by Jan Potocki
‘So you have made your choice?’
‘Certainly not; such a choice is very difficult. I don’t know why, but I do not think that I shall be easily satisfied by a man of my own religion. I shall under no circumstances marry someone of yours, which only leaves a Muslim. It is said that men from Tunis and Fez are handsome and agreeable. That will do for me, provided that I can find one who is affectionate.’
‘But why do you so hate Christians?’ I asked Rebecca.
‘Please do not ask me,’ she replied. ‘All you need to know is that apart from my own religion, Islam is the only one I could embrace.’
We carried on in this vein for some time, but after a while the conversation began to pall, and I took my leave of the young Israelite. I spent the rest of the day hunting, and came back at supper time. I found everyone in a pretty good mood. The cabbalist was talking about the Wandering Jew; he said that he was already on his way and would arrive shortly from deepest Africa. Rebecca then said to me, ‘Señor Alphonse, you will shortly meet someone who knew personally the Saviour whom you adore.’
Such words could not but displease me, so I changed the subject. We would all have liked that very evening to have had the gypsy chief continue his story, but he asked to be allowed to put this off to the next day. So we all went to bed, and I enjoyed an unbroken night’s sleep.
The Sixteenth Day
I was awoken just after dawn by the chirping of the cicadas, which is particularly lively and cheerful in Andalusia. I had become sensitive to the beauties of nature. I left my tent to see the effect of the first rays of the sun on the vast horizon. My thoughts turned to Rebecca. ‘She is right,’ I said to myself, ‘to prefer the concrete joys of this mortal life to idle speculation about an ideal world to which we shall all sooner or later belong. Does not this world offer us physical sensations and pleasurable impressions in enough variety to occupy us during the time of our short life?’ I was carried away for a moment by such thoughts, though they were no more than day-dreams. Then, seeing that others were on their way to breakfast in the cave, I made my way there also. We ate like people who had slept in the fresh mountain air, and when our appetite had been satisfied we asked the gypsy chief to take up again the thread of his story, which he did as follows:
THE GYPSY CHIEF’S STORY CONTINUED
I told you, Señores, that two nights out from Madrid on the way to Burgos we were in the company of a young girl who was in love with Maria de Torres’s son, who was dressed up as a muleteer. This same Maria was telling us that the Conde de Rovellas had been left for dead at one end of the arena, while at the other a mysterious young stranger had killed the bull which threatened to put an end to his life. So it’s Maria de Torres who will continue her story.
MARIA DE TORRES’S STORY CONTINUED
Once the fearsome bull lay wallowing in its own blood, the count’s equerries rushed into the arena to come to his assistance. He gave no sign of life. He was lifted on to a stretcher and was carried to his house. The spectacle did not go ahead, as you may well imagine, and everyone returned home. But that very evening we learnt that Rovellas was out of danger. My husband sent our page out for news of him. It was a long time before he returned. At last he brought us the following letter.
Señor Coronel Don Enrique de Torres,
Your honour will see from this letter that the Creator’s mercy has deigned to leave me still in possession of some of my powers. But a great pain which I feel in my chest leads me to doubt whether I shall recover completely. You know, Señor Don Enrique, that providence lavished upon me worldly goods. I hereby bequeath a share of these to the noble stranger who risked his life to save mine. As for the remainder, I could not make better use of it than to lay it at the feet of Elvira de Noruña, your incomparable sister-in-law. I beg you to make known to her the respectful and honourable feelings she has inspired in one who will shortly perhaps be no more than dust and ashes, and whom heaven still grants the strength to call himself, Conde de Rovellas, Marqués de Vera Lonza, y Cruz Velada, Hereditary Commander of Tallaverde, y Rio Floro, Señor de Tolesquez, y Riga Fuera, y Mendez, y Lonzos, and so on, and so on, and so on, and so on.
You will be surprised that I can remember so many of his titles but we used to attribute them to my sister one after another as a joke and in this way we ended up by learning them.
As soon as my husband received this letter he let us know its contents and asked my sister what reply he should make to it. Elvira replied that she would not act without having first heard the advice of my husband, but she confessed that the count’s good qualities had impressed her less than the excessive vanity which was apparent in all his words and actions.
My husband easily grasped the tenor of this reply, and so he replied to the count that although Elvira was too young to appreciate the proposals of His Excellency, she joined with all the household in wishing him restored to health. The count did not take this to be a refusal. He even spoke of his marriage with Elvira as settled. In the meanwhile we left for Villaca.
Our house was situated at one end of the village and was more or less in the country. Its situation was charming and it had moreover been very prettily restored. But exactly opposite it stood a peasant’s house which had been decorated in unusually good taste. There were flowerpots on the front steps, fine windows and an aviary, together with some other pleasant, refined features. We were told that the house had just been bought by a labrador from Murcia. The farmers to whom are given the name of labradores in our province are a class of persons midway between the nobles and the peasants.
It was late when we arrived at Villaca. We began by going over the whole house from cellar to attic. Then we had chairs placed at the front door and partook of chocolate. My husband teased Elvira about the poverty of the house, which was unworthy to receive a future Countess of Rovellas. She took these jokes in good part. Soon after, we saw a cart pulled by four powerful oxen returning from work in the fields. They were led by a farm-hand, followed by a young man with a young woman on his arm. The young man was remarkable for his height. When he came close Elvira and I recognized the person who had saved Rovellas. My husband paid no attention to him, but my sister shot a glance at me which I clearly understood. The young man greeted us like a person who did not wish to make our acquaintance and went into the house opposite. The young woman seemed to observe us very closely.
‘What a handsome couple,’ said our housekeeper, Doña Manuela.
‘What do you mean, a handsome couple?’ said Elvira. ‘Are they married?’
‘Indeed, they are,’ said Doña Manuela. ‘To tell you the truth, they were married against the wishes of their parents. The girl was abducted. No one around here is under any misapprehension about it. We could well see they are not peasants.’
My husband asked Elvira why she had made so much of it and added, ‘He might well be the mysterious singer.’
At that moment we heard a prelude on the guitar coming from the house opposite, and the voice that accompanied it confirmed the suspicions of my husband. ‘That’s strange,’ he said. ‘But since he’s married, the serenades were perhaps intended for one of our neighbours.’
‘Actually,’ said Elvira, ‘I believe they were intended for me.’
This naïve comment made us smile and then we fell silent on the matter. Throughout the six weeks of our stay at Villaca the blinds of the house opposite remained closed, and we did not catch sight of our neighbours. I even think that they left Villaca before us.
At the end of our stay we learned that the Conde de Rovellas was well on the road to recovery and that the bullfights were going to begin again, although he himself would not take part. We returned to Segovia. Festivity followed festivity, and ingeniously contrived social event followed ingeniously contrived social event. In the end the count’s attentions touched Elvira’s heart and the wedding was celebrated with the greatest magnificence.
The count had only been married three weeks when he learned that his exi
le was over. He had permission once again to appear at court. The idea of taking my sister there gave him very great pleasure, but before leaving Segovia he wanted to discover the name of the person who had saved his life. So he had the town crier announce that anyone giving news of the person who had saved him would receive a reward of a hundred pieces of eight, each worth eight pistoles. The next day he received the following letter:
Señor Conde,
Your Excellency is putting himself out to no purpose. Give up your plan of discovering the man who saved your life and satisfy yourself with the thought that you have taken his from him.
Rovellas showed this letter to my husband and said in a very haughty way that this missive could only have come from a rival, but that he had not known that Elvira had had previous affairs of the heart. If he had known this he would not have married her. My husband begged the count to be more circumspect in what he said and never again called on him.
Going to court was no longer in question. Rovellas became sombre and violent. All his vanity had turned into jealousy and his jealousy turned into sustained fury. My husband had communicated to me the contents of the anonymous letter. We concluded that the farmer from Villaca must have been a suitor in disguise. We sent for information about him, but he had disappeared and the house had been sold.
Elvira was pregnant. We carefully hid from her what we knew about the change in her husband’s feelings. She noticed it and did not know to what to attribute it. The count declared that for fear of incommoding his wife he would sleep in a separate bed. He only saw her at mealtimes. Conversation then was awkward and nearly always conducted in an ironic tone.
As my sister was in her ninth month of pregnancy, Rovellas left on the pretext of business which called him to Cadiz. A week later, a notary appeared who gave Elvira a letter and asked her to read it in front of witnesses. We all foregathered. These were the contents of the letter:
Señora,
I have discovered your amorous intrigue with Don Sancho de Peña Sombra. I have long harboured suspicions about it. His stay at Villaca proves your infidelity, which was ineptly disguised by the presence of Don Sancho’s sister, whom he passed off as his wife. I expect that I was preferred because of my wealth. You will have no part of it. We will never again live together. I will provide for your needs but I will not recognize as mine the child to whom you will give birth.
Elvira did not hear the end of the letter. She had fainted after the first lines. My husband left that evening to avenge the offence done to my sister. Rovellas had just set sail for America. My husband left on another ship. A sudden storm claimed both their lives. Elvira gave birth to the girl who is here with me today, and died two days later. How did it come about that I too did not die? I really do not know. I believe that the very excess of my grief gave me the strength to endure it.
I gave the little girl the name of Elvira and tried to establish her right to succeed her father. I was told that I had to address myself to the court of Mexico. I wrote to America. I was told that the inheritance had been divided between twenty collateral relations and that it was well known that Rovellas had refused to recognize my sister’s child as his. My whole income would not have been sufficient to pay for as much as twenty pages of legal representations so I contented myself with declaring Elvira’s birth and parentage at Segovia. I sold the house I possessed in the town and retired to Villaca with my little Lonzeto, who was soon to be three, and my little Elvira, who was as many months old. My greatest regret was to have always in my sight the house where the accursed stranger with his mysterious passion had taken up residence. In the end I became accustomed to it and my children were a consolation.
I had been in retirement in Villaca for less than a year when I received the following letter from America:
Señora,
This letter is addressed to you by the unhappy person whose respectful passion caused the ills which have befallen your house. My respect for the incomparable Elvira was, if such a thing were possible, even greater than the love she inspired in me at first sight. I did not therefore venture to air my sighs and to play the guitar until after the street had been abandoned and there were no longer any witnesses to my audacity.
As soon as the Conde de Rovellas declared himself the slave of the charms which had conquered my heart, I thought it my duty to lock away in my bosom even the slightest sparks of a potentially blameworthy love. But when I learned that you planned to spend some time at Villaca I was so bold as to buy a house in that place, and there, hidden behind the blinds, I risked gazing on the person to whom I should never have dared to speak, still less declare my love. With me was my sister, whom I passed off as my wife, so that not the slightest suspicion could arise that I might be a lover in disguise.
The danger to the health of our much-loved mother made us rush to her side.
On my return I discovered that Elvira now bore the name of Condesa de Rovellas. I wept at the loss of a prize to which I could, however, never have aspired, and I set off deep into the forests of another hemisphere to hide my sufferings. There I learned of the indignities which I had innocently caused and the horrors of which my respectful love had been accused. I declare therefore that the late Conde de Rovellas lied when he suggested that my respect for the incomparable Elvira could have made me the father of the child she was carrying in her womb.
I declare that this is a falsehood and I swear on my faith and on my salvation never to marry anyone other than the daughter of the incomparable Elvira, which must prove that she is not my child. In witness of this truth I invoke the Blessed Virgin and the sacred blood of her Son. Let them be my succour at my last hour.
Don Sancho de Peña Sombra.
PS I have had this letter countersigned by the corregidor of Acapulco and several witnesses. Please have it formally recorded and legalized by the court of Segovia.
No sooner had I finished reading the letter than I liberally cursed Peña Sombra and his respectful passion. ‘You wretched, preposterous, mad demon! You Lucifer! Why did the bull which you killed before our very eyes not tear your stomach out? Your cursed respect has caused the death of my husband and my sister. You have condemned me to spend my life in tears and poverty and now you dare to ask for the hand of a ten-month-old infant in marriage. Let heaven… Let…’ Well, I gave vent to everything that my anger inspired me to say and then I went to Segovia and legalized Don Sancho’s letter. I found my affairs in a terrible state on my arrival in that town. The payments from the house I had sold had been stopped to meet arrears of the pensions which we had to pay to the five knights of Malta. And my husband’s pension had been suppressed. I made a final settlement with the five knights and six nuns, after which all I had left was the little estate at Villaca which became all the more dear to me, and my delight in going back there all the greater.
I found my children healthy and happy. I kept on the woman who had been looking after them and she, together with a lackey and a carter, comprised my whole household. I lived thus without wanting for anything.
My birth and my husband’s rank gave me a certain position in the village. Everybody served me as best they could. Six years passed in this way. I hope never to have ones less pleasant.
One day the alcalde1 of the village came to see me. He knew about Don Sancho’s extraordinary declaration. He brought me the gazette and said, ‘Señora, please allow me to congratulate you on the brilliant marriage that your niece will one day make. Read this article.’
Don Sancho de Peña Sombra, having done the king outstanding service not only by conquering two provinces rich in silver mines to the north of New Mexico but also by the skill and judgement with which he ended the Cuzco rebellion, has been raised to the dignity of grandee of Spain with the title Conde de Peña Vélez. He has just been sent to the Philippines as captain-general.
‘Praise be to God!’ I said to the alcalde. ‘Elvira will have if not a husband then at least a protector. May he return without mishap from the Philippines,
be made viceroy of Mexico and cause our property to be restored to us.’
And indeed what I so ardently desired came about four years later. The Conde de Peña Vélez was made viceroy, and I wrote to him on behalf of my niece. He replied to me that I had deeply insulted him in thinking that he would ever forget the daughter of the incomparable Elvira; but far from being guilty of such forgetfulness he had already taken the necessary steps at the court of Mexico. But the case would last a very long time and he dared not force the pace because, as he desired no other wife than my niece, it would not be fitting that he should cause an exception to the way justice was administered to be made in her favour. I then realized that the count had not weakened in his resolve. Soon after, a Cadiz banker sent me a thousand pieces of eight and refused to tell me from whom the sum came. I suspected that it came from the viceroy. But a sense of delicacy prevented my accepting the money or even touching it. I asked the banker to invest it in the Asiento Bank.
I kept all this as secret as I could, but everything is discovered in the end, and so in Villaca it became known what the viceroy’s intentions towards my niece were. And she was then called nothing other than the little wife of the viceroy.
My little Elvira was then eleven years old, and any other girl of her age would have had her head turned by all this. But I only discovered too late that her mind and heart were of a disposition which prevented vanity from acting on them. From her earliest childhood, she had already, as it were, been stammering words of love and affection. The object of these precocious feelings was her little cousin, Lonzeto. I often thought of separating them but didn’t know what to do with my son. So I scolded my niece, but all that I achieved was to make her hide things from me.
