, I never want to do it. Not even when I have been a long time inRetreat and we have been happy and quiet, here, inside the walls. And thelife they lead here seems so little trouble; and one can lay aside thatnightmare of the world to come. I do not even want it then. But when I gointo the world, like last Sunday, Marcos, and see the shops, and UncleRamon and you, then I hate the thought of it. And when I touched the dearold Moor's soft nose just now, I felt I couldn't do it at any cost; butthat I must go into the world and have dogs and horses, and see themountains and enjoy myself, and leave the rest to chance and the kindnessof the Virgin, Marcos."
He did not answer at once, and she thrust her hand through the woodbineagain.
"Where are you?" she asked. "Why do you not answer?"
He took her hand and held it for a moment.
"You are thinking," she said, with a little laugh. "I know. I have seenyou think like that by the side of the river, when one of the trout wouldnot come out of the Wolf and you were wondering what more you could do totry and make him. What are you thinking about?"
"About you."
"Oh!" she laughed. "You must not take it so seriously as that. Everybodyis very kind, you know. And I am quite happy here. At least, I think Iam. Where are the chocolates? I believe you have eaten them on theway--you and the Moor. I always said you were the same sort of people,you two, didn't I?"
By way of reply he handed the little neat packets, tied with ribbon.
"Thank you," she said. "You are kind, Marcos. Somehow you never saythings, but you do them--which is better, is it not?"
"I will get you out of here," he answered, "if you want it."
"How?" she asked, with a startled ring in her voice. "Can you really doit? Tell me how."
"No," answered Marcos. "I will not tell you how. Not now. But I can do itif you are in real danger of going into religion against your will; ifthere is real necessity."
"How?" she asked again, with a deeper note in her voice.
"I will not tell you," he answered, "until the necessity arises. It is asecret, and you might have to tell it... in confession."
"Yes," she admitted. "Perhaps you are right. But you will come again nextThursday, Marcos?"
"Yes," he answered, "next Thursday." "By the way, I forgot. I wrote you anote, in case there should have been no time to speak to you. Where isit, in my pocket? No, here, I have it. Do you want it?"
"Yes."
And Marcos tried to get his hand through the hole in the wall, but hefailed.
"Aha?" laughed Juanita. "You see I have the advantage of you."
"Yes," he answered gravely. "You have the advantage of me."
And on the other side of the wall, he smiled slowly to himself.
"Go! Go at once," she whispered hurriedly, "Milagros is calling me. Thereis some one coming. I can see through the leaves. It is Sor Teresa. Andshe has some one with her. Oh! it is Senor Mon. He is terrible. He seeseverything. Go, Marcos!"
And Marcos did not wait. He had the note in his hand--a small screw ofpaper, all wet with the dew on the woodbine. He galloped up the hill,close under the wall, and put his willing horse straight at the canal.The horse leapt in and struggled, half swimming, across.
To have gone any other way would have been to make himself visible fromone part or another of the convent grounds, and Evasio Mon was in thatgarden.
Both Sor Teresa and Evasio Mon saw Juanita emerge from the nut trees andjoin her friend, but neither appeared to have noticed anything unusual.
"By the way," said Mon, pleasantly, "I am on foot and can save myself aconsiderable distance by using the door at the foot of the garden."
"That way is unfrequented,"
answered Sor Teresa. "It is scarcelyconsidered desirable at night."
"Oh! no one will touch me--a poor man," said Mon, with his pleasantsmile. "Have you the key with you?"
Sor Teresa looked on the bunch hanging at her girdle.
"No," she admitted rather reluctantly, "I will send for it."
And she called by gesture one of the nuns who seemed to be looking theother way and yet perceived the movement of Sor Teresa's hand.
While the key was being brought, Mon stood looking with his gentle smileover the lower wall of the garden, where the pathway cuts across the barefields down towards the river.
"Would it not be wiser to carry that key with you always in case itshould be wanted, as in the present instance?" he said, smoothly.
"I shall do so in future," replied Sor Teresa, humbly; for the first dutyof a nun is obedience, and there is no nunnery that is not under theimmediate and unquestioned control of some man, be he a priest or in someprivileged cases, the Pontiff himself.
At last a second bunch of keys was placed in Sor Teresa's hands, and sheexamined them carefully.
"I am not quite sure," she said, "which is the right one. It is so seldomused."
And she fingered them, one by one.
Mon glanced at her sharply, though his lips still smiled.
"Allow me," he said. "Those keys among which you are looking are the keysof cupboards and not of doors. There are only two door keys among themall."
He took the keys and led the way towards the door hidden behind the groveof nut-trees. The nightingales were singing as he passed beneath theboughs, followed by Sor Teresa. Juanita hurrying up towards the house byanother path, turned and glanced anxiously over her shoulder.
"This, I think, will be the key," said Mon, affably, as he stooped toexamine the lock. And he was right.
He opened the door, passed out and turned to salute Sor Teresa before heclosed it gently, in her face.
"Go with God, my sister," he said, bowing with a raised hat andceremonious smile.
He waited until he heard Sor Teresa lock the door from within. Then heturned to examine the ground in the little lane that skirts the conventwall. But on the sun-baked ground, the neat, light feet of the Moor hadmade no mark. He looked at the wall, but failed to perceive the hole init, for the woodbine and the wild rose tree covered it like a curtain.
Marcos had made a round by the summit of the hill and turning to theright rejoined the high road from the Casa Blanca, crossing the canalagain by that bridge and returning to Saragossa by the broad avenue knownas the Monte Torrero.
He reined in his horse beneath the lamp that hangs from the treesopposite to the gate of the town called the Puerta de Santa Engracia, andunfolded the note that
Juanita had written to him. It was scribbled in pencil on a half sheettorn from an exercise book.
"Dear Marcos," it said. "Thank you most preposterously for thechocolates. The next time please put in some almonds. Milagros so lovesalmonds; and I am very fond of Milagros--Your grateful Juanita."
There was a mistake in the spelling.