(1/3) Go Saddle the Sea

by Joan Aiken

  At last I cried out roundly and furiously that they could cut me in pieces but it would do them no good, for I could not pass on information that I did not possess, even should I wish to. Convinced at last by this—or apparently so—the ratero chief allowed me to return to my corner.

  Visitors were now mingling freely with the prisoners, for it was the supper hour. Some were in the calabozo, others outside walking in the court. My old man, I saw, was being attended by a young, gentle-looking girl, his granddaughter no doubt. She had brought him clean linen, a towel, and a clean cover for his cushion. Out of delicacy I would have stayed at a distance, but he beckoned me to come.

  "This is my grandchild Frasquita," he said. "She is a good girl! Although she lives a league outside Oviedo, in the village of Lugones, she comes with food every day, and brings me clean linen twice a week. She keeps me as fine as any of those dandies over there."

  Frasquita smiled at him—she wis a short, plump, round-faced girl, about my height—and said, "Who would not, for such a kind grandfather?"

  "Well, you will not have to do it for much longer," he said, "for I can feel my death overtaking me in swift strides.—You will not need to come again, my dearest child. Run along now, and God go with you."

  When he had kissed her and she had gone sorrowfully away, he looked at me and smiled, as if at his own thoughts. He said, "I wished to see you standing beside Frasquita in order to be certain of something; and it is just as I thought: You could be brother and sister."

  I was puzzled.

  "Señor, I do not understand you."

  "Listen,hijo," he said, "I can see it is not healthy for you here. I do not meddle—but I can see that too many people are after you for something that they think you have."

  "I do not have it!" I said angrily. Was he about to prove another of them?

  But he said, "As to that, I do not care—I am going to die tonight in any case. I feel Death in my bones—I know it is coming."

  Remembering Bernie, I looked at him carefully and thought, with sorrow, that he was probably right.

  "I am going to die," he said, "and I have a wish that my parrot shall not be left in this stinking hole without me. Somebody would probably eat her for breakfast! Listen—stoop closer—I asked Frasquita to leave her cloak and hood behind. It is a warm evening—I told her to wrap the towel round her shoulders instead of a cloak. Now,hijo, you squat down and put on the hood; no one is looking this way, they are all talking to their visitors. Very good: Now wrap the cloak round you. Excellent! You could be a girl setting off for the market. Now: Take the parrot on your wrist. Everybody knows Asistenta. Frasquita has often taken her out for an airing. Good: Now run along! Keep quite calm; don't look to right or left but straight ahead; and good luck to you!"

  "But, señor—"

  "Don't delay," he said, "or the visitors will all have gone and then you will be in trouble. At present many are going—you will slip out unobserved among them. Leave the parrot, if you will be so good, with Frasquita, who lives in the third house on the left after you cross the bridge into Lugones—"

  "Oh, of course, senor, I will do that—"

  "Good boy," he said. "Be off with you then.Vaya con Dios."

  So I left him, and walked out with the rest of the visitors, trying to look quite calm and unconcerned, though my heart was banging to and fro like the pendulum of the great clock in Compostela.

  Nobody spared me a glance, however, and I got out of the jail without the least difficulty. Once out, and away from the main square, I ran like a hare back to the posada. There, by the goodness of God, the master of the house was from home, and only the skinny boy remained, sweeping the courtyard. He seemed startled to death at sight of me, and I remembered that I was still wearing the girl's cloak and hood.

  "Why, it's you?" he gasped, when I took off the hood. "The alguacils were here inquiring about you this morning, and they said you had been thrown in prison; lucidly Master was asleep, so I did not tell them your mule was here or they would very likely have taken it. How did you manage to escape?"

  I said that a friend had helped me, and I had better leave the town straightway, and what was to pay for my and the mule's lodging?

  "Nothing, nothing!" said he. "Only play me another tune on your pipe!"

  However, as the inn was his master's rather than his, I persuaded him to take a few coins. Then, after leading the mule into the street—so as not to be caught in a corner—I played him three or four tunes, and he, as before, danced about like a lunatic, in an ecstasy of joy. At last I said I must go, tied on my saddlebags—which he had hidden in the stable—and left him with his brow puckered and his cheeks hollow, trying to whistle the tunes that I had played. -

  Not daring to ask the way, in spite of my girl's hood, I had some trouble finding the right road out of Oviedo, which is a most confusing town. At last, by good luck, I chanced on a sign that said "Santander," and following its direction, struck eastward. I was greatly delighted at being reunited with my bad-tempered mule and my belongings, but very much saddened at the thought of the poor old man left to die in jail without even his parrot.

  Also I was much alarmed by this false notion about the treasure which seemed to have become attached to me, and wondered if I should encounter any more dangers because of it.

  AFTER about an hour's ride I came to the small village of Lugones. By now it was dark: a mild, misty night. The mule clip-clopped across a bridge, the stones of which rang hollowly under her hoofs, and I could hear the gentle babble of a river below. The village was < quiet and dark, smelling of wet thatch, wet stone, and horse dung. How sweet that seemed, after the stench of the prison!

  I counted three houses on my left, and knocked at a door under which a faint thread of light showed golden.

  When, after a pause, a frightened voice cried, "Who's there?" I answered softly, "This is a friend. I have brought Asistenta."

  The door opened suddenly, and I saw a woman standing outlined against the dim light.

  "Ay, mother of God!" she exclaimed, seeing the parrot on my wrist. The girl whom I had seen in the jail came swiftly up behind her.

  "Señorita Frasquita, I have brought back your cloak and hood, and your grandfather's parrot," I said to her. "I am deeply grateful to you for the loan of all three. Without them I should still be in that jail, which I had done nothing to deserve, for I have not committed any crime."

  The older woman began to cry and wring her hands. She was a thin, doleful-looking person with scanty graying hair and a sallow, wasted face.

  "Ay—ay—they are bound to discover that we played a part in his escape, and we, too, shall be thrown into jail!" she cried. "Is it not bad enough that my own father must die in prison?"

  "Mother, hush!" said the girl. "Let the young gentleman come in and warm himself."

  But I thanked her and said I would not come in, for I could see that the mother wished me at the other end of the world.

  "Nor do I want that evil parrot!" she lamented. "For if the alguacils come here inquiring about the boy, and they see it—"

  "But why should they come here?" argued Frasquita. "What is to connect the young gentleman with Grandfather? It will be thought that I brought the parrot home myself."

  However, the mother was quite unreasonable and kept repeating, "I do not want it, I tell you, it reminds me of our shame. Besides, who knows what wicked blasphemies he may have taught it?"

  I did not at all wish to be encumbered with it myself, but as the mother seemed clean distracted by her terror, I feared the poor bird might have its neck wrung if it were left with her, and so finally I said that I would take it with me. At this Frasquita looked greatly relieved.

  She offered me food—greatly to her mothers indignation—but again I declined, thanking her and saying that I had best be on my way, to put as great a distance as possible between myself and the town before day came.

  As I took my leave, I said to Frasquita in a low tone, "If—if you should see
your grandfather again—"

  "No, I shall not see him again," she said sadly but positively. "He was very certain that he would die tonight. And I have never known him wrong about anything."

  I could restrain my curiosity no longer.

  "He seemed such a good, kind man. Why should he be in prison?"

  "Oh, he is the best man in the world! But he wrote a pamphlet which they said was seditious blasphemy—about the liberty of the individual and the properties of minerals and the laws of gravity—and many other things that I do not understand. So he was thrown into jail."

  I bade her good-bye and rode off, thinking how unjust it was that good men should be punished for using the wits God gave them in trying to puzzle out the secrets of the universe, while wicked men, who use their wits only for their own profit, seem to prosper in freedom.

  Perhaps, I thought, it is some joke of God's, which He will explain to us later. But He had better have a good explanation!

  As I had told Frasquita, I proposed to press on as fast as I could, and since the bad-tempered mule had been given a day's rest in the stable of the posada, I thought it would be no hardship for her to travel through the night.

  Judging from the map that Don José had made me, I did not think that it could be more than eight or nine leagues from Oviedo to the port of Villa Viciosa, which, on a good road as this seemed, should not take the mule more than six or seven hours. As for myself, I was so happy to be out of the stink and misery of that prison that I would gladly have ridden thirty hours through a blizzard to put distance between it and myself.

  However, the night was fresh, mild, and damp, and I rode along in it most happily, sniffing at the aromatic scent of the gum trees, which grow plentifully in the valleys and rías of that region. The road, though well surfaced, twisted about very much, and climbed endlessly up and down, crossing or doubling along the side of innumerable creeks and inlets, all of which, I supposed, were making their way toward the sea.

  For the first part of the night the moon, though veiled by cloud, showed me the road; and by the time the moon had set my eyes were accustomed to the darkness, and the mule, surefooted as old Gato, proceeded confidently on her way. Meanwhile I was much entertained by my other companion, the parrot, who, seated sometimes on my head, sometimes on my shoulder, announced the hour with deep gravity, in loud measured tones, every sixty minutes. And in between these announcements she diverted me with other scraps of information, as that it takes two days to sail from La Coruña to Santander with a following wind, five to six days if winds are contrary; that the resin of the eucalyptus and myrtle trees may be used to cure a cough; that the element mercury is obtained from cinnabar and the planet Mercury is nearest the sun; and many other useful pieces of knowledge. I resolved to increase her education myself, and began by reciting a list of the prepositions which in Latin govern the dative case; for, I thought, if I am lucky enough to find my English family, they will be glad to know that I have not forgotten all the Latin that Father Tomás took pains to beat into me.

  So the night passed; and morning found us on a high, cultivated hillside, having crossed over the last and lowest ridge of the mountains that had lain in our way and cut us off from the ocean.

  As the light increased I saw, with wonder, that same ocean, lying before me at a distance of some three or four leagues: like a long, shining steel knife blade that stretched all the way across the horizon from right to left, as far as the eye could see. My heart filled with triumph and joy, for now all I had to do was pass over that water (though it would grieve me to part from the bad-tempered mule)—and then I would be in my father's country.

  Below me, at no great distance, I saw what I took to be the port of Villa Viciosa, which lay at the head of a wooded creek, about a league inland from the open sea. I made haste to descend toward it, and found it, on closer inspection, to be a small dirty town, scattered along its inland channel, which smelled abominably of salt mud and dead fish.

  What was my dismay, on reaching the quayside and inquiring for boats to England, when I was told that they had all sailed the previous week!

  "It is the season for the avellanas, the hazelnuts, you see, boy," explained an old man whom I discovered sitting on a pile of nets. "They have all loaded up with their cargoes and gone, since winds and tides were favorable. What a pity you were not here a week ago! For, after they return, it is not likely they will cross again this winter."

  "But what are all those boats I see anchored here?"

  "Oh, they are just the small fishing craft; they go out and return the same day; or, at most, sail along thé coast to Santander or La Coruna."

  "Then," I said despondently, "if I wish to cross to England, where should I look for a boat?"

  "At Santander, my boy, or at Bilbao; there the craft are bigger and sail all winter long; there you will find something without much trouble."

  For a moment I considered inquiring whether any ships were sailing in the direction of Santander from Villa Viciosa during the next few hours. But it struck me that (as I had lost the three thousand reales from the sale of the robber's horse) I certainly had not enough money to pay for two sea voyages; indeed it was highly probable that I had not enough for one; therefore I had better continue riding along the coast to Santander, which at least I could do for nothing on my faithful if bad-tempered mount. The distance might be about twenty leagues: less than I had come already, and a much easier road; it should not take more than three or four days' riding.

  I delayed no longer at Villa Viciosa—which I found a most dismal and disappointing spot—but set out straightway eastward on the road to Santander.

  Now what beauties opened before me! The road continued for a short time along the verge of the inlet, but then climbed onto a great shoulder of cliff, and from this height, which was all open, cultivated land, I was able to see for many miles along the coast.

  Truth to tell, my first sight of the water, close at hand, in Villa Viciosa, had greatly disappointed me. But now I realized that was not true sea, merely an inland water; now the true sea, in all its majesty, lay before me, green and luminous like some great moving jewel catching the sun's light; here and there flecked with cloud shadows; hurling itself in smoking white plumes against the ribs of cliffs. I shouted with joy, and sang as we made our way along; the mule snorted as she filled her lungs with salt air; and the parrot gravely remarked, "Six o'clock!"

  However, the weather is very changeable in those parts, and all of a sudden the clear day clouded to mist, and then to a violent rain, so I wrapped the blanket-cloak over myself and as much of the mule as I could cover (tucking the parrot underneath my jacket, where she settled with her head under her wing) and so we traveled on. The road continually climbed and descended, passing over headlands and crossing estuaries; and still the rain fell in torrents.

  At last, descending to one of these rías, I was dismayed to find it quite impassable. The river which formed it, swollen probably from rains higher up in the mountains, had flooded over the bridge and swept past in a furious, tossing torrent, carrying great hanks of hay and trunks of trees. The mule rolled white eyes^ tossing her head, and backed away from the brink, so I knew it was useless to think of trying to swim that water. The only solution would be to go upstream, along the bank, until, perhaps, we reached a point where a bridge remained above water, or the river was narrow enough to ford.

  A weary way it proved. Most of that day was spent in doggedly following the bank of the stream, which was more difficult because there was no road, sometimes not even a track; here and there we were obliged to push our way through close bushes, or to plod through marshy brooks; the mule became more and more bad-tempered and I more discouraged.

  At last as dusk fell we were lucky enough to find, not a bridge but a deserted barn, raised on four pillars to keep it dry.

  "Here we spend the night,niña," I said to the mule.

  The barn would provide good shelter for me and the parrot, but what about the mu
le? She could not go underneath, for it was only three feet above the ground on its stone legs. However, looking inside, I found some boards, long enough to make a bridge from the muddy ground to the entrance.

  "Now, niña, you will have to be clever: come along—one foot after the other!"

  The mule was clever (sensing, perhaps, that her cleverness would win her a dry stable); she came up my improvised ramp like a cat, and we spent the night huddled together for warmth on some prickly fodder in the dark barn.

  Next day it still rained, and we continued our harassing way up the side of the creek. My spirits were very dejected; I imagined this long and tedious detour taking me halfway back to Villaverde.

  But after an hour's scrambling we came to a/man who was in an even greater state of distress and exasperation.

  "My pigs, my pigs!" he kept lamenting. "My old mother! My pigs, my pigs!"

  I could not help but notice that he placed his pigs first, and seemed to value them somewhat above his old mother.

  "Where are your pigs, señor? I see no pigs."

  "They are over yonder!" he wailed. "On the island! Ay de mi! they will be swept to destruction!"

  Walking closer to the flooded river, I saw that here was another bridge, covered six feet deep in a swirl of floodwater; and that the wooded height which I had taken to be the opposite side of the estuary was in fact an island in the middle. I could just see that a second leg of the bridge led on from the island to the farther shore. The island, thickly grown over with young chestnut trees, was half submerged, and it seemed possible that it would soon be completely covered with water.