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

What do you require? asked the old man with a

reproachful accent. I have been but too indulgent to you. I am

not a person to crown your wanton wishes at the expense of my

master’s honour, your good fame, and my own eternal infamy; the

infamy of a man whose past life has been one continued series of

faithful service and exemplary conduct. I had rather leave the

family than stay in it on such scandalous conditions. Alas!

Marcos, interrupted the lady, frightened out of her wits at these

last words, you wring my heart by talking in this manner.

Obdurate man! Can you bear the thought of sacrificing her who

lays all her present agony to your account? Give me back my

former pride, and that savage soul you have taken from me. Why am

I no longer happy in my very imperfections? I might now have been

at peace, but your rash counsels have robbed me of the repose I

then enjoyed. You, the corrector of my manners, have tampered

with my morals — But why do I rave, unhappy wretch as I am? why

upbraid you thus wrongfully? No, my guardian angel, you are not

the fatal source of my miseries; my evil destiny had decreed

these tortures to await me. Lay not to heart, I conjure you on my

knees, these transports of a disordered imagination. Oh mercy! my

passion drives me mad, have compassion on my weakness; you are my

sole support and stay: if then my life is not indifferent to you,

deny me not your aid.

 

At these words her tears flowed in fresh torrents, and stifled

her lugubrious accents. She took out her handkerchief, and

throwing it over her face, fell into a chair, like a person

overcome by her affliction. Old Marcos, who was perhaps one of

the most tractable go-betweens in the world, could no longer

steel his heart against so touching a spectacle. Pierced to the

quick, he even mingled his tears with those of his mistress, and

spoke to her in a softened tone — Ah! madam, why are you thus

bewitching! I cannot hold out against your sorrowful complaints,

my virtue yields under the pressure of my pity. I promise you all

the relief in my power. No longer do I marvel at the oblivious

influence of passion over duty, since mere sympathy can mislead

my footsteps from its thorny paths. Thus did this pander, whose

past life had been one continued series of faithful service and

exemplary conduct, sell himself to the devil to feed Mergelina’s

illicit flame. One morning he came and talked over the whole

business with me, saying at his departure, that he had a scheme

in his head, to bring about a private interview between us. At

the thought my hopes were all re-kindled, but they glimmered

tremblingly in the socket at a piece of news I heard two hours

afterwards. A journeyman apothecary in the neighbourhood, one of

our customers, came in to be shaved. While I was making ready to

trim his bushy honours, he said — Master Diego, do you know

anything about your friend, the old usher, Marcos de Obregon? Is

he not going to leave Doctor Oloroso? I said, No. But he is

though, replied he; he will get his dismission this very day. His

master and mine were talking about it just now in my hearing, and

their conversation was to the following effect: — Signor

Apuntador, said the physician, I have a favour to beg of you. I

am not easy about an old usher of mine, and should like to place

my wife under the eye of a trusty, strict, and vigilant duenna. I

understand you, interrupted my master. You want Dame Melancia, my

wife’s directress, and indeed mine for the last six weeks, since

I have been a widower. Though she would be very useful to me in

housewifery, I give her up to you, from a paramount regard to

your honour. You may rely upon her for the security of your brow;

she is the phoenix of the duenna tribe — a spring-gun and a man-trap set in the purlieus of female chastity. During twelve whole

years that she was about my wife, whose youth and beauty, you

know, were not without their attractions, I never saw the least

semblance of manhood within my doors. No, no! by all the powers!

That game was not so easily played. And yet I must let you know

that the departed saint, heaven rest her soul! had in the outset

a great hankering after the delights of the flesh; but Dame

Melancia cast her in a new mould, and regenerated her to virtue

and self-denial. In short, such a guardian of the weaker sex is a

treasure, and you will never have done thanking me for my

precious gift. Hereupon the doctor expressed his rapture at the

issue of the conference; and they agreed, Signor Apuntador and

he, on the duenna’s succeeding the old usher on this very day.

 

This news, which I thought probable, and turned out to be true,

disturbed the pleasurable ideas, just beginning to flow afresh,

and renovate my soul. After dinner, Marcos completed the

convulsion, by confirming the young drugpounder’s story: My dear

Diego, said the good squire, I am heartily glad that Doctor

Oloroso has turned me off; it spares me a world of trouble.

Besides that it hurt my feelings to be invested with the office

of a spy, endless must have been the shifts and subterfuges to

bring you and Mergelina together in private. We should have been

rarely gravelled! Thanks to heaven, I am set free from all such

perplexing cares, to say nothing of their attendant danger. On

your part, my dear boy, you ought to be comforted for the loss of

a few soft moments, which must have been dogged at the heels by a

thousand fears and vexations. I relished Marcos’ sermon well

enough, because my hopes were at an end, the game was lost. I was

not, it must be confessed, among the number of those stubborn

lovers who bear up against every impediment; but though I had

been so, Dame Melancia would have made me let go my hold. The

established character of that duenna would have daunted the

adventurous spirit of a knight-errant. Yet, in whatever colours

this phoenix of the duenna tribe might have been painted, I had

reason to know, two or three days after wards, that the

physician’s lady had unset the man-trap and spring-gun, and given

a stop to this watch-dog of lubricity. As I was going out to

shave one of our neighbours, a civil old gentlewoman stopped me

in the street, and asked if my name was Diego de la Fuenta. I

said, Yes. That being the case, replied she, I have a little

business with you. Place yourself this evening at Donna

Mergelina’s door; and when you are there, give a signal, and you

shall be let in. Vastly well! said I, what must the signal be? I

can take off a cat to the life: suppose I was to mew a certain

number of times? The very thing, replied this Iris of intrigue; I

will carry back your answer. Your most obedient, Signor Diego!

Heaven protect the sweet youth! Ah! you are a pretty one! By St

Agnes, I wish I was but sweet fifteen, I would not go to market

for other folks! With this hint, the old procuress waddled out of

sight.

 

You may be sure this message put me in no small flutter. Where

now was the morality of Marcos? I waited for night with

impatience, and, calculating the time of Dr Oloroso’s going to

bed, took my station at his door. There I set up my caterwauling,

till you might hear me ever so far off, to the eternal honour of

the master who instructed me in that imitative art. A moment

after Mergelina opened the door softly with her own dear hands,

and shut it again with me on the inside. We went into the hall,

where our last concert had been performed. It was dimly lighted

by a small lamp, which twinkled in the chimney. We sat down side

by side, and began our tender parley, each of us overcome by our

emotions, but with this difference; that hers were all inspired

by pleasure, while mine were somewhat tainted by fear. In vain

did the divinity of my adorations assure me that we had nothing

to fear from her husband. I felt the access of an ague, which

unmanned my vigour. Madam, said I, how have you eluded the

vigilance of your directress? After what I have heard of Dame

Melancia, I could not have conceived it possible for you to

contrive the means of sending me any intelligence, much less of

seeing me in private. Donna Mergelina smiled at this remark, and

answered: You will no longer be surprised at our being together

to-night, when I tell you what has passed between my duenna and

me. As soon as she came to her place, my husband paid her a

thousand compliments, and said to me: Mergelina, I consign you to

the guidance of this wary lady, herself an abstract of all the

virtues: in this glass you may look without a blush, and array

yourself in habits of wisdom. This extraordinary personage has

for these twelve years been a light to the ways of an

apothecary’s wife of my acquaintance; but how has she been a

light to them? — why, as ways never were enlightened before: she

turned a very slippery piece of mortal flesh into a downright

nun.

 

This panegyric, not belied by the austere mien of Dame Melancia,

cost me a flood of tears, and reduced me to despair. I fancied

the din of eternal lectures from morning till night, and daily

rebukes too harsh to be endured. In short, I laid my account in a

life of wretchedness, beyond the patience of a woman. Keeping no

measures in the expectation of such cruel sufferings, I said

bluntly to the duenna, the moment I was alone with her: You mean,

no doubt, to exercise your tyranny most wantonly on my poor

person; but I cannot bear much severity, I warn you beforehand.

I give you, moreover, fair notice, that I shall be as savage as

you can be. My heart cherishes a passion, which not all your

remonstrances shall tear from it: so you may act accordingly.

Watch me as closely as you please; it is hard if I cannot outwit

such an old thing as you. At these taunting words, I thought this

saracen in petticoats was going to give me a specimen of her

discipline. But so far from it, she smoothed her brow, relaxed

her surly features, and primming up her mouth into a smile,

promulgated this comfortable doctrine: Your temper charms me, and

your frankness calls for a return. We must have been made for one

another. Ah! lovely Mergelina, little do you fathom my character,

to be deceived by the fine compliments of your husband the

Doctor, or by my Tartar contour. There never was a creature more

fortified against moral prejudices! My inducement for getting

into the service of jealous husbands is to lend myself to the

enjoyments of their pretty wives. Long have I trodden the stage

of life in masquerade; and I may call myself doubly happy, in the

spiritual rewards of virtue, and the temporal indulgences of the

opposite side. Between ourselves, mine is the system of all

mankind in the long run. Real virtue is a very expensive article;

plated goods look just as well, and are within the reach of all

purchasers.

 

Put yourself under my direction. We will make Doctor Oloroso pay

the piper to our dancing, or I am no duenna. By my