About the time our story commences, 1841, Rosas was beginning that
system of terrorism, espionage, confiscation, and secret assassination,
which has since made his government so notorious abroad and so dreaded
at home. The Monte Videans were in his province of Santa Fé, in the
north; and his political opponents, the Unitarians,[6] were supposed to
be plotting in the capital: but Rosas not a man to stick to the common
modes of war. If he could not inspire confidence among friends, he could
at least inspire terror among his foes. A club, calling themselves the
friends of public security, the sons of liberty, or some such name, but
called by others “Masorcheros,” was established, and many enrolled
themselves in this murderous body to save themselves. Rosas betook
himself to the encampment he called the “sacros Ingares,” holy places;
and thence issued secret orders to his myrmidons, to whose fury the town
was completely abandoned.
There are few darker pages in the modern annals of South America than
the record of the months of October 1841, and April 1842, in the devoted
town of Buenos Ayres. Rosas, himself secure amid his savage soldiery,
issued his secret death-roll. The chiefs of the Masorcheros, anxious to
secure their own safety, rivalled each other in their zeal to capture;
and the work of death itself was intrusted to hands whose trade was
blood. Without trial[7] for offences, without warrants for apprehension,
without even a knowledge of danger, houses were openly entered, men
massacred, women flogged, and property destroyed; victims were decoyed
out, by friends, from theatres and ball-rooms; men were followed in the
streets, and stabbed at their own doors; and concerted signals were
arranged to tell the police carts, that wandered about the streets at
night, where to find out the victims. We shall not give any more
harassing details here. There is no doubt that there were more massacres
committed than ever were ordered by authority: the machinery of murder,
once set agoing, revolved of itself, and knives were sometimes made to
settle old quarrels and long accounts; Rosas, when he found things going
on too far, easily put a stop to them by disposing of some of the
Masorcheros themselves, among others, the chief, who was thus for ever
prevented from telling any tales against his master.
Such unheard-of and unexpected scenes suddenly occurring in the midst of
a happy, prosperous, and orderly city, were accompanied by strange
anomalies. Foreigners could scarcely conceive the existence of a regular
organised body of assassins. Natives, not yet schooled into distrust of
their best friends, and perhaps not even conscious of guilt, could not,
all at once, throw aside their habits of social conviviality. The
churches were open for their usual services, the markets still crowded;
there was no rioting in the streets, which the police paraded as usual.
Ministers and consuls still displayed their flags, and balls and dinners
were as numerously attended as ever; and those who had not seen or
suffered were unwilling to believe the horrid reports that circulated in
secret whispers; and many who knew, or had seen some of the fearful
goings-on around them, probably deemed an affectation of ignorance or
indifference their best policy. Such was the state of the city until the
frequency of outrages forced the natives to keep their houses, take
refuge under the roofs of foreigners, smuggle themselves on board
merchant vessels or men-of-war, or sneak through the deserted streets
like doomed men, shunning the contact of their fellows as if it had been
a city of the plague.
It was at the beginning of this reign of terrorism, and the morning
after the ball at Señora Tertulia’s, that our friend Tom Thorne awoke in
a room by no means so snug, airy, or odorous as his own well-appointed
bed-chamber in the Calle Derecho. Close beside, him, busily engaged in
brushing his clothes with his hands, and alternately muttering
maledictions against sanguinary Spaniards, and mumbling over odds and
ends of old songs, was a strong-built ruddy-looking gentleman of about
twenty-eight or thirty.
“Holla, Griffin!” cried Tom, “where the deuce is this, and how came you
here?”
“Faith, Mr Thorne. I came here for much the same reason as you did; and,
though not in a very creditable place, I can thank my stars I’m in good
company any how.”
“But how came we here, Griffin?”
“Faith, Thorne, except your nerves are very steady--and in virtue of
Señora Tertulia’s champagne, mine are not--I think it might be as well
to defer that same story until you have shaved, or you may run the risk
of having some of the cuts in your face which were intended for your
throat last night. You see, sir, I left La Señora’s about the same time
you did. They say the cool air is refreshing, but I never found it so
after drinking champagne. Well, as I was stumbling along, I fell over a
body, stretched across the pavement. ‘You have taken mighty convenient
quarters for a cold night,’ thought I, ‘bad luck to you;’ and, intending
to do him a good turn, as I might require it myself soon, I was trying
to raise him up, when two men, who were standing in the shadow of a
door-way, within a few feet of me, cried, ‘Hist, hist, passa adelante,
amigo.’ ‘Come and help me with this poor devil here,’ said I. ‘Pass
a-head, friend, if you do not wish the same accommodation,’ said they,
throwing the light of a dark lantern suddenly, and only for a moment, on
the object of my attention. I required no second bidding, Thorne. The
pavement was soft and warm enough for a corpse! My first thought was for
a pistol or a stick, but I had neither. I looked at the men,--there they
stood as cool and careless as the door-posts, and me fixed and staring
at them as if they had been Gog and Magog. ‘Passa adelante,’ growled out
one of them, drawing a knife, at the same time. This brought me to my
senses, and I passed on--and, mark me, Thorne, as sober as a judge.
“Well, sir, off I started, leaving Gog and Magog to keep their watch at
the door-post, when who should I overtake but yourself, walking as proud
as a prince and as bold as a lion. We did not walk far, till three men
met us, one of whom threw the light of his dark-lantern full into your
face, scanning it for a few seconds with more freedom than manners.
Although dazzled and stupefied by the light, I saw you grasping your
stick, and beginning to break out, when I interposed. ‘Gentlemen,’ said
I, in my best Spanish--for it’s always best to be civil--‘Gentlemen,’
said I, ‘we are gentlemen who have lost our way. I’ll give you fifty
dollars,[8] and thanks to boot, if you please to take us to the police
office.’ You appeared inclined to show fight at the mention of the
police office, but I passed it off as if you had more money than sense,
and promised them fifty from you too; so after a slight struggle we
secured you, and here we are, without any solutions of continuity, as
surgeons say, except in our raiment.”
“But why did you not tell them to take us to my house?” said Thorne.
“Why, in the first place,” said Griffin, “I have not the honour of
knowing where you live; and, by Castor and Pollux! I would not have
left you with these ruffians for a world of coppers.”
“But then the disgrace of being lodged in the prison all night!”
“As for that,” said the imperturbable Griffin, “in my opinion the
prisons will soon be fuller than the hotels in this city; and wherever
you and I condescend to take up our quarters becomes _de ipso facto_
respectable.”
“Well, well, Griffin, it’s no use telling you to keep it quiet, but
don’t tell the ladies of it at any rate.”
“Don’t trouble yourself, Thorne,--I won’t be such a bear as that. But by
the way, Gog and Magog, as I’m a sinner, were standing either at or
close by Mendoza’s door: they could not be watching for any of them,
could they?”
“Never fear,” said Thorne; “Mendoza is very thick with the Government;
at all events he was not at the party, and the ladies are sure to be
well convoyed.”
Just as they were talking, a messenger came from the Commissary of
Police, to summon them to the presence of the Functionary, into whose
dread presence they were immediately ushered.
The Commissary--a stout, healthy-looking man about middle age--sat
smoking a cigarito, dressed in a red waistcoat, a braided jacket, and a
slouching cap with a broad gilt band; from the button-hole of his jacket
was the usual red ribbon with the head of Rosas upon it, and the
favourite motto which he has caused to be inscribed on the national
colours, and over every proclamation, “_Vivan los Federales--mucran los
salvages imundos ascherosas Unitarios._”[9] He was listening attentively
to the information given by a very precise, trim, well-dressed looking
youth, if we might call him so, for his dress betokened youth more than
his face, which at that moment appeared particularly pale. The
conversation, whatever was its nature, appeared to be taken notes of by
a clerk, who was sitting near them, and it dropped the moment they
entered; whether it was that Thorne, who was the first to enter, had
still the sound of Mendoza buzzing in his ears, or that, in the excited
state of his nervous system, he was thinking of the frightful scene
committed at his doors, certain it is, that on his appearance, Don
Felipe Le Brun started and appeared agitated for a moment, and our
friend thought he heard the name of Mendoza.
“Sorry to meet you here,” exclaimed Don Felipe, suddenly recovering from
his start. “Can I be of any service, sir? If so, command me.”
“I am sorry to meet you here, sir,” said Thorne in German, so as not to
be understood by the Commissary, and viewing Le Brun with a keen and
inquisitive look--“I am sorry to find that you have such private
business in these quarters. Pray, señor,” he continued to the
magistrate, who appeared on the point of interrupting him, “do not allow
me or my friend to disturb your correspondence with Don Felipe Le Brun.”
“My business with you, Señor Thorne,” said the magistrate, “is confined
to giving you the advice, which you may find of use, to keep more
orderly hours, and thus you will save the police the trouble of
providing you with night-quarters. I have no complaint against you--you
may go.”
Most men living in a community where a magistrate is not only the
instrument but the interpreter of the law, and where there is no free
press or public opinion to expose the injustice or temper the insolence
of power, would have gladly and immediately availed themselves of the
magisterial permission to withdraw, with thanks for the leniency
extended to them. But Mr Thorne was neither a selfish man nor a timid;
and his was not the disposition humbly to accept that as a favour which
he did not conceive could be withheld from him as a right. He knew that
the most arrogant and imperative of the natives were only so to those
who cringed to them as they themselves cringed to their superiors. As a
proud and independent man, and a good citizen, he resolved to let the
proud official know of the scene witnessed by his friend the preceding
night; and he had hopes, by so doing, either to confirm or allay his
suspicions of the nature of Bruin’s communication with the _Juez de
Paz_. He therefore answered with a bold front--
“I thank the Senor _Juez de Paz_ for his counsel, and I beg to inform
him, that the officers of the police could scarcely be better, and have
been much worse employed than in affording protection to those who
demanded it on a night like the last.”
The official started up--his eye sparkling, his face suffused with
passion. Before he could speak, Mr Thorne pursued--
“Sir, as a respectable citizen of this city, as an accredited consular
agent to this government, I think it my duty to report to you, as one of
its chief magistrates, that last night a man was found murdered on the
pavement in front of Luis Mendoza’s house, and two men standing close
beside him; and these men, Signor _Juez de Paz_, were dressed the same
as those who brought us here last night. Probably, Signor Le Brun, this
may be the same information you were conveying to his honour.”
Signor Le Brun with great energy protested that it was the first he had
heard of the affair.
By this time the _juez de paz_ had recovered his command of temper. He
was, in fact, somewhat cowed by the bold and manly bearing of Thorne,
who, as an Englishman, and in a kind of official capacity, was, in some
respects, beyond his jurisdiction. Moreover, he was aware that Thorne
had, in one instance, for some petty grievance, demanded and obtained
redress from the “Illustrious Restorer of Laws” in person; and thus,
though he felt indignant at being bearded in his own hall--I had almost
said _hell_; he rather considered Thorne as a person whose officious
information was to be got rid of than as a culprit to be bullied. He
therefore contented himself by saying, “Don Thomas, this is not an
affair that comes under my cognisance, or yours; and let me assure you,
the less you trouble yourself with the affairs of others the better.”
“But, sir, with respect to the man on the pavement,” commenced Griffin.
“Officers, take the fool away!” roared the magistrate, with his hand on
the bell.
But the worthy Radamanthus and his myrmidons were saved the trouble; for
Tom Thorne, with a bow to the exasperated official, and a kind of
dubious glance at Le Brun, hurried Griffin out of the Sala of Justice
without any extraneous assistance.
“By the powers of Moll Kelly and the bean-stalk of Jack the
Giant-Killer!” said Griffin, when once they were out of sight and
hearing, “but that justice cares no more about the finding of dead men
in the street than I would care when I am hungry for a chop from the
Brother of the Sun and Moon interdicting pork.”
“Why, of course, he knew all about it before,” said Thorne.
“Then, I should think, you might as well have kept the information to
yourself.”
“No,” said Tom; “I thought there could be no harm in letting them see
that there might be some suspicions of who did it, if any thing out of
the way did happen to old Mendoza.”
“If you have a twinkling of suspicion that that square-shaved sinner in
the corner is in your way at all, I’ll let day-light shine through him
in the presence of his friends before you call say hair-trigger.”
“Griffin, dine with me to-day, will you, and we will have a scamper into
the Camp after.”
“I shall be delighted,” said Griffin.
“_Hasta luego_, then--at three precisely,” and each took a different
route.
“He is a jolly, frank fellow that,” said Thorne to himself. “I wonder
what he is!”
“That’s the very man I wanted,” said Griffin. “Faith, I may know every
body I care about now, and dine every day of the week for nothing.”
Griffin was one of those genteel adventurers that you find in every
large community hanging on to the outskirts of society, who come from
nobody knows where, and live nobody knows how; who have no profession
except that of an idler, and no occupation except paying off their
debts with promises; they never lose a bet; they often, very often, lose
one game of billiards or ecarte, but never a rub; they never _can_
remember to carry small change in their pockets; and they never _do_
forget an invitation to dinner. They probably answer some good purpose
in society--perhaps, that of teaching flats the sweet lessons of
experience, and preparing them for the wiles and stratagems of the
world: be this as it may, they fulfil, at least, one maxim of the word
of Wisdom, for they neither toil nor spin; and they steadfastly practise
the principle, that sufficient for the day is the evil thereof.