CHAPTER XVI.
Now they open, to the beautiful April morning, the shutters of their
narrow windows, pierced like portholes in the thickness of the very old
wall.
And suddenly, it is a flood of light that dazzles their eyes. Outside,
the spring is resplendent. Never had they seen, before this, summits so
high and so near. But along the slopes full of leaves, along the
mountains decked with trees, the sun descends to radiate in this valley
on the whiteness of the village, on the kalsomine of the ancient houses
with green shutters.
Both awakened with veins full of youth and hearts full of joy. They have
formed the project this morning to go into the country, to the house of
Madame Dargaignaratz's cousins, and see the two little girls, who must
have arrived the night before in the carriage, Gracieuse and
Pantchika.--After a glance at the ball-game square, where they shall
return to practice in the afternoon, they go on their way through small
paths, magnificently green, hidden in the depths of the valleys, skirting
the cool torrents. The foxglove flowers start everywhere like long, pink
rockets above the light and infinite mass of ferns.
It is at a long distance, it seems, that house of the Olhagarray cousins,
and they stop from time to time to ask the way from shepherds, or they
knock at the doors of solitary houses, here and there, under the cover of
branches. They had never seen Basque houses so old nor so primitive,
under the shade of chestnut trees so tall.
The ravines through which they advance are strangely enclosed. Higher
than all these woods of oaks and of beeches, which seem as if suspended
above, appear ferocious, denuded summits, a zone abrupt and bald, sombre
brown, making points in the violent blue of the sky. But here,
underneath, is the sheltered and mossy region, green and deep, which the
sun never burns and where April has hidden its luxury, freshly superb.
And they also, the two who are passing through these paths of foxglove
and of fern, participate in this splendor of spring.
Little by little, in their enjoyment at being there, and under the
influence of this ageless place, the old instincts to hunt and to destroy
are lighted in the depths of their minds. Arrochkoa, excited, leaps from
right to left, from left to right, breaks, uproots grasses and flowers;
troubles about everything that moves in the green foliage, about the
lizards that might be caught, about the birds that might be taken out of
their nests, and about the beautiful trout swimming in the water; he
jumps, he leaps; he wishes he had fishing lines, sticks, guns; truly he
reveals his savagery in the bloom of his robust eighteen
years.--Ramuntcho calms himself quickly; after breaking a few branches,
plucking a few flowers, he begins to meditate; and he thinks--
Here they are stopped now at a cross-road where no human habitation is
visible. Around them are gorges full of shade wherein grand oaks grow
thickly, and above, everywhere, a piling up of mountains, of a reddish
color burned by the sun. There is nowhere an indication of the new times;
there is an absolute silence, something like the peace of the primitive
epochs. Lifting their heads toward the brown peaks, they perceive at a
long distance persons walking on invisible paths, pushing before them
donkeys of smugglers: as small as insects at such a distance, are these
silent passers-by on the flank of the gigantic mountain; Basques of other
times, almost confused, as one looks at them from this place, with this
reddish earth from which they came--and where they are to return, after
having lived like their ancestors without a suspicion of the things of
our times, of the events of other places--
They take off their caps, Arrochkoa and Ramuntcho, to wipe their
foreheads; it is so warm in these gorges and they have run so much,
jumped so much, that their entire bodies are in a perspiration. They are
enjoying themselves, but they would like to come, nevertheless, near the
two little, blonde girls who are waiting for them. But of whom shall they
ask their way now, since there is no one?
"Ave Maria," cries at them from the thickness of the branches an old,
rough voice.
And the salutation is prolonged by a string of words spoken in a rapid
decrescendo, quick; quick; a Basque prayer rattled breathlessly, begun
very loudly, then dying at the finish. And an old beggar comes out of the
fern, all earthy, all hairy, all gray, bent on his stick like a man of
the woods.
"Yes," says Arrochkoa, putting his hand in his pocket, "but you must take
us to the Olhagarray house."
"The Olhagarray house," replies the old man. "I have come from it, my
children, and you are near it."
In truth, how had they failed to see, at a hundred steps further, that
black gable among branches of chestnut trees?
At a point where sluices rustle, it is bathed by a torrent, that
Olhagarray house, antique and large, among antique chestnut trees.
Around, the red soil is denuded and furrowed by the waters of the
mountain; enormous roots are interlaced in it like monstrous gray
serpents; and the entire place, overhung on all sides by the Pyrenean
masses, is rude and tragic.
But two young girls are there, seated in the shade; with blonde hair and
elegant little pink waists; astonishing little fairies, very modern in
the midst of the ferocious and old scenes.--They rise, with cries of joy,
to meet the visitors.
It would have been better, evidently, to enter the house and salute the
old people. But the boys say to themselves that they have not been seen
coming, and they prefer to sit near their sweethearts, by the side of the
brook, on the gigantic roots. And, as if by chance, the two couples
manage not to bother one another, to remain hidden from one another by
rocks, by branches.
There then, they talk at length in a low voice, Arrochkoa with Pantchika,
Ramuntcho with Gracieuse. What can they be saying, talking so much and so
quickly?
Although their accent is less chanted than that of the highland, which
astonished them yesterday, one would think they were speaking scanned
stanzas, in a sort of music, infinitely soft, where the voices of the
boys seem voices of children.
What are they saying to one another, talking so much and so quickly,
beside this torrent, in this harsh ravine, under the heavy sun of noon?
What they are saying has not much sense; it is a sort of murmur special
to lovers, something like the special song of the swallows at nesting
time. It is childish, a tissue of incoherences and repetitions. No, what
they are saying has not much sense--unless it be what is most sublime in
the world, the most profound and truest things which may be expressed by
terrestrial words.--It means nothing, unless it be the eternal and
marvellous hymn for which alone has been created the language of men and
beasts, and in comparison with which all is empty, miserable and vain.
The heat is stifling in the depth of that gorge, so shut in from all
sides; in spite of the shade of the chestnut trees, the rays, that the
leaves sift, burn still. And this bare earth, of a reddish color, the
extreme oldness of this nearby house, the antiquity of these trees, give
to the surroundings, while the lovers talk, aspects somewhat harsh and
hostile.
Ramuntcho has never seen his little friend made so pink by the sun: on
her cheeks, there is the beautiful, red blood which flushes the skin, the
fine and transparent skin; she is pink as the foxglove flowers.
Flies, mosquitoes buzz in their ears. Now Gracieuse has been bitten on
the chin, almost on the mouth, and she tries to touch it with the end of
her tongue, to bite the place with the upper teeth. And Ramuntcho, who
looks at this too closely, feels suddenly a langour, to divert himself
from which he stretches himself like one trying to awake.
She begins again, the little girl, her lip still itching--and he again
stretches his arms, throwing his chest backward.
"What is the matter, Ramuntcho, and why do you stretch yourself like a
cat?--"
But when, for the third time, Gracieuse bites the same place, and shows
again the little tip of her tongue, he bends over, vanquished by the
irresistible giddiness, and bites also, takes in his mouth, like a
beautiful red fruit which one fears to crush, the fresh lip which the
mosquito has bitten--
A silence of fright and of delight, during which both shiver, she as much
as he; she trembling also, in all her limbs, for having felt the contact
of the growing black mustache.
"You are not angry, tell me?"
"No, my Ramuntcho.--Oh, I am not angry, no--"
Then he begins again, quite frantic, and in this languid and warm air,
they exchange for the first time in their lives, the long kisses of
lovers--
