The Road to Santiago: Pilgrims of St. James

the audience before she calls in her husband, who kills her. The rustic audience were deeply moved by the old actor’s exaggerated emphasis as he tore passion to tatters. After this ‘high spot’ of the performance I was suddenly called upon to tell a story. I racked my brains, and as we had been talking about ghosts, I resolved to tell a ghost tale by Lope de Vega Carpió, which George Borrow used to say, was the best one ever written.
    First of all I told Don Eusebio to have the lights lowered, and when the audience had been hushed into silence I began as follows: “When a pilgrim sets out on his long journey towards the shrine of Santiago the Apostle he must take the rough with the smooth and he must be prepared to suffer the ache of loneliness, aye, and he must have lost his father, mother, children, friends or never have had them, to wander leisurely over the habitable globe. Can we wonder if he suffers at times from terrors and delusions, so that men think he has the windmills of La Mancha in his head? One day some years ago I set out from Saragossa on foot. The first stage of my journey was to Calatayud—a long, weary journey through deserted country. After many hours of tramping the bypaths I determined to halt in one of the small towns. When I asked for a shelter nobody would give it, for they distrusted me. My shoes were worn out, my feet were bleeding, my hair was tousled and my face scorched by the sun. Everyone shut the door in my face, and so I wended my way to the last refuge of the poor man—the asylum. It was night time when I arrived, but to my surprise not a light did I see in the building. Neighbours told me that nobody would stay there because strange noises had been heard at night.
    “ ‘The house is haunted,’ said they, ‘ever since the stranger died there some time ago.’
    “One pulled me aside and told me to go into the building and straight to the chapel where a holy man was praying. ‘He will tell you where you may sleep without danger.’
    “I passed through the door into a long, dark passage and groped my way with my stick towards a tiny flickering light in the distance, calling out the name of the holy man.
    “ ‘What do you want with me, evil spirit?’ said he.
    “ ‘I am no evil spirit,’ said I. ‘Open to me, friend, I am a traveller seeking a shelter for the night.’
    “The door was then opened and I saw a very strange old man. He was of medium height, middle-aged, with long hair and a thick, matted beard. He was dressed in a rough habit which reached to his feet. The chapel was small and the old man slept on the marble step before the altar. His pillow was a big stone and by his side lay a staff and a skull to remind him of the vanity of human life.
    “The hermit then addressed me:
    “ ‘You must be a brave man to come in here. Has no one told you that this house is haunted?’
    “ ‘Yes, they told me,’ I said, ‘but I have had so many knocks and been in so many tight comers that nothing will starde me.’
    “The old man then lit a candle from a lamp that hung before one of the statues and told me to follow him.
    “We passed through a garden, so overgrown with rank weeds that it resembled a jungle, then between a row of cypress trees until we reached a building. The hermit unlocked the door into a vast room and said:
    “ ‘There is your room: you are a strong man and toughened by the world. Make the sign of the Cross and go to sleep in peace.’ He then closed the door and slipped away.
    “There was a bed of sorts in the room, but it was a luxury for me, for I had slept many a night on the ground. I took off my clothes and slipped on me one of the two nightshirts which my dear wife put into my knapsack when I left home. I had hardly time to review the events of the day when sleep covered me over with a thick cloak as she does all tired pilgrims.
    “How long I slept I do not know, but I woke all of a sudden hearing the sound of horses galloping in the distance. At first I imagined that I was still walking, for the bed seemed to move like a ship or a horse, a phenomenon that always happens to those who have tramped overmuch during the day. But then I remembered that I was in the asylum, and as I had been warned that the place was haunted I opened my eyes. To my amazement I saw some men enter the room on horseback with long tubes in their hands. They rode over to the candle which I had left lighted and lit the tubes from its flames. Then they threw