THE RUINS OF THE HACIENDA.
It was indeed the Indians, who guided by Meli-Antou, were pursuing the
smugglers with terrible imprecations. This is what had occurred.
We said that on the day of the escape Leon surprised the Sayotkatta in
the act of listening at the door. He had not deceived himself; still,
as Schymi-Tou was ignorant of Spanish, he had been unable to understand
the young people's conversation, but he had noticed a certain animation
which appeared to him suspicious. He did not dare, however, oppose
the ceremony of exorcism which was about to take place, and contented
himself with imparting his suspicions to Meli-Antou, who was astonished
at the Sayotkatta's doubts, and treated them as chimeras.
But, as the old man seemed strongly inclined to suppose some
machination, or, at least, some jugglery, on the part of the pretended
conjuror, he resolved to watch what took place on the eminence, and
hold himself in readiness to march with twenty men, to the help of
Tcharanguii, if he were the dupe of the medicine man's trickery. A
little while, then, after the young ladies started for the hillock, he
followed on their track, accompanied by his warriors; and, on reaching
the hill, he crawled up through the tall grass, and listened.
He first heard the prayers of the five men, and was on the point of
regretting that he had followed the Sayotkatta's advice, when Leon
suddenly ceased speaking. He thought, however, that whispered prayers
had succeeded the former ones. Still, as this silence was prolonged, he
went a little higher, and was staggered at only seeing Tcharanguii and
his four warriors, lying on the ground. Thinking them dead, he rushed
toward them, and shouted to his men, whom he had left at the foot of
the mound. They were soon with him, and shook the five sleepers, who at
last woke up with a very confused idea of what had happened to them.
Meli-Antou guessed a portion of the truth, and, not doubting but that
the fugitives had gone into the forest, he gave orders to pursue them.
At the moment when they were setting out, they heard the eagle cries
which had served as a signal to the smugglers, and dashed toward
the spot whence they came. Meli-Antou was the first to perceive the
fugitives, and fired at them, and, though he missed his mark, he hoped
very soon to recapture them.
Before the smugglers had time to select the route which they must
follow, the Indians were upon them. The young ladies were in the middle
of the little band and in safety. Leon, therefore, gave orders to
accept the fight and charge the enemy. Seizing a mace which had just
fallen from the grasp of a wounded Indian, Leon rushed into the centre
of the medley with the bounds of a tiger. The combatants, who were too
close together to employ their firearms, fought with their knives, and
dealt furious blows with their clubbed rifles or maces.
This frightful carnage lasted for more than half an hour, animated by
the yells of the Indians and the shouts of the smugglers, who killed
them to the last man--thanks to their numerical superiority--by a
determined charge, which decided the victory. The victory, however,
cost the smugglers eight of their party.
The next great point was to get away from the vicinity of the Indians
before the news of the fight spread in Garakouaïti; for if it did so
they would not have to contend only against twenty men, but against
an entire army of redskins, animated with the desire to avenge their
brothers. Leon assembled all his men, and they started for the forest,
along the path which he and Wilhelm had cut, and which the smugglers
were well acquainted with, through having come along it.
At sunrise they had got through the forest, and found themselves on the
banks of the river where the captain, Wilhelm, and Giacomo had been
so hotly pursued. Leon gave orders to halt--and it was high time, for
the horses were panting with fatigue. Besides, whatever diligence the
Indians might display to catch up the smugglers, the latter had a whole
night's start of them; hence they could rest in perfect security.
While the men, in various groups, were preparing the meal or dressing
their wounds, and the young ladies were sleeping on a pile of ponchos
and sheepskins, Leon went to bathe, in order to remove the Indian
paint that disfigured him; and, after resuming his European dress, he
stationed himself near the spot where the ladies were reposing.
The first words of the latter, on awaking, were a torrent of thanks,
which amply rewarded the captain for all that he had done to save them.
Maria could not find expressions sufficiently strong to testify to Leon
the joy which she felt at being restored to liberty by his assistance;
and Inez, herself, gradually felt her heart expanding to a feeling
more lively than that of gratitude.
Betrothed to Don Pedro Sallazar by her father's wish, she had accepted
this alliance with perfect indifference, only seeing in this marriage
greater liberty of action, and the pleasure of being the wife of a
rich and brilliant gentlemen, who would devote his entire attention to
satisfying her slightest caprices. But her heart had never beaten more
violently than usual in the presence of the husband destined for her.
Such was the state of her heart, when the attack of the Indians at the
Parumo of San Juan Bautista had suddenly modified her ideas by causing
her to reflect on the conduct of the captain, who had not hesitated to
risk his life to save her, while her betrothed husband had not even
followed her track. Thus she guessed the grandeur and nobility of the
smuggler's character, and at the same time conceived a love for him,
which was the more violent because the man who was the object of it did
not seem to notice it.
It was only at this moment that she understood why her sister had
so often praised the young man's courageous qualities, and that she
recognised the passion which they entertained for each other. A cruel
grief gnawed at her heart, and it was in vain that she struggled
against the horrible torture of a frenzied jealousy. She felt that she
had no chance of being loved by Leon, who only lived for Maria; and
yet, in spite of herself, she could not dispel the charm with which he
inspired her. As for Leon, intoxicated with happiness, he revelled in
the felicity with which the presence of Maria, who was seated by his
side, inundated him.
After a few hours halt, they set out again, and on the morning of the
fourth day reached the Parumo of San Juan Bautista, without having
been molested in any way. Here they halted, and so soon as the camp was
pitched, Leon went up to the maidens, and taking them by the hand, led
them to the grave in which the Señora Soto-Mayor was interred.
"Kneel down," he said to them in a grave voice, "and pray, for here
rests the body of your mother, whose soul is in heaven."
Maria and Inez mingled their prayers and sobs over the tomb of her
who had taken care of their childhood, and both remained absorbed in
profound grief. Leon had discreetly withdrawn, leaving the maidens to
weep without witnesses: but at the expiration of an hour he went up to
them, and by gentle words recalled them to a sense of the things of
this world by speaking to them of their father, to whom he had pledged
himself to restore them.
On hearing their father's name, the sisters wiped their tears and
went back to join the smugglers, who were conversing about the combat
which they had waged five weeks previously at that very spot. The
men whom Hernandez and Joaquin had enlisted at Valparaíso listened
to the narration with the greatest interest, and resolved, on the
first opportunity, to avenge those whose places they had taken in
Leon's band. The way in which they had behaved before Garakouaïti was,
however, a sufficient guarantee of their good disposition.
From the Parumo of San Juan Bautista, the party proceeded to Talca; and
after two days' march, the lofty peaks of the Cordilleras had gradually
sunk behind the smugglers, who found themselves in the hot regions of
the llanos, uninhabited by the Chilians.
Leon, who for more than a month had been unable to receive any news
about the political events which had occurred during the period, and
who desired to obtain some information about General Soto-Mayor, and
whether on his return from Valdivia he had passed through Talca, gave
orders to march straight on the latter town, where he intended to let
the young ladies rest for two or three days. The nearer they drew
to it the darker the captain's brow became; he frowned anxiously,
and the glances which he cast in all directions revealed a profound
preoccupation.
A great change had, indeed, taken place in these parts during the last
month; the country had no longer that rich appearance which it formerly
offered to the eye. Fields trampled by horses, the remains of burnt
haciendas, and the ashes heaped up at places where flour mills had
stood a few weeks previously--all these signs indicated that war had
passed that way.
Two or three leagues farther, however, the houses of Talca could be
seen on the horizon glistening in the sun. All was perfectly calm in
the vicinity; no human being showed himself: no flocks grazed on the
devastated prairies; on all sides, a leaden silence and a lugubrious
tranquillity brooded over the landscape, and imparted a heart-breaking
effect to the cheerful sunbeams.
All at once Wilhelm, who was riding a few paces ahead of the troop,
stopped his horse with a start of terror, and anxiously leaned over his
saddle. Leon dashed his spurs into his horse's flanks, and joined the
smuggler. A hideous spectacle was presented to the two men; in a ditch
bordering the road lay, pell-mell, a pile of Spanish corpses horridly
disfigured, and all deprived of their scalps.
Leon commanded a halt, while asking himself what he had better do.
Should he turn back, or advance on the town, which was evidently in the
hands of the Indians? Hesitation was permissible. Still the captain
understood that a determination, no matter what its nature, must be
formed at once, and looking around him, he noticed a ruined hacienda
about a league distant. It was a shelter, and it was better to seek
refuge there, than remain on the open plain.
Twenty minutes had not elapsed before Leon leaped from his horse and
rushed into the farm. The house bore traces of fire and devastation.
The cracked walls were blackened with smoke, the windows broken, and
amid the ruins that encumbered the patios lay the bodies of several men
and women, assassinated and partly burnt.
Leon conducted the trembling ladies to a room which was cleared of the
rubbish that obstructed the entrance; then, after recommending them not
to leave it, he rejoined his comrades, who were establishing themselves
as well as they could among the ruins.
"Caballeros," he said to them, "we are going to entrench ourselves here
while four of you go out to reconnoitre; for we should commit a grave
imprudence by entering the town before knowing in whose hands it is.
Who are the four men who will undertake the duty?"
"I!--I!" all the smugglers replied, in chorus.
"Very good," Leon remarked, with a smile; "I shall be obliged to
choose."
They were all silent.
"Giacomo, Hernandez, Joaquin, and Harrison, leave the ranks!"
The four advanced.
"You will go out," Leon said to them, "in four different directions
as scouts. Do not stay away more than two hours, and find out what is
going on. Above all, do not let yourselves be caught. Begone!"
The smugglers rushed to their horses, and set out at a gallop.
"Now," said Leon, addressing Wilhelm, "how many are there of us?"
"Fifty-four," a voice answered.
Leon felt himself strong. With fifty-four men he thought a good, deal
could be done. His first care was to fortify the house in the best way
he could; it was surrounded by a breast-high wall, like all the Chilian
haciendas; he had the gateway blocked up, and then, returning to the
house, he had loopholes pierced, and placed sentries near the wall and
on the terrace. Then summoning Wilhelm, he gave him the command of
twenty-five resolute men, and ordered him to ambuscade with this band
behind a hillock, which was about two hundred yards from the house.
All these precautions taken, he waited. The scouts soon after
returned, and their report was not reassuring:--The grand Molucho
army, commanded by Tahi-Mari, had seized on Talca by surprise; the
town was given over to pillage; and the Chilians, defeated in several
engagements, were flying in the direction of Santiago. Parties of
Indians were beating up the country on all sides; and it appeared
evident that the smugglers could not go a league beyond the hacienda
without falling into an ambuscade.
Hernandez, who was the last to arrive, brought with him some thirty
Chilian soldiers and guasos, who had been wandering about for two
days at the risk of being caught at any moment by the Indians, who
pitilessly massacred all the white men that fell into their hands.
Leon gladly welcomed the newcomers, for a reinforcement of thirty men
was not to be despised. They were well armed, and could render him a
great service. After distributing his men at the spots most exposed
to attack, the captain went up on the terrace, and after lying down,
carefully examined the country in the direction of Talca.
Nothing had altered, and the country was still deserted. This calmness
appeared to him to be of evil augury. The sun set in a reddish mist,
the light suddenly decreased, and night arrived with its darkness and
mysteries. Leon went down, and proceeded to the room serving as refuge
to the two sisters, in order to reassure them, and give them hopes
which he was far from feeling. The maidens were sitting on the ground
silently.
"Niñas," Leon said to them, "regain your courage. We are numerous, and
shall be able to start again tomorrow morning without any fear of being
disquieted by the Indians."
"Captain," Maria answered him, "it is vain for you to try and
tranquillize us; we have heard what the soldiers are saying to one
another, and they are prepared for an attack which appears to them
inevitable."
"Señor Captain," Inez said, in her turn, "we are the daughters and
sisters of soldiers, so you can tell us frankly to what we are exposed."
"Good heavens! do I know it myself?" Leon remarked. "I have taken all
the precautions necessary to defend the hacienda dearly, but still I
hope that we shall not be discovered."
"You are deceiving us again," Maria said with a smile, which was
sorrowful, though full of grace and charms.
"Besides," Leon continued, without replying to the young lady's
interruption, "be assured that, in the event of an attack, both I and
my men will be dead ere an Indian crosses the threshold of this door."
"The Indians!" the young ladies could not help exclaiming, for they had
before them the recollection of their captivity at Garakouaïti, and
trembled at the mere thought of falling into their hands again.
Still, this terror was but momentary. Maria's face soon reassumed the
delicious expression which was habitual to it, and it was with the
softest inflexion of her voice that she addressed him.
"Captain," she said to him, "my sister and I wish to ask a favour of
you--will you promise to grant it to us?"
"What is it, Señora? Speak, for you know that I am only too happy to
obey the slightest wish of yours."
"Then you swear to grant it me, whatever it may be?"
"Without doubt," Leon answered; "but what is it?"
"Give me the pistols hanging from your girdle."
"Pistols! Great Heaven! what would you do with them?"
"Kill ourselves," Maria said, simply, "sooner than return to the Indian
city."
"Oh! am I not here to defend you?"
"We know it," Inez added, "and know, too, that you are the noblest and
bravest of all your comrades: but I join my entreaty to that of my
sister, and beg you not to refuse us."
"If you were killed, Leon," Maria at length said, "must not I die too?"
Inez looked at her sister, and was silent.
Leon started, and drew the pistols from his girdle.
"Here they are," he said, as he handed them to the ladies.
And, without adding a word, he left the room, with his face buried in
his hands. Maria and Inez threw themselves into each other's arms, and
passionately embraced.
At the moment when Leon re-entered the patio, Harrison walked up to
him, and said, as he pointed to several rows of black dots, which
seemed crawling at no great distance from the hacienda--
"Look there, captain."
"They are Indians," Leon answered; "every man to his post."
An hour passed in horrible anxiety. All at once, the hideous head of a
redskin appeared above the enclosing wall, and took a ferocious glance
into the patio. Leon raised his axe, and the Indian's body fell back
outside, while the head rolled at the captain's feet. Several attempts
of the same nature, made at different points of the wall, were repulsed
with equal success.
Then the Indians, who had expected to surprise a few sleepy guasos,
on seeing themselves so unpleasantly received, raised their war yell,
and rising tumultuously from the ground on which they had hitherto
been crawling, bounded upon the wall, which they tried to escalade
on all sides at once. A belt of flame then flashed forth round the
hacienda, and a shower of bullets greeted them. Several fell, but their
impetuosity was not checked, and a fresh discharge, almost in their
faces, which caused them enormous loss, was unable to repulse them.
Ere long, assailants and assailed were contending hand to hand. It was
a fearful combat, in which men only loosed their hold to die, and in
which the conquered, frequently dragging down the conqueror in his
fall, strangled him in a last convulsion. For nearly half an hour it
was impossible to judge how matters went; the shots and the blows of
axes and sabres followed each other with marvellous rapidity.
At length the Indians fell back: the wall had not been scaled. But
the truce was not long; the Indians returned to the charge, and the
struggle recommenced with new obstinacy. This time, in spite of the
prodigies of valour, the smugglers, surrounded by the mass of enemies
who attacked them on all sides simultaneously, were compelled to fall
back on the house, defending every inch of ground; their resistance
could not last much longer.
At this moment shouts were heard in the rear of the Indians, and
Wilhelm rushed upon them like a hurricane at the head of his band.
The redskins, surprised at this unexpected attack, fell back in
disorder, and dispersed over the country. Leon, taking advantage of the
opportunity, dashed forward at the head of twenty men to support his
ambuscading party and complete the defeat of his enemies. The pursuit
did not last long, however, and the smugglers returned to the hacienda,
for the Indians had vanished like shadows.
Two hours passed without any incident. Leon gave orders to repair the
damage done by the enemy, and then went to the young ladies, in order
to learn how they had endured this fearful assault. On entering the
room, he stumbled over the body of an Indian. The captain recoiled;
a cold perspiration bathed his face; a convulsive tremor seized upon
him, and he was on the point of losing his senses. A terrible thought
crossed his mind; he feared he should see the young ladies killed.
Looking sharply about the room, he saw them crouching in a corner, and
a cry of delight burst from him.
"Oh!" he exclaimed, "what has happened here?"
Maria, without answering, took the torch, which was burning in a ring
against the wall, and illumined the Indian's countenance.
"Tcharanguii!" he exclaimed.
"Yes," she said, "and it was this that killed him." She displayed with
savage energy the pistol that she held in her hand.
"Oh!" said Leon, falling on his knees, "Heaven be thanked!"
"Captain, captain!" Wilhelm shouted, as he rushed into the room, "here
are the Indians!"
Leon hurried out. The fight had recommenced between his men and the
Indians. Day was beginning to break, and discovered an entire army of
Indians forming a circle round the hacienda.
"Comrades!" Leon said, in a thundering voice, addressing the smugglers,
"we cannot hope to conquer, but we must die like brave men."
"We will!" they replied, with an accent of sublime resignation.
They were only twenty-nine in all, for sixty had been killed in the
first two attacks.
"Do not let us waste our powder," Leon added; "but make sure of our
aim."
The horizon was gradually growing clearer, and friend and foe could
perfectly distinguish each other. There was something painful in this
spectacle of twenty-nine calm and stoical men, who had all made a
sacrifice of their life, and were preparing with heroic carelessness to
support the onrush of thousands of implacable enemies.
All at once Leon uttered a cry of surprise; he had just recognised the
grand chief of the Moluchos, who was advancing at the head of a portion
of the army to carry the hacienda by storm.
"Diego!" he shouted.
"Leon!" Tahi-Mari replied.
And then turning to the fighting Indians, he commanded them to stop.
Then, rushing towards the man who had been his friend, he said--
"You here! Why, unhappy man, you must wish for death!"
"Yes," Leon replied.
"Oh! I will save you!"
"Thanks, Diego. But will you also save those who are with me?"
"Those who are with you have killed five hundred of my men during the
night. Oh! the incarnate demons! Yes, I ought to have suspected it; you
alone were able to withstand an army for a whole night in a dismantled
ruin. Save them," he added--"no, it is impossible."
"In that case, good-bye," Leon said, as he prepared to turn away.
"Where are you going, brother?"
"To die with them, since their death is resolved."
"Oh, you will not do that?"
"Why should I not do it? Why have you forgotten, that you were for a
long time their leader, but will now sacrifice them to your blind fury?"
"Oh! I cannot let the Soto-Mayor family escape thus!"
"That family left me at the Parumo of San Bautista, after the Indian
bullets had killed the general's wife."
"Are you speaking the truth?"
"I have only two ladies with me."
"Wait!" said the chief of the redskins, and returned to his band.
Leon said a few words to Wilhelm, who dashed into the house to inform
the young ladies that they were out of danger, but only on condition
that they wrapped themselves so carefully in their rebozos that their
features could not be recognised.
Leon saw Tahi-Mari talking with great animation for about ten minutes
among the Molucho chiefs: at length they separated, and Diego returned
to him.
"Brother," he said to him, "you are an adopted son of the Moluchos;
you can retire withersoever you please with the men whom you command,
without fear of being disquieted."
"Thanks, brother," Leon said; "I recognise you in that."
"Where will you go?" Diego asked again.
"To Valparaíso."
"Good-bye."
"Why good-bye; do you never wish to see me again?"
"How?"
"Listen; in a week I shall be free from any engagement. Where will you
give me a meeting?"
"At the Rio Claro," said the Indian chief.
"I will be there."
The two friends parted as in the happy days of their friendship, and
then the captain joined his men, while the Indian put himself at the
head of his army again.
"To horse!" Leon then said.
The smugglers obeyed; and then forming a close squadron, they left the
hacienda at a canter, having the two veiled ladies in their midst. The
Indian army made way for them to pass; and the twenty-nine men rode
with head erect through the dense ranks of the Moluchos, who watched
them pass without evincing the slightest impression. Six days after,
Maria and Inez de Soto-Mayor were in safety behind the walls of the
convent of the Purísima Concepción.