Carmen Ariza

Charles Francis Stocking

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• Publié par: opse
• Publié le: 08 décembre 2010
• Nombre de lectures: 62
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 1 Mo

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The Project Gutenberg EBook of Carmen Ariza, by Charles Francis Stocking
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Title: Carmen Ariza
Author: Charles Francis Stocking
Release Date: October 24, 2009 [EBook #30312]
Language: English
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In the name of the Church he would serve these humble people.––Book 2, Page 77.
CARMEN ARIZA
BY
CHARLES FRANCIS STOCKING, E. M.
Author of THE DIARY OF JEAN EVARTS,
THE MAYOR OF FILBERT, Etc.
CHICAGO
THE MAESTRO CO.
1921
COPYRIGHT 1915
BY
CHARLES FRANCIS STOCKING
ISSUED JANUARY 1916
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED
TWENTY-FIFTH EDITION
PRINTED IN U. S. A.
CARMEN ARIZA
BOOK 1
Doth this offend you?––the words that I speak unto you, they are spirit, and
they are life.
––Jesus.3CARMEN ARIZA
CHAPTER 1
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
4suggested his calling. A hanging shelf held a few books, all evidently used 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 threwwide 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.”
5“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 hemanifest 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.
6As the man above turned back into the room his face, wearing the look of one
far gone in despair, was contorted with passion. Fear, confusion, and
undefined soul-longing seemed to move rapidly across it, each leaving its
momentary impression, and all mingling at times in a surging flood that
swelled the veins of his temples to the point of rupture. Mechanically he paced
his narrow cell, throwing frequent furtive glances at the closed door, as if he
suspected himself watched. Often he stopped abruptly, and with head bowed
and brows furrowed, seemed to surrender his soul to the forces with which it
was wrestling. Often he clasped his head wildly in his hands and turned his
beseeching eyes upward, as if he would call