He crawled back to Granada sorely bruised
and battered, but was glad to find the city looking as usual, with
Christian churches and crosses.
"When he told the story of his night's adventure, every one
laughed at him; some said he had dreamed it all, as he dozed on his
mule; others thought it all a fabrication of his own- but what was
strange, senor, and made people afterwards think more seriously of the
matter, was, that the Grand Inquisitor died within the year. I have
often heard my grandfather, the tailor, say that there was more
meant by that hobgoblin army bearing off the resemblance of the
priest, than folks dared to surmise."
"Then you would insinuate, friend Mateo, that there is a kind of
Moorish limbo, or purgatory, in the bowels of these mountains, to
which the padre Inquisitor was borne off."
"God forbid, senor! I know nothing of the matter. I only relate what
I heard from my grandfather."
By the time Mateo had finished the tale which I have more succinctly
related, and which was interlarded with many comments, and spun out
with minute details, we reached the gate of the Alhambra.
The marvellous stories hinted at by Mateo, in the early part of
our ramble about the Tower of the Seven Floors, set me as usual upon
my goblin researches. I found that the redoubtable phantom, the
Belludo, had been time out of mind a favorite theme of nursery tales
and popular traditions in Granada, and that honorable mention had even
been made of it by an ancient historian and topographer of the
place.
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