We drank. Don Juan recounted gallant anecdotes and amorous escapades. He laughed uproariously, but his eyes were melancholy and distracted.
The field of honor was a secluded spot on the outskirts of Córdoba. We drove in silence. Don Juan’s face was drawn. The two long wrinkles on either cheek dug deep channels. The white spot upon his forehead appeared and disappeared at intervals. He kept his eyes closed. I knew that his fatigue was not due to the previous night’s revelry—a very simple affair—but to my words which had been sharper and had struck deeper than the sword thrusts he was wont to administer to his adversaries.
I regretted having spoken. A mere mortal cannot endure the truth, uncoated with the sweets of illusion. It was too late to undo the harm. I had a premonition that Don Juan’s last day had come.
Don Fernando and his seconds were waiting for us. The young man pretended a nonchalance out of harmony with the trembling of his body which he attributed to the morning chill. Don Juan scrutinized him, neither as an enemy nor as a friend, but as if endeavoring to discover whether what I had told him was true or false. He breathed deeply. Both the strange, affectionate attitude and the fury he had exhibited at their previous meeting, had disappeared. The lassitude of complete disillusionment possessed the great lover.
By the manner in which Don Juan handled his weapon, it was immediately evident that he was a master swordsman. Don Fernando was obviously a novice. Nervous, irritable, he exhibited the awkwardness characteristic of women in any purely masculine sport. Indeed, one might have taken him for a young girl in disguise, with his white skin, his delicate neck, whose Adam’s apple was merely a dot that shivered nervously, his chest deeply indented in the center and bulging on either side, his arms rounded and hairless…
Upon three occasions in quick succession, Don Juan’s sword touched his opponent’s chest. Three times Fernando was at his mercy. One pressure, and the battle would have been ended. Don Fernando waved his sword wildly, striking always either the ground or the steel of his enemy.
Don Juan smiled faintly. He made small inconsequent movements, uncovering his chest. Was it a deliberate gesture, fatigue of life? Did he realize that he could no longer endure existence…?
Fernando waved his weapon wildly, erratically. Suddenly, unexpectedly, it touched Don Juan. With the desperation of the tyro who sees himself vanquished, the boy forced it until half of it disappeared in the body of Don Juan. Then, surprised and awed by what had happened, he unclasped his hand from the hilt and stared, his mouth open.
Don Juan, closing his eyes in agony, tottered and fell. His mouth, flushed with blood, was contracted into a diabolic grin. His eyes rolled backward and glared at us with their whites, like newly polished porcelain.
The physician proclaimed him dead, killed in a lawful duel by Don Fernando in the presence of witnesses. But I knew that I was his murderer.
LIII: I RETURN TO THE FOLD—AN ENCOUNTER IN THE GHETTO—THE RABBI’S DAUGHTER
THE gate that led Kotikokura and me to the Ghetto was of Moorish origin,—a fine piece of workmanship now almost in total ruins. From one pillar, the black mortar dripped slowly to the ground like blood from a fatal wound. The other shook under the weight of my hand. The top was garlanded by many birds’ nests from which now and then a tiny inhabitant tried his unfledged wings.
On the side of the gate, which faced Córdoba proper, were carved and pointed threats against the Jews. On the opposite side in Hebrew letters, anathemas against the Christians, prayers, and prophecies of destruction.
Small ugly huts, surrounded by yards crowded with débris, goats, cows, and now and then a horse whose ribs pressed against his skin like the taut strings of a grotesque harp. Bearded men, their hands hidden within the sleeves of their long kaftans, their backs bent as if carrying an invisible load. Women with black shawls as if in perpetual mourning. Dilapidated shops upon the threshold of which the owners sat and gossiped with neighbors. Rickety carts dragged wearily through the mud by long-horned oxen or donkeys. Children—countless children—dirty, naked, noisy, ringlets over their cheeks or long braids upon their backs knotted with bits of string.
A thick stench—the stench of ancient and hopeless penury. I stopped a young man and asked him to direct us to the home of Rabbi Sholom.
“I am going to the synagogue which is opposite our Rabbi’s dwelling. If you will allow me, I shall show you the way.”
I thanked him and bade him walk at my side.
The young man sighed from time to time. It sounded like the sighing of the Jews of Jerusalem, the sighing of hopelessness and futility. ‘Will this always be the symbol of my race?’ I thought.
“Is it true,” the young man asked, “that Don Juan was killed in a duel?”
“Yes.”
“Thank God.”
“Why?”
“Rumor said that he planned to steal the daughter of our Rabbi, and kill everyone who defended her.”
“Don’t you exaggerate, señor?” I asked. “Are not your people somewhat too sensitive?”
“Sensitive?” He laughed ironically. “Is not a man whose skin has been flayed necessarily sensitive?” He threw his head back. His face uncovered from the blond curls, disclosed a head emaciated and delicate.
I forgot that I was Cartaphilus, centuries old, walking in the ghetto of Córdoba. It seemed to me that I was Isaac, a youth of Jerusalem, walking with a companion of my age, talking about the Jews and their conquerors—the Romans.
Little merchants with baskets on their arms or upon their backs called out their wares from time to time. Here and there, groups of men discussed clamorously either their business or some difficult passage of the Talmud.
A woman, a pot in her hand, ran past us. Another woman stopped her.
“Where are you running, Sarah?”
“My clumsy husband has spilt some milk into the soup. I am going over to the Rabbi’s to ask him if we may eat it, and if I can continue to use the pot for meat after this.”
“Our men too,” sighed the youth, “squabble and fight about trifles without consequence. My people have degenerated into ants seeking invisible crumbs while the feast is forgotten.”
“But they are not allowed to go to the feast– —”
“True, true,” he sighed. “They are not allowed to go to the feast.” Suddenly, however, he waved his thin, almost transparent hands. “Let them make a feast of their own! Let them show the merry-makers on the other side of the gate that they– —” He stopped short. “It is ridiculous, señor, it cannot be done.” He coughed, and sighed profoundly. “It cannot be done.”
“Is it so difficult to get beyond the gate?”
He looked at me. “Difficult? It all depends. To some to deny their faith is very easy, to others death is preferable.”
“Is denial of faith the only way?”
He nodded.
“A Jew remains a Jew, even if he accepts Christianity. Does the body,” I asked, “change because the dress is different?”
He twisted one of his curls. “Who knows? Perhaps, after all, that stupid woman running with her pot to the Rabbi is right. Meticulous observance of trifles enables the race to persist.”
We reached Rabbi Sholom’s house. The woman with the pot of soup, now covered with a heavy coat of grease, emerged, her eyes dazzling with joy.
“What a man our Rabbi is! An angel, I tell you! What a man!”
The young man was about to bid me farewell.