The Adventures of Gil Blas of Santillane, Alain René le Sage [most read books .txt] 📗

commit this spark on my recognizance; he is one

of the gang who have an undiscovered retreat in this country.

 

At this discourse, which gave me to understand my accuser to be

the gentleman robbed, whose spoils to my confusion were

exclusively my own, I was without a word to say for myself,

looking one way and the other, and not knowing where to fix my

eyes. The corregidor, whose office was suspicion, set me down for

the culprit; and, presuming on the lady for an accomplice,

ordered us into separate custody. This magistrate was none of

your stem gallows-preaching fellows, he had a jocular

epigrammatic sort of countenance. God knows if his heart lay in

the right place for all that! As soon as I was committed, in came

he with his pack. They knew their trade, and began by searching

me. What a forfeit to these lords of the manor! At every handful

of pistoles, what little eyes did I see them make! The corregidor

was absolutely out of his wits! It was the best stroke within the

memory of justice! My pretty lad, said his Worship with a

softened tone, we only do our duty, but do not you tremble for

your bones before the time: you will not be broken on the wheel

if you do not deserve it. These bloodsuckers were emptying my

pockets all the time with their cursed palaver, and took from me

what their betters of the shades below had the decency to leave -

- my uncle’s forty ducats. They stuck at nothing! Their staunch

fingers, with slow but certain scent, routed me out from top to

toe; they whisked me round and round, and stripped me even to the

shame of modesty, for fear some sneaking portrait of the king

should slink between my shirt and skin. When they could sift me

no further, the corregidor thought it time to begin his

examination. I told a plain tale. My deposition was taken down;

and the sequel was, that he carried in his train his bloodhounds,

and my little property, leaving me to toss without a rag upon a

beggarly wisp of straw.

 

Oh the miseries of human life! groaned I, when I found myself in

this merciless and solitary condition. Our adventures here are

whimsical, and out of all time and tune. From my first outset

from Oviedo, I had got into a pleasant round of difficulties;

hardly had I worked myself out of one danger, before I soused

into another. Coming into town here, how could I expect the

honour of the corregidor’s acquaintance? While thus communing

with my own thoughts, I got once more into the cursed doublet and

the rest of the paraphernalia which had got me into such a

scrape; then plucking up a little courage, never mind, Gil Blas,

thought I, do not be chicken-hearted. What is a prison above-ground, after so brimstone a snuffle as thou hast had of the

regions below? But, alas! I hallo before I am out of the wood! I

am in more experienced hands than those of Leonarda and Domingo.

My key will not open this grate! I might well say so, for a

prisoner without money is like a bird with its wings clipt; one

must be in full feather to flutter out of distance from these

gaol-birds.

 

But we left a partridge and a young rabbit on the spit! How they

got off I know not; but my supper was a bit of sallow-complexioned bread, with a pitcher of water to render it amenable

to mastication! and thus was I destined to bite the bridle in my

dungeon. A fortnight was pretty well without seeing a soul but my

keeper, who had orders that I should want for nothing in the

bread and water way! Whenever he made his appearance I was

inclined to be sociable, and to parley a little to get rid of the

blue devils; but this majestic minister was above reply, he was

mum! he scarcely trusted his eyes but to see that I did not slip

by him. On the sixteenth day, the corregidor strutted in to this

tune — You are a lucky fellow! I have news for you. The lady is

packed off for Burgos. She came under my examination before her

departure, and her answers went to your exculpation. You will be

at large this very day if your carrier from Pegnaflor to

Cacabelos agrees in the same tale. He is now in Astorga. I have

sent for him, and expect him here; if he confirms the story of

the torture, you are your own master.

 

At these words I was ready to jump out of my skin for joy. The

business was settled! I thanked the magistrate for the abridgment

of justice with which he had deigned to favour me, and was

getting to the fag end of my compliment, when the muleteer

arrived, with an attendant before and behind. I knew the fellow’s

face; but he, having as a matter of course sold my cloakbag with

the contents, from a deep-rooted affection to the money which the

sale had brought, swore lustily that he had no acquaintance with

me, and had never seen me in the whole course of his life. Oh!

you villain, exclaimed I, go down on your knees and own that you

have sold my clothes. Prythee, have some regard to truth! Look in

my face; am not I one of those shallow young fellows whom you had

the wit to threaten with the rack in the corporate town of

Cacabelos? The muleteer turned upon his toe, and protested he had

not the honour of my acquaintance. As he persisted in his

disavowal, I was recommitted for further examination. Patience

once more! It was only reducing feasts and fasts to the level of

bread and water, and regaling the only sense I had the means of

using with the sight of my tongue-tied warden. But when I

reflected how little innocence would avail to extricate me from

the clutches of the law, the thought was death; I panted for my

subterraneous paradise. Take it for all in all, said I, there

were fewer grievances than in this dungeon. I was hail fellow

well met with the banditti! I bandied about my jokes with the

best of them, and lived on the sweet hope of an escape; whereas

my innocence here will only be a passport to the galleys.

 

CH. XIII. — The lucky means by which Gil Blas escaped from

prison, and his travels afterwards.

 

WHILE I passed the hours in tickling my fancy with my own gay

thoughts, my adventures, word for word, as I had set my hand to

them, were current about the town. The people wanted to make a

show of me! One after another, there they came, peeping in at a

little window of my prison, not too capacious of daylight; and

when they had looked about them, off they went! This raree show

was a novelty. Since my commitment, there had not been a living

creature at that window, which looked into a court where silence

and horror kept guard. This gave me to understand that I was

become the town-talk, and I knew not whether to divine good or

evil from the omen.

 

One of my first visitors was the little chorister of Mondognedo,

who had a fellow-feeling with me for the rack, and an equally

light pair of heels. I knew him at once, and he had no qualms

about acknowledging me as an acquaintance. We exchanged a kind

greeting, then compared notes since our separation. I was obliged

to relate my adventures in due form and order. The chorister, on

his part, told me what had happened in the inn at Cacabelos,

between the muleteer and the bride, after we had taken to our

heels in a panic. Then with a friendly assurance at parting, he

promised to leave no stone unturned for my release. His

companions of mere curiosity testified their pity for my

misfortune; assuring me that they would lend a helping hand to

the little chorister, and do their utmost to procure my freedom.

 

They were no worse than their word. The corregidor was applied to

in my favour, who, no longer doubtful of my innocence, above all

when he had heard the chorister’s story, came three weeks

afterwards into my cell. Gil Blas, said he, I never stand shilly-shally: begone, you are free; you may take yourself off whenever

you please. But, tell me, if you were carried to the forest,

could you not discover the subterraneous retreat? No, sir,

replied I: as I only entered in the night, and made my escape

before daybreak, it would be impossible to fix upon the spot.

Thereupon the magistrate withdrew, assuring me that the gaoler

should be ordered to give me free egress. In fact, the very next

moment the turnkey came into my dungeon, followed by one of his

outriding establishment with a bundle of clothes under his arm.

They both of them stripped me with the utmost solemnity, and

without uttering a single syllable, of my doublet and breeches,

which had the honour to be made of a bettermost cloth almost new;

then, having rigged me in an old frock, they shoved me out of

their hospitable mansion by the shoulders.

 

The taking I was in to see myself so ill equipped, acted as a

cooler to the usual transport of prisoners at recovering their

liberty. I was tempted to escape from the town without delay,

that I might withdraw from the gaze of the people, whose prying

eyes I could not encounter but with pain. My gratitude, however,

got the better of my diffidence. I went to thank the little

chorister, to whom I was so much obliged. He could not help

chuckling when he saw me. That is your trim, is it? said he. As

far as I see, you cannot complain that your case has not been

sifted to the bottom. I have nothing to say against the laws of

my country, replied I; they are as just as need be. I only wish

their officers would take after them! They might have spared me

my suit of clothes: I have paid for them over and over again. I

am quite of your mind, rejoined he; but they would tell you that

these are little formalities of old standing, which cannot be

dispensed with. What! you are foolish enough to suppose, for

instance, that your horse has been restored to its right owner?

Not a word of it, if you please: the beast is at this present in

the stables of the register, where it has been impounded as a

witness to be brought into court: if the poor gentleman comes off

with the crupper, he will be so much in pocket. But let us change

the subject. What is your plan? What do you mean to do with

yourself? I have an inclination, said I, to take the road for

Burgos. I may light on my rescued lady; she will give me a little

ready cash: I shall then buy a new short cassock, and betake

myself to Salamanca, where I shall see what I can make of my

Latin. All my trouble is, how to get to Burgos: one must live on

the road. I understand you, replied he. Take my purse: it is

rather thinly lined, to be sure; but you know a chorister’s

dividends are not like a bishop’s. At the same time he drew it

from his pouch, and inserted it between my hands with so good a

grace, that I could not do otherwise than accept it, for want of

a better. I thanked him as though he had made me a present of a

gold mine, and tendered him a thousand promises