“There is good enough to live with me,” said Don Ricardo stiffly, “my lady sister, the Doña Dolorez Eulalia Vitoria.” He looked out across the chasm.
Cartaret caught his breath. There was an awkward pause. Then, glancing up, he saw, coming toward them along the terrace, the figure of a woman-servant that seemed startlingly familiar.
It was Chitta. She was bent, no doubt, on some household errand to her master, whose face was luckily turned away—luckily because, when she caught sight of Cartaret, her jaw dropped and her knees gave under her.
Cartaret had just time to knit his brows with the most forbidding scowl he could assume. The old woman clasped her hands in what was plainly a prayer to him to be silent concerning all knowledge of her and her mistress. A moment more, and Don Ricardo was giving her orders in the Basque tongue.
“Our servants,” he said apologetically when she had gone, “are faithful, but stupid.” His gray eyes peered at Cartaret searchingly. “Very stupid, sir,” he added. “For instance, you, sir, know something of our customs; you know that centuries-old tradition—the best of laws—makes it the worst of social crimes for a Basque to marry any save a Basque——”
He stopped short, holding Cartaret with his eyes. Cartaret nodded.
“Very well, sir,” Ricardo continued: “one time a lady of our house—it was years upon years ago, when Wellington and the English were here—fell in love, or thought that she did, with a British officer. For an Englishman, his degree was high, but had he been the English King it would have served him nothing among us. Knowing of course that the head of our house would never consent to such a marriage, this lady commanded her most loyal servant to assist in an elopement. Now, the Basque servant must obey her mistress, but also the Basque servant must protect the honor of the house that she has the privilege to serve. This one sought to do both things. She assisted in the elopement and brought the lady to the English camp. Then, thus having been faithful to one duty, she was faithful to the other: before the wedding, she killed both her mistress and herself.” He turned quickly. “Sir, I have pressing duties in the valley, and you are too weary to ride with me: my poor house is at your disposal.”
Cartaret leaned against the parapet and, when his host was out of earshot, whistled softly.
“What a delightful raconteur,” he mused. “I wonder if he meant me to draw any special moral from that bit of family-history.”
He waited until, a quarter of an hour later, he saw Don Ricardo and two servants ride across the drawbridge and wind their way toward the valley. He waited until the green forest engulfed them. What he was going to do might be questionable conduct in a guest, but there was no time to waste over nice points of etiquette. He was going to find Vitoria.