that cadet nephew of Don Sebastian’s, takes
in the cloister whenever my granddaughter stands at
the door. The crackbrained fellow dreams of nothing
less than becoming related to the cardinal, and seeing
his daughter a general’s wife; he might remember
poor Sagrario. And as far as regards Don Sebastian,
you may be quite easy, Gabriel. He will say nothing
but that we ought to bring the child back—and
what should he say? People ought to be charitable
one to another, and none more than they; for after
all, Gabriel, believe me—they are only men,
nothing but men!”
The people of the Primacy always received with obstinate
silence the slightest allusion to the reigning prelate.
It was a traditional custom in the Claverias, and
Gabriel remembered to have noticed the same in his
childhood.
If they spoke of the preceding archbishop, these people,
so used to grumbling, like all those who live in solitude,
would loose their tongues and comment on his history
and his defects. There was nothing to fear from
a dead prelate, and besides, it was an indirect praise
to the living archbishop and his favourites to speak
ill of the defunct. But if during the conversation
the name of His reigning Eminence arose, they were
all silent, raising their hands to their caps to salute,
as though the prince of the church were able to see
them from the neighbouring palace.
Gabriel, listening to his companions of the upper
cloister, remembered the funeral judgment of the Egyptians.
In the Primacy no one dared to speak the truth about
the prelates, or to discuss their faults till death
had taken possession of them.
The most that they dared to do was to comment on the
disagreements among the canons, to compare their lists
of those who saluted one another in the choir, or
who glared at one another between versicle and antiphon
like mad dogs ready to fly at one another, or to speak
with wonder about a certain polemic discussed by the
Doctoral and the Obrero in the Catholic papers in
Madrid, which had lasted for three years, as to whether
the deluge was partial or universal; answering each
other’s articles with an interval of four months.
A group of friends had collected round Gabriel.
They sought him, feeling the necessity of his presence,
experiencing that attraction exercised by those who
are born to be leaders of men even though they remain
silent. In the evenings they would meet in the
dwelling of the bell-ringer, or when it was fine weather
they would go out into the gallery above the Puerta
del Perdon. In the mornings the assembly would
be in the house of the shoemaker who mended the giants,
a yellow little man, who suffered from continual pains
in his head, which obliged him to wear sundry coloured
handkerchiefs tied round his head in the fashion of
a turban.
