"I guess," remarked the "Military" to the "Naval," "that Englishman"s goin" to walk off with old d"Alta"s girl."
"You bet," confirmed the Naval, "he"s fairly on the job. What is he?"
"Well, he"s the cousin of that young Lord St. Nivel," responded the Military, "and that counts a lot, of course. But his _real_ trade I"m told is book writing."
"Jeehosophat!" commented the Naval. "I guess he"ll chuck that when he"s Don Juan"s son-in-law; the old snake-charmer will never tolerate a mere _bookman_ in his drawing-room. His blue Spanish blood would all turn green, I reckon."
Thus was the humble calling of a novelist despised, even in Valoro!
When, however, I descended from my bedroom at 7.45, after partaking of a delicious _pet.i.t dejeuner_ of coffee, milk, bread, and fruit in my apartment, I found Don Juan d"Alta ready for the road, and the motor at the door. In five minutes St. Nivel joined us.
"I didn"t like to be left behind, old sportsman," he exclaimed.
"Staying in bed on a huntin" mornin" is not exactly my form, even when the quarry is merely a harmless Trappist!"
"Your early habits do you credit, but your language, St. Nivel," I said reprovingly, "is verging on the profane."
"I"m sure I"m very sorry," he answered. "I"d walk ten miles rather than offend any one"s feelings. I hope Don Juan didn"t hear me."
"Don Juan is a man of the world," I answered, "and it wouldn"t matter if he did, but other people might hear you and not like it."
"Righto, Bill," replied my sporting cousin. "I"ll keep my eye on you and try and not put my foot in it."
In a few minutes we were rattling through some magnificent mountain scenery, with luxuriant vegetation and lovely wild flowers on every side. On the tops of the trees were parrots of varied colours which, disturbed by the noise of the motor, fluttered in all directions before us.
"Now I particularly want you to notice the abbot," said Don Juan as we approached the monastery, a very ancient-looking pile of buildings situated in a most lonely spot on the side of a mountain, yet surrounded by scenery which would have rivalled any in the world; "he is a most remarkable man, and possesses, as you will see, a most remarkable presence."
Presently we drew up at a very plain front door, and were immediately reconnoitred through a small wicket hole.
"The janitor," observed St. Nivel, "is evidently taking stock of us, and for that reason, Bill, I feel thankful that you have put on that new Norfolk suit; it gives the whole party a cla.s.sy appearance."
The survey seemed satisfactory. Some bolts were shot back and the door opened, disclosing a monk in a brown habit.
He made some evidently most respectful remarks to Don Juan in Spanish, and then we all entered the monastery and were shown into a guest-room.
Here in a few minutes another lay brother brought a liqueur stand with gla.s.ses.
"Veritable Chartreuse," remarked Don Juan, as he laid his hand on the little decanters of green and yellow liquid, "the true stream drunk at the source!"
He filled the little gla.s.ses and handed them round as the lay brother stood looking on admiringly.
"You must take some," he said, "or they will be offended."
St. Nivel sipped his gla.s.s appreciatively.
"The monk who invented this," he remarked sententiously, "_deserved_ to go to heaven."
"Our abbot will give himself the honour of waiting upon your lordships," were the lay brother"s parting words as translated to us by Don Juan.
We possessed our spirits in contentment, and awaited his coming, whilst d"Alta expatiated on the rigours of the Trappists" life, their isolation, their silence, their exactness in the keeping of the Office of the Church.
I fear this discourse, earnest though it was on the part of our host, was lost upon St. Nivel, whom I detected catching flies--and liberating them immediately--in the most solemn part. To him the severest form of penance was represented by a life from which all descriptions of "huntin"" and "shootin"" were excluded. He had been burning to kill something big in the game line ever since he had set foot on sh.o.r.e, and I was quite prepared to hear him ask the abbot when he arrived whether he was "a huntin" man." He had asked that question of almost everybody we had met up to then in Aquazilia.
The abbot, however, came at last, just as Don Juan was concluding an account of St. Bruno, the Founder of the Order, and Jack was sitting with his eyes stolidly fixed upon the liqueur decanter.
Yes, the abbot was all d"Alta had said; he was a man of fifty, tall, spare, straight as a dart, but unlike most of the other monks we saw, fair and fresh coloured.
I stood looking at him for some time, gazing into his fair open face, after he had taken my hand and released it. I wondered who it was he reminded me of, whose face he brought so vividly to my recollection.
Yet striking as the likeness was to _some one_, I could not recall who that some one was.
"You must be hungry after your drive, gentlemen," he said, speaking very fair English, as indeed most educated people did in Aquazilia. "I have ordered _dejeuner_ at once for you. While it is preparing would you like to see the monastery?"
St. Nivel and I at once expressed our pleasure at the prospect, and the abbot preceded us, walking with Don Juan, but stopping occasionally to turn and speak to us and point out some object of interest.
In this way we pa.s.sed through the wonderful inst.i.tution and saw the Trappists each in his little abode, a sort of cottage to himself in which he ate and slept, and worked _alone_. At stated hours all through the day and night, the hundreds of monks met in the church to recite the office.
Don Juan told us as we stood on the steps of the great corridor that he had spent a week there in retreat before his marriage, and kept the "Hours" with the community.
Pointing down the corridor which stretched before us, he said the sight which struck him most was to stand as we did, on a night in winter and hear the great bell ring for Matins.
"Then," said he, "all those doors of the little houses open, and from each comes out a monk with a lantern. They look like hundreds of fireflies all going towards the great Abbey church."
I think the abbot saw with that intuitive knowledge which belongs to a refined nature that St. Nivel was _bored_; he steered us back to the guest-room, where a most excellent lunch was awaiting us--soup, fish, a dish of cutlets and a sweet omelette, all excellent, and served with red and white wine-like nectar and coffee from the Trappists" estate on the hills.
The abbot did not eat with us, but sat and charmed us with his conversation, for charming it was.
He talked with that fascinating fluency which one would have expected to find in a travelled man of the world rather that in a cloistered monk. He held us during all that meal, giving zest to each dish that came, with anecdotes of every country, and yet he spoke with a refined simplicity and perfect innocence of thought. His clear-cut and healthy face, his bright blue eyes and white teeth, the exceeding sweetness of his face and expression are with me now as I write.
When it was over and we had parted from him and were flying back to Valoro and modernism, I turned to Don Juan and spoke my thoughts.
"And where," I asked, "can the Order of Trappists have gained such a wonderful recruit from?"
The old man"s face, which had been smiling, turned very grave; he shook his head and sighed.
"Ah! I wish I could tell you!"
That was his answer.
CHAPTER XVI
THE CONFESSION OF BROOKS
We left Valoro a few days after the great festival of the New Year, which came as a fitting finale to all our gaiety.
Christmas had been a quiet, sedate feast in the nature of a Sunday. We left just as the premonitory signs of the rainy season were making themselves apparent.
St. Nivel"s friends, the American attaches, told him that we were well out of it, as the rains were torrential.