Subject: Chapter XVI: Monica to the convent
Author: Robin N (157.198.3.51)
Date: 09-21-1999 11:57
Chapter XVI
“Sister tornera (the porteress), have the goodness to announce me
immediately to Father Vivier and the Mother Superior. Tell them that
Monica de Molnar has returned. Quickly, Sister, please… I think that
I can’t wait much longer.”
With a voice trembling with sorrow and shame, Monica asks the
porteress of the convent to let her in. As Monica steps into the
cloister, she feels an irresistible urge to turn and look back at
Juan. He’s standing there, arms crossed, and gazing at her with a
look that cleaves her in two, but she doesn’t give into the
temptation. She sighs as if she can’t get her breath and stumbles,
as if the ground trembles beneath her. Juan bites his lips and
watches the door close.
* * * *
Juan is with Noel who is incredulous that he’s taken Monica to the
convent. Juan tells him that he was complying with Monica’s wish.
Noel speaks candidly. “Good, good, let’s understand this. At the end
of the trial, when I congratulated you, you told me that you owed
everything to Monica. Perhaps you spoke with a little ingratitude,
but love forgives all, and you can’t deny that you were proud during
the tribunal…”
Juan tells him that Monica paid her debt and considers that they are
at peace and now that they are at peace, she doesn’t have any
obligation to stay with him. That’s the truth, the truth that you
also know. Noel doesn’t buy this.
“Yo solo se que esa pobre nińa sufria como una condenada… yo solo se
que fue tu mobre lo primero que sus labios pronunciaron al pisar la
tierra de la Martinica: que corrio a mi enloquecida, llenos los ojos
de lagrimas, para pedirme que le aydara a conseguir su unico anhelo:
verte esa misma noche, hablarte, Juan. No le asustaron las
dificultades. Contra toda logica, y contra toda la voluntad de
Renato, logre que pudieramos escurrirnos a traves de la vigilancia
del Fuerte. Usando dinero y de las buenas amistades, le arregle la
forma de llegar hasta tu celda la vispera del primer dia del
juicio…”
“Pero no llego, no fue” refuta Juan, vivamente intersado. “Todo
quedo una buena intencion, en un proposito vano…”
“No llego hasta tu celda, porque su lugar estaba ocupado. Habia otra
mujer. Por sus propios ojos la vio Monica.”
“No puede ser!” exclama Juan, desconcertado.
Noel tells him it’s true. Monica came to see him in the jail, saw
him with another woman and came out trembling. She told Renato that
you were with a lawyer, but she later told him that you were with a
woman. She didn’t name anyone, but I know the world pretty well and
have a good idea what women like Aimee are capable of.
Juan’s still stunned. He repeats, “it can’t be!” and Noel tells him,
“well yes it is!” and goes on to say that with a single blow, you
two destroyed her illusions and her memories and she was too noble,
she stood by your side and did everything for you all the while she
was dying inside. Juan tells him that he’s very candid. Monica is
indeed an admirable woman. I can’t dispute her merits, nor her
strength, everything about her, nor her loyalty, but she doesn’t
love me, she’s never loved me. Or did she tell you that she loved
me?”
Noel tells him that in so many words, she never said that, but to
see her humiliation and despair…and as your wife… Juan tells him
that Monica has never “been his wife.”
“Como esposa? No, Noel, Monica no ha sido mi esposa jamas. La mujer
que legalmente me entragaron en Campo Real, la que lleve a la fuerza
sobre el arzon de mi caballo, como conquista de vandalo, continua
siendo la seńorita de Molnar.”
A bitter grimace mars his face and Noel looks at him for more
answers but Juan reacts brusquely. “Pero piense que se lo he dicho a
usted, a usted solamente, y que reetirlo podria costarle demasiado
caro, porque soy capaz…!”
“Take you hand off my shoulder and stop this nonsense,” Noel
interrumpts pretending to be in a bad mood. “I’m not going to tell
anyone anything of no importance to them, and your stupid threats
don’t scare me! De modo que esa fue tu conducta con ella?”
Juan tells him how Monica was ill, almost dying on the ship. She
didn’t even know herself for several weeks. When she came to, his
insane hate had passed and he realized that she was nothing more
than a sweet and fragile woman… like a flower, like a swallow with
broken wings who had fallen to the deck of his boat.
Noel lowered his head. He felt a strange emotion in his throat that
wouldn’t let him speak and his eyes filled with tears. He tells
Juan, “You are a strange one, Juan.” “Why? What does another woman
more matter? And a woman that loves another?” retorts Juan. “That
loves another? You seem very sure of that.”
Juan tells him that he heard it from her lips many times. He fought
to help her get over that unhealthy love. He could prove that it
still continues. It’s a love that causes her horror, and fear, and
humilliates her, but she can’t free herself of it.
Noel tells him that he could swear that it’s Juan that she loves,
that it was he for whom she cried. Of course, she didn’t tell him,
but… He thinks a moment and asks Juan if he’s trying to tell him
that Monica loves Renato.
“Si, Noel, eso he dicho sin quererlo decir; pero ya esta dicho y es
inutil volver atras las palabras. No es por el pobre diablo de Juan,
es por el caballero D’Autremont por quen Monica del Molnar quierre
enterrar su juventud entre estas paredes y ocultar su belleza en las
sombras del claustro.”
* * * *
Monica is meeting with the Mother Superior who tells her that the
convent is her home. “But the porteress told me that you were
accompanied by your husband and a notary. Where are they? Why didn’t
they come in?” Monica tells her that they came to accompany her
there, Pedro Noel is a friend, and she asked her husband to bring
her there and he complied with her supplication.
“Podia no haberlo hecho, podia haberme dejado en mitad de la called,
o haberme arrastrado con el adonde dice que va a hospedarse: las
tabernas del puerto. Pero, para eso, hubiera sido necesario que
realmente me considerara su mujer, que me amara… Creo que le importa
muy poco… Esa es la verdad… Creo que no es capaz de senitr compasion
por mi, porque su corazon se compadece de todos que sufren, aun
cuando no quiera el mismo confesarlo…” Creo que cortesmente me trajo
esta puerta, porque hay en su alma un instinto de nobleza y de
dignidad… Pero nada mas, Madre, absolutamente nada mas..”
She covers her face with her hands and Mother Superior (MS) calms
her. Monica tells her that she’s the most unfortunate creature on
earth and is cautioned that it’s a sin to exaggerate one’s sins.
There are thousands of others that suffer infinitely more than you
in this moment. Monica replies, perhaps, but that she can’t suffer
any more. MS tells her that she’s been told of the strange wedding
and had been waiting to see if she would come and tell her about it
herself. Now she’s just finished saying that her husband isn’t bad.
“No lo es, Madre… El, que parecia mi enemigo, es quizas el unico
amigo que he tenido sobre la tierra!”
“Pues, entonces, hija, cuales son tus males?”
“El es un hombre bueno, generoso… Por mi sintio primero odio y
desprecio; compasion mas tarde, al merme desdichada. Ahora… ahora no
siente nada… Si acaso, un poco de gratitud… nada mas que un poco, y
quizas la compasion despective a que nos mueven los dolores que no
compredemos.”
“Bueno… Pero esos sentimientos no pueden herirte ni dańarte…”
“Me hieren y me dańan, me destrozan el alma, porque el quiere a
otra! La quiere locamente, con una pasion sin freno, con una locura
de pecado; la quiere sin importarle nada ni nadie; la quiere por
encima de sus traiciones y de sus infamias; la quiere sabiendo que
no tiene corazon, y busca sus labios aunque beba veneno en cada
beso…”
MS is shocked by these words. She tells Monica that that’s not love,
in so much as it’s a plot from hell. She tells her that it will
pass. Monica tells her “No, it won’t. It’s stronger than he is, and
it fills his life. The one he loves is the most false, most
hypocritical, the most cowardly and betraying of women, and he loves
her forever. He loves her with all his being.” MS wants to know how
Monica feels.
“Yo lo quiero a el del mismo modo, Madre! Lo quiero loca,
ciegamente, con ese mismo amor de locura y pecado… pero me morire
mil veces antes de confesarselo!”
Giving her a few moments to cry, MS asks her why her love for him is
crazy, isn’t he her husband? Didn’t she swear before the altar to
love and respect him? Isn’t she just complying with her sacred oath,
offered in the sacrament of marriage? Monica tells her that he
doesn’t love her. She tells her that she doesn’t know the horrible
circumstances in which their wedding came to pass. Everything came
about in a torrent of passions and he wasn’t the one most
responsible. She accepted the sacrament and profaned when she took
him for a spouse because he horrified her and almost hated him.
Later, everything changed. What changed things, asks MS. Monica can
hardly tell her. It could be for his goodness and the pity he showed
her, but she doesn’t know why she loves him, nor when she came to
love him.
“It could be because he has everything that captivates a woman: he’s
strong, handsome, masculine and healthy; because his soul is filled
with nobility; because his life was one of sorrow; because the
qualities of his soul made me look at him as if he were a precious
stone that had fallen in the mud of the streets; because, although I
never heard him pray, his goodness to those unfortunates brings him
close to God…”
MS tells her that in her love there is nothing more than the sin of
pride. It’s pride that you wish to die a thousand times rather than
confess it. Monica tells her that Juan would laugh at her love. MS
tells her that if he is as she says he is, then she doesn’t believe
that he would. At the very least, offer the humiliation in your soul
up to God. Monica tells her that it’s just not possible, that in the
cloistered world they see things differently. MS tells her that she
can serve God many ways and she should offer up her sin of pride.
Monica tells her that it’s not pride, it’s dignity. Juan doesn’t
love her and when she asked him to take her here, he didn’t try to
talk her out of it, he seemed impatient and irritable, as if he was
longing for his freedom. MS tells her that it doesn’t matter, he’s
still her husband and she should be at his side, not in the
cloister—at the very least in her house. Monica tells her that she
can’t return to her home because she doesn’t want to see certain
people and it belongs to her mother and sister. She would go crazy
in that house, she would forget that she’s a Christian.
MS calms her and tells her that the convent is always her home, but
as a married woman, she has another place in the world… Monica tells
her that she can’t return to her family. Her mother hates Juan and
allies herself with Renato and begged him to free her from this
marriage. And her sister! She can never see her sister again! MS
tells her that she can live alone and honestly, she has the
wherewithal to do so, her dote is there in the convent and belongs
to her. Monica tells her that it doesn’t belong to her, she promised
it to pay Juan’s debts and she will no matter what. She reminds the
MS that she and Father Vivier promised her that she could return one
day to try her vocation… if you reject me… MS tells her that they
don’t reject her. If she really wants to stay, then she can stay and
the peace of God will fill her soul.
* * * *
Juan is drinking when Noel finds him. He asks him what’s happened to
make him get so drunk. Juan bitterly asks him if he still needs to
ask what’s happened? What always happens to him? Noel tells him that
they’re not going to speak of what’s happened in the past, rather
what’s happening now. His boat’s been released to him since the
morning without him having to have paid a cent because he’s been
declared innocent. His record is cleaned of all stains. “Yes, and
so?” Noel asks him if he didn’t tell him that on his mysterious last
trip that he brought back enough money to set himself up and change
his life. Wasn’t he going to set up a fishing business? And what
about that house on Devil’s point? Juan doesn’t want to hear about
this. Noel tells him to leave off the rum. You were going to get
married, now you are married. Doesn’t it seem to you that your
project “viene de perlas” with your new civil state?
Juan tells him that he’s married to a woman that doesn’t love him,
that has never loved him, so leave him alone! He’s trying to forget
all this in a bottle of rum. Noel wants to know why he doesn’t try
to get closer to Monica, to win her heart? Juan tells him that her
heart is occupied. It’s filled with the image of another man and she
suffers loving him. To her it’s a mortal sin and she suffers like a
condemned one. He’s not going to support her in her suffering for
the love of another. Juan doesn’t want to hear any sermons from Noel
and he’s grateful for his good will, but don’t insist on the truth.
Noel wants to know why not.
“Piensa usted que yo no he querido acercarme al alma de Monica?
Piensa que no he tenido lastima de su tortura, que no he llegado a
sentir la ilusion de que por fin se rompian las cadenas de su amor
maldito, y de que eran mis manos, mis palabras, mi devocion
silenciosa las que habian hecho el milagro?”
“Have you done all this?” “Yes, Noel, I’ve done all this and I’ve
failed. And you know why? Because Monica de Molnar can’t love Juan
del Diablo. She can marry him in a whirlwind of craziness; she can
almost die for him, and pay a debt that her pride won’t let her
keep. But to love him for life, to share with him her life, to feel
an equal at his side… no, Noel…”
Noel tells him that he’s totally mistaken in respect to Monica. “She
doesn’t have prejudices and if she did, you broke them with the
strength you have to do so and much more. Break this impossible love
and take yourself out of this hell that torments you. Lift up your
arms and save her… save her from herself! You can do it, Juan, she’s
your wife and…”
Juan tells him that even though she could shout it from the
tribunal, he doesn’t feel it inside. Besides, he doesn’t have any
right to use even his mother’s name. Who married Monica de Molnar?
Nobody, Noel, nobody. The bitter truth escapes his lips and Noel
looks at him with compassion. The kindness in his eyes breaks Juan
and a flood of words escapes.
“I agreed to marry Monica because I hated her, because I abhorred
all in her that since I was a child had offended me. Can you
understand that? It was like a vengeance. Hating her, I could have
kept her by my side, the need to do so stronger than the knots that
tied us, to take her into my abyss, to stain her with my mud, to
plant in her sons that, like I, would have no legal name that would
empower us. But not hating her, how could I offer her such injury?
She was raised in another world, for other things. For her and only
for her, I think that the world should exist that I detest, that I
would destroy: the world of clean people, without a stain, without a
shade…”
Noel tells him that he’s mistaken. There are shades and stains even
in Monica’s heart. He talks of what may be a forbidden love and Juan
replies that she’s paid with sorrow for that love. He suggests that
they leave the tavern and sees the walls of the convent: to him it
seems worse than the jail cell, it’s a tomb, and she chose to entomb
herself rather than be with him. She didn’t want to see the sun, nor
the sea, the blue heavens and freedom. Noel reminds him that he
didn’t speak to her of such things, he spoke to her of taking her to
all of the taverns in the port! Juan tells him that that is his
world and they were raised in opposite extremes in the world. To
sail together in a moment… Noel sees that Juan’s will is that they
would be together always and asks him why he didn’t test her. Juan
replies, “How? Throw myself at her feet? Reclaim rights?” He tells
him that he could be a bandit and a pirate, but he can not be
someone who forces someone. Noel asks him if he would let him speak
to Monica, but Juan vigorously tells him no. He doesn’t want anyone
to speak to her in his name, don’t betray his trust. Noel pleads
with him but to no avail:
“Triunfaria de todos, menos de ella. Se vencen las tempestades, se
doman los mares, se hacen polvo las montańas, se batalla contra los
hombres hasta vencerlos, pero no se gana el corazon de una mujer por
la fuerza…”
“A woman loves a man for his strength, just as a man loves a woman
for her sweetness and beauty.” Noel asks Juan if he’s too proud,
won’t he fight then? He is worth much and he can put him amongst the
‘primeros’ if he asks him to. Juan mocks him. Noel wants to know why
not, others have been raised similarly. Put the world at your feet.
And meanwhile Monica takes the habit? No, this isn’t for Juan. Leave
her in the convent. He’ll go to sea and leave her forever. Noel
stops him with one thing: it’s not worth the trouble confronting
Renato with all this. You are going to please him with this.
Besides, it wouldn’t surprise him if Sofia isn’t intriguing with the
governor that he sign a document forcing him to leave the island
forever, even though he’s been absolved. This stops Juan. Noel tells
him that as soon as they learn that he’s abandoning his lands
voluntarily and his wife as well, hinting dire things. Juan shouts
that he didn’t abandon Monica. He left her free to do whatever she
wished. It was what she wanted. “Por nobleza, por lealtad, por deber
se puso de mi parte… Pues bien, yo cedo…”
“You said publicly that they would have to kill you to separate you
from her” Noel replies. “Her behavior in front of the tribunal
fooled me,” Juan pauses and thinks further, “But alone to hear her
say to you that the D’Autremonts’ plotted to take away my lands…
before I go, I will find Renato and face to face I will tell him….”
Noel tells him that that was exactly what Monica feared. “Are you
trying to drive me crazy?” asks Juan. Noel tells him that he merely
wants him to set his course the way he would navigating on the sea
when he was thousands of miles off course and the rudders didn’t
work and a cyclone threatened, putting them all in danger. You took
command and planned your course, using the evil winds… and the woman
you loved wasn’t on the boat. Juan tells him that this was true, but
he wanted to see her and to see in her eyes if they would hold the
truth or a lie. Noel asks him if that’s no longer important; “no
quieres saberlo?” He brings up once again the offer he made to give
him his last name. Juan recalls how he rejected that honor, but he
doesn’t think he was sufficiently grateful. Noel tells him that at
the moment, it hurt his feelings, but now he thinks he was right to
reject it. His name is of little value to a man of your stripe.
“There are two classes of men, Juan: those that make their name and
those that inherit it. Why don’t you make yours? It’s almost made
now. They call you del Diablo, the same way they call others de
Valle, or del Mar, or de Montańa, and if you search for the origins
of those surnames, they were arrived at because they were given a
piece of land, and you have been given yours by your Peńon del
Diablo.”
Juan thinks that perhaps Noel is right. He gets to his feet and sets
down the bottle and glass and looks one more time at the door of the
convent, “para observar con una intensa mirada las oscuras paredes
del convento.” He leaves, and with a hope in his eyes, Noel follows.