STRONGHAND.
It is impossible to imagine what terrors night brings with it under
its thick mantle of mist, when the earth is no longer warmed by the
sparkling sunbeams, and darkness reigns as supreme lord. At that time
everything changes its aspects, and assumes in the flickering rays
of the moon a fantastic appearance; the mountains seem loftier, the
rivers wider and deeper; the trees resemble spectres--gloomy denizens
of the tomb, watching for you to pass, and ready to clutch you in their
fleshless arms. The imagination becomes heated, ideas grow confused,
you tremble at the fall of a leaf, at the moaning of the night breeze,
at the breakage of a branch; and, suffering from a horrible nightmare,
you fancy at every moment that your last hour is at hand.
In the American forests, night has mysteries still more terrible.
Beneath these immense domes of verdure, which the sun is powerless
to pierce even at midday, and which remain constantly buried in an
undecided clear obscure, the darkness may, so to speak, be felt;
nothing could produce a flash in this chaos, excepting, perhaps,
the luminous eyeballs of the wild beasts, that dart electric sparks
from the thickets. Here Night is truly the mistress; the darkness is
peopled by the sinister denizens of the forest, whom the obscurity
drives from their unknown hiding places, and who begin their mournful
prowling in search of prey. From each clump, from each ravine, issue
confused sounds that have no name in human language; some clear and
sharp, others hoarse and low, and others, again resembling miauling,
or sardonic laughter, are blended in horrible concert. Then come the
heavy footfalls on the ground, and the sullen flapping of birds' wings,
as well as that incessant indistinct murmur, which is nought else but
the continual buzz of the infinitely little, mingled with the hollow
moan always heard in the desert, and which is only the breath of Nature
travailing with her incomprehensible secrets. A night passed in the
forest, without fire or weapons, is a terrible thing for a man; but the
situation becomes far more frightful for a woman--a girl--a frail and
delicate creature, accustomed to all the comforts of life, and unable
to find within herself those thousand resources which a strong man,
habituated to struggle, manages to procure, even in the most desperate
situations.
Without dwelling further on the subject, the reader can imagine without
difficulty the painful situation in which Doña Marianna found herself.
So long as she could hear the sound of her horse's hoofs, as it fled
at full speed, she stood with her body bent forward and outstretched
ears, attaching herself to life, and, perchance, to hope, through the
sound which was so familiar to her; but when it had died out in the
distance, when a leaden silence once again weighed on her, the maiden
shuddered, and, folding her hands on her chest, sank in a half-fainting
condition at the foot of a tree--no longer thinking or hoping, but
awaiting death. For what succour could she expect in the tomb of
verdure, which, though so spacious, was not the less secure?
How long did she remain plunged in this state of prostration, which
was only an anticipated death--one hour or five minutes? She could not
have said. For wretched people, whom everything, even hope, abandons,
time seems to stand still--minutes become ages, and an hour seems as
if it would never end. All at once a feeble, almost indistinguishable
sound smote her ear, and she instinctively listened. This sound grew
louder with every second, and ere long she could not be mistaken; it
was a rapid mad gallop through the forest. This sound Doña Marianna
recognised with terror; for it was produced by the return of her
horse. For the noble animal to come back with such velocity, it must
be pursued, and that closely, by ferocious animals, such was Doña
Marianna's idea, and, unfortunately, she only too soon recognised its
correctness. The horse gave a snort of terror, which was immediately
answered by two loud, sharp growls. Then, as if dreaming, Doña Marianna
heard prodigious leaps; she saw ill-omened shadows pass before her with
the rapidity of a lightning flash, and then a fearful struggle, in
which groans of agony were mingled with yells of delight.
However terrible the maiden's position might be she felt tears slowly
course down her cheeks--her horse, her last comrade, had succumbed--the
liberty she had granted it had only precipitated its destruction.
Strange to say, though, at this supreme moment Doña Marianna did
not think for an instant that the death of her horse probably only
preceded her own by a brief space, and that it was a sinister warning
to her to prepare for being devoured.
When terror has attained a certain degree, a strange effect is produced
upon the individual; animal life still exists in the sense that the
arteries pulsate, the heart palpitates; but intellectual life is
completely suspended; the brain, struck by a temporary paralysis, no
longer receives the thought; the eyes look without seeing; the voice
itself cannot force its way through the contracted throat; in a word,
terror produces a partial catalepsy, by destroying for a period, longer
or shorter, all the noblest faculties of man. Doña Marianna had reached
such a point that, even had she possessed the means of flight, she
would have been incapable of employing them, so thoroughly was every
feeling extinct in her--even the instinct of self-preservation, which
usually remains when all the others are destroyed.
Fortunately for the girl, the jaguars--for there were several of
them--were to leeward; moreover, they had tasted blood, and this was a
double reason which temporarily saved her, by depriving their scent of
nearly all its delicacy. No other sound was audible, save that produced
by the crushing of the horse's bones, which the wild beasts were
devouring, mingled with growls of anger, when one of the banqueters
tried to encroach on its neighbour's share of the booty. There could be
no doubt about the fact; the animals enjoying this horrible repast were
the jaguars, so long hunted by the tigrero, and which her evil star had
brought across the maiden's track.
By degrees, Doña Marianna became--not familiarized with the danger
hanging over her head, for that would have been impossible; but as,
according to the law of nature, anything that reaches its culminating
point must begin to descend, her first terror, though it did not
abandon her, produced a strange phenomenon. She felt involuntarily
attracted towards these horrible animals, whose black outlines she
could distinguish moving in the darkness; suffering from a species of
vertigo with her body bent forward, and her eyes immoderately dilated,
without, even accounting for the strange feeling that urged her to
act thus, she kept her eyes eagerly fixed upon them, following with a
febrile interest their slightest movements, and experiencing at the
sight a feeling of inexplicable pleasure, which produced a mingled
shudder of joy and pain. Let who will try to explain this singular
anomaly of human nature; but the fact is certain, and among our readers
many will, doubtless, bear witness to its truth.
All at once the jaguars, which had hitherto been greedily engaged with
the corpse of the horse, without thinking of anything beyond making
a hearty meal, raised their heads and began sniffing savagely. Doña
Marianna saw their eyes, sparkling like live coals, fixed upon her;
she understood that she was lost; instinctively she closed her eyes
to escape the fascination of those metallic eyeballs, which seemed in
the darkness to emit electric sparks, and prepared to die. Still the
jaguars did not stir; they were crouching on the remains of the horse,
and, while continuing to gaze at the maiden, gracefully passed their
paws over their ears with a purr of pleasure--in a word, they were
coquettishly performing their toilet, appearing not only most pleased
with the meal they had just ended, but with that which was awaiting
them.
Still, in spite of the calmness affected by the two animals--for the
cubs were sleeping, rolled up like kittens--it was evident that for
some unknown motive they were restless; they lashed the ground with
their weighty tails, or laid back their ears with a roar of anger,
and, turning their heads in all directions, sniffed the air. They
scented a danger; but of what nature was it? As for Doña Marianna, they
appeared so sure of seizing her whenever they thought proper, and saw
how harmless she was, that they contented themselves with crouching
before her, and did not deign to advance a step. All at once the male,
without stirring, uttered a sharp, quick yell. The female rose, bounded
forward, seized one of her cubs in her mouth, and with one backward
leap disappeared in a thicket; almost immediately she reappeared,
and removed the second in the same way; then she returned calmly and
boldly to place herself by the side of the male, whose anxiety had now
attained formidable proportions.
At the same instant a flash traversed the air--a shot echoed far and
wide--and the male jaguar writhed on the ground with a roar of agony.
Almost immediately a man dashed from the tree at the foot of which Doña
Mariana was crouching, stood in front of her, and received the shock
of the female, which, at the shot, had instinctively bounded forward.
The man tottered, but for all that kept his feet: there was a frightful
struggle for a few minutes, and then the jaguar fell back with a last
and fearful yell.
"Come," the hunter said, as he wiped on the grass the long machete with
which he had stabbed the beast, "my arrangements were well made, but I
fancy that I arrived only just in time. Now for the cubs; for I must
not show mercy to any member of this horrible family."
Then this man, who seemed to possess the faculty of seeing in the
darkness, walked without hesitation towards the spot where the female
had hidden her cubs. He resolutely entered the thicket, and came out
again almost immediately, holding a cub in either hand. He smashed
their heads against the trunk of a tree, and threw the bodies on those
of their father and mother.
"That is a very tidy butchery," he said; "but what on earth is Don
Hernando's tigrero about, that I am obliged to do his work?"
While saying this, the hunter had collected all the dry wood within
reach, struck a light, and within a few minutes a bright flame
rose skywards. This duly accomplished, the stranger hurried to the
assistance of Doña Marianna, who had fainted.
"Poor girl!" he muttered, with an accent of gentle pity, as he lifted
her in his arms, and carried her to the fire; "How is it that the
fright has not killed her?"
He gently laid her on some firs he had arranged for her bed, and gazed
at her for a moment with a look of delight impossible to describe. But
then he felt considerably embarrassed. Accustomed to the hardships of
a desert life, and a skilful hunter as he had proved himself, this man
was naturally a very poor sick nurse. He knew how, at a pinch, to dress
a wound or extract a bullet, but he was quite ignorant how to bring a
fainting woman round.
"Still, I cannot leave her in this state, poor girl," gazing on her
sorrowfully; "but what am I to do?--how can I relieve her?"
At length he knelt down by the young lady's side, gently raised her
lovely head, which he laid on his knee, and, opening with his dagger
point her closed lips, poured in a few drops of Catalonian refino
contained in a gourd. The effect of this remedy was instantaneous. A
nervous tremour passed over the maiden's body; she heaved a sigh, and
opened her lips. At the first moment she looked around her wildly, but
ideas seemed gradually to return to her brain; her contracted features
grew brighter, and fixing her eyes on the hunter, who was still bending
over her, she muttered, with an expression of gratitude which made the
young man's heart beat, "Stronghand!"
"Have you recognised me, señorita?" he exclaimed, with joyous surprise.
"Are you not my Providence?" she answered. "Do you not always arrive
when I have to be saved from some fearful danger?"
"Oh, señorita!" he murmured, in great embarrassment.
"Thanks! Thanks, my saviour!" she continued, seizing his hand,
and pressing it to her heart; "Thanks for having come to my help,
Stronghand, for this time again. I should have been lost without you."
"I really believe," he said, with a smile, "that I arrived just in
time."
"But how is it that you came so opportunely?" she asked, curiously, as
she sat up and wrapped herself in the furs, for the feminine instinct
had regained its power over her.
At this question, simple though it was, the hunter turned red.
"Oh," he said, "it is very simple. I have been hunting in these parts
for some days past. I had tracked this family of jaguars, which I
obstinately determined to kill, I know not why; but now I understand
that it was a presentiment. After pursuing them all day, I had lost
them out of sight, and was seeking their trail, when your horse enabled
me to recover it."
"What!--my horse?" she exclaimed, in amazement.
"Do you not remember that it was I who gave you this poor Negro on our
first meeting?"
"That is true," she murmured, as she let her eyes fall beneath the
hunter's ardent glance.
"I saw you for a moment this morning when you were going to Sanchez'
rancho."
"Ah!" she remarked.
"Sanchez is a friend, of mine," he continued, as if to explain his
remark.
"Go on."
"On seeing the horse, which I at once recognised, I feared that some
accident had happened to you, and set out after it. But the jaguars had
scented it at the same time, and in spite of my thorough acquaintance
with this forest, it was impossible for me to run as fast as they did.
Luckily, they were hungry, and amused themselves by devouring poor
Negro; otherwise I should not have arrived in time."
"But how was it that you came by this strange road?"
"In the first place, I was bound to save your life, as I knew that if
I killed one jaguar, the other would leap upon you, in order to avenge
it."
"But you ran the risk of being torn in pieces by the horrible animals,"
she said, with a shudder of retrospective terror, as she thought of the
frightful dangers from which she had been so miraculously preserved.
"That is possible," he said, with an unmistakable expression of joy;
"but I should have died to save you, and I desired nothing else."
The maiden made no reply. Pensive and blushing, she bowed her head
on her chest. The hunter thought that he had offended her, and also
remained silent and constrained. This silence lasted several minutes.
At length Doña Marianna raised her head and offered her hand to the
young man.
"Thank you again!" she said, with a gentle smile.
"Your heart is good. You did not hesitate to sacrifice your life for
me, whom you scarce know, and I shall feel eternally grateful to you."
"I am too amply repaid for my services by these words, señorita," he
replied, with marked hesitation; "still I have a favour to ask you, and
I should be pleased if you would deign to grant it."
"Oh, speak, speak! Tell me what I can do!"
"I know not how to explain it; my request will appear to you so
strange, so singular--perhaps so indiscreet."
"Speak; for I feel convinced that the favour you pretend to ask of me
is merely another service you wish to render me."
Stronghand bent a searching glance on the maiden, and then seemed to
make up his mind.
"Well, señorita," he said, "it is this:--should you ever, for any
reason neither you nor I can foresee, need advice, or the help of a
friend, either for yourself or any member of your family, do nothing
till you have seen me, and explained to me unreservedly the motives
that impelled you to come to me."
Doña Marianna reflected, while the hunter gazed at her attentively.
"Be it so," she at length said; "I promise to act as you wish. But how
am I to find you?"
"Your foster brother is my friend, señorita; you will request him to
lead you to me, and he will do so; or, if you prefer it, you can warn
me through him to proceed to any place you may point out."
"Agreed."
"I can count on your promise?"
"Have I not passed my word?"
All at once a loud noise, resembling the passage of a wild beast, was
heard in the forest glade; the maiden started, and instinctively clung
to the hunter.
"Fear nothing, señorita," the latter said; "do you not recognise a
friend?"
At the same moment the tigrero's dog leaped up to fondle her, followed
almost instantaneously by Mariano.
"Heaven be blessed!" he said, joyfully, "She is saved!" and pressing
the hunter's hand cordially, he added, "Thanks; it is a service I owe
you, brother."