Woman Triumphant | Page 7

set the
family in dissension, deaf to the storms that thundered beyond the
Pyrenees. The one, surrounded by brutal-faced imbeciles, by gloomy
pettifoggers, by Infantas with childish faces and the hollow skirts of a
Virgin's image on an altar; the others bringing as a merry, unconcerned
retinue, a rabble clad in bright colors, wrapped in scarlet capes or lace
mantillas, crowned with ornamental combs or masculine hats--a race

that, without knowing it, was sapping its heroism in picnics at the
Canal or in grotesque amusements. The lash of invasion aroused them
from their century-long infancy. The same great artist that for many
years had portrayed the simple thoughtlessness of this gay people,
showy and light-hearted as a comic-opera chorus, afterwards painted
them, knife in hand, attacking the Mamelukes with the agility of
monkeys, felling those Egyptian centaurs under their slashes, blackened
with the smoke of a hundred battles, or dying with theatrical pride by
the light of a lantern in the gloomy solitude of Moncloa, shot by the
invaders.
Renovales admired the tragic atmosphere of the canvas before him. The
executioners hid their faces, leaning on their guns; they were the blind
executors of fate, a nameless force, and before them rose the pile of
palpitating, bloody flesh; the dead with strips of flesh torn off by the
bullets, showing reddish holes, the living with folded arms, defying the
murderers in a tongue they could not understand, or covering their
faces with their hands, as though this instinctive movement could save
them from the lead. A whole people died, to be born again. And beside
this picture of horror and heroism, in another close to it, he saw Palafox,
the Leonidas of Saragossa, mounted on horseback, with his stylish
whiskers and the arrogance of a blacksmith in a captain-general's
uniform, having in his bearing something of the appearance of a
popular chieftain, holding in one hand, gloved in buckskin, the curved
saber, and in the other the reins of his stocky, big-bellied steed.
Renovales thought that art is like light, which acquires color and
brightness from the objects it touches. Goya had passed through a
stormy period; he had been a spectator of the resurrection of the soul of
the people and his painting contained the tumultuous life, the heroic
fury that you look for in vain in the canvases of that other genius, tied
as he was to the monotonous existence of the palace, unbroken except
by the news of distant wars in which they had little interest and whose
victories, too late to be useful, had the coldness of doubt.
The painter turned away from the dames of Goya, clad in white
cambric, with their rosebud mouths and with their hair done up like a

turban, to concentrate his attention on a nude figure, the luminous
gleam of whose flesh seemed to throw the adjacent canvases in a
shadow. He contemplated it closely for a long time, bending over the
railing till the brim of his hat almost touched the canvas. Then he
gradually moved away, without ceasing to look at it, until, at last, he sat
down on a bench, still facing the picture with his eyes fixed upon it.
"Goya's Maja. The Maja Desnuda!"
He spoke aloud, without realizing it, as if his words were the inevitable
outburst of the thoughts that rushed into his mind and seemed to pass
back and forth behind the lenses of his eyes. His expressions of
admiration were in different tones, marking a descending scale of
memories.
The painter looked with delight at the gracefully delicate form,
luminous, as though within it burned the flame of life, showing through
the pearl-pale flesh. A shadow, scarcely perceptible, veiled in mystery
of her femininity; the light traced a bright spot on her smoothly
rounded knees and once more the shadow reached down to her tiny feet
with their delicate toes, rosy and babyish.
The woman was small, graceful, and dainty; the Spanish Venus with no
more flesh than was necessary to cover her supple, shapely frame with
softly curving outlines. Her amber eyes that flashed slyly, were
disconcerting with their gaze; her mouth had in its graceful corners the
fleeting touch of an eternal smile; on her cheeks, elbows and feet the
pink tone showed the transparency and the moist brilliancy of those
shells that open their mysterious colors in the secret depths of the sea.
"Goya's Maja. The Maja Desnuda!"
He no longer said these words aloud, but his thought and his expression
repeated them, his smile was their echo.
Renovales was not alone. From time to time groups of visitors passed
back and forth between his eyes and the picture, talking loudly. The
tread of heavy feet shook the wooden floor. It was noon and the

bricklayers from nearby buildings were taking advantage