Reading Notes: Carmen

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Chapter 1 - A gentleman and his guide, Antonio, encounter a stranger who they share a cigar and food with, and seek lodging for the night with. They figure out along the way that he is Jose Navarro, the most noted bandit in Andalusia. Antonio insists on spending the night in the stable with the horses. The gentleman wakes up feeling itchy and sneaks outside. He and Antonio talk. Navarro had threatened him to not tell the gentleman who he is. Antonio plans to go get others to help take Navarro down. This angered the gentleman, as he saw no reason to turn Navarro in, as he had done nothing to them. The gentleman goes back inside and wakes Navarro, telling him that half a dozen lancers will be coming. He tells him that someone he doesn't know told him, instead of throwing Antonio under the bus. He tells Navarro to go, and as payment for the tip, to never suspect anyone (Antonio). He gives him some cigars and sends him on his way. When Antonio returns with the soldiers, he tells them the robber left 2 hours ago. Antonio was sulky with him, and they parted ways.

Chapter 2 - The gentleman went to a convent in Cordova to read a manuscript about the ancient world. In town, just before the Angellus bell rings, women gather beside the river. The bell ringing brings darkness, and the women disrobe and bathe in the river. Men gather on the upper quay to watch, even though they can barely see a thing. One evening, a woman sits down near him on the parapet. She has jasmine in her hair. She was beautiful and young. The gentleman put out his cigar out of respect. She told him she liked the smell and sometimes liked to smoke papelitos. He had some and gave her one, and they smoked and talked so long that they were alone. She says she is a gipsy and offers to read his fortune. She asks if he has ever heard of Carmencita, and says that's who she is. The gentleman had studied occult science is college and was attracted to darkness. He doubted Carmen was a full gipsy. "There was something strange and wild about her beauty." Sensuality and fierceness in her eyes. He feels funny having his fortune read in a cafe, so he asks to go home with her, and she consents.

They are let into the house by a child, and Carmen speaks in gipsy language to her. They sit and she pulls out her cards, beginning to read his fortune. A man enters and begins yelling at her in gipsy. The gentleman is wondering when he will need to grab a stool and hit the man over the head with it when the man asks if it's him. It's Don Jose. The gentleman feels sorry he saved him from the gallows (he's a pretty funny guy, this gentleman). Don Jose pulls him outside and tells him to go straight and he will come to the bridge. Don Jose runs off, and the gentleman reluctantly goes back to his inn. He realized when he gets there that his watch is missing. He can't go back and get it the next day, and is done with the manuscript, goes to Seville and spends months there, then he leaves, wanting to head back to Madrid, stopping in Cordova on the way. One of the monks welcomes him back and tells him they thought he was dead and knew he had been robbed. The monk tells him that Jose Navarro is imprisoned and going to be hung, and that he will take him to him to get his watch back. The gentleman brings him cigars, which Don Jose thanks him for. The gentleman asks if there is anything he can do to soften his sentence (pay money), and Jose asks him to have a mass said for his soul. Then he asks him to go to Vittoria and take Jose's silver medal to an old lady there, and to tell her he is dead, but not how he died. The gentleman promises, and spends the following day with Jose, listening to incidents that had happened to him.



Carmen by Prosper Mérimée. Web Source.