the part of her three Cuban guides. They momentarily expected to see
her stricken. Then when she gave no sign of distress they marveled, and
expressed great admiration at her fortitude in enduring pain.
That night was spent at another farm-house. When on the next morning
Norine not only was seen to be alive and well, but insisted upon making
her breakfast of mangoes and milk, the fellow in the derby hat flung
his hands on high and told O'Reilly:
"It is no less than a miracle, but now she courts the wrath of God,
senor! As for me, I shall never again associate with eccentric persons
who delight to fly in the face of Providence. It is my opinion that all
Americans are crazy."
The party had penetrated to the foot-hills of the Sierra de Cubitas
now, and as they ascended, the scenery changed. Rarely is the Cuban
landscape anything but pleasing. For the most part green pastures sown
with stately palm-trees and laid out as if for a picnic alternate with
low rolling hills, and in but few places are the altitudes at all
impressive. It is a smiling island. It has been said, too, that
everything in it is friendly to man: the people are amiable,
warm-hearted; the very animals and insects are harmless. Cuban cattle
are shy, but trusting; Cuban horses are patient and affectionate; the
serpents have no poison, and although the spiders and the scorpions
grow large and forbidding, their sting is ineffective. But here in the
Cubitas range all was different. The land was stern and forbidding:
canons deep and damp raised dripping walls to the sky; bridle-paths
skirted ledges that were bold and fearsome, or lost themselves in
gloomy jungles as noisome as Spanish dungeons. Hidden away in these
fastnesses, the rebel Government had established its capital. Here,
safe from surprise, the soldiers of Gomez and Maceo and Garcia rested
between attacks, nursing their wounded and recruiting their strength
for further sallies.
It was a strange seat of government--no nation ever had a stranger--for
the state buildings were huts of bark and leaves, the army was
uniformed in rags. Cook-fires smoldered in the open glades; cavalry
horses grazed in the grassy streets, and wood-smoke drifted over them.
The second evening brought O'Reilly and Miss Evans safely through, and
at news of the expedition's success a pack-train was made ready to go
to its assistance. Norine's letter from the New York Junta was read,
and the young woman was warmly welcomed. One of the better huts was
vacated for her use, and the officers of the provisional Government
called to pay their respects.
XVII
THE CITY OF BEGGARS
There were other Americans in Cubitas, as O'Reilly soon discovered.
During his first inspection of the village he heard himself hailed in
his own language, and a young man in dirty white trousers and jacket
strode toward him.
"Welcome to our city!" the stranger cried. "I'm Judson, Captain of
Artillery, Departmento del Oriente; and you're the fellow who came with
that quinine lady, aren't you?"
O'Reilly acknowledged his identity, and Judson grinned:
"The whole camp is talking about her and those mangoes. Jove! It's a
wonder she didn't die of fright. Something tells me you're Irish.
Anyhow, you look as if you'd enjoy a scrap. Know anything about
artillery?"
"Nothing whatever."
"I'm sorry. We need gunners. Still, you know as much as the rest of us
did when we came."
"I'm not a fighter," Johnnie told him. "I'm here on--other business."
Captain Judson was plainly disappointed. Nevertheless, he volunteered
to assist his countryman in any way possible. "Have you met the old
man," he inquired--"General Gomez?"
"No, I'd like to meet him."
"Come along, then; I'll introduce you. This is about the right time of
day for it; he'll probably be in good humor. He has dyspepsia, you
know, and he's not always pleasant."
It was nearly sundown; the eastern slopes were in shadow, and supper
was cooking. As the two men passed down the wide street between its
rows of bohios the fragrance of burning fagots was heavy in the
air--that odor which is sweet in the nostrils of every man who knows
and loves the out-of-doors. To O'Reilly it was like the scents of
Araby, for his hopes were high, his feet were light, and he believed
his goal was in sight.
Gen. Maximo Gomez, father of patriots, bulwark of the Cuban cause, was
seated in a hammock, reading some letters; O'Reilly recognized him
instantly from the many pictures he had seen. Gomez was a keen, wiry
old man; the color of his swarthy, sun-bitten cheeks was thrown into
deeper relief by his snow-white mustache and goatee. He looked up at
Judson's salute and then turned a pail of brilliant eyes, as hard as
glass, upon O'Reilly. His was an irascible, brooding face; it had in it
something of the sternness, the exalted detachment, of the eagle, and
O'Reilly gained a hint of the personality behind it. Maximo Gomez was
counted one of the world's ablest guerrilla leaders; and indeed it had
required the quenchless enthusiasm of a real military genius to fuse
into a homogeneous fighting force the ill-assorted rabble of
nondescripts whom Gomez led, to school them to privation and to render
them sufficiently mobile to defy successfully ten times their number of
trained troops. This, however, was precisely what the old Porto-Rican
had done, and in doing it he had won the admiration of military
students. He it was, more than any other, who bore the burden of Cuba's
unequal struggle; it was Gomez's cunning and Gomez's indomitable will
which had already subjugated half the island of Cuba; it was Gomez's
stubborn, unflagging resistance which was destined to shatter for all
time the hopes of Spain in the New World.
With a bluntness not unkind he asked O'Reilly what had brought him to
Cuba, Then before the young man could answer he gestured with a letter
in his hand, saying:
"Major Ramos gives you splendid credit for helping him to land his
expedition, but he says you didn't come to fight with us. What does he
mean?"
When O'Reilly explained the reason for his presence the old fighter
nodded.
"So? You wish to go west, eh?"
"Yes, sir. I want to find Colonel Lopez."
"Lopez? Miguel Lopez?" the general inquired, quickly.
"I believe that's his name--at any rate the Colonel Lopez who has been
operating in Matanzas Province, You see, he knows the whereabouts of
my--friends."
"Well, you won't have to look far for him." General Gomez's leathery
countenance lightened into a smile. "He happens to be right here in
Cubitas." Calling Judson to him, he said: "Amigo, take Mr. O'Reilly to
Colonel Lopez; you will find him somewhere about. I am sorry we are not
to have this young fellow for a soldier; he looks like a real man
and--quite equal to five quintos, eh?"
It was the habit of the Cubans to refer to their enemies as
quintos--the fifth part of a man! With a wave of his hand Gomez
returned to his reading.
As Judson led his companion away he said: "When you have finished with
Lopez come to my shack and we'll have supper and I'll introduce you to
the rest of our gang. You won't get much to eat, for we're short of
grub; but it's worse where Lopez comes from."
Col. Miguel Lopez, a handsome, animated fellow, took O'Reilly's hand in
a hearty clasp when they were introduced; but a moment later his smile
gave way to a frown and his brow darkened.
"So! You are that O'Reilly from Matanzas," said he. "I know you now,
but--I never expected we would meet."
"Esteban Varona told you about me, did he not?"
The colonel inclined his head.
"I'm here at last, after the devil's own time. I've been trying every
way to get through. The Spaniards stopped me at Puerto Principe--they
sent me back home, you know. I've been half crazy. I--You--" O'Reilly
swallowed hard. "You know where Esteban is? Tell me-"
"Have you heard nothing?"
"Nothing whatever. That is, nothing since Rosa, his sister--You
understand, she and I are--engaged-"
"Yes, yes; Esteban told me all about you."
Something in the Cuban's gravity of manner gave O'Reilly warning. A
sudden fear assailed him. His voice shook as he asked:
"What is it? My God! Not bad news?"
There was no need for the officer to answer. In his averted gaze
O'Reilly read confirmation of his sickest apprehensions. The men faced
each other for a long moment, while the color slowly drove out of the
American's cheeks, leaving him pallid, stricken. He wet his lips to
speak, but his voice was no more than a dry, throaty rustle.
"Tell me! Which one?" he whispered.
"Both!"
O'Reilly recoiled; a spasm distorted his chalky face. He began to shake
weakly, and his fingers plucked aimlessly at each other.
Lopez took him by the arm. "Try to control yourself," said he. "Sit
here while I try to tell you what little I know. Or, would it not be
better to wait awhile, until you are calmer?" As the young man made no
answer, except to stare at him in a white agony of suspense, he sighed:
"Very well, then, as you wish. But you must be a man, like the rest of
us. I, too, have suffered. My father"--Lopez's mustached lip drew back,
and his teeth showed through--"died in the Laurel Ditch at Cabanas. On
the very day after my first victory they shot him--an old man, Christ!
It is because of such things that we Cubans fight while we starve--that
we shall continue to fight until no Spaniard is left upon this island.
We have all faced something like that which you are facing now--our
parents murdered, our sisters and our sweethearts wronged. ..."
O'Reilly, huddled where he had sunk upon the bench, uttered a gasping,
inarticulate cry, and covered his face as if from a lash.
"I will tell you all I know--which isn't much. Esteban Varona came to
me soon after he and his sister had fled from their home; he wanted to
join my forces, but we were harassed on every side, and I didn't dare
take the girl--no woman could have endured the hardships we suffered.
So I convinced him that his first duty was to her, rather than to his
country, and he agreed. He was a fine boy! He had spirit. He bought
some stolen rifles and armed a band of his own--which wasn't a bad
idea. I used to hear about him. Nobody cared to molest him, I can tell
you, until finally he killed some of the regular troops. Then of course
they went after him. Meanwhile, he managed to destroy his own
plantations, which Cueto had robbed him of. You knew Cueto?"
"Yes."
"Well, Esteban put an end to him after a while; rode right up to La
Joya one night, broke in the door, and macheted the scoundrel in his
bed. But there was a mistake of some sort. It seems that a body of
Cobo's Volunteers were somewhere close by, and the two parties met. I
have never learned all the details of the affair, and the stories of
that fight which came to me are too preposterous for belief. Still,
Esteban and his men must have fought like demons, for they killed some
incredible number. But they were human--they could not defeat a
regiment. It seems that only one or two of them escaped."
"Esteban? Did he--"
Colonel Lopez nodded; then he said, gravely: "Cobo takes no prisoners.
I was in the Rubi hills at the time, fighting hard, and it was six
weeks before I got back into Matanzas. Naturally, when I heard what had
happened, I tried to find the girl, but Weyler was concentrating the
pacificos by that time, and there was nobody left in the Yumuri; it was
a desert."
"Then you don't know positively that she ... that she--"
"Wait. There is no doubt that the boy was killed, but of Rosa's fate I
can only form my own opinion. However, one of Esteban's men joined my
troops later, and I not only learned something about the girl, but also
why Esteban had been so relentlessly pursued. It was all Cobo's doings.
You have heard of the fellow? No? Well, you will." The speaker's tone
was eloquent of hatred. "He is worse than the worst of them--a monster!
He had seen Miss Varona. She was a beautiful girl. ..."
"Go on!" whispered the lover.
"I discovered that she didn't at first obey Weyler's edict. She and the
two negroes--they were former slaves of her father, I believe--took
refuge in the Pan de Matanzas. Later on, Cobo's men made a raid
and--killed a great many. Some few escaped into the high ravines, but
Miss Varona was not one of them. Out of regard for Esteban I made
careful search, but I could find no trace of her."
"And yet, you don't know what happened?" O'Reilly ventured. "You're not
sure?"
"No, but I tell you again Cobo's men take no prisoners. When I heard
about that raid I gave up looking for her."
"This--Cobo"--the American's voice shook in spite of his effort to hold
it steady--"I shall hope to meet him some time."
The sudden fury that filled Colonel Lopez's face was almost hidden by
the gloom. "Yes. Oh yes!" he cried, quickly, "and you are but one of a
hundred; I am another. In my command there is a standing order to spare
neither Cobo nor any of his assassins; they neither expect nor receive
quarter from us. Now, companero"--the Cuban dropped a hand on
O'Reilly's bowed head--"I am sorry that I had to bring you such evil
tidings, but, we are men--and this is war."
"No, no! It isn't war--it's merciless savagery! To murder children and
to outrage women--why, that violates all the ethics of warfare."
"Ethics!" the colonel cried, harshly. "Ethics? Hell is without ethics.
Why look for ethics in war? Violence--injustice--insanity--chaos--THAT
is war. It is man's agony--woman's despair. It is a defiance of God.
War is without mercy, without law; it is--well, it is the absence of
all law, all good."
There was a considerable silence. Then Lopez went on in another key.
"We Cubans carry heavy hearts, but our wrongs have made us mighty, and
our sufferings have made us brave. Here in the orient we do well
enough; but, believe me, you cannot imagine the desolation and the
suffering farther west--whole provinces made barren and their
inhabitants either dead or dying. The world has never seen anything
like Weyler's slaughter of the innocents. If there is indeed a God--and
sometimes I doubt it--he will not permit this horror to continue; from
every pool of Cuban blood another patriot will spring up, until we
drive that archfiend and his armies into the sea. Go back to your own
country now, and if your grief has made you one of us in sympathy, tell
the world what that black butcher in Havana is doing, and beg your
Government to recognize our belligerency, so that we may have arms.
ARMS!"
It was some time before O'Reilly spoke; then he said, quietly: "I am
not going back. I am going to stay here and look for Rosa."
"So!" exclaimed the colonel. "Well, why not? So long as we do not know
precisely what has happened to her, we can at least hope. But, if I
were you, I would rather think of her as dead than as a prisoner in
some concentration camp. You don't know what those camps are like, my
friend, but I do. Now I shall leave you. One needs to be alone at such
an hour--eh?" With a pressure of his hand, Colonel Lopez walked away
into the darkness.
Judson and his adventurous countryman did not see O'Reilly that night,
nor, in fact, did any one. But the next morning he appeared before
General Gomez. He was haggard, sick, listless. The old Porto-Rican had
heard from Lopez in the mean time; he was sympathetic.
"I am sorry you came all the way to hear such bad news," he said. "War
is a sad, hopeless business."
"But I haven't given up hope," O'Reilly said. "I want to stay here
and--and fight."
"I inferred as much from what Lopez told me." The general nodded his
white head. "Well, you'll make a good soldier, and we shall be glad to
have you." He extended his hand, and O'Reilly took it gratefully.
The city of Matanzas was "pacified." So ran the boastful bando of the
captain-general. And this was no exaggeration, as any one could see
from the number of beggars there. Of all his military operations, this
"pacification" of the western towns and provinces was the most
conspicuously successful and the one which gave Valeriano Weyler the
keenest satisfaction; for nowhere did rebellion lift its head--except,
perhaps, among the ranks of those disaffected men who hid in the hills,
with nothing above them but the open sky. As for the population at
large, it was cured of treason; it no longer resisted, even weakly, the
law of Spain. The reason was that it lay dying. Weyler's cure was
simple, efficacious--it consisted of extermination, swift and pitiless.
Poverty had been common in Matanzas, even before the war, but now there
were so many beggars in the city that nobody undertook to count them.
When the refugees began to pour in by the thousands, and when it became
apparent that the Government intended to let them starve, the better
citizens undertook an effort at relief; but times were hard, food was
scarce, and prices high. Moreover, it soon transpired that the military
frowned upon everything like organized charity, and in consequence the
new-comers were, perforce, abandoned to their own devices. These
country people were dumb and terrified at the misfortunes which had
overtaken them; they wandered the streets in aimless bewilderment,
fearful of what blow might next befall. They were not used to begging,
and therefore they did not often implore alms; but all day long they
asked for work, for bread, that their little ones might live. Work,
however, was even scarcer than food, and the time soon came when they
crouched upon curbs and door-steps, hopeless, beaten, silently
reproachful of those more fortunate than they. Their eyes grew big and
hollow; their outstretched hands grew gaunt and skinny. The sound of
weeping women and fretting babies became a common thing to hear.
In the suburbs, just within the ring of guardian forts, an "area of
cultivation" was set aside, and here the prisoners put up huts of
yagua--comfortless bark shelters, which were well enough, perhaps, in
fair weather, but sadly ineffective against wind and rain. Here, housed
with hunger and crowded together in indescribable squalor, they dwelt,
seeking comfort in their common wretchedness. Since they had no farm
implements, no seeds, no means whatever of cultivating this ground
apportioned to their use, it remained untilled while they grew hungrier
day by day. Outside the lines there were yams, potatoes, edible roots
and such, for the Spaniards' work of desolation had not been quite
complete, and no hand can rob the Cuban soil of all its riches; but the
pacificos were not allowed to leave the city.
Fish were plentiful in the harbor, too, but to catch them was
forbidden. Sentries were on guard with ready rifles and bared machetes;
every morning through the filthy reconcentrado quarter guerrillas drove
pack-mules bearing the mutilated bodies of those who had dared during
the night to seek food surreptitiously. Sometimes they dragged these
ghastly reminders at the ends of ropes; this, indeed, was a favorite
way with them.
Dogs and cats became choice articles of diet, until they disappeared.
The Government did supply one quality of food, however; at intervals,
it distributed yucca roots. But these were starchy and almost
indigestible. From eating them the children grew pinched in limb and
face, while their abdomens bloated hugely. Matanzas became peopled with
a race of grotesquely misshapen little folks, gnomes with young bodies,
but with faces old and sick.
Of course disease became epidemic, for in the leaky hovels,
dirt-floored and destitute of any convenience, there could be no effort
at sanitation. Conditions became unspeakable. The children died first,
then the aged and infirm. Deaths in the street were not uncommon;
nearly every morning bodies were found beneath the portales. Starving
creatures crept to the market in the hope of begging a stray bit of
food, and some of them died there, between the empty stalls. The
death-wagons, heavy with their daily freight, rumbled ceaselessly
through the streets, adding to the giant piles of unburied corpses
outside the city.
Typhoid, smallpox, yellow fever, raged unchecked. The hospitals were
crowded, and even in them the commonest necessities were lacking. It is
believed that men have returned from the grave, but no one, either
Spaniard or Cuban, had ever been known to return from one of these
pest-houses, and, in consequence, those who were stricken preferred to
remain and to die among their dear ones.
Yes, Matanzas was pacified. Weyler's boast was true. Nowhere in the
entire province was a field in cultivation; nowhere, outside the
garrisoned towns, was a house left standing. Nor was the city of
Matanzas the only concentration camp; there were others dotted through
Santa Clara, Habana, and Pinar del Rio. In them half a million people
cried for food. Truly no rebellious land was ever more completely
pacified than this, no people's spirits ever more completely crushed.
Voices no longer preached resistance; they prayed to "Our Lady of Pity"
for a merciful conclusion of this misery. Hands were upraised, but only
to implore. In leaky huts from Jucaro to Cape San Antonio the dead lay
huddled thickly.
Into Matanzas, city of beggary and death, came Rosa Varona and her two
negro companions, looking for relief. They made the journey without
mishap, for they were too destitute to warrant plundering, and Rosa's
disguise concealed what charms remained to her. But once they had
entered the city, what an awakening! What suffering, what poverty, what
rags they saw! The three of them grew weak with dismay at the horror of
it all; but there was no retreat.
Asensio built a makeshift shelter close under La Cumbre--from it the
ruins of the Quinta de Esteban were visible--and there they settled
down to live. They had hoped to lose themselves among the other
prisoners, and in this they were successful, for none of their
miserable neighbors were in any condition to notice them, and there was
nothing sufficiently conspicuous about two tattered blacks and their
hunchbacked daughter to draw attention from the soldiers.
Asensio foraged zealously, and at first he managed somehow to secure
enough food for his little family. He developed a real talent for
discovering vegetables and fruits. He stole, he begged, and he found
food where there was none. One day the soldiers seized him and put him
to work on the fortifications along with a gang of other men who
appeared strong enough to stand hard labor. Asensio was not paid for
this, but he was allowed one meal a day, and he succeeded in bringing
home each night a share of his allotment.
It is surprising how little nourishment will sustain life. Rosa and her
two friends had long felt the pinch of hunger, but now they plumbed new
depths of privation, for there were days when Asensio and his
fellow-conscripts received nothing at all. After a time Evangelina
began making baskets and weaving palm-leaf hats, which she sold at six
cents each. She taught Rosa the craft, and they worked from dawn until
dark, striving with nimble, tireless fingers to supplement Asensio's
rations and postpone starvation. But it was a hopeless task. Other
nimble fingers worked as tirelessly as theirs, and the demand for hats
was limited.
Their hut overlooked the road to San Severino, that via dolorosa on
which condemned prisoners were marched out to execution, and in time
the women learned to recognize the peculiar blaring notes of a certain
cornet, which signified that another "Cuban cock was about to crow."
When in the damp of dewy mornings they heard that bugle they ceased
their weaving long enough to cross themselves and whisper a prayer for
the souls of those who were on their way to die. But this was the only
respite they allowed themselves.