“Ah, there you are, señor,” one of them said to Dr. Bernard. “We were beginning to worry that something had happened to you, since you were taking so long. But wait, that’s Berganza!” he suddenly exclaimed, realizing who the dog before him was.
“Indeed it is. I am happy to inform you, señores, that our search has been crowned with success and that in the home of my friend Dr. Monardes, I am completely safe. Your concerns were unfounded. But all’s well that ends well. And you can let that poor man go, by the way.”
The tall commodore, who was standing at the far end of the group, let go of Jesús and gave him a friendly — in a certain sense — pat on the head with his metal glove. Perhaps I was hearing things, but I could’ve sworn his head clanged at that moment. Poor Jesús looked pretty bad. I had never seen him like that.
“Jesús, why didn’t you call for us? We would’ve answered from here.”
“Uh. .” he replied in a choked voice, “I couldn’t.”
“Señores, I sincerely thank you for your invaluable assistance,” said Dr. Bernard as he shook our hands. “We wouldn’t have succeeded without your help. I am certain that His Majesty will not forget your incomparable service.”
After that, we walked back to the garden gate, chatting with Dr. Bernard about the Andalusian heat. We, along with the commodores, helped him somehow load the struggling Berganza into his carriage and answered his final goodbyes with a wave as his carriage drove off down the road. The commodores were riding in a separate carriage. One of them — the one who had spoken in the garden — came up to us and said, “Señor Monardes, it is an honor for me to make the acquaintance of a great physician such as yourself. You cured my sister. I am Captain Alvarez of the royal guard. At one time, we lived in Formentera de Leon,” he said, taking off his metal glove and holding his hand out to the doctor.
“Ah yes, now I recall,” replied the doctor, shaking his hand. I know Dr. Monardes quite well by now, and from the confident and warm way he responded I would be willing to bet that he didn’t recall a thing. “How is your dear sister?” the doctor asked.
“Very well, señor, thank you,” Captain Alvarez replied with a cheerful laugh. “She married Duke de Leon.”
“Well, what do you know,” said the doctor. He’s had quite a few surprises in one day, I would say.
“Señor,” the captain continued, “I, too, would like to thank you in the king’s name for your help today.”
“I am honored to be at our king’s service,” replied Dr. Monardes. “Please give my personal greetings to Duke de Leon as well.”
“By all means, señor,” the captain replied, and he saluted and got into the commodores’ elongated wagon, which took off after the royal physician’s carriage.
The doctor and I remained on the street until the carriages disappeared from view, then we went back into the garden. The doctor was walking a step ahead of me in silence, his gaze fixed on the ground. I didn’t know what to expect. The doctor shook his head and laughed. Then he shook his head and laughed again. I smiled. The doctor looked back to see if I was coming, met my gaze, laughed again, and kept walking, shaking his head from time to time.
Jesús was standing by the well splashing water on his face.
“Filled your pants, eh, Jesús?” Dr. Monardes called to him jokingly.
“Are they gone?” Jesús asked, stepping away from the well and glancing over our shoulders.
“They’re not going to stay here for ages,” replied the doctor. But then he stopped and turned around. I turned around, too. They had left, of course.
“Sons of bitches!” Jesús yelled. “Sponges! They don’t plow, don’t sow, don’t work, yet they eat like pigs! Who feeds them? The people feed them! I feed them!” he cried, dramatically pounding his fist on the shabby, ragged undershirt covering his chest.
The doctor started laughing. “You better feed them voluntarily, otherwise they’ll come to your house on their own and devour everything,” he said. “Maybe even you. They might even devour the walls. . And buy yourself some new clothes,” he added as he passed Jesús. “Dr. Monardes’ coachman can’t be walking around in rags like a gypsy. Come tomorrow and I’ll give you money for new clothes.”
“Tomorrow, señor?” Jesús called, with that unexpected surge of quick-wittedness that was sometimes characteristic of him.
“Fine, here it is now.” The doctor stopped, took out his purse, counted out a few coins, and dropped them into Jesús’s palm. “All right, all right,” he waved at Jesús, who had opened his mouth to thank him. “Guimarães”—he turned to me—“I’m going to lie down. I can’t imagine anyone will come now, but if someone does turn up, send him away and tell him to come back tomorrow. No matter what the problem is. Even if the sky is falling.”
“Very well, señor, you can count on me,” I replied.
The doctor went up the steps to the house and disappeared inside.
I went over to Jesús, put my arm around his shoulders, and said: “Jesús, you’re a fool, but I’m an even bigger fool than you.”
“Oh, I can’t believe it, señor,” Jesús replied politely.
“It’s true, it’s true,” I said. “Damn Portugal! Everyone in Portugal is really stupid.”
“Hmm,” said Jesús.
“It’s something in the air there, you know. If you grow up there like I did, there’s no way to avoid catching it.”
“Hmm,” said Jesús.
“Yes. Big mouth, big trouble,” I said. “Listen, Jesús,” I continued after a short pause, glancing at Dr. Monardes’ dark house, “I was thinking of going down to Don Pedro’s Three Horses to wet my whistle. If someone comes, send him away, all right?”
“Well, I don’t know, señor. . I was thinking of stepping out for a bit, too.”
“Don’t,” I told him. “I know you and you know yourself. You’ll go to some tavern, spend that money, and tomorrow the doctor will ask you where your new clothes are. . Can’t you just picture it?”
“That wouldn’t be good,” Jesús said.
“That wouldn’t be good,” I confirmed. “Best you stay here tonight, and if someone comes, send him away.”
“Well. . I don’t feel like staying here alone, señor,” he replied. For a moment I wondered whether I really shouldn’t stay and let him go home to his wife and so on, or even take him with me to the Three Horses, but he added shortly: “Very well. Very well, señor.”
“Good,” I said and headed down the darkened walkway slowly at first, then faster and faster. Night had already fallen. When I got out onto Calle de la Sierpes, the city lamplighters were lighting the street lamps.
I needed to draw some conclusion from everything that had happened. Even though I wasn’t too sure there would be any point to it — such things only happen once in a lifetime. The golden bird alights on your shoulder. You say something stupid. The bird flies away. Farewell, Guimarães da Silva, farewell, fool, you shan’t be seeing me again. I had to come up with some conclusion. But what? Something very important should appear in my mind at this moment. But where? No matter how long I turned it inside out, I couldn’t find anything too important in there. And that’s when the thought struck me. Well, not exactly then, but later that night, as I staggered dizzily back through the streets of Sevilla. But that’s how it is, such things dawn on you when you least expect it. It dawned on me that I could become a veterinary physician. I could cure animals with the help of tobacco. The competition in that department was very scarce. There was only one Dr. Duvar, also known as Pablo the Loser. And lots and lots of animals in the villages. No one treated animals with tobacco, even though it was known in principle to be able to cure them of certain things. Why, perhaps it could cure them of all the things it cured people of! Why not? It seemed like a brilliant idea to me at that moment. When I woke up the next morning, it didn’t seem so brilliant. I said to myself: “I had to draw some conclusion, and just look at what I came up with!” And indeed, it didn’t seem like much in view of the circumstances. Alas, the harsh light of day somehow makes everything fade drastically. But when I thought it over, I started to change my opinion little by little. In fact, the idea wasn’t bad at all. I could try it, and if it turns out I’ve guessed right, I’ll became rich and grand. It wouldn’t even be necessary to treat animals for all sorts of illnesses. I did a little investigation into how things stood — via Dr. Monardes and others. It turned out that in almost all cases in which a veterinary physician was called involved some kind of wound — broken bones, cuts, bites, punctures, and so forth. Yes, that area of medicine was very backwards. And in such cases, veterinary physicians always used one and the same thing — sublimatum, or ratsbane, in the vernacular. Because of this, sublimatum had become so expensive that it was now more costly than the animals themselves, thus the villagers called a doctor only if they highly prized an animal, otherwise they tried to treat it themselves and it usually died or ended up lame. I shared my plans with Dr. Monardes and asked him whether tobacco really could heal animals’ wounds. He said this was almost certainly true and that in the few cases it had been tested to this end, tobacco had done the trick very nicely. The doctor approved of my idea and promised to help me by announcing that I treated animals in the villages we passed through. He even agreed to give out the address of his house, in case someone decided to call for me. He finally even agreed to let me have the carriage and Jesús (who had bought himself new clothes, red from head to toe, such that the people in the villages took him for a gypsy flamenco dancer) when necessary, and in cases where it was unavailable, he promised to lend me the twenty or so ducats (interest free) that I would need to rent another carriage and make my rounds. His only condition was that I not expect help from him which would require his physical presence, since for a person such as himself that would be rather shameful and would give rise to rumors that he had fallen on hard times or some such thing, which, by the way, couldn’t be further from the truth.