“Accordingly, señores, the next day I made the trusty Pedillo cut off all the bushy beard about his ugly face, and had the crown of his head shaved besides––quite like that round, oily spot there on the top of good Ricardo’s poll––and then he rigged himself out in a clerical gown, to which the trunks of my bride’s old mother contributed, and, take my word for it, he was as proper and rascally a looking priest as could be found on the island of Cuba. He performed the ceremony, too, by way of practice, on Lascar Joe and the second cook beforehand, with as much decorum and solemnity, and gave as pious a benediction, as his old Trinidad uncle, the prelate, ever did. Well, that evening we were married.”
“How many times has the capitano been married?” grunted out Don Ignaçio.
“Why, let me reflect,” as he threw his cold, icy look at the frame of miniatures on the opposite wall. “You mean, compadre, how often the ceremony has been performed. Ah! I think on eleven occasions. No, it was only ten. Madame Mathilde had two husbands living when I made love to her, and declined to take a third. But then, you know, I have an affectionate disposition, and I can not set my heart against the fascinations of the sex.”
He gave vent to these moral sentiments as if he really meant them to be believed and generally adopted by his audience.
“Well, that same evening I was married to the beautiful Señorita 108 Lucia Lavarona, though I am sorry to say that Pedillo did not perform his part of the business as well as I had expected of him, from his practice in the morning. He stammered a good deal, and when he raised the crucifix to the lips of the young girl, her innocent looks and maidenly majesty of deportment so struck my coadjutor with confusion that he let the crucifix fall to the deck at her dainty feet. This little incident caused me some displeasure; but, reflecting that the poet tells us
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‘A tiger, ’tis said, will turn and flee From a maid in the pride of her purity,’ |
I said nothing to the abashed Pedillo as I gave him back the emblem; but I favored him with a look, with my right hand in my pocket––this fashion.”
Here the cold-blooded scoundrel dipped his thumb and fore finger into the flap of his waistcoat, while the commander of the “Guarda Costa” waved his brown digit before him, as if he knew what was there all the time.
“Ah! that restored my new-made priest to his senses, and he then got through the ceremony entirely to my satisfaction.
“However,” said Captain Brand, turning with lazy indifference toward Padre Ricardo, “ever after this I resolved not to take the risk of such another chance of failure, and this is the reason why I first sought your services.”