“It is at number five, Calle de la Merced, but
they will await, E. M.”
“And the other carriage that is on the road?”
Marcos asked the man. “The carriage which
brings the caballero—has it arrived in Saragossa?”
“Not yet,” answered the driver. “I
have heard from one who passed them on the road that
they had a second mishap just after leaving the inn
of The Two Trees, where their Excellencies took coffee—a
little mishap this one, which will only delay them
an hour or less. He has no luck, that caballero.”
The man looked quite gravely at Marcos, who returned
the glance as solemnly. For they were as brothers,
these two, sons of that same mother, Nature, with
whom they loved to deal, fighting her strong winds,
her heat, her cold, her dust and rivers, reading her
thousand and one secrets of the clouds, of night and
dawn, which townsmen never know and never even suspect.
They had a silent contempt for the small subtleties
of a man’s mind, and were half ashamed of the
business on which they were now engaged.
As the man withdrew in obedience to Marcos’
salutation, “Go with God,” the clock struck
twelve.
“Come,” said Marcos to his father, “we
must go to number five, Calle de la Merced. Do
you know the house?”
“Yes; it is one of the many in Saragossa that
stand empty, or are supposed to stand empty.
It is an old religious house which was sacked in the
disturbances of Christina’s reign.”
He walked to the window as he spoke and looked out.
The house had been thrown open for the first time
for many years, and they now occupied one of the larger
rooms looking across the garden to the Ebro.
“Ah! you have ordered the carriage,” he
said, seeing the brougham standing at the door, and
the rusty gates thrown open, giving egress to the
Paseo del Ebro.
“Yes,” answered Marcos in an odd and restrained
voice. “To bring Juanita back.”
The makers of history Number
Five Calle de la Merced is to this day an empty house,
like many in Saragossa, presenting to the passer-by
a dusty stone face and huge barred windows over which
the spiders have drawn their filmy curtain. For
one reason or another there are many empty houses in
the larger cities of Spain and many historical names
have passed away. With them have faded into oblivion
some religious orders and not a few kindred brotherhoods.
Number Five Calle de la Merced has its history like
the rest of the monasteries, and the rounded cobblestones
of the large courtyard bear to-day a black stain where,
the curious inquirer will be told, the caretakers
of the empty house have been in the habit of cooking
their bread on a brazier of charcoal fanned into glow
with a palm leaf scattering the ashes. But the
true story of the black stain is in reality quite
otherwise. For it was here that the infuriated
people burnt the chapel furniture when the monasteries
of Saragossa were sacked.
