To stimulate and direct the political activities of its members was only a part of the Club's function. It was also a social meeting-ground for the officers of merchant ships, Customs officers and other minor officials of the great port. Drinks could be had there at a bar and cold snacks at a buffet. Cards and dice could be played. It also had a library and a small gymnasium; so, quite apart from his special reason for cultivating the company who frequented it, de Quesnoy found it a useful place in which to kill time. And after Modesto Pelayo's return to duty in his ship on the Monday the Count found time hang heavily on his hands.
He dared not appear too curious and could only leave it to time to develop his acquaintance with several regular frequenters of the Club, whom he suspected might be anarchists, until one of them either took him into his confidence or, inadvertently, made some incriminating admission. As the Club did not open until after the siesta hour, he was reduced in the mornings to taking long solitary walks or strolling aimlessly along the Ramblas among the colourful crowd that always thronged this principal shopping street of the old town.
The old town appealed to him, but it formed only a small part of the great modern city. Of Barcelona the Spaniards, even in other cities, were intensely proud, as it had made almost their only contribution to twentieth-century architecture and town-planning. There were many fine blocks of offices and apartments in it, with electric light, lifts, telephones and other up-to-date innovations, and it was laid out like an American city, in blocks intersected by scores of parallel streets. But de Quesnoy found their sameness both confusing and dreary, and he would have much preferred it had his quest taken him back to the picturesque alleyways of Cordoba or the tranquil, irregular side-streets of Seville.
For him to have spent a pleasant hour or two in any of the better hotels or restaurants would have been to risk being seen going in or out by some members of the Somaten and so, probably, ruining his build-up of himself as a Russian schoolmaster of very limited means. In consequence, as the only alternative to walks in the woods and gardens on the slopes of Montjuich, which lay at the end of the street in which his pensidn was situated, he again took to sightseeing, but he was always relieved when the hour came for him to resume his role as an unsuspected inquiry agent at the Club.
Yet, strange as he afterwards thought it to be, it was not there that he picked up his first real lead to the militant anarchists of Barcelona, but through Doctor Luque.
The Infernal Machine
De quesnoy had taken the Luques' having asked him to let them know how he was getting on as no more than a casual politeness, but being by habit good-mannered himself, instead of ignoring it he had, on Tuesday, sent the Doctor a line saying that he had found quite comfortable quarters suitable to his modest means, and hoped they had found all well on their arrival home; but he did not really expect that they had taken sufficient interest in a poor refugee to wish to pursue his acquaintance.
However, on the Thursday he received a reply asking him to dine with them on the Saturday. It came from the Senora Luque, whom he had judged to be a good-natured motherly woman and, as he rightly guessed, had been inspired by a kind thought for a lonely foreigner in a strange city.
Their apartment was in one of the new blocks of flats some way to the north of the Plaza de Las Glorias, and on arriving there he found that they had staying with them a Lieutenant Aguilera of the Spanish Navy, who was a nephew of the Doctor.
The Lieutenant had returned a few days before from a long tour of duty in the Canaries, and only that morning the light cruiser in which he had served had been paid off. After the introductions had been made and the Doctor had provided them with aperitifs, the question of the Lieutenant's prospects came up, and it transpired that these were very far from rosy.
The Spanish Navy had never fully recovered from the crushing defeat inflicted on it by Nelson at Trafalgar, and from that time, too, the once mighty Spanish Empire had begun to fall to pieces. Chunk after chunk of South America had revolted, thrown off the Spanish yoke and declared itself a Republic, so that by the 'nineties the only considerable colonies left to Spain, apart from the Canaries, were Cuba, Puerto Rico and the Philippines. This reduction of her Empire militated against any necessity for Spain to attempt again to build up a first class fleet, but with the introduction of ironclads she had continued to build and maintain a navy of the second rank. By 1898 many of its ships were in poor condition and their guns obsolete, although the navy was still a calling in which many thousands of sailors found a career. But then its death blow fell.
6o
Cuba, owing to the exactions and tyranny of a succession of Spanish Governor-Generals, had, for the previous twenty years, been in a state of semi-revolt, and during a good part of that time the great island had been rent by a series of bloody civil wars. In an attempt to suppress the rebels one General, known as 'Butcher' Weyler, had even gone to the length of destroying the insurgents' crops and houses and herding their non-combatant relatives into concentration camps. The United States, becoming alarmed for the big investments her citizens had made in Cuba, sent the battleship Maine to protect their interests. From a cause that still remains a mystery, soon after arriving in Havana harbour she blew up.
War followed, and the American Pacific Squadron promptly destroyed the Spanish warships based on the Philippines. Although Spain's main fleet was ill-equipped and ill-munitioned, she at once dispatched it to the Caribbean. It reached Santiago safely but was there blockaded by a much more powerful American fleet. Meanwhile, the Americans had landed troops and were about to attack the city from its landward side. The Spanish Admiral, Cervera, decided that his honour demanded he should leave harbour and fight, although he knew his choice to be suicidal. His fleet was totally destroyed.
This annihilation of the Spanish Navy had occurred only eight years ago. Since then no new ships of any size had been built; so Lieutenant Aguilera had been extremely lucky to get his last posting in one of the few remaining cruisers. And as there were still hundreds of naval officers of experience intriguing to be given further sea service he had good grounds for fearing that he might never get another.
Over a hearty meal of escudella soup, chicken cooked a la cilindron and a chocolate cake layered with thick cream, which they washed down with the local Alella wine, the Lieutenant continued futilely to resurrect and inveigh against the brutal greed of past Generals, the criminal stupidity of the statesmen and the unbending pride of the Admiral, which had combined to threaten him at the age of twenty-eight with an abrupt termination to his career.
De Quesnoy, having had his own career as a soldier cut short, although for very different reasons, sympathized with him; but he became distinctly bored by the conversation as, despite several attempts by Senora Luque and himself, they seemed unable to get away from the subject.
In Spanish homes it is customary for guests not to linger for long after dinner; so having partaken of a small glass of Anis in the sitting-room, the Count made a move to leave. But the Senora waved him back to his chair and said:
'Don't go for a little while. You have not yet told us how you like Barcelona.'
4It is a beautiful city,' he replied politely, 'and I find the people most courteous and friendly. The old town appeals to me particularly, owing to my interest in history.'
'Have you visited the Cathedral?' asked the Lieutenant.