On their way back to the cottage they heard dogs barking, and a man
talking to them. Next moment these came in sight.
"The old hunter!" exclaimed Pedro, hastening forward with evident
pleasure to meet his friend.
It was equally evident that the old man was as much pleased to meet
Pedro, for they grasped each other's hands with hearty good-will.
"What news?" asked the old man, eagerly, as he held up a hand to check
the dogs, which were leaping round him.
Pedro shook his head sadly, and the expression of the old man became
grave. The question referred to Pedro's search for his lost child. It
had long been the first inquiry when these two met after a separation.
The old man seemed never to lose hope, but he had become so accustomed
to the reply that his despondency was now of short duration. He had
known and loved the child in days gone by--had helped the mother in
cultivating her garden-plot, and had gone out hunting with the father
many a time. He was a fine-looking man, above seventy years of age,
with iron-grey hair, turning in some places to pure white. The hunter's
spare though still upright figure showed that he must have been a
powerful man in his youth, and the deeply-marked wrinkles about his
mouth and eyes told eloquently that he was a kind one. Round his
shoulders were twined the cords of the heavy "bolas," or balls, with
which he sometimes felled, at other times entangled, his prey. These
balls were covered with clotted blood. He carried a short gun in his
hand, and a large knife was stuck in his belt.
The dogs that leaped around him were a strange pack--some being very
large, some very small, and all of different breeds. A few of them had
been lamed, and all were more or less marked by the wounds received from
jaguars and pumas.
"You expected me, Ignacio?" said Pedro, after the first greetings were
over.
"No--not quite so soon, but I chanced to be wandering about in the
mountains, and came down to take a look at the old place, to see that
all was right. You know I am fond of our old haunts, and never stay
long away from them, but I did not expect to find you here."
The hunter spoke in Spanish, and Lawrence found to his satisfaction
that, although he by no means understood all that was said, he had
already improved so much in that tongue through his frequent efforts to
converse with Manuela, that he could follow the drift at least of the
hunter's remarks.
"I have come back sooner than I intended," returned Pedro, "for war is a
wonderful hastener, as well as dictator, of events; but I have to thank
war for having given me a new friend. Let me introduce Senhor Lawrence
Armstrong to you; Senhor, my old comrade Ignacio, who, as I have told
you, nursed me back to life many years ago."
The old man held out a hard bony hand, and gave Lawrence a hearty
squeeze of friendship that had something vice-like in its vigour. He
then turned to Pedro, and began to make anxious inquiries about the war.
As the two men spoke in undertones, Lawrence drew back a few paces, and
followed them towards the cottage. He observed that Ignacio shook his
head very often, and also that he laughed once or twice silently, but
with apparent heartiness. As he overheard the name of Manuela just
before one of these laughs, he experienced some disagreeable feelings,
which it was not easy to understand or get rid of, so he took to
fondling the hunter's dogs by way of diversion to his mind.
The animals testified indirectly to the character of their master by
receiving his advances with effusive demonstrations of joy.
At the cottage they found Ignacio's horse--a very fine one--with a lasso
hanging from the saddle. Beside it stood a loose horse with the carcass
of a guanaco flung over it, and a Gaucho lad who was the hunter's only
attendant. Quashy was engaged in animated conversation with this youth,
and Manuela stood beside him listening.
"I cannot understand," said Lawrence to Pedro, as they approached, "how
men ever acquire dexterity in the use of these bolas."
"Practice makes perfect, you know," said the guide, "and it doesn't
matter much what sort of weapons you use, if you only learn to use them
well. Of course it's not easy to a beginner. When Ignacio's dogs turn
out a jaguar or a puma, they follow him hotly till he stops to defend
himself. If the dogs fly upon the brute, the hunter usually jumps off
his horse, whirls the three balls about till they get up tremendous
momentum, and then brings them down on the jaguar's skull with a whack
that generally drops him. But if the dogs are afraid to go at him,
Ignacio throws the lasso over him, gallops away, and drags him over the
ground, while the dogs rush in and tear him. What between bumping and
hounds, the jaguar's career is soon finished."
"I'm glad I've met you," said Pedro to Ignacio, as they turned aside
into the bushes together, "for I've got news to tell, and I'll want your
help. There's mischief brewing in the air, and I am commissioned--"
Thus much did Lawrence and Quashy overhear before the voice died away in
the distance. It was a tantalising point to stop at! Lawrence looked
at Quashy and at Manuela, who stood near.
"Does Manuela know anything of the mischief that is brewing?" asked
Lawrence in amazing Spanish.
"Not'ing," replied the girl in English, "but she _trust_ Pedro."
"So do I, with all my heart," returned Lawrence; "my question was
prompted by curiosity, not by doubt."
"I's not so sure," said Quashy, with a frown, and a tone of
self-assertion which was rare in him. "Nice-lookin' men like him's not
allers as nice as dey looks."
"Fie, Quashy! I thought you were of a more trustful spirit."
"So I is, massa--awrful trus'ful! Kin trus' _you_ wid a'most anyt'ing.
Trus' dis yer Injin gal wid untol' gol'. Trus' Sooz'n wid de whole
world, an' eberyt'ing else besides, but I's not quite so sure about dis
yer Pedro. Di'n't he say dar's noos to tell, an' he wants help, an'
der's mischif a-brewin'? An' ain't I sure 'nuff dat he's got suffin to
do wid de mischif, or he wouldn't be so secret?"
"Well, Quashy, you'd better not tell Pedro your doubts of him," said
Lawrence; "for if he knocks you down, I won't feel bound to stand up for
you--seeing that I have perfect confidence in him."
Further conversation on this point was cut abruptly short by a
tremendous hissing inside the cottage, followed by clouds of steam. It
was caused by one of Quashy's pots having boiled over. The negro sprang
to the rescue. Soon afterwards, the host and the old hunter returning,
they all entered the place together, and sat down to supper.
It was but a simple cottage, suitable to the simple tastes of a
mountaineer in such a region, with only two rooms and a kitchen, besides
a small attic divided into two chambers, which could be reached only by
a ladder through a trap-door. Little furniture graced it, yet what
little there was bore evidence of having felt the touch of a tasteful
female hand. Numerous nails and pegs were stuck in the walls for the
purpose of supporting fire-arms, etcetera, but the weapons had been
secreted in a place of safety, for, during the owner's frequent and long
absences from home, the cottage was locked up and left pretty much to
take care of itself, being deemed safe enough, owing to its remote and
lonely position.
The key was always left in charge of old Ignacio who was understood to
have his eye on the place, and privileged to inhabit it whenever he
chose.
All this, and a great deal more, Pedro told to Lawrence as they sat
round the table at supper in what used to be the parlour of the
establishment. "But I'm going to lock it up, and hide the key this
time," he continued; "because I have to send Ignacio on urgent matters
into the eastern parts of Bolivia, to--"
"To git help, an' tell de noos about de mischif what's a-brewin'," said
the negro abruptly, with a pointed stare at the guide, and an arrested
potato on the end of his fork.
"You've learnt your lesson well, Quashy," returned Pedro, with a
good-humoured smile, as he helped himself to a fresh supply of meat;
"these are the very words--to obtain help and spread the news about the
mischief that's brewing. Pass the salt, like a good fellow, and help
Manuela to some more maize. You're forgetting your manners, boy."
The negro heaved a sigh of discomfiture, and did as he was bid.
Next morning at daybreak they left the cottage, and descended the
intricate valley which led to it. Pedro seemed to have quite subdued
his feelings--at least all outward manifestation of them--for he was
sterner and more silent than usual as they resumed their journey. For
some distance their route and that of Ignacio lay in the same direction,
but towards the afternoon of the same day on which they left Mariquita
Cottage the old hunter bade the party adieu, and, accompanied by his
Gaucho lad and his dogs, entered a north-easterly defile of the hills,
and disappeared.
"We shall soon get to more cultivated lands, Manuela," said Pedro, in
the Indian tongue, glancing back at Lawrence, who rode a few paces
behind. "I doubt not you will be glad to see female faces again."
To the surprise of the guide, Manuela said that she did not care!
"Indeed!" he rejoined; "I thought you would be getting tired by this
time of such rough travelling, and frequent hard lodging and fare, as
well as of the conversation of us men."
"No, I am not tired. I delight in this wild, free life."
"Surely not because it is _new_ to you," said Pedro, with a glance of
amusement; "when you dwell with your kindred, your life must be wild
enough--unless indeed the great chief, your father, deems it beneath the
dignity of his daughter to join in the sports of her fellows."
Manuela made no reply, but for a moment or two gave vent to that clear,
short, merry laugh in which she sometimes indulged. Lawrence Armstrong,
irresistibly charmed by the sound, rode up alongside.
"Manuela is merry," he said to the guide; "will you not translate, that
I may enjoy the joke?"
"It is not easy to translate," replied Pedro. "In fact, I doubt if you
will see the joke at all. It requires a little knowledge of Manuela's
past career to make understanding possible. She only said that she
delighted in this wild, free life."
"Not much jest in that, truly," returned Lawrence, "being, I fear, dull
of comprehension; nevertheless, I see an unintentional compliment to
_us_ in the remark, for it implies that we have not made Manuela's
journey tedious to her."
"It may be so," said Pedro, simply. "I was just telling her that we
shall soon get to more inhabited parts of the land, where she will have
a little female society now and then, and I was about to add that
afterwards we shall descend into the lower grounds of Bolivia, where she
will have wild life enough to her heart's content--perchance too much of
it."
Soon afterwards the guide's prophecy came true, for they passed from the
rugged mountains into a wide and richly clothed table-land, where there
were a few scattered farms, at which they were made heartily welcome
whenever they chose to stop for the night or for a meal.
Passing thence into another range of comparatively low hills, they
reached the town of San Ambrosio, where they found comfortable quarters
in a new and commodious inn--at least it seemed commodious, after the
recent experiences of our travellers.
Here Pedro said he would have to spend a day or two, as he had business
to transact in the town, and that he would search out an old
acquaintance with whose family he would place Manuela till their
departure.
While Pedro was gone in quest of his friend, the Indian girl, probably
feeling shy in the midst of such unwonted crowds, retired to the room
provided for her, and Lawrence and Quashy found themselves left in the
unusual condition of having nothing to do. Of course, in these
circumstances, they resolved to go out and see the town.
While Lawrence was questioning the landlord, an American, as to how he
should proceed, a very decided tremor passed through his frame. Quashy
seemed to experience a similar sensation, for he said abruptly--
"Eart'quak'!"
"That's nothing new here, sir," said the landlord to Lawrence, as he
lighted a cigarette; "we're used to it, though some of the natives ain't
quite easy in their minds, for the shocks have been both frequent as
well as violent lately."
"Have they done any damage?" asked Lawrence.
"Nothin' to speak of. Only shook down a house or two that was built to
sell, I suppose, not to stand. You'll find the market-place second turn
to your left."
Somewhat impressed by the landlord's free-and-easy manner, as well as by
his apparent contempt for earthquakes, the master and man went out
together. With characteristic modesty the negro attempted to walk
behind, but Lawrence would by no means permit this. He insisted on his
walking beside him.
"Bery good, massa," said Quashy, at last giving in, "if you _will_ walk
'longside ob a nigger, 's'not _my_ fault. Don't blame _me_."
With this protest, solemnly uttered, the faithful negro accompanied our
hero in his inspection of the town.