A prolonged silence followed, a period devoted to the two cigars. “That Escobar,” La Clavel said, “is a very beautiful boy. What you tell me is surprising; he, at any rate, seems quite different. And I have seen you time after time sitting together, the two or three or four of you, with affectionate glances and arms. I am sensitive to such things, and I think you are lying.”
An air of amused surprise appeared on his countenance, “If you are so taken with Andrés Escobar,” he observed, “why did you make this appointment with me? May I have the pleasure of taking him a note from you? he is very fond of intrigues.”
Leaning forward she laid a firm square palm on his knee. “You have told me all that I wanted—this Tirso, who was killed, he was your dear friend and his death an agony; the smaller, the coffee berry, you are devoted to his goodness and simplicity; beneath Quintara’s waistcoats you find a heart of gold. But Escobar—is it Andrés?—you love better than your life. They care nothing for your American dollars; it is evident they all have much more than you. What is it, then, you are united by? I shall tell you—Cuba. You are patriots, insurrectionists; 96 Santacilla was right. And neither is your rebellion crushed, not with Agramonte alive.” She leaned back with glimmering eyes and the cruel paint of her mouth smiling at him.
She was, then, Charles Abbott reflected, an agent of Spain’s; calmly he rehearsed all they had said to each other, he examined every sentence, every inflection of voice. He could not have been more circumspect; the position he had taken, of a pleasure-loving young American, was so natural that it was inevitable. No, La Clavel knew nothing, she was simply adopting another method in her task of getting information for Santacilla. At this, remembering the adoration of his circle for her, he was brushed by a swift sorrow. For them she had been the symbol, the embodiment, of beauty; the fire and grace of her dancing had intensified, made richer, their sense of life. She had been the utmost flashing peak of their desire; and now it was clear to him that she was rotten at the core, La Clavel was merely a spy; what had engaged them was nothing more than a brilliant flowery surface, a bright shawl.
“You are wasting your efforts,” he assured 97 her, with an appearance of complete comfort. “Even if you were right, I mean about the others, what, do you think, would make them confide in me, almost a stranger? You understand this so much better than I that, instead of questioning me, you ought to explain the whole Cuban situation. Women like yourself, with genius, know everything.”
She utterly disconcerted Charles by enveloping him in a rapid gesture, her odorous lips were pressed against his cheek. “You are as sweet as a lime flower,” La Clavel declared. “After the others—” her expression of disgust was singularly valid. “That is what I love about you,” she cried suddenly, “your youth and freshness and courage. Tirso Labrador dying so gallantly ... all your beardless intent faces. The revolt in Cuba, I’ve felt it ever since I landed at Havana, it’s in the air like wine. I am sick of officers: look, ever since I was a child the army has forced itself upon me. I had to have their patronage when I was dancing and their company when I went to the cafés; and when it wasn’t the cavalry it was the gentlemen. They were always superior, condescending; and always, inside me, I hated them. They thought, because I was peasant born, that their attentions filled me with 98 joy, that I should be grateful for their aristocratic presences. But, because I was what I was, I held them, with their ladies’ hands and sugared voices, in contempt. There isn’t one of them with the entrails to demand my love.
“I tell you I was smothering in the air about me. My dancing isn’t like the posturing of the court, it’s the dancing of the people, my people, passionate like a knife. I am from the Morena, and there we are not the human sheep who live in the valleys, along the empty rivers. How shall I explain? But how can you explain yourself? You are not a Cuban; this rebellion, in which you may so easily be killed almost before you begin to live, it isn’t yours. What drew you into it? You must make it plain, for I, too, am caught.”
“Men are different from women,” he replied, putting into words his newly acquired wisdom; “whatever happened to me would be useless for you, you couldn’t be helped by it.” Yet he was forced to admit to himself that all she had said was reasonable; at bottom it didn’t contradict his generalization, for it was based on a reality, on La Clavel’s long resentment, on indignities to her pride, on, as she had said, the innate freedom of the mountain spirit. If she were honest, any 99 possible attachment to Cuba might result from her hatred of Spain, of Sevilla and Madrid. Hers, then, would be the motive of revenge.