Don Quixote_ Translation by Edith Grossman (HarperCollins) - Miguel De Cervantes Saavedra [147]
She fell silent after she said this, and her face flushed with a color that clearly showed the grief and shame in her soul. The souls of those who had listened to her felt as much compassion as astonishment at her misfortune, and although the priest immediately wanted to console and advise her, Cardenio stepped forward first, saying:
“So then, Señora, you are the beautiful Dorotea, the only child of the wealthy Clenardo?”
Dorotea was surprised to hear her father’s name and to see the wretched condition of the man who named him, for the rags Cardenio wore have already been mentioned, and therefore she said to him:
“And who are you, friend, that you know my father’s name? If I am not mistaken, in recounting the story of my misfortune, I have not spoken his name.”
“I am, Señora,” responded Cardenio, “that luckless man who, as you have told us, Luscinda declared to be her husband. I am the unfortunate Cardenio, and the wicked purpose of the man who has brought you to the condition in which you find yourself has driven me to the one in which you see me now: ragged, naked, bereft of all human consolation, and, what is worse, bereft of reason, except when it pleases heaven to grant it to me for some brief time. I, Dorotea, am the one who witnessed the wrongs committed by Don Fernando, the one who waited until Luscinda spoke the words that made her his wife. I am the one who did not have the courage to see the consequences of her swoon or the outcome of the letter found in her bosom, because my soul could not bear to see so many misfortunes together; and so I abandoned the house, and my forbearance, and gave a letter to the man who was my host, asking him to deliver it into Luscinda’s hands, and came to this solitary place where I intended to end my life, which from that moment on I despised as if it were my mortal enemy. But fate has not wished to take it from me, being satisfied with taking my reason, perhaps wanting to preserve me for the good fortune I have had in finding you; for if what you have recounted is true, as I believe it is, it well might be that heaven has in store a more favorable conclusion to our calamities than we can imagine. Since Luscinda cannot marry Don Fernando because she is mine, and Don Fernando cannot marry her because he is yours, and she has openly declared this, we can reasonably hope that heaven will restore to each of us what is ours, for it is still intact, not given away or destroyed. And since we have this consolation, not born of remote hopes, or founded on wild imaginings, I beg you, Señora, to come to another decision in your honorable thoughts, as I intend to do in mine, and prepare to expect better fortune; I give you my vow as a gentleman and a Christian not to abandon you until I see that you are Don Fernando’s, and if reason cannot persuade him to recognize his duty to you, then I shall use the prerogative I have as a gentleman to legitimately challenge him and right the wrong he has done you; and I shall not think of the offenses committed against me, vengeance for which I leave to heaven so that here on earth I may attend to those committed against you.”
Dorotea was overwhelmed when she heard Cardenio’s words, and because she did not know how to express her thanks for so noble an offer, she attempted to kiss his feet, but Cardenio would not permit it, and the licentiate responded for himself and the barber and approved Cardenio’s fine speech and in particular asked, advised, and urged them to accompany him to his village, where they could obtain the things they lacked, and decide how to find Don Fernando, or return Dorotea to her parents, or do whatever they thought most appropriate. Cardenio and Dorotea thanked