“What say you?” exclaimed Don Luis. “Have any dared to throw my honoured father into prison?”
“Heaven deliver us from a like calamity,” answered the old couple. “Oh no, senhor, it is not so bad as that; but when the Senhor Conde came home, he ordered his carriage and his horses, and the escudeiro, and the other servants to be prepared, and set off the next day for the Quinta.”
“This is indeed bad news you give me,” answered Don Luis. “And I must hasten away to-morrow to join my father: I have therefore no time to lose in Lisbon. First, can you tell me if my fair cousin, Donna Theresa d’Alorna, is residing in the city, or is she in the country?”
“Oh, senhor, the Senhora Donna Theresa is at present at the house of the marquis, her father; but, alas! she is much changed from what she was; for she never comes here now to spend the day; though, to be sure, she has more to occupy her than formerly, for it is said she has become a great favourite of the queen, and is constantly at Court; and that is not a good place for young ladies, who are much better-employed staying at home, and learning to work and to embroider.”
“The dissipations of a Court will have no power to alter Donna Theresa’s heart,” exclaimed the lover. “But now, my good Lucas and Senhora Anna, I must hasten away, though I will soon return; for I have much to learn and much to tell you.”
“But you cannot think, senhor, of leaving the house without taking something to eat,” exclaimed the old lady: “you would die of hunger, and you always used to have a very good appetite.”
“All, senhor, do stay,” added old Lucas, “and we will soon cook you up something to please you.”
“I am not hungry, I assure you, my good friends,” answered Don Luis; “and I cannot remain, but I will leave Pedro to recount all the wonders he has seen, and the dangers he has escaped;” saying which, he hurried off in the fond hope of finding his mistress fair and loving as ever. How grievously he was disappointed we have seen; and he then remembered Captain Pinto’s warning and advice.
On rushing from the apartment of his false and fickle mistress, Don Luis scarcely knew whither he was wandering. All his bright hopes and aspirations were crushed and blighted at the moment he expected to find them realised. A weight was on his heart, from which he felt none could relieve him, and he believed that from henceforth the world for him could have no happiness in store; but yet he recollected that he was a man, and he resolved not to sink tamely under his cruel fate.
Now we opine that romance writers would have made their heroes act very differently; they would either have thrown themselves, in despair, into the Tagus, or flown to weary the live-long hours in deploring their hapless lot, with groans and sighs, beneath the mournful shade of some solitary grove; but Don Luis was of a very different character. In the first place, he was too brave, and too much in his senses, to quit the world; and he had been taught, and believed, that he had no right to give up existence till summoned by a higher Power than his own will. Nor is suicide a crime at all common with his countrymen: they live under too bright a sky, and breathe too pure and elastic an atmosphere, to wish to change them for the gloomy, narrow tomb. Had he been of that disposition which delights to brood over grief in solitude, there were no shady groves in the neighbourhood of Lisbon whither he could repair to indulge his propensity, if we except a few orange and olive plantations, where he would most certainly have been accompanied by a rabble of little boys, to wonder what he could be about, probably mistaking him for some actor rehearsing his part in a tragedy. To return home was almost as bad; for he knew that he should be assailed by the importunate, though kind, questions of his old domestics; and though he had many relations and friends in the city who would be glad to see him, he could not bring himself to call upon them.