LOYAL HEART'S HISTORY.
After the scene of torture we described a few chapters back, Loyal Heart
returned to his rancho with his friends, Tranquil, Lanzi, and the
faithful Quoniam. Fray Antonio had left the village the same morning to
convey to the Jaguar the news of the good reception given his companions
by the Comanches. The Whites sat down sorrowfully on equipals, and
remained silent for some minutes. The horrible tortures inflicted on
Running-elk had affected them more than they liked to say. In fact, it
was a frightful and repulsive spectacle for men accustomed to fight
their enemies bravely, and, when the battle was over, help the wounded
without distinction of victors or vanquished.
"Hum!" Quoniam muttered, "the Red race is a brutal race."
"All races are the same," Tranquil answered "when abandoned without
restraint to the violence of their passions."
"The Whites are men more cruel than the Redskins," Loyal Heart observed,
"because they act with discernment."
"That is true," John Davis struck in, "but that does not prevent the
scene we have just witnessed being a horrible one."
"Yes," said Tranquil, "horrible is the word."
"Come," Loyal Heart remarked, for the purpose of changing the
conversation, "did you not tell me, my friend, that you were entrusted
with a message for me? I fancy the moment has arrived for an
explanation."
"In truth, I have delayed too long in delivering it; besides, if my
presentiments do not greatly deceive me, my return must be anxiously
expected."
"Good! Speak, nobody will disturb you; we have all the time necessary
before us."
"Oh, what I have to say to you will not take long; I only wish to ask
you to lay a final hand to a work for which you have already striven?"
"What is it?"
"I wish to claim your help in the war of Texas against Mexico."
The young hunter frowned, and for some minutes remained silent.
"Will you refuse?" Tranquil asked, anxiously.
Loyal Heart shook his head.
"No," he said; "I merely feel a repugnance to mingle again with white
men, and--shall I confess it? to fight against my countrymen."
"Your countrymen?"
"Yes, I am a Mexican, a native of Sonora."
"Oh!" the hunter said with an air of disappointment.
"Listen to me," Loyal Heart said, resolutely, "after all, it is better I
should speak frankly to you; when you have heard me, you will judge and
tell me what I ought to do."
"Good! Speak, my friend."
"You have, I think, been several times surprised at seeing a white man,
like myself, dwelling with his mother and an old servant among an Indian
tribe; you have asked yourself what reason could be powerful enough, or
what crime was sufficiently great, to compel a man like myself, of
gentle manners, gifted with a pleasant exterior, and possessing some
degree of education, to seek a refuge among savages? This appeared to
you extraordinary. Well, my friend, the cause of my exile to these
remote regions was a crime I committed: on the self-same day I became an
incendiary and an assassin."
"Oh!" Tranquil exclaimed, while the other hearers gave an incredulous
glance; "you an incendiary and assassin, Loyal Heart! it is simply
impossible."
"I was not Loyal Heart then," the hunter continued with a melancholy
smile; "but it is true that I was only a lad, just fourteen years of
age. My father was a Spaniard of the old race, with whom honour was a
sacred inheritance, which he ever kept intact. He succeeded in saving me
from the hands of the Juez de Letras, who had come to arrest me; and
when the magistrate had left the house, my father assembled his tenants,
formed a court, of which he constituted himself president, and tried me.
My crime was evident, the proofs overwhelming, and my father himself
uttered my sentence in a firm voice: I was condemned to death."
"To death?" his hearers exclaimed, with a start of horror.
"To death!" Loyal Heart repeated. "The sentence was a just one. Neither
the supplications of his servants, nor the tears nor entreaties of my
mother, succeeded in obtaining a commutation of my punishment. My father
was inexorable, his resolution was formed, and he immediately proceeded
to execute the sentence. The death my father reserved for me was not
that vulgar death, whose sufferings endure a few seconds; no, he had
said that he had determined to punish me, and designed a long and cruel
agony for me. Tearing me from the arms of mother, who was half fainting
with grief, he threw me across his saddle-bow, and started at a gallop
in the direction of the desert.
"It was a long journey, for it lasted many hours ere my father checked
the speed of his horse or uttered a syllable. I felt the trembling
sinews of the wearied horse give way under me; but still it went on at
the same rapid and dizzy speed. At length it stopped; my father
dismounted, took me in his arms, and threw me on the ground. Within a
moment, he removed the bandage that covered my eyes; I looked anxiously
around me, but it was night, and so dark that I could see nothing. My
father regarded me for a moment with an indefinable expression, and then
spoke. Although many long years have elapsed since that terrible night,
all the words of that address are still imprinted on my mind.
"'See,' he said to me in a quick voice, 'you are here more than twenty
leagues from my hacienda, in which you will never set foot again, under
penalty of death. From this moment you are alone--you have neither
father, mother, nor family. As you are a wild beast, I condemn you to
live with the wild beasts. My resolution is irrevocable, your entreaties
cannot alter it, so spare me them.'
"Perhaps in the last sentence a hope was concealed; but I was no longer
in a condition to see the road left open for me, for irritation and
suffering had exasperated me.
"'I do not implore you,' I replied; 'we do not offer entreaties to a
hangman.'
"At this insulting outrage, my father started; but almost immediately
after every trace of emotion disappeared from his face, and he
continued:
"'In this bag,' he said, to a rather large pouch thrown down by my side,
'are provisions for two days; I leave you this rifle, which in my hands
never missed its mark; I give you also these pistols, this machete,
knife, and axe, and gunpowder and bullets in these buffalo horns. You
will find in the provision bag a flint and steel, and everything
necessary for lighting a fire; I have also placed in it a Bible that
belonged to your mother. You are dead to society, where you must never
return; the desert is before, and it belongs to you: for my part, I have
no longer a son--farewell! May the Lord have mercy on you! All is
finished between us on this earth; you are left alone and without
family; you have a second existence to begin, and to provide for your
wants. Providence never abandons those who place their trust in it:
henceforth it will watch over you.'
"After uttering these words coldly and distinctly, to which I listened
with deep attention, my father cut with his knife the bonds that held my
limbs captive, and leaping info the saddle, started at a gallop without
once turning his head. I was alone, abandoned in the desert in the midst
of the darkness, without hope or help from anywhere. A strange
revolution then took place in me, and I felt the full extent of the
crime I had committed; my heart broke at the thought of the solitude to
which I was condemned; I got up on my knees, watching the fatal outline
that was constantly getting further from me, and listening to the
hurried gallop of the horse with feverish anxiety. And then, when I
could hear no more, when all noise had died out in the distance, I felt
a furious grief wither my heart; my courage all at once abandoned me,
and I was afraid; then, clasping my hands with an effort, I exclaimed
twice in a chocking voice:
"Oh, my mother--my mother!"
"Succumbing to terror and despair, I fell back on the sand and fainted."
There was a moment's silence. These men, though accustomed to the
affecting incidents of their rough life, felt moved to pity at this
simple and yet so striking recital. The hunter's mother and his old
servant had silently joined the hearers, while the dogs, lying at his
feet licked his hands. The young man had let his head sink on his chest,
and hid his face in his hands, for he was suffering from terrible
emotion. No one dared to risk a word of consolation, and a mournful
silence prevailed in the rancho; at length Loyal Heart raised his head
again.
"How long I thus remained unconscious," he continued in a broken voice,
"I never knew; a feeling of coolness I suddenly experienced, made me
open my eyes; the abundant morning dew, by inundating my face, had
recalled me to life. As I was frozen, my first care was to collect some
dry branches, and light a fire to warm me; then I began reflecting.
"When a great suffering does not kill on the spot, a reaction
immediately takes place; courage and will resume their empire, and the
heart is strengthened. In a few moments I regarded my position as less
desperate. I was alone in the desert, it was true; but though still very
young, as I was hardly fourteen, I was tall and strong, gifted with a
firm character like my father, extremely tenacious in my ideas and will;
I had weapons, ammunition, and provisions, and my position was,
therefore, far from being desperate; frequently when I had been still
living at my father's hacienda, I had gone hunting with the tigrero and
vaqueros of the house, and during these hunts had slept under the open
air in the woods; I was now about to begin a fresh hunt, though this
time it would be much longer, and last for life. For a moment I had the
thought of returning to the hacienda, and throwing myself at my father's
knees; but I knew his inflexible character, and feared being
ignominiously expelled a second time. My pride revolted, and I repulsed
this thought, which was, perhaps, a divine inspiration.
"Still, being slightly comforted by the reflections I had just made, and
crushed by the poignant emotions of the last few hours, I at length
yielded to sleep, that imperious need of lads of my age, and fell off,
after throwing wood on the fire to make it last as long as possible. The
night passed without any incident, and at daybreak I awoke. It was the
first time I saw the sun rise in the desert, and the majestic and grand
spectacle I now had before me filled me with admiration.
"This desert, which seemed to me so gloomy and desolate in the darkness,
assumed an enchanting aspect in the dazzling sunbeams: the night had
taken with it all its gloomy fancies. The morning breeze, and the sharp
odours exhaled from the ground inflated my chest, and made me feel
wondrously comforted; I fell on my knees, and with eyes and hands raised
to heaven, offered up an ardent prayer.
"This duty accomplished, I felt stronger, and rose with an infinite
sense of confidence and hope in the future. I was young and strong;
around me the birds twittered gaily, the deer and the antelopes bounded
carelessly across the savannah: that God, who protected these innocent
and weak creatures, would not abandon me, I felt, if by a sincere
repentance I rendered myself worthy of His protection, whose goodness is
infinite. After making a light meal, I put my weapons in my belt, threw
my bag on one shoulder, my rifle on the other, and after looking back
for the last time with a sigh of regret, I set out, murmuring the name
of my mother--that name which would henceforth be my sole talisman, and
serve me in good as in evil fortune.
"My first march was long; for I proceeded toward a forest which I saw
glistening in the horizon, and wished to reach before sunset. Nothing
hurried me, but I wished at once to discover my strength, and know of
what I was capable. Two hours before nightfall I reached the spurs of
the forest, and was soon lost in the ocean of the verdure. My father's
tigrero, an old wood ranger, who had left his footmarks in every
American desert, had told me during the long hunting nights we have
spent together, many of his adventures on the prairies, thus giving me,
though neither of us suspected it at the time, lessons which the moment
had now arrived for me to profit by.
"I formed my bivouac on the top of a hill, lit a large fire, and after
supping with good appetite, said my prayer, and fell asleep. All at once
I woke up with a start: two rastreros were licking my hands with whines
of joy, while my mother and my old Eusebio were bending over and
carefully examining me, not knowing whether I were asleep or in a
fainting fit.
"'Heaven be praised!' my mother exclaimed, 'he is not dead.'
"I could not express the happiness that suddenly flooded my soul at the
sight of my mother, whom I never hoped to see again in this world, at my
pressing to her heart, and hanging round her neck, as if afraid she
would escape me again. I gave way to a feeling of immense joy; when our
transports were somewhat calmed, my mother said to me--
"'And now, what do you intend doing? We shall return to the hacienda,
shall we not? Oh! If you but knew how I suffered through your absence!'
"'Return to the hacienda?' I repeated.
"'Yes; your father, I am certain, will pardon you, if he has not done so
already in his heart.' And while saying this, my mother looked at me
anxiously, and redoubled her caresses.
"I remained silent.
"'Why do you not answer me, my child?' she said to me.
"I made a violent effort over myself. 'Mother,' I at length answered,
'the mere thought of a separation fills my heart with sorrow and
bitterness. But before I inform you of my resolution, answer me frankly
one thing.'
"'Speak, my child.'
"'Has my father sent you to me?'
"'No,' she answered, sorrowfully.
"'But, at any rate, you believe that he approves the step you are now
taking?'
"'I do not believe--' she said, with even greater sorrow than before,
for she foresaw what was about to happen.
"'Well, my mother,' I answered, 'God will judge me. My father has denied
me, he has abandoned me in the desert. I no longer exist for him, as he
himself told me--and I am dead to all the world. I will never set foot
in the hacienda again, unless God and my father forgive my crime--and I
am able to forgive myself. A new existence commences for me from today.
Who can say whether the Deity, in permitting this great expiation, may
not have secret designs with me? His will be done,--my resolution is
immoveable.'
"My mother looked at me fixedly for a moment; she knew that once I had
categorically expressed my will, I never recalled my words. Two tears
silently coursed down her pale cheeks. 'The will of God be done,' she
said; 'we will remain, then, in the desert.'
"'What!' I exclaimed, with joyous surprise, 'Do you consent to remain
with me?'
"'Am I not thy mother?' she said, with an accent of ineffable kindness,
as she pressed me madly to her heart."