I postponed the fatal hour when I must face my master as long as possible, but at last my destitute condition, without money and without a home, brought me to the point. As I went to the house of DoÑa Flora my heart beat so violently that I had to stop for breath at every step. The terrible shock I was about to give the family by announcing young Malespina’s death weighed so terribly on my soul that I could not have felt more crushed and guilty if I had myself been the occasion of it. At last however, I went in. My presence in the court-yard caused an immense sensation. I heard heavy steps hurrying along the upper galleries and I had not been able to speak a word before I felt myself in a close embrace. I at once recognized DoÑa Flora, with more paint on her face than if it had been a picture, but seriously discomposed in effect by the good old soul’s delight at seeing me once more. But all the fond names she lavished on me—her dear boy, her pet, her little angel—could not make me smile. I went up stairs, every one was in a bustle of excitement. I heard my master exclaim: “Oh! thank God! he is safe.” I went into the drawing-room, and there it was DoÑa Francisca who came forward, asking with mortal anxiety—“And Don Rafael?—Where is Don Rafael?”

But for some minutes I could not speak; my voice failed me, I had not courage to tell the fatal news. They questioned me eagerly and I saw DoÑa Rosita come in from an adjoining room, pale, heavy-eyed, and altered by the anguish she had gone through. At the sight of my young mistress I burst into tears, and there was then no need for words. Rosita gave a terrible cry and fell senseless; her father and mother flew to her side, smothering their own grief, while DoÑa Flora melted into tears and took me aside to assure herself that I, at any rate, had returned whole in every part.

“Tell me,” she said, “how did he come by his death? I felt sure of it—I told Paca so; but she would only say her prayers and believed that so she could save him. As if God could be troubled with such matters.—And you are safe and sound—what a comfort! No damage anywhere?”

It is impossible to describe the consternation of the whole household. For a quarter of an hour nothing was to be heard but crying, lamentation, and sobbing; for Malespina’s mother had come to Cadiz and was also in the house. But how mysterious are the ways of Providence in working out its ends! About a quarter of an hour, as I say, had elapsed since I had told them the news when a loud assertive voice fell on my ear. It was that of Don JosÉ Maria, shouting in the court-yard, calling his wife, Don Alonso, and Rosita. That which first struck me was that his tones seemed just as strident and cheerful as ever, which I thought very indecorous after the misfortune that had happened. We all ran to meet him, and I stared to see him radiant and smiling.

“But poor Don Rafael....” said my master.

“Safe and sound,” replied Don JosÉ. “That is to say not exactly sound, but out of danger, for his wound is nothing to be anxious about. The fool of a surgeon said he would die, but I knew better. What do I care for surgeons! I cured him, gentlemen—I, I myself, by a new treatment which no one knows of but myself.”

These words, which so suddenly and completely altered the aspect of affairs, astounded the audience. The greatest joy took the place of grief and dismay; and to wind up, as soon as their agitation allowed them to think of the delusion they had suffered under, they scolded me soundly for the fright I had given them. I excused myself by saying that I had only repeated the tale as it was told to me, and Don JosÉ flew into a great rage, calling me a rascal, an imposter, and a busybody.

It was happily true that Don Rafael was alive and out of danger; he had remained with some friends at SanlÚcar while his father had come to Cadiz to fetch his mother to see him. My readers will hardly believe in the origin of the mistake which had led me to announce the young man’s death in such perfect good faith; though a few may have been led to suspect that some tremendous fib of the old man’s must have given rise to the report that reached me. And so it was, neither more nor less. I heard all about it at SanlÚcar whither I went with the family. Don JosÉ Maria had invented a whole romance of devotion and skill on his own part, and had related more than once the history of his son’s death, inventing so many dramatic details that for a few days he figured as a hero, and had been the object of universal admiration for his humanity and courage. His story was that the boat had upset, and that as the choice lay between rescuing his son and saving all the others he had chosen the latter alternative as the most magnanimous and philanthropical. This romance he dressed up in so many interesting, and at the same time probable circumstances that it could not fail to be believed. The falsehood was of course very soon found out, and his success was of brief duration, but not before the story had come to my ears and put me under the necessity of reporting it to the family. Though I knew very well how absolutely mendacious old Malespina could be, I had never dreamed of his lying about so serious a matter.

When all this excitement was over my master sank into deep melancholy; he would scarcely speak and seemed as though his soul, having no illusions left, had closed accounts with the world and was only waiting to take its departure. The absence of Marcial was to him the loss of the only companion of his childish old age; he had no one now to fight mimic battles with, and he gave himself up to dull sorrow. Nor did DoÑa Francisca spare him any drop of mortification, seeing him in this crest-fallen state. I heard her the same day saying spitefully: “A pretty mess you have made of it! What do you think of yourself now? Now are you satisfied? Go, oh go by all means and join the fleet! Was I right or was I wrong? If you would only have listened to me. But you have had a lesson I hope; you see now how God has punished you.”

“Woman, leave me in peace,” said my master sadly.

“And now we are left without any fleet at all, and without sailors, and we shall soon find ourselves ruined out of hand if we keep up our alliance with the French.—Please God those gentry may not pay us out for their misfortunes. SeÑor Villeneuve!—he has covered himself with glory indeed! And Gravina again! If he had opposed the scheme of taking the fleet out, as Churruca and AlcalÁ Galiano did, he might have prevented this heartbreaking catastrophe.”

“Woman, woman—what do you know about it? Do not annoy me,” said Don Alonso quite vexed.

“What do I know about it? More than you do. Yes—I repeat it: Gravina may be a worthy gentleman and as brave as you please; but in this case, much good he has done!” “He did his duty. You would have liked us all to be set down as cowards, I suppose?”

“Cowards, no—but prudent. It is as I say and repeat: the fleet ought never to have gone out of Cadiz just to humor the whims and conceit of Villeneuve.

“Every one here knew that Gravina, like the others, was of opinion that it ought to stop in the bay. But Villeneuve had made up his mind to it, intending to hit a blow that might restore him to his master’s favor, and he worked on our Spanish pride. It seems that one of the reasons Gravina gave was the badness of the weather, and that he said, looking at the barometer in the cabin: ‘Do you not see that the barometer foretells foul weather? Do you not see how it has gone down?’ And then Villeneuve said drily: ‘What is gone down here is courage!’ At such an insult Gravina stood up, blind with rage, and threw the French Admiral’s own conduct at Finisterre in his teeth. Some angry words were spoken on both sides and at last our Admiral exclaimed: ‘To sea then to-morrow morning.’

“But I say that Gravina ought to have taken no notice of Villeneuve’s insolence—none whatever; that prudence is an officer’s first duty, and particularly when he knew—as we all knew—that the fleet was not in a condition to fight the English.”

This view, which at the time seemed to me an insult to our national honor, I understood later was well-founded. DoÑa Francisca was right. Gravina ought not to have given way to Villeneuve’s obstinacy, and I say it almost dims the halo of prestige with which the popular voice crowned the leader of the Spanish forces on that disastrous occasion. Without denying Gravina’s many merits, in my opinion there was much exaggeration in the high-flown praises that were lavished upon him, both after the battle, and again when he died of his wounds a few months later.[3] Everything he did proved him to be an accomplished gentleman and a brave sailor, but he was perhaps too much of a courtier to show the determination which commonly comes of long experience in war; he was deficient too in that complete superiority which, in so learned a profession as the Navy, can only be acquired by assiduous study of the sciences on which it relies. Gravina was a good commander of a division under superior orders, but nothing more. The foresight, coolness, and immovable determination, which are indispensable elements in the man whose fortune it is to wield such mighty forces, he had not; Don Cosme Damian Churruca had—and Don Dionisio AlcalÁ Galiano.

My master made no reply to DoÑa Francisca’s last speech and when she left the room I observed that he was praying as fervently as when I had left him in the cabin of the Santa Ana. Indeed, from that day Don Alonso did nothing else but pray; he prayed incessantly till the day came when he had to sail in the ship that never comes home.

He did not die till some time after his daughter’s marriage with Don Rafael Malespina, an event which took place two months after the action which the Spanish know as “the 21st,” and the English as the battle of Trafalgar. My young mistress was married one lovely morning, though it was winter time, and set out at once for Medina-Sidonia where a house was ready and waiting for the young couple. I might look on at her happiness during the days preceding the wedding but she did not observe the melancholy that I was suffering under; nor, if she had, would she have guessed the cause. She thought more of herself every day, as I could see, and I felt more and more humiliated by her beauty and her superior position in life. But I had taught myself to understand that such a sweet vision of all the graces could never be mine, and this kept me calm; for resignation—honest renunciation of all hope—is a real consolation, though it is a consolation akin to death.

Well, they were married, and the very day they had left us for Medina-Sidonia DoÑa Francisca told me that I was to follow them and enter their service. I set out that night, and during my solitary journey I tried to fight down my thoughts and my feelings which wavered between accepting a place in the house of the bridegroom or flying from them forever. I arrived very early in the morning and found out the house. I went into the garden but on the bottom step I stopped, for my reflections absorbed all my energies, and I had to stand still to think more clearly; I must have stood there for more than half an hour.

Perfect silence prevailed. The young couple were sleeping untroubled by a care or a sorrow. I could not help recalling that far-off time when my young mistress and I had played together. To me she had then been my first and only thought. To her, though I had not been the first in her affections, I had been something she loved and that she missed if we were apart for an hour. In so short a time how great a change!

I looked round me and all I saw seemed to symbolize the happiness of the lovers and to mock my forlorn fate. Although it was winter time, I could picture the trees in full leaf, and the porch in front of the door seemed suddenly overgrown with creepers to shade them when they should come out. The sun was warmer, the air blew softer round this nest for which I myself had carried the first straws when I served as the messenger of their loves. I seemed to see the bare rose-bushes covered with roses, the orange-trees with blossoms and fruit pecked by crowds of birds thus sharing in the wedding feast. My dreams and reflections were at last interrupted by a fresh young voice breaking the silence of the place and which made me tremble from head to foot as I heard it. It thrilled me with an indescribable sensation, that clear, happy, happy voice—whether of fear or shame I can hardly say; all I am sure of is that a sudden impulse made me turn from the door, and fly from the spot like a thief afraid of being caught.

My mind was made up. I quitted Medina-Sidonia forthwith, quite determined never to be a servant in that house, nor to return to Vejer. After a few minutes reflection I set out for Cadiz intending to get from thence to Madrid; and this was what I ultimately did, in spite of the persuasions of DoÑa Flora who tried to chain me to her side with a wreath of the faded flowers of her affection!

But since that day how much I have gone through; how much I have seen, well worthy of record. My fate, which had taken me to Trafalgar, led me subsequently through many glorious and inglorious scenes, all in their way worth remembering. If the reader cares to hear the story of my life I will tell him more about it at a future opportunity.