Mare Nostrum (Our Sea) Part 36

Many times Ferragut's wife would be awaiting him with impatience in order to ask his mature counsel, and he would emit his opinion in a slow voice after long reflection.

Esteban found it intolerable that this gentleman, who was no more than a distant relative of his grandmother, should meddle in the affairs of the house, pretending to oversee him as though he were his father. But it irritated him still more to see him in a good humor and trying to be funny. It made him furious to hear his mother called "Penelope" and himself "the young Telemachus."... "Stupid, tedious old bore!"

The young Telemachus was not slow to wrath nor vengeance. From babyhood he had interrupted his play in order to "work" in the reception room near to the hatrack by the door. And the poor professor on his departure would find his hat crown dented in or its nap roughened up, or he would sally home innocently carrying spitb.a.l.l.s on the skirts of his overcoat.

Now the boy contented himself with simply ignoring the existence of the family friend, pa.s.sing in front of him without recognizing him and only greeting him when his mother ordered him to do so.

The day in which he brought the news of the return of the s.h.i.+p without its captain, Don Pedro made a longer visit than usual. Cinto shed two tears upon the lace, but had to stop weeping, vanquished by the good sense of her counselor.

"Why weep and get your mind overwrought with so many suppositions without foundation?... What you ought to do, my daughter, is to call in this Toni who is mate of the vessel; he must know all about it....

Perhaps he may tell you the truth."

Esteban was told to hunt him up the following day, and he quickly noticed Toni's extreme disquietude upon learning that Dona Cinta wished to talk with him. The mate left the boat in lugubrious silence as though he were being taken away to mortal torment: then he began to hum loudly, an indication that he was in deep thought.

The young Telemachus was not able to be present at the interview but he hung around the closed door and succeeded in hearing a few loud words which slipped through the cracks. His mother was speaking with greater frequency. Toni was reiterating in a dull voice the same excuse:--"I don't know. The captain will come at any moment...." But when the mate found himself outside the house, his wrath broke out against himself, against his cursed character that did not know how to lie, against all women bad and good. He believed he had said too much. That lady had the skill of a judge in getting words out of him.

That night, at the supper hour, the mother scarcely opened her mouth.

Her fingers communicated a nervous trembling to the plates and forks, and she looked at her son with tragic commiseration as though she foresaw terrible troubles about to burst upon his head. She opposed a desperate silence to Esteban's questions and finally exclaimed:

"Your father is deserting us!... Your father has forgotten us!..."

And she left the dining-room to hide her overflowing tears.

The boy slept rather restlessly, but he slept. The admiration which he always felt for his father and a certain solidarity with the strong examples of his s.e.x made him take little account of these complaints.

Matters for women! His mother just didn't know how to be the wife of an extraordinary man like Captain Ferragut. He who was really a man, in spite of his few years, was going to intervene in this affair in order to show up the truth.

When Toni, from the deck of the vessel, saw the lad coming along the wharf the following morning, he was greatly tempted to hide himself....

"If Dona Cinta should call me again in order to question me!..." But he calmed himself with the thought that the boy was probably coming of his own free will to pa.s.s a few hours on the _Mare Nostrum_. Even so, he wished to avoid his presence as though he feared some slip in talking with him, and so pretended that he had work in the hold. Then he left the boat going to visit a friend on a steamer some distance off.

Esteban entered the galley, calling gayly to Uncle Caragol. He wasn't the same, either. His humid and reddish eyes were looking at the child with an extraordinary tenderness. Suddenly he stopped his talk with an expression of uneasiness on his face. He looked uncertainly around him, as though fearing that a precipice might open at his feet.

Never forgetful of the respect due to every visitor in his dominion, he prepared two "refrescos." He was going to treat Esteban for the first time on this return trip. On former days, incredible as it may seem, he had not thought of making even one of his delicious beverages. The return from Naples to Barcelona had been a sad one: the vessel had a funereal air without its master.

For all these reasons, Caragol's hand lavishly measured out the rum until the liquid took on a tobacco tone.

They drank.... The young Telemachus began to talk about his father when the gla.s.ses were only half empty, and the cook waved both hands in the air, giving a grunt which signified that he had no wish to bother about the captain's absence.

"Your father will return, Esteban," he added. "He will return but I don't know when. Certainly later than Toni says."

And not wis.h.i.+ng to say more, he gulped down the rest of the gla.s.s, devoting himself hastily to the confection of the second "refresco" in order to make up for lost time.

Little by little he slipped away from the prudent barrier that was hedging in his verbosity and spoke with his old time abandon; but his flow of words did not exactly convey news.

Caragol preached morality to Ferragut's son,--morality from his standpoint, interrupted by frequent caresses of the gla.s.s.

"Esteban, my son, respect your father greatly. Imitate him as a seaman.

Be good and just toward the men that you command.... But avoid the females!"

The women!... There was no better theme for his piously drunken eloquence. The world inspired his pity. It was all governed by the infernal attraction exercised by the female of the species. The men were working, struggling, and trying to grow rich and celebrated, all in order to possess one of these creatures.

"Believe me, my son, and do not imitate your father in this respect."

The old man had said too much to back out now and he had to go on, letting out the rest of it, bit by bit. Thus Esteban learned that the captain was enamored with a lady in Naples and that he had remained there pretending business matters, but in reality dominated by this woman's influence.

"Is she pretty?" asked the boy eagerly.

"Very pretty," replied Caragol. "And such odors!... And such a swis.h.i.+ng of fine clothes!..."

Telemachus thrilled with contradictory sensations of pride and envy. He admired his father once more, but this admiration only lasted a few seconds. A new idea was taking possession of him while the cook continued:

"He will not come now. I know what these elegant females are, reeking with perfume. They are true demons that dig their nails in when they clutch, and it is necessary to cut off their hands in order to loosen them.... And the boat as useless now as though it were aground, while the others are filling themselves with gold!... Believe me, my son, this is the only truth in the world."

And he concluded by gulping in one draft all that was left in the second gla.s.s.

Meanwhile the boy was forming in his mind an idea prompted by his pleasant intoxication. What if he should go to Naples in order to bring his father back!...

At this moment everything seemed possible to him. The world was rose-colored as it always was when he looked at it, gla.s.s in hand, near to Uncle Caragol. All obstacles would turn out to be trifling: everything would arrange itself with wonderful facility. Men were able to progress by bounds.

But hours afterward when his thoughts were cleared of their beatific visions, he felt a little fearful when recollecting his absent parent.

How would he receive him upon his arrival?... What excuses could he give his father for his presence in Naples?... He trembled, recalling the image of his scowling brow and angry eyes.

On the following day a sudden self-confidence replaced this uneasiness.

He recalled the captain as he had seen him many times on the deck of his vessel, telling of his escapades when rowing in the harbor of Barcelona, or commenting to friends on his son's strength and intelligence. The image of the paternal hero now came to his mind with good-humored eyes and a smile pa.s.sing like a fresh breeze over his face.

He would tell him the whole truth. He would make him understand that he had come to Naples just to take him away with him, like a good comrade who comes to another's rescue in time of danger. Perhaps he might be irritated and give him a blow, but he would eventually accede to his proposition.

Ferragut's character was reborn in him with all the force of decisive argument. And if the voyage should prove absurd and dangerous?... All the better! So much the better! That was enough to make him undertake it. He was a man and should know no fear.

During the next two weeks he prepared his flight. He had never taken a long journey. Only once he had accompanied his father on a flying business trip to Ma.r.s.eilles. It was high time that he should go out in the world like the man that he was, acquainted with almost all the cities of the earth,--through his readings.

The money question did not worry him any. Dona Cinta had it in abundance and it was easy to find her bunch of keys. An old and slow-going steamer, commanded by one of his father's friends, had just entered port and the following day would weigh anchor for Italy.

This sailor accepted the son of his old comrade without any traveling papers. He would arrange all irregularities with his friends in Genoa.

Between captains they ought to exchange such services, and Ulysses Ferragut, who was awaiting his son in Naples (so Esteban told him), would not wish to waste time just because of some ridiculous, red tape formality.

Telemachus with a thousand pesetas in his pocket, extracted from a work box which his mother used as a cash box, embarked the following day. A little suit-case, taken from his home with deliberate and skillful precaution, formed his entire baggage.

From Genoa he went to Rome, and from there to Naples, with the foolhardiness of the innocent, employing Spanish and Catalan words to reinforce his scanty Italian vocabulary acquired at the opera. The only positive information that guided him on his quest of adventure was the name of the _albergo_ on the sh.o.r.e of S. Lucia which Caragol had given him as his father's residence.

He sought him vainly for many days and visited in Naples the consignees who thought that the captain had returned to his country some time ago.

Not finding him, he began to be afraid. He ought to be back in Barcelona by this time and what he had begun as an heroic voyage was going to turn into a runaway, a boyish escapade. He thought of his mother who was perhaps weeping hours at a time, reading and rereading the letter that he had left for her explaining the object of his flight. Besides, Italy's intervention in the war,--an event which every one had been expecting but had supposed to be still a long way off,--had suddenly become an actual fact. What was there left for him to do in this country?... And one morning he had disappeared.

Since the hotel porter could not tell him anything more, the father, after his first impression of surprise had pa.s.sed, thought it would be a good plan to visit the firm of consignees. Perhaps there they might give him some news.

The war was the only thing of interest in that office. But Ferragut, owner of a s.h.i.+p and a former client, was guided by the director to the employees who had received Esteban.

They did not know much about it. They recalled vaguely a young Spaniard who said that he was the captain's son and was making inquiries about him. His last visit had been two days before. He was then hesitating between returning to his country by rail or embarking in one of the three steamers that were in port ready to sail for Ma.r.s.eilles.