“Nothing at all,” she would reply, making a stampede into the kitchen, and muttering dreadful oaths in her Basque dialect. We would hear her knocking the kettles and frying pans about, and after a little while the cheerful sputtering of oil would announce to us that anyhow potatoes and eggs were frying, and that breakfast would soon be ready.
The stout, bald-headed gentleman, who had the back parlor, was a Portuguese physician who had come to Madrid to bring a lawsuit against the Administration for some claim or other he had against it. He was an ardent admirer of Spanish popular music, like most Portuguese, and he would pass the whole blessed day in a chair, near the balcony,—dressed as lightly as possible in jacket and linen pantaloons (it was in the month of June, I must observe), a Scotch cap, with floating streamers concealing his bald pate,—and strumming on a guitar, to the harsh and discordant accompaniment of which he would sing the following words:
Love me, girl of Seville, beauteous maid, spotless flower,
For with the sound of my guitar my heart beats for thee,
Here he would break off his song to look toward the window of a young washerwoman, ugly enough in appearance, but lively and sociable. She would stand at the window laughing and making eyes at him. The Portuguese would sigh, and exclaim in broken Spanish: “Moy bunita!” and then, attacking his guitar with renewed zest, would finish his song:
Oh, what grief, if she is false—no, fatal doubt flee far from me.
Ah, what joy is love when one finds a heavenly soul!
When he was done, he would draw a straw cigar-case from his breast pocket, with a package of cigarettes and some matches. Hardly would he have finished lighting the first one, when a young man, twenty-four years old,—one of Pepa’s boarders also, whom I looked upon for a long time as the personification of an artist,—would burst into the room. His surname was Botello, but I never thought to inquire his Christian name. He was fine looking, of good height, wore his hair rumpled, not too long, but thick and curly, and he looked something like a mulatto—like Alexandre Dumas, with his great thick lips, mustache like Van Dyke’s, bright black eyes, and a fine, dark complexion. We used to tease him, calling him Little Dumas every hour of the day.
Why had Pepa Urrutia’s boarders made up their minds that Botello was an artist? Even now, when I think of it, I cannot understand why. Botello had never drawn a line, nor murdered a sonata, nor scrawled an article, nor written a poor drama, not even a simple farce in one act; yet we all had the firm conviction that Botello was a finished artist.
I think that this conviction sprang from his careless and slovenly attire more than from his way of living, or his striking and genial countenance. In all sorts of weather, he would wear a close-fitting blue cloth overcoat, which he declared belonged to the Order of the Golden Fleece, because the collar and cuffs displayed a broad band of grease, and the front a lamb, figured in stains. This precious article of apparel was such an inseparable companion that he wore it in the street, washed and shaved in it, and even threw it over his bed, as a covering, while he slept. His trousers were frayed around the bottom, his boots were worn down at the heels, and the cracked leather allowed his stockings to be seen, smeared with ink so that their incautious whiteness might not appear. With all that, Botello’s handsome head and graceful form did not lose all their attractiveness even in such a guise; on the contrary, his very rags, when seen upon his elegant figure, acquired a certain mysterious grace.
Another distinctive phase of Botello’s character, which made him resemble a Bohemian of the artistic type, was his happy-go-lucky disposition, as well as his contempt for labor, and utter ignorance of the realities of life. Botello was the son of a judge, and the nephew of a nobleman’s steward. When Botello’s father died, he was left under his uncle’s charge, who lodged and fed him, and gave him an allowance of two hundred and fifty dollars, only demanding that Botello should be in bed by twelve o’clock. He did not oblige him to study, nor take any pains to give him an education; but when he discovered that his nephew passed every evening at the Bohemian café or at some low resort, and came home at all hours of the night, letting himself in with a latch-key so as not to be heard, he made the welkin ring. Instead of trying to reform him, he ignominiously drove him out of his house.
Without any occupation, with only twenty-one dollars a month to keep him, Botello wandered from boarding-house to boarding-house, each one worse than the last, until in a gaming-saloon he made the acquaintance of Don Julián, the lord and master of Pepa’s heart. Thus he came to our dwelling, drawn by this new bond of friendship. From that hour, Botello found an exemplary guardian in the Valencian. Don Julián took it upon himself to draw the young man’s monthly allowance, and then off he would rush to the tavern or gaming-house to try his luck. If he got a windfall of one or two hundred dollars, he could give Botello his twenty-one, and even, occasionally, add a few more; but if fate were unpropitious, Botello might take leave of his money forever. As he sorely needed funds, the ward would then engage in a lively tussle with his guardian.