Ever since don Vicente de la Cruz’s visit I had thought I detected the movement of suspicious people around our house. Nothing truly disturbing, it is true; only a couple of faces that were not usually seen either on Calle del Arcabuz or in the Tavern of the Turk. I suppose that this in itself was not overly strange, for on Cava Baja, as well as other streets in the neighborhood, there were a number of inns. But that morning I had noticed something I would have given more consideration to had I not been waiting for Angelica to pass by. It was only later that I gave it proper thought, when I had ample time to mull over the events that had brought me to the sinister place I found myself in. Or where, to be more accurate, I found myself forced to go.
It had happened that after we returned from the mass at the church of Las Benitas, I stood at the tavern door, and Diego Alatriste went on to Calle de los Correos, where he had business at the letter-office. And at that moment, as the captain was walking up Toledo, two strangers strolling past the fruit stands with an innocent air exchanged a few words in a low voice before one of them turned and followed the captain. I watched from where I was, wondering whether it was a chance move or whether the two were planning some thievery, when Angelica’s carriage went by and erased everything but her from my mind. And yet, as I later had bitter opportunity to lament, the ear-to-ear mustaches, the wide-brimmed hats pulled down in swashbuckling fashion, the swords and daggers, and the swaggering walk of those two bullies, should have made me dog their steps. But God, the Devil, or whoever plays us life’s pranks, always watches with amusement as through carelessness, pride, or ignorance, we find ourselves walking on the sharp edge of the knife.
She was as beautiful as Lucifer before his expulsion from Paradise. Her carriage had stopped beneath the poplar trees lining the road, and she had got out of the coach to stroll around the fountain. She had not yet outgrown her blond curls, and the lustrous cloth of her dress, as blue as her eyes, seemed to have been cut from the cloudless sky that framed the rooftops and towers of Madrid, its ancient wall, and the solid mass of the palace. After the coachman hobbled his mules, he had gone to join his fellow drivers, and the duenna had gone to fill a receptacle with water from the famed fountain. Angelica was alone. I felt my heart thumping as I drew closer beneath the trees, and from a distance I watched as she graciously greeted a few young friends who were having a little social, and then, after stealing a glance toward the distant chaperone, accepted a treat they offered her.
At that moment, I would have given all my youth and all my dreams to be, instead of a humble, beardless page, one of the dashing hidalgos—or at least men who resembled hidalgos—following the paths, twisting their mustaches as they sighted appealing senoritas, addressing a few clever words to them, hat in hand, fist elegantly posed on a hip or on the pommel of a sword. It was undoubtedly true that there were also ordinary folk there, no few of them, and with experience I learned that in those days, as in ours, not everything that glisters is good breeding, for there were whores and rogues among them who gave themselves airs out of vanity or a wish to improve their lot. Whatever their background, however dubious, Jew or Moor, it was enough to have bad handwriting, speak slowly and gravely, have debts, ride a horse, and carry a sword, in order to pass oneself off as a gentleman. But to my young eyes, anyone who wore a cape and sword—or clog shoes, fine petticoats, and farthingales—seemed to me to be a person of quality. At that point, I did not know much of the world.
A few dandies rode by on horseback, making their mounts rear and curvet as they neared a coach filled with ladies—or doxies—flirting with them whoever they were, and I wished with all my heart to be one of them, to rein in my horse and address Angelica in exquisite phrases. By now, she had penetrated deeper into the grove and, gathering up her underskirts with infinite grace, was meandering among the ferns that bordered the banks of the stream. Her eyes seemed to be fixed on the ground, and as I drew closer I could see that she was following the path of a long line of industrious ants scurrying back and forth with the discipline of German infantrymen. More venturesome than ever before, I took a few more steps in her direction before some twigs snapped beneath my feet. She looked up at me. Or it might be more accurate to say that the sky and her gown and her gaze enveloped me like a warm mist, and I felt my head whirl the way it did in the Tavern of the Turk from the vapors of wine spilled on the table, clouding my senses and making everything seem very slow and far away.
“I know you,” she said.
She did not smile, nor did she seem surprised or displeased by my presence. She looked at me with curiosity, in the way that mothers and older sisters look before they say “You have grown a good inch,” or “Your voice is changing.” To my good fortune, I was wearing an old but clean doublet that had no patches, and passable breeches; also, following the captain’s orders, I had washed my face and ears. I strove to pass her scrutiny without flinching, and after a brief struggle with my innate shyness, I was able to return her gaze serenely.
“My name is Inigo Balboa,” I said.
“I know. You are the friend of that Captain Triste, or Batristre.”
She spoke with a very familiar tone, as she might to a friend or a servant. But she had said “friend” of the captain, and not “page” or “servant.” More, she had remembered who I was. That alone—which in other circumstances might not be calming in the least, since my name or Alatriste’s on the lips of the niece of Luis de Alquezar was more a promise of danger than cause for satisfaction—seemed to me completely adorable, making me happier than the gift of new doublet and breeches of Castile woolen. Angelica remembered my name. And with it, a portion of the life that I was resolved to place at her feet, sacrificing it to her without so much as blinking. I felt, and I wonder if you will truly know what I mean, like a man run through with a dagger: that I would live as long as it was not pulled out, and that removing it would kill me.
“Have you come for the healing waters?” I asked, to break the silence that the intensity of her gaze had made unbearable.
She wrinkled her nose and pouted. “I eat too many sweets,” she said. Then she shrugged her shoulders in a childish way, as if that was a stupid concern. She looked toward the fountain where her duenna was standing talking with a acquaintance.
“It’s ridiculous,” she added scornfully.
I deduced that Angelica de Alquezar did not hold the highest regard for the dragon charged with looking after her, nor of the physics of physicians who with their bloodletting and remedies dispatched more Christians than the hangman of Seville.
“So I imagine,” I replied courteously. “Everyone knows that sweets are good for one’s health.” I vaguely remembered having heard the pharmacist Fadrique say something similar in the tavern. “They build up the blood and the humors. I am sure that a honey bun, or a fritter, or custards, do more to stimulate melancholy humors than water from that fountain.”
I stopped, hesitant to go any further, for I had exhausted my pharmaceutical knowledge.
“You have a funny accent,” she said.
“It’s Basque,” I replied. “I was born in Onate.”
“I thought that Basques cut off their words,” she said, and recited an old Basque saying, imitating their clipped speech:
