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The Gold-Seekers: A Tale of California

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Title: The Gold-Seekers: A Tale of California

Author: Gustave Aimard

Translator: Sir Lascelles Wraxall


        
Release date: April 14, 2013 [eBook #42532]
                Most recently updated: October 23, 2024

Language: English

Other information and formats: www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/42532

Credits: Produced by Camille Bernard & Marc D'Hooghe (Scanned by Google)


*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE GOLD-SEEKERS: A TALE OF CALIFORNIA ***
THE GOLD-SEEKERS:

A TALE OF CALIFORNIA

BY

GUSTAVE AIMARD,


AUTHOR OF "PRAIRIE FLOWER," THE "TIGER-SLAYER," ETC.


LONDON

WARD AND LOCK,

158, FLEET STREET.

1861




PREFACE.


The "Gold-Seekers" must be regarded as forming the connecting link
between the "Tiger-Slayer" and the "Indian Chief," the concluding volume
of this series. It must not be forgotten that the author is dealing with
real characters, and that the hero lived and died in the way hereafter
to be described; and the three volumes may be considered a life-history
of a very remarkable man. Although they may be perused separately with
equal interest, I feel confident that those readers who have gone so far
with me will desire to know the conclusion of this strange eventful
history.

                                                     LASCELLES WRAXALL.




CONTENTS.

     PROLOGUE:--

         I. THE MEETING
        II. EL MESÓN DE SAN JUAN
       III. THE GENTLEMEN OF THE ROAD
        IV. THE BARRANCA DEL MAL PASO


         I. THE NIGHT HALT
        II. FIFTEEN YEARS' SEPARATION
       III. A SAD MISTAKE
        IV. EXPLANATIONS
         V. THE CONSEQUENCES OF A LOVE SONG
        VI. DELILAH
       VII. A RETROSPECT
      VIII. A MEXICAN'S PROGRESS
        IX. THE NEXT DAY
         X. IN WHICH THE SALE OF THE HERD IS DISCUSSED
        XI. A COMMERCIAL TRANSACTION
       XII. CONVERSATION
      XIII. PREPARATIONS
       XIV. VALENTINE'S RETURN
        XV. THE DEPARTURE
       XVI. TWO MEN MADE TO UNDERSTAND EACH OTHER
      XVII. GUAYMAS
     XVIII. THE FIRST FORTNIGHT
       XIX. PITIC
        XX. DIAMOND CUT DIAMOND
       XXI. THE TAPADA
      XXII. THE REVOLT





THE GOLD-SEEKERS


PROLOGUE



I.--THE MEETING.


On the 5th of July, 184-, at about six in the evening, a party of
well-mounted horsemen started at a gallop from Guadalajara, the capital
of the state of Jalisco, and proceeded along the road that traverses the
village of Zapopan, celebrated for its miraculous virgin. After crossing
the escarped summits of the Cordilleras, this road reaches the charming
little town of Tepic, the usual refuge of those Europeans and rich
Mexicans whom business carries to San Blas, but to whom the insalubrity
of the air breathed in that port, the maritime arsenal of the Mexican
union, would be mortal.

We have said that six o'clock was striking as the cavalcade passed the
gateway. The officer of the watch, after bowing respectfully to the
travellers, watched them for a long time, then re-entered the guardroom,
shaking his head, and muttering to himself,--

"Heaven save me! What can Colonel Guerrero be thinking of, to set out on
a Friday, and at such an hour as this? Does he fancy that the
_salteadores_ will allow him to pass? Hum! He will see what they are
about at the _barranca del mal paso_ (the gorge of the evil step)."

The travellers, however, probably unaffected by the superstitious fears
that ruled the worthy officer, rapidly sped on the long poplar alley
that extends from the town to Zapopan, caring neither for the advanced
hour nor the ill-omened day of the week.

They were six in number--Colonel Sebastian Guerrero, his daughter, and
four peons, or Indian criados. The colonel was a tall man, with harsh,
marked features, and a bronzed complexion. The few silvery threads
mingled with his black hair showed that he had passed middle life,
although his robust limbs, upright stature, and the brilliancy of his
glance denoted that years had not yet gained the mastery over this
vigorous organisation. He wore the uniform of a Mexican field officer
with the ease and nonchalance peculiar to old soldiers; but, in addition
to the sabre hanging by his side, his holsters held pistols; and a rifle
laid across the saddle-bow proved that, in case of need, he would offer
a vigorous resistance to any robbers who ventured to attack him.

His daughter, Doña Angela, rode on his right hand. In Europe, where the
growth of girls is not nearly so precocious as in America, she would
only have been a child; for she counted scarce thirteen summers. As far
as could be judged, she was slight, but graceful, and perfectly
proportioned; her features were delicate and noble; her mouth laughing;
her eyes black, quick, and flashing with wit; while her brown hair fell
in two enormous tresses down upon her horse. She was wrapped up
coquettishly in her _rebozo_, and laughed madly at every bound of her
steed, which she maliciously tormented, in spite of her father's
reiterated remonstrances.

The servants were powerfully-built Indians, armed to the teeth, and
appeared capable of defending their master in case of need. They rode
some ten paces behind the colonel, and led two mules loaded with
provisions and baggage--an indispensable precaution in Mexico, if
travellers do not wish to die of hunger by the way.

Mexico combines all the climates of the globe. From the icy peaks of the
Cordilleras, down to the burning coasts of the ocean, the traveller in
that country undergoes every temperature. Hence this vast territory has
been divided into three distinct zones: _las tierras calientes_, or hot
lands, composed of the plains on the seashore, and which produce sugar,
indigo, and cotton in truly tropical abundance; _las tierras templadas_,
or temperate lands, regions formed by the Cordilleras, and which enjoy
an eternal spring, great heat and extreme cold being equally unknown
there; and lastly, _las tierras frias_, or cold lands, which include the
central plateaux, and where the temperature is relatively much lower
than in the other zones.

Still we should remark that in Mexico the expressions "heat," and
"cold," have not an absolute value as in Europe, and that the lofty
plateaux, known as the _tierras frias_, enjoy a temperature like that of
Lombardy, which would seem to any European a very pleasant climate.
Owing to its position, Guadalajara shares in two of the three zones that
divide Mexico. Situated on the limit of the _tierra caliente_ and the
_tierra templada,_ the tepid breezes and pure sky reveal the warm
regions of the seaboard, which extend thus far. The arid sands are
succeeded by fertile and well-cultivated plains, fields of sugar-cane,
Indian corn, bananas, goyaviers, and other productions of the tropical
flora. By degrees the gloomy black oaks and pines, which only grow on
the mountains, become rarer, and eventually disappear entirely, to make
room for poplars, fan-palms, calabash trees, sumachs, Peru trees, and
thousands of others, which proudly wave their superb crowns over the
spontaneous vegetation that surrounds them.

In _las tierras calientes_, where the heat of the day is stifling,
persons generally only travel from five to eleven A.M., and from three
in the afternoon till ten at night, so as to enjoy the morning and
evening freshness. Colonel Guerrero had, therefore, only conformed to
the general custom by commencing his journey in the evening; but, as so
often occurs, he had started later than he wished, owing to those
numberless obstacles which ever supervene at the moment of departure,
and cause a lengthened delay for no visible reason. But the colonel
cared little about the advanced hour: a night march possessed no terrors
for him, as he had been accustomed for years to modify his humour by
circumstances, and yield to the exigencies of the situation in which he
found himself.

The sun set behind the Peak of Teguilla, and the Cerro del Col
disappeared in the centre of the chain of tall, abrupt hills which
borders the Rio Tololotlan: gradually the scene was veiled in darkness.
The travellers progressed gaily conversing together, while following the
winding and accidented course of the Rio Grande del Norte, along whose
banks their road ran. The latter was wide, well made, and easy to
follow. Hence the colonel, after taking a careful glance around to
assure himself there was nothing suspicious in the neighbourhood,
trusted entirely to the vigilance of the criados, and resumed the
conversation with his daughter, which he had for a moment broken off.

"Angela, my child," he said to her, "you are wrong to tease your horse
so. Rebecca is a good beast, very gentle, and very sure-footed; and you
should be more merciful to her than you are."

"I assure you, papa," the pretty girl answered with a laugh, "I am not
in the least teasing Rebecca; on the contrary, I am only tickling her to
render her lively."

"Yes, and to make her dance too, as I can plainly see, little madcap.
That would be all very well if we were only taking a ride for a few
hours, instead of a journey which will last a month. Remember, niña,
that a rider must also treat his horse carefully if he wish to reach his
destination safe, and sound. You would not like, I fancy, to be left on
the road by your horse."

"Heaven forbid, father! If it be so, I will obey you. Rebecca may be at
ease in future; I will not tease her."

And, while speaking thus, she bent over her horse's neck and gently
patted it.

"There!" the colonel continued, "now that peace, as I suppose, is made
between you, what do you think of our way of travelling? Does it please
you?"

"I think it charming, father; the night is magnificent, the moon lights
us as if it were day; the breeze is fresh, and yet not cold. I never was
so happy."

"All the better, my child. I am the more pleased to hear you speak thus,
because I so feared the effects of such a journey for you, that I was on
the point of leaving you at the convent."

"Thank you, father, for having changed your mind, and bringing me with
you. I was so wearied with that wretched convent; and then it is so long
since I have seen my dear mother, whom I long to embrace."

"This time, child, you will have ample leisure to do so for I propose
leaving you with your mother."

"Then I shall not return to Guadalajara with you?"

"No, child; you will live at my large _hacienda_, Aguas Frescas, with
your mother and my most faithful servants, during the period of my
absence; for so soon as I have ended the urgent business that demands my
presence at San Blas, I shall go to Mexico and join General Santa Anna.
His Excellency has done me the honour to send for me."

"Oh!" she said, clasping her hands in entreaty, "you ought to take me
with you to the _ciudad_."

"Little madcap, you know perfectly well that is impossible; but on my
return I will bring you and your mother the finest things from the
Portales des Mercaderes and the Parian, in order that you may eclipse
the most coquettish señoras of Tepic, when it may please you to walk on
the Alameda of the Pueblo."

"Oh! That is not the same thing," she said with a charming pout; "and
yet," she added, suddenly regaining her good humour, "I thank you,
father; for you are kind--you love me; and when you do not satisfy my
whims, it is because you find it impossible."

"I am glad that you recognise that fact, and at length do me justice,
little rattle-brain; for you spend your life in teasing me."

The girl began laughing, and by a sudden impulse letting her reins fall,
she threw her arms round her father's neck and kissed him several times.

"Take care what you are about," the colonel said, at once happy and
alarmed. "If Rebecca were to bolt you would be killed. Take up your
reins at once, I say!"

"Nonsense!" she said, laughing, and shaking her brown tresses
carelessly; "Rebecca is too well trained to behave in such a way."

Still she caught up her reins and settled herself in her saddle.

"Angelita mia," the father continued, perhaps more seriously than the
circumstances demanded, "you are no longer a child. You ought to begin
to grow more reasonable, and moderate the vivacity of your character."

"Do you scold me for loving you, my father?"

"Heaven forbid, my child! I only make a remark which I consider just;
for, if you yield in this way to your first impressions, you will
prepare great grief for yourself at a future day."

"Do not think that, my kind father. I am quick, careless,
impressionable, that is true; but, by the side of those defects, I have
the family pride I derive from you, and which will defend me from many
faults."

"I hope so, my daughter."

"Do not assume that stern air for a harmless act of folly, father, or I
shall fancy that you are angry with me." Then she added, with a laugh,
"I remember that our family descends in a straight line from the Mexican
king, Chimalpopocatzin, who, as his name indicates, had for his emblem a
buckler from which smoke is issuing. You see, father, our character has
not degenerated since that valorous king, and we have ever remained as
firm as he was himself."

"Come, come," the colonel said good-humouredly, "I shall give up
scolding you in future, for I see that it is labour wasted."

The girl smiled maliciously, and was about to reply, when a flash of
light was seen in front of the party.

"What is that?" the colonel asked, raising his voice. "Is there anyone
on the road?"

"I think so, colonel," one of the domestics answered at once, "for that
flash seems to me produced by the flint of a _mechero_.

"That is my opinion too," the colonel said. "Let us hasten on, in order
to see this delayed smoker."

The little band, which had hitherto proceeded at a slow pace, broke into
an amble. At the expiration of an hour, at the same time as the sound of
a horse's hoofs reached the travellers, they also heard the shrill and
discordant sounds of a _jarana_ (guitar), and the refrain of the
following song, so familiar in Mexico, was borne on the breeze:--

     "Sin pena vivamos
     En calma feliz:
     Gozar es mi estrella,
     Cantar y reir."[1]

"Bravo!" the colonel shouted, who reached the singer at this moment.
"Bravely and joyously said, comrade!"

The latter, with a husk cigarette in his mouth, bowed his head in
affirmation, and defiantly twanged an air on his jarana; then, throwing
it across his shoulder, where it was held by a species of brace, he
turned to his addresser, and ceremoniously doffed his vicuna-skin hat.

"May God protect you, caballero!" he said politely. "It seems that the
music pleases you."

"Greatly," the colonel answered, scarce able to retain his laughter at
the sight of the singular person before him.

He was a tall fellow of eight-and-twenty at the most, marvellously thin,
dressed in a ragged jacket, and haughtily folded in a cloak, whose
primitive colour it was impossible to recognise, and which was as full
of holes as a sieve. Still, in spite of this apparent wretchedness and
starving face, the man had a joyous and decided expression about him,
which it was a pleasure to look upon. His little black eyes, which
looked as if pierced by an auger, sparkled with humour, and his manner
had something _distingué_ about it. He was mounted on a horse as thin
and lanky as himself, against whose hollow flanks beat the straight
sword called a _machete_, which the Mexicans continually wear at their
side, passed through an iron ring instead of a sheath.

"You are very late on the road, compañero," the colonel continued, whose
escort had by this time caught him up. "Is it prudent for you to travel
alone at this hour?"

"What have I to fear?" the stranger replied. "What salteador would be
such a fool as to stop me?"

"Who knows?" the colonel remarked with a smile. "Appearances are often
deceitful, and it is not a bad plan to pretend poverty, in order to
travel in safety along the high roads of our beloved country."

Though uttered purposelessly, these words visibly troubled the stranger;
still he at once recovered, and continued in a hearty voice,--

"Unfortunately for me, any feint is useless. I am really as poor as I
seem at this moment, although I have seen happier days, and my cloak was
not always so ragged as you now see it."

The colonel, perceiving that the subject of conversation was
disagreeable to his new acquaintance, said,--

"As you did not stop either at San Pedro or at Zapopan, for I presume
that, like myself, you came from Guadalajara----"

"It is true," the stranger interrupted him; "I quitted the city about
three in the afternoon."

"I suppose," the colonel continued, "that you intend to halt at the
mesón of San Juan; so, if you have no objection, we will proceed thither
together, for I intend to halt for the night there."

"The mesón of San Juan is a good hostelry," the other said, respectfully
lifting his hand to his hat; "but what shall I do there? I have not an
_ochavo_ to expend uselessly, and have far to go. I will bivouac on the
road; and while my horse, poor brute, is sucking its bit, I will smoke
cigarettes, and sing that romance of King Rodrigo, which, as you are
aware, commences thus."

And quickly bringing his guitar to the front, he began singing in a loud
voice,--

     "Cuando las pintadas aves
     Mudas están, y la tierra
     Atenta escucha los rio
     Que al mar su tributo llevan:
     Al escaso resplandor--"[2]

"Eh!" the colonel exclaimed, brusquely interrupting, "what musical rage
possesses you? It is frenzy."

"No," the singer replied in melancholy mood; "it is philosophy."

The colonel examined the poor fellow for a moment; then drawing nearer
to him,--

"I am Colonel Don Sebastian Guerrero de Chimalpos. I am travelling with
my daughter and a few servants. Grant me the honour of your company for
this night: tomorrow we will separate, and go our several ways."

The stranger hesitated for a moment, and frowned. This shade of
dissatisfaction, however, soon disappeared.

"I am a proud fool," he replied with affecting frankness; "misery
renders me so susceptible that I fancy people are ever trying to
humiliate me. I accept your gracious invitation as frankly as it is
offered. Perhaps I may be able to prove my gratitude to you ere long."

The colonel paid no great attention to these words, because, just at the
moment, the party arrived at the mesón of San Juan, whose lighted
windows had revealed its proximity to the travellers for some time past.


[1] Let us live without annoyance in a happy calm: playing is my star,
singing and laughing.

[2] When the spangled birds are dumb, and the attentive earth listens to
the rivers that bear their tribute to the sea by the weak light--.




II.--EL MESÓN DE SAN JUAN.


A great deal has been written about the cool and inhospitable way in
which Spanish and Sicilian landlords receive the travellers whom
Providence sends them; but it is evident to us that those who write in
such wise are not acquainted, even by hearsay, with the _mesoneros_ or
Mexican hosts. Were it so, they would doubtlessly, at their own risk
and peril, have rehabilitated those worthy fellows, to discharge the
whole weight of their indignation on the _huéspedes_ of New Spain.

It is a justice to render to the Spanish and Sicilian landlords, that if
they are utterly unable to satisfy in any way the exigencies of
travellers, by giving the latter the provisions they demand, still they
greet them with so affable a countenance, and veil their refusal under
such an exquisite politeness, that in nine cases out of ten the
traveller is compelled to allow that he was himself to blame for not
laying in the necessary provisions, and therefore sups on apologies.

In Mexico things are very different. On the few high roads formerly
constructed by the Spaniards, and which the neglect of the different
governments that succeeded them has left in such a state that they will
soon disappear completely, there stand, at long distances from each
other, vast buildings which resemble fortresses, for they are nearly all
surrounded by embattled and loopholed walls. These buildings are the
_mesones_, or inns.

The interior is composed, first, of an enormous court, with a _noria_,
or well, intended to water the horses. Corrals for the beasts of burden
occupy the four corners of this yard. In a separate building are the
travellers' _cuartos_; that is to say, miserable dens furnished only
with a frame of oak, covered with a cowhide, which serves as a bed.
These cuartos are numbered, and all open on long corridors. Each
traveller is obliged to bring with him the indispensable bedding, for
the host only supplies the alfalfa for the horses' provender, and water
from the noria.

It was about ten at night when Colonel Guerrero arrived at the door of
the mesón of San Juan, which was hermetically closed. Upon the repeated
blows dealt by one of the servants, a wicket pierced in the wall, about
two paces from the gate, at length opened; an ill-tempered face was
visible, and a rough voice shouted,--

"Who dares to make such a disturbance at the gate of so honest and
respectable a mesón as this?"

"Travellers have arrived, Don Cristoval Saccaplata," the colonel
answered. "Come, open quickly, for we have made a long journey, and are
tired."

"Hum! They all say the same thing," the host growled. "What do I care
for that? I shall not open, it is too late; so go your way, and Heaven
protect you!"

And he prepared to close the wicket.

"One moment. Confound you!" the colonel shouted, "you will not let us
bivouac in front of your door? That would not be at all honourable for
you."

"Bah! A night is soon passed," the host replied with a grin; "besides,
you can go on to the mesón del Salto: they will open to you there."

"Don't you know that is eight miles off?"

"Of course I do."

"Come, open, Señor Saccaplata: you would not have the barbarity to leave
us out here?"

"Why not?"

"Because, if you do open, you will be rewarded in a way which you will
not repent of."

"Yes, yes, all travellers are the same; they make plenty of promises so
long as they are outside; but once in, they are not in a hurry to untie
their purse-strings."

"That will not be the case with us."

"How do I know?" the _huésped_ said, shrugging his shoulders. "My house
is full; I have no room left."

"We will find some, dear Saccaplata."

"Halloh! Who are you, pray, who know me so well? Maybe you are one of
those _caballeros de la noche_ who have been ransacking the country for
some time past."

"You are mistaken grossly, and I will prove it to you," the colonel
answered, anxious to cut short this open-air conversation. "Take that
first," he said, throwing two ounces through the wicket; "and now, to
prevent any misunderstanding, know that I am Don Sebastian Guerrero."

The worthy landlord was only sensible to one argument--that which the
colonel had so judiciously employed to overcome his resistance. He
stooped, picked up the two ounces, which disappeared in a second, and
again addressing the travellers, but this time with a tone which he
strove to render more amiable,--

"Come," he said, "I must e'en do what you wish, I am too good-hearted.
You have provisions, I hope?"

"We have everything we require."

"All the better, for I could not have supplied you. Do not be impatient;
I am coming down."

He disappeared from the wicket, and within five minutes could be heard
unbarring the door, growling fearfully the while. The travellers then
entered the yard of the mesón. The huésped had lied like the true
landlord he was; he only had in the house two or three muleteers with
their animals, and three travellers, who, by their dress, seemed to be
hacenderos from the vicinity.

"Halloh!" Don Sebastian shouted, "someone to take my horse."

"If you begin in that way we shall not be friends long," the huésped
said in the sharp tone he had previously employed. "Here, everyone, big
or little, waits on himself, and attends to his own horse."

The colonel was far from being of a patient temper. If he had previously
endured the host's insolence, it was solely because it was impossible to
chastise him; but that reason no longer existed. Sharply dismounting, he
drew his pistols from his holsters, thrust them in his belt, and walking
boldly toward Señor Saccaplata, seized him by the collar and shook him
roughly.

"Listen, master rogue!" he said to him. "A truce to your insolence, and
wait on me, unless you would repent it."

The host was so amazed at this brusque way of replying to him, and this
assault on his inviolability, that for a moment he remained dumb through
confusion and wrath. His face became crimson, his eyes rolled, and he at
length shouted in a strangled voice,--

"Help! Help me! Such an insult! By the body of Christ, I will not
overlook it! Leave my house at once!"

"I shall not go," the colonel answered peaceably, but firmly; "and you
will attend to me immediately."

"Oh! We shall see that. Here, help, Pedro, Juan, Jacinto! Come, all of
you, and on to these rascals!"

Seven or eight servants rushed from the corrals at the sound of their
master's voice, and ranged themselves behind him.

"Very good," the colonel said, raising his pistols. "I'll blow out the
brains of the first scamp who moves a step toward me with bad
intention."

We need not say that the peons remained motionless, as if they had
suddenly been changed into blocks of granite. One of the colonel's
servants had assisted Doña Angela from her horse, and accompanied her to
a cuarto, in which he installed her; then he returned in all haste to
his master's side, foreseeing that his co-operation would be speedily
needed.

The courtyard of the mesón offered a most singular aspect at this moment
by the light of the torches of ocote wood, passed through iron rings
along the walls. On one side stood the host and his servants; on the
other, Don Sebastian's four footmen, with their hands on their weapons,
and the guitar player, with his jarana on his back, and his hands folded
on his chest; a little on one side, the travellers and arrieros
previously arrived; and in the centre, alone, with his pistols in his
hand, the colonel, with frowning brow and flashing eyes.

"Enough of this, scoundrel!" he shouted. "For a long time you have been
plundering and insulting the travellers whom Providence sends to you.
By heavens! If you do not on the instant demand my pardon for your
insolence, and if you do not serve me with all that politeness I have a
right to demand from you, I will inflict on you, upon the spot, a
correction which you will remember your life long."

"Take care what you are about, my master," the huésped answered
ironically. "You see that I have men to help me. If you do not decamp at
once, all the worse for you. I have witnesses, and the _juez de letras_
shall decide."

"Good heavens!" the colonel shouted, "that is too much, and removes all
my scruples. The scoundrel threatens me with the law. Level your pieces,
men, and fire on the first who stirs!"

The domestics obeyed. Don Sebastian then seized the host, despite his
cries and desperate resistance, and in a second had him down on the
ground.

"I believe I shall do a service to all the travellers whom their evil
star may in future bring to this den," he continued, "by punishing this
scamp as he deserves."

The witnesses of this scene--peons, arrieros, or travellers--had not
made a move to help the host. It was evident that all, for certain
reasons, were in their hearts pleased with what was happening to him.
Not one of them would have dared to take on himself the responsibility
of such an act; but as there was someone ready to do so, they were
careful not to offer the slightest obstacle to him. By the peremptory
order of the colonel, the poor landlord was fastened by two of his own
servants to the long pole of the noria, and debarred from making the
slightest movement.

"Now," the colonel continued, "each of you take a _reata_, and thrash
him till he confesses himself conquered, and consents to do what I ask
of him."

Despite their feigned repugnance, the host's two peons were compelled to
obey the colonel; for his orders were supported by four rifles and two
pistols, whose gaping muzzles were directed point blank at them. To
honour the truth, we must confess that, either through terror or for
some other cause, the two peons conscientiously performed their duty.

The host howled like a bull. He was mad with rage, and writhed like a
viper in the bonds which he tried in vain to break. The colonel stood
stoically by his side, only asking him from time to time, ironically,
how he liked his arguments, and if he would soon make up his mind to
yield. Human strength has limits which it cannot pass. In spite of all
his fury and obstinacy, the host was forced to confess to himself,
aside, that he had to do with a man more obstinate than he was, and
that, if he did not wish to die under the lash, he must resolve to
endure the humiliation imposed on him.

"I surrender," he said, in a voice broken as much by anger as by pain.

"Already!" the colonel remarked coldly. "Pooh! I fancied you braver.
Why, you have hardly received thirty lashes. Stop, you fellows, and
unfasten your master!"

The peons eagerly obeyed. When free, the host tried to rise, but his
strength failed him, and he fell back on the ground, where he lay for
several moments powerless to move. At length he made a desperate effort,
and picked himself up. His face was pale; his features were contracted;
an abundant perspiration stood on his temples, which throbbed as if
ready to burst; he had a buzzing in his ears; and tears of shame poured
from his eyes. He took a few tottering steps toward the colonel.

"I am at your orders, caballero," he said, bowing his head humbly.
"Speak: what must I do?"

"Good!" the latter remarked. "Now you are reasonable; you are much
better so. Give some provender to my horses, and assist my servants to
wait on me."

"Pardon, caballero!" the huésped said. "Will you allow me to say two
words to you?"

The colonel smiled contemptuously.

"To what end? I know them, and I will repeat them myself. You wish to
warn me that, obliged to yield to superior force, you have done so, but
you will avenge yourself on the first opportunity. Is not that it?"

"Yes," he muttered in a hollow voice.

"Very well; you are quite at liberty to do so, master host; but take
your precautions, for I warn you that, if you miss me, I shall not miss
you. So now wait on me, and make haste."

And, shrugging his shoulders, the colonel turned his back on him with a
smile of disdain.

The host watched him depart with a hateful expression, which imparted
something hideous to his face; and when he saw that the colonel was out
of the yard, he shook his head twice or thrice, muttering to himself,--

"Yes, I will avenge myself, demon, and sooner than you imagine."

After this aside, he composed his face and attended to his household
duties with an activity and apparent indifference that caused his
servants to be thoughtful, for they knew his rancorous character. Still
he did not complain; he made no allusion to the cruel punishment he had
undergone, but, on the contrary, waited on the travellers with an
attention and politeness they had not been accustomed to prior to this
unlucky day; and they took advantage of the change, while keeping on
their guard.

Still nothing apparently happened to justify their suspicions--all went
on calmly: the travellers retired to bed one after the other; then the
host made his round to assure himself that all was in order, and retired
to the room reserved for his private use.

The colonel had already been asleep some hours, and was in a deep sleep,
from which he was suddenly aroused by a noise he heard at his door.

"Who's there?" he asked.

"Silence!" someone answered outside. "Open; it is a friend."

"Friend or foe, tell me who you are, that I may know with whom I have to
deal."

"I am," the voice made answer, "the man you met on the road."

"Hem! What do you want with me? Why are you not asleep at this hour,
instead of coming to rouse me?"

"Open, in Heaven's name! I have important news to tell you."

The colonel hesitated for a moment, but soon reflecting that this man,
to whom he had done no harm, could have no motive, for being his enemy,
he decided on getting up. Still, through prudence, he cocked one of his
pistols, which he had placed by his side on retiring to bed, and went to
open the door. The stranger walked in quickly, and closed it after him.

"Speak low," he said hurriedly. "Listen to me: the host is forming some
scheme against you."

"I suspect it," the colonel said, who, while speaking, had lit a candle;
"but whatever he may do, I am out of his reach, and the scoundrel will
be crushed if he attack me."

"Who knows?" the stranger said.

"Come, you know something positive. Have I any plot to fear inside the
house?"

"I do not think so."

"Tell me what you have discovered, then."

"I will do so; but in the first place, as I am a total stranger to you,
allow me to tell you my name."

"For what good?"

"No one knows what may happen in this world: it is useful to be able to
distinguish one's friends from one's enemies."

"Speak; I am listening."

"You nearly guessed the truth. Under my starving appearance I conceal a
certain monetary value. My name is Don Cornelio Mendoza. I am a student.
I had at Guadalajara an aunt, who, on dying, appointed me her heir. I am
carrying with me in my belt one hundred and fifty gold ounces, and in my
portfolios bills for an equal amount payable at San Blas. You see that I
am not so poor as I appear to be. But the road between the two cities is
long and dangerous, and I assumed this disguise to escape the robbers,
if that be possible."

"Very good, Don Cornelio: you can now, if you please, change your
attire, for I hope that we shall pursue our journey together."

"With all my heart; but if it make no difference, I will retain my
lepero dress provisionally."

"As you please; but now to the fact. What have you to tell me?"

"Not much, but yet enough to put us on our guard. Our landlord, after
making his round and assuring himself that everyone had retired, woke up
one of his servants, the very one who thrashed him with such good will."

"Yes, I remember that rogue's face."

"Very good. After calling him into his room, he remained shut up with
him for ten minutes; then he opened a window, the peon leaped out on the
highway, and ran off at full speed."

"Oh, oh!" the colonel said.

"The landlord looked after him till he disappeared, then muttered
several words I could not understand, excepting one name, which, thanks
to Heaven, reached my ear."

"What was it?"

"El Buitre (the Vulture)."

"Hum! Is that all?"

"Yes."

"It does not teach me much; but how did you learn all this? The landlord
did not make you his confidant, I suppose?"

"No, not a bit in the world. I became his confidant in spite of himself,
and in the most natural way. My cuarto is just over his room. I heard
him open a window, and I listened."

"Yes, but unfortunately you heard nothing."

"Yes, a name."

"But a name which has no meaning for us."

"On the contrary, it is of enormous significance."

"How so?"

"The famous leader of the salteadores, whose band has been desolating
the province for a year, is called El Buitre. Do you now understand?"

"Body o' me!" the colonel shouted, as he jumped up hurriedly, "I rather
think I do understand."




III.--THE GENTLEMEN OF THE ROAD.


We will for the moment quit the mesón of San Juan, and proceed about two
leagues further on, where certain persons, with whom the reader must
form an acquaintance, are assembled.

Hardly one hundred and fifty yards beyond the mesón the road begins to
grow narrower; the mountains approach, as if wishful to shake hands, and
that so abruptly and unexpectedly, that they form all at once a narrow
and long gorge, which is known throughout the country as the _barranca
del mal paso_.

After passing through this gorge, the scenery leaves its abrupt and
savage aspect to resume a smiling character; the road widens again; a
charming valley, intersected by a stream, presents itself to sight; and
on all sides the eye surveys a deliciously accidented horizon.

On either side of the barranca begin impenetrable forests, through which
a road can only be cut axe in hand, unless the traveller has a deep
knowledge of the narrow and almost invisible paths which lead into the
interior with innumerable twinings.

We must ask the reader to follow us to one of the most hidden and least
known resorts in this forest.

In the centre of a vast clearing, where burned a cedar eighty feet in
height, emitting incessant sparks, some twenty men in sordid garments--a
horrible medley of luxury and indigence--with faces in which crime was
written in capital letters, but all armed to the teeth, were assembled
in groups of three or four each, drinking, eating, smoking, and singing.

Not far from them, their horses, saddled and ready to mount at the first
signal, were eating their provender of alfalfa and climbing peas; while,
on the edge of the covert, four or five men, motionless as bronze
statues, were attentively surveying the surrounding country.

A little on one side, two men, seated on low stools, were talking and
puffing in each other's faces enormous volleys of smoke. The first and
elder of the two appeared about eight-and-twenty years of age; his long,
light hair fell in heavy curls on his shoulders; his features were
effeminate; but his aquiline nose, his bright blue eyes, and narrow
forehead, imparted to his face a character of baseness and cold cruelty.
He wore the splendid costume of the Mexican hacenderos, and was
carelessly playing with the trigger of a splendid silver-mounted
American rifle.

His companion offered a striking contrast to him: while the first was
tall, well built, and endowed with pleasing manners, the second was
short, stumpy, heavy, and repulsive in face, gestures, and even in
language. The richness of his attire only seemed to render more striking
the hideousness imprinted as an indelible stigma on this odious person.
Everything announced in him the prowling jackal, that possesses all the
ferocity of the lion, but none of that animal's nobility or courage.

The clearing we have described was one of the principal haunts of the
Vulture, that terrible bandit who, at the time we write of, was
ravaging the state of Guadalajara. The men collected in it formed his
band, and the two men we have just introduced were, the first, _El
Buitre_ himself; the second, _El Garrucholo_, his lieutenant and dearest
friend.

At the moment we bring them on the stage, these two interesting
personages were engaged, as we shall see, in a confidential
conversation. We may observe that, strangely enough, this conversation
was not held in Spanish, but in English.

"Hem!" El Garrucholo said, as he inhaled a mouthful of smoke, which he
immediately sent forth again from his mouth and nostrils. "What do you
find so disagreeable in our profession, John? For my part, I consider it
delightful. These worthy Mexicans are gentle as lambs; they allow
themselves to be plundered with unequalled patience; and you will agree
with me, my dear fellow, that we gain more by cutting the buttons from
their _calzoneras_ than by easing the richest gentleman down there."

"All that is possible, my friend," El Buitre answered, throwing away his
cigarette with a gesture of impatience. "I do not assert the contrary.
Assuredly the profit is large, and the risk nothing, I grant; but--"

"Well, why do you stop? Go on."

"In a word, I was not born for such a trade."

El Garrucholo gave vent to a hearty laugh.

"That's where the shoe galls you, then?" he said, with a shrug of his
shoulders. "You are mad, comrade: every man is born for the trade he
carries on, especially when he chose it himself."

"Would you assert by that----?"

"What I say I mean. When I picked you up in Mexico, under the arcades of
the Plaza Mayor, with a dagger buried in your breast up to the hilt, and
not a real in your pockets, I should have done better, deuce take me, to
let you die like a masterless dog, instead of curing you; at least, I
should not have heard such nonsense from you."

"Why did you not do so? At any rate I should have died without
dishonouring an honourable name."

"Deuce take the honourable name, and the man who bears it! My dear
fellow, you annoy me by your ridiculous pretensions; you forget, with
your mania for nobility, that you are only a foundling."

El Buitre frowned and seized his lieutenant's arm.

"Enough on that subject, Red Blood; you know that I have already warned
you that I would not suffer any jesting on that head."

"Bah! What's the odds about being a foundling? A man ought not to feel
annoyed at that; it is one of those accidents for which the most honest
fellow cannot be responsible."

"You are my friend, Red Blood; or, at least, seem to be so."

"In your turn, my noble Mr. John Stanley," the bandit sharply
interrupted him, "do not express such doubts about me; they grieve and
insult me more than I can express. I am attached to you as the blade of
my bowie-knife is to the hilt I am yours, body and soul. I have only
that one virtue, if it be one; so pray do not strip me of it."

El Buitre remained silent for a moment, and then continued in a
conciliating voice,--

"I am wrong. Pardon me, brother; in truth, I have had sufficient proofs
of your friendship to have no right to doubt it. Still it seems to me so
strange, that I at times ask myself how it comes that you, Red Blood,
who hate humanity in a mass--you to whom nothing is respectable or
sacred--feel for me a friendship which rises to the most complete
abnegation and the most utter weakness. That appears to me so
extraordinary, that I would give much to hold the solution of the
problem."

"You are an ass, John!" the bandit replied in a mocking tone. "What is
the use of telling you why I love you? You would not understand me.
Suffice it for you to know that it is so. Do you believe me, then, a
perfect ferocious brute, incapable of generous instincts?"

"I do not say that."

"You think it, which comes to the same thing. But it is of no matter to
me: I dispense you from gratitude; you may even hate me, and I should
not care. I do not love you for yourself, but for myself. But suppose we
talk of something else, if you are agreeable?"

"I wish nothing better, for I see that I should lose as much time in
trying to draw a good reason from you as in washing a blackamoor
white."

"Ta, ta, ta! You are an ass, I repeat. But let me alone; if a certain
thing I am now scheming succeed, we shall soon bury El Buitre to bring
John Stanley to life again."

The salteador quivered.

"May Heaven hear you!" he exclaimed involuntarily.

"You had better appeal to the other place if you wish to succeed," the
bandit said with a grin; "but you trust to me. Soon, I hope, we shall so
completely change our skins that fellows will be very clever who
recognise us. Look ye, John: in, this world all that is needful is to
take the ball on the bound and turn with the wind."

"I confess, my good fellow, that I do not understand a syllable of what
you are saying to me."

"Eh! What do you want to understand for? You never were the worse off
for leaving me to guide you. Two words are as good as a thousand. Before
long we shall turn our coats, and change, not the trade we carry on so
agreeably, but the name under which we do it, to assume one better
sounding and more lofty. Look there!" he added, pointing sarcastically
at his comrades. "What an imposing collection of honest fellows we shall
restore to circulation under our auspices! Will it not be magnificent,
after having so long plundered individuals, to become suddenly the
defenders of a nation to the prejudice of the government?"

"Yes," El Buitre said thoughtfully, "I have always dreamed--"

"Of carrying on our trade on a grand scale, eh? You were right: there
is nothing like doing things properly, if you wish to be held in
estimation. Well, be at ease; I will procure that pleasure. At any rate,
if luck desert you, you will have the advantage of being shot instead of
being hanged or garotted, and that is a consolation."

"Yes," El Buitre said quickly; "in that way a man dies like a
gentleman."

"And is not dishonoured, I allow. Ah! The filibusters of old were lucky
fellows; they conquered empires, and handed down their names to
posterity, the exploits of the hero easily causing the crimes of the
bandit to be forgotten."

"Will you never be serious?"

"I am only too much so, on the contrary; for, as you see, although you
did not confide in me, I am preparing you a place by the side of the
Cortez, the Almagros, and Pizarros, whose glory has so long prevented
you sleeping."

"You may jest, Red Blood," the salteador said with an accent of profound
emotion; "but if, as I suppose, you appreciate my character at its true
value, you know that I only seek one thing--to regenerate these unhappy
races, whom a brutalising subjection has plunged during so many
centuries into a degrading barbarism."

"You only wish for the welfare of humanity of course," the bandit said
with an ironical laugh. "We should not be worthy sons of Uncle Sam, that
land of liberty and theoretical philanthropy, did we not dream of the
amelioration of society. That is the reason why, while biding our time,
we have become of our private authority redressers of wrong, and
gentlemen of the road--a charming trade, I may remark parenthetically,
and which we carry on conscientiously."

"Go to the deuce, you inexplicable scamp!" the young man exclaimed in a
passion. "Shall I never know how to speak or how to deal with you?"

"No," he replied seriously, "no, John, so long as you try to play at
hide and seek with me, who know every thought of your heart. Cease to
display these pretensions to honesty, which deceive nobody, not even
yourself, and become frankly a bandit chief till you can be something
else. When the moment has arrived it will be time to put on a cloak of
hypocrisy, which will deceive the fools, and consolidate the position
you have acquired."

At this moment the shriek of the owl was heard in the thickest part of
the forest.

"What's that?" El Buitre asked, not sorry to break off a conversation
which was taking a personal turn rather disagreeable to him.

"A signal given by a sentry," El Garrucholo answered; "a spy who
doubtlessly brings us news. We are awaiting, as you know, the passing of
certain travellers."

"I know it; but they are said to be well armed, and under good escort."

"All the better; they will defend themselves, and that will be a
change."

"The truth is, that those we have stopped for some time past seemed to
have agreed to let themselves be plundered without a murmur."

"If the information I have received be exact, that will not be the case
with the present party."

The owl cry was heard a second time, but now much nearer.

"It is time," El Garrucholo observed.

The two chiefs then put on black velvet masks, and almost immediately a
man appeared, led by two bandits. On entering the clearing this
individual threw around a glance rather of astonishment than terror:
nothing in his conduct showed that he had fallen into an ambuscade, for
his face was calm, though rather pale, and his step was assured.

The bandits who escorted him led him before the two chiefs, who examined
him attentively through the holes in their masks. El Buitre then
addressed the bandits in Spanish.

"Where the deuce did you catch that scoundrel?" he said in a rough
voice. "He has not an ochavo about him. Hang him, and let us have no
more bother."

"Yes," the lieutenant observed, "he is only fit for that, as he was such
an ass as to rush into the net prepared for more noble game."

"Permit me, excellency," one of the bandits said, bowing respectfully;
"this man was not caught by us."

"How is he here, then?"

"Because, illustrious captain, he earnestly asked to be led into your
excellency's presence, as he had matters of the utmost importance to
impart to you."

"Ah!" the chief said, but added, "I know the fellow; he is, if I am not
mistaken, the huésped of the mesón of San Juan."

The prisoner bowed in affirmation.

It was really the worthy Saccaplata himself. After sending off his
criado, and while Don Cornelio was with the colonel, the host thought
that nobody could do one's business so well as one's self; and as he was
probably anxious that it should succeed, he had started off after the
peon, whom he had no difficulty in catching up, for the poor fellow was
not at all anxious to execute the commission his master had intrusted to
him. Saccaplata sent him back to the mesón; and, while the peon returned
in delight, had himself attempted the adventure.

"Indeed!" the lieutenant remarked. "Does Señor Saccaplata wish to enter
into business relations with us? That would be an excellent idea."

"I do not say no, honourable caballero," the landlord replied in a
honeyed voice. "Business is very bad at this moment, and it is certain
that a little extra profit, honestly come by, would be acceptable; but,
for the present, I only desire--"

"To the point," El Buitre suddenly interrupted him; "we have no time to
lose in silly remarks."

The landlord understood that he must be brief, if he did not wish to
bring down certain unpleasantnesses on himself.

"The fact is this," he said: "I have in my house, at the present moment,
several rich travellers."

"We know it. What next?"

"Among them is the Señor Colonel--"

"Don Sebastian Guerrero, proceeding to Tepic with his daughter and four
servants," the lieutenant interrupted him. "What next?"

"What next?" the landlord said, sadly discountenanced.

"Yes, what next?"

"That is all."

"What, you scoundrel! And you had the effrontery to venture among us,
only to tell us a thing we knew as well as yourself?" El Garrucholo
exclaimed.

"I thought I was doing you a service."

"You wished to be a spy on us."

"I!"

"Of course. Do you take us for fools like yourself, you wretch? But you
shall remember this visit. The _orejada_" he added, turning to the two
bandits, who had remained by the landlord's side.

"One moment," the captain said.

Saccaplata, fancying he should escape with the fright, grimaced a smile.

"I will tell you," the captain continued, "why you came to us. You want
to revenge yourself on Colonel Guerrero, who a few hours back inflicted
on you a well-merited correction."

"But--" the landlord ventured.

"Silence! Do not attempt to deny it. I was there. I saw what occurred.
As you are too great a coward to dare to avenge yourself, you thought of
us, supposing that we should not refuse to render you that slight
service. What do you say--is that the truth?"

"Hum! I would not venture to contradict your excellency," the landlord
said, now beginning to regret having entered this wasp's nest.

The bandits, attracted by the colloquy, had gradually drawn nearer, and
formed a circle round the speakers, while laughing cunningly to each
other. Still, although accustomed to the pleasing eccentricities of
their worthy chief, they were far from anticipating the _dénouement_ of
this scene.

After having proved to Saccaplata as clearly as the day that he knew the
motive that led him to offer his good services to the salteadores, the
captain continued in these terms, while smiling cunningly:--

"Dear huésped of my heart, we do not refuse to undertake revenging you,
the more so as we had already made up our minds to stop the colonel."

"Ah!" the landlord said, beginning to feel easier.

"Yes: still, after reflecting on it thoroughly, we gave up the plan. The
colonel is brave--he will defend himself; moreover, he has with him four
well-armed and determined men. My faith, it was too great a risk; but if
you insist--"

"Immensely!" the other exclaimed, deceived by the bandit's feigned
kindliness.

"Very good," the other answered, changing his tone; "then it is a matter
of business between us. Now, such things are always paid for, as you
know, my scamp."

Saccaplata turned involuntarily toward the other salteadores, who were
grinning affably at him.

"Consequently," the captain continued with perfect calmness, "you will
pay me twenty ounces for your vengeance, which I take on my own account,
and ten for your ransom."

"Heaven save me!" the landlord said, clasping his hands in despair. "I
never possessed such a sum, not even in a dream."

"That is a matter of perfect indifference to me. I never recall my
decision under any circumstances. Another time you will think twice
before venturing so rashly into the claws of El Buitre. The orejada--"

"Oh, my lord!" the luckless Saccaplata exclaimed, as he fell on his
knees, "I am a poor devil. Have pity on me, noble captain, I implore
you!"

"Come, put an end to this."

In spite of his cries and protestations, the landlord was seized and
haled off by his guardians, amid the laughter and sarcasms of the
bandits, whom the sight promised by the captain delighted.

"Stop!" the huésped suddenly exclaimed; "I think I have a little money
about me."

"No, no!" the salteadores shouted. "Give him the orejada all the same."

El Garrucholo made a sign, and order was restored.

"Let us see," he said.

The wretch gave a sigh, and with extreme difficulty, after ransacking
all his pockets with many a protestation that he was utterly ruined,
which the bandits listened to with stoical indifference, he at last
succeeded in making up a little more than half the sum.

"Hum!" the lieutenant said as he pocketed the money, "that is nothing;
but I am a good fellow. You have no more?"

"Oh! I swear it, excellency," he said, turning out all his pockets.

"Well," El Garrucholo continued philosophically, "no man is bound to do
impossibilities, and as you have only that--"

"I am sure of it," the other said, fancying himself saved.

"Well, then," the lieutenant continued, "let him be only attached by one
ear: we must be honest."

An immense burst of laughter from the whole band greeted this
proposition. The landlord was carried off to a tree, and before he
understood what they meant to do to him, he uttered a frightful yell of
pain. A bandit had fastened him to the tree by the right ear, by simply
driving his knife through it.

"There, that's settled," the lieutenant said. "Now, I warn you that, if
you continue to howl, I will have you gagged."

"Traitors, dogs, assassins, kill me!"

"No. But listen; that wound is nothing. It is easy for you to deliver
yourself by a slight tug. Your ear will be torn, I allow, but you can't
have everything. As soon as you are free, return home; one of our
friends will accompany you, and you will pay him the rest of the sum."

"Never!" the landlord howled, "Never! I would sooner die!"

"Very good; then you shall die, and after that we will carry off the
contents of the hiding place you have so cleverly made in the wall of
your cuarto, by placing before it a picture of Nuestra Señora de
Guadalupe. Eh! What do you think of that?"

The lieutenant had hardly finished speaking ere the landlord, by a sharp
movement, had regained his liberty. Without thinking of his
frightfully-mutilated ear, he threw himself at the feet of El
Garrucholo.

"I accept, my lord, I accept; but I implore you, do not ruin me."

"I was certain you would understand. Be off, scoundrel; and if it is any
consolation, know that you will be avenged on the colonel."

"Yes," the landlord muttered to himself, "but who will avenge me on you?
Thanks," he added aloud; "that promise causes me to forget my
suffering."

"All the better; but mind you, no treachery, or we shall manage to get
hold of you again."

Saccaplata bowed, but made no reply. He understood that it would have
been better for him to remain at home, and allow matters to follow their
course, without seeking a problematic vengeance which cost him thirty
gold ounces and an ear. On reaching the mesón he paid the rest of his
ransom, and banging the door in the face of the bandit who accompanied
him, and thanked him with an air of mockery, he sank on a bench, and
overcome by so many terrible emotions, fainted away.




IV.--THE BARRANCA DEL MAL PASO.


The rest of the night passed, apparently at any rate, calmly and
tranquilly, and nothing occurred to disturb the rest enjoyed by the
guests at the mesón of San Juan. About four in the morning the doors of
the travellers' cuartos began to open one after the other, and lights
flashed in the patios. The shouts of the muleteers, and the bells of
their animals, aroused the colonel and his daughter, warning them that
it was time to prepare for their departure.

Don Sebastian, after the suspicions Don Cornelio had suggested to him,
did not at all wish, as he had a young lady with him, to start before
sunrise, especially as he had to traverse the gorge we have already
described, and where it would be easy to form an ambuscade.

By the sunlight he had a better chance, for two reasons: in the first
place, the servants who accompanied him were old soldiers, accustomed to
war, and greatly attached to him; the second was, that the Mexican
brigands are usually great cowards, and whenever they meet with any
serious resistance from those they attack, they immediately give up the
game.

These two reasons, and, before all, the fear of alarming his daughter,
and uselessly exposing her to danger during the darkness, obliged the
colonel to let all the other travellers at the mesón start before him;
and, in fact, they soon quitted the hostelry, and dispersed in various
directions.

The Señor Saccaplata, with pallid face, compressed eyebrows, and head
bandaged up, was walking up and down the patio, with his arms behind his
back, every now and then raising his eyes angrily to the colonel's
window, and growling in a low voice,--

"Body and bones! Will not that trumpery colonel make up his mind to
start soon, if he is so ready to give the bastinado to poor folk? But
let him do what he will, he will not escape the fate that awaits him."

At this moment a young man appeared in the patio, strumming a guitar,
and singing in a low voice,--

     "No sabo donde mirar,
     De todo teme y rezela,
     Si al cielo teme su furia,
     Porque hizo al cielo ofensa."[3]

These verses, taken from the romance of King Rodrigo, though probably
sung without any malignant meaning, still referred so closely to the
landlord's present position, that he turned furiously to the unlucky
singer, and attacked him in a brutal voice.

"Deuce take your howling! Why do you come buzzing in this way in my
ears, when you ought, on the contrary, to be preparing for your
departure?"

"Why, it is our worthy huésped," Don Cornelio replied with that joyful
accent peculiar to him. "What! You are not fond of music? You are
wrong, my worthy friend, for what I am singing to you is really fine."

"That is possible," the other said in a rough voice; "but I should feel
obliged by your giving me no more of it."

"Oh, oh! You are not in a good temper this morning. What's the matter
with you, that you are so bandaged up? On my soul, you must be ill. Oh!
I see what it is; you slept with your window open, and have caught a
toothache."

The landlord turned green with impotent fury.

"Caballero," he shouted, "take care."

"Of what?" Don Cornelio said peacefully. "Toothache is not catching, as
I am aware. Poor man! Pain causes him to wander. Take care of yourself,
my good man; take care of yourself, I advise you."

And without further ceremony he turned his back on him, and began again
the song which so annoyed the landlord at the point where he broke it
off.

"Hum!" the latter growled, shaking his fist at the singer; "I hope that
you will catch something in the row. Ah!" he added, "the sun is rising:
perhaps that will induce him to come down."

In fact, the sun appeared at this moment in a bed of vapour, and after a
twilight, whose duration was almost nothing, the day succeeded, as it
were, immediately to night.

Don Cornelio, aided by the colonel's servants, fed the horses and
saddled the mules--preparations which brought a smile to the landlord's
lips which would have caused the colonel to feel uncomfortable had he
seen it.

Suddenly a sound of horses was heard outside, and two men trotted into
the patio, through the gateway left open after the departure of the
arrieros and other travellers. At this unexpected arrival the landlord
turned as if a viper had stung him.

"Confusion!" he muttered; "day has hardly broken ere these accursed
fellows come across my path."

The two arrivals troubled themselves in no way about their host's
ill-temper, but dismounted, and taking the bridles off their horses, led
them to the noria to let them drink.

The travellers were dressed in the garb of the frontier men, and
appeared to be from forty to forty-five years of age. Like all wayfarers
in this blessed country, where every man must depend on himself alone,
they were armed; but, in lieu of the lance or fusil usual in the
interior, they had excellent Mexican rifles--a peculiarity which, in
addition to their _zarapés_ of Indian manufacture, and their fiery and
half-wild mustangs, allowed them to be recognised as Sonorians, or at
least men domiciled in that state.

The landlord, seeing that the newcomers did not appear to trouble
themselves in the least about him, decided at length on walking toward
them and addressing them.

"What do you want?" he said to them.

"Nothing just at present," the elder replied; "but so soon as our horses
have finished drinking, you will give each of them a measure of maize
and a truss of alfalfa."

"I am the mesonero, and not a peon. It is not my place to wait upon
you," he said brutally.

The traveller who had spoken looked askance at the host.

"I don't care whether it is you or your criados who do it," he answered
dryly, "provided that the order I have given is executed promptly, for I
am in a hurry."

In the face of this rebuff, and especially the glance that accompanied
it, the huésped judged it prudent to draw in his horns and assume a more
conciliatory tone. For the last few hours poor Saccaplata had not been
fortunate with his travellers. All those Heaven sent him had the air of
young bulls escaped from the _toril_.

"Your excellencies are doubtless anxious to set out again?" he said in
an insinuating voice.

The strangers made no answer.

"Not to be too curious," the landlord continued, not yet discouraged,
"may I ask in what direction your honourable seigneuries intend to
proceed?"

One of the travellers then raised his head, and, looking the indiscreet
mesonero full in the face, said with a mocking air,--

"If you are asked, you will answer that you do not know. Come, my good
fellow, have us attended to, and blow your own _puchero_, without
troubling yourself about ours: you might find it too hot for you."

The host shrugged his shoulders and slipped away, the more nimbly
because he noticed the colonel entering the patio at the moment, and
felt no desire to come in contact with him.

The two strangers exchanged a smile, and, without further remark,
watched the peon who was giving their horses the provender they had
ordered.

Don Sebastian was ready to start: he had come to give a final glance to
the horses before leading his daughter downstairs. Don Cornelio walked
up to him so soon as he saw him, and after wishing him good day, drew
him a little aside and whispered,--

"Look there, colonel," and he pointed to the two strangers; "those are
sturdy fellows, if I am not mistaken."

"They are so," Don Sebastian made answer; "I did not notice them
before."

"They have only just arrived. They would be famous recruits added to our
party, if they would consent to travel with us. What do you think of
it?"

"I think you are right; but will they consent?"

"Why not? If they are going the same road as ourselves they will derive
the same benefit from our presence as we shall from theirs."

"That is true. Have you spoken to them?"

"No: as I told you, they arrived this moment. You ought to try to
persuade them."

"I see no harm in attempting it, at least," the colonel answered.

Hereupon, leaving Don Cornelio, he advanced toward the strangers, and
saluting them politely, said,--

"You have magnificent horses, caballeros. I see that they come from the
prairies."

"Yes, they are real mustangs," one of the strangers replied, returning
the bow.

"You are finishing your journey at a very early hour," the colonel
continued. "With horses like yours a deal of ground could be covered."

"What makes you suppose, caballero, that our journey is ended?"

"Why, your arrival at this hostelry at so early an hour."

"Ah! You might be mistaken."

"Pardon my indiscretion, caballeros. Do you come from Guadalajara, or
are you going there?"

"Caballero," the stranger replied dryly, who had hitherto spoken, "we
the more readily pardon your indiscretion, because it appears that in
this hostelry everybody passes his time in asking questions; still, you
will permit me not to answer yours. My companion and myself are old
travellers, and we know that on the roads of this country men too often
repent gossiping about their business, but never of keeping it to
themselves."

The colonel drew himself up with an air of pique.

"As you please, caballero," he replied coldly. "I cannot feel annoyed at
your prudence; still, I would observe that you have given a wrong
meaning to my remarks. I only wished to offer you my escort in crossing
an ill-famed gorge, in which the band of the dangerous robber, El
Buitre, is at this moment ensconced."

"I know the man by repute," the stranger said in a somewhat more affable
tone. "My friend and myself will, I hope, be sufficient to keep him at
arm's length; still, though I do not accept your offer, I thank you for
the cordiality which urged you to make it."

The conversation broke off here. The two men bowed with all the marks of
the most exquisite politeness, and turned their backs on each other. The
colonel, annoyed at the way in which his advances had been met, gave the
order for departure, and went to fetch his daughter. An instant later he
reappeared with her; the band mounted, and, on a signal from Don
Sebastian, set out. On passing before the strangers, who watched their
departure, the colonel took off his hat, as did Don Cornelio. Doña
Angela gave a graceful bow, accompanied by a charming smile. The
strangers, in their turn, uncovered and bowed respectfully to the party.

"There, scoundrel," the colonel said as he threw an ounce to the
landlord, who watched their departure with a cunning look, "there's a
plaster for your wounds."

Saccaplata sharply picked up the ounce, thrust it into his pocket, and
crossed himself as he muttered,--

"You will want a good many ounces to cure your wounds, you will. Bah!"
he added, with a sinister laugh, "it is now El Buitre's affair; let them
settle it together."

When Don Sebastian had left the hostelry he divided his party into
three: two of his servants rode in front, gun on thigh; two others
behind; while he and Don Cornelio, having Doña Angela between them, rode
in the middle. All being thus arranged, and the order given to keep a
careful outlook, the cavalcade started at a sharp trot.

In the meanwhile the two strangers, as we have said, remained at the
mesón. They watched the little party for a long time, and then, as their
horses had finished eating, they put on their bridles and tightened
their girths.

"My faith, Don Louis!" the younger of the two at length said, "I can't
help it; I must tell you what I have on my mind, or I shall choke."

"Speak, my friend," his comrade said with a sad smile. "I know as well
as you do what is troubling your mind."

"Perhaps so; still that would surprise me."

"Listen, then, Belhumeur. You are asking yourself at this moment why I
was so rude to that gentleman whom I do not know, and whom I saw for a
moment for the first time in my life?"

"By my faith! You have guessed it: that was, in truth, my thought. I
seek in vain the reason for such extraordinary conduct on your part, and
I confess that I give it up as a bad job."

"Do not trouble yourself any further, my good fellow. I was
involuntarily guided by a secret presentiment, by a species of
incomprehensible instinct, which forced me to act as I did."

"That is strange."

"Yes, is it not so? You know the feeling of instinctive repulsion one
experiences on touching a reptile?"

"Of course."

"Well, when that man advanced toward me, even before I saw him, I felt
his presence, if I may say so; my heart beat violently; and when he
addressed me I felt a sudden and incomprehensible pain."

Belhumeur regarded him for a moment with fixed attention.

"And you conclude from that?" he said.

"That this man will be my enemy at some appointed moment; that he will
stand in my path, gloomy and implacable, and prove fatal to me."

"Come, my friend, that is not possible. You are leaving this country,
never to return to it, since, in spite of all your researches, you have
been unable to find the man on whose behalf you came. The man you saw
this morning is a field officer in the Mexican army, and it is not very
likely he will leave his country: everything opposes it. Where can you
meet again?"

"I do not know, Belhumeur; I seek neither to guess nor to foresee the
future. It is evident that, after leaving you at the Hacienda del
Milagro, I shall proceed to Guaymas, where I shall embark, I know not
yet for what country; and it is my settled purpose never to set foot in
Mexico again. Still I repeat to you, although it may appear absurd, I am
convinced that that man will be my enemy some day, and that one of us
will kill the other."

"Come, come, I will not discuss that subject with you; it is better for
us, I fancy, to start, for we have a long journey before us today."

"That is true, my friend. Let us start, and think no more of my
forebodings. They will turn out as Heaven may direct."

"Amen!" Belhumeur said. "That is how I like to see you; thus you
resemble my brave Raphael, my dear Loyal Heart, to whom I wish to make
you known before leaving you."

"You will afford me the greatest pleasure."

They mounted their horses, paid the landlord, and in their turn quitted
the mesón de San Juan, walking their horses in the direction of the
barranca del mal paso, where the colonel had preceded them. They
proceeded for some time in silence, side by side. At length the
Canadian, who could not remain long without speaking, took the word.

"Do you not think, Don Louis, that, supposing the colonel spoke the
truth, two men like ourselves would prove very useful to him?"

"What does that concern us?" Don Louis asked sharply.

"Us nothing; and assuredly, if only that soldier, to whom you have such
an antipathy, were concerned, I should not trouble myself about him, but
leave him to settle with the bandits as best he could."

"Well?"

"Don't you understand me?"

"No, on my honour."

"Did you not notice the charming girl that accompanies him?"

"Of course I did."

"Would it not be frightful--?"

"Good heavens!" the Count de Prébois Crancé, whom the reader has
doubtlessly recognised,[4] quickly interrupted him, "that would be
fearful. Poor child! Forward, Belhumeur, forward! We must save her."

"Ah!" the Canadian thought to himself, "I was sure I should find the
soft place."

The two men bowed over their horses' necks, and started with the
velocity of the tempest. They had scarce gone a mile when cries and
shots reached their ears.

"Forward--confound it, forward!" the count shouted, urging his horse to
increased speed.

"Forward!" Belhumeur repeated.

They rushed into the barranca at headlong speed, and fell like two
demons into the midst of the bandits, whom they saluted with two shots;
then clubbing their rifles, they employed them like maces, bounding into
the medley with indescribable fury.

It was high time for this assistance to reach the colonel. Three of his
servants were killed; Don Cornelio was lying wounded on the ground;
while Don Sebastian, with his back against a block of granite, was
desperately defending himself against five or six bandits who assailed
him.

El Buitre had seized Doña Angela, and thrown her across his saddle-bow,
in spite of her shrieks and resistance; but suddenly Don Louis dealt the
bandit a crushing blow on the head, which hurled him to the ground, and
delivered the girl. Belhumeur all this time did not remain inactive; he
wounded and trampled under his horse's hoofs all those who dared to
oppose his passage.

The salteadores, surprised by this sudden attack, which they were far
from anticipating--frightened by the carnage the newcomers caused among
their comrades, and not knowing how many foes they might have upon them,
were seized with a panic fear, and fled in the utmost disorder,
clambering up the rocks. El Garrucholo, at the peril of his life, picked
up his captain, whom he would not abandon, and El Buitre once again
escaped the garota. The salteadores lost in this skirmish more than
two-thirds of their numbers.

When tranquillity was restored, and the bandits had completely
disappeared, Don Sebastian warmly thanked the two adventurers for the
timely aid they had rendered him. Don Louis received politely, but very
coldly, the colonel's advances, confining himself to saying that if he
had been so fortunate as to save his life, he found a reward in his own
heart, and that was sufficient for him; but, in spite of the colonel's
pressing, he refused to tell him who he was, alleging as his sole reason
that he was about to leave Mexico for ever, and that he did not wish to
lay on him a burden so heavy as gratitude. At this remark Doña Angela
drew nearer to Don Louis, and said with a smile of gentle reproach,--

"It is quite natural that you who have saved our lives should forget the
fact, or at least attach but slight importance to it; but my father and
myself will remember it for ever."

And before Don Louis could prevent it, the lovely girl bounded like a
fawn, threw her arms round his neck, and holding up her pure forehead,
which was still rather pale,--

"Kiss me, my saviour!" she said, with tears in her eyes.

The count, affected, in spite of himself, by an action full of such
simple frankness, respectfully kissed the maiden's brow, then turned
away, that she might not read the sweet and yet painful impression so
simple an action had produced on him.

Doña Angela, smiling and blushing, sought refuge in her father's arms,
leaving in Don Louis' hand a small relic she usually wore round her
neck.

"Keep it," she said to him, with that sweet Spanish superstition so full
of grace; "it will bring you good fortune."

"Yes, I will keep it, señorita," the count replied, hiding it in his
bosom, "as a reminiscence of a moment of happiness you unconsciously
caused me this day, by proving to me that, in spite of misfortunes, my
heart is not so dead as I fancied."

The preparations for departure were made. Don Sebastian, deprived of his
servants, could not dream of continuing his journey. He decided on
returning to Guadalajara, in order to obtain another escort
sufficiently strong to protect his daughter from such a danger as that
she had escaped by a miracle. He was, however, greatly embarrassed by
Don Cornelio, whom he did not wish to abandon, and yet could not
transport.

"I will take charge of this man, caballero," Don Louis then said to him.
"Do not trouble yourself about him further. My friend and I are in no
great haste. We will carry him to the mesón of San Juan, and not leave
him till he is thoroughly cured."

Two hours later the two parties separated in front of Saccaplata's
mesón, who saw them return with great terror; but the colonel thought it
advisable, for Don Cornelio's sake, to appear ignorant of the part the
landlord had played in the attack, to which himself and daughter had so
nearly fallen victims.

Don Sebastian and Don Louis separated with a frigid bow, like men who
are persuaded they will never meet again. But no one can foresee the
future, and unconsciously chance was about to bring them hereafter face
to face under strange circumstances, the realisation of which neither
assuredly suspected at the moment.


End Of Prologue.


[3] He knows not where to look; he fears or distrusts everything. If he
is afraid of the anger of Heaven, why did he insult it?

[4] See the "Tiger Slayer." Same publishers.




CHAPTER I.

THE NIGHT HALT.


Before the discovery of the rich placers in the neighbourhood of San
Francisco, California was completely wild and almost unknown. The port
of San Francisco, the finest and largest in the world, destined to
become very shortly the commercial _entrepôt_ of the Pacific, was at
that time only frequented by whalers, who, at the period when the whales
retire to the shallow water, came to fish there, cut them up, and melt
down their blubber.

A few Flat-head Indians wandered haphazard through the vast forests that
covered the seaboard; and in this country, which trade has now seized
on, and which is entering, with all sail set, into the movement of
progress, wild beasts lorded it as masters.

An old officer of Charles X.'s Swiss Guard had founded a poor colony on
the territory of San Francisco, and cut down trees, which he converted
into planks by the aid of a few watermills.

Such was the condition in which this magnificent country languished,
when suddenly the news of the discovery of rich placers in California
burst on the world like a shell. Then the country, as if touched by the
magic wand of some powerful enchanter, became all at once transformed.
From all parts of the world adventurers flocked in, bearing with them
that feverish activity and boundless audacity which ignore all
difficulties, and surmount every obstacle.

At a spot where, a few days previously, gloomy and mysterious forests,
old as the world, stretched out, a city was created, improvised, and
within a few months counted its inhabitants by tens of thousands. The
port, so long deserted, was crammed with vessels of every sort and every
size, and the gold fever renewed the Saturnalia of the Spanish
conquistadors of the Middle Ages.

For some time after, this country offered to the eye of the observer a
sight the most hideous, the most grand, the most heart-rending, and most
striking that can be imagined. All was mingled, confounded, and
upturned. It was a confusion, a hurly-burly impossible to describe,
where nothing existed any longer--where every tie was broken, every
social idea annihilated; and in this terrible pell-mell, in this
frightful race to the placers, rogues and gentlemen, soldiers and
priests, diplomatists and physicians, jostled each other, all running,
howling, wielding the dagger or the revolver, possessed by only one
idea, instinct, or passion--that of gold. For gold these men would have
sold everything--conscience, honour, probity, everything, even to
themselves!

We will not enter into fuller details of this wondrous period, during
which California emerged from her nothingness, to take her place, after
ten years of desperate struggling, among the civilised peoples. Other
pens, far more eloquent than ours, have undertaken the rude task of
telling us the history of these striking incidents. We will confine
ourselves to stating that, at the period of our story, gold had only
just been discovered, and California was struggling against the first
raging attack of _delirium tremens_.

It was about three years after the events we narrated in our prologue.

In the Sierra Nevada, upon the picturesque slopes that descend gradually
to the sea, in the heart of an immense virgin forest a hundred leagues
from San Francisco, between that city and Los Angeles, the heat had been
stifling during the day. At sunset the sea breeze had risen, and
slightly refreshed the atmosphere; but it sank again almost immediately,
and the temperature had again become heavy and oppressive.

The motionless trees concealed beneath their dense foliage birds of
every description, which only revealed their presence at intervals by
shrill and discordant cries. Hideous alligators wallowing in the mud of
the swamps, or holding on to the trunks of dead trees scattered here and
there, were the only living beings that animated the landscape, which
was rendered even more gloomy and mournful by the pale, uncertain, and
tremulous flickering of the moonbeams that filtered with great
difficulty through the rare openings in the verdurous forest dome, and
sported capriciously and fantastically about the trees and branches,
though unable to lessen the mysterious obscurity that reigned in the
leafy covert.

A noise of horses' hoofs was heard on one of the innumerable tracks made
by the wild beasts as they proceed in search of water, and two men
debouched into a clearing formed by the fall of several trees that had
died of old age, and whose mossy trunks were already in a state of
decomposition.

These men were both dressed in the costume of hunters or wood rangers,
and were armed with American rifles, long knives, and _machetes_. A
_reata_, rolled up and fastened to the saddle-bow, allowed them to be
recognised as partisans from the Mexican frontiers.

Both had passed middle life; but there the resemblance between them
ended. At the first glance it was easy to guess that one belonged to the
Northern European race; while his comrade, on the contrary, by the olive
tint of his complexion, and his angular features, offered a perfect type
of the Indian aborigines of Chili, so eloquently celebrated by Ercilla,
and known in South America by the name of Araucanos--a powerful,
intelligent, and energetic race, the only one of all the native tribes
of the New World which has managed to retain its nationality, and caused
its independence to be respected to the present day.

These two men were Valentine Guillois, better known as the
"Trail-hunter," and Curumilla, his silent and devoted companion ever
since the day that chance so many years previously had led Valentine
into Araucania.[1]

Years, while accumulating on the heads of the two men, had produced but
a slight change in their external appearance. They were still quite
upright, and seemed equally vigorous. A few more wrinkles had formed on
the Frenchman's pensive brow, and some silvery threads were added to his
locks; his features, more angular than before, had assumed those firm
and distinct lines, alone produced by reflection and long contests
valiantly sustained; his eye was still equally frank, but the flash was
more incisive; and his face wore that melancholy impression which
deceptions of every description, and great grief, stamp indelibly on the
countenance of powerful men, whom the fearful storms of life have bowed,
though not broken.

The Indian was still morose and concentrated. Age, which had laid even a
smaller hold on his organisation than on that of his comrade, had merely
increased the worthy Araucanian's habitual taciturnity, and drawn over
his gloomy face a thicker veil of that stoical fatalism peculiar to the
aboriginal race of America.

The two men advanced slowly side by side, apparently plunged in deep
thought. At times Valentine stopped, looked cautiously around him, and
then resumed his march, shaking his head dubiously. Each time that the
hunter reined in his horse Curumilla imitated him, though not evidencing
by the slightest sign that he took any interest in his companion's
operations.

The forest grew with each step denser, the paths became narrower, and
all appeared to forebode that the horses would soon be unable to
advance, impeded as they were by the creepers that were intertwined into
a thick trellis-work in front of them.

The two horsemen at length reached the clearing to which we have
already alluded, after intense difficulty. On arriving there, Valentine
stopped, and heaving a sigh of relief,--

"By Jove!" he said, "Curumilla, my good friend, I was mad to believe you
and follow you so far; it is evident that we are lost."

The Indian shook his head in denial.

"Hem! I am aware that you fellows have a marvellous talent for following
a trail, and that you rarely lose your way, even in a place you have
never visited before. Still the darkness is so intense here, that I can
hardly distinguish objects only two paces ahead of me. Come, allow that
we have lost ourselves. Hang it! That may happen to anybody. I propose
that we stop here and await sunrise before we renew our search, the more
so because, for nearly two hours, it has been impossible to discover the
slightest trace proving to us that we are still on the right road."

Curumilla, without replying, dismounted, and explored the clearing on
all sides; then, at the expiration of a few minutes, he returned to his
friend's side, and gave him a sign to mount again. Valentine had
carefully followed his movements.

"Well," he said, checking him, "are you not convinced yet?"

"One hour more," the Indian replied, liberating himself gently, and
getting into his saddle.

"Hang, it all!" Valentine said, "I confess I am growing tired of playing
at hide and seek in this inextricable forest, and if you do not give me
a positive proof of what you assert, I will not stir from this spot."

Curumilla bent toward him, and, showing him a small object, said,--

"Look!"

"Eh?" Valentine remarked in surprise, after carefully examining the
object his comrade handed him. "What the deuce is it? Why," he added
almost immediately, "I ought to have recognised it at once: it is a
cigar-case, and a handsome one too. There is a cigar still in it, if I
am not mistaken."

He remained for an instant in thought.

"It is true," he went on, "that I have not seen these luxurious products
of civilisation for a long time; indeed, since I gave them up to lead
the life of a free hunter. Where did you find it, Curumilla?"

"There," he answered, stretching out his arm.

"Good! The owner of that case cannot be far from us, so let us push on."

He pocketed the case, and the two horsemen set out once more.

After crossing the clearing, the path on which they entered began
gradually to widen, and soon they noticed, by the moonbeams that lighted
them at intervals, that the path had been trodden by a large number of
cloven-footed animals, which had cropped the leaves and broken down the
branches on both sides. These traces were still quite fresh.

"Come," Valentine said gaily, "I was wrong just now, Curumilla. We were
really on the right track, and I believe we shall soon catch up the
persons we have so long been seeking."

Something like a smile attempted to contract the Indian's features; but
the attempt was not a happy one, and stopped at a grimace. All at once
Curumilla laid his hand on his comrade's bridle, and bending forward,--

"Listen," he said.

Valentine listened attentively; but, for all that, several moments
passed ere he could distinguish aught else than those confused and
mysterious sounds which never expire in the desert: at length something
resembling a musical note borne on the breeze gently died away on his
ear. The hunter started back in surprise.

"Ah, by Jupiter!" he exclaimed, "that musician has chosen a strange time
to give a concert. I am curious to see such an original a little nearer.
Let us push on."

After marching for about a quarter of a mile further they began to see a
fire flashing through the trees, and distinctly heard a masculine and
sonorous voice singing to the accompaniment of a jarana. The hunters
stopped in surprise, and listened.

"By heaven!" the Frenchman muttered, "it is the romancero of King
Rodrigo, sung by an unknown voice at night in the heart of a virgin
forest. Never has that powerful poetry affected me so deeply. In truth,
everything here harmonises with that song, which is so thoroughly
sorrowful and despairing. Whoever he may be, I must see the man who has
unconsciously caused me a few moments of such gentle emotion. Were it
the demon in person, I would shake his hand ere the last strains had
ceased vibrating on the strings of his jarana."

And without further deliberation, Valentine, after giving Curumilla a
sign to follow him, resolutely entered the circle of light. At the sound
of horses' hoofs, the stranger, with a movement swift as thought, threw
the guitar across his back, and leaped up with a sabre in his right hand
and a revolver in the other.

"Hold!" he shouted boldly; "stop, if you please, caballero, or I shall
fire."

"Pray do not do so, señor," Valentine answered, who considered it
prudent to obey the order given him, "for you would run the risk of
killing a friend, and they are too rare in the desert to be received,
when met, by a pistol shot."

"Hum! I trust what you say is true," the other answered, still on the
defensive; "still I should feel obliged by your explaining to me, in two
words, who you are, and what you are seeking after the acquaintance
becomes more intimate between us."

"Of course, caballero; I see no inconvenience in satisfying your wishes,
especially as prudence is one of the theological virtues recommended in
the regions where we now are."

"On my soul, you appear to me to be a jolly fellow! I hope we shall
become friends ere long; and to prove to you that I sincerely desire it,
and at the same time to arouse your confidence, I will begin by telling
you who I am, which will not take long."

"Pray do so."

The stranger then thrust his revolver into his belt, took three paces
forward, removed his wide-brimmed hat, whose long feather swept the
ground, and saluted his new acquaintance ceremoniously.

"Señor caballero," he said with infinite grace and politeness, "my name
is Don Cornelio Mendoza de Arrizabal, gentleman of the Asturias, noble
as the king, and poor at this moment as Job of Bohemian memory. The few
_novillos_ lying around me are my property, and that of my partner,
absent at this moment in search of a few strayed members of the herd,
but whom I expect at any moment. These animals were purchased by us at
Los Angeles, and we are taking them to San Francisco, with the purpose
of selling them at the best price to the gold-seekers and other
adventurers collected in that curious city."

After uttering this short speech the young man bowed again, put his hat
on his head, placed the point of his sabre on his boot, and waited, foot
forward, and his hand on his hip.

Valentine had listened attentively, and when he spoke of his partner a
flash of joy sparkled in the hunter's eyes.

"Caballero," he answered, uncovering in his turn, "my friend and myself
are two wood rangers, hunters, or trail-seekers, whichever you may
please to term us. Attracted by the light of your fire, and the
harmonious song that reached our ears, we came toward you for the
purpose of claiming from you that hospitality which is never refused in
the desert, offering to share our provisions with you, and to be hail
fellows well met so long as we may remain in your agreeable company."

"You are welcome, caballeros," Don Cornelio replied nobly. "Pray
consider the little we possess as your own."

The hunters bowed and dismounted.


[1] These two characters have been introduced in another work by our
author, and are old friends to French readers.




CHAPTER II.

FIFTEEN YEARS' SEPARATION.


The reception offered the travellers by Don Cornelio was stamped with
that graceful kindness and careless ease which so eminently distinguish
the Spanish character. Although the adventurer's resources were
extremely limited, still he gave the little he possessed with such
complacency and so much good humour to his guests, that the latter knew
not how to thank him for the attentions he lavished upon them.

After supping as well as they could on _tasajo_ (jerked meat) and
_tortillas_ of maize, washed down with _pulque_ and _mezcal_, they
carefully wrapped themselves in their zarapés, lay down on the ground
with their feet to the fire, and soon appeared to be buried in a deep
sleep.

Don Cornelio took up his jarana, and leaning against a larch tree,
hummed one of those interminable Spanish romances he was so fond of, in
order to keep awake while awaiting his partner's return.

The bivouac where our friends now found themselves was certainly not
without a degree of the picturesque. The uncertain gleams of the fire
were reflected fantastically on the heads of some seven hundred and
fifty novillos, lying side by side, ruminating and sleeping, while the
horses were devouring their provender, stamping and neighing. The
Spaniard twanged his guitar, and the two hunters slept peacefully. This
scene, at once so simple and so singular, was worthy the pencil of
Callot.

Two hours thus passed away, and nothing occurred to disturb the repose
the encampment enjoyed, and the moon sank lower and lower on the
horizon. Don Cornelio's fingers stiffened; his eyes closed; and at
times, despite his efforts to keep awake, his head fell on his chest. In
despair, the Spaniard at last, beaten by fatigue, was about to yield to
the sleep that overpowered him, when a distant noise suddenly dispelled
his somnolency, and restored him the full use of his mind and other
faculties.

By degrees this noise, at first vague and indistinct, became louder; and
a horseman, armed with a long goad, entered the clearing, driving before
him a dozen novillos and half-savage bulls. After being helped by Don
Cornelio in stockading the straying animals he brought back, the
partner, who was no other than Count Louis de Prébois, dismounted and
sat down to the fire with that nonchalance and careless motion produced
in energetic natures, not so much by fatigue as by discouragement and
moral lassitude.

"Ah!" he said, looking at the two men stretched out at the fire, and
who, in spite of the noise caused by his arrival, still slept, or
appeared to do so, "we have visitors, I see."

"Yes," Don Cornelio made answer, "two hunters from the great prairies. I
thought I ought not to refuse them hospitality."

"You have done well, Don Cornelio: no one has a right in the desert to
refuse the stranger, who asks for them courteously, the heat of his fire
and a moiety of his _tasajo_."

"That was my idea."

"Now, my friend, lie down by our guests and rest yourself. This long
watch after the day's toil must have fatigued you beyond measure."

"But will you not sleep a few moments, Don Louis? Rest must be more
necessary to you than to myself."

"Permit me to watch," the count answered with a sad smile. "Rest was not
made for me."

Don Cornelio did not press him any further. Long accustomed to his
companion's character, he considered it useless to make any more
objections. A few moments later, wrapped in his zarapé, and with his
head on his jarana for a pillow, he slept soundly.

Don Louis threw a few handfuls of dry wood on the fire, which threatened
to expire, crossed his arms on his chest, and, leaning his back against
a tree, indulged in his thoughts, which were doubtlessly sorrowful and
very bitter; for the tears soon fell from his eyes, and ran down his
pallid cheeks, while stifled sighs exhaled from his bosom, and muttered
words escaped from his lips, crushed between his teeth by sorrow.

So soon as the count, after ordering Don Cornelio to take some repose,
fell down exhausted at the foot of a tree, the hunter, who appeared to
be sleeping so profoundly, suddenly opened his eyes, rose, and walked
gently toward him step by step.

Several hours passed away thus, Louis being still plunged in mournful
thoughts, Valentine standing behind him, leaning on his rifle, and
fixing on him a glance full of strange meaning.

The stars gradually expired in the depths of the sky, an opal-coloured
band began slowly to stripe the horizon, the birds awoke beneath the
foliage, sunrise was at hand. Don Louis let his head fall on his chest.

"Why struggle longer?" he said in a hoarse, deep voice. "What good to go
farther?"

"Those are very despairing words in the mouth of a man so strong as
Count Louis de Prébois," a low but firm voice whispered in his ear, with
a tone of gentle and sympathising reproach.

The count shuddered as if he had received an electric shock; a
convulsive tremor agitated all his limbs; and he bounded to his feet,
examining with haggard eye, pale brow, and disordered features, the man
who had so suddenly replied to the words pain had torn from him. The
hunter had not changed his position; his eye remained obstinately fixed
upon him, with an expression of melancholy, pity, and paternal kindness.

"Oh!" the count muttered in terror, as he passed his hand over his dank
forehead; "it is not he--it cannot be he! Valentine, my brother!--you
whom I never hoped to see again--answer, in Heaven's name, is it you?"

"'Tis I, brother," the hunter said gently, "whom Heaven brings a second
time across your path when all seems once again to fail you."

"Oh!" the count said with an expression impossible to render, "for a
long time I have been seeking you--for a long time I have called on
you."

"Here I am."

"Yes," he continued, shaking his head mournfully, "you are here,
Valentine; but now, alas! It is too late. All is dead in me
henceforth--faith, hope, courage: nothing is left to me--nothing but the
desire to lie in that tomb, where all my belief and all my departed
happiness are buried eternally!"

Valentine remained silent for a few moments, regarding his friend with a
glance at once gentle and stern. A flood of memories poured over the
hunter's heart; two glistening tears escaped from his eyes, and slowly
coursed down his bronzed cheeks; then, without any apparent effort, he
drew the count toward him, laid his head on his wide and loyal chest,
and kissed him paternally on the forehead.

"You have suffered, then, severely, my poor Louis," he said to him
tenderly. "Alas, alas! I was not there to sustain and protect you; but,"
he added, turning to heaven a glance of bitter sadness and sublime
resignation, "I too, Louis, I too, in the heart of the desert, where I
sought a refuge, have endured agonising grief. Many times I felt myself
strangled by despair; often and often my temples were crushed in by the
pressure of the furious madness that invaded my brain; my heart was
broken by the terrible anguish I endured; and yet, brother," he added in
a soft voice, filled with an ineffable melodiousness, "yet I live, I
struggle, and I hope," he said, so low that the count could hardly hear
him.

"Oh! Blessed be the chance that brings us together again when I
despaired of seeing you, Valentine."

"There is no such thing as chance, brother: it is God who prepares the
accomplishment of all events. I was seeking you."

"You were seeking me over here?"

"Why not? Did you not yourself come to Mexico to find me?"

"Yes; but how did you learn the fact?"

Valentine smiled.

"There is nothing extraordinary in it. If you wish it, I will prove to
you in a few words that I am much better informed than you suppose, and
that I know nearly all that has happened to you since our separation at
the hacienda of the Paloma."

"That is strange."

"Why so? About three months ago were you not at the Hacienda del
Milagro?"

"I was."

"You left it after spending some days there on your return from a
journey you had undertaken to the far west, in search of a rich
auriferous placer?"

"It is true."

"During that expedition, full of strange and terrible incidents, two men
accompanied you?"[1]

"Yes; a Canadian hunter and a Comanche chief."

"Very good. The hunter's name was Belhumeur, the chief's Eagle-head, I
think?"

"They were."

"Do you not remember revealing to Belhumeur (a worthy and honourable
hunter, by the way) the reason of the gloomy sorrow that devours you,
and for what motives, mere vague suspicions though they were, you had
come to Mexico in order to look for your dearest friend, from whom you
had been separated so many years?"

"Yes, I remember telling him all that."

"The rest is not difficult to comprehend. I have known Belhumeur many
years, and Heaven brought us together during a hunt on the Rio Colorado.
One night, while seated at the fire, where our supper was roasting,
after talking about a thousand indifferent things, Belhumeur, whom you
had left only a few days previously, began by degrees to talk about you.
At first, absorbed in my own thoughts, I paid but slight attention to
his recital; but when he described to me your meeting with Count de
Lhorailles in the desert, your name, uttered by Belhumeur
unintentionally, made me tremble. It was then my turn to cross-question
him. When I had learned everything, by making him tell the story twenty
times over, my resolution was immediately formed, and two days later I
set out on your track. For three months I have been following you, and
have at last come up with you--this time, I hope, never to part again,"
he added with a stifled sigh. "Still I do not know what has occurred to
you during the last three months. Tell me what you have been about. I am
listening."

"Yes, I will tell you all. My object, indeed, in seeking you was to
demand the fulfilment of a solemn promise."

The hunter's brow grew dark, and he frowned.

"Speak," he said; "I am listening. As for the promise to which you
allude, when the moment has arrived I shall know how to fulfil it."

"The sun is rising," Louis answered with a sad smile; "I must pay the
proper attention to my herd."

"I will help you. You are right; those poor brutes must not be
neglected."

At this moment the gloom was dispersed as if by enchantment; the sun
appeared radiant on the horizon; and thousands of birds of every
variety, hidden beneath the foliage, gaily celebrated its advent by
singing their matin hymn to it.

Don Cornelio and Curumilla shook off the torpor of sleep, and opened
their eyes. The Indian chief rose, and walked toward Valentine with that
slow and majestic step peculiar to him.

"Brother," the latter said, taking the Araucanian's hand in his own, "I
was not alone in my search for you. I had near me a friend whose heart
and arm never failed me, and whom I have ever found ready to help me in
weal and woe."

Don Louis gazed doubtfully at the man whom the hunter pointed out to
him, and who stood motionless and stoical before him. Gradually his
features were expanded, his memory returned, and he affectionately
offered his hand to the Indian, saying with deep emotion,--

"Curumilla, my brother!"

At this proof of memory and friendship, after the lapse of so many
years--this frank and true emotion on the part of a man to whom he had
already given so many marks of devotion--the crust of ice that
surrounded the Indian's heart suddenly melted, his face assumed an
earthy hue, and a convulsive tremor agitated all his limbs.

"Oh, my brother Louis!" he exclaimed with an accent impossible to
describe.

A sob resembling a roar burst from his chest; and, ashamed of having
thus betrayed his weakness, the chief turned quickly away, and hid his
face in the folds of his robe.

Like all primitive and energetic natures, this man, on whom adversity
had no effect, was moved like a weak child by the immense joy he
experienced at seeing once again Don Louis, the man whom Valentine loved
more than a brother, and whose absence he had so long lamented.

"Then you will not leave me again, brother?" Louis asked anxiously.

"No, nothing shall separate us henceforth."

"Thanks," the count answered.

"Come, come," Valentine gaily remarked, "let us attend to the cattle."

All were soon on the move in the bivouac. Don Cornelio understood
nothing of what he saw. These strangers, who had arrived but a few hours
ago, already so attached to his friend, talking with him like old
acquaintances, produced in him a series of notions each more extravagant
than the other; but Don Cornelio was a philosopher, and more than that,
remarkably curious. Certain that all would end sooner or, later in a
satisfactory explanation, he gaily made up his mind, and had no idea of
asking any information, especially as the two helps chance had sent him
could not fail to be extremely useful to him in guiding the
undisciplined animals which the count and himself had burdened
themselves with, and had yet so far to drive.

A person must have himself been a _vaquero_ in the great American
savannahs, in order to form an idea of the numberless difficulties met
with in guiding novillos and untamed bulls for hundreds of leagues
across virgin forests and arid plains, defending them against wild
beasts which follow their track, and snap them up under your very eyes
if you do not take care, and, like the roaring lion of the Gospel,
wander incessantly round the herd, seeking what they may devour. At
other times the animals must be defended against the raving madness, or
_estampida_, caused by the want of water and the refraction of the sun,
during which they rush in every direction, and gore those who try to
bring them back. A man must be desperate like Don Louis, or a careless
philosopher like Don Cornelio, not to recoil before the perils and
difficulties of so hazardous a trade; for, among the eventualities we
have enumerated, we have not mentioned the _temporales_, or tempests,
which in a few minutes overthrow the face of nature, hollow out lakes,
and throw up mountains; nor the _Indios bravos_, or nomadic Indians, who
watch the caravans, plunder the merchandise, and murder the drivers or
traders.

Valentine in vain racked his brains in order to discover why his friend,
whom he had known to be so effeminate and weak, could have resolved on
adopting such a mode of life. But his astonishment almost became
admiration when he saw him at work, and recognised the complete
metamorphosis that had been effected in him, both morally and
physically, and the cold, indomitable energy which had usurped the place
of the careless weakness and original irresolution of his character.

He studied him thus carefully during the whole time he was employed in
restoring order among the herd, and organising everything for the day's
march.

"Oh!" he said to himself, "this chosen organisation has been purified by
misfortune. There remain at the bottom of that half-broken heart a few
noble chords, which I will manage to set in motion when the time comes."

And for the first time since many days a feeling of hearty joy caused
the trail-seeker to quiver.


[1] See "The Tiger Slayer." Same publishers.




CHAPTER III.

A SAD MISTAKE.


Several days elapsed ere the two friends resumed their interrupted
conversation.

They had continued their journey toward San Francisco without any
incident worth noticing, owing to the skill of Valentine and Curumilla.
Although this was the first time they had advanced so far from the
regions they were accustomed to traverse, their sagacity made up so well
for their want of knowledge that they avoided, with extreme good
fortune, the dangers that menaced the success of their journey, and
foresaw obstacles still remote, but which their knowledge of the desert
caused them to guess, as it were, intuitively.

The two old friends observed, we may say studied, each other. After so
long a separation they required to restore a community of ideas. That
communion of thoughts and feelings which had existed so long between
them might be eternally broken through the different media into which
they had been thrown, and the circumstances that had modified their
characters. Each of them rendered greater by events--having acquired the
consciousness of his personal value and his intellectual power--had
possibly the right no longer to admit, without previous discussion,
certain theories which were formerly recognised without a contest.

Still the friendship between the two men was so lively, the confidence
so entire, and the devotion so true, that, after a fortnight's
travelling side by side--a fortnight during which they touched on the
most varying subjects without once introducing the one they had so much
interest in thoroughly discussing--they convinced themselves that they
stood to each other precisely in the same position as before their
separation.

Either through lassitude or deference, or perhaps the tacit recognition
of his foster brother's superiority over him, during this fortnight, Don
Louis, happy, perhaps, at having found once more the man who had been
wont to think and act for him, had not once attempted to assume an
independent position, but insensibly fell back under that moral
guardianship which Valentine had so long exercised over him.

The two other persons lived on a perfectly good understanding--Don
Cornelio through carelessness, perhaps, Curumilla through pride.

The Spaniard--a dear lover of liberty, happy at living in the open air
without troubles or annoyances of any description--goaded his novillos,
strummed his jarana, and sang the interminable _Romancero del Rey
Rodrigo,_ which he began again imperturbably so soon as he had finished,
in spite of Valentine's repeated remarks about the silence that must be
maintained in the desert, in order to avoid the ambuscades which the
Indians constantly place like so many spiders' webs in the path of
incautious travellers. The Spaniard listened docilely, and with a
contrite air, to the hunter's remonstrances; but, so soon as they were
ended, he twanged a tune, and recommenced his romancero--a philosophy
which the trail-seeker, while blaming, could not refrain from admiring.

Curumilla was always the man we have seen him--prudent, foresighted, and
silent--but with a double dose of each quality. With eyes ever opened
and ears alert, the Araucanian chief rode from one end of the file to
the other, watching so carefully over its safety that no accident
occurred up to the day when we resume our narrative.

They thus descended the woody slopes of the Sierra Nevada, and entered
the naked and sandy plains that stretch down to the sea, and on which,
with the exception of San José and Monterey (two towns in the last
throes of existence), the traveller only sees stunted trees and thorny
shrubs scattered at a great distance apart.

Three days before reaching San José--a miserable _pueblo_, which serves
as a gathering place for hunters and arrieros who frequent these parts;
but where the population, decimated by fevers and misery, can do but
little for the _forasteros_ (strangers)--the caravan encamped on the
banks of a stream, beneath the shelter of a few trees that had grown
there by accident, and which the sea breeze shook incessantly, and
covered with that fine sand which enters the eyes, nose, ears, and
nothing can keep out.

The sun was plunging into the sea under the form of a huge fire-ball;
there was a fresh breeze; in the distance appeared a few white sails,
which, like light kingfishers fearing a tempest, were hastening to
reach San Francisco; the coyotes were beginning to bark furiously on
the plain; and the few birds nestled on the branches tucked their heads
under their wings, and prepared to go to sleep.

The fires were lighted, the animals penned, and after supper each
hastened to repair, by a few hours' sleep, the fatigue of a long day's
journey beneath a burning sky.

"Sleep!" Louis said. "I will keep the first watch--the idler's watch,"
he added with a smile.

"I will take the second, then," Valentine said.

"No, I will take that," Curumilla objected. "An Indian's eyes see
clearly in the night."

"Hum!" the hunter remarked; "and yet I fancy my eyes are not so bad
either."

Curumilla, without further reply, placed his finger on his lips.

"Good!" the hunter said; "as you wish it, keep watch in my place, chief.
When you are tired, however, be sure and wake me."

The Indian bowed. The three men wrapped themselves in their zarapés, and
lay on the ground, Don Louis alone remaining awake.

It was a magnificent night: the sky, of a deep azure, was studded with
an infinity of stars that sparkled like diamonds; the moon poured forth
its tremulous and pallid beams; the atmosphere, wondrously pure and
transparent, allowed the country to be surveyed for an enormous
distance; the evening breeze had risen, and deliciously refreshed the
air; the earth exhaled acrid and balmy perfumes; the waves died away
amorously, and with mysterious murmurs, on the beach; and in the
distance might be indistinctly traced the outlines of the coyotes which
prowled about, howling mournfully, for they scented the novillos.

Louis, seduced by this splendid evening, and yielding to that prairie
languor which conquers the strongest minds, was indulging in a gentle
reverie. He had attained that stage of mental somnolency which is not
waking, and yet not sleeping. He was enjoying the magic pictures his
fancy conjured up, when he was suddenly roused from this charming
sensation by a hand pressing heavily on his shoulder, while a voice
muttered in his ear the single word,--

"Prudence."

Louis, suddenly recalled to a consciousness of the present, opened his
half-closed eyes, and turned sharply round. Curumilla was leaning over
him, and repeated his warning, with a sign of terrible meaning. The
count seized his rifle, which rested near him.

"What is the matter?" he asked in a low voice.

"Come, but keep in the shade," Curumilla replied in the same tone.

Louis obeyed the hint, whose importance he recognised. Lying down on the
ground, he glided gently in the direction indicated by the Indian.

He soon found himself sheltered behind a thicket, where he saw Don
Cornelio and Valentine in ambush, with their bodies bent forward, and
looking anxiously into the darkness.

"Good heavens, friends!" the count said, "what is the meaning of this?
The profoundest silence prevails around us. All appears tranquil. Why
this alarm?"

"Curumilla noticed this evening, before our halt, traces of Yaqui
Indians. You know, brother, that these demons are the most daring
robbers in the world. It is plain that they are after our beasts."

"But what makes you suppose that? These traces, whose existence I do not
deny, may belong to travellers as well as to vagabonds. Nothing up to
the present makes us suppose that these fellows intend attacking us, and
we have not even seen them."

A sinister smile contracted the chief's thin lips, and, touching the
count's arm with his finger, while at the same time lifting his own
robe, he showed him a bleeding scalp hanging from his belt.

"Oh, oh!" Don Louis said, "have those demons ventured so near us, then?"

"Yes; and had it not been for Curumilla, whose eye is never closed, and
mind ever on the watch, our animals would probably have been carried off
more than an hour ago."

"Thanks for his vigilance, then," the count said with an expression of
annoyance, which he could not entirely conceal; "but you know the
Indians, comrades: so soon as they find they are detected, they are no
longer to be feared. I believe that, after the lesson they have
received, we are now in safety, and we need not trouble ourselves about
them more."

"No, brother, you are mistaken. Look at your novillos; they are
restless. At each instant they raise their heads, and do not eat their
food in comfort. God has given animals an instinct of self-preservation
which never deceives them. Believe me, they fear a danger, and scent
enemies not far from them."

"It is possible, indeed. Let us watch, then."

The four men remained thus silent and attentive. An hour almost passed
away, and nothing happened to confirm their suspicions. Still the bulls
pressed more closely together. They had left off eating, and their
restlessness increased instead of diminishing.

Suddenly Curumilla stretched out his arm in a north-eastern direction,
and after laconically whispering, "Do not stir," he gave Valentine his
rifle to hold, and before his friends had time to guess the direction he
had taken, he disappeared in the gloom. The three hunters exchanged a
silent glance, and cocked their rifles, so as to be ready for any event.

There cannot be a more painful position than that of the brave man who,
in a strange country and on a dark night, is obliged to stand on guard
against a danger whose extent he cannot calculate. Affected by the
silent majesty of solitude, he creates phantasms a hundredfold more
terrible than the actual danger, and feels his courage fly away
piecemeal beneath the harsh pressure of waiting for something unseen.

Such was the situation in which our three friends now were; and yet they
were three lion hearts, accustomed for many years to Indian warfare, and
whom no peril, however great it might have been, would have been able
to affect beneath the warm beams of the sun; but, during the darkness,
imagination creates such horrible phantoms, that, if we may be allowed
to employ a trivial comparison, we might say that people are not so much
afraid of the danger itself as of the fear of that danger.

The three men had remained in this awkward situation for some time; when
suddenly a fearful yell rose in the air, followed by the fall of a body
to the ground, and the flight of several men, whose black outlines stood
out on the horizon. The adventurers fired at random, and rushed rapidly
in the direction where they heard the struggle, which seemed still going
on.

At the moment they arrived, Curumilla, whom they recognised, had his
right knee pressed into the chest of a man he held down under him, while
his left hand compressed his throat, and reduced him to the most perfect
state of powerlessness.

"Wah!" the Araucanian said, turning to his comrades with a look of
inexpressible ferocity, "a chief!"

"Good prize," Valentine said. "Thrust your knife into the scoundrel's
chest, and there's an end of him."

Curumilla raised his knife, whose blade sent forth a bluish flash.

"A moment," Don Louis exclaimed. "Let us see first who he is; we shall
still be able to kill him if we think fit."

Valentine shrugged his shoulders.

"Let the chief settle that business," he said; "he understands it
better than we do. When you have one of those vipers under your heel you
must crush him, lest he may sting you presently."

"No," the count remarked resolutely, "I will never consent to see a man
murdered before me. That poor wretch has acted in accordance with his
nature; let us act in accordance with ours, then. Curumilla, I implore
you, allow your prisoner to rise, but watch him, so that he cannot
escape."

"You are wrong, brother," the implacable hunter replied; "you do not
know these demons so well as I do. Still act as you please; but you will
eventually see that you have committed a folly."

The count made no reply, but only gave Curumilla another sign to do as
he ordered. The Araucanian obeyed with repugnance. Still he helped his
half-strangled prisoner to rise, and while carefully watching him, led
him to the fire, where the hunters had already preceded him.

The count took a rapid glance at the Indian. He was a man of Herculean
stature, powerfully built, and still young, with haughty, gloomy, and
cruel features; in a word, though he was a handsome rather than an ugly
man in appearance, there was an expression of roguery, baseness, and
ferocity about him, which in no way pleaded in his favour. He wore a
species of hunting shirt, without sleeves, of striped calico, drawn in
round the waist by a large girdle of untanned deer hide; breeches of the
same stuff as the shirt hung down to his knees; and the lower part of
his legs was protected from stings by leather gaiters fastened to the
knee and ankle. He wore on his feet moccasins artistically worked, and
adorned behind by several wolf tails--a mark of distinction only allowed
to renowned warriors. His plaited hair was raised on either side his
head, while behind it fell to his waist, and was decorated with plumes
of every possible colour. Round his neck hung several medals, among
which was one rather larger than the rest, representing General Jackson,
ex-President of the American Union. His face was painted with four
different colours--blue, black, white, and red.

So soon as he found himself in the presence of the hunters seated round
the fire, he crossed his arms on his chest, raised his head haughtily,
and waited stoically till they thought proper to address him.

"Who are you?" Don Louis asked him in Spanish.

"Mixcoatzin (the Serpent of the Cloud)."

"Hum!" Valentine muttered to himself, "the scoundrel is well named. I
never saw such a hangdog face as his before."

"What did Mixcoatzin want in my camp?"

"Does not the _Yori_ know?" the Indian said imperturbably. "Mixcoatzin
is a chief among the Yaquis."

"You wished to steal my cattle, I suppose?"

"The Yaquis are not robbers; all that is on their land belongs to them.
The palefaces need only return to their home on the other side of the
great salt lake."

"If I condemn you to death what will you say?"

"Nothing; it is the law of war. The paleface will see how a Yaqui chief
endures pain."

"You allow, then, that you deserve death?"

"No; the paleface is the stronger--he is the master."

"If I let you go what will you think?"

The Indian shrugged his shoulders.

"The paleface is not a fool," he said.

"But suppose I do act in that way?"

"I shall say that the paleface is afraid."

"Afraid of what?"

"Of the vengeance of the warriors of my nation."

It was Don Louis' turn to shrug his shoulders.

"Then," he proceeded, "if I restored you your liberty you would feel no
gratitude?"

"Why should I be grateful? A warrior should kill his enemy when he holds
him. If he does not do so he is a coward."

The hunters could not refrain from a start of surprise at the
enunciation of this singular theory. Don Louis rose.

"Listen," he said. "I do not fear you, and I will give you a proof of
it."

And, with a movement quick as thought, he seized the long tail that hung
down the chiefs back, and cut it off with his knife.

"Now," he added, buffeting him with the tress he had cut off, "be off,
villain: you are free. I despise you too much to inflict on you any
other punishment than that you have undergone. Return to your tribe,
and tell your friends how the whites avenge themselves on enemies so
contemptible as yourself, and those that resemble you."

At the deadly insult he received the Indian's face became hideous; he
suffered a momentary stupor caused by shame and anger; but by a
supernatural effort he suddenly overcame his feelings, seized Don Louis'
arm, and thrusting his face into the Frenchman's,--

"Mixcoatzin is a powerful chief," he hissed. "Let the Yori remember his
name, for he will meet him again."

And, bounding like a tiger, he dashed into the plain, where he at once
disappeared.

"Stop!" Don Louis shouted to his friends, who were rushing in pursuit;
"Let him escape. What do I care for such a wretch's hatred? He can do
nothing to me."

The hunters reluctantly took their seats again by the fire.

"Hum!" Louis added, "I have perhaps committed a folly."

Valentine looked at him.

"Worse than a folly, brother," he said; "a sad mistake. Take care of
that man: one day or other he will revenge himself on you."

"Possibly," the count said carelessly; "but when did you begin to fear
the Indians so greatly, brother?"

"From the day I first learned to know them," the hunter said coldly.
"You have offered that man an insult which demands blood; be assured
that he will make you repent of it."

"I care little."

After these few words the hunters resumed their interrupted sleep, and
the rest of the night passed without any fresh incident.

At sunrise the adventurers continued their journey; and by night, after
a day of incredible fatigue through the burning sands of the savannah,
they at length reached the _pueblo_ or _lugar_ of San José, where the
inhabitants received them with shouts of joy, persuaded as they were
that the strangers would not leave without supplying them with a few of
those objects of primary necessity which they have themselves no means
of procuring.

San José is the last caravan halt before reaching San Francisco. The
travellers had made a journey of more than one hundred and eighty
leagues in less than three weeks, through difficulties and dangers
without end--a speed hitherto unexampled.




CHAPTER IV.

EXPLANATIONS.


The hunters placed their animals in a vast corral; then they sought a
shelter for themselves in a mesón, the landlord of which, a perfect
likeness of the worthy Knight of La Mancha, received them to the best of
his ability. After the rough journey they had made, it was a great
delight to the adventurers to rest their heads once again beneath a
roof, and be, for a few hours at least, lodged in a manner almost
civilised.

Don Louis and Valentine occupied the same cuarto, while Curumilla and
Don Cornelio selected that exactly facing theirs. So soon as these
provisional arrangements were made, and supper enjoyed in common, all
retired to rest.

Before lying down on the _cuadro_, covered with an oxhide, intended for
his bed, Don Louis walked up to Valentine, who, lying back in a _butaca_
(easy chair), was smoking a cigarette, and idly watching the blue smoke
ascend in spirals.

"What are you thinking about?" he asked him, as he leant familiarly on
the back of the butaca.

"About you," Valentine replied, turning to him with a smile.

"About me?"

"Yes. What other anxiety can I have at present, save to see you happy?"

The count looked down on the ground and sighed.

"It is impossible," he said.

Valentine looked at him.

"Impossible!" he repeated. "Oh, oh! Have we reached that point? Come,
let us have an explanation, once for all."

"You are right; the hour has arrived: let us have a hearty explanation."

The count drew up a butaca, sat down opposite Valentine, took a cigar
from the case his foster brother handed him, and lit it. The hunter
followed all his movements attentively. When he saw him comfortably
installed, he said,--

"Speak."

"Alas! My life has nothing very interesting in it; it has resembled that
of all adventurers. At one time rich, at another poor, I have wandered
about, traversing Mexico in every direction, dragging after me the
memory of my lost happiness, like the galley slaves cannon ball. For a
moment I imagined that a future might still exist for me, and that I
might at least regain my rank in the world, if I did not secure again a
position like that I had lost I started for San Francisco, that weird
Eldorado, whose marvels the hundred-mouthed rumour was narrating. There
I found myself mixed up with a crowd of greedy and unbridled
adventurers, whose life was one continued orgy, and whose sole passion
was gold. I saw there, within a few months, the most prodigious
metamorphoses. I saw the most scandalous fortunes spring up and collapse
again, and plunging resolutely into this gulf, I demanded from chance my
share of feverish joys and intoxicating emotions; but I lacked faith,
and nothing succeeded with me. I tried every profession, ever pursued by
that implacable fatality which was determined to crush me. I had great
difficulty in saving myself from a death by hunger. In turn hunter,
porter, Heaven knows what, my efforts availed nothing in that Babel,
where the condemned of civilisation jostled each other, who, all marked
with the indelible seal of Dante's reprobates, piled ruin on ruin to
form themselves a pedestal of ingots, which was immediately overthrown
by another. Disgusted with this mingled life of blood, filth, rags, and
gold, I set off, resolved to become a drover. A noble profession, is it
not, for a Count de Prébois, whose ancestors made three crusades?" he
added, with a bitter laugh. "But I knew generals ostlers, marquises
waiters; hence I, who had never been anything, could, without any great
degradation, become a trader in cattle. And then I had another object in
the choice of my profession. Ever since my arrival in North America I
have been looking for you: I hoped to find you again some day. For the
first time fortune has smiled on me, you see, as I have succeeded in
meeting with you. That is all I had to say to you. Now you know as much
about my life as I do; so ask me no more."

After these words, uttered in a sharp voice, the count threw himself
back on his butaca, relit his cigar, crossed his arms on his chest, and
seemed determined not to add a word. Valentine looked at him for a long
time with the most concentrated attention, at times tossing his head,
and frowning with evident dissatisfaction. At length he resolved to
renew the conversation.

"Hum!" he said, "I now know your whole life, I grant it. There is
nothing very extraordinary about it in a country like that where we are.
It in no way departs from the common law. You would do very wrong to
complain."

"I do not complain," the count exclaimed quickly; "I merely assert a
fact."

"Of course," Valentine said; "and yet, in all you have told me, one
point remains obscure to me."

"Which?"

"You told me all you wished to do--that is well; but leaving out of the
question the fraternal friendship that attaches us, and which, however
powerful it may be, cannot to my mind account for your settled
determination to find me again, you have not told me for what purpose
you sought me so obstinately."

The count sprang up, and his eye flashed.

"Have you not guessed it, Valentine?"

"No!"

The count let his head fall, and for a few moments the conversation was
again interrupted.

"You are right, Valentine: better finish at once, and never return to
the subject again; besides, you know as well as I what I wish to say,"
the count replied, with the accent of a man whose mind is made up.

"Perhaps so," the hunter said laconically.

"Come, come, I am not an ass; and on the morning of that day when you
asked a shelter at my bivouac, you understood me at the first word I let
fall."

"It is possible," Valentine said imperturbably; "still, as I have no
pretence to the art of divination, be good enough to explain yourself
clearly and categorically."

"You insist on it?"

The hunter bowed his assent.

"Well, be it so," the count went on; "you are still the same man you
were fifteen years ago."

"Are we not referring to that very period now?" Valentine said with a
smile.

"Ah!" the count exclaimed, striking the arm of his butaca, "you see that
you understood me."

"Did I say the contrary?"

"Why, then, do you demand----?"

"Because it must be so," the hunter said dryly.

"Be at rest, for I will repeat your own words."

"I am listening."

"You remember, I suppose, a cold winter night, in the bedroom of my
house at Paris?"

"December 31st, 1834, at eleven in the evening," Valentine remarked.

"Yes; the rain lashed the window panes, the wind whistled in the long
passages. I was awaiting your coming. You arrived. Then, as now, I was
face to face with ruin. I wished to die: you prevented me."

"It is true. Did I do wrong?"

"Perhaps," the count said in a hollow voice; "but these are the words
you made use of."

"Allow me to repeat them myself; for, in spite of the fifteen years that
have elapsed, Louis, that scene is as present to my mind as if it took
place yesterday. After proving to you that you did wrong to despair,"
Valentine said in a solemn voice, "that all was not lost, I replied to a
final objection you raised, 'Be easy, Louis, be easy. If I have not
fulfilled my promise in two years, I will hand you the pistols myself,
and then--' 'Then?' you asked. 'Then,' I added, 'you shall not kill
yourself alone.' 'I accept,' you answered. Those were the words that
passed between us on that night, which decided your future and made a
man of you. Is it not so? Have I forgotten the slightest detail?
Answer."

"No, you have forgotten nothing, Valentine."

"Well?"

"Well, now that I have faithfully fulfilled the promise I made you, I
come to claim of you the complete execution of our compact."

"I do not comprehend you."

"What! You do not comprehend me?" the count said, bounding from his
butaca.

"No," Valentine answered coldly. "Did I not keep my promise? Ah, Louis,
since you insist on it, by heavens!" he added, growing animated in his
turn, "let us reckon up accounts. I ask nothing better. What do you mean
by talking to me of fulfilling an agreement? Have I not fulfilled my
engagements? Did I not find for you that woman you despaired of ever
seeing again? Did you not marry her? Did you not enjoy with her ten
years of perfect happiness? By what right do you complain of the
fatality that pursues you? By what right do you curse your destiny,
ungrateful man! Whose happiness lasted ten years--ten ages in this
earth? Look around you. Show me a man who, throughout his whole life,
can reckon one year of that happiness you rail at, and then I will pity
you, will weep with you, and, if it must be, help you to die. Oh! All
men are the same--weak in the presence of joy as in grief, forgetting,
in a few hours of adversity, years of happiness. And so, after fifteen
years, you have returned to the same point. Insensate! Do you know, you
who speak in that way, what it is to pass a whole existence of suffering
and horrible agony: to feel hour by hour, minute by minute, your heart
lacerated, and that without hope, and yet smile and seem gay--in a word,
live? Have you for a single day endured that atrocious suffering, you
who speak so deliberately about dying?"

Gradually, while speaking, Valentine had grown animated, his features
were contracted, and his eyes flashed flames. Louis gazed on his friend
without comprehending him, but startled at the state of exaltation in
which he saw him.

"Valentine," he exclaimed, "Valentine, in heaven's name, calm yourself!"

"Ah!" the hunter continued, with a ghastly laugh, "you suffer, you
say--you are unhappy; and yet listen. That woman you loved, whom I found
for you again, whom I enabled you to marry--well, it was not love I felt
for her, but idolatry. To be able to tell her so I would joyfully have
parted with my blood drop by drop; and yet I, to whom you have just told
your grief, I placed you in each other's arms. I smiled--do you
understand me?--smiled on your love, and without a murmur, a word, to
reveal that passion which gnawed my heart, I fled into the desert, alone
with my love. Face to face with it I suffered for fifteen years. Oh, my
God, my God! The wound is as painful now as on the first day. Tell me,
Louis, now that you know all--for we are frank with each other--what are
your sufferings compared with mine? By what right would you die?"

"Oh, pardon me, pardon me, Valentine!" Louis exclaimed, as he rushed
into his arms. "Oh! You are right; I am very ungrateful to you."

"No," Valentine answered sadly, as he returned his embrace; "no, Louis,
you are a man; you have followed the common law. I cannot and ought not
to be angry with you. Pardon me, on the contrary, for allowing myself to
be carried away so far as to reveal to you the secret which I had sworn
to bury eternally in my heart. Alas! We have all our cross to bear in
this world, and mine has been rude. God doubtlessly decreed it so,
because I am strong," he added, with an attempt at a smile. "But, to
return to yourself, it is true that youth has fled far from us, with its
gay perspective and smiling illusions; life has no longer anything to
offer us, save the painful trials of a ripe age. I am as wearied of
existence as yourself; it weighs equally on me as on you. You see, my
friend, I am fully of your opinion. I will not only not prevent you from
dying, but I wish to accomplish my promise fully by accompanying you
into the tomb."

"You, Valentine! O no! It is impossible."

"Why so? Is not our position the same? Have we not both suffered
equally? An implacable creditor, you have asked me to honour my
signature. Very good; but on one condition."

Louis was too well acquainted with his foster brother's firm and
resolute character to try and combat his will.

"What is it?" he asked simply.

"I shall choose the mode of death."

"Be it so."

"Oh, pardon me, Louis! I shall not propose an ordinary suicide, so I
must have your word of honour before I explain myself more fully."

"I give it you."

"Good! There are two difficult things for a man to do in this
world--arranging his life, and arranging his death. The man who kills
himself coldly by blowing out his brains in his room, after writing to
his friends to announce his suicide, is either a coward or a madman.
That is not the sort of suicide I wish; it means nothing, it proves
nothing, and is of no service. But there is a manner of suicide which I
have ever dreamed of, because it is noble and great: it is that of the
man who, unable or unwilling to do more with a life he despises,
sacrifices it for his fellow men, with no other object than that of
being useful to them, and falls after accomplishing his task."

"I believe I understand you, Valentine."

"Perhaps so; but let me finish. We are in the country best prepared for
such a design. Already several attempts--all unsuccessful, however--have
been made, especially by the Count de Lhorailles in his colony of
Guetzalli. Sonora, which is the richest country in the world, is in the
last throes, under the brutalising and unintelligent system of the
Mexican government. Well, let us restore life to this country; let us
galvanise it, summon to our aid the French emigrants in California, and
come here to give liberty to a people whose energetic character will
comprehend us. What do we risk in the event of non-success? Death! Why,
that is exactly what we desire. At any rate, when we have fallen, we
shall sleep in a shroud of glory as martyrs, bearing with us the regrets
and sympathies of all. Instead of killing ourselves like cowards, we
shall have died in the breach like heroes. Is not that martyrdom the
noblest, the most sublime of all?

"Yes, Valentine, you are right--always right Oh, men like ourselves can
only die in that fashion!"

"Good!" Valentine exclaimed; "you have understood me."

"Not only have I understood you, brother, but I guessed your meaning
before."

"How so?"

"When I met the Count de Lhorailles for the last time in the desert, I
was returning with Belhumeur and an Indian chief from visiting a placer
of incalculable value which that Indian had discovered, and the
ownership of which he gave to Belhumeur, who, in his turn, handed it
over to me. On my return, I proceeded to Mexico, where I entered into
negotiations with several notable persons; among others, the French
_chargé d'affaires_. You of course know how slow everything is to
succeed in this unhappy country. Still, owing to the rich samples I had
the precaution to bring with me, and, above all, the powerful protection
of certain persons, I succeeded in founding a company, of which I was
appointed chief, with the right of levying a French company, armed and
disciplined, in order to take possession of the placer, and work it on
behalf of the company."

"What then?"

"Well, I returned to San Francisco, and made a few arrangements; but I
needed two things--first, patience, and next, money to enlist my men and
purchase the necessary stores; and--shall I confess it to you?--what I
most needed was the desire to succeed. But you, Valentine, have caused
that desire to spring up in me; your presence has restored all my
energy, and though I know not how I shall remove all the obstacles that
oppose the execution of my plan, I shall do so, I swear it to you."

"What were you doing in Sonora, then?"

"I can hardly explain it to you. My speculation in cattle was more a
flight than anything else. I was disgusted with everything, and tried to
make an end of it, no matter how."

"Now it is my turn. Tomorrow, at sunrise, you will start. You will
proceed at full speed to San Francisco. Your excursion in Sonora was
only an exploring tour. You will employ any pretext you like, in a word,
and set to work earnestly forming your company. During that time I will
sell your herd, and arrange so as to procure you the funds you require.
Trouble yourself about nothing, but push ahead boldly."

"But how will you manage it? The sum I need is large."

"That does not concern you: let me arrange matters in my way; At the
appointed hour I will furnish you with more than you want, so it is
settled. You will start at sunrise?"

"I will do so; but when and where shall I see you again?"

"Ah! That is true. On the twenty-fifth day from this, at sunset, I will
enter your room."

"But I do not know myself yet where I shall lodge."

"Do not let that trouble you; I shall find out."

"So, then, at sunset of the twenty-fifth day?"

"Yes, I will arrive with the treasure ships," Valentine replied with a
laugh.

"Thanks, brother; you are my good genius. If my life has had a few
blemishes, you are preparing me a glorious death to expiate them."

"Pity yourself, pray! I am going to make of you a Francisco Pizarro and
an Almagro."

The two men shook hands affectionately, while exchanging a sorrowful
smile. After a few more unimportant remarks, they threw themselves on
their beds, where they soon fell asleep, overpowered as they were by
fatigue.




CHAPTER V.

THE CONSEQUENCES OP A LOVE SONG.


During the conversation between the foster brothers, certain events we
must describe to the reader occurred in the cuarto to which Curumilla
and Don Cornelio had retired.

On entering the room, Curumilla, instead of lying down on the cuadro
intended for him, laid his zarapé on the tiled flooring, stretched
himself out upon it, and immediately closed his eyes. Don Cornelio, on
the contrary, after hanging the lamp to a nail in the wall, trimmed up
the smoking wick with the point of his knife, sat down on the side of
the bed, with his legs hanging down, and then began in a sonorous voice
the romance of King Rodrigo.

At this slightly unseasonable music Curumilla half opened one eye,
though without protesting in any other way against this unwonted
disturbance of his rest. Don Cornelio may or may not have noticed the
Indian's silent protest; but in either case he took no heed of it, but
went on singing, raising his voice to the highest compass of which it
was capable.

"Wah!" the chief said, raising his bead.

"I was certain," Don Cornelio remarked with a friendly smile, "that the
music would please you."

And he redoubled his flourishes.

The Araucanian rose, went up to the singer, and touched him gently on
the shoulder.

"We must sleep," he said in his guttural voice, and with an ill-tempered
grimace.

"Bah, chief! Music makes a man forget sleep. Just listen.

     "'Oh, si yo naciera ciego!
     Oh, tú sin beldad nacieras!
     Maldito sea el punto--'"[1]

The Indian seemed to listen with sustained attention, his body bent well
forward, and his eyes obstinately fixed on the singer. Don Cornelio
felicitated himself internally on the effect he fancied he had produced
on this primitive native, when suddenly Curumilla, seizing him by the
hips, squeezed him in his nervous hands at in iron pincers, and lifting
him with as much ease as if he had been but a child, carried him, spite
of his resistance, into the patio, and seated him on the side of the
wall.

"Wah!" he said, "music is good here."

And, without adding another word, he turned his back on the Spaniard,
walked into his cuarto, laid himself on his zarapé, and went to sleep
immediately.

At first Don Cornelio was quite confounded by this sudden attack, and
knew not if he ought to laugh or feel vexed at the simple way in which
his companion had got rid of his company; but Don Cornelio was a
philosopher, gifted with an admirable character. What had happened to
him seemed so droll that he burst into an Homeric laugh, which lasted
several minutes.

"No matter," he said, when he had at length regained his seriousness,
"the adventure is curious, and I shall laugh at it for many a long day.
After all, the fellow was not entirely in the wrong. I am famously
situated here to sing and play my jarana as long as I think proper; at
any rate I shall run no risk of disturbing the sleepers, as I am quite
alone."

And after this consolation, which he administered to himself to satisfy
his somewhat offended pride, he prepared to continue his serenade.

The night was clear and serene; the sky was studded with a profusion of
stars, in the midst of which sparkled the dazzling southern cross; a
slight breeze, laden with the perfumes of the desert, gently refreshed
the air; the deepest silence brooded over San José; for, in the retired
Mexican pueblos, everybody returns home at an early hour. Everybody
appeared asleep, too, in the mesón, although at a few windows the weak
and dying light of the candles gleamed behind the cotton curtains.

Thus Don Cornelio, unconsciously yielding to the influences of this
magnificent evening, omitted the first four verses of the romancero, and
after a skilful prelude, struck up the sublime description of night:--

     "A l'escaso resplendor,
     De cualque luciente estrella,
     Que en el medroso silencio,
     Tristamente centellea."[2]

And he continued thus with eyes uplifted to heaven, and brow glowing
with enthusiasm to the end of the romance; that is to say, until he had
sung the ninety-six verses of which this touching piece of poetry is
composed.

The Mexicans, children of the Andalusians, the musicians and dancers
_par excellence_, have not degenerated in this respect from their
forefathers; on the contrary, they have, if that be possible,
exaggerated these two passions, to which they sacrifice everything.

When Don Cornelio began singing, the patio, as we have, already
remarked, was completely deserted; but gradually, as the musician became
more animated, doors opened in every corner of the yard, men and women
appeared, advanced gently to the singer, and formed a circle round him;
so that after the final strophe he found himself surrounded by a group
of enthusiastic hearers, who applauded him frenziedly.

Don Cornelio rose from the wall on which he was seated, lifted his hat,
and saluted his audience gracefully.

"Come," he said to himself, "this will be something for that Indian, who
appreciates music so slightly, to reflect upon."

"_Capa de Dios!_" an arriero said, "that is what I call singing."

"Poor Señor Don Rodrigo, how he must have suffered!" a young criada
exclaimed in short petticoats, and with a flashing eye.

"And that perfidious _picaro_ of a Count Julian, who introduced the
Moors into a Catholic country!" the landlord said with an angry gesture.

"God be praised!" the audience said in chorus; "Let us hope that he is
roasting in the lowest pit."

Don Cornelio was at the pinnacle of jubilation. Never before had he
obtained such a success. All his hearers thanked him for the pleasure he
had caused them, with those noisy demonstrations and cries of joy which
distinguish southern races. The Spaniard did not know whom to listen to,
or on which side to turn. The shouts assumed such a character of
enthusiasm, that the singer began to fear that he would be unable to get
rid of his frenzied audience the whole long night.

Fortunately for him, at the moment when, half willingly, half perforce,
he was preparing, on the general request, to recommence his romance,
there was a movement in the crowd; it parted to the right and left, and
left a passage for a tall and pretty girl, who, with a well-turned leg
confined in silk stockings with gold clocks, her _rebozo_ coquettishly
drawn over her head, and her hair buried beneath a profusion of jasmine
flowers, placed herself resolutely before the singer, and said with a
graceful smile, which allowed her double row of pearly teeth to be
seen,--

"Are you not, caballero, a noble hidalgo of Spain, of the name of Don
Cornelio?"

We must do Don Cornelio the justice to allow that he was so dazzled by
this delicious apparition that he remained for some seconds with gaping
mouth, unable to find a word.

The girl stamped her foot impatiently.

"Have you been suddenly turned into stone?" she asked, with a slightly
mocking accent.

"Heaven forbid, señorita!" he at length stammered.

"Then be good enough to answer the question I asked you."

"Nothing easier, señorita. I am indeed Don Cornelio Mendoza de
Arrizabal, and have the honour to be a Spanish gentleman."

"That is what I call plain speaking," she said, with a slight pout. "If
it be so, caballero, I must ask you to follow me."

"To the end of the world," the young man exclaimed impetuously. "I
should never travel in pleasanter company."

"I thank you for the compliment, caballero, but I do not intend to take
you so far. I only wish to conduct you to my mistress, who desires to
see you and speak with you for an instant."

"_Rayo del cielo!_ If the mistress be only as pretty as the maid, I
shall not regret the trip if it last a week."

The girl smiled again.

"My mistress is staying in this inn, only a few steps off."

"All the worse, all the worse! I should have preferred a journey of
several leagues before meeting her."

"A truce to gallantry. Are you willing to follow me?"

"At once, señorita."

And throwing his jarana on his back, and bowing for the last time to the
audience, who opened a passage for him respectfully,--

"I am at your orders," he said.

"Come, then."

The girl turned away and hurried off rapidly, the Spaniard following
close at her heels.

Don Cornelio, like all the adventurers whom a hazardous life in Europe
had cast on the American shores, nourished in his heart a secret hope
of re-establishing, by a rich marriage, his fortunes, which were more
than compromised. Several instances, though rare, we allow, of marriages
contracted in this romantic fashion, had imbedded this idea deeply in
the Spaniard's somewhat windy brain.

He was young, noble, handsome--at least he thought so; hence he
possessed all needed for success. It is true that, until this moment,
fortune had never deigned to smile on him; no young girl seemed to care
for his assassinating glances, or respond to his interested advances.
But this ill success had in no way rebuffed him, and what happened at
this moment seemed to justify his schemes, by offering him, at the
moment he least expected it, that occasion he had so long awaited.

Only one thing saddened his brow, and clouded the internal joy he
experienced, and that was the seedy condition of his attire, sadly
ill-treated by the brambles, and torn by the sharp points of the rocks,
during his long journey in Sonora. But with that characteristic fatuity
innate in the Spaniards, he consoled himself by the reflection that his
personal advantages would amply compensate for the seedy condition of
his dress, and that the lady who had sent for him, if she felt any
tender interest in him, would attach but slight value to a new cloak or
a faded cloak. It was with these conquering feelings that Don Cornelio
arrived behind the _camarista_ at the door of a cuarto, before which she
stopped.

"It is here," she said, turning round to him.

"Very good," he said, drawing himself up. "We will enter whenever you
please."

She smiled cunningly with a twinkle of her black eyes, and turned the
key in the lock. The door opened.

"Señorita," the waiting-maid said, "I have brought you the gentleman."

"Let him come in, Violanta," a sweet voice answered.

The girl stepped aside to make room for Don Cornelio, who walked in,
twisting his moustache with a conquering air.

The room in which he found himself was small, and rather better
furnished than the other cuartos in the hostelry, probably owing to the
indispensable articles the temporary occupier of the room had the
precaution to bring with her. Several pink candles burned in silver
chandeliers, and on a sofa lay a lovely young girl of sixteen to
seventeen years of age, buried in muslin, like a hummingbird in a nest
of roses, who bent on the Spanish gentleman two large black eyes
sparkling with humour, maliciousness, and curiosity.

In spite of the immense dose of self-love with which he was cuirassed,
and the intimate conviction he had of his own merits, Don Cornelio
stopped in considerable embarrassment on the threshold, and bowed
profoundly, without daring to advance into the interior of this cuarto,
which appeared to him a sanctuary.

By a charming sign the young woman invited him to draw nearer, and
pointed out a butaca, about two paces from the sofa on which she was
reclining. The young man hesitated; but the camarista, laughing like a
madcap, pushed him by the shoulders and compelled him to sit down.

Still the position of our two actors, opposite each other, was rather
singular. Don Cornelio, a prey to the most powerful embarrassment he
ever experienced, twisted the brim of his beaver in his hands, as he
cast investigating glances cautiously around; while the girl, no less
confused, timidly looked down, and seemed at present almost to regret
the inconsiderate step she had let herself be led to take.

Still, as in all difficult circumstances of life, women possess a will
of initiative greater than that of men, because they make a strength of
their weakness, and know at once how to approach the most awkward
questions, it was the lady who first regained her coolness and commenced
the conversation.

"Do you recognise me, Don Cornelio?" she asked him in a deliberate tone,
which made the Spaniard quiver.

"Alas, señorita!" he replied, trying to gain time, "where could I have
had the happiness of ever seeing you? I have only lived up to the
present in an _inferno_."

"Let us speak seriously," she said with an almost imperceptible frown.
"Look me well in the face, caballero, and answer me frankly: do you
recognise me--yes or no?"

Don Cornelio timidly raised his eyes, obeyed the order he had received
in so peremptory a fashion, and after a few seconds,--

"No, señorita," he said with a suppressed sigh, "I do not recognise you;
I do not believe that I ever had the happiness of meeting you before
today."

"You are mistaken," she replied.

"I! O no! It is impossible."

"Do not swear, Don Cornelio; I will prove to you the truth of what I
assert."

The young man shook his head incredulously.

"When a man has had once the happiness of seeing you--" he murmured.

She interrupted him sharply.

"You do not know what you say, and your gallantry is misplaced. Before
contradicting me you would do better by listening to what I have to say
to you."

Don Cornelio protested.

"I repeat," she said distinctly, "that you are mad. For two days you
travelled in the company of my father and myself."

"I!"

"Yes, you."

"Oh!"

"It is just three years ago. At that period I was only a child, scarce
fourteen: there is, consequently, nothing extraordinary in your having
forgotten me. At that period you sang your inevitable romance of Don
Rodrigo, of which I will say no harm, however," she added, with an
enchanting smile, "because I recognised you by that song. My father, now
governor and political chief of Sonora, was at that time only a
colonel."

The Spaniard struck his forehead.

"I remember," he exclaimed. "You were going from Guadalajara to Tepic,
when I had the pleasure of meeting you in the middle of the night."

"Yes."

"That is it. Let me see, your father's name is Don Sebastian Guerrero,
and yours--"

"Well, and mine?" she said, with a pretty challenging pout.

"Yours, señorita," he said gallantly, "is Doña Angela. What other name
could you bear?"

"Come," she said, clapping her dainty hands together with a ringing
laugh, "I am glad to see that you have a better memory than I believed."

"Oh!" he muttered reproachfully.

"We had a rather disagreeable adventure, if I remember right, with
certain bandits?" she continued.

"Extremely disagreeable, for I was half killed."

"That is true; I remember something of the sort. Were you not rescued by
a hunter, a wood ranger? I can hardly remember."

"A noble gentleman, señorita," Don Cornelio replied with fire, "to whom
I owe my life."

"Ah!" she said carelessly, "that is possible. The man helped you, nursed
you, and then you parted?"

"Not exactly."

"What!" she said, with some agitation, "you continued to live together?"

"Yes."

"Always?"

"Yes."

"But now?" she said, with a certain hesitation in her voice.

"I repeat to you, señorita, that we have not separated."

"Indeed! Is he here?"

"Yes."

"In this hostelry?"

"On the other side of the yard."

"Ah!" she murmured, letting her head fall on her breast.

"What's the matter now?" the Spaniard asked himself.

And not interrupting the sudden reverie into which the young lady had
fallen, he waited respectfully until it pleased her to renew the
conversation.


[1] Oh, if I had been born blind, or if you had been born ugly! Accursed
be the day and hour--

[2] By the feeble light of some clear star, which, in the midst of the
gloomy silence, mournfully twinkles.




CHAPTER VI.

DELILAH.


The position of our two characters toward each other was somewhat
singular. Both appeared to be watching each other, and trying to
discover the flaw in the armour; but in this struggle of a man against a
woman, the latter must inevitably prove the conqueror.

Don Cornelio had possibly a rather exaggerated opinion of himself. This
was what ruined him, and delivered him bound hand and foot over to his
dangerous adversary.

Doña Angela, resting coquettishly on her elbow, with her chin on the
palm of her dainty hand, fixed on him two eyes sparkling with
maliciousness, so that the Spaniard, as it were, fascinated by the
brilliancy of this irresistible glance, had not even the will to turn
his head, and liberate himself from the deceptive charm that fascinated
him.

"Violanta," the girl said, in a voice soft and pure as the song of the
_centzontle_, the American nightingale, "have you no refreshments to
offer this caballero?"

"Oh, certainly," said the crafty camarista, with a look sufficient to
tempt St. Anthony; and she rose quickly to obey her mistress's
directions.

Don Cornelio, flattered in his heart by this politeness, which he was
far from expecting, thought it necessary to break out in excuses; but
Doña Angela cut him short by herself saying,--

"You will forgive me, caballero, for receiving you so poorly, but I did
not expect to have the honour of your visit in this wretched pueblo."

Naturally enough, Don Cornelio, infatuated with the advantages he
fancied he possessed, regarded this remark as a compliment.

Angela maliciously bit her rosy lips, and continued, with a bow,--

"But now that I have been so fortunate as to meet again with an old
friend, for I hope you will permit me to give you that appellation----"

"Oh, señorita!" the young man said with a movement of joy.

"I flatter myself that I shall have the pleasure of enjoying your
company more frequently."

"Señorita, believe me that I shall be too happy."

"I know your gallantry, Don Cornelio," she interrupted him with a smile.
"I am aware that you will seize every opportunity to offer me your
homage."

"Heaven is my witness, señorita. Unfortunately, adverse fate will
possibly ordain differently."

"Why so?"

"You are only passing through this wretched town."

"Yes. My father is proceeding to Tepic, where his new position as
governor of the province demands his residence."

"That is true. You see, then, madam, that it is almost impossible for us
ever to meet again."

"Do you think so?" she asked.

"Alas! I am atrociously afraid of it."

"Why so?" she said, bending her body forward in curiosity.

"Because, according to every probability, tomorrow, at sunrise, we shall
take diametrically opposite routes, señorita."

"Oh, that is not possible!"

"Unfortunately it is too true."

"Explain this enigma to me."

"I would it were one; but a child can read it."

"I do not at all understand you?"

"I will explain myself more clearly."

"Go on."

"When you and your father, madam, start tomorrow for Tepic, my friends
and myself will set out for San Francisco."

"San Francisco!"

"Alas! Yes."

"What need have you to go there?"

"I! None."

"Well, then?"

Don Cornelio behaved like most men when in a state of embarrassment;
that is to say, he scratched his head. At length he said,--

"I cannot leave my friends."

"What friends?"

"Those in whose company I am."

"Then they want to go to San Francisco?"

"Yes."

"What to do?"

"Ah! That is it," the Spaniard replied, more and more embarrassed by the
obligation of confessing the trade in which he was engaged, and which he
fancied must lower him to an extraordinary degree in the eyes of the
young lady whose heart he fancied he had touched.

"I am waiting," she said with a slight frown of her arched brows.

Don Cornelio, driven into his last retrenchments, determined to make a
clean breast of it.

"You must know," he said in a honeyed voice, "that my friends are
hunters."

"Ah!" she remarked.

"Yes."

"Well, what then?"

"Why, then, why, they hunt, I suppose," he continued, discountenanced by
the lady's singular tone.

"That is probable," she said, with a little silvery laugh. "And what do
they hunt?"

"Well, pretty nearly all sorts of animals."

"Specify."

"Wild bulls, for instance."

"Very good; we will say, then, that they hunt wild bulls?"

"Yes."

"Why those animals more than others?"

"I will tell you."

"I shall feel delighted."

Don Cornelio bowed.

"You must know that at San Francisco--"

"San Francisco again?"

"Alas! Yes."

"Very good: proceed."

"Oxen, bullocks, and generally all animals that serve for food, are
extremely dear."

"Ah!"

"O dear, yes! You understand that people in that country pay great
attention to finding gold, and very little to seeking food."

"Quite correct."

"So my friend reasoned thus."

"Which friend?"

"The hunter, Don Louis."

"Don Louis?"

"Yes, the man who three years back, when the bandits attacked you,
arrived so opportunely, and whom I have never quitted since."

Doña Angela experienced such a startling emotion that her face suddenly
turned pale. Don Cornelio, busied with his story, did not perceive the
effect the accidental mention of that name produced, but continued,--

"'Very good, then,' he said to himself. 'Bulls obtain fabulous prices in
California; in Mexico they may be had for almost nothing. Let us go and
buy or lasso them in Mexico.'"

"So then?"

"Well, we set out."

"You were in California at that time?"

"At San Francisco, with Don Louis."

"And now?"

"We have a magnificent herd of novillos, which we have driven a long
distance, and which we hope to dispose of at a large profit at San
Francisco."

"I hope so."

"Thank you, madam; the more so as we had an enormous difficulty in
procuring them."

"But all that does not teach me why you cannot separate from your
friends."

"At any rate not until we have sold the bullocks. You understand,
señorita, that acting otherwise would be ungentlemanly."

"That is true; but why insist on selling your bulls nowhere save at San
Francisco?"

"We do not at all insist on that."

"Then, supposing you found a good price here, you would dispose of
them?"

"I see nothing to prevent it."

Doña Angela gave a start of joy, which Don Cornelio naturally
interpreted to his own advantage.

"That might be arranged," she said.

"You think so?"

"Yes, if you are not too craving."

"You need not apprehend that, señorita."

"My father possesses a hacienda a few leagues from this town. I know
that he intends to re-form his _ganado_, and he stopped here today in
order to have an interview with his _mayordomo_."

"Oh! That is a providential chance."

"Is it not?"

"It is really. Has the mayordomo arrived?"

"Not yet: we do not expect him till tomorrow. I fancy that a day's delay
will do you no injury."

"Not the slightest."

"Well, then, if you consent, we will settle this affair while we are
together; that is to say," she added, "you will tell me the prices, that
I may inform my father."

"Ah!" he said, with a certain hesitation, "I can, unfortunately, say
nothing on that head."

"Why so? Are you not the owner of the herd?"

"Pardon me."

"Well, what then?" she interrupted, looking at him with fixed attention.

"That is to say, I am not sole owner."

"You have partners?"

"Yes, I have one."

"And that partner----?"

"Stay, madam, I prefer being frank with you, and telling you clearly how
matters stand."

"I am listening, caballero."

"I am owner without being so."

"I do not understand you at all."

"It is very simple, however, as you will see."

"I am all anxiety."

"Just imagine that Don Louis, after curing me of my wounds, felt that
loyal and open friendship for me which has no counterpart in town life.
Not only would he not consent to my leaving him, but aware that, owing
to reverses too long to repeat to you, I was almost penniless, he
insisted on my becoming a sharer in all the enterprises he thought
proper to undertake; so that, without the outlay of a penny, I hold one
half the property. Hence, as you will see, I can do nothing until I have
first taken his instructions."

"That is only just, it seems to me."

"And to me too, madam; and that is the reason why, in spite of the
lively desire I entertain to settle the business with you at once, I
find it impossible to do so."

Doña Angela seemed to reflect for a moment, then went on with a
palpitation of the heart and a tremor in her voice, which she could not
conceal, in spite of all her efforts:--

"After all, the matter is perfectly simple, and may be arranged very
easily."

"I ask nothing better; still I confess, to my shame, that I do not see
what means I should employ."

"It is a trifle, tomorrow, before the mayordomo's arrival, I will speak
with my father: he will, I doubt not, be delighted to render a service
to the man who saved our lives. You will tell your friend, he will come
to an arrangement with my father, and all will be settled."

"Indeed, madam, I did not think of that. All can be arranged in that
way."

"Unless your friend--Don Louis, I think you called him----?"

"Yes, madam, Don Louis. He is a gentleman belonging to one of the
noblest and oldest families in France."

"Ah! All the better. Unless, I say, he should not consent to deal with
my father."

"And why should he not, señorita?"

"Oh! I do not know; but on our first meeting, after saving my father's
life and mine, that caballero behaved so singularly toward us that I
fear----"

"You are wrong, madam, to suppose that Don Louis could refuse an offer
so advantageous as that you make him; besides, I will talk with him, and
am certain to bring him over to my views."

"O dear me!" she said negligently, "I have but a very slight interest in
all this. I should not like the proposal to cause you the slightest
annoyance with your partner. I am only looking after your interests in
the affair, Don Cornelio."

"I am convinced of it, madam, and thank you humbly," he replied, with a
low bow.

"I only know you. Your partner, though he rendered me a great service,
is but a stranger to me, especially after the peremptory manner in which
he declined my father's advances and offers of service."

"You are perfectly right, señorita. Believe me that I attach full value
to the delicacy of your conduct."

"Still," she continued, in an insinuating and slightly malicious voice,
"I confess to you that I should not be sorry to find myself once more
face to face with that strange man, were it only to convince myself that
the opinion I formed of him was wrong."

"Don Louis, madam," the Spaniard answered complacently, "is a true
caballero, kind, noble, and generous, ever ready to help with purse or
sword those who claim his assistance. Since I have had the honour of
living in his society I have had many opportunities of appreciating the
greatness of his character."

"I am happy to hear what you tell me, señor, for I confess that this
caballero left a very bad impression on me, doubtlessly through the
rough manner in which he parted from us."

"That bad impression was unjust, madam. As for the roughness with which
you reproach him alas! It is only melancholy."

"What!" she exclaimed quickly, while a rosy tinge suddenly invaded her
forehead, "melancholy, do you say? Is the gentleman unhappy?"

"Who is not so?" Don Cornelio asked with a sigh.

"Perhaps, though, you are mistaken."

"Alas! No, madam. Don Louis has been the victim of frightful disasters:
judge for yourself. He had a wife he adored, who had presented him with
several charming children. One night the Indians surprised his hacienda,
fired it, massacred his wife, his children, his whole family, in a word,
and himself only escaped by a miracle."

"Oh, that is horrible!" she exclaimed, as she buried her face in her
hands. "Poor man! Now I heartily pardon what appeared singularity in his
manners. Alas! The society of his fellow men must weigh upon him."

"Yes, madam, it doubtlessly does so; for the grief he endures is of that
nature which cannot be consoled. And yet, when he knows of a misfortune
to alleviate, or any good deed to do, he forgets himself only to think
of those he wishes to aid."

"Yes, you are right, caballero; that man has a noble heart."

"Alas, madam! I should ever remain below the truth in what I might tell
you of him. You must live his life, be constantly by his side, in order
to understand and appreciate him at his full value."

There were a few moments of silence. The night was drawing on; the
candles were beginning to dim; the camarista, who had but a very slight
interest in this conversation, had laid her head against the back of her
butaca; her eyes were closed, and she was enjoying that catlike sleep
peculiar to women and the feline race, and which does not prevent them
being constantly on the watch.

"Tell me, Don Cornelio," Doña Angela continued with a smile, "have you
never spoken with Don Louis about our meeting during the long period
that has since elapsed?"

"Never, madam."

"Ah!"

"Once, and only once, I remember that I tried to bring the conversation
round to that subject by some rather direct allusions."

"Well?"

"Don Louis, who, till then, had seemed to listen kindly to my
observations, suddenly requested me, in very distinct language, never to
return to that subject, remarking that he had only acted in accordance
with his duty; that he would do the same again; and that it was not
worth while talking about, the less so as chance would, in all
probability, never again bring him into contact with the persons to whom
he had been so fortunate as to render this slight service."

The young lady frowned.

"I thank you," she said in a slightly affected voice, "I thank you, Don
Cornelio, for the kindness with which you have treated the whims of a
woman you did not know."

"Oh, madam!" he exclaimed in protest; "for a long time I have been your
most humble slave."

"I know your gallantry, but will not abuse it longer. Be assured that I
shall keep our long conversation in pleasant memory. Be kind enough not
to forget the proposals I wish to make to Don Louis."

"Tomorrow, madam, at the hour you think most suitable, my friend and
myself will have the honour to present ourselves to the general."

"Do not derange yourselves, caballero; a criado will warn you when my
father is ready to receive you. Farewell!"

"Farewell!" he replied, bowing respectfully to the young lady, who
dismissed him with a gracious smile.

The Spaniard went out with joy in his heart.

"Oh!" Doña Angela murmured, so soon as she was alone, "I love him!"

Whom was she speaking of?




CHAPTER VII.

A RETROSPECT.


Before carrying our story further we must give the reader certain
details about the family and antecedents of Don Sebastian Guerrero, who
is destined to play a great part in our narrative.

The family of Don Sebastian was rich; he descended in a straight line
from one of the early kings of Mexico, and pure Aztec blood flowed in
his veins. Like several other great Mexican families, his ancestors had
not been dispossessed by the conquerors, to whom they rendered important
services; but they were obliged to add a Spanish name to the Mexican
one, which sounded harshly in Castilian ears.

Still the Guerrero family boasted loudly of its Aztec origin, and if it
seemed ostensibly devoted to Spain, it secretly maintained the hope of
seeing Mexico one day regain her liberty.

Thus, when the heroic Hidalgo, the humble curate of the little village
of Dolores, suddenly raised the standard of revolt against the
oppressors of his country, Don Eustaquio Guerrero, though married but a
short time previously to a woman he adored, and father of a son hardly
six years of age, was one of the first to respond to the appeal of the
insurgents, and join Hidalgo at the head of four hundred resolute men
raised on his own enormous estates.

The Mexican revolution was a singular one; for nearly all the promoters
and heroes were priests--the only country in the world where the clergy
have openly taken the initiative in progress, and thus displayed
profound sympathy for the liberty of the people.

Don Eustaquio Guerrero was in turn companion of those modest heroes whom
disdainful history has almost forgotten, and whose names were, Hidalgo,
Morelos, Hermenegildo Galeana, Allende, Abasolo, Aldama, Valerio
Trujano, Torres, Rayon, Sotomayor, Manuel Mier-y-Teran, and many others
whose names have escaped me; and who, after fighting gloriously for the
liberty of their country, now repose in their bloody tombs, protected by
that glorious nimbus which Heaven places round the brow of martyrs,
whatever be the cause they have defended, so long as that cause is just.

More fortunate than the majority of his brave comrades in arms, who were
destined to fall one after the other, some as victims to Spanish
barbarity, others conquered by treachery, Don Eustaquio escaped as if by
a miracle from the innumerable dangers of this war, which lasted ten
years, and at length witnessed the complete expulsion of the Spaniards
and the proclamation of independence.

The brave soldier, prematurely aged, covered with wounds, and disgusted
by the ingratitude of his fellow countrymen, who, scarce free, began
attacking each other, and inaugurated that fatal era of
_pronunciamientos,_ the list of which is already so long, and will only
be closed by the ruin of the country, and the loss of its nationality,
retired, gloomy and sad, to his Hacienda del Palmar, situated in the
province of Valladolid, and sought, in the company of his wife and son,
to recover some sparks of that happiness he had formerly enjoyed when he
was but an obscure citizen.

But this supreme consolation was denied him; his wife died in his arms
scarce two years after their reunion, attacked by an unknown disease,
which dragged her to the grave in a few weeks.

After the death of the woman he loved with all the strength of his soul,
Don Eustaquio, crushed by sorrow, only dragged on a wretched existence,
which terminated exactly one year after his wife's death. Her name was
the last word that wandered on his pallid lips as he drew his parting
breath.

Don Sebastian, who was scarce twenty years of age, was left an orphan.
Alone, without relatives or friends, the young man shut himself up in
his hacienda, where he silently bewailed the two beings he had lost,
and on whom he had concentrated all his affections.

Don Sebastian would probably have remained for many years in retirement,
without seeing the world, or caring how it went on--leading the
careless, idle, and brutalising life of those great land-holders whom no
idea of progress or amelioration impels to trouble themselves about
their estates, timid and fearful, like all men who live alone, spending
his days in hunting and sleeping--had not chance, or rather his lucky
star, brought to Palmar an old partisan chief who had long fought by the
side of Don Eustaquio, and who, happening to pass a few leagues from the
place, felt old reminiscences aroused in him, and determined to press
the hand of his old comrade, whose death he was not aware of.

The name of this man was Don Isidro Vargas. He was of lofty stature, his
shoulders were wide, his limbs athletic, and his features imprinted with
an uncommon energy; in a word, he presented in his person the type of
that powerful and devoted race which is daily dying out in Mexico, and
of which, ere long, not a specimen will be left.

The unexpected arrival of this guest, whose heavy spurs and long
steel-scabbarded sabre re-echoed noisily on the tiled floors of the
hacienda, brought life into the mansion which had been so long devoted
to silence and the gloomy tranquillity of the cloister.

Like all old soldiers, Captain Don Isidro had a rough voice and sharp
way of speaking; his manners were brusque, but his character was gay,
and gifted with a rare equanimity of temper.

When he entered the house Don Sebastian was out hunting, and the
hacienda seemed uninhabited. The captain at first found enormous
difficulty in meeting with anyone to address. At length, by careful
search, he detected a peon half asleep under a verandah, who gave some
sort of answer to the questions asked him. By great patience and
questions made with that craft peculiar to the Mexicans, the captain
succeeded in obtaining some valuable information.

The death of Don Eustaquio only astonished the worthy _soldado_
slightly; he expected it, indeed, from the moment he learnt the death of
the señora, for whom he knew his old comrade professed so deep a love;
but on learning the idle life Don Sebastian had led since his father's
death, the captain burst out in a furious passion, and swore by all the
saints in the Spanish calendar (and they are tolerably numerous), that
this state of things should not last much longer.

The captain had known the young man when he was but a child. Many times
he had dandled him on his knee, and thus, with his ideas of honour and
generosity, he thought himself obliged, as an old friend of his father,
to remove the son from the slothful existence he led.

Consequently the old soldier installed himself authoritatively in the
hacienda, and firmly awaited the return of the man he had been
accustomed to regard for a long time almost in the light of a son.

The day passed peacefully. The Indian peons, long accustomed to profess
the greatest respect for embroidered hats and jingling sabres, left him
free to act as he pleased--a liberty the old soldier did not at all
abuse, for he contented himself with ordering an immense vase full of an
infusion of tamarinds, which he placed on a table, up to which he drew a
butaca, and amused himself with smoking an enormous quantity of husk
cigarettes, which he made as he wanted them, with that dexterity alone
possessed by the Spanish race.

At about _oración_ time, or six in the evening, the captain, who had
fallen quietly asleep, was aroused by a great noise, mingled with
shouts, barking, and the neighing of horses, which he heard outside.

"Ah, ah!" he said, turning up his moustache, "I fancy the _muchacho_ has
at last arrived."

It was, indeed, Don Sebastian returning from the chase.

The old partisan, who was sitting opposite a window, was enabled to
examine his friend's son at his ease, without being perceived in his
turn. He could not repress a smile of satisfaction at the sight of the
vigorous young man, with his haughty features bearing the imprint of
boldness, wildness, and timidity, and his well-built limbs.

"What a pity," he muttered to himself, "if such a fine fellow were to be
expended here without profit to himself or to others! It will not be my
fault if I do not succeed in rousing the boy from the state of lethargy
into which he is plunged. I owe that to the memory of his poor father."

While making these reflections, as he heard the clanking of spurs in the
room before that in which he was, he fell back on his butaca, and put on
again his usual look of indifference. Don Sebastian entered. He had not
seen the captain for several years. The greeting he gave him, though
slightly awkward and embarrassed, was, however, affectionate. After the
first compliments they sat down face to face.

"Well, muchacho," the captain said, suddenly plunging _in medias res_,
"you did not expect a visit from me, I fancy?"

"I confess, captain, that I was far from supposing that you would come.
To what fortunate accident do I owe your presence in my house?"

"I will tell you presently, muchacho. For the present we will talk about
other matters, if you have no objection."

"At your ease, captain; I do not wish to displease you in any way."

"We will see that presently, _cuerpo de Dios!_ And in the first place,
to speak frankly, I will tell you that I did not come to see you, but
your worthy father, my brave general. _Voto a brios!_ The news of his
death quite upset me, and I am not myself again yet."

"I am very grateful, captain, for the kindly memory in which you hold my
father."

"_Capa de Cristo!_" the captain said, who, among other habits more or
less excellent, possessed to an eminent degree that of seasoning each of
his phrases with an oath, at times somewhat unorthodox, "of course I
hold in kind memory the man by whose side I fought for ten years, and
to whom I owe it that I am what I am. Yes, I do remember him, and I hope
soon, _canarios!_ To prove it to his son."

"I thank you, captain, though I do not perceive in what way you can give
me this proof."

"Good, good!" he said, gnawing his moustache. "I know how to do it, and
that is enough. Everything will come at its right season."

"As you please, my old friend. At any rate, you will be kind enough to
remember that you are at home here, and that the longer you stay the
greater pleasure you will afford me."

"Good, muchacho! I expected that from you. I will avail myself of the
hospitality so gracefully offered, but will not abuse it."

"An old comrade in arms of my father's cannot do that in his house,
captain, and you less than anyone else. But," he added, seeing a peon
enter, "here is a servant come to announce that the dinner is served. I
confess to you that, as I have been hunting all day, I am now dying of
hunger: if you will follow me we will sit down to the table and renew
our acquaintance glass in hand."

"I ask nothing better, _rayo de Dios!_" the captain said as he rose.
"Though I have not been hunting, I think I shall do honour to the
repast."

And without further talking they passed into a dining room, where a
sumptuously and abundantly-served table awaited them.

According to a patriarchal custom, which, unfortunately, like all good
things, is beginning to die out, at Palmar the master and servants took
their meals together. This custom, which had existed in the family since
the conquest, Don Sebastian kept up--in the first place, through respect
for his father's memory, and secondly, because the servants at the
hacienda were devoted to their master, and to some extent supplied the
place of a family.

The evening passed away, without any incident worthy of remark, in
chatting about war and the chase. Captain Don Isidro Vargas was an old
soldier, as cunning as a monk. Too clever to assail the young man's
ideas straightforwardly, he resolved to study him for some time, in
order to discover the weak points of his character, and see how he must
attack him in order to drag him out of that slothful and purposeless
life he led in this forgotten province. Thus several days were passed in
hunting and other amusements, and the captain never once alluded to the
subject he had at heart. At times he might make a covert allusion to the
active life of the capital, the opportunities of securing a fine
position which a man of Don Sebastian's age could not fail to find at
Mexico, if he would take the trouble to go there, and many other
insinuations of the same nature; but the young man let them pass without
making the slightest observation, or even appearing to understand them.

"Patience!" the captain muttered. "I shall eventually find the flaw in
his cuirass; and if I do not succeed, I must be preciously clumsy."

And he recommenced his covert attacks, not allowing the young man's
impassive indifference to rebuff him.

Don Sebastian performed his duties as master of the house with
thoroughly Mexican grace, amenity, and sumptuousness; that is, he
invented every sort of amusement which he thought would be most suited
to the worthy captain's tastes. The latter let him do so with the utmost
coolness, and conscientiously enjoyed the pleasures the young man
procured him, charmed in his heart by the activity he displayed in
pleasing him, and more and more persuaded that, if he succeeded in
arousing in him the feelings which he supposed were slumbering in his
mind, it would be easy to convert him to his own ideas, and make him
abandon the absorbing life of a _campesino_.

More than once, during the few days they spent in hunting in the
magnificent plains that surrounded the hacienda, accident enabled the
captain to admire the skill with which the young man managed his steed,
and his superiority in all those exercises which demand strength,
activity, and, above all, skill.

On one occasion especially, at the moment the hunters galloped in
pursuit of a magnificent stag they had put up, they found themselves
suddenly face to face with a cougouar, which threatened to dispute their
progress. The cougouar is the American lion. It has no mane. Like all
the other carnivora of the New World it cares little about attacking a
man, and it is only when reduced to the last extremity that it turns
upon him; but then it fights with a courage and energy that frequently
render its approach extremely dangerous.

On the occasion to which we allude the cougouar seemed resolved to await
its enemies boldly. The captain, but little accustomed to find himself
face to face with such enemies, experienced that internal tremor which
assails the bravest man when he finds himself exposed to a serious
danger. Still, as the old soldier was notoriously brave, he soon
recovered from this involuntary emotion, and cocked his gun, while
watching the crouching animal, which fixed its glaring eyes on him.

"Do not fire, captain," Don Sebastian said with a perfectly calm voice;
"you are not used to this chase, and, without wishing it, might injure
the skin, which you see is magnificent, and that would be a pity."

Don Sebastian thereupon let his gun fall, took a pistol from his
holster, and spurring his horse at the same time that he checked it,
made it rear. The animal rose, and stood almost on its hind legs; the
cougouar suddenly bounded forward with a terrible roar; the young man
dug his knees into his horse, which bounded on one side, while Don
Sebastian pulled the trigger. The monster rolled on the ground in
convulsive agony.

"_Cuerpo de Cristo!_" the captain shouted; "why, you've killed it on the
spot! No matter, muchacho; you played for a heavy stake."

"Bah!" the other said as he dismounted; "it is not so difficult as you
fancy; it only requires practice."

"Hum! It must require practice to shoot such an animal on the wing. The
ball has entered its eye."

"Yes, we generally shoot them there, so as not to spoil the skin."

"Ah, very good! To tell you the truth, though, I, who am by no means a
bad shot, should not like to try the experiment."

"You are calumniating yourself."

"Very possibly."

"Poor Pepe, my tigrero, will lose by that a reward of ten piastres--all
the worse for him. Shall we return to the hacienda, and send someone to
bring the brute in?"

"With all my heart."

They went back.

"Hum!" the captain said to himself as they galloped on, "I must have a
definitive explanation with him this very evening."




CHAPTER VIII.

A MEXICAN'S PROGRESS.


The Hispano-Americans usually drink nothing with their meals: it is only
when the _dulces_, or cakes and sweetmeats, have been eaten, and each
guest has swallowed the glass of water intended to facilitate digestion,
that the liquors are put on the table, and the Catalonian _refino_
begins to circulate; then the _puros_ and _pajillos_ are lighted, and
the conversation, always rather stiff during the meal, becomes more
intimate and friendly, owing to the absence of the inferior guests, who
then retire, leaving the master of the house and his guests at perfect
liberty.

The captain had judiciously chosen this moment to commence his attack.
Not that he hoped to have a better chance with the young man at the
termination of the meal--for the sobriety of the Southern Americans is
proverbial--but because at that moment Don Sebastian, being freed from
all cares, must more easily yield to the influence the captain fancied
he could exercise over him.

The captain poured some refino into a large glass, which he filled with
water, lit a puro, leant his elbows on the table, and looked fixedly at
the young man.

"Muchacho," he said to him abruptly, "does the life you lead in the
desert possess a great charm for you?"

Surprised at this question, which he was far from expecting, Don
Sebastian hesitated ere he replied.

"Yes," the captain said, emptying his glass, "do you amuse yourself
greatly here? Answer me frankly."

"On my word, captain, as I never knew any other existence than that I am
leading at this moment, I cannot answer your question thoroughly: it is
certain that I feel myself hipped at times."

The captain struck his tongue against his palate with evident
satisfaction.

"Ah, ah!" he said, "I am glad to hear you speak so."

"Why?"

"Because I hope you will easily accept the proposition I am about to
make to you."

"You!"

"Who else, then, if not I?"

"Speak!" the young man said with a careless air; "I am listening."

The captain threw away his cigar, gave vent to two or three sonorous
_hums_, and at length said in a sharp voice,--

"Sebastian, my dear fellow! Do you think that, if your worthy father
could return to this world, he would be well pleased to see you thus
idly wasting the precious hours of your youth?"

"I do not at all understand your meaning, captain."

"That is possible. I never pretended to be a great orator, and today
less than at any other period of my long career. I will, however, try to
explain myself so clearly that, if you do not understand me, _caray!_ It
is because you will not."

"Go on; I am listening."

"Your father, muchacho, whose history you probably do not know, was at
once a brave soldier and a good officer. He was one of the founders of
our liberty, and his name is a symbol of loyalty and devotion to every
Mexican. For ten years your father fought the enemies of his country on
every battlefield, enduring, though rich and a gentleman, hunger and
thirst, heat and cold, gaily and without complaining; and yet, had he
wished it, he might have led a luxurious and thoroughly easy life. You
loved your father?"

"Alas, captain! Can I ever be consoled for his loss?"

"You will be consoled. You have many things to learn yet, and that among
others. Poor boy! There is nothing eternal in the world--neither joy,
nor sorrow, nor pleasure. But let us return to what I was saying. Were
your father permitted to quit the abode of the just, where he is
doubtlessly sojourning, and return for a few moments to earth, he would
speak to you as I am now doing; he would ask an account of the useless
indolence in which you spend your youth, thinking no more of your
country, which you can and ought to serve, than if you lived in the
heart of a desert. Did your father endure so many sacrifices in order to
create such an existence--tell me, muchacho?"

The worthy captain, who had probably never preached so much in his life,
stopped, awaiting a reply to the question he had asked; but this reply
did not come. The young man, with his arms crossed on his chest, his
body thrown back, and his eyes obstinately fixed on the ground, seemed
plunged in deep thought. The captain continued after a lengthened
delay,--

"We," he said, "demolished; you young men must rebuild. No one at the
present day has the right to deprive the Republic of his services. Each
must, under penalty of being considered a bad citizen, carry his stone
to the social edifice, and you more than anyone else, muchacho--you, the
son of one of the most celebrated heroes of the War of Independence.
Your country calls you--it claims you: you can no longer remain deaf to
its voice. What are you doing here among your dogs and horses, wasting
ingloriously your courage, dissipating your energy without profit to
anyone, and growing daily more brutalised in a disgraceful solitude?
_Cuerpo de Cristo!_ I can understand that a man may love his father, and
even weep for him--for that is the duty of a good son, and your father
certainly deserves the sacred recollection you give him--but to make of
that grief a pretext to caress and satisfy your egotism, that is worse
than a bad action--it is cowardice!"

At this word the young man's tawny eye flashed lightning.

"Captain!" he shouted, as he struck the table with his clenched fist.

"_Rayo de Dios!_" the old soldier continued boldly, "the word is spoken,
and I will not withdraw it: your father, if he hear me, must approve me.
Now, muchacho, I have emptied my heart; I have spoken frankly and
loyally, as it was my duty to do. I owed it to myself to fulfil this
painful duty. If you do not understand the feeling that dictated the
rough words I uttered, all the worse for you; it is because your heart
is dead to every generous impulse, and you are incapable of feeling how
much I must have loved you to find the courage to speak to you in that
way. Now do as you think proper; I shall not have to reproach myself for
having hidden the truth from you. It is late. Good night, muchacho. I
will go to bed, for I start early tomorrow. Reflect on what I have said
to you. The night is a good counsellor, if you will listen in good
faith to the voices that chatter round your pillow in the darkness."

And the captain emptied his glass and rose. Don Sebastian imitated him,
took a step toward him, and laid his hand on his shoulder.

"One moment," he said to him.

"What do you want?"

"Listen to me in your turn," the young man said in a gloomy voice. "You
have been harsh with me, captain. Those truths you have told me you
might perhaps have expressed in milder language, in consideration of my
age, and the solitude and isolation in which I have hitherto lived.
Still I am not angry at your rude frankness; on the contrary, I am
grateful to you for it, for I know that you love me, and the interest
you take in me alone urged you to be so severe. You say that you depart
tomorrow?"

"Yes."

"Where do you intend going?"

"To Mexico."

"Very good, captain; you will not go alone. I shall accompany you."

The old soldier looked at the young man for a moment tenderly; then
pressing with feverish energy the hand held out to him,--

"It is well, muchacho," he said to him with great emotion. "I was not
mistaken in you; you are a brave lad, and, _caray!_ I am satisfied with
you."

The two men left Palmar together the next morning, and rode toward
Mexico, which city they reached after a ten days' journey. But during
those ten days, spent _tête-à-tête_ with the captain, the young man's
ideas were completely modified, and a perfect change came over his
aspirations.

General Guerrero's son belonged unconsciously to that numerous class of
men who are utterly ignorant of themselves, and pass their lives in
indolence until the moment when, an object being suddenly offered them,
their imagination is inflamed, their ambition is aroused, and they
become as eager in the chase as they had been previously negligent and
indifferent as to their future.

Captain Don Isidro Vargas heartily praised the intelligence with which
the young man he emphatically called his pupil understood the lessons he
gave him as to his behaviour in the world.

Don Sebastian experienced no difficulty--thanks to his name, and the
reputation his father so justly enjoyed--in obtaining his grade as
lieutenant in the army. This step was, for the young man, the first rung
of the ladder, which he prepared to climb as rapidly as possible.

It was fine work at that day, in Mexico, for an intelligent man to fish
in troubled waters; and, unfortunately, we are obliged to confess that,
in spite of the long years that have passed since the proclamation of
its independence, nothing is as yet changed in that unhappy country,
where anarchy has been systematised.

If ever a country could do without an army, it was Mexico after the
recognition of her liberty and the entire expulsion of the Spaniards,
owing to her isolation in the midst of peaceful nations, and the
security of her frontiers, which no enemy menaced. Unhappily, the war of
independence had lasted ten years. During that long period the peaceful
and gentle population of that country, held in guardianship by its
oppressors, had become transformed. A warlike ardour had seized on all
classes of society, and a species of martial fever had aroused in every
brain a love of arms.

Hence that naturally came about which all sensible people expected; that
is to say, when the army had no longer enemies before it to combat, the
troops turned their arms against their fellow citizens, vexing and
tyrannising over them at their pleasure.

The government, instead of disbanding this turbulent army, or at any
rate reducing it to a _minimum_ by only keeping up the depôts of the
various corps, considered it far more advantageous to lean on it, and
organise a military oligarchy, which pressed heavily on the country.
This deplorable system has plunged this unhappy country into disastrous
complications, against which it struggles in vain, and has dug the abyss
in which its nationality will sooner or later be swallowed up.

The army, then, after the war, assumed an influence which it has ever
since retained, and which increased in proportion as the men placed at
the head of the government more fully understood that it alone could
maintain them in power or overthrow them at its good pleasure. The army,
therefore, made revolutions that its leaders might become powerful. From
the lowest _alférez_ up to the general of division, all the officers
look to troubles for promotion--the alférez to become lieutenant, the
colonel to exchange his red scarf for the green one of the brigadier
general, and the general of division to become President of the
Republic.

Hence pronunciamientos are continual; for every officer wearied of a
subaltern grade, and who aspires to a higher rank, pronounces himself;
that is to say, aided by a nucleus of malcontents like himself, which is
never wanting, he revolts by refusing obedience to the government, and
that the more easily because, whether conqueror or conquered, the rank
he has thus appropriated always remains his.

The military career is, therefore, a perfect steeplechase. We know a
certain general, whose name we could write here in full if we wished,
who attained the presidency by stepping from pronunciamiento to
pronunciamiento without ever having smelt fire, or knowing the first
movement of platoon drill--an ignorance which is not at all
extraordinary in a country where one of our sergeant conductors would be
superior to the most renowned generals.

Don Sebastian judged his position with the infallible eye of an
ambitious man; and suddenly attacked by a fever of immense activity, he
resolved to profit cleverly by the general anarchy to gain a position.
He clambered up the first steps at full speed and became a full colonel
with startling rapidity. On reaching th

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