As the cavalier sprang among his countrymen almost fainting with
exhaustion, he loosened, with as much discretion as dexterity, the knot
of the tilmatli, and dropped it to the earth, so that he might not be
mistaken for a foe. The sudden gleam of his armour, and the sight of his
wan visage, struck all those who had rushed against him with horror.
Among the foremost of all, was the man-at-arms Lazaro, who no sooner
perceived that he had raised his trusty espada against what he doubted
not was the spectre of the novice, than he fell upon his knees, yelling
aloud,
"Jesu Maria! my master! my master's ghost!" with other such exclamations
of terror.
At this moment, the page revived in the arms of his patron, but only to
add to the cry of Lazaro a shriek so wild and heart-piercing, that it
drove all other sounds from the ears of Don Amador. The cavalier
observed the cause of this cry, and again his eye lighted up with the
fires of passion. A group of soldiers, agitated by some tumult, which
had no part in the conflict around, stood against the palace wall, under
a casement, from which was projected a bundle of partisans. Round this
extempore gibbet was fixed a rope, one end of which being pulled at by
those below, the cavalier beheld, shooting up above the heads of the
mass, a human being, to all appearance, bound hand and foot; and in the
blackened and horribly convulsed countenance of the sufferer, he
perceived the features of Abdalla, the Wali.
With a bound, that carried him at once into their midst, and with a
rapidity that prevented opposition he rushed up to the wall, and before
the Morisco was elevated above his reach, struck the halter with his
weapon. The Zegri fell to the earth;--the executioners looked upon the
visage of his bold preserver, and being persuaded, like Lazaro, that the
very ghastly apparition before them was nothing less than the ghost of
an hidalgo, universally reckoned dead, they recoiled in affright. Before
they had recovered from their confusion, the culprit rose to his feet,
glared a moment on the cavalier, and then springing away, was instantly
lost among the combatants. A wild and exulting cry of "Moro! Moro!
Tlatoani Moro!" rose among the barbarians; and the Spaniards knew that
their prey was beyond pursuit.
"Santos santisimos! Holy Mother of heaven! grace upon all, and Amen! if
thou beest a living creature, speak,--or I will smite thee for a devil!"
These words came from the lips of Alvarado, who had himself commanded
the body of hangmen, and who now, though his teeth chattered with
terror, advanced his rapier towards the bosom of his late companion. As
he gazed and menaced, Don Amador, yielding, at last, to the consequences
of labours altogether above his enfeebled powers, sunk swooning to the
earth; and Jacinto, rushing from the crowd, flung himself upon his body.
"Viva! praise God, and let the cry go round; for we have saved the noble
De Leste!" shouted Don Pedro, with a voice of joy, raising the senseless
cavalier. "Now shall ye hear from his own mouth, ye caitiffs that have
belied me, that I played not the foul companion. Viva! I swear it
rejoices me to behold thee!--Why, thou little rascal traitor, art thou
here, too! It was God's will thy vagabond father should purchase me my
brother; for which reason, I am not incensed he has escaped me. One day
is as good as another for hanging.--How now, my noble friend! art thou
hurt beyond speaking! God's lid! but I would hug thee, if thou didst not
look so dismal!"
All this time, the neophyte surveyed the astounded visages around him
with a bewildered eye; and, doubtless, his obtuse senses could not, at
that moment of clamour, detect the accents of Don Pedro.
"Tetragrammaton! did I not tell thee the truth?" cried the harsh voice
of Botello.
"Master! dear master!" exclaimed Lazaro, as he embraced the knees of the
novice.
"Thanks be to God! the noble senor has escaped!" shouted the secretary.
"God be praised! but would it had been yesterday! for then might it have
been better for Don Gabriel."
The name of his kinsman, spoken by the well-known voice of Baltasar,
dispelled at once the dreamy trance of the cavalier.
"How fares my noble kinsman?" he cried.
The head of Baltasar fell on his breast, and a loud groan came from his
fellow-servitor. Don Amador looked to the Tonatiuh, and witnessed the
change from blithe joy to gloomy hesitation, which instantly marked his
handsome aspect; the face of Fabueno darkened; and the magician strode
away.
"Clear for me, if ye will not speak!" said the cavalier, with sudden
sternness; "for there is no sight of wo I cannot now look upon."
He grasped the arm of Jacinto, and pushing into the palace, made his way
toward the chamber of the knight.--The hand of devastation had been upon
the walls of the passage; beams and planks had been torn away to supply
the materials for the mantas and other martial engines; and Don Amador
no longer knew the apartment of his kinsman. A dim light, and a low
sound of wailing, came from a curtained door. Before the secretary and
the other attendants who followed, could intercept him, he stepped into
the room.
The sight that awaited him instantly fastened his attention. He was in
the chamber of Montezuma, and the captive monarch lay on the bed of
death. Around the low couch knelt his children, and behind were the
princes of the empire, gazing with looks of awe on the king. In front
were several Spanish cavaliers, unhelmed and silent; and Cortes himself,
bare-headed and kneeling, gazed with a countenance of remorse on his
victim; while the priest Olmedo stood hard by, vainly offering, through
the medium of Dona Marina and the cavalier De Morla, the consolations
of religion.
The king struggled in a kind of low delirium, in the arms of a man of
singular and most barbarous appearance. This was a Mexican of gigantic
stature, robed in a hooded mantle of black; but the cowl had fallen from
his head, and his hair, many feet in length, plaited and twisted with
thick cords, fell like cables over his person and that of the dying
king. This was the high-priest of Mexico, taken prisoner at the battle
of the temple.
The countenance of Montezuma was changed by suffering and the
death-throe; and yet, from their hollow depths, his eyes shot forth
beams of extraordinary lustre. As he struggled, he muttered; and his
broken exclamations being interpreted, were found to be the lamentations
of a crushed spirit and a broken heart.
"Bid the Teuctli depart," were some of the words which Don Amador
caught, as rendered by the lips of Marina: "before he came, I was a king
in Mexico.--But the son of the gods," he went on, with a hoarse and
rattling laugh, "shall find that there are gods in Mexico, who shall
devour the betrayer! They roar in the heavens, they thunder among the
mountains,"--(the continued peals of artillery, shaking the fabric of
the palace, mingled with his dreams, and gave a colour to them)--"they
speak under the earth, and it trembles at their shouting. Ometeuctli,
that dwelleth in the city of heaven, Tlaloc, that swimmeth on the great
dark waters, Tonatricli and Meztli, the kings of day and night, and
Mictlanteuctli, the ruler of hell,--all of them speak to their people;
they look upon the strangers that destroy in their lands, and they say
to me, 'Thou art the king, and they shall perish!'--Wo! wo! wo!" he
continued, with an abrupt transition to abasement and grief; "they look
upon me and laugh, for I have no people! In the face of all, I was made
a slave; and, when they had spit upon me, they struck me as they strike
the slave; so struck my people. Come, then, thou that dwellest among
the rivers of night; for, among the rivers, with those who die the death
of shame, shall I inhabit. Did not Mexico strike me, and shout for joy?
Wo, wo! for my people have deserted me! and, in their eyes, the king is
a slave!"
"Put thy lips to this emblem of salvation," said the Spanish priest,
extending his crucifix, eagerly; "curse thy false gods, which are
devils; acknowledge Christ to be thy master; and part,--not to dwell
among the rivers of hell, which are of fire, but in the seats of bliss,
the heaven of the just and happy."
"I spit upon thy accursed image!" said the monarch, rousing, with
indignation, into temporary sanity, and endeavouring to suit the action
to the word; "I spit upon thy cross, for it is the god of liars and
deceivers! of robbers and murderers! of betrayers and enslavers! I curse
thy god, and I spit upon him!"
All the Spaniards present recoiled with horror at the impiety, which was
too manifest in the act to need interpretation; and some, in the moment,
half drew their swords, as if to punish it by despatching the dying man
at once. But they looked again on the king, and knew that this sin was
the sin of madness.
As they started back, the person of De Leste, whom, in their fixed
attention to Montezuma, none of them had yet perceived, was brought into
the view of the monarch. His glittering eye fell upon the penacho, which
the cavalier had not yet thought to remove from his helmet, and which
yet drooped, with its badges of rank, over his forehead. A laugh, that
had in it much of the simple exultation of childhood, burst from the
king's lips; and, raising himself on the couch, he pointed at the ruddy
symbols of distinction. The cavaliers, following the gesture with their
eyes, beheld, with great agitation, their liberated companion; and even
Cortes, himself, started to his feet, with an invocation to his saint,
when his eye fell upon the apparition.
The words of Amador,--"Fear me not, for I live,"--though not lost, were
unanswered; for, notwithstanding that many of the cavaliers immediately
seized upon his hands, to express their joy, they instantly cast their
regards again upon Montezuma, as not having the power to withdraw them
for a moment from him.
"Say what they will," muttered the king, still eyeing the penacho with
delight, "I, also, am of the House of Darts; and in Tlascala and
Michoacan, and among the Otomies of the hills, have I won me the tassels
of renown. Before I was a king, I was a soldier: so will I gather on me
the armour of a general, and drive the Teuctli from my kingdom. Ho,
then, what ho! Cuitlahuatzin! and thou, son of my brother,
Quauhtimotzin! that are greater in war than the sons of my body, get ye
forth your armies, and sound the horns of battle! Call upon the gods,
and smite! on Mexitli the terrible, on Painalton the swift! call them,
that they may see ye strike, and behold your valour! Call them, for
Montezuma will fight at your side, and they shall know that he is
valiant!"
The struggles of the king, as he poured forth these wild exclamations,
were like convulsions. But suddenly, and while the Spaniards thought he
was about to expire in his fury, the contortions passed from his
countenance, his lips fell, his eyes grew dim, and his voice was turned
to a whisper of lamentation.
"I sold my people for the smile of the Teuctli; I bartered my crown for
the favour of the Christian; I gave up my fame for the bonds of a
stranger; and now what am I? I betrayed my children--and what are they?
Let it not be written in the books of history,--blot the name of
Montezuma from the list of kings; let it not be taught to them that are
to follow.--Tlaloc, I come!--Let it be forgotten."
Suddenly, as he concluded, and as if the fiend of the world of waters he
had invoked, had clutched upon him, he was seized with a dreadful
convulsion, and as his limbs writhed about in the agony, his eyes,
dilating with each struggle, were fixed with a stony and basilisk glare
upon those of Cortes; and thus,--his gaze fixed to the last on his
destroyer,--he expired.
When the neophyte beheld the last quiver cease in the body, and knew by
the loud wail of the Mexicans, that Montezuma was no more, he looked
round for Don Hernan; but the general had stolen from the
apartment.--The visage of Cortes revealed not the workings of his mind;
but his heart spoke to his conscience, and his soul recorded the
confession;--"I have wronged thee, pagan king;--but thy vengeance
cometh!"
Don Amador's arm was touched by his friend De Morla.
"In the chamber of death," said the cavalier, sadly, "thou mightest best
hear of death: but I cannot discourse to thee, while Minnapotzin is
mourning. Let us depart, brother."
Don Amador motioned to the page, and followed his friend out of the
apartment.