The Velvet Glove

by Henry Seton Merriman

  CHAPTER XXV

  WAR'S ALARMJuanita's carriage emerged from the valley of the Wolf into the plain atsunset. She could see that the driver paid but little heed to his horses.His attention wandered constantly to the mountains. For, instead oflooking to the road in front, his head was ever to the right, and hiseyes searched the plain and the bare brown hills.

  At last he pulled up and, turning on his box, held up one finger.

  "Listen, Senorita," he said, and his dark eyes were alight withexcitement.

  Juanita stood up and listened, looking westward as he did. The sound waslike the sound of thunder, but shorter and sharper.

  "What is it?"

  "The Carlists--the sons of dogs!" he answered, with a laugh, and heshook his whip towards the mountains. "See," he said, gathering up thereins again, "that dust on the road to the west--that is the troopsmarching out from Pampeluna. We are in it again--in it again!"

  At the gate of the city there was a crowd of people. The carriage had tostand aside against the trees to let pass the guns which clattered downthe slope. The men were laughing and shouting to each other. Theofficers, erect on their horses, seemed to think only of the safety ofthe guns as a woman entering a ballroom reviews her jewelery with a quickcomprehensive glance.

  At the guard-house, beneath the second gateway, there occurred anotherdelay. The driver was a Pampeluna man and well-known to the sentries. Butthey did not recognise his passenger and sent for the officer on duty.

  "The Senorita Juanita de Mogente," he muttered, as he came into theroad--a stout and grizzled warrior smoking a cigarette. "Ah, yes!" hesaid, with a grave bow at the carriage door. "I remember you as aschoolgirl. I remember now. Forgive the delay and pass in--Senora deSarrion."

  Juanita was ushered into the little bare waiting-room in the conventschool of the Sisters of the True Faith in the Calle de la Dormitaleria.It is a small, square apartment at the end of a long and dark passage.The day filters dimly into it through a barred window no larger than apocket-handkerchief. Juanita stood on tiptoe and looked into a narrowalley. On the sill of this window Marcos had stood to wrench apart thebars of the window immediately overhead, through which he had lifted herone cold night--years and years ago, it seemed.

  Nothing had changed in this gloomy house.

  "The dear Sister Superior is at prayer in the chapel," the doorkeeper hadwhispered. The usual formula; for a nun must always be given the benefitof the doubt. If she is alone in her cell or in the chapel it is alwayspiously assumed that she is at prayer. Juanita smiled at the familiarwords.

  "Then I will wait," she said, "but not very long."

  She gave the nun a familiar little nod of warning as if to intimate thatno tricks of the trade need be tried upon her.

  She stood alone in the little gray, dim room now, and waited withbrooding eyes. Within, all was quiet with that air of awesome mysterypeculiar to the cloister, which so soon gives place with increasingfamiliarity, to a sense of deadly monotony. It is only from outside thatthe mystery of the cloister continues to interest. Juanita knew everystone in this silent house. Its daily round of artificial duties appearedsmall to her eyes.

  "They have nothing to do all day in a nunnery," she once said to Marcosin jest. "So they rise up very early in the morning to do it."

  She had laughed on first seeing the mark of Marcos' heel on thewindow-sill. She turned and looked at it again now--without laughing. Andshe thought of Torre Garda with its keen air, cool to the cheek likespring water; with the scent of the bracken that she loved; with thetall, still pines, upright against the sky, motionless, whispering withthe wind.

  She had always thought that the cloister represented safety and peace ina world of strife. And now that she was back within the walls she feltthat it was better to be in the world, to take part in the strife, ifnecessary; for Heaven had given her a proud and a fierce heart. She wouldrather be miserable here all her life than go back to Marcos, who haddared to marry her without loving her.

  The door of the waiting-room opened and Sor Teresa stood on thethreshold.

  "I have come back," said Juanita. "I think I shall go into religion. Ihave left Torre Garda."

  She gave a short laugh and looked curiously at Sor Teresa--impassive inher straight-hanging robes.

  "So you have got me back," she said. "Back to the convent."

  "Not to this convent," replied Sor Teresa, quietly.

  "But I have come back. I shall come back--the Mother Superior..."

  "The Mother Superior is in Saragossa. I am mistress here," replied SorTeresa, standing still and dark, like one of the pines at Torre Garda.The Sarrion blood was rising to her pale cheek. Her eyes glowed darklybeneath her overshadowing head-dress. Command--that indefinable spiritwhich is vouchsafed to gentle people, while rough and strong men missit--was written in every line of her face, every fold of her dress, inthe quiet of her small, white hands, resting motionless against herskirt.

  Juanita stood looking at her with flashing eyes, with her head thrownback, with clenched hands,

  "Then I will go somewhere else. But I do not understand you. You alwayswanted me to go into religion."

  Sor Teresa held up one hand and cut short her speech. For the habit ofobedience is so strong that clear-headed men will deliberately go totheir death rather than relinquish it. The gesture was known to Juanita.It was dreaded in the school.

  "Think--" said Sor Teresa. "Think before you say that."

  "Well," argued Juanita, "if you did not urge me in words, you used everymeans in your power to induce me to take the veil--to make it impossiblefor me to do anything else."

  "Think!" urged Sor Teresa. "Think again. Do not include me in suchgeneralities without thinking."

  Juanita paused. She ran back in her mind over a hundred incidents ofschool life, remembered, as such are, with photographic accuracy.

  "Well," she admitted at length. "You did your best to make me hate it--atall events."

  "Ah!" said Sor Teresa, with a slow smile.

  "Then you did not want me to go into religion--" Juanita came a stepnearer and peered into Sor Teresa's face. She might as well have soughtan answer in a face of stone.

  "Answer me," she said impatiently.

  "All are not suited for the religious life," answered the Sister Superiorafter the manner of her teaching. "I have known many such, and I haveseen much sorrow arising from a mistaken sense of duty. I have heard oflives wrecked by it--I have known of two."

  Juanita who had moved away impatiently, now turned and looked at SorTeresa. The gloom of evening was gathering in the little bare room. Thestillness of the convent was oppressive.

  "Were you suited to the religious life?" asked the girl suddenly.

  But Sor Teresa made no answer.

  Juanita sat suddenly down. Her movements were quick and impulsive still,as they had been when she was a schoolgirl. When she had arrived at theconvent she had felt hungry and tired. The feelings came back to her withrenewed intensity now. She was sick at heart. The gray twilight withinthese walls was like the gloom of a hopeless life.

  "I wonder who the other was," she said, half to herself. For the worldwas opening out before her like a great book hitherto closed. The livesof men and women had gained depth and meaning in a flash of thought.

  She rose and impulsively kissed Sor Teresa.

  "I used to be afraid of you," she said, with a laugh which seemed tosurprise her, as if the voice that had spoken was not her own. Then shesat down again. It was almost dark in the room now, and the windowglimmered a forlorn gray.

  "I am so hungry and tired," said Juanita in rather a faint voice, "but Iam glad I came. I could not stay in Torre Garda another hour. Marcosmarried me for my money. The money was wanted for political purposes.They could not get it without me--so I was thrown in."

  She dropped her two hands heavily on the table and looked up as ifexpecting some exclamation of surprise or horror. But her hearer made nosign.

  "Did you know this?" she asked, i
n an altered voice after a pause. "Areyou in the plot, too, as well as Marcos and Uncle Ramon? Have you beenscheming all this time as well, that I should marry Marcos?"

  "Since you ask me," said Sor Teresa, slowly and coldly, "I think youwould be happier married to Marcos than in religion. It is only myopinion, of course, and you must decide for yourself. It is probably theopinion of others, however, as well. There are plenty of girls who ..."

  "Oh! are there?" cried Juanita, passionately. "Who--I should like toknow?"

  "I am only speaking in generalities, my child."

  Juanita looked at her suspiciously, her April eyes glittering with a newlight.

  "I thought you meant Milagros. He once said that he thought her pretty,and liked her hair. It is red, everybody knows that. Besides, we aremarried."

  She dropped her tired head upon her folded arms--a schoolgirl attitudewhich returned naturally to her amid the old surroundings.

  "I don't care what becomes of me," she said wearily. "I don't know whatto do. It is very hard that papa should be dead and Leon ... Leon such apreposterous stupid. You know he is."

  Sor Teresa did not deny this sisterly truth; but stood motionless,waiting for Juanita's decision.

  "I am so hungry and tired," she said at length. "I suppose I can havesomething to eat ... if I pay for it."

  "Yes; you can have something to eat."

  "And I may be allowed to stay here to-night, at all events."

  "No, you cannot do that," answered the Sister Superior.

  Juanita looked up in surprise.

  "Then what am I to do? Where am I to go?"

  "Back to your husband," was the reply in the same gentle, inexorablevoice. "I will take you back to Marcos--that is all I will do for you. Iwill take you myself."

  Juanita laughed scornfully and shook her head. She had plenty of thatspirit which will fight to the end and overcome fatigue and hunger.

  "You may be mistress here," she said. "But I do not think you can deny mea lodging. You cannot turn me out into the street."

  "Under exceptional circumstances I can do both."

  "Ah!" muttered Juanita, incredulously.

  "And those circumstances have arisen. There, you can satisfy yourself."

  She laid before Juanita, on the bare table, a paper which it was notpossible to read in the semi-darkness. She turned to the mantelpiece,where two tall candles added to the sacerdotal simplicity of the room.While the sulphur match burnt blue, Juanita looked indifferently at theprinted paper.

  "It is a siege notice," said Sor Teresa, seeing that her hearer refusedto read. "It is signed by General Pacheco, who arrived here with a largearmy to-day. It is expected that Pampeluna may be besieged by to-morrowevening. The investment may be a long one, which will mean starvation.Every householder must make a return of those dwelling under his roof. Hemust refuse domicile to any strangers; and I refuse to take you into thishouse."

  Juanita read the paper now by the light of the candles which Sor Teresaset on the table. It was a curt, military document without explanation orunnecessary mitigation of the truth. For Pampeluna had seen the likebefore and understood this business thoroughly.

  "You can think about it," said Sor Teresa, folding the paper and placingit in her pocket. "I will send you something to eat and drink in thisroom."

  She closed the door, leaving Juanita to realise the grim fact that--shapeour lives how we will, with all foresight--every care--the history of theworld or of a nation will suddenly break into the story of the singlelife and march over it with a giant stride.

  Presently a lay-sister brought refreshments and set the tray on the tablewithout speaking. Juanita knew her well--and she, doubtless, knewJuanita's story; for her pious face was drawn into lines indicative ofthe deepest disapproval.

  Juanita ate heartily enough, not noticing the cold simplicity of thefare. She had finished before Sor Teresa returned and without thinking ofwhat she was doing, had rearranged the tray after the manner of therefectory. She was standing by the window which she had opened. Thesounds of war came into the room with startling distinctness. The boom ofthe distant guns disputing the advance of the Carlists; while nearer, thebugles called the men to arms and the heavy tramp of feet came and wentin the Calle de la Dormitaleria.

  "Well," asked Sor Teresa. "What have you decided to do?"

  Juanita listened to the alarm of war for a moment before turning from thewindow.

  "It is not a false alarm?" she inquired. "The Carlists are really out?"

  For she had fallen into the habit of the Northern Provinces, of speakingof the insurrection as if it were a recurrent flood.

  "They have been preparing all the winter," answered Sor Teresa.

  "And Pampeluna is to be invested?"

  "Yes."

  "And Torre Garda?..."

  "Torre Garda," answered the nun, "is to be taken this time. The Carlistshave decided to besiege it. It is at the mouth of the valley that thefighting is taking place."

  "Then I will go back to Torre Garda," said Juanita.