登陆注册
15540700000006

第6章 THE BIRTHDAY OF THE INFANTA(1)

[TO MRS.WILLIAM H.GRENFELL OF TAPLOW COURT -LADY DESBOROUGH]

It was the birthday of the Infanta.She was just twelve years of age,and the sun was shining brightly in the gardens of the palace.

Although she was a real Princess and the Infanta of Spain,she had only one birthday every year,just like the children of quite poor people,so it was naturally a matter of great importance to the whole country that she should have a really fine day for the occasion.And a really fine day it certainly was.The tall striped tulips stood straight up upon their stalks,like long rows of soldiers,and looked defiantly across the grass at the roses,and said:'We are quite as splendid as you are now.'The purple butterflies fluttered about with gold dust on their wings,visiting each flower in turn;the little lizards crept out of the crevices of the wall,and lay basking in the white glare;and the pomegranates split and cracked with the heat,and showed their bleeding red hearts.Even the pale yellow lemons,that hung in such profusion from the mouldering trellis and along the dim arcades,seemed to have caught a richer colour from the wonderful sunlight,and the magnolia trees opened their great globe-like blossoms of folded ivory,and filled the air with a sweet heavy perfume.

The little Princess herself walked up and down the terrace with her companions,and played at hide and seek round the stone vases and the old moss-grown statues.On ordinary days she was only allowed to play with children of her own rank,so she had always to play alone,but her birthday was an exception,and the King had given orders that she was to invite any of her young friends whom she liked to come and amuse themselves with her.There was a stately grace about these slim Spanish children as they glided about,the boys with their large-plumed hats and short fluttering cloaks,the girls holding up the trains of their long brocaded gowns,and shielding the sun from their eyes with huge fans of black and silver.But the Infanta was the most graceful of all,and the most tastefully attired,after the somewhat cumbrous fashion of the day.

Her robe was of grey satin,the skirt and the wide puffed sleeves heavily embroidered with silver,and the stiff corset studded with rows of fine pearls.Two tiny slippers with big pink rosettes peeped out beneath her dress as she walked.Pink and pearl was her great gauze fan,and in her hair,which like an aureole of faded gold stood out stiffly round her pale little face,she had a beautiful white rose.

From a window in the palace the sad melancholy King watched them.

Behind him stood his brother,Don Pedro of Aragon,whom he hated,and his confessor,the Grand Inquisitor of Granada,sat by his side.Sadder even than usual was the King,for as he looked at the Infanta bowing with childish gravity to the assembling counters,or laughing behind her fan at the grim Duchess of Albuquerque who always accompanied her,he thought of the young Queen,her mother,who but a short time before -so it seemed to him -had come from the gay country of France,and had withered away in the sombre splendour of the Spanish court,dying just six months after the birth of her child,and before she had seen the almonds blossom twice in the orchard,or plucked the second year's fruit from the old gnarled fig-tree that stood in the centre of the now grass-grown courtyard.So great had been his love for her that he had not suffered even the grave to hide her from him.She had been embalmed by a Moorish physician,who in return for this service had been granted his life,which for heresy and suspicion of magical practices had been already forfeited,men said,to the Holy Office,and her body was still lying on its tapestried bier in the black marble chapel of the Palace,just as the monks had borne her in on that windy March day nearly twelve years before.Once every month the King,wrapped in a dark cloak and with a muffled lantern in his hand,went in and knelt by her side calling out,'MI REINA!MIREINA!'and sometimes breaking through the formal etiquette that in Spain governs every separate action of life,and sets limits even to the sorrow of a King,he would clutch at the pale jewelled hands in a wild agony of grief,and try to wake by his mad kisses the cold painted face.

To-day he seemed to see her again,as he had seen her first at the Castle of Fontainebleau,when he was but fifteen years of age,and she still younger.They had been formally betrothed on that occasion by the Papal Nuncio in the presence of the French King and all the Court,and he had returned to the Escurial bearing with him a little ringlet of yellow hair,and the memory of two childish lips bending down to kiss his hand as he stepped into his carriage.

Later on had followed the marriage,hastily performed at Burgos,a small town on the frontier between the two countries,and the grand public entry into Madrid with the customary celebration of high mass at the Church of La Atocha,and a more than usually solemn AUTO-DA-FE,in which nearly three hundred heretics,amongst whom were many Englishmen,had been delivered over to the secular arm to be burned.

Certainly he had loved her madly,and to the ruin,many thought,of his country,then at war with England for the possession of the empire of the New World.He had hardly ever permitted her to be out of his sight;for her,he had forgotten,or seemed to have forgotten,all grave affairs of State;and,with that terrible blindness that passion brings upon its servants,he had failed to notice that the elaborate ceremonies by which he sought to please her did but aggravate the strange malady from which she suffered.

When she died he was,for a time,like one bereft of reason.

同类推荐
  • 海陵从政录

    海陵从政录

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。
  • 悟真篇阐幽

    悟真篇阐幽

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。
  • 吴普本草

    吴普本草

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。
  • A CONFESSION

    A CONFESSION

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。
  • 登鹳雀楼

    登鹳雀楼

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。
热门推荐
  • 还记得那年冬

    还记得那年冬

    那年冬,你给了我生;那年冬,你给了我亡......
  • 我的腹黑男神,再见

    我的腹黑男神,再见

    不对,我是不是喜欢他?没有,我只爱他的美色而已,他什么都不是,装B男一个,而且人家还有女朋友……转学,求求你,别转好吗?渣男已上线……
  • 我家的医仙大人

    我家的医仙大人

    一个普通的不能再普通的大学生周子轩,百无聊赖之际,随意的一次旅行,带回了一个萝莉。这个萝莉不一般,会医术会毒术。最重要的是做事还不讲道理。周子轩也只得供着这位大神,忍辱负重,只为学的一招半式,改变这枯燥无味的生活。拜师?不行,会让她更加作威作福,那只能争取将她娶回家当老婆了。这是一个努力赚钱,努力养家,出任CEO,迎娶小医仙的温馨故事。
  • 霸主之都市传奇

    霸主之都市传奇

    何为霸主?一行一地之霸,一业一国之主?不够。霸主应是,各行各业,各地各区,称霸之主,方才真正的实至名归。霸者,豪杰也,人人敬畏。肖明峰,曾在国内第一政治世家的逼迫下,无奈选择自杀,刻骨铭心的经历,给了他足够的动力,推着他大步走向时代巨擎。软件业第一微软?分分钟用技术拿下。IBM,你只是配角好嘛。娱乐业:奥斯卡、戛纳、威尼斯、柏林,邀请我去拿奖,看心情吧。惹毛了大爷,我自己设立个奖来玩。金融业:世界十大银行,九家都是我的私人金库,就差发行货币了,你说谁说了算。房地产业:虽然能赚取暴利,可我不耻与民争,给个建筑成本价不亏就行。工业,制造业?确实需要长时间投入,但无论是资金还是技术,通通难不倒我。
  • 机动传说

    机动传说

    人们生活是靠一种叫做生物提炼的技术所支撑着。正如500年前,消失的地球一样,人类被迫进入外太空。另一方面,很多国家为了开发拥有生物力量的兵器而展开激烈的争夺,成为霸权国家变成很多国家的意图……在这个错综复杂的时代里,太阳系陷入了混乱之中。这个时代,有一个生存于宇宙卫星群中的独立小国——盛罗。以盛罗为舞台的起点,主人公扎克斯将在冒险旅途上遇到各色各样的人物,以成为正式生物机械师为目标的他,揭开了故事的序幕。以新的世界、新的角色来描述新的故事,这就是开拓时代的物语——机动传说。
  • 重生宠后

    重生宠后

    上辈子,姜蕙家破人亡,沦为衡阳王的奴婢,从不曾如意过。重生之后,她一心要改了自己的命,谁想到,这一路,非得多个碍眼的。可她再不想给他做奴婢了,做侧妃也不行!穆戎:……王妃呢?
  • 月老很忙

    月老很忙

    月老祠香火惨淡,于是,我来到了人间,嗯!拆散一对是一对。
  • 动物与海洋(海洋与科技探索之旅)

    动物与海洋(海洋与科技探索之旅)

    海洋占地球表面积的71%,它孕育了种类繁多且数量庞大的生物资源。海洋动物是海洋中异养型生物的总称。它门类繁多,各门类的形态结构和生理特点有很大差异。本书介绍了各种海洋动物的生活习性,性格特点和生存环境,以及海洋生物作为人类所依赖的最主要、最直接的资源,怎样在提高海洋生产力的同时加强海洋环境的保护。
  • 心理学与人生

    心理学与人生

    本书探讨人生中的重大问题与心理学的关系,从心理学的角度解读生命中的每一个环节,将这些生活中最容易被忽略,却往往也是最本质的问题提出来,然后进行思考和解答。
  • 舞尽桃花:倾城弃妃很冷艳

    舞尽桃花:倾城弃妃很冷艳

    卧槽!洗个澡也能穿越?!还有木有比这更狗血的事!穿了就算了吧!竟然穿成八岁的小屁孩,OMG!老天爷你收了我吧!我云梦梦好歹也是21世纪的天才美少女吧!天哪,这叫我以后可怎么活啊!算了算了,既来之则安之,反正穿成了将军之女,不愁吃不愁穿,而且自己的便宜爹爹以后要将自己嫁给当朝太子,好耶!太子妃耶!那以后等太子当了皇上那自己就是皇后了,好耶好耶!皇后耶!几年后,他们奉旨成婚,可在大婚之日,他却对她厌恶至极,只因她不是自己心爱的女人。可她却早已爱上了他,她跌落悬崖,可他却转身离去。青楼重生,她出尘绝艳,冷若冰霜,她发誓,一定要他付出代价!