The Joy of Captain Ribot

by Armando Palacio Valdés

"In work, no—I know that. But as a figure-head you can do me a great service. As you are rich and are known as a scientific man (you know that, although you don't care much about it), it is necessary that you should take the most important position, and be president of the council of administration. No work will be demanded of you. You shall be given a comfortable arm-chair, and you can, from time to time, drop off to sleep, scattering benedictions."

Cristina had remained near the table. Standing up, she, with a lofty expression, cast one full glance at Castell. Then unfolding that which she held, she tranquilly tore it up and flung the tiny bits into the waste-paper basket.

CHAPTER X.

OUR way that afternoon lay towards the cottage of Tonet, where some refreshment was prepared for us. This Tonet, a regular Moor according to his eyes, his complexion, and his teeth, was a wonder at preparing paellas and playing on the flute. Whenever it occurred to us to go and visit him, he received us with the gravity and courtesy of a feudal señor. Scarcely opening his lips, he made himself understood to his wife and children by signs, had chairs brought for us under the arbor, and soon afterwards he used to serve us figs, dates, chufas, and fresh cinnamon cakes, with which his pantry was always provided. When we had let him know we were coming, as on the present occasion, he offered us ice cream, rich with vanilla and filberts. He was a meek, sad man, seeming careless of all things. He was never joyful, but liked to see joyousness in others. On Sundays and on many afternoons when his work was done early, he would come out and sit down alone in front of the cottage and play softly for a while on his flute. He did not do it for his own pleasure; it was a lure, nothing more. Little by little he drew to his own cottage the young people from all the cottages round about, and a dance was improvised. His eldest son, a boy of fourteen years, played on the taboret and was almost as grave and silent as he. Both passed hours, one blowing and the other beating his instrument, serious, melancholy, with eyes fixed on space, and heeding neither much nor little the noisy dance that their music evoked.

Sabas, who was of the party this afternoon, marched abreast with me as we were making our way across the fields of high Indian corn, already bursting into ears. The first subject that he proposed for my consideration, sucking his pipe and spitting at regular intervals, was of a nature essentially critical. Why did his brother-in-law persist in keeping up this estate with so little of it under cultivation, and at so much expense, when by so little effort it could be made productive? Every one of the constituent elements of this proposition was separately examined by a rigidly mathematical method. To do so he formulated in the first place certain definitions, clear, distinct, and luminous. What is an estate for recreation? What is a productive estate? What is an estate of combined pleasure and utility? After this he laid down certain axioms as profound as they were indisputable. All that is productive ought to produce. To attain an end one ought to employ means. Man is not alone in the world, and ought to consider his family. Vanity should not influence human actions. One-sided propositions immediately followed with their premises and corollaries; then he would go on to the end gently, but with invincible logic to prove the proposition on which hung the following corollary: Emilio is an active and enterprising man, but at the same time a careless fellow.

Satisfied, with good reason, by the method and intuition and the logic wherewith the Supreme Being had so highly favored him, Sabas continued sucking and spitting with dizzying rapidity. The second subject which this lucid soul attacked this afternoon directly concerned me.

"Come, tell us, Ribot, have you never thought of getting married?" he asked me after a long pause, taking out his pipe and fixing a scrutinizing gaze upon me.

I confess I felt disturbed. I understood that the depths of my soul were next to be sounded, and trembled, perceiving that this transcendent critic was disposed to exercise his scalpel on me.

"Tss! Sailors think little of that. Our life is incompatible with family pleasures."

"Sailors, when they arrive at a certain comfortable condition and have reached an independent position like you, have the right to retire peacefully and enjoy a comfortable life," he replied with the gravity and firmness which marked every utterance that came out of his mouth.