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

“ ‘Well, then!’ rejoined I, ‘your reasons shall be conclusive with me, and your sage counsels my rule. Lay down the line of conduct I am to adopt, for the prevention of any left-handed catastrophe.’

“ ‘We will have no more concerts,’ was his peremptory decree. ‘Do not show yourself any more to my mistress: when the sight of you does not inflame her, she will recover her composure. Stay within doors: I will call in upon you, and we will torture the guitar with impunity.’

“ ‘With all my heart,’ said I, ‘and I will never set my foot again in your premises.’ In good truth, I was determined to serenade no longer before the physician’s door, but henceforth to keep within the precincts of my shop, since my attractions as a man were so formidable.

“In the meantime, good Squire Marcos, with all his prudence, experienced in the course of a few days that the plan he had devised to quench Doña Mergelina’s flame produced a directly opposite effect. The lady on the second night not hearing me sing, asked why we had discontinued our concerts, and the reason of my absence. He told her I was so busy as not to have a moment to spare for relaxation. She seemed satisfied with that excuse, and for three days longer bore the disappointment of all her hopes like a heroine; but at the end of that period, my martyr to the tender passion lost all patience, and said to her conductor, ‘You are playing false with me, Marcos; Diego has not discontinued his visits without a cause. This mystery must be unravelled. Speak, I command you; conceal nothing from me!’

“ ‘Madam,’ answered he, ‘making use of another subterfuge, since the truth must be told, it has often happened to him to find the cloth taken away at home after the concert; he cannot run the risk any longer of going to bed without his supper.’

“ ‘What, without his supper!’ exclaimed she in an agony, ‘why did not you tell me so sooner? Go to bed without his supper! O! the poor little sufferer! Go to him this instant, and let him come again this evening; he shall not go home starving any more, there shall always be a luncheon for him.’

“ ‘What do I hear?’ said the squire, affecting astonishment at this language; ‘O, Heaven, what a reverse! Is this you, madam, and are these your sentiments? Well-a-day! Since when are you so compassionate and tenderhearted?’

“ ‘Since,’ replied she significantly, ‘since you have lived in this house, or rather since you disapproved my disdainful manners, and have labored to soften the acrimony of my temper. But, alas!’ added she, in a melting mood, ‘I have gone from one extreme to the other. Proud and insensible as I was, I am become too susceptible⁠—too tender. I am enamoured of your young friend Diego, and I cannot help myself; his absence, far from allaying my ardor, only adds fuel to the fire.’

“ ‘Is it possible,’ resumed the old man, ‘that a young fellow with neither face nor person should have inspired so strong a passion? I could make allowance for your feelings, if they had been set afloat by some nobleman of distinguished merit.⁠ ⁠…’

“ ‘Ah! Marcos,’ interrupted Mergelina, ‘I am not like the rest of my sex; or, rather, spite of your long experience, your penetration is but shallow if you fancy merit to have much share in our choice. Judging by myself, we all leap before we look. Love is a mental derangement, forcibly drawing all our views and attachments into one vortex⁠—a species of hydrophobia. Have done then with your hints that Diego is not worthy of my tenderness; that he has it is enough to invest him with a thousand perfections too ethereal for your gross sight, and perhaps too unsubstantial for any but a lover’s perception. In vain you disparage his features or his stature; in my eyes he was created to undo, and encircled by the hand of Nature with the glories of the opening day. Nay, more, there is a thrilling sweetness in his voice; his touch on the guitar has the taste of an amateur, and the execution of a professor.’

“ ‘But, madam,’ subjoined Marcos, ‘do you consider who Diego is? The meanness of his station.⁠ ⁠…’

“ ‘My own is very little better,’ interrupted she again; ‘though were I of noble birth, it would make no difference in my sensations.’

“The result of that conference was that the squire, concluding he should make no impression on the mind of his mistress, gave over struggling with her obstinacy, as a skilful pilot runs before the storm, though it carries him out to sea from his intended port. He did more: to satisfy his patroness, he paid me a visit, took me aside, and, after having related what had passed between them: ‘You see, Diego,’ said he, ‘that we cannot dispense with the performance of our concerts at Mergelina’s door. Absolutely, my friend, that lady must see you again; otherwise she may commit some act of desperation fatal to her good name.’ I was not inexorable, but answered Marcos that I would attend with my guitar early in the evening; and dispatched him to his mistress with the happy tidings. He executed his office, and the impassioned dame was out of her wits with joy, in the delicious prospect of hearing and seeing me in a few hours.

“A most disagreeable circumstance, however, was very near disappointing her in that hope. I could not leave home before night, and, for my sins, it was dark as pitch. I went groping along the street, and had got, maybe, half way, when down from a window came upon my head the contents of a perfuming-pan, which did not tickle my olfactory nerves very pleasantly. I may say that not a whiff was wasted, so exactly had the giver taken measure of the receiver. In this situation I was at a