Blackwoods Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 59, No. 366, April, 1846

"Something I know," said he, when Herrera paused, "of the convent you mention, and still more of its abbess. Carmen de Forcadell was long celebrated, both at Madrid and in her native Andalusia, for her beauty and intrigues. Her husband was assassinated by one of her lovers, as some said, and within three years of his death, repenting, it was believed, of her dissolute life, she took the veil. Once, I know, Baltasar was her reputed lover; but whatever may now be his influence over her, I cannot think she would allow my daughter to be ill treated whilst within her walls. No, Herrera, the danger is, lest the villain may remove my Rita, and place her where no shield may stand between her and his purposes."

"Do not fear it," replied Herrera, in his turn reassured by the Count's moderation. "Your cousin was taken in the action of the 16th, and is now a prisoner at Pampeluna."

"Indeed!" exclaimed the Count, his face brightening with satisfaction. "It is good news, indeed."

"Better than you even think, perhaps. You have preserved the ball that was extracted from your wound?"

"I have," replied the Count, "at your request. What of it?"

"So long," said Herrera, "as no advantage could be gained from my communication, I would not shock you with a statement that even now will cause you serious pain. You remember, sir, that at the time of receiving your wound you were at a very short distance from me, and that your cousin was at a still less one from you, in your rear. As you advanced towards the intervening stream, my eyes, conducted by chance, or something better, fixed on your cousin, who at the moment drew a pistol from his holster. You were but a few paces from him, when I saw him deliberately – I could not be mistaken – deliberately vary his aim from myself to you. The pistol was fired – you fell from your horse, struck by his hand. You seem surprised. The deed was as inexplicable to me until from your own lips I heard who the officer was – that there had been serious disagreement between you – and that his temper was violent, and character bad. Coupled with what my own eyes saw, the bullet itself, far too small for a carbine ball, convinced me that it had proceeded from a pistol. Instinctively, rather than from any anticipation of its being hereafter useful, I requested you to preserve the ball, and to-day an extraordinary chance enables me to verify my suspicions. Let the bullet be now produced."

Astounded by what he heard, but still incredulous, the Count summoned his attendant.

"Bring me the bullet that I bade you keep," said the Count.

"And desire my orderly," added Herrera, "to bring me the brace of pistols he will find in my valise."

In a few moments both commands were obeyed. The bullet was of very small calibre, and, not having encountered any bone, had preserved its rotundity without even an indentation.

"Do you recognize these pistols?" said Herrera, showing the Count those which he had taken from Baltasar's holsters. "This coronet and initials proclaim them to have been once your own."

"They were so," replied the Count, taking one of them in his hand – "a present to my cousin soon after he joined us. I remember them well; he carried them on the day that I was wounded."

"Behold!" said Herrera, who placed the bullet in the muzzle of the pistol, into the barrel of which it slid, fitting there exactly. Shocked and confounded by this proof of his kinsman's villany, the Count dropped the other pistol and remained sad and silent.

"You doubt no longer?" said Herrera.

"May it not have been accident?" said the Count, almost imploringly. "No Villabuena could commit so base and atrocious a crime."

"None but he," said Herrera. "I watched him as he took his aim, not twenty paces from you. With half a doubt, I would have bitten my tongue from my mouth before an accusation should have passed it against the man in whose favour indeed I have no cause to be prejudiced. Count Villabuena, the shot was fired with intent. For that I pledge my honour and salvation."

There was a pause.

"But my daughter," said the Count; "you forget her, Luis. She must be rescued. How does this fiend's imprisonment render that rescue easier?"

"Thus," replied Herrera. "Yesterday I had an interview with Cordova, and told him every thing; the abduction of Rita, and Baltasar's attempt on your life. Of the latter I engaged to furnish ample proofs. Cordova, as I expected, was indignant, and would have shot the offender had I consented to the act. Upon reflection, however, he himself saw reasonable objections to a measure so opposed to the existing treaty for exchange of prisoners, and feared retaliation from the enemy. After some discussion it was agreed that the proof of Baltasar's attempt upon your life should be submitted, and, if found satisfactory, that the prisoner should be placed at my disposal. In that event his liberty, nay, his life, must depend upon his consenting, unreservedly, to write to the convent, to desire the abbess to set Rita at liberty, and to provide for her safe conduct into France. Until then, Baltasar, by the general's order, remains in solitary confinement at Pampeluna."

"Good," said the Count approvingly.

"I had a threefold object in coming hither," continued Herrera. "To obtain proof of Baltasar's guilt, to comfort you with the hopes of Rita's safety, and to take you with me to Pampeluna. Baltasar of course believes you dead; he will the more readily abandon his designs when he finds that you still live."

"Rightly reasoned," said the Count. "Why should we now delay another instant? Your news, Herrera, has made me young and strong again."

"We will set out to-morrow," said Herrera. "A column of troops march at daybreak for Pampeluna, and we can avail ourselves of their escort."

His hopes revived and energies restored by the intelligence Luis had brought, the Count would have preferred starting without a moment's delay; but Herrera, although not less impatient, insisted on waiting till the next day. Although the principal force of the Carlists had been driven back into Western Navarre, the road to Pampeluna was not safe without a strong escort, and Herrera himself had incurred no small risk in traversing it as he had done, with only half a dozen dragoons. Count Villabuena yielded to his representations, and the following morning witnessed their departure.

Three days' marching brought the Count and Herrera to Pampeluna, whither Cordova and his victorious army had preceded them. Count Villabuena had reckoned too much upon his lately recovered strength; and, although the marches had not been long, he reached Pampeluna in a very exhausted state. It was evening when they arrived, and so crowded was the town with troops that they had some difficulty in obtaining quarters, which they at last found in the house of one of the principal tradesmen of the place. Leaving the Count to repose from his fatigues, Herrera went to visit Cordova, whom he informed of the positive certainty he had now obtained of Baltasar's culpability. The proofs of it might certainly, in a court of law, have been found insufficient, but Cordova took a military view of the case; his confidence in Herrera was great, his opinion of Baltasar, whom he had known in the service of Ferdinand, very bad; and finally, the valid arguments adduced by Luis left him no moral doubt of the prisoner's guilt. He gave the necessary orders for the admission of Herrera and Count Villabuena into the prison. The next day, however, the Count was still so fatigued and unwell from the effects of his journey, that it was found necessary to call in a physician, who forbade his leaving the house. The Count's impatience, and the pressing nature of the matter in hand, would have led him to disregard the prohibition, and at once proceed to the prison, which was at the other extremity of the town, had not Herrera, to conciliate his friend's health with the necessity for prompt measures, proposed to have the prisoner brought to him. An order to that effect was readily granted by Cordova, and, under proper escort, Don Baltasar was conducted to the Count's quarters.

It would be erroneous to suppose, that, during the late war in Spain, adherents of Don Carlos were only to be found in the districts in which his standard was openly raised. In many or most of the towns best affected to the liberal cause, devoted partisans of the Pretender continued to reside, conforming to the established order of things, and therefore unmolested. In most instances their private opinions were suspected, in some actually known; but a few of them were so skilful in concealing their political bias and partialities, as to pass for steady and conscientious favourers of the Queen's government. Here was one and no unimportant cause of the prolongation of the war; the number of spies thus harboured in the very heart of the Christino camp and councils. By these men intelligence was conveyed to the Carlists, projected enterprises were revealed, desertion amongst the soldiery and disaffection amongst the people, stimulated and promoted. Many of these secretly-working agents were priests, but there was scarcely a class of the population, from the nobleman to the peasant, and including both sexes, in which they were not to be found. Innumerable were the plans traversed by their unseen and rarely detectable influence. On many a dark night, when the band of Zurbano, El Mochuelo, or some other adventurous leader, issued noiselessly from the gates of a town, opened expressly for their egress, to accomplish the surprise of distant post or detachment, a light in some lofty window, of no suspicious appearance to the observer uninformed of its meaning, served as a beacon to the Carlists, and told them that danger was abroad. The Christinos returned empty-handed and disappointed from their fruitless expedition, cursing the treachery which, although they could not prove it, they were well assured was the cause of their failure.

One of the most active, but, at the same time, of the least suspected, of these subtle agents, was a certain Basilio Lopez, cloth-merchant in the city of Pampeluna. He was a man past the middle age, well to do in the world, married and with a family, and certainly, to all appearance, the last person to make or meddle in political intrigues of any kind, especially in such as might, by any possibility, peril his neck. Whoever had seen him, in his soberly cut coat, with his smooth-shaven, sleek, demure countenance and moderately rotund belly, leaning on the half-door of his Almacen de Paños, and witnessed his bland smile as he stepped aside to give admission to a customer or gossip, would have deemed the utmost extent of his plottings to be, how he should get his cloths a real cheaper or sell them at a real more than their market value. There was no speculation, it seemed, in that dull placid countenance, save what related to ells of cloth and steady money-getting. Beyond his business, a well-seasoned puchero and an evening game at loto, might have been supposed to fill up the waking hours and complete the occupations of the worthy cloth-dealer. His large, low-roofed, and somewhat gloomy shop was, like himself, of respectable and business-like aspect, as were also the two pale-faced, elderly clerks who busied themselves amongst innumerable rolls of cloth, the produce of French and Segovian looms. Above the shop was his dwelling-house, a strange, old-fashioned, many-roomed building, with immensely thick walls, long, winding corridors, ending and beginning with short flights of steps, apartments panneled with dark worm-eaten wood, lofty ceilings, and queer quaintly-carved balconies. It was a section of a line of building forming half the side of a street, and which, in days of yore, had been a convent of monks. Its former inmates, as the story went, had been any thing but ascetics in their practices, and at last so high ran the scandal of their evil doings, that they were fain to leave Pampeluna and establish themselves in another house of their order, south of the Ebro. Some time afterwards the convent had been subdivided into dwelling-houses, and one of these had for many years past been in the occupation of Basilio the cloth-merchant. Inside and out the houses retained much of their old conventual aspect, the only alterations that had been made consisting in the erection of partition walls, the opening of a few additional doors and windows, and the addition of balconies. One of the latter was well known to the younger portion of the officers in garrison at Pampeluna; for there, when the season permitted, the two pretty, black-eyed daughters of Master Basilio were wont to sit, plying their needles with a diligence which did not prevent their sometimes casting a furtive glance into the street, and acknowledging the salutation of some passing acquaintance or military admirer of their graces and perfections.

In this house was it that Herrera and the Count had obtained quarters, and thither, early upon the morrow of their arrival at Pampeluna, Baltasar was conducted. The passage through the streets of a Carlist prisoner, whose uniform denoted him to be of rank, had attracted a little crowd of children and of the idlers ever to be found in Spanish towns; and some of these loitered in front of the house after its door had closed behind Baltasar and his escort. The entrance of the prisoner did not pass unnoticed by Basilio Lopez, who was at his favourite post at the shop-door. His placid physiognomy testified no surprise at the appearance of such unusual visitors; and no one, uninterested in observing him, would have noticed that, as Baltasar passed him, the cloth-merchant managed to catch his eye, and made a very slight, almost an imperceptible sign. It was detected by Baltasar, and served to complete his perplexity, which had already been raised to a high pitch by the different circumstances that had occurred during his brief captivity. He had first been puzzled by Herrera's conduct at Puente de la Reyna; the importance attached by the Christino officer to the possession and identification of his pistols was unaccountable to him, never dreaming of its real motive. Then he could not understand why he was placed in a separate prison, and treated more as a criminal than as a prisoner of war, instead of sharing the captivity and usage of his brother officers. And now, to his further bewilderment, he was conducted to a dwelling-house, before entering which, a man, entirely unknown to him, made him one of the slight but significant signs by which the adherents of Don Carlos were wont to recognise each other. He had not yet recovered from this last surprise, when he was ushered into a room where three persons were assembled. One of these was an aide-de-camp of Cordova, Herrera was another, and in the third, to his unutterable astonishment and consternation, Baltasar recognized Count Villabuena.

There was a moment's silence, during which the cousins gazed at each other; the Count sternly and reproachfully, Baltasar with dilated eyeballs and all the symptoms of one who mistrusts the evidence of his senses. But Baltasar was too old an offender, too hardened in crime and obdurate in character, to be long accessible to emotion of any kind. His intense selfishness caused his own interests and safety to be ever uppermost in his thoughts, and the first momentary shock over, he regained his presence of mind, and was ready to act his part. Affecting extreme delight, he advanced with extended hand towards the Count.

"Dare I believe my eyes?" he exclaimed. "A joyful surprise, indeed, cousin."

"Silence, sir!" sternly interrupted the Count. "Dissimulation will not serve you. You are unmasked – your crimes known. Repent, and, if possible, atone them."

Baltasar recoiled with well-feigned astonishment.

"My crimes!" he indignantly repeated. "What is this, Count? Who accuses me – and of what?"

Without replying, Count Villabuena looked at Herrera, who approached the door and pronounced a name, at which Baltasar, in spite of his self-command, started and grew pale. Paco entered the apartment.

"Here," said the Count, "is one witness of your villany."

"And here, another," said Herrera, lifting a handkerchief from the table and exhibiting Baltasar's pistols.

The Carlist colonel staggered back as if he had received a blow. All that he had found inexplicable in the events of the last few days was now explained; he saw that he was entrapped, and that his offences were brought home to him. With a look of deadly hate at Herrera and the Count, he folded his arms and stood doggedly silent.

In few words Herrera now informed Baltasar of the power vested in him by Cordova, and stated the condition on which he might yet escape the punishment of his crimes. These, however, Baltasar obstinately persisted in denying; nor were any threats sufficient to extort confession, or to prevail with him to write the desired letter to the abbess. Assuming the high tone of injured innocence, he scoffed at the evidence brought against him, and swore solemnly and deliberately that he was ignorant of Rita's captivity. Paco, he said, as a deserter, was undeserving of credit, and had forged an absurd tale in hopes of reward. As to the pistols, nothing was easier than to cast a bullet to fit them, and he vehemently accused Herrera of having fabricated the account of his firing at his cousin. A violent and passionate discussion ensued, highly agitating to the Conde in his then weak and feverish state. Finding, at length, that all Herrera's menaces had no effect on Baltasar's sullen obstinacy, Count Villabuena, his heart wrung by suspense and anxiety, condescended to entreaty, and strove to touch some chord of good feeling, if, indeed, any still existed, in the bosom of his unworthy kinsman.

"Hear me, Baltasar," he said; "I would fain think the best I can of you. Let us waive the attempt on my life; no more shall be said of it. Gladly will I persuade myself that we have been mistaken; that my wound was the result of a chance shot either from you or your followers. Irregularly armed, one of them may have had pistols of the same calibre as yours. But my daughter, my dear poor Rita! Restore her, Baltasar, and let all be forgotten. On that condition you have Herrera's word and mine that you shall be the very first prisoner exchanged. Oh, Baltasar, do not drive to despair an old man, broken-hearted already! Think of days gone by, never to return; of your childhood, when I have so often held you on my knee; of your youth, when, in spite of difference of age, we were for a while companions and friends. Think of all this, Baltasar, and return not evil for good. Give me back my Rita, and receive my forgiveness, my thanks, my heartfelt gratitude. Your arm shall be stronger in the fight, your head calmer on your pillow, for the righteous and charitable act."

In the excitement of this fervent address, the Count had risen from his chair, and stood with arms extended, and eyes fixed upon the gloomy countenance of Baltasar. His lips quivering with emotion, his trembling voice, pale features, and long grey hair; above all, the subject of his entreaties – a father pleading for the restoration of his only child – and his passionate manner of urging them, rendered the scene inexpressibly touching, and must have moved any but a heart of adamant. Such a one was that of Baltasar, who stood with bent brow and a sneer upon his lip, cold, contemptuous, and relentless.

"Brave talk!" he exclaimed, in his harshest and most brutal tones; "brave talk, indeed, of old friendship and the like! Was it friendship that made you forget me in Ferdinand's time, when your interest might have advanced me? When you wanted me, I heard of you, but not before; and better for me had we never met. You lured me to join a hopeless cause, by promises broken as soon as claimed. You have ruined my prospects, treated me with studied scorn, and now you talk, forsooth, of old kindness and friendship, and sue – to me in chains – for mercy! It has come to that! The haughty Count Villabuena craves mercy at the hands of a prisoner! I answer you, I know nothing of your daughter; but I also tell you, Count, that if all yonder fellow's lies were truth, and I held the keys of her prison, I would sooner wear out my life in the foulest dungeon than give them up to you. But, pshaw! she thinks little enough about you. She has found her protector, I'll warrant you. There are smart fellows and comely amongst the king's followers, and she won't have wanted for consolation."

It seemed as if Baltasar's defenceless condition was hardly to protect him from the instant punishment of his vile insinuation. With a deep oath, Herrera half drew his sword, and made a step towards the calumniator of his mistress. But his indignation, great though it was, was checked in its expression, and entirely lost sight of, owing to a sudden outbreak of the most furious and uncontrolled anger on the part of the Count. His face, up to that moment so pale, became suffused with blood, till the veins seemed ready to burst; his temples throbbed visibly, his eyes flashed, his lips grew livid, and his teeth chattered with fury.

"Scoundrel!" he shouted, in a voice which had momentarily regained all its power – "scoundrel and liar! Assassin, with what do you reproach me? Why did I cast you off, and when? Never till your own vices compelled me. What promise did I make and not keep? Not one. Base traducer, disgrace to the name you bear! so sure as there is a God in heaven, your misdeeds shall meet their punishment here and hereafter!"

During this violent apostrophe, Baltasar, who, at Herrera's threatening movement, had glanced hurriedly around him as if seeking a weapon of defence, resumed his former attitude of indifference. Leaning against the wall, he stood with folded arms, and gazed with an air of insolent hardihood at the Count, who had advanced close up to him, and who, carried away by his anger, shook his clenched hand almost in his cousin's face. Suddenly, however, overcome and exhausted by the violence of his emotions, and by this agitating scene, the Count tottered, and would have fallen to the ground, had not Herrera and Torres hurried to his support. They placed him in his chair, into which he helplessly sank; his head fell back, the colour again left his cheeks, and his eyes closed.

"He has fainted," cried Herrera.

The Count was indeed insensible. Torres hastened to unfasten his cravat.

"Air!" exclaimed Torres; "give him air!"

Herrera ran to the window and threw it open. Water was thrown upon the Count's face, but without reviving him; and his swoon was so deathlike, that for a moment his anxious friends almost feared that life had actually departed.

"Let him lie down," said Torres, looking around for a sofa. There was none in the room.

"Let us place him on his bed," cried Herrera. And, aided by Torres and Paco, he carefully raised the Count and carried him into an adjoining room, used as a bedchamber. Baltasar remained in the same place which he had occupied during the whole time of the interview, namely, on the side of the room furthest from the windows, and with his back against the wall.

It has already been said that Baltasar de Villabuena had few friends. In all Pampeluna there was probably not one man, even amongst his former comrades of the guard, who would have moved a step out of his way to serve or save him; and certainly, in the whole city, there were scarcely half a dozen persons who, through attachment to the Carlist cause, would have incurred any amount of risk to rescue one of its defenders. Most fortunately for Baltasar, it was in the house of one of those rare but strenuous adherents of Don Carlos that he now found himself. Scarcely had the Count and his bearers passed through the doorway between the two rooms, when a slight noise close to him caused Baltasar to turn. A pannel of the chamber wall slid back, and the sleek rotund visage of the man who had exchanged signs with him as he entered the house, appeared at the aperture. His finger was on his lips, and his small grey eyes gleamed with an unusual expression of decision and vigilance. One lynx-like glance he cast into the apartment, and then grasping the arm of Baltasar, he drew, almost dragged him through the opening. The pannel closed with as little noise as it had opened.

Ten seconds elapsed, not more, and Herrera, who, in his care for the Count, had momentarily forgotten the prisoner, hurried back into the apartment. Astonished to find it empty, but not dreaming of an escape, he ran to the antechamber. The corporal and two soldiers, who had escorted Baltasar, rose from the bench whereon they had seated themselves, and carried arms.