Don Quixote_ Translation by Edith Grossman (HarperCollins) - Miguel De Cervantes Saavedra [75]
“Then, you have been beaten as well?” responded Don Quixote.
“Didn’t I just tell you I was, to the sorrow of me and my whole family?” said Sancho.
“Do not be distressed, my friend,” said Don Quixote, “for I shall now prepare the precious balm with which we shall be healed in the wink of an eye.”
By now the officer of the Holy Brotherhood had lit the lamp, and he came in to see the man he thought was dead; as soon as Sancho saw him come in wearing his nightshirt and nightcap and holding a lamp in his hand and with a very grim expression on his face, he asked his master:
“Señor, can this by any chance be the enchanted Moor, come back to hit us some more in case there’s anything left in the inkwell?”
“He cannot be the Moor,” responded Don Quixote, “because those who are enchanted do not permit themselves to be seen by anyone.”
“If they don’t permit themselves to be seen, they do permit themselves to be felt,” said Sancho, “as my back can tell you.”
“As could mine,” Don Quixote responded, “but that is not sufficient evidence for believing that the man you see is the enchanted Moor.”
The officer was perplexed when he discovered them engaged in so peaceable a conversation. It is certainly true that Don Quixote still lay on his back, but he was unable to move simply because he was so badly beaten and so covered with poultices. The officer came up to him and said:
“Well, how goes it, my good man?”
“I would speak with more courtesy,” responded Don Quixote, “if I were you. Is it the custom in this land to speak in that manner to knights errant, you dolt?”
Finding himself treated so abusively by someone whose appearance was so unprepossessing, the officer could not bear it; he raised the lamp filled with oil, brought it down on Don Quixote’s head, and dealt him a serious blow; since everything was now in darkness, he left immediately, and Sancho Panza said:
“There’s no doubt, Señor, that this man is the enchanted Moor, who must be guarding the treasure for others, but for us he only has fists and blows with lamps.”
“That is true,” responded Don Quixote, “and one must not take notice of such matters in enchantments, nor is there reason to become angry or enraged at them, for, as these beings are invisible and magical, we shall find no one on whom to take our revenge no matter how much we try. Get up, Sancho, if you can, and summon the warder of this fortress, and persuade him to give me some oil, wine, salt, and rosemary so that I may prepare the health-giving balm; for, in truth, I believe I have great need of it now, since I am losing a good deal of blood from the wound this phantom has inflicted on me.”
Sancho stood, all his bones aching, and began to walk in the darkness to find the innkeeper, but he encountered the officer, who had been listening to hear what his adversary would do, and Sancho said to him:
“Señor, whoever you may be, do us the kindness and favor of giving us a little rosemary, oil, salt, and wine; they are needed to heal one of the best knights errant on the face of the earth, lying in that bed badly wounded at the hands of the enchanted Moor who’s in this inn.”
When the officer heard this, he thought Sancho was out of his mind, but since day was beginning to break, he opened the door of the inn, called to the innkeeper, and told him what the good man wanted. The innkeeper gave him what he asked for, and Sancho carried it to Don Quixote, who was holding his head in his hands and moaning at the pain of the blow from the lamp, which had done him little harm other than the raising of two rather large bumps; what he thought was blood was nothing but the sweat pouring out of him because of the distress he had experienced in the tempest that