CARMEN ARIZA

BOOK 1

Doth this offend you?––the words that I speak unto you, they are spirit, and they are life.

––Jesus.

CARMEN ARIZA

The tropical sun mounted the rim of the golden Caribbean, quivered for a moment like a fledgeling preening its wings for flight, then launched forth boldly into the vault of heaven, shattering the lowering vapors of night into a myriad fleecy clouds of every form and color, and driving them before it into the abysmal blue above. Leaping the sullen walls of old Cartagena, the morning beams began to glow in roseate hues on the red-tiled roofs of this ancient metropolis of New Granada, and glance in shafts of fire from her glittering domes and towers. Swiftly they climbed the moss-grown sides of church and convent, and glided over the dull white walls of prison and monastery alike. Pouring through half-turned shutters, they plashed upon floors in floods of gold. Tapping noiselessly on closed portals, they seemed to bid tardy sleepers arise, lest the hurrying midday siesta overtake them with tasks unfinished. The dormitory of the ecclesiastical college, just within the east wall of the city, glowed brilliantly in the clear light which it was reflecting to the mirror of waters without. Its huge bulk had caught the first rays of the rising sun, most of which had rebounded from its drab, incrusted walls and sped out again over the dancing sea. A few, however, escaped reflection by stealing through the slanting shutters of a window close under the roof of the building. Within, they fell upon a man kneeling on the tiled floor beside a rude cot bed.

In appearance the man was not more than twenty-five years of age. His black, close-curling hair, oval face, and skin of deep olive tint indicated a Latin origin. His clerical garb proclaimed him a son of the Church. The room was a small, whitewashed cell of stone, musty with the dampness which had swept in from the sea during the night. It was furnished with Spartan simplicity. Neither image, crucifix, nor painting adorned its walls––the occupant’s dress alone suggested his calling. A hanging shelf held a few books, all evidently used 4 as texts in the adjoining college. A table, much littered; a wooden dressing stand, with a small mirror; and an old-fashioned, haircloth trunk, bearing numerous foreign labels, eked out the paucity of furnishings.

If the man prayed, there was only his reverent attitude to indicate it, for no words escaped his lips. But the frequent straining of his tense body, and the fierce clenching of his thin hands, as he threw his arms out over the unopened bed, were abundant evidence of a soul tugging violently at its moorings. His was the attitude of one who has ceased to inveigh against fate, who kneels dumbly before the cup of Destiny, knowing that it must be drained.

With the break of day the bells awoke in the church towers throughout the old city, and began to peal forth their noisy reminder of the virility of the Holy Catholic faith. Then the man raised his head, seemingly startled into awareness of his material environment. For a few moments he listened confusedly to the insistent clatter––but he made no sign of the cross, nor did his head bend with the weight of a hollow Ave on his bloodless lips while the clamoring muezzins filled the warm, tropical air with their jangling appeal. Rising with an air of weary indifference, he slowly crossed the room and threw wide the shutters of the solitary window, admitting a torrent of sunlight. As he did this, the door of the cell softly opened, and a young novitiate entered.

“With your permission, Padre,” said the boy, bowing low. “His Grace summons you to the Cathedral.”

The man made a languid gesture of dismissal, and turned from the lad to the rare view which greeted him through the open window. The dusty road below was beginning to manifest the city’s awakening. Barefooted, brown-skinned women, scantily clad in cheap calico gowns, were swinging along with shallow baskets under their arms to the plaza for the day’s marketing. Some carried naked babes astride their hips; some smoked long, slender cigars of their own rolling. Half-clad children of all ages, mixtures of mestizo, Spaniard, and Jamaican negro, trotted along beside them; and at intervals a blustering cochero rattled around the corner in a rickety, obsolete type of trap behind a brace of emaciated horses.

The lively gossip of the passing groups preluded the noisy chaffering to follow their arrival at the market place.

“Caramba, little pig!” shrilled a buxom matron, snatching her naked offspring away from a passing vehicle. “Think you I have money to waste on Masses for your naughty soul?”

“Na, señora,” bantered another, “it will cost less now than later to get him out of purgatory.”

“But, comadre, do you stop at the Cathedral to say a Pater-noster?”

“To be sure, amiga, and an Ave, too. And let us return by way of the Hotel España, for, quien sabe? we may catch a glimpse of the famous matador.”

“Señor Varilla?”

“Yes. He arrived from Barranquilla last night––so my Pedro tells me––and will fight in the arena this Sunday. I have saved fifty pesos to see him. Madre de Dios! but I would sell my soul to see him slay but a single bull. And do you go?”

“God willing!”

The soft air, tempered by the languid ocean breeze, bore aloft the laughter and friendly bantering of the marketers, mingled with the awakening street sounds and the morning greetings which issued from opening doors and windows. The scent of roses and the heavier sweetness of orchids and tropical blooms drifted over the ancient city from its innumerable patios and public gardens. The age-incrusted buildings fused in the mounting sun into squares of dazzling white, over which the tiled roofs flowed in cinctures of crimson. Far off at sea the smoke of an approaching vessel wove fantastic designs against the tinted sky. Behind the city the convent of Santa Candelaria, crowning the hill of La Popa, glowed like a diamond; and stretching far to the south, and merging at the foot of the Cordilleras into the gloom-shrouded, menacing jungle, the steaming llanos offered fleeting glimpses of their rich emerald color as the morning breeze stirred the heavy clouds of vapor which hung sullenly above them.

To all this the man, looking vacantly out across the city walls to where the sea birds dipped on the rippling waves, was apparently oblivious. Nor did he manifest the slightest interest in the animated scene before him until a tall, heavy-set young priest emerged from the entrance of the dormitory below and stopped for a moment in the middle of the road to bask in the brilliant sunlight and fill his lungs with the invigorating ocean breeze. Turning his eyes suddenly upward, the latter caught sight of the man at the window.

“Ah, amigo Josè!” he called in friendly greeting, his handsome face aglow with a cordial smile. “Our good Saint Claver has not lobbied for us in vain! We shall yet have a good day for the bulls, no?”

“An excellent one, I think, Wenceslas,” quickly replied the man addressed, who then turned abruptly away as if he wished to avoid further conversation. The priest below regarded the empty window for a moment. Then, with a short, dry laugh and a cynical shrug of his broad shoulders, he passed on.