Soon we reached the spot where we had watched the grape-pressing. The men were giving up work and clearing away, leaving nothing behind them but the stains of the fruit and the scent of the muscatel. They nodded in friendly recognition, and we knew the laugh they gave meant to say that the cup we had refused they had found very cheering. The narrow street was growing dim, and in the arched room, half cellar, half wine vault, they had lighted candles. The semi-obscurity was weird and picturesque in the extreme, almost Rembrandt-like in effect. The men's faces were thrown up against the dark background as the light fell upon them; and as one of them sitting astride a barrel raised a cup to his lips, he looked a true disciple of Bacchus.

Our guide pa.s.sed on and turning up a narrow street halted before the door of a quaint old house. The street was quiet and respectable; the house clean and well cared for, in spite of its age.

"We have lived here for a quarter of a century and more--twenty-seven years," said the old man, "and the house does not look a day older than it looked then. Ah, senor," with a sigh, "we cannot say the same of ourselves. Twenty-seven years in a lifetime make all the difference between youth and age. But let us mount. My wife does not expect you, but you will find her ready to receive the young king himself if he paid her a visit."

We pa.s.sed up a broad old staircase of solid oak, that would almost have adorned a palace. In days gone by, this house, fallen to a low estate, must have had a greater destiny. The walls were panelled. There was a refined, imposing air about the place. We would have given worlds for the power to transport the staircase over the seas.

The old man mounted to the topmost floor, and knocked at a large oak door which well matched its surroundings. A voice responded, he lifted the latch and we walked in.

"I bring you visitors, Nerissa," said the old man. "A gentleman from France, who will talk to you in our beautiful language, and tell you of scenes and places you have not looked upon for nearly seventy years. You were only eighteen, I only twenty when we turned our backs for ever upon la belle Normandie."

It was a sight worth seeing. The room was large and airy, quaint and old as the rest of the house. Light came in through large cas.e.m.e.nts with latticed panes that bore the unmistakable seal of time. The room itself was in perfect and spotless order. In a large alcove stood the bed, neatly draped and curtained. What furniture the room contained matched its surroundings. There was an utter absence of any commonplace element about it.

But it was not all this that distinguished it so singularly. It was the figure of a little old woman seated near the latticed panes in an arm-chair. The evening light, still strong in the west, fell upon her.

As we entered she did not move, but turned her sightless eyes towards us, with the intent, listening look that is so pathetic. She was very small, and looked almost like a fairy-queen. Her hair was white as snow, but still abundant and faultlessly arranged. The face was small and refined, and possessed all the beauty of age, just as in years gone by it must have possessed in a very marked manner all the beauty of youth.

It had the placid look the blind so often wear, was delicately flushed, and without line or wrinkle. This was very strange in one who must have had, to some extent at least, a hard and laborious life, with many anxieties. Her dress was neatness itself; an old dark silk probably given to her by a rich visitor whose turn it had served; and it was worn with the air that seemed to betoken one who had been a lady. But her whole appearance and bearing was gentle. It was a perfect and faultless picture, charming to look upon.

We turned to the old man in wonder. His eyes were fixed upon his wife with an intensity of admiration and reverence almost startling. It was evident that the love of youth had survived every trial, all life's rough lessons. So far he could have nothing to regret. The folly of which he had been guilty--and it was an undoubted folly and mistake--had been condoned and excused by the after life.

"We no longer marvel that you deserted the ranks of the army for those of a sweeter service," we said, looking from one to the other and feeling that we gazed upon a wonderful idyll.

"Was she not worth it--even all I renounced!" he cried. "Nerissa, I have told these gentlemen all my boyish folly and indiscretion--all you made me give up for your bewitching eyes."

Almost a youthful flush pa.s.sed over the old lady's face as she smiled rather sadly in response.

"It was indeed much to renounce for me," she said, in a very sweet voice. "I was not worth it; no woman could be worth it. I ought never have permitted it, and the thought has been one of the lasting sorrows of my life. But we act first and think after. Though after all, what I renounced was also great."

"We are quite sure you would do it all over again. You do not in the least regret it, and your life has been a very happy one."

Again the youthful flush pa.s.sed over the old lady's face. She put out her hand--a small, delicate hand--as though searching for her husband's.

He had soon clasped it.

"Nerissa, you do not regret anything," he said. "You know quite well you would do it all over again if we could go back to the beginning of life."

Her sightless but still wonderfully expressive eyes looked up into his face.

"With you to tempt me, Alphonse, how could I resist? Alas, human nature is weak where the heart is concerned."

"Have you any children?" we asked.

"We have four, senor," replied the old lady. "And grand-children also.

Our children are all out in the world, and not one of them lives in Lerida. As far as I was able I brought them up well, and tried to give them a little bearing and refinement. But we have always been poor, and poverty means limitation. They are all prospering, but in fairly humble life. At rare intervals one or other pays us a visit; but time flies quickly and they are soon gone again."

[Ill.u.s.tration: OLD GATEWAYS: LERIDA.]

Then we talked about France and the French. We happened to know many places in common, and describing what they are to-day, enabled her to realise the vast changes seventy years had worked. The old lady gave many a sigh.

"Alphonse, it is all a new world," she said over and over again. "If we went back to it we should be lost and strange. It is time we pa.s.sed out of life. But, senor, your visit has brought back a breath of that old life to me. Those who come to us now are humble, and know nothing of our past world. You almost make me feel young again; bring back lost realities, when I was a lady, and had not thrown up all for love, and dreamed not of a humble life of poverty. But, oh, I would renounce it all again a second time for my husband's sake."

Who would have supposed such an idyll in the quiet town of Lerida? When our Boot-cleaner in Ordinary had come to us that morning and received his humble dole for the work done, who could have imagined that such a romance, a poem in real life, was concealed in his history?

When we went back into the quiet streets the gloom had deepened; twilight reigned; a soft glow was in the evening sky; one or two stars were faintly shining. We could not lose the impression of the visit we had just paid; the wonderful little fairy-queen in the arm-chair, who was still ladylike and beautiful and refined in spite of a hard and humble life, and the fine and venerable old man, who for seventy years had remained true and faithful to his first love. No Knight of the Round Table could ever have proved more n.o.ble and devoted; worthier King Arthur's friendship. The very streets of the town seemed to have gained a charm as we pa.s.sed through them on our way to the fonda.

H. C. was singularly quiet and grave. "Of what are you thinking?" we asked.

He started, as if suddenly aroused from sleep. "I am thinking of the faithfulness of that beautiful old couple," he replied. "No, if I tried for a hundred years I never could be as constant as that. In fact I begin to think my only chance of happiness is to emigrate to Salt Lake City and become a Mormon."

"Wait until you are in love," we returned. "You were never that yet.

Your fancy has been touched often enough, but your heart never. That comes only once in a lifetime."

H. C. only shook his head and murmured something about having a heart large enough to embrace a whole Agapemone of beauty. We did not argue the point, feeling there are opinions and delusions time alone can correct.

But we went back to the bridge and looked down upon the quiet stream, and beyond the houses of the town to the wonderful outlines of the old cathedral, darkly and distinctly visible against the evening sky.

Everything seemed glorified by the story we had just learned, the romance we had witnessed. It was an experience we would not have lost; and henceforth to us the word Lerida would be weighted with a hidden charm of which the interpretation meant everything that was true and chivalrous, everything that was brave and constant, lovely and of good report.

CHAPTER XXI.

THE END OF AN IDYLL.

Days of chivalry not over--In the evening light--Night porter grateful--Dragon in full force--Combative and revengeful--Equal to the occasion--Gall turns to sweetness when H. C. appears--Last night in Lerida--Bane of our host's life--Mysterious disappearance--Monastery of Sigena--Devout ladies--Returning at night--Place empty and deserted--Birds flown with keys--Quite a commotion--"The senor is pleased to joke"--Was murder committed?--Mysteries explained--Probably down the well--Drag for skeletons--Host's horror--"We drink the water"--A tragedy--Out in the quiet night--Discords--Lerida cafe--Create a sensation--Polite captain--Offer declined--Regrets--Final crash--Paradise or Lerida--Deserted market-place--Trees whisper their secrets--El Sereno at the witching hour--Hard upon the angels--Not a bed of roses--Alphonse--End of a long life--Until the dawn--Acolyte and priest--"We must all come to it, senor"--El Sereno disappears for the last time--Daybreak--In presence of death--Alone, but resigned--Surpa.s.sing loveliness--Sacred atmosphere.

So the days of chivalry and devotion were not over: could never be over as long as there are Alphonses and Nerissas in the world. As we went back to the hotel in the evening light, the whole town seemed full of romance. One by one the outlines faded and died out, and when we entered the fonda the stars were beginning to shine.

The night porter was standing in the doorway, though his reign had not yet begun. He made us a low bow.

"Senor, allow me to thank you for not complaining of me this morning to the padrone. I am still full of remorse for having locked you out last night, but it is seldom any of our visitors trouble the dark streets of Lerida at midnight. Most of our guests are commercial travellers, who have no eye for the ancient and picturesque, and are generally glad to get early to bed."

Again a.s.suring the worthy man of our good will, we pa.s.sed up the shabby old staircase. At the top we came into contact with the Dragon striding along with bare arms and flourishing a rolling-pin. She looked the picture of fiery indignation and we wondered what had gone wrong.

After some difficulty we managed to gather that the waiter, in spite of her want of beauty, in spite of her being an appropriated blessing, had offered her a chaste salute. In return for the affront, the rolling-pin--it was a _washing_ pin, by the way--had come into sharp contact with his skull, which, fortunately for him was a hard one. Since then the Dragon had been marching up and down with threatening weapon and flashing eyes, brandishing her rolling-pin like another Communist, mouthing voiceless words.

As soon as she caught sight of H. C., however, her gall turned to sweetness; she marshalled him to our rooms, threw wide the door, and beamed on him one of her most cavernous smiles. That a chaste salute from him would have been very differently received was evident.

It was our last night in Lerida. The landlord still attended us at dinner, for the waiter was nursing his wounds in the kitchen. A violent headache had come on, and he was vowing vengeance against the Dragon, declaring she had imagined the whole thing.

"But for the servants, my life would be happy," said our host. "If they keep the peace with me, they are disputing amongst themselves. The last waiter and chambermaid I had, after quarrelling like cat and dog for six months, suddenly went off one day together, and we never heard of them again. It was a Sunday, and madame and I had gone off with some friends by train to Sarinena--a long day's excursion, for we were going to the Monastery of Sigena, near Villanueva. Has the senor visited the famous monastery?"

We had never done so.

"It is to be regretted," returned the landlord, as he busily changed the plates and poured out the wine. "The monastery is the most interesting in our neighbourhood; and people come from far and wide to see it. In situation it is most romantic, standing near a lovely stream full of fine fish. The nuns, however, don't fish; the very thought would be sacrilege. They are devout ladies, some of them very handsome; a pity so much beauty should be wasted. They are of the order of St. John of Jerusalem, which I have heard dates as far back as the twelfth century, but I am not learned in those matters. I have seen the nuns at ma.s.s in their chapel, and they looked like a vision of angels. But I was saying.

We had left the hotel in charge of the waiter and chambermaid. As it happened, there were no guests staying here. When we came home at night, we found the place locked and empty. Both servants had flown, and to add insult to injury had taken the keys with them. Fortunately the gla.s.s doors in this very dining-room had been left open, and by means of a ladder, and climbing over walls at the risk of one's life, I managed to get in, took the duplicate keys out of my desk, and admitted madame. It caused quite a commotion."

"And had the enterprising pair taken nothing but the keys?" we asked.

"Was your gold plate safe, and madame's diamonds?"