HOW THEY TOOK THE GOLD-TRAIN
“God will relent, and quit thee all thy debt,
Who ever more approves, and more accepts
Him who imploring mercy sues for life,
Than who self-rigorous chooses death as due,
Which argues over-just, and self-displeased
For self-offence, more than for God offended.”
Samson Agonistes.
A fortnight or more has passed in severe toil, but not more severe than
they have endured many a time before. Bidding farewell once and
forever to the green ocean of the eastern plains, they have crossed the
Cordillera; they have taken a longing glance at the city of Santa Fe,
lying in the midst of rich gardens on its lofty mountain plateau, and
have seen, as was to be expected, that it was far too large a place for
any attempt of theirs. But they have not altogether thrown away their
time. Their Indian lad has discovered that a gold-train is going down
from Santa Fe toward the Magdalena; and they are waiting for it beside
the miserable rut which serves for a road, encamped in a forest of oaks
which would make them almost fancy themselves back again in Europe, were
it not for the tree-ferns which form the undergrowth; and were it not,
too, for the deep gorges opening at their very feet; in which, while
their brows are swept by the cool breezes of a temperate zone, they
can see far below, dim through their everlasting vapor-bath of rank hot
steam, the mighty forms and gorgeous colors of the tropic forest.
They have pitched their camp among the tree-ferns, above a spot where
the path winds along a steep hill-side, with a sheer cliff below of many
a hundred feet. There was a road there once, perhaps, when Cundinamarca
was a civilized and cultivated kingdom; but all which Spanish misrule
has left of it are a few steps slipping from their places at the bottom
of a narrow ditch of mud. It has gone the way of the aqueducts, and
bridges, and post-houses, the gardens and the llama-flocks of that
strange empire. In the mad search for gold, every art of civilization
has fallen to decay, save architecture alone; and that survives only in
the splendid cathedrals which have risen upon the ruins of the temples
of the Sun, in honor of a milder Pantheon; if, indeed, that can be
called a milder one which demands (as we have seen already) human
sacrifices, unknown to the gentle nature-worship of the Incas.
And now, the rapid tropic vegetation has reclaimed its old domains,
and Amyas and his crew are as utterly alone, within a few miles of an
important Spanish settlement, as they would be in the solitudes of the
Orinoco or the Amazon.
In the meanwhile, all their attempts to find sulphur and nitre have been
unavailing; and they have been forced to depend after all (much to Yeo's
disgust) upon their swords and arrows. Be it so: Drake took Nombre de
Dios and the gold-train there with no better weapons; and they may do as
much.
So, having blocked up the road above by felling a large tree across it,
they sit there among the flowers chewing coca, in default of food and
drink, and meditating among themselves the cause of a mysterious roar,
which has been heard nightly in their wake ever since they left the
banks of the Meta. Jaguar it is not, nor monkey: it is unlike any sound
they know; and why should it follow them? However, they are in the land
of wonders; and, moreover, the gold train is far more important than any
noise.
At last, up from beneath there was a sharp crack and a loud cry.
The crack was neither the snapping of a branch, nor the tapping of a
woodpecker; the cry was neither the scream of the parrot, nor the howl
of the monkey.
“That was a whip's crack,” said Yeo, “and a woman's wail. They are close
here, lads!”
“A woman's? Do they drive women in their gangs?” asked Amyas.
“Why not, the brutes? There they are, sir. Did you see their basnets
glitter?”
“Men!” said Amyas, in a low voice, “I trust you all not to shoot till
I do. Then give them one arrow, out swords, and at them! Pass the word
along.”
Up they came, slowly, and all hearts beat loud at their coming.
First, about twenty soldiers, only one-half of whom were on foot; the
other half being borne, incredible as it may seem, each in a chair on
the back of a single Indian, while those who marched had consigned their
heaviest armor and their arquebuses into the hands of attendant slaves,
who were each pricked on at will by the pike of the soldier behind them.
“The men are mad to let their ordnance out of their hands.”
“Oh, sir, an Indian will pray to an arquebus not to shoot him; he sure
their artillery is safe enough,” said Yeo.
“Look at the proud villains,” whispered another, “to make dumb beasts of
human creatures like that!”
“Ten shot,” counted the business-like Amyas, “and ten pikes; Will can
tackle them up above.”
Last of this troop came some inferior officer, also in his chair, who,
as he went slowly up the hill, with his face turned toward the gang
which followed, drew every other second the cigar from his lips, to
inspirit them with those pious ejaculations to the various objects of
his worship, divine, human, anatomic, wooden and textile, which earned
for the pious Spaniards of the sixteenth century the uncharitable
imputation of being at once the most fetish-ridden idolaters and the
most abominable swearers of all Europeans.
“The blasphemous dog!” said Yeo, fumbling at his bow-string, as if
he longed to send an arrow through him. But Amyas had hardly laid his
finger on the impatient veteran's arm, when another procession followed,
which made them forget all else.
A sad and hideous sight it was: yet one too common even then in those
remoter districts, where the humane edicts were disregarded which the
prayers of Dominican friars (to their everlasting honor be it spoken)
had wrung from the Spanish sovereigns, and which the legislation of that
most wise, virtuous, and heroic Inquisitor (paradoxical as the words may
seem), Pedro de la Gasca, had carried into effect in Peru,--futile and
tardy alleviations of cruelties and miseries unexampled in the
history of Christendom, or perhaps on earth, save in the conquests of
Sennacherib and Zingis Khan. But on the frontiers, where negroes were
imported to endure the toil which was found fatal to the Indian, and all
Indian tribes convicted (or suspected) of cannibalism were hunted down
for the salvation of their souls and the enslavement of their bodies,
such scenes as these were still too common; and, indeed, if we are to
judge from Humboldt's impartial account, were not very much amended even
at the close of the last century, in those much-boasted Jesuit missions
in which (as many of them as existed anywhere but on paper) military
tyranny was superadded to monastic, and the Gospel preached with fire
and sword, almost as shamelessly as by the first Conquistadores.
A line of Indians, Negroes, and Zambos, naked, emaciated, scarred with
whips and fetters, and chained together by their left wrists, toiled
upwards, panting and perspiring under the burden of a basket held up
by a strap which passed across their foreheads. Yeo's sneer was but
too just; there were not only old men and youths among them, but women;
slender young girls, mothers with children, running at their knee;
and, at the sight, a low murmur of indignation rose from the ambushed
Englishmen, worthy of the free and righteous hearts of those days, when
Raleigh could appeal to man and God, on the ground of a common humanity,
in behalf of the outraged heathens of the New World; when Englishmen
still knew that man was man, and that the instinct of freedom was
the righteous voice of God; ere the hapless seventeenth century had
brutalized them also, by bestowing on them, amid a hundred other bad
legacies, the fatal gift of negro-slaves.
But the first forty, so Amyas counted, bore on their backs a burden
which made all, perhaps, but him and Yeo, forget even the wretches who
bore it. Each basket contained a square package of carefully corded
hide; the look whereof friend Amyas knew full well.
“What's in they, captain?”
“Gold!” And at that magic word all eyes were strained greedily forward,
and such a rustle followed, that Amyas, in the very face of detection,
had to whisper--
“Be men, be men, or you will spoil all yet!”
The last twenty, or so, of the Indians bore larger baskets, but more
lightly freighted, seemingly with manioc, and maize-bread, and other
food for the party; and after them came, with their bearers and
attendants, just twenty soldiers more, followed by the officer in
charge, who smiled away in his chair, and twirled two huge mustachios,
thinking of nothing less than of the English arrows which were itching
to be away and through his ribs. The ambush was complete; the only
question how and when to begin?
Amyas had a shrinking, which all will understand, from drawing bow in
cool blood on men so utterly unsuspicious and defenceless, even though
in the very act of devilish cruelty--for devilish cruelty it was, as
three or four drivers armed with whips lingered up and down the slowly
staggering file of Indians, and avenged every moment's lagging, even
every stumble, by a blow of the cruel manati-hide, which cracked like
a pistol-shot against the naked limbs of the silent and uncomplaining
victim.
Suddenly the casus belli, as usually happens, arose of its own accord.
The last but one of the chained line was an old gray-headed man,
followed by a slender graceful girl of some eighteen years old, and
Amyas's heart yearned over them as they came up. Just as they passed,
the foremost of the file had rounded the corner above; there was a
bustle, and a voice shouted, “Halt, senors! there is a tree across the
path!”
“A tree across the path?” bellowed the officer, with a variety of
passionate addresses to the Mother of Heaven, the fiends of hell, Saint
Jago of Compostella, and various other personages; while the line of
trembling Indians, told to halt above, and driven on by blows below,
surged up and down upon the ruinous steps of the Indian road, until the
poor old man fell grovelling on his face.
The officer leaped down, and hurried upward to see what had happened. Of
course, he came across the old man.
“Sin peccado concebida! Grandfather of Beelzebub, is this a place to lie
worshipping your fiends?” and he pricked the prostrate wretch with the
point of his sword.
The old man tried to rise: but the weight on his head was too much for
him; he fell again, and lay motionless.
The driver applied the manati-hide across his loins, once, twice, with
fearful force; but even that specific was useless.
“Gastado, Senor Capitan,” said he, with a shrug. “Used up. He has been
failing these three months!”
“What does the intendant mean by sending me out with worn-out cattle
like these? Forward there!” shouted he. “Clear away the tree, senors,
and I'll soon clear the chain. Hold it up, Pedrillo!”
The driver held up the chain, which was fastened to the old man's wrist.
The officer stepped back, and flourished round his head a Toledo blade,
whose beauty made Amyas break the Tenth Commandment on the spot.
The man was a tall, handsome, broad-shouldered, high-bred man; and Amyas
thought that he was going to display the strength of his arm, and the
temper of his blade, in severing the chain at one stroke.
Even he was not prepared for the recondite fancies of a Spanish
adventurer, worthy son or nephew of those first conquerors, who used to
try the keenness of their swords upon the living bodies of Indians, and
regale themselves at meals with the odor of roasting caciques.
The blade gleamed in the air, once, twice, and fell: not on the chain,
but on the wrist which it fettered. There was a shriek--a crimson
flash--and the chain and its prisoner were parted indeed.
One moment more, and Amyas's arrow would have been through the throat
of the murderer, who paused, regarding his workmanship with a satisfied
smile; but vengeance was not to come from him.
Quick and fierce as a tiger-cat, the girl sprang on the ruffian, and
with the intense strength of passion, clasped him in her arms, and
leaped with him from the narrow ledge into the abyss below.
There was a rush, a shout; all faces were bent over the precipice.
The girl hung by her chained wrist: the officer was gone. There was a
moment's awful silence; and then Amyas heard his body crashing through
the tree-tops far below.
“Haul her up! Hew her in pieces! Burn the witch!” and the driver,
seizing the chain, pulled at it with all his might, while all springing
from their chairs, stooped over the brink.
Now was the time for Amyas! Heaven had delivered them into his hands.
Swift and sure, at ten yards off, his arrow rushed through the body of
the driver, and then, with a roar as of the leaping lion, he sprang like
an avenging angel into the midst of the astonished ruffians.
His first thought was for the girl. In a moment, by sheer strength, he
had jerked her safely up into the road; while the Spaniards recoiled
right and left, fancying him for the moment some mountain giant or
supernatural foe. His hurrah undeceived them in an instant, and a cry
of “English! Lutheran dogs!” arose, but arose too late. The men of Devon
had followed their captain's lead: a storm of arrows left five Spaniards
dead, and a dozen more wounded, and down leapt Salvation Yeo, his white
hair streaming behind him, with twenty good swords more, and the work of
death began.
The Spaniards fought like lions; but they had no time to fix their
arquebuses on the crutches; no room, in that narrow path, to use their
pikes. The English had the wall of them; and to have the wall there, was
to have the foe's life at their mercy. Five desperate minutes, and not a
living Spaniard stood upon those steps; and certainly no living one lay
in the green abyss below. Two only, who were behind the rest, happening
to be in full armor, escaped without mortal wound, and fled down the
hill again.
“After them! Michael Evans and Simon Heard; and catch them, if they run
a league.”
The two long and lean Clovelly men, active as deer from forest training,
ran two feet for the Spaniard's one; and in ten minutes returned, having
done their work; while Amyas and his men hurried past the Indians, to
help Cary and the party forward, where shouts and musket shots announced
a sharp affray.
Their arrival settled the matter. All the Spaniards fell but three or
four, who scrambled down the crannies of the cliff.
“Let not one of them escape! Slay them as Israel slew Amalek!” cried
Yeo, as he bent over; and ere the wretches could reach a place of
shelter, an arrow was quivering in each body, as it rolled lifeless down
the rocks.
“Now then! Loose the Indians!”
They found armorers tools on one of the dead bodies, and it was done.
“We are your friends,” said Amyas. “All we ask is, that you shall help
us to carry this gold down to the Magdalena, and then you are free.”
Some few of the younger grovelled at his knees, and kissed his feet,
hailing him as the child of the Sun: but the most part kept a stolid
indifference, and when freed from their fetters, sat quietly down where
they stood, staring into vacancy. The iron had entered too deeply into
their soul. They seemed past hope, enjoyment, even understanding.
But the young girl, who was last of all in the line, as soon as she was
loosed, sprang to her father's body, speaking no word, lifted it in her
thin arms, laid it across her knees, kissed the fallen lips, stroked
the furrowed cheeks, murmured inarticulate sounds like the cooing of a
woodland dove, of which none knew the meaning but she, and he who heard
not, for his soul had long since fled. Suddenly the truth flashed on
her; silent as ever, she drew one long heaving breath, and rose erect,
the body in her arms.
Another moment, and she had leaped into the abyss.
They watched her dark and slender limbs, twined closely round the old
man's corpse, turn over, and over, and over, till a crash among the
leaves, and a scream among the birds, told that she had reached the
trees; and the green roof hid her from their view.
“Brave lass!” shouted a sailor.
“The Lord forgive her!” said Yeo. “But, your worship, we must have these
rascals' ordnance.”
“And their clothes too, Yeo, if we wish to get down the Magdalena
unchallenged. Now listen, my masters all! We have won, by God's good
grace, gold enough to serve us the rest of our lives, and that without
losing a single man; and may yet win more, if we be wise, and He thinks
good. But oh, my friends, remember Mr. Oxenham and his crew; and do
not make God's gift our ruin, by faithlessness, or greediness, or any
mutinous haste.”
“You shall find none in us!” cried several men. “We know your worship.
We can trust our general.”
“Thank God!” said Amyas. “Now then, it will be no shame or sin to
make the Indians carry it, saving the women, whom God forbid we
should burden. But we must pass through the very heart of the Spanish
settlements, and by the town of Saint Martha itself. So the clothes and
weapons of these Spaniards we must have, let it cost us what labor it
may. How many lie in the road?”
“Thirteen here, and about ten up above,” said Cary.
“Then there are near twenty missing. Who will volunteer to go down over
cliff, and bring up the spoil of them?”
“I, and I, and I;” and a dozen stepped out, as they did always when
Amyas wanted anything done; for the simple reason, that they knew that
he meant to help at the doing of it himself.
“Very well, then, follow me. Sir John, take the Indian lad for your
interpreter, and try and comfort the souls of these poor heathens. Tell
them that they shall all be free.”
“Why, who is that comes up the road?”
All eyes were turned in the direction of which he spoke. And, wonder of
wonders! up came none other than Ayacanora herself, blow-gun in hand,
bow on back, and bedecked in all her feather garments, which last were
rather the worse for a fortnight's woodland travel.
All stood mute with astonishment, as, seeing Amyas, she uttered a cry
of joy, quickened her pace into a run, and at last fell panting and
exhausted at his feet.
“I have found you!” she said; “you ran away from me, but you could not
escape me!” And she fawned round Amyas, like a dog who has found his
master, and then sat down on the bank, and burst into wild sobs.
“God help us!” said Amyas, clutching his hair, as he looked down upon
the beautiful weeper. “What am I to do with her, over and above all
these poor heathens?”
But there was no time to be lost, and over the cliff he scrambled; while
the girl, seeing that the main body of the English remained, sat down on
a point of rock to watch him.
After half-an-hour's hard work, the weapons, clothes, and armor of the
fallen Spaniards were hauled up the cliff, and distributed in bundles
among the men; the rest of the corpses were thrown over the precipice,
and they started again upon their road toward the Magdalena, while Yeo
snorted like a war-horse who smells the battle, at the delight of once
more handling powder and ball.
“We can face the world now, sir! Why not go back and try Santa Fe, after
all?”
But Amyas thought that enough was as good as a feast, and they held on
downwards, while the slaves followed, without a sign of gratitude, but
meekly obedient to their new masters, and testifying now and then by a
sign or a grunt, their surprise at not being beaten, or made to carry
their captors. Some, however, caught sight of the little calabashes of
coca which the English carried. That woke them from their torpor,
and they began coaxing abjectly (and not in vain) for a taste of that
miraculous herb, which would not only make food unnecessary, and enable
their panting lungs to endure that keen mountain air, but would rid
them, for awhile at least, of the fallen Indian's most unpitying foe,
the malady of thought.
As the cavalcade turned the corner of the mountain, they paused for one
last look at the scene of that fearful triumph. Lines of vultures were
already streaming out of infinite space, as if created suddenly for the
occasion. A few hours and there would be no trace of that fierce fray,
but a few white bones amid untrodden beds of flowers.
And now Amyas had time to ask Ayacanora the meaning of this her strange
appearance. He wished her anywhere but where she was: but now that she
was here, what heart could be so hard as not to take pity on the poor
wild thing? And Amyas as he spoke to her had, perhaps, a tenderness in
his tone, from very fear of hurting her, which he had never used before.
Passionately she told him how she had followed on their track day and
night, and had every evening made sounds, as loud as she dared, in hopes
of their hearing her, and either waiting for her, or coming back to see
what caused the noise.
Amyas now recollected the strange roaring which had followed them.
“Noises? What did you make them with?”
Ayacanora lifted her finger with an air of most self-satisfied mystery,
and then drew cautiously from under her feather cloak an object at which
Amyas had hard work to keep his countenance.
“Look!” whispered she, as if half afraid that the thing itself should
hear her. “I have it--the holy trumpet!”
There it was verily, that mysterious bone of contention; a handsome
earthen tube some two feet long, neatly glazed, and painted with quaint
grecques and figures of animals; a relic evidently of some civilization
now extinct.
Brimblecombe rubbed his little fat hands. “Brave maid! you have cheated
Satan this time,” quoth he; while Yeo advised that the “idolatrous
relic” should be forthwith “hove over cliff.”
“Let be,” said Amyas. “What is the meaning of this, Ayacanora? And why
have you followed us?”
She told a long story, from which Amyas picked up, as far as he could
understand her, that that trumpet had been for years the torment of her
life; the one thing in the tribe superior to her; the one thing which
she was not allowed to see, because, forsooth, she was a woman. So she
determined to show them that a woman was as good as a man; and hence
her hatred of marriage, and her Amazonian exploits. But still the Piache
would not show her that trumpet, or tell her where it was; and as for
going to seek it, even she feared the superstitious wrath of the tribe
at such a profanation. But the day after the English went, the Piache
chose to express his joy at their departure; whereon, as was to be
expected, a fresh explosion between master and pupil, which ended, she
confessed, in her burning the old rogue's hut over his head, from which
he escaped with loss of all his conjuring-tackle, and fled raging into
the woods, vowing that he would carry off the trumpet to the neighboring
tribe. Whereon, by a sudden impulse, the young lady took plenty of coca,
her weapons, and her feathers, started on his trail, and ran him to
earth just as he was unveiling the precious mystery. At which sight
(she confessed) she was horribly afraid, and half inclined to run; but,
gathering courage from the thought that the white men used to laugh at
the whole matter, she rushed upon the hapless conjuror, and bore off her
prize in triumph; and there it was!
“I hope you have not killed him?” said Amyas.
“I did beat him a little; but I thought you would not let me kill him.”
Amyas was half amused with her confession of his authority over her; but
she went on--
“And then I dare not go back to the Indians; so I was forced to come
after you.”
“And is that, then, your only reason for coming after us?” asked stupid
Amyas.
He had touched some secret chord--though what it was he was too busy to
inquire. The girl drew herself up proudly, blushing scarlet, and said:
“You never tell lies. Do you think that I would tell lies?”
On which she fell to the rear, and followed them steadfastly, speaking
to no one, but evidently determined to follow them to the world's end.
They soon left the highroad; and for several days held on downwards,
hewing their path slowly and painfully through the thick underwood. On
the evening of the fourth day, they had reached the margin of a river,
at a point where it seemed broad and still enough for navigation. For
those three days they had not seen a trace of human beings, and the spot
seemed lonely enough for them to encamp without fear of discovery, and
begin the making of their canoes. They began to spread themselves along
the stream, in search of the soft-wooded trees proper for their purpose;
but hardly had their search begun, when, in the midst of a dense
thicket, they came upon a sight which filled them with astonishment.
Beneath a honeycombed cliff, which supported one enormous cotton-tree,
was a spot of some thirty yards square sloping down to the stream,
planted in rows with magnificent banana-plants, full twelve feet high,
and bearing among their huge waxy leaves clusters of ripening
fruit; while, under their mellow shade, yams and cassava plants were
flourishing luxuriantly, the whole being surrounded by a hedge of orange
and scarlet flowers. There it lay, streaked with long shadows from the
setting sun, while a cool southern air rustled in the cotton-tree, and
flapped to and fro the great banana-leaves; a tiny paradise of art and
care. But where was its inhabitant?
Aroused by the noise of their approach, a figure issued from a cave in
the rocks, and, after gazing at them for a moment, came down the garden
towards them. He was a tall and stately old man, whose snow-white beard
and hair covered his chest and shoulders, while his lower limbs were
wrapt in Indian-web. Slowly and solemnly he approached, a staff in one
hand, a string of beads in the other, the living likeness of some old
Hebrew prophet, or anchorite of ancient legend. He bowed courteously to
Amyas (who of course returned his salute), and was in act to speak, when
his eye fell upon the Indians, who were laying down their burdens in
a heap under the trees. His mild countenance assumed instantly an
expression of the acutest sorrow and displeasure; and, striking his
hands together, he spoke in Spanish:
“Alas! miserable me! Alas! unhappy senors! Do my old eyes deceive me,
and is it one of those evil visions of the past which haunt my dreams
by night; or has the accursed thirst of gold, the ruin of my race,
penetrated even into this my solitude? Oh, senors, senors, know you not
that you bear with you your own poison, your own familiar fiend, the
root of every evil? And is it not enough for you, senors, to load
yourselves with the wedge of Achan, and partake his doom, but you must
make these hapless heathens the victims of your greed and cruelty,
and forestall for them on earth those torments which may await their
unbaptized souls hereafter?”
“We have preserved, and not enslaved these Indians, ancient senor,” said
Amyas, proudly; “and to-morrow will see them as free as the birds over
our heads.”
“Free? Then you cannot be countrymen of mine! But pardon an old man,
my son, if he has spoken too hastily in the bitterness of his own
experience. But who and whence are you? And why are you bringing into
this lonely wilderness that gold--for I know too well the shape of those
accursed packets, which would God that I had never seen!”
“What we are, reverend sir, matters little, as long as we behave to you
as the young should to the old. As for our gold, it will be a curse or
a blessing to us, I conceive, just as we use it well or ill; and so is
a man's head, or his hand, or any other thing; but that is no reason for
cutting off his limbs for fear of doing harm with them; neither is it
for throwing away those packages, which, by your leave, we shall deposit
in one of these caves. We must be your neighbors, I fear, for a day
or two; but I can promise you, that your garden shall be respected, on
condition that you do not inform any human soul of our being here.”
“God forbid, senor, that I should try to increase the number of my
visitors, much less to bring hither strife and blood, of which I have
seen too much already. As you have come in peace, in peace depart. Leave
me alone with God and my penitence, and may the Lord have mercy on you!”
And he was about to withdraw, when, recollecting himself, he turned
suddenly to Amyas again--
“Pardon me, senor, if, after forty years of utter solitude, I shrink at
first from the conversation of human beings, and forget, in the habitual
shyness of a recluse, the duties of a hospitable gentleman of Spain.
My garden, and all which it produces, is at your service. Only let me
entreat that these poor Indians shall have their share; for heathens
though they be, Christ died for them; and I cannot but cherish in my
soul some secret hope that He did not die in vain.”
“God forbid!” said Brimblecombe. “They are no worse than we, for aught
I see, whatsoever their fathers may have been; and they have fared no
worse than we since they have been with us, nor will, I promise you.”
The good fellow did not tell that he had been starving himself for the
last three days to cram the children with his own rations; and that
the sailors, and even Amyas, had been going out of their way every five
minutes, to get fruit for their new pets.
A camp was soon formed; and that evening the old hermit asked Amyas,
Cary, and Brimblecombe to come up into his cavern.
They went; and after the accustomed compliments had passed, sat down on
mats upon the ground, while the old man stood, leaning against a slab of
stone surmounted by a rude wooden cross, which evidently served him as
a place of prayer. He seemed restless and anxious, as if he waited for
them to begin the conversation; while they, in their turn, waited for
him. At last, when courtesy would not allow him to be silent any longer,
he began with a faltering voice:
“You may be equally surprised, senors, at my presence in such a spot,
and at my asking you to become my guests even for one evening, while I
have no better hospitality to offer you.”
“It is superfluous, senor, to offer us food in your own habitation when
you have already put all that you possess at our command.”
“True, senors: and my motive for inviting you was, perhaps, somewhat of
a selfish one. I am possessed by a longing to unburthen my heart of a
tale which I never yet told to man, and which I fear can give to you
nothing but pain; and yet I will entreat you, of your courtesy, to hear
of that which you cannot amend, simply in mercy to a man who feels that
he must confess to some one, or die as miserable as he has lived. And
I believe my confidence will not be misplaced, when it is bestowed upon
you. I have been a cavalier, even as you are; and, strange as it may
seem, that which I have to tell I would sooner impart to the ears of a
soldier than of a priest; because it will then sink into souls which can
at least sympathize, though they cannot absolve. And you, cavaliers, I
perceive to be noble, from your very looks; to be valiant, by your mere
presence in this hostile land; and to be gentle, courteous, and prudent,
by your conduct this day to me and to your captives. Will you, then,
hear an old man's tale? I am, as you see, full of words; for speech,
from long disuse, is difficult to me, and I fear at every sentence lest
my stiffened tongue should play the traitor to my worn-out brain: but
if my request seems impertinent, you have only to bid me talk as a host
should, of matters which concern his guests, and not himself.”
The three young men, equally surprised and interested by this exordium,
could only entreat their host to “use their ears as those of his
slaves,” on which, after fresh apologies, he began:
“Know, then, victorious cavaliers, that I, whom you now see here as a
poor hermit, was formerly one of the foremost of that terrible band who
went with Pizarro to the conquest of Peru. Eighty years old am I this
day, unless the calendar which I have carved upon yonder tree deceives
me; and twenty years old was I when I sailed with that fierce man from
Panama, to do that deed with which all earth, and heaven, and hell
itself, I fear, has rung. How we endured, suffered, and triumphed; how,
mad with success, and glutted with blood, we turned our swords against
each other, I need not tell to you. For what gentleman of Europe knows
not our glory and our shame?”
His hearers bowed assent.
“Yes; you have heard of our prowess: for glorious we were awhile, in
the sight of God and man. But I will not speak of our glory, for it is
tarnished; nor of our wealth, for it was our poison; nor of the sins of
my comrades, for they have expiated them; but of my own sins, senors,
which are more in number than the hairs of my head, and a burden too
great to bear. Miserere Domine!”
And smiting on his breast, the old warrior went on:
“As I said, we were mad with blood; and none more mad than I. Surely it
is no fable that men are possessed, even in this latter age, by devils.
Why else did I rejoice in slaying? Why else was I, the son of a noble
and truthful cavalier of Castile, among the foremost to urge upon
my general the murder of the Inca? Why did I rejoice over his dying
agonies? Why, when Don Ferdinando de Soto returned, and upbraided us
with our villainy, did I, instead of confessing the sin which that noble
cavalier set before us, withstand him to his face, ay, and would have
drawn the sword on him, but that he refused to fight a liar, as he said
that I was?”
“Then Don de Soto was against the murder? So his own grandson told me.
But I had heard of him only as a tyrant and a butcher.”
“Senor, he was compact of good and evil, as are other men: he has paid
dearly for his sin; let us hope that he has been paid in turn for his
righteousness.”
John Brimblecombe shook his head at this doctrine, but did not speak.
“So you know his grandson? I trust he is a noble cavalier?”
Amyas was silent; the old gentleman saw that he had touched some sore
point, and continued:
“And why, again, senors, did I after that day give myself up to cruelty
as to a sport; yea, thought that I did God service by destroying the
creatures whom He had made; I who now dare not destroy a gnat, lest I
harm a being more righteous than myself? Was I mad? If I was, how then
was I all that while as prudent as I am this day? But I am not here to
argue, senors, but to confess. In a word, there was no deed of blood
done for the next few years in which I had not my share, if it were but
within my reach. When Challcuchima was burned, I was consenting; when
that fair girl, the wife of Inca Manco, was tortured to death, I smiled
at the agonies at which she too smiled, and taunted on the soldiers, to
try if I could wring one groan from her before she died. You know what
followed, the pillage, the violence, the indignities offered to the
virgins of the Sun. Senors, I will not pollute your chaste ears with
what was done. But, senors, I had a brother.”
And the old man paused awhile.
“A brother--whether better or worse than me, God knows, before whom he
has appeared ere now. At least he did not, as I did, end as a rebel
to his king! There was a maiden in one of those convents, senors, more
beautiful than day: and (I blush to tell it) the two brothers of whom
I spoke quarrelled for the possession of her. They struck each other,
senors! Who struck first I know not; but swords were drawn, and--The
cavaliers round parted them, crying shame. And one of those two
brothers--the one who speaks to you now--crying, 'If I cannot have her,
no man shall!' turned the sword which was aimed at his brother, against
that hapless maiden--and--hear me out, senors, before you flee from my
presence as from that of a monster!--stabbed her to the heart. And as
she died--one moment more, senors, that I may confess all!--she looked
up in my face with a smile as of heaven, and thanked me for having rid
her once and for all from Christians and their villainy.”
The old man paused.
“God forgive you, senor!” said Jack Brimblecombe, softly.
“You do not, then, turn from me, do not curse me? Then I will try you
farther still, senors. I will know from human lips, whether man can do
such deeds as I have done, and yet be pitied by his kind; that so I may
have some hope, that where man has mercy, God may have mercy also. Do
you think that I repented at those awful words? Nothing less, senors
all. No more than I did when De Soto (on whose soul God have mercy)
called me--me, a liar! I knew myself a sinner; and for that very reason
I was determined to sin. I would go on, that I might prove myself right
to myself, by showing that I could go on, and not be struck dead from
heaven. Out of mere pride, senors, and self-will, I would fill up the
cup of my iniquity; and I filled it.
“You know, doubtless, senors, how, after the death of old Almagro, his
son's party conspired against Pizarro. Now my brother remained faithful
to his old commander; and for that very reason, if you will believe it,
did I join the opposite party, and gave myself up, body and soul, to do
Almagro's work. It was enough for me, that the brother who had struck
me thought a man right, for me to think that man a devil. What Almagro's
work was, you know. He slew Pizarro, murdered him, senors, like a dog,
or rather, like an old lion.”
“He deserved his doom,” said Amyas.
“Let God judge him, senor, not we; and least of all of us I, who drew
the first blood, and perhaps the last, that day. I, senors, it was
who treacherously stabbed Francisco de Chanes on the staircase, and so
opened the door which else had foiled us all; and I--But I am speaking
to men of honor, not to butchers. Suffice it that the old man died like
a lion, and that we pulled him down, young as we were, like curs.
“Well, I followed Almagro's fortunes. I helped to slay Alvarado. Call
that my third murder, if you will, for if he was traitor to a traitor, I
was traitor to a true man. Then to the war; you know how Vaca de Castro
was sent from Spain to bring order and justice where was naught but
chaos, and the dance of all devils. We met him on the hills of Chupas.
Peter of Candia, the Venetian villain, pointed our guns false, and
Almagro stabbed him to the heart. We charged with our lances, man
against man, horse against horse. All fights I ever fought” (and the old
man's eyes flashed out the ancient fire) “were child's play to that day.
Our lances shivered like reeds, and we fell on with battle-axe and mace.
None asked for quarter, and none gave it; friend to friend, cousin to
cousin--no, nor brother, O God! to brother. We were the better armed:
but numbers were on their side. Fat Carbajal charged our cannon like an
elephant, and took them; but Holguin was shot down. I was with Almagro,
and we swept all before us, inch by inch, but surely, till the night
fell. Then Vaca de Castro, the licentiate, the clerk, the schoolman,
the man of books, came down on us with his reserve like a whirlwind.
Oh! cavaliers, did not God fight against us, when He let us, the men of
iron, us, the heroes of Cuzco and Vilcaconga, be foiled by a scholar in
a black gown, with a pen behind his ear? We were beaten. Some ran; some
did not run, senors; and I did not. Geronimo de Alvarado shouted to
me, 'We slew Pizarro! We killed the tyrant!' and we rushed upon the
conqueror's lances, to die like cavaliers. There was a gallant gentleman
in front of me. His lance struck me in the crest, and bore me over my
horse's croup: but mine, senors, struck him full in the vizor. We both
went to the ground together, and the battle galloped over us.
“I know not how long I lay, for I was stunned: but after awhile I lifted
myself. My lance was still clenched in my hand, broken but not parted.
The point of it was in my foeman's brain. I crawled to him, weary and
wounded, and saw that he was a noble cavalier. He lay on his back, his
arms spread wide. I knew that he was dead: but there came over me the
strangest longing to see that dead man's face. Perhaps I knew him. At
least I could set my foot upon it, and say, 'Vanquished as I am, there
lies a foe!' I caught hold of the rivets, and tore his helmet off. The
moon shone bright, senors, as bright as she shines now--the glaring,
ghastly, tell-tale moon, which shows man all the sins which he tries to
hide; and by that moonlight, senors, I beheld the dead man's face. And
it was the face of my brother!
* * * * *
“Did you ever guess, most noble cavaliers, what Cain's curse might be
like? Look on me, and know!
“I tore off my armor and fled, as Cain fled--northward ever, till I
should reach a land where the name of Spaniard, yea, and the name of
Christian, which the Spaniard has caused to be blasphemed from east to
west, should never come. I sank fainting, and waked beneath this rock,
this tree, forty-four years ago, and I have never left them since, save
once, to obtain seeds from Indians, who knew not that I was a Spanish
Conquistador. And may God have mercy on my soul!”
The old man ceased; and his young hearers, deeply affected by his tale,
sat silent for a few minutes. Then John Brimblecombe spoke:
“You are old, sir, and I am young; and perhaps it is not my place to
counsel you. Moreover, sir, in spite of this strange dress of mine, I am
neither more nor less than an English priest; and I suppose you will not
be willing to listen to a heretic.”
“I have seen Catholics, senor, commit too many abominations even with
the name of God upon their lips, to shrink from a heretic if he speak
wisely and well. At least, you are a man; and after all, my heart yearns
more and more, the longer I sit among you, for the speech of beings of
my own race. Say what you will, in God's name!”
“I hold, sir,” said Jack, modestly, “according to holy Scripture, that
whosoever repents from his heart, as God knows you seem to have done, is
forgiven there and then; and though his sins be as scarlet, they shall
be white as snow, for the sake of Him who died for all.”
“Amen! Amen!” said the old man, looking lovingly at his little crucifix.
“I hope and pray--His name is Love. I know it now; who better? But, sir,
even if He have forgiven me, how can I forgive myself? In honor, sir, I
must be just, and sternly just, to myself, even if God be indulgent;
as He has been to me, who has left me here in peace for forty years,
instead of giving me a prey to the first puma or jaguar which howls
round me every night. He has given me time to work out my own salvation;
but have I done it? That doubt maddens me at whiles. When I look upon
that crucifix, I float on boundless hope: but if I take my eyes from
it for a moment, faith fails, and all is blank, and dark, and dreadful,
till the devil whispers me to plunge into yon stream, and once and for
ever wake to certainty, even though it be in hell.”
What was Jack to answer? He himself knew not at first. More was wanted
than the mere repetition of free pardon.
“Heretic as I am, sir, you will not believe me when I tell you, as a
priest, that God accepts your penitence.”
“My heart tells me so already, at moments. But how know I that it does
not lie?”
“Senor,” said Jack, “the best way to punish oneself for doing ill, seems
to me to go and do good; and the best way to find out whether God means
you well, is to find out whether He will help you to do well. If you
have wronged Indians in time past, see whether you cannot right them
now. If you can, you are safe. For the Lord will not send the devil's
servants to do His work.”
The old man held down his head.
“Right the Indians? Alas! what is done, is done!”
“Not altogether, senor,” said Amyas, “as long as an Indian remains alive
in New Granada.”
“Senor, shall I confess my weakness? A voice within me has bid me a
hundred times go forth and labor, for those oppressed wretches, but I
dare not obey. I dare not look them in the face. I should fancy that
they knew my story; that the very birds upon the trees would reveal my
crime, and bid them turn from me with horror.”
“Senor,” said Amyas, “these are but the sick fancies of a noble spirit,
feeding on itself in solitude. You have but to try to conquer.”
“And look now,” said Jack, “if you dare not go forth to help the
Indians, see now how God has brought the Indians to your own door. Oh,
excellent sir--”
“Call me not excellent,” said the old man, smiting his breast.
“I do, and shall, sir, while I see in you an excellent repentance, an
excellent humility, and an excellent justice,” said Jack. “But oh, sir,
look upon these forty souls, whom we must leave behind, like sheep which
have no shepherd. Could you not teach them to fear God and to love each
other, to live like rational men, perhaps to die like Christians? They
would obey you as a dog obeys his master. You might be their king, their
father, yea, their pope, if you would.”
“You do not speak like a Lutheran.”
“I am not a Lutheran, but an Englishman: but, Protestant as I am, God
knows, I had sooner see these poor souls of your creed, than of none.”
“But I am no priest.”
“When they are ready,” said Jack, “the Lord will send a priest. If you
begin the good work, you may trust to Him to finish it.”
“God help me!” said the old warrior.
The talk lasted long into the night, but Amyas was up long before
daybreak, felling the trees; and as he and Cary walked back to
breakfast, the first thing which they saw was the old man in his garden
with four or five Indian children round him, talking smilingly to them.
“The old man's heart is sound still,” said Will. “No man is lost who
still is fond of little children.”
“Ah, senors!” said the hermit as they came up, “you see that I have
begun already to act upon your advice.”
“And you have begun at the right end,” quoth Amyas; “if you win the
children, you win the mothers.”
“And if you win the mothers,” quoth Will, “the poor fathers must needs
obey their wives, and follow in the wake.”
The old man only sighed. “The prattle of these little ones softens
my hard heart, senors, with a new pleasure; but it saddens me, when I
recollect that there may be children of mine now in the world--children
who have never known a father's love--never known aught but a master's
threats--”
“God has taken care of these little ones. Trust that He has taken care
of yours.”
That day Amyas assembled the Indians, and told them that they must obey
the hermit as their king, and settle there as best they could: for if
they broke up and wandered away, nothing was left for them but to fall
one by one into the hands of the Spaniards. They heard him with their
usual melancholy and stupid acquiescence, and went and came as they were
bid, like animated machines; but the negroes were of a different temper;
and four or five stout fellows gave Amyas to understand that they had
been warriors in their own country, and that warriors they would be
still; and nothing should keep them from Spaniard-hunting. Amyas saw
that the presence of these desperadoes in the new colony would both
endanger the authority of the hermit, and bring the Spaniards down
upon it in a few weeks; so, making a virtue of necessity, he asked them
whether they would go Spaniard-hunting with him.
This was just what the bold Coromantees wished for; they grinned and
shouted their delight at serving under so great a warrior, and then set
to work most gallantly, getting through more in the day than any ten
Indians, and indeed than any two Englishmen.
So went on several days, during which the trees were felled, and the
process of digging them out began; while Ayacanora, silent and moody,
wandered into the woods all day with her blow-gun, and brought home
at evening a load of parrots, monkeys, and curassows; two or three old
hands were sent out to hunt likewise; so that, what with the game and
the fish of the river, which seemed inexhaustible, and the fruit of the
neighboring palm-trees, there was no lack of food in the camp. But what
to do with Ayacanora weighed heavily on the mind of Amyas. He opened his
heart on the matter to the old hermit, and asked him whether he would
take charge of her. The latter smiled, and shook his head at the notion.
“If your report of her be true, I may as well take in hand to tame a
jaguar.” However, he promised to try; and one evening, as they were
all standing together before the mouth of the cave, Ayacanora came up
smiling with the fruit of her day's sport; and Amyas, thinking this a
fit opportunity, began a carefully prepared harangue to her, which he
intended to be altogether soothing, and even pathetic,--to the effect
that the maiden, having no parents, was to look upon this good old man
as her father; that he would instruct her in the white man's religion
(at which promise Yeo, as a good Protestant, winced a good deal), and
teach her how to be happy and good, and so forth; and that, in fine, she
was to remain there with the hermit.
She heard him quietly, her great dark eyes opening wider and wider, her
bosom swelling, her stature seeming to grow taller every moment, as she
clenched her weapons firmly in both her hands. Beautiful as she always
was, she had never looked so beautiful before; and as Amyas spoke of
parting with her, it was like throwing away a lovely toy; but it must be
done, for her sake, for his, perhaps for that of all the crew.
The last words had hardly passed his lips, when, with a shriek of
mingled scorn, rage, and fear, she dashed through the astonished group.
“Stop her!” were Amyas's first words; but his next were, “Let her
go!” for, springing like a deer through the little garden and over the
flower-fence, she turned, menacing with her blow-gun the sailors, who
had already started in her pursuit.
“Let her alone, for Heaven's sake!” shouted Amyas, who, he scarce knew
why, shrank from the thought of seeing those graceful limbs struggling
in the seamen's grasp.
She turned again, and in another minute her gaudy plumes had vanished
among the dark forest stems, as swiftly as if she had been a passing
bird.
All stood thunderstruck at this unexpected end to the conference. At
last Aymas spoke:
“There's no use in standing here idle, gentlemen. Staring after her
won't bring her back. After all, I'm glad she's gone.”
But the tone of his voice belied his words. Now he had lost her, he
wanted her back; and perhaps every one present, except he, guessed why.
But Ayacanora did not return; and ten days more went on in continual
toil at the canoes without any news of her from the hunters. Amyas, by
the by, had strictly bidden these last not to follow the girl, not even
to speak to her, if they came across her in their wanderings. He was
shrewd enough to guess that the only way to cure her sulkiness was to
outsulk her; but there was no sign of her presence in any direction; and
the canoes being finished at last, the gold, and such provisions as they
could collect, were placed on board, and one evening the party prepared
for their fresh voyage. They determined to travel as much as possible by
night, for fear of discovery, especially in the neighborhood of the few
Spanish settlements which were then scattered along the banks of the
main stream. These, however, the negroes knew, so that there was no fear
of coming on them unawares; and as for falling asleep in their night
journeys, “Nobody,” the negroes said, “ever slept on the Magdalena; the
mosquitoes took too good care of that.” Which fact Amyas and his crew
verified afterwards as thoroughly as wretched men could do.
The sun had sunk; the night had all but fallen; the men were all on
board; Amyas in command of one canoe, Cary of the other. The Indians
were grouped on the bank, watching the party with their listless
stare, and with them the young guide, who preferred remaining among the
Indians, and was made supremely happy by the present of Spanish sword
and an English axe; while, in the midst, the old hermit, with tears in
his eyes, prayed God's blessing on them.
“I owe to you, noble cavaliers, new peace, new labor, I may say, new
life. May God be with you, and teach you to use your gold and your
swords better than I used mine.”
The adventurers waved their hands to him.
“Give way, men,” cried Amyas; and as he spoke the paddles dashed into
the water, to a right English hurrah! which sent the birds fluttering
from their roosts, and was answered by the yell of a hundred monkeys,
and the distant roar of the jaguar.
About twenty yards below, a wooded rock, some ten feet high, hung over
the stream. The river was not there more than fifteen yards broad; deep
near the rock, shallow on the farther side; and Amyas's canoe led the
way, within ten feet of the stone.
As he passed, a dark figure leapt from the bushes on the edge, and
plunged heavily into the water close to the boat. All started. A jaguar?
No; he would not have missed so short a spring. What, then? A human
being?
A head rose panting to the surface, and with a few strong strokes the
swimmer had clutched the gunwale. It was Ayacanora!
“Go back!” shouted Amyas. “Go back, girl!”
She uttered the same wild cry with which she had fled into the forest.
“I will die, then!” and she threw up her arms. Another moment, and she
had sunk.
To see her perish before his eyes! who could bear that? Her hands
alone were above the surface. Amyas caught convulsively at her in the
darkness, and seized her wrist.
A yell rose from the negroes: a roar from the crew as from a cage of
lions. There was a rush and a swirl along the surface of the stream; and
“Caiman! caiman!” shouted twenty voices.
Now, or never, for the strong arm! “To larboard, men, or over we go!”
cried Amyas, and with one huge heave he lifted the slender body upon
the gunwale. Her lower limbs were still in the water, when, within arm's
length, rose above the stream a huge muzzle. The lower jaw lay flat, the
upper reached as high as Amyas's head. He could see the long fangs
gleam white in the moonshine; he could see for one moment full down the
monstrous depths of that great gape, which would have crushed a buffalo.
Three inches, and no more, from that soft side, the snout surged up--
There was the gleam of an axe from above, a sharp ringing blow, and the
jaws came together with a clash which rang from bank to bank. He had
missed her! Swerving beneath the blow, his snout had passed beneath
her body, and smashed up against the side of the canoe, as the striker,
overbalanced, fell headlong overboard upon the monster's back.
“Who is it?”
“Yeo!” shouted a dozen.
Man and beast went down together, and where they sank, the moonlight
shone on a great swirling eddy, while all held their breaths, and
Ayacanora cowered down into the bottom of the canoe, her proud spirit
utterly broken, for the first time, by the terror of that great need,
and by a bitter loss. For in the struggle, the holy trumpet, companion
of all her wanderings, had fallen from her bosom; and her fond hope of
bringing magic prosperity to her English friends had sunk with it to the
bottom of the stream.
None heeded her; not even Amyas, round whose knees she clung, fawning
like a spaniel dog: for where was Yeo?
Another swirl; a shout from the canoe abreast of them, and Yeo rose,
having dived clean under his own boat, and risen between the two.
“Safe as yet, lads! Heave me a line, or he'll have me after all.”
But ere the brute reappeared, the old man was safe on board.
“The Lord has stood by me,” panted he, as he shot the water from
his ears. “We went down together: I knew the Indian trick, and being
uppermost, had my thumbs in his eyes before he could turn: but he
carried me down to the very mud. My breath was nigh gone, so I left go,
and struck up: but my toes tingled as I rose again, I'll warrant. There
the beggar is, looking for me, I declare!”
And, true enough, there was the huge brute swimming slowly round and
round, in search of his lost victim. It was too dark to put an arrow
into his eye; so they paddled on, while Ayacanora crouched silently at
Amyas's feet.
“Yeo!” asked he, in a low voice, “what shall we do with her?”
“Why ask me, sir?” said the old man, as he had a very good right to ask.
“Because, when one don't know oneself, one had best inquire of one's
elders. Besides, you saved her life at the risk of your own, and have a
right to a voice in the matter, if any one has, old friend.”
“Then, my dear young captain, if the Lord puts a precious soul under
your care, don't you refuse to bear the burden He lays on you.”
Amyas was silent awhile; while Ayacanora, who was evidently utterly
exhausted by the night's adventure, and probably by long wanderings,
watchings, and weepings which had gone before it, sank with her head
against his knee, fell fast asleep, and breathed as gently as a child.
At last he rose in the canoe, and called Cary alongside.
“Listen to me, gentlemen, and sailors all. You know that we have a
maiden on board here, by no choice of our own. Whether she will be a
blessing to us, God alone can tell: but she may turn to the greatest
curse which has befallen us ever since we came out over Bar three years
ago. Promise me one thing, or I put her ashore the next beach, and that
is, that you will treat her as if she were your own sister; and make an
agreement here and now, that if the maid comes to harm among us, the man
that is guilty shall hang for it by the neck till he's dead, even though
he be I, Captain Leigh, who speak to you. I'll hang you, as I am a
Christian; and I give you free leave to hang me.”
“A very fair bargain,” quoth Cary, “and I for one will see it kept to.
Lads, we'll twine a double strong halter for the captain as we go down
along.”
“I am not jesting, Will.”
“I know it, good old lad,” said Cary, stretching out his own hand to him
across the water through the darkness, and giving him a hearty shake. “I
know it; and listen, men! So help me God! but I'll be the first to back
the Captain in being as good as his word, as I trust he never will need
to be.”
“Amen!” said Brimblecombe. “Amen!” said Yeo; and many an honest voice
joined in that honest compact, and kept it too, like men.