Of What Passed Between Don Quixote and His Squire, Together with Other Very Notable Incidents
AS soon as the housekeeper heard Don Quixote turn the key in the door, she realized the urgency of the situation, put on her shawl, and ran to the house of the bachelor Samson Carrasco. She knew that her master had taken a fancy to this learned young man and thought he might be able to persuade him to give up the crazy idea. She fell on her knees before Samson and told him in excited language that her master had broken out again.
"Where is he breaking out?" asked the roguish bachelor.
"He is breaking out at the door of his madness," replied the bewildered housekeeper. "I mean he is going to break out again, for the third time, to hunt all over the world for what he calls adventures."
And then she went on to say that his first sally ended in his being brought back home, slung across the back of a donkey. The second time he made his entry into the village in an ox-cart, shut up in a cage, and looking so worn and emaciated that his own mother would not have known him. The last escapade had been an extremely expensive one, for it had taken no less than six hundred eggs to cover up his bones again.
The bachelor quieted the housekeeper, and promised her to do all he could for her master. Then he advised her to return home and prepare something hot for breakfast, and on her way home to repeat the prayer of Santa Appolonia. He himself would be there in time for breakfast, he said. The housekeeper remonstrated with the bachelor for prescribing the prayer of Santa Appolonia, which, she declared, was for toothache and not for brains; but Samson told her to do as he bade her, reminding her that he was a learned bachelor of Salamanca and knew what he was talking about. The housekeeper then left, saying her prayer, and the bachelor went to look for the curate that they might decide what to do.
In the meantime Don Quixote and Sancho were discussing what the future was holding for them, and Sancho gave the glad news to his master that he had induced his wife to sanction his departure and his becoming governor. Sancho was very much annoyed by his master's continual interruptions and corrections. Whenever Sancho would misuse or abuse a word, as he did in almost every sentence, Don Quixote would stop and ask him what he meant, until poor Sancho was so confused that he did not know what he had meant. Finally Don Quixote asked him to tell him all that his wife had said, and as soon as Sancho had a chance to use proverbs again, he felt more at home. "Teresa says," he repeated, "that I should make sure with your Worship, and let papers speak and beards be still. One take is better than two I'll give thee's."
"And so say I," said Don Quixote. "Continue, Sancho my friend. Go on; thou talkest pearls to-day."
"The fact is," continued Sancho, "that, as your Worship knows better than I do, we are all of us liable to death, and to-day we are, and to-morrow we are not. The lamb goes as soon as the sheep, and nobody can promise himself more hours of life in this world than God may be pleased to give him; for death is deaf, and when it comes to knock at our life's door, it is always insistent, and neither prayers, nor struggles, nor scepters, nor miters, can keep it back, as they tell us from the pulpits every day."
Here Don Quixote felt he ought to ask a question. "Sancho," said he, "all that is true; but what art thou driving at?"
And then came the reason for all these long-winded preliminaries. Sancho wanted his master to make definite arrangements with him for compensation. But here was the drawback. Don Quixote could recall no incident in any of the many books he had read, when a knight errant had given his squire fixed wages. How could he possibly establish a precedent now? And so it became his sad and solemn duty to refuse his squire's miserly request, and inform him that his services were no longer wanted. Not only that, but our valiant hero was cruel enough to remark that there would be any number of people who would be only too eager to serve him; and, what was more, he was convinced that no one could be less careful and diligent, or more thick-headed and talkative than Sancho.
Poor Sancho stood thunderstruck. He had expected his master would address him in a much more gracious manner; and had taken for granted that his own person was indispensable to his master. As he stood there gaping in amazement, the bachelor, Samson, suddenly entered, followed by the niece and the housekeeper. Samson threw himself on his knees before the knight, passionately declaiming:
"O flower of knight-errantry! O shining light of arms! O honor and mirror of the Spanish nation! May God Almighty grant that any person or persons who would impede or hinder thy third sally, may find no way out of the labyrinth of their schemes, nor ever accomplish what they most desire!"
Then he rose and turned to the housekeeper, who was distressed and astonished beyond words, telling her it was no use gainsaying her master; that he had made up his mind, and no Santa Appolonia or any other prayer would cause him to change it. Whereupon he addressed Don Quixote again in the same lofty way, and slyly asked him whether he would deign to accept him as his squire or as his meanest servant.
Sancho's eyes nearly bulged out of his head at this, and filled with tears. Fearing that he might lose both his master and his island, he embraced Don Quixote's knees and kissed his hand, begging Don Quixote not to give him up. Then he began to plead with him to leave the village at once. Don Quixote, having taken the squire into his fold again, embraced him, and then conferred with the bachelor and decided that they would set out three days hence. Samson promised to obtain a helmet for Don Quixote before the departure.
In the meantime the bachelor had daily conferences with the curate and the barber. The niece and the housekeeper were cursing the evil and learned bachelor of Salamanca, and hardly slept at night for fear that Don Quixote would steal away in the darkness.
Finally the night of the third day arrived, and Don Quixote and Sancho, accompanied by Samson, quietly and secretly stole out of the village, in the direction of El Toboso. When they had ridden half a league, Samson wished the knight errant godspeed, embraced him tenderly, begged him to let him hear of his good fortune, and then he returned to the village.