DON BALTAZAR CARLOS. Velasquez
“How he baffled me! Now I have learned as much of his secret as a man can learn; rather twenty-five Velasquez than one Moro. This is the last, if I live to finish it!”
I told Don Carlos about the King of Portugal. “He always comes to the Prado when he is in Madrid,” he said. “He is a fair painter himself, for a king. There is a portrait of his worth seeing in the Museum of Modern Arts.”
“I think he once complimented thee on a copy thou wast making?” said Don Luis.
“Perhaps he did,” growled Don Carlos. He smoothed out his towsled hair and went back, grumbling still, though less violently, to his work. Somehow the energy of despair had become the energy of courage; little Don Luis the Valencian with the pink in his mouth had turned the water of drudgery to the wine of work!
Madrid was perpetually en fête during the visit of the King and Queen of Portugal. We had visions of them flitting by like figures in a panorama, on their way to the bull-fight, driving to the gala performance at the opera, reviewing the troops. The review began with an open-air mass, the salute of the flag by the new recruits, and the defile before the two kings, Don Alfonzo and Don Carlos. The artillery was much applauded, especially the mountain battery, a troop of mules with cannon on their backs. The cavalry, a fine body of men and horses, galloped by the grand stand at breakneck speed. One company, all mounted on white horses, preceded by two lines of buglers, came flashing past with a splendid dash and brilliancy that pleased Don Carlos, for he clapped his great hands and cried “Bravo.” After the review the two kings rode down the Paseo de la Castellana side by side. Don Carlos, an immense man with a strong likeness to his uncle, Victor Emanuel, was in uniform; he wore the broad blue ribbon of Charles III, and a row of other decorations on his coat. He rode a gigantic sorrel horse. He seemed very popular, for there was a deal of hand clapping and hurrahing as he passed. The young King rode beside him, looking gallant and boyish; he had a happy genial smile for everybody. Queen Amelia, a beautiful woman, built on a generous plan to match Don Carlos, followed in a daumont with four horses and two postilions. How often I have remembered the answer of a Spanish diplomat to my question that day:
“Is Don Carlos as popular at home as he is in Madrid?”
“I fear not. He spends too much money. If the things were done here that go on in Portugal, Spain would be in revolution from one end to the other.”
Don Luis had more time for Patsy and me in those days than any of our friends. He was always ready to take us to see sights or studios. One day we surprised him in his own studio, an eyry at the top of a tall building. A card pinned to the door by a thumb tack told us where to knock. A little old lady with a white cap tied under her chin opened the door. She had a kind face, wrinkled like the skin of a late russet apple, and eyes like Luis’. She led us along a narrow passage—so low Patsy was forced to stoop—to a little door where she tapped.