Gil Blas, Alain-René Lesage [best romance ebooks .txt] 📗

dexterity to save from their harpy clutches two large bags of double pistoles. Salero, in whose custody I deposited them, will make restitution on your release, which cannot be far distant, as you were put upon his majesty’s pension list of prisoners without the Duke of Lerma’s knowledge or consent.”

I asked Scipio how he knew his excellency to have had no share in my arrest. “You may depend on it,” answered he, “my information is undeniable. One of my friends in the Duke of Uzeda’s confidence acquainted me with all the circumstances of your imprisonment. Calderona, having discovered by a spy that Señora Sirena, with the handle of an alias to her name, was receiving night visits from the Prince of Spain, and that the Count de Lemos managed that intrigue by the pandarism of Señor de Santillane, determined to be revenged on the whole knot. To this end, he waited on the Duke of Uzeda, and discovered the whole affair. The duke, overjoyed at such a fine opportunity of ruining his enemy, did not fail to bestir himself. He laid his information before the king, and painted the prince’s danger in the most lively colors. His majesty was much angered, and showed that he was so by sending Sirena to the nunnery provided for such frail sisters, banishing the Count de Lemos, and condemning Gil Blas to perpetual imprisonment.”

“This,” pursued Scipio, “is what my friend told me. Hence you gather your misfortune to be the Duke of Uzeda’s handiwork, or rather Calderona’s.”

Thus it seemed probable that my affairs might be reinstated in time; that the Duke of Lerma, chagrined at his nephew’s banishment, would move heaven and earth for that nobleman’s recall; and it might not be too much to expect that his excellency would not forget me. What a delicate gypsy is hope! She wheedled me out of all anxiety about my shattered fortunes, and made me as lighthearted as if I had good reason to be so. My prison looked not like the dungeon of perpetual misery, but like the vestibule to a more distinguished station. For thus run the train of my reasoning: Don Fernando Borgia, Father Jerome of Florence, and more than all, Friar Louis of Aliaga, who may thank him for his place about the king’s person, are the prime minister’s partisans. With the aid of such powerful friends, his excellency will bear down all opposition, even supposing no change to take place in the political barometer. But his majesty’s health is very precarious. The first act of a new reign would be to recall the Count de Lemos; he would not feel himself at home in the young monarch’s presence till he had introduced me at court; and the young monarch would not sit easy on his throne till he had showered benefits on my head. Thus, feasting by anticipation on the pleasures of futurity, I became callous to existing evils. The two bags, snug in the goldsmith’s custody, were no bad doubles to the part which hope acted in this shifting pantomime.

It was impossible not to express my gratitude to Scipio for his zeal and honesty. I offered him half the salvage; but he rejected it. “I expect,” said he, “a very different acknowledgment.”

Astonished as much at his mysterious claim as at his refusal, I asked what more I could do for him.

“Let us never part,” answered he. “Allow me to link my fate with yours. I feel for you what I never felt for any other master.”

“And on my part,” my good fellow, said I, “you may rest assured that your attachment is not thrown away. You caught my fancy at first sight. We must have been born under Libra or Gemini, where friendship is lord of the ascendant. I willingly accept your proffered partnership, and will commence business by prevailing with the warden to immure you along with me in this tower.”

“That is the very thing,” exclaimed he. “You were beforehand with me, for I was just going to beg that favor. Your company is dearer to me than liberty itself. I shall only just go to Madrid now and then, to snuff the gale of the ministerial atmosphere, and try whether any scent lies which may be favorable for your pursuit. Thus will you combine in me a bosom friend, a trusty messenger, and an unsuspected spy.”

These advantages were too important for me to forego them. I therefore kept so useful a person about me, with leave of the obliging warden, who would not stand in the way of so soothing a relief to the weariness of solitude.

VIII

Scipio’s first journey to Madrid⁠—its object and success⁠—Gil Blas falls sick⁠—The consequence of his illness.

If it is a common proverb that our direst enemies are those of our own household, the converse ought equally to be admitted among the saws of a more candid experience. After such incontestable proof of Scipio’s zeal, he became to me like another self. All distinction of place was confounded between Gil Blas and his secretary; all insolence was dropped on the one hand, all cringing on the other. Their lodging, bed, and board were in common.

Scipio’s conversation was of a very lively turn; he might have been dubbed the Spanish Momus, without any derogation to the Punch of the Pantheon. But he had a long head, as well as a fanciful brain, combining the characters of counsellor and jester. “My friend,” said I, one day, “what do you think of writing to the Duke of Lerma? It could, methinks, do no harm.”

“Why, as to that,” answered he, “the great are such chameleons, that there is no knowing where to have them. At all events, you may risk it; though I would not lay the postage of your letter on its success. The minister loves you, it is true; but then political love lacks memory as much as personal love lacks visual discrimination. ‘Out of sight, out of mind!’ is at once