Free Cervantes Street by Jaime Manrique Page A

made me feel like a mere boy in his presence. I memorized his compliments about my poetry: “Professor López de Hoyos speaks of you as one of the future glories of Spanish letters,” he said to me one evening at dinner. “He raves about the elegance of your verses, the originality of your conceits, and your persuasive flourishes. I dabble a little in poetry myself. Will you show me some of your verses?”
    At the professor’s house I left for the cardinal a selection of my poems rolled up and tied with a ribbon. When I saw him next, Acquaviva said, “Cervantes, you must come to Rome to learn the language and study Italian poetry. You will always have a job waiting for you in my household.” I took his invitation to mean that he liked my poems. I clung to that casual offer as the only bright spot in my dire circumstances, the one beacon of light on my shadowy horizon.
    That autumn, as I traveled with the Gypsies through the leafy valleys of southern France, the weather was mild, the foliage afire, and the languid afternoons were filled with buzzing, inebriated golden-gloved bees. We camped in idyllic chestnut and cork tree forests that reminded me of the settings in pastoral novels. The French countryside teemed with rabbits, hedgehogs, deer, pigeons, partridges, pheasants, quail, and wild boars. By day the women and children rummaged in the wooded areas for berries, pine nuts, eggs, snails, mushrooms, wild herbs, and truffles. The older women stayed in the camp minding the smallest children and tatting lace, looping multicolored threads of cotton and linen to make the tablecloths that were highly esteemed as decorations for the dining rooms of the prosperous homes in Spain.
    We camped on the banks of cold, burbling streams or narrow but fast-flowing rivers, thick with fat trout that we caught from the mossy banks with our bare hands. At night we bivouacked around a bonfire. New mothers squatted on the ground breast-feeding their babies; they displayed their bursting teats in front of the men without any shame. This custom added to the reputation the Roma had of being immoral. As the night wore on, the clapping of hands and the ringing notes of the tambourines charged the air of the camp; caskets of red wine were uncorked; pipes with aromatic hash were smoked. The dancing and singing went on until everyone—the very young and the old included—collapsed on the ground exhausted and intoxicated.
    I never let out of my sight the few gold escudos I had left after I paid El Cuchillo. Before I went to sleep, I hid the leather pouch between my scrotum and my undergarment. Perhaps I need not have been so vigilant. Maese Pedro had introduced me to the Gypsies as a criminal poet wanted for numerous murders. Once my murderous identity was established, I was always called “Brother Miguel” or “Poet.” The children could not hide the awe my reputation inspired in them.
    My lifelong fascination with Gypsies was cemented by that trip. Their love of drinking, dancing, making love, and fighting, and their ferocious attachment to their customs and their people, were qualities I held dearly. They spoke Castilian—and a little bit of many European languages—but they communicated among themselves in Calo. I passed many of my waking hours talking to the children, trying to learn the rudiments of their language. I was speaking from direct experience when I wrote in The Gypsy Girl, “It seems that Gypsies, both male and female, are born into the world to be thieves: their parents are thieves, they grow up among thieves, study to become thieves, and graduate with honors in the arts of thievery. The desire to steal and the act of stealing are inseparable traits that only death can part.”
     
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    I said goodbye to my Roma friends in Italy, as they continued on their way to their ancestral land in the Carpathians. I rode to Rome as fast as my horse would take me, afraid to run out of money before I reached my destination. Six