Kabanata Kabanata 26 · XII. The Latest Intelligence from Tarascon.
. XII. The Latest Intelligence from Tarascon.
PARTING from his little country seat, Sidi Tart’ri was returning alone
on his mule on a fine afternoon, when the sky was blue and the zephyrs
warm. His legs were kept wide apart by ample saddle-bags of esparto
cloth, swelled out with cedrats and water-melons. Lulled by the ring of
his large stirrups, and rocking his body to the swing and swaying of the
beast, the good fellow was thus traversing an adorable country, with
his hands folded on his paunch, three-quarters gone, through heat, in a
comfortable doze. All at once, on entering the town, a deafening appeal
aroused him.
“Ahoy! What a monster Fate is! Anybody’d take this for Monsieur
Tartarin.”
On this name, and at the jolly southern accent, the Tarasconian lifted
his head, and perceived, a couple of steps away, the honest tanned
visage of Captain Barbassou, master of the Zouave, who was taking his
absinthe at the door of a little coffee-house.
“Hey! Lord love you, Barbassou!” said Tartarin, pulling up his mule.
Instead of continuing the dialogue, Barbassou stared at him for a space
ere he burst into a peal of such hilarity that Sidi Tart’ri sat back
dumbfounded on his melons.
“What a stunning turban, my poor Monsieur Tartarin! Is it true, what
they say of your having turned Turk? How is little Baya? Is she still
singing ‘Marco la Bella’?”
“Marco la Bella!” repeated the indignant Tartarin. “I’ll have you to
know, captain, that the person you mention is an honourable Moorish
lady, and one who does not know a word of French.”
“Baya does not know French! What lunatic asylum do you hail from, then?”
The good captain broke into still heartier laughter; but, seeing the
chops of poor Sidi Tart’ri fall he changed his course.
“Howsoever, may happen it is not the same lass. Let’s reckon that I
have mixed ‘em up. Still, mark you, Monsieur Tartarin, you will do well,
nonetheless, to distrust Algerian Moors and Montenegrin princes.”
Tartarin rose in the stirrups, making a wry face.
“The prince is my friend, captain.”
“Come, come, don’t wax wrathy. Won’t you have some bitters to sweeten
you? No? Haven’t you anything to say to the folks at home, neither?
Well, then, a pleasant journey. By the way, mate, I have some good
French ‘bacco upon me, and if you would like to carry away a few
pipefuls, you have only to take some. Take it, won’t you? It’s your
beastly Oriental ‘baccoes that have befogged your brain.”
Upon this the captain went back to his absinthe, whilst the moody
Tartarin trotted slowly on the road to his little house. Although his
great soul refused to credit anything, Barbassou’s insinuations had
vexed him, and the familiar adjurations and home accent had awakened
vague remorse.
He found nobody at home, Baya having gone out to the bath. The negress
appeared sinister and the dwelling saddening. A prey to inexpressible
melancholy, he went and sat down by the fountain to load a pipe with
Barbassou’s tobacco. It was wrapped up in a piece of the Marseilles
Semaphore newspaper. On flattening it out, the name of his native place
struck his eyes.
“Our Tarascon correspondent writes:--
“The city is in distress. There has been no news for several months from
Tartarin the lion-slayer, who set off to hunt the great feline tribe
in Africa. What can have become of our heroic fellow-countryman? Those
hardly dare ask who know, as we do, how hot-headed he was, and what
boldness and thirst for adventures were his. Has he, like many others,
been smothered in the sands, or has he fallen under the murderous fangs
of one of those monsters of the Atlas Range of which he had promised the
skins to the municipality? What a dreadful state of uncertainty! It is
true some Negro traders, come to Beaucaire Fair, assert having met in
the middle of the deserts a European whose description agreed with his;
he was proceeding towards Timbuctoo. May Heaven preserve our Tartarin!”
When he read this, the son of Tarascon reddened, blanched, and
shuddered. All Tarascon appeared unto him: the club, the cap-poppers,
Costecalde’s green arm-chair, and, hovering over all like a spread
eagle, the imposing moustaches of brave Commandant Bravida.
At seeing himself here, as he was, cowardly lolling on a mat, whilst his
friends believed him slaughtering wild beasts, Tartarin of Tarascon was
ashamed of himself, and could have wept had he not been a hero.
Suddenly he leaped up and thundered:
“The lion, the lion! Down with him!”
And dashing into the dusty lumber-hole where mouldered the shelter-tent,
the medicine-chest, the potted meats, and the gun-cases, he dragged them
out into the middle of the court.
Sancho-Tartarin was no more: Quixote-Tartarin occupied the field of
active life.
Only the time to inspect his armament and stores, don his harness, get
into his heavy boots, scribble a couple of words to confide Baya to
the prince, and slip a few bank-notes sprinkled with tears into
the envelope, and then the dauntless Tarasconian rolled away in the
stage-coach on the Blidah road, leaving the house to the negress,
stupor-stricken before the pipe, the turban, and babooshes--all the
Moslem shell of Sidi Tart’ri which sprawled piteously under the little
white trefoils of the gallery.
EPISODE THE THIRD, AMONG THE LIONS