Read Ebook: The Novel on the Tram by P Rez Gald S Benito Wooff Michael Translator

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Ebook has 106 lines and 6498 words, and 3 pages

unning from the low notes to the high notes, the lady's hands awoke in a second hundreds of sounds that were lying dormant in among the strings and hammers. At first the music was a confused mixture of sounds that stunned rather than pleased, but then that storm blew over and a funereal and timorous dirge like the Dies irae came out of such disorder. It seemed to me I heard the sad sound of a choir of Carthusians accompanied by the hoarse bellow of the bassoons. After could be heard pitiful sighs like those that we imagine souls exhale, condemned in purgatory to ceaselessly beg for a pardon that is a long time in coming.

Then came loud and extended arpeggios and the notes reared up as if arguing about which of them would could there first. Chords came together and broke up like the foam on waves which forms and is then effaced. The harmonies boiled and fluctuated in an endless heavy swell, fading into silence and then coming back more strongly in great and hasty eddies. I carried on entranced by the majestic and impressive music. I could not see the face of the countess, sat with her back to me, but I imagined it to be in such a state of bewilderment and fright that I started to think that the piano was playing itself. The young man was behind her, the count to her right, leaning on the piano. From time to time she raised her eyes to look at him, but she must have seen something dreadful in the eyes of her companion as she went back to lowering hers and kept on playing. Suddenly the piano stopped sounding and the Countess cried out.

Just at that moment I felt an extremely strong blow to my shoulder, shook myself violently and woke up.

In my agitated dream I had changed position and had allowed myself to fall on the venerable English lady who was travelling next to me. "Aah! You--sleeping--disturb me," she said, making a sour face, while she pushed away from her my bundle of books which had fallen onto her knees.

"Madam, it's true. I fell asleep," I replied, embarrassed to see that all the passengers were laughing at this scene.

"Oh! I tell driver--you disturb me--very shocking," the English woman added in her incomprehensible gibberish: "Oh! You think my body is your bed for you to sleep. Oh! Gentleman, you are a stupid ass."

On saying this, this daughter of Britannia, who already had a ruddy complexion, blushed red as a tomato. You might have thought that the blood that had rushed to her cheeks and her nose was flowing from her incandescent pores. She showed me four sharp and very white teeth as if she wanted to bite me. I asked of her a thousand pardons for the discourtesy of falling asleep, picked up my bundle and reviewed the new faces that there now were in the tram.

Imagine, oh calm and kind reader, when I saw facing me--guess who? the young man I had just finished dreaming about, Don Rafael in the flesh. I rubbed my eyes to convince myself that I was not still asleep and found myself awake, as awake as I am now. He it was and he was talking to someone else who was travelling with him. I paid attention and listened as hard as I could:

"But didn't you suspect anything?" the other person said to him.

"Something, yes. But I held my tongue. She looked petrified with terror. Her husband ordered her to play the piano and she did not dare to resist. She played, as always, admirably, and, as I listened to her, I managed to forget the dangerous situation in which we found ourselves. Despite the efforts she was making to look calm, a moment came when she was no longer able to pretend any more. Her arms relaxed and slipped off the keys. She threw her head back and cried out. Then her husband took out a dagger and, taking a step towards her, shouted furiously: "Play or I'll kill you this instant." When I saw this my blood boiled. I wanted to throw myself at that wretch, but I felt in my body a sensation that I cannot describe to you. A furnace had lit up in my stomach. Fire was running through my veins. My lungs were hyperventilating and I fell on the floor senseless."

"And before that did you not recognize the symptoms of poisoning?" asked the other. "I noticed a certain feeling of uneasiness and had a vague suspicion, but nothing more than that. The poison had been well prepared. It had a delayed effect on me and did not kill me, though it's left me with a physical impairment for life."

"And after you passed out, what happened?"

Rafael was going to answer and I was hanging on his every word as if it were a matter of life and death when the tram halted.

"Ah, here we are already at Consejos. Let's get off here," said Rafael.

What a nuisance! They were getting off and I would not know how the story ended.

"Sir, sir, a word," I said on seeing them get off. The young man stopped and looked at me.

"And the Countess? What became of her?" I asked eagerly.

Loud laughter was my only response. The two young men laughed too and left without saying a word. The only living being to keep her sphinx-like calm at such a comic scene was the English woman who, indignant at my outlandish behaviour, turned to the other passengers saying: "Oh! A lunatic fellow!"

The tram continued on its way and I was burning with curiosity to know what had happened to the unfortunate Countess. Had her husband killed her? I understood how that villain's mind worked. Desirous of enjoying his revenge, like all cruel souls, he wanted his wife to be present, without pause in playing, at the death of that unwary young man brought there by a spiteful trick on the part of Mudarra. But the lady could not continue making desperate efforts to keep calm, knowing that Rafael had swallowed the poison. A tragic and horrifying scene I thought, more convinced than ever of the reality of that event--and now you'll say that such things only happen in novels!

On passing in front of Palacio the tram halted and a woman got on who was carrying a small dog in her arms. I immediately recognized the dog I had seen reclining at the feet of the Countess. This was the same dog with the same white and fine fur, the same black patch on one of his ears. As luck would have it the woman sat down next to me. Unable to resist being curious, I put the following question to her:

"Is this nice dog your dog?"

"Who else could he belong to? Do you like him?"

I fondled one of the ears of the intelligent animal to show him affection, but he, oblivious to my blandishments, jumped and put his paws on the knees of the English woman, who showed me her two teeth again as if wanting to bite me, and exclaimed:

"Oh! You are unsupportable!"

"And where did you acquire this dog?" I asked without taking notice of the latest explosion of righteous indignation on the part of the British lady. "Can you tell me?"

"My mistress gave it me."

"And what became of your mistress?" I asked most anxiously.

"Ah! Did you know her?" the woman replied.

"She was a good woman, wasn't she?"

"An excellent woman. But may I know how that bad business ended?"

"So you know about it, you've had news of it."

"Yes, madam. I know what happened, including the tea that was served. And tell me--did your mistress die?"

"Yes, sir. She's gone to a better place."

"And what happened? Was she murdered or did she die of fright?"

"What murder? What fright?" she said with a mocking expression. "You're not in the know after all. She ate something that disagreed with her that night and it harmed her. She had a fainting fit that lasted till dawn."

This one, I thought, knows nothing about the incident with the piano and the poison or doesn't want to make me think she does. Afterwards I said in a loud voice:

"So she died of food poisoning?"

"Yes, sir. I warned her not to eat those shellfish, but she took no notice of me."

"Shellfish, eh?" I said incredulously. "I know what really happened."

"Don't you believe me?"

"Yes. Yes," I replied, pretending to believe her. "And what about the Count, her husband, the one who pulled the dagger on her while she was playing the piano?"

The woman looked at me for a moment and then laughed in my face.

"You're laughing, are you? Don't you think I know what took place? You don't want to tell me what really happened. There'd be grounds for a criminal prosecution if you did."

"But you mentioned a count and a countess."

"Was not this dog's mistress the Countess wronged by the butler Mudarra?"

The woman burst out laughing again so uproariously that I muttered to myself distractedly: She must be Mudarra's accomplice and naturally she'll hide as much as she can.

"You're mad," the unknown woman added.

"Lunatic, lunatic. I'm suffocated. Oh! My God!"

"I know everything. Come now. Don't hide it from me. Tell me what the Countess died of."

"For crying out loud, what countess?" exclaimed the woman, laughing even more loudly.

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