water was near him. From the day when he learned who the King was from
Walter Grey, until that other day when the summons to forgive his enemies
smote him to the heart, José had occupied somewhat the position of a
devout Jew “waiting for the consolation of Israel,” looking with earnest
faith for a national Messiah, a great Redeemer and Deliverer, who should
save his beloved people from all their enemies. Such a Deliverer he was
prepared to welcome and to obey, even to the death. But now a lightning
flash, scathing and burning while it illumined, had revealed to him
the necessity of another deliverance, hitherto undreamt of,—a personal
deliverance from sin. He was learning that the Son of God must be sought
as the Saviour of the soul, or He will not reveal Himself as the King
of the nations. Even the question, “Will He restore the Incas?” was
postponed, of necessity, until their child found an answer to that other
question, “Will He receive _me_, and make me over again, so that I can
serve and please Him?”
He who read was seeking as earnestly as those who listened. Fray
Fernando’s difficulties were far more complex than those of José. He
needed everything—truth, peace, light, pardon. There were times when the
last seemed the most pressing need of all. If each had tried to condense
his longings into a single prayer, that of Fray Fernando would probably
have been, “Wash me throughly from mine iniquity, and cleanse me from my
sin;” and that of José, “Create in me a clean heart, and renew a right
spirit within me.” Though it is likely José would soon have added, “Do
good in thy good pleasure unto Zion” (meaning what stood for Zion in his
mind); “build thou the walls of Jerusalem.”
XXXIII.
The King Found.
“He came to me in Power; I knew Him not.
He came to me in Love; and my heart broke;
And from its inmost depths there rose a cry—
‘My Father, oh, my Father, smile on me!’
And the great Father smiled.”
_Night and the Soul._
A quiet month glided by, bearing the _San Cristofero_ away to more
northern shores; and slowly—almost imperceptibly—drifting another bark,
long tossed by storms, towards the haven of welcome rest. So gradually
was Melchior sinking, that although Fray Fernando watched him, hour by
hour, with the devoted love of a brother born for adversity, and José
with tender kindness, it was probable that the coming Visitant, the
shadow of whose presence any stranger might readily have seen in his
face, would take them both by surprise. The more accustomed they grew to
the pleasant office of tending him, reading to him, talking with him, the
less they seemed to think that all must have an end, and that shortly.
By this time they had read the Gospels through—and not once or twice.
They had read the Epistles also; they had explored the narratives and
prophecies of the Old Testament; they had even, to José’s intense
delight, made some acquaintance with “the book of the Golden City,” as
he called the Apocalypse. But always they turned back to the Gospels
with fresh wonder, interest, and joy. What one of them, at least, found
therein, will appear in the following conversation.
It was a close and sultry afternoon. Fray Fernando had gone out to
perform the duties of his office towards some poor fever-stricken
mariners, who lay in a rude shed on the beach, called by courtesy the
Hospital. José sat beside Melchior, gently fanning him, and, as he did
so, chanting in a low harmonious voice some melody of his people.
“Ancha Incay Hocca?” Melchior repeated, opening his eyes with a smile.
“If I were you, Don José, I would rather sing a psalm than those heathen
words.”
“The words I sing are a psalm to me,” José answered; “but if they trouble
you I will stop.”
“Oh no. But I did not think there were any psalms or sacred songs as yet
rendered into your tongue.”
“Nor are there, so far as I know. These are words from a Play which my
fathers used to act before the white men came.”
Melchior heard him with indifference. What were plays to a dying man? He
had done with “vain shows;” where he was going all would be real. Still
he felt that a little interest in what interested his Indian friend was
the least proof he could give of his gratitude for a thousand benefits;
so, when José said, “Shall I tell you about it?” he answered promptly,
“If you please, Don José.”
José, with evident pleasure, began his story. “There was once,” he said,
“a great and brave chieftain, whose name was Ollantā. He rebelled against
his lord the Inca; he took for himself the province given him to rule
over; and he slew those who were sent against him. For he would fain
obey no lord, but be lord and Inca over all himself. But, after a long
time and a grievous war, in which many men were killed, he was overcome
and made prisoner; and his friends, who aided him in his rebellion, were
taken also. With their hands bound and their eyes bandaged, they were
led to Cuzco. Then, at last, the bandage was taken away. Behold! they
stood in the presence of the sole Inca. He sat on his golden throne, the
high priest on his right hand, the great general whose valour had won
the victory, on his left; and standing around him, like stars around
the sun, all his glorious court. He looked awful in his majesty. Right
sternly he asked the trembling captives, ‘Why have you done this thing?’
But they only bowed their heads and answered, ‘Father, we have nothing
to say.’ Then the Inca turned to the high priest, ‘What do these men
deserve?’ he asked. Too well the high priest knew the answer, but his
lips refused to utter it. ‘The Sun has given me a merciful heart,’ he
said. So the Inca looked from him to the victorious general, whose heart
was cast in a harder mould. And he spoke out boldly, ‘Inca, these men
have slain our fathers; they must die. Let them be tied to stakes driven
into the ground, and let their servants, who fought for them, be made
to march over their bodies. Then let those servants also be slain with
arrows.’ Then the Inca looked upon the captives; and his face was sad and
stern; ‘You have heard your sentence,’ he said.—‘Take them away.’ And the
servants wept and wailed and made sore lamentation. But Ollantā and his
friends spake never a word; for they knew that their doom was just. As
they had sown, they must reap. Only they looked up to the glorious Sun,
and around them on the fair earth, as men who take their farewell look of
all.
“Then once more spake the Inca. ‘Stay,’ he said. ‘Unbind those men. They
shall not die, but live. Ollantā, I forgive thee.’ And turning to the
guards that stood around, he added, ‘Bring the golden helmet, the mace,
and the arrows.’ (These were the signs of Ollantā’s forfeited honours.)
‘Give them back to him. And to his friends likewise restore their maces
of office, their arrows, and their bracelets.’ Moreover, forasmuch as
pardon is not complete without trust restored, he said to him, ‘Ollantā,
thou shalt govern Cuzco for me when I go forth shortly upon my warlike
expedition to Collasuyu.’ And he sealed all with the generous word, ‘I
shall go with joy; leaving, to govern here, my faithful Ollantā.’
“Oh, my friend! Ollantā’s eyes were dry at the terrible death-sentence;
but I tell you he wept then! Ollantā never knelt at the Inca’s feet to
implore his life; but I tell you, when the Inca forgave him thus, he
flung himself in the dust before him, and swore to be his slave for ever!
And, at last, the grateful, reverent love that overflowed his heart,
found voice in the words I sang just now.
‘O Inca! this is too much
For a man who is nothing.
Mayest thou live a thousand years.
I am as thou makest me;
Thou dost give me succour:
Crippled, thou makest me stand;
Fallen, thou raisest me up;
Poor, thou enrichest me;
Blind, thou givest me sight;
Dead, thou restorest life;—
Thou, indeed, teachest me to forget.’”[50]
“What, Don José, are you weeping at your own tale?” asked Melchior,
wondering at the emotion that filled the eyes and well-nigh choked the
voice of José.
The Indian dashed the unbidden drops away. “Not often do we weep, we
Children of the Sun,” he said. “Yet Ollantā wept at the Inca’s pardon;
for his heart grew soft within him, like the heart of a little child.
And I too—O Melchior, can you not read the meaning of my tale? Listen,
then. I am Ollantā, the rebel. I did not know my King, my Inca. I would
not obey Him; I fought against Him; I wanted to be lord and ruler myself,
and to do my own will, not His. But He conquered me, and took me, and led
me step by step, as it were with bandaged eyes. And now, at last, the
bandage is taken away. I have seen Him. First _there_,” indicating with
rapid gesture the Book on the table; “then _here_,” laying his hand on
his heart. “He has pardoned me—pardoned, blessed, restored; made me His
free, happy servant; told me to live and work for Him.
‘O Inca! this is too much
For a man who is nothing.
I am as thou makest me;
Thou dost give me succour:
Crippled, thou makest me stand;
Fallen, thou raisest me up;
Poor, thou enrichest me;
Blind, thou givest me sight;
Dead, thou restorest life;—
Thou, indeed, teachest me to forget.’
Ranti! Ranti! Capac Inca! Huacchacuyac!”
There was a long silence, filled with happy thought. Then, at last,
Melchior asked gently, “What of Don Ramon de Virves _now_, Don José?”
“Have I not said, ‘Thou, indeed, teachest me to forget’?” José answered.
Presently he added, with a smile, “It is not told in the Play; but for my
part, I have always believed that Ollantā stretched out his hand that day
to the general who was his enemy and sought his life, and said to him,
‘Let us be friends for the Inca’s sake.’—But I am sorry for Don Ramon de
Virves. He is gone where my pardon cannot reach him. I have told all to
the King; and I have asked Him to let me show some of them how He teaches
to forget.”
“Don José, you ought to tell Fray Fernando what you have just told me. I
would die without a shadow on my heart if only he—he too—”
“_He?_ the patre? Of course he has known all this, and far more, for many
a year—from his childhood, I suppose. I wish indeed from my heart that
I could tell Señor Hualter, who is far away from us now. He it was who
first told me about Christ the King. Instead of the gem I sought—the hope
of deliverance for my people—he put that day into my outstretched hand a
little seed, like a grain of sand. I was grieved and angry, for to my
eyes it had no beauty: it did not burn and quiver in the light like the
stones of fire. But I buried it in my heart; and lo! it sprang up and
grew, until at last there came forth a living flower, brighter and more
glorious than a thousand cold dead stones.—But the patre, oh,—he knows
everything!”
“I am sure God has marked him for His own,” said Melchior—“‘chosen him
in the furnace of affliction,’ as he read yesterday from the good Book.
But if it were not for the hope in Him, life would be a sad thing enough
for my brother and for me, Don José. Does he seem to you an old, broken,
world-weary man, with the wrinkles on his brow and the gray streaks in
his hair? In years he is yet almost young. If he has numbered eight and
thirty, it is the utmost.”
“I know he has suffered as few suffer, even in this sad world.”
“You may well say that. Think of those long, dark, weary years! And now I
go hence—I who have cost him so much, and been able to give him back so
little. But I turn to you, Don José. All that I would have been to him,
all that I would have done for him, and never can be or do, I leave to
you—you, his adopted son. I pray you to help him, guard him, watch over
him.”
“I vowed to do that, Melchior, ere I ever saw your face.”
“Yet promise now once more, to please a dying man.”
“With all my heart I promise. Perhaps,” he added, “you may be able to
watch over him yourself, from your place in yonder sky.”
“I do not think that, Don José. What do we know, after all, save so much
as that Book tells us? And it tells us scarce anything of the dead, but
that they are ‘with the Lord.’—Ah, there is Señor Don Alfonso at the
door. I would know his step amongst a thousand.”
Another was at the door also, though neither José nor Fray Fernando heard
his footsteps. But at midnight he entered unbidden, touched Melchior
with his shadowy hand, and whispered the gentle yet imperative summons,
“Arise, and go hence.” Not always without a struggle does the flesh leave
the spirit free to obey that call. With Melchior the struggle lasted
“until the breaking of the day.” But in the end there was peace. For the
last time on earth, the foster-brothers held converse together. What
passed was unheard, even by José, who kept watch in the outer room. If
“the rites of the Church” were administered, José did not know it, and
was amazed at the apparent omission.
And when the sun arose in glory, the weary spirit won its freedom. There
was one more look and smile for “Señor Don Alfonso,” there was a murmured
word of grateful farewell for José, and then the brave and faithful heart
of Melchior del Salto ceased to beat.
Fray Fernando closed his eyes, and sat down and wept beside him.
But José said, “You should not weep for him, patre. He sees the King in
His beauty.”
Yet Fray Fernando did well to weep. There are tears that bring help and
healing with them. Of such were the tears he shed over the lifeless form
of the brother whom God had given back to him so strangely from the
dead. Instead of the thoughts of restless anguish, of remorse and shame,
that had haunted him for sixteen weary years, he could think of Melchior
del Salto, now and henceforward, with tender regret; not indeed unmixed
with pain, but still calm and soothing. Meanwhile, for himself, the long
conflict of his life seemed over. Peace and reconciliation had come to
him at last, breathed softly by dying lips. And with peace there came
strength also. Possibilities of new life, of a life of healthful, holy
activity, began from that day forward to open out before him. Even yet he
might serve the God to whom Melchior del Salto had lifted up his heart
in the hour of need, and who had heard him, and saved him out of all his
distresses.
XXXIV.
The King Followed.
“So I go on not knowing;
I would not if I might!
I would rather walk in the dark with God,
Than walk alone in the light;
I would rather walk with Him by faith,
Than walk alone by sight.”
ANON.
A year has passed away since all that was mortal of Melchior del Salto
found a quiet resting-place beneath the shadow of the new church of
Callao. To Fray Fernando it has been “the beginning of years,” the first
year of a new life. Its days and nights have been filled to overflowing
with thought and action. Inward change and progress have kept pace with
outward activity; “great searchings of heart” with valiant work of
head and hand. And yet the Fray Fernando who raises his eyes from his
book, with a pleasant smile of greeting for José as he enters, looks a
healthier, happier, and even a younger man than he who brought the dying
galley-slave to his home. Nay more: Fray Fernando looks younger now than
he did when he bought the best blessing of his life, some fifteen years
ago, from Don Ramon de Virves with the tooth of St. Joseph.
The book he is reading—his favourite, almost his only study—is still
the Vulgate. From its pages he has learned many things. Important side
lights have been thrown upon their teaching by numerous conversations
with Walter Grey (now once more at Callao, after a long coasting
expedition)—by the simple faith that upheld Melchior del Salto in the
hour of death—by Fray Constantino’s well-worn volume. But another light,
without which these would have been useless, has illumined the sacred
page for Fray Fernando—even “the candle of the Lord,” which is his
Spirit. The result of all may be briefly told:—at the year’s end his
faith differed widely from the recognized creed of that Church with which
he still remained in outward communion.
No man who thinks profoundly and feels keenly can change his ancestral
faith for another without many a fear and misgiving and many a pang. In
deep soil the roots strike deepest: even to lay the branches low the
tempest must put forth the fierceness of its strength; what then if the
roots be torn away? Surely the soil will come up with them—the heart
itself be convulsed to its depths.
Yet Fray Fernando, who had suffered so much already, suffered less than
might have been expected during the progress of this momentous change.
It was in his favour that he had grasped truth with a firm hand before
he felt the call to abandon error. Moreover, action was with him not
only the companion of thought, but its precursor. The cumbrous armour
of superstition was not torn from him by violence so much as laid down
voluntarily piece by piece, as he found that it hindered instead of
helping him in his daily conflict with sin and ignorance. Experience
taught him, also, that the truths his own soul lived upon were life and
peace to the sick and dying to whom he ministered continually—to the
crowd of Negroes, Creoles, and mariners to whom he preached on the shore
every Sunday and holiday; and that whatever was not found in the Vulgate
was not good for them any more than for himself.
And, added to all, he had José—José, the most appreciative of scholars,
the most sympathetic of friends—“answering him like silver bells lightly
touched.” Everything he learned was imparted almost immediately to José,
and the joy it gave more than doubled by the process. José himself would
have originated nothing in this line. He was content, and would have been
content, to the end of his days, to eat the heavenly manna as his fathers
ate their maize, simply as they got it, without the aid of the stones
that bruise or the fan that winnows. He would have gone on, satisfied and
happy, loving his King, living for Him, and willing at need to die for
Him, but never suspecting the mode of worship he had learned at Cerro
Blanco not to be altogether well pleasing and acceptable in His sight. If
anything he had been taught had ever chanced to perplex him, as appearing
contrary to some other thing that his heart held dear, he would have told
himself, “It is a mystery of the faith,” and have rested satisfied.
What Fray Fernando taught him, however, he understood thoroughly, and
felt profoundly. Moreover, he was the safest confidant the monk could
have chosen. No man ever knew better how to keep his mouth and his
tongue, and in so doing to keep his soul from troubles. He was the
guardian of many deadly secrets about his own people; and he was just
as likely to betray Maricancha or Rimac to the Viceroy, as he was to
compromise Fray Fernando with the Inquisition.
His own life at this time was quite as busy, and probably quite as
useful, as that of his patron. Most of the surviving members of the
Inca family, who had been banished from Cuzco and its neighbourhood,
were forced to take up their residence at Lima, where, severed from the
associations dear to their hearts, and exposed to the influences of
an unhealthy climate, they withered away like trees transplanted into
ungenial soil.[51] Every hour that José could spare from attendance on
the patre he devoted to the task of comforting and ministering to these
his brethren. It is true that the common wants of the body, such as food
and clothing, he seldom had to supply. Impoverished though the Incas
were, they still had treasures at command in the love and reverence with
which every Indian heart regarded them. “We were wrong, indeed,” said the
baptized Indians, when taunted by the Spaniards with having worshipped
their ancient kings—“we were wrong; for now we know they were not gods,
but men. Yet, having received so much good from them, we cannot think
them less than of divine race; and if you show us such men now, needs
must that we pay them the same veneration.”
Yet much remained that José could do for his friends. His familiarity
with the white man’s language, learning, and habits, enabled him to
perform many important services for them. But best of all was his power
to comfort them with strange sweet words spoken in the tongue of their
fathers, and linked in a thousand ways to all their cherished thoughts
and traditions, yet strong with a strength and wise with a wisdom that
was not theirs. Earnestly did he labour to inspire the hearts of his
brethren with his own passionate love and reverence for the King, the
great Inca of the East, upon whom all his hopes were resting.
To return to that particular evening, just one year after the death of
Melchior del Salto. José came in, hot and tired, from a walk to Lima,
undertaken as escort and guide to a Dominican friar, newly arrived from
the West Indies. The monk had spent the preceding day and night with
Fray Fernando, being ill from the effects of a long and uncomfortable
voyage. He was not too ill, however, for much conversation, or rather
controversy, with his kind-hearted host.
“Well, José, did you deliver up your charge in safety?” Fray Fernando
asked with a smile.
José’s face wore a rather curious expression as he answered, “I did. Two
years ago, patre, I should have been pleased to see a Spaniard treat his
own countrymen as Spaniards everywhere treat Indians.”
“I had hoped, José,” said Fray Fernando a little sadly, “that those old
thoughts of bitterness were of the past.”
“The old bitterness, yes; the old thoughts—_never_!” José was silent
a moment, then resumed in a different tone. “This good friar seems to
imagine that we of Rimac are all fast asleep, and that he has come to
wake us. He thinks we are poor, silly, ignorant folk, understanding
nothing; just as the Spaniards think of my people. All the time it is
_they_ who cannot understand. How can they, when they despise us? We know
secrets that are sealed from them for ever.”
“Did you follow our long argument to-day, José?” Fray Fernando asked
somewhat anxiously.
“I followed you,” said José, “and I went before you, and all round you,
and away from you, and back again to you, twenty times, at least, while
you were talking.”
“Ah, José! I shall never get the slightest idea of logic into your head.
How could you possibly think out a chain of reasoning after that fashion?”
“I do not think my thoughts, patre, in chains, with one link holding on
to another. My thoughts grow up like flowers—here, there, anywhere they
list.”
“Then read this, and tell me what thoughts ‘grow up’ in your mind
about it.” And Fray Fernando handed him a letter, a fair, well-written
document, with a mitre on its seal. It was in Latin, but that was now no
impediment to José.
He laid it down again with a look of satisfaction. Evidently “the words
of the wise had been heard in quiet;” the fame of the patre’s simple yet
fervid eloquence had reached at last the dignitaries of his Church, and
induced them to pay him a high, but well-merited compliment. “My heart is
glad,” said José. “You will make the walls of that great cathedral echo
to grand, glorious words of truth. And on Easter-day, too! You will tell
them Christ is risen!”
But Fray Fernando’s face did not reflect the joy that beamed from the
dusky countenance of José. On the contrary, it wore an expression of
anxious thought. “How can I tell them Christ is risen,” he said, “without
telling them also—Oh, my son, do you not perceive the strait I am in?”
José understood him; and the gladness faded from his face. But he placed
his hand on Fray Constantino’s book. “Have you not told me that _he_
preached for years in the cathedral of Seville, and no man even suspected
him of believing as you do?”
“Not quite as I do. That last terrible mystery”—his eyes sought the
little silver casket, rarely used of late—“having dared to let _that_ go,
José—”
“We keep Christ, the King. He will guide us,” José said reverently.
“Perhaps it were best to accept this call, and, once for all, tell out
all the truth in the face of the great congregation!”
José shuddered inwardly. He knew the Holy Inquisition as a vague, dark
shadow, nothing more. Neither Walter Grey, nor Melchior del Salto, nor
Fray Fernando himself, would ever talk of it. Presently he drew close to
the patre, laid his hand, as a son might do, on his shoulder, and began
to speak—eagerly, fluently—in low, soft, pleading words, that fell from
his lips like ripe fruit “dropped in a silent autumn night.”
Tears glistened in Fray Fernando’s eyes. “My son,” he answered tenderly,
“it must be God’s will even before yours. If He has given me back—after
all those years of anguish—light, joy, hope, liberty,—is it too much that
I should bring Him a thank-offering?”
“Many thank-offerings you will bring Him, patre; such as the soul of that
poor man who died yester-even calling upon Christ the Saviour.”
“It may be He has other work for me. But I know not. Rest content, José;
I will go nowhere, I will do nothing, save as He leads my footsteps.”
“I ought to rest content with that, patre. The King will lead you, and by
the right way.”
There was a pause, which Fray Fernando broke at last. “José, do you
remember—long ago, on our journey from Cerro Blanco to Cuzco—that moment
when, suddenly emerging from the darkness of the rock-hewn passage, we
came in sight of the deep ravine of the Apurimac, spanned by the bridge
of sogas?”
“I remember it well, patre; but what brings it to your mind just now?”