About a month after in San Augustin a small two-masted vessel--a
goleta--might have been observed standing on tacks off the coast of
Oaxaca, as if working against the land wind to make to the mouth of Rio
Tecoyama--a stream which runs into the Pacific near the south-western
corner of that State. Only sharp eyes could have seen the schooner; for
it was night, and the night was a very dark one. There were eyes
sharply on the lookout for her, however, anxiously scanning the horizon
to leeward, some of them through glasses. On an elevated spot among the
mangroves, by the river's mouth, a party was assembled, in all about a
score individuals. They were mostly men, though not exclusively; three
female figures being distinguishable, as forming part of the group. Two
of them had the air, and wore the dress, of ladies, somewhat torn and
travel-stained; the third was in the guise of a maid-servant attending
them. They were the Condesa Almonte the Don Luisa Valverde, and her
ever faithful Pepita.
Among the men were six with whom the reader has acquaintance. Don
Ignacio, Kearney, Rock, Rivas, Jose, and he who had been major-domo in
the old monastery, baptismally named Gregorio. Most of the others,
undescribed, had also spent some time in the establishment with the
monks while playing the part of Free Lances. They were, in fact, a
remnant of the band--now broken up and dispersed.
But why! When last seen it looked as though their day of triumph had
come, or was at all events near. So would it have been but for a
betrayal, through which the _pronunciamento_ had miscarried, or rather
did not come off. The Dictator, well informed about it--further warned
by what occurred at San Augustin--had poured troops over the Sierras
into Oaxaca in force sufficient to awe the leaders of the intended
insurrection. It was but by the breadth of a hair that his late Cabinet
Minister, and those who accompanied him, were able to escape to the
sequestered spot where we find them on the shore of the South Sea. To
Alvarez, chief of the Pintos, or "spotted Indians," were they indebted
for safe conduct thither; he himself having adroitly kept clear of all
compromise consequent on that grito unraised. Furthermore, he had
promised to provide them with a vessel in which they might escape out of
the country; and it was for this they were now on the lookout.
When Ruperto Rivas, gazing through that same telescope he had given
Florence Kearney to make survey of the valley of Mexico, cried out, "La
goleta!" every eye around him brightened, every heart beat joyously.
Still more rejoiced were they when, after an hour's tacking against the
land breeze, the goleta got inside the estuary of the stream, and
working up, brought to by the edge of the mangroves.
Unencumbered with heavy baggage, they were all soon aboard, and in three
days after debarked at the port of Panama. Thence crossing the Isthmus
to Chagres, another sea-going craft carried them on to the city, where
they need no longer live in fear of Mexico's despot.
Back to his old quarters in New Orleans had Don Ignacio repaired; again
under the ban of proscription, his estates sequestrated as before. So,
too, those of the Condesa Almonte.
But not for all time, believed they. They lived in hope of a
restoration.
Nor were they disappointed; for it came. The _pronunciamento_ delayed
was at length proclaimed, and carried to a successful issue. Once again
throughout the land of Anahuac had arisen a "grito," its battle cry
"Patria y Libertad!" so earnestly and loudly shouted as to drive the
Dictator from his mock throne; sending him, as several times before, to
seek safety in a foreign land.
Nor were the "Free Lances" unrepresented in this revolutionary struggle;
instead, they played an important part in it. Ere it broke out, they
who had fled the country re-entered it over the Texan border, and
rejoining their brethren, became once more ranged under the leadership
of Captain Ruperto Rivas, with Florence Kearney as his lieutenant, and
Cris Rock a sort of attache to the band, but a valuable adjunct to its
fighting force.
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Swords returned to their scabbards, bugles no longer sounding war
signals, it remains out to speak of an episode of more peaceful and
pleasanter nature, which occurred at a later period, and not _so very
long_ after. The place was inside the Grand Cathedral of Mexico, at
whose altar, surrounded by a throng of the land's elite, bells ringing,
and organ music vibrating on the air, stood three couples, waiting to be
wedded.
And wedded they were! Don Ruperto Rivas to the Condesa Almonte,
Florence Kearney to the Dona Luisa Valverde, and--Jose to Pepita.
Happy they, and happy also one who was but a witness of the ceremony,
having a better view of it than most of the spectators, from being the
head and shoulders taller than any. Need we say this towering personage
was the big Tejano? Cris looked on delightedly, proud of his comrade
and _protege_, with the beautiful bride he had won and was wedding. For
all it failed to shake his own faith in single blessedness. In his eyes
there was no bride so beautiful as the "Land of the Lone Star," no wife
so dear as its wild "purairas." And to them after a time he returned,
oft around the camp-fire entertaining his companions of the chase with
an account of his adventures in the Mexican valley--how he had there
figured in the various roles of jail-bird, scavenger, friar, and last of
all as one of the Free Lances.