The Manuscript Found in Saragossa Read Free

mockery of the innkeeper of Andújar. On the contrary, I was resolutely set on continuing my journey.
    Having exhausted all my thoughts on such matters, I could not stop myself going over in my mind the well-known tale of the counterfeiters and others of the same kind which I had been told at bedtime when I was a child. I also thought about the inscription on the alms box. I did not believe that the devil had wrung the neck of the innkeeper, but I could not make any sense of his tragic end.
    Hours went by in this way in deep silence, when suddenly the unexpected chiming of a bell made me start up with surprise. It tolled twelve, and as everyone knows, ghosts are only active from midnight to cock crow. I say that I started up with surprise; I had good reason to, for the bell had not tolled the other hours, and as well as that, it seemed to me that there was something lugubrious about its tolling.
    A moment later the bedroom door opened and I saw a totally black figure come in; not a frightening apparition, however, but a beautiful, half-naked negress holding a torch in each hand.
    She came up to me, bowed low and said in very good Spanish, ‘Señor caballero, you are invited to partake in the supper of two foreign ladies who are spending the night at this hostelry. Please be so good as to follow me.’
    I followed the negress along corridor after corridor until we reached a well-lit room in the middle of which stood a table laden with oriental bowls and carafes made of rock crystal, with three places set. At the end of the room was a magnificent bed. Many negresses were there, all eager to be of service; I saw them fall back respectfully as two ladies came in, whose pink-and-white complexions formed a perfect contrast with the ebony hue of their maidservants. They were holding each other by the hand. Both were dressed in a strange manner: strange, that is, as it then seemed to me, but in fact the style of their dress is common to several towns on the Barbary coast, as I have since discovered on my travels. Their attire was as follows: it consisted of a shift and a bodice. The shift was made of linen above the waist, but of Meknes gauze below it; such a gauze as would be wholly transparent if broad silk ribbons woven into its fabric had not caused it to veil those feminine charms which are best imagined and not seen. The sleeveless bodice, richly embroidered with pearls and adorned with diamond clasps, moulded itself closely to the bosom. The gauze sleeves of the shift were lifted back and fastened in a knot behind the neck. On their bare arms the ladies wore bracelets, both at the wrist and above the elbow. Had they been she-devils, their feet would have been cloven or armed with talons; they were not at all like that, but bare, and encased in small embroidered slippers. Their legs were adorned with anklets studded with large diamonds.
    The two strangers approached me with an easy and sociable air. They were perfect beauties; one was tall, slim, dazzling; the other tender and shy. The elder was statuesque; she had a fine figure, with fine features to match. The younger of the two was well-rounded, with slightly pouting lips and half-closed eyelids, revealing but a small part of the pupils through extraordinarily long lashes.
    The elder addressed me in Castilian: ‘Señor caballero, we are grateful for the kindness you have shown in accepting our invitation to share this light repast. If I am not mistaken, you must be in need of it.’
    She said these last words in such a mischievous way that I almost suspected her of having contrived the abduction of my pack animal; but the proffered meal was such a good substitute for my provisions that I could not find it in my heart to be angry with her.
    We sat down to table; the same lady moved an oriental bowl towards me and said, ‘Señor caballero, you will find in here an
olla podrida
9 containing all sorts of meat with one exception, for we are of the number