When the voluble Rotiro had vanished round the end of the
counting-house, Silencio retired to his inner sanctum and closed and
locked the door. The contrast between this room and the bare front
office was marked. Here cretonne draped the walls, its delicate white
and green relieving the plain white of the woodwork. Coming from the
outer glare, the cool coloring was more than grateful to the senses. The
large wicker chairs with which the room was furnished were painted
white, their cushions being of the same pale green whose color pervaded
the interior. The white tables, with their green silken cloths, the
white desk, the mirrors with white enameled frames, the white porcelain
lamps with green shades, all of the same exquisite tint, made the
sanctum a symphony of delicate color, a bower of grateful shade. Pull
one of the hangings aside, ever so little, and a fortress stared you in
the face--a fortress known of, at the most, to but two persons in the
island.
It is true that the more curious of the peons had wondered somewhat why
Don Gil had brought down from the es-States those large sheets of iron
with clamps and screws; but the native is not inquisitive as a rule, and
certainly not for long. All señors do strange things, things not to be
accounted for by any known rule of life, and the Señor Don Gil was rich
enough to do as he liked. What, then, was it to a hard-working peon,
what a grand señor like the Don Gil took into his mahogany house?
The man who had come down in the steamer with the sheets of iron had
remained at Palmacristi for a month or more. He had brought two workmen,
and when he sailed for Nueva Yorka no one but the owner of the Casa de
Caoba and the old Guillermina knew that the inner counting-house had
been completely sheathed with an iron lining, whose advent the peons had
forgotten.
"This is my bank," said Don Gil to Don Juan Smit'.
"It may become a fort some day, who knows?" answered the Don Juan Smit',
"if those rascally Spaniards come over here and create another rumpus."
Strange to say, Don Gil did not resent this remark about the nation
which had produced his ancestors. But, then, Don Gil was a
revolutionist, and had fought side by side with the bravest generals of
the ten years' Cuban war.
"It is a very secure place to detain a willing captive," smiled Don Gil.
"Well, I guess!" assented the Señor Don Juan Smit', with a very knowing
wink of the eye, which proved that he had not understood his employer's
meaning in the very slightest.
Old Guillermina, who had reared Don Gil's mother, was the only person
allowed within the counting-house.
"A very fine place for the black spiders to hide," remarked Guillermina,
as she twitched aside the green and white hangings, and exposed the iron
sheathing. "There is no place they would prefer to this."
When Don Gil had locked the door, he seated himself and took Escobeda's
note from his pocket. He examined the flap of the envelope; it was badly
soiled and creased. He was morally certain that Rotiro had possessed
himself of the contents of the letter. He had told Rotiro that peons
should not think, but they would think, semi-occasionally, and more than
that, they would talk. When a peon was found clever enough to carry a
message, he also possessed the undesirable quality of wishing to excite
curiosity in others, and to make them feel what a great man he was to be
trusted with the secrets of the Señor. By evening the insolence of
Escobeda would be the common property of every man, woman, and child on
the estate, and, what Silencio could bear least of all, the insulting
news as to the ultimate destination of Raquel would be gossiped over in
every palm hut and rancho far and near. All his working people would
know before to-morrow the message which had been brought to him by
Rotiro, and it was his own rum that would loosen Rotiro's tongue and aid
materially in his undoing. His face grew red and dark. His brow knotted
as he perused the vile letter for the fourth time. Escobeda's
handwriting was strong, his grammar weak, his spelling not always up to
par. The letter was written in Spanish, into which some native words had
crept. The translation ran:
"TO THE SEÑOR DON GIL SILENCIO-Y-ESTRADA.
"_Señor_:--You are forbidden to set foot in my house. You are
forbidden to try to see or speak to the Señorita Raquel. I do not
continue the farce of saying my niece; she is not more than a
distant relative of mine. But in this case, might makes right. I
control her and she is forever lost to you. You refused me the
trocha farm for a fair price. See now, if it would not have been
better to yield. The Señorita Raquel starts for the Port of Entry
this afternoon. She sails to-night for the government town. The
Governor desires her services. Knowing the Governor by repute, you
may imagine what those services are."
Silencio struck the senseless sheet with his clenched fist. His ring
tore a jagged hole in the paper, so that he had difficulty in smoothing
it for re-perusal.
"It pays me better to sell her to him than to give her to you."
Wild thoughts flew through the brain of Silencio. He started up, and
had almost ordered his horse. He was rich. He would offer all,
everything that he possessed, to save Raquel from such a fate, but he
sadly resumed his seat after a moment of reflection. Escobeda hated him,
there had been a feud between the families since the old Don Gil had
caused the arrest of the elder Escobeda, a lawless character; and the
son had made it the aim of his life to annoy and insult the family of
Silencio. Here was a screw that he could turn round and round in the
very heart of his enemy, and already the screwing process had begun. Don
Gil took up the mutilated letter and read to the end:
"We start for the coast this afternoon. Do not try to rescue her. I
have a force of brave men who will protect me from any number that
you may bring. We have colinos and escopetes in plenty. Your case
is hopeless. You dare not attack me on land; you cannot attack me
on the water."
Don Gil dashed the paper on the floor and ground savagely beneath his
heel the signature "Rafael Escobeda."
"It is true," he said, shaking his head. "It is true; I am helpless!"
With a perplexed face and knitted brow he went into the outer room,
closed the entrance door and took a flat bar of iron from its
resting-place against the wall. This he fitted into the hasps at each
side of the door, which were ready to receive it. Then he returned to
the inner room, and secured the iron-sheathed door with two similar
bars. After this was done, he looked somewhat ruefully at his handiwork.
"The cage is secure," he said, "if I but had the bird."
Silencio opened the door which connected the office with the main part
of the house. He closed and locked it behind him, and proceeded along a
passage so dark that no light crept in except through the narrow slits
beneath the eaves. When he had traversed this passage, he opened a
further door and emerged at once into the main part of the house. Here
everything was open, attractive, and alluring. Here spacious apartments
gave upon broad verandas, whose flower boxes held blooms rare even in
this garden spot of the world. Here were beauty and colour and splendour
and glowing life.
Don Gil threw himself down in a hammock which stretched across a shady
corner. Through the opening between the pilotijos, he could see the
wooded heights in the distance, those heights beyond which Troja lay,
Troja, which held his heart and soul. What to do? To-night she would set
sail for the government town in the toils of Escobeda, her
self-confessed betrayer and barterer--set sail for that hateful place
where her worse than slavery would begin. The person to whom she was to
be sold--none the less sold because the price paid did not appear on
paper--was possessed of power and that might of which Escobeda had
spoken in his letter--that might which makes right. He could give
countenance to speculators and incorporators, he could grant concessions
for an equivalent; into such keeping Escobeda, with his devil's
calculation, was planning to deliver her--his Raquel, his little
sweetheart. That she loved him he knew. A word and a glance are enough,
and he had received many such. A note and a rose at the last _festin_,
where she had been allowed to look on for a while under the eye of her
old duenna! A pressure of her hand in the crowd, a trembling word of
love under her breath in answer to his fierce and fiery ones!
The cause for love, its object does not know nor question. The fact is
all that concerns him, and so far Silencio was secure. And here was this
last appeal from the helpless girl! They had started by this time
perhaps. Don Gil looked at the ancient timepiece which had descended
from old Don Oviedo. Yes, they had started. It was now twenty minutes
past six; they needed but two hours to ride to the Port of Entry. The
steamer would not sail until between nine and ten o'clock. Very shortly
Escobeda's party would cross the trocha, which at that point was a
public highway. It ran through the Palmacristi estate, and neared the
casa on the south. Could he not rescue her when they were so near? There
were not three men within the home enclosure. The others had gone direct
to their huts and ranchos from their work in the fields. He could not
collect them now, and if he could, of what use a skirmish in the road?
Escobeda was sure to ride with a large force, and a stray shot might do
injury to Raquel herself. No, no! Some other way must be thought of.
Silencio arose, passed quickly through the casa and entered the patio.
He ran up the stairs which ascended from the veranda to the flat roof
above. He stood upon the roof, shading his eyes with his hand, and
straining his vision to catch the first sight of Escobeda and his party
of cut-throats. He was none too early. A cloud of dust on the near side
of the cacao grove told him this, and then he heard the jingling of
spurs and the sound of voices. A group of some thirty horsemen swept
round the curve and came riding into full view. In their center rode a
woman. She was so surrounded that by no effort of hers could she break
through the determined-looking throng. One glance at those cruel faces,
and Silencio's heart sank like lead.
The woman was gazing with appealing eyes at the Casa de Caoba. Silencio
was not near enough to distinguish her features, but her attitude was
hopeless and appealing, and he knew that it was Raquel the moment that
he discovered her.
Suddenly she drew a handkerchief from her bosom and waved it above her
head. There was something despairing and pitiable in her action.
Silencio whirled his handkerchief wildly in the air. He was beside
himself! Escobeda turned and struck the girl, who dropped her signal
hand and drooped her head upon her breast.
Silencio put his hands to his mouth and shouted: "Do not fear; I will
save you!" He shook his clenched hand at Escobeda. "You shall pay for
that! By God in Heaven! you shall pay for that!"
Yes, pay for it, but how? How? Oh, God! how? He was so helpless. No one
to aid him, no one to succour.
At this defiance of Silencio's there came an order to halt. The men
faced the Casa de Caoba, Escobeda placed his rifle to his shoulder, but
as he fired, Raquel quickly reached out her hand and dashed the muzzle
downward. A crash of glass below stairs told Silencio where the shot had
found entrance.
"And for that shot, also, you shall pay. Aye, for twenty thousand good
glass windows." Glass windows are a luxury in the island.
A burst of derisive laughter and a scattering flight of bullets were
thrown back at him by the motley crew. They reined their horses to the
right, turned a corner, and were lost in their own dust.
Silencio descended the stairs, how he never knew. He ran through the
patio and the main rooms, and out on to the veranda, from which the path
led toward the gate of the enclosure. He was beside himself. He seized
his gun from the rack; he cocked it as he ran.
"He said that I could not reach him upon the water; I can reach him upon
the land. Piombo, my horse! Do not wait to saddle him, bring him at
once. No, I cannot reach him upon the water--"
A sound of footsteps. A head bound in a ragged cloth appeared above the
flower boxes which edged the veranda, and pushed its way between the
leaves. A body followed, and then a man ascended slowly to a level with
Don Gil Silencio. Over his shoulder was slung a shotgun; in his leathern
belt, an old one of his master's, was thrust a machete; from his hand
swung a lantern with white glass slides. This man was stupid but kindly.
He pattered across the veranda with bare and callous feet, and came to a
halt within a few paces of Don Gil. There he stopped and leaned against
the jamb of the open door.
At night Andres hung a lantern upon the _asta_ at the headland yonder,
more as a star of cheer than as a warning. The red lantern on Los
Santos, some miles further down the coast, was the beacon for and the
warning to mariners. The ray from its one red sector illumined the
channel until the morning sun came again to light the way. When the
white pane changed the ray of red to one of white, the pilot shouted,
"Hard over." With a wide and foaming curve, the vessel swept round and
out to sea, thus avoiding the sand spit of Palmacristi.
Silencio's eyes fell upon the lantern in the hand of Andres, and in that
moment the puzzle of the hour was solved. So suddenly does the bread of
necessity demand the rising of the yeast of invention. The expression of
Don Gil's face had changed in a moment from abject gloom to radiant
exultation.
"_Bien venido_, Andres! _Bien venido!_"
No dearest friend could have been greeted with a more joyous note of
welcome. Andres raised his eyes in astonishment to the face of the young
Señor. He had expected to meet with Guillermina's reproaches because he
had forgotten to lower the lantern from the asta that morning, and had
left it burning all the long day, so that now it must be refilled. Here
was a very different reception. He had been thinking over his excuses.
He had intended to say at once how ill El Rey had been all night, and
how he had forgotten everything but the child; and here, instead of the
scolding of the servant, he was greeted with the smiles of the master.
Truly, this was a strange world; one never knew what to expect.
"I come for oil for the lantern, Don Gil. It is a very good _farol de
señales_, but it is a glutton! It is never satisfied! It eats, and
eats!"
"Like the rest of you." Don Gil laughed aloud. Andres gazed at him with
astonishment. "That blessed glutton! Let us feed it, Andres! Give it
plenty to eat to-night, of all nights. I will hoist it upon the headland
myself to-night." At Andres's still greater look of astonishment, "Yes,
yes, leave it to me. I will hoist the blessed lantern myself to-night
upon my headland."
"The Señor must not trouble himself. It is a dull, dark night! The Señor
will find the _sendica_ rough and hard to climb."
"What! that little path? Have not I played there as a child? Raced over
it as a boy? I could go there blindfold. How is the little king,
Andres?" Andres's face fell.
"He is not so well, Señor. That is why I forgot the lantern. He was
awake in the night talking to her. I have left him for barely an hour to
fill the lantern and return it again to the asta. He talks to her at
night. Sometimes I think she has returned. He begged me to leave the
door unlocked; he thinks she may come when I am gone." Andres turned
away his heavy face, and brushed his sleeve across his eyes.
"You shall go home early to-night, Andres; as I said, I will hoist the
lantern."
The dull face of Andres lighted up with a tender smile, a smile which
glorified its homely lineaments--that smile which had always been ready
to appear at the bidding of El Rey. Poor little El Rey, who had never
ceased to call, in all his waking hours for Roseta, Roseta who had found
the charms of Dondy Jeem, with his tight-rope and his red trunk-hose and
his spangles and his delightful wandering life, much more to be desired
than the palm-board hut down on the edge of the river, with El Rey to
care for all day, and Andres to attend when he returned at night from
the sucker planting or banana cutting.
"How is the sea, Andres?"
"It is quiet, Señor, not a ripple."
"And we shall have no moon?"
"As the Señor says, not for some weeks past have we had a moon."
Don Gil laughed. He could laugh now, loud and long. His heart was almost
light. What better tool and confidant could he procure than a peon who
knew so little of times and seasons as Andres?
"And it is low tide at ten o'clock to-night?"
"As the Señor says."
Had Don Gil asked, "Is the sea ink?" Andres would have replied, "As the
Señor says."
"At about what time is the red lantern lighted on Los Santos?"
"At about six o'clock, Señor. I heard old Gremo say that he lights it
each evening at six o'clock."
"He does not live near it now?"
"As the Señor says. The old casa fell quite to pieces in the last
hurricane, and now Gremo lives at the Romando cannuca."
"He must start early from the conuco?"
"As the Señor says. At half after five. It is a long way to carry a
ladder--there and back. Gremo is afraid of the ghosts who infest the
mompoja patch. If one but thrusts his head at you, you are lost.
Marianna Romando says that Gremo is not much of a man, but far superior
to Garcito Romando. The few pesos that he gets for lighting the lantern
keep the game cock in food."
"And no one can tamper with the light, I suppose?"
"As the Señor says. The good God forbid! The cords by which it is
lowered hang so high that no one can reach them--not even Natalio, who,
as all know, is a giant."
"And you could not get that ladder, Andres?"
"As the Señor says, when Gremo carries it a mile away, and puts it
inside the enclosure. He is a good shot, though so old. There is only
one better in all the district. Besides, there are ghosts between the
asta and the cannuca."
Don Gil stood for a moment lost in thought.
"I suppose El Rey needs you at home, Andres. I should not keep--"
"That is quite true; I do, very much, Señor."
The thin little voice came from behind the giant ceiba round which the
circular end of the veranda had been built.
"You here, El Rey?"
A slight, childish figure emerged slowly from behind the giant trunk and
leaned against its corrugated bark.
"El Rey becomes weary staying down there in the palm hut, Señor. There
is nothing to do but watch the pajara bobo, and the parrots, and listen
to river, going, going, going! Always going! Has Roseta been here,
Señor?"
Don Gil shook his head. He gazed sadly at the child.
"When do you think she will come, Señor?"
"I know not, little one; perhaps to-morrow."
The boy raised his hand and smoothed down his thin hair. The hand
trembled like that of an old man. His cheek was sunken, his lips
colourless. He lifted his large eyes to Don Gil's face.
"They always tell me that. Mañana, mañana; always mañana!"
He sighed patiently, looking at the Señor, as if the great gentleman
could help him in his trouble.
Andres turned away his head. He gazed across the valley toward the hills
beyond which lay Troja. That was where they had gone to see Dondy Jeem,
he and his pretty Roseta--Roseta, who had tossed her head and shaken the
gold hoops in her ears when Dondy Jeem had kissed his hand to the
spectators. He had turned always to the seats where Roseta and Andres,
stupid Andres--he knew that now--sat. Then Roseta had given El Rey to
the ever-willing arms of Andres, and fixed her eyes on Dondy Jeem and
watched his graceful poise, the white satin shoes descending so easily
and securely upon the swaying rope, the long pole held so lightly in the
strong hands. It had been before those days that Roseta used to call the
child her king. Poor El Rey! He looked a sorry enough little king
to-day, a dethroned little king, with his pinched face and trembling
fingers and wistful eyes, searching the world in vain for the kingdom
which had been wrested from him.
"How did you get out of the rancho, El Rey?"
"That Señorita from El Cuco, she let me out."
"You should be in bed, muchachito."
"But it is lonely, Señor, in that bed. That is Roseta's bed. I turn
that way and this way. It is hot. I look for Roseta. She is not there. A
man look in at the door once; he frighten me. To-day a hairy beast came.
He push back the shutter. When he was gone, I ran. I stumble, I fell
over bajucos. I caught my foot in a root. That would not matter if I
could find Roseta. I would rather be here with the Señor than at the
river."
El Rey pushed a confiding little hand into Don Gil's palm. Don Gil sat
down and took the child between his knees.
"Andres, do you shoot as well as of old?"
"I shoot fairly well, Señor."
The Señor laughed. He had seen Andres at only the last fair, less than a
year ago, shoot, at eighty yards, a Mexican dollar from between the
fingers of Dondy Jeem. The scene recurred to Andres. "Had it been but
his heart!" he muttered, dully. And then, with a look at Don Gil, "There
are few who cannot do one thing well, Señor."
"You are far too modest, Andres."
Don Gil glanced again at the lantern which Andres had set down upon the
veranda rail. When he had first caught sight of that lantern in Andres's
hand his difficulty had vanished like the morning mist. With a flash of
thought, rather of many thoughts in one train, he had seen the
proceedings of the evening to come mapped out like a plan of campaign.
"Will you do something for me, Andres?"
"The good God knows; anything that I can, Señor. But what I should
prefer would be a night when the moon shines. He could not then see me
behind the old ironwood, and I could distinguish him better when there
is a little light. Is it the Señor E'cobeda, Señor?"
Don Gil laughed again. He put El Rey gently from him, and arose. He
walked to the corner of the veranda and back again. Andres took El Rey
tenderly up in his arms, the child laid his hot head on Andres's
shoulder.
"When will Roseta come?" he whispered. With the unreason and trustful
selfishness of childhood, he did not see that if his heart was breaking,
the heart of Andres had already broken.
"No, Andres; it is not Escobeda. I do not hire assassins, even for such
a villain as he. But I need a servant as faithful and as dumb as if that
were my custom. I want something done at once, Andres, and I truly
believe that you are the only one upon all the coloñia whom I can trust.
Come in here with me. No! Set the child down; he will listen and
repeat."
"El Rey will not listen at nothing, Señor," said the child. He clung
tightly to Andres's neck.
"Come in, then, both of you."
Andres, with El Rey in his arms, followed Don Gil across the large
living-room. Don Gil turned as he unlocked the door at the end of the
passage.
"I have something to say to you," he said, "which must not be
overheard."
Andres, the pioneer of his race, followed the Señor into the spring-like
privacy of the sanctum.
"Now don't worry your brain, Andres. Listen to what I shall ask of you,
and go and do it. You know it has always been my theory that a peon
should not try to think, and why? Simply because he has no brain,
Andres."
"As the Señor says," assented Andres.
X
When Andres issued from the counting-house of Palmacristi he was
examining critically the trigger of a gun. That fine Winchester it was
which had been the wonder and delight of the natives since the Señor Don
Juan Smit' had brought it down from the es-States. When the Señor
Silencio had asked the Señor Don Juan Smit' if the gun would shoot
straight, the Señor Don Juan Smit' had laughed softly, and had answered,
"Well, I guess!" and the Señor Don Juan Smit' had not exaggerated.
"And El Rey?"
"El Rey will go with Andres, Señor," answered the thin voice.
"The muchachito will do as he chooses, Señor." The child was following
close upon his father's steps.
"It is too far for him, Andres. Stay with me, El Rey."
The child looked wistfully up at Andres.
"Andres will carry El Rey. Perhaps we shall find Roseta at the place
where Andres goes to shoot."
"I will carry him, Señor. His weight is nothing. Dear God! nothing!"
Andres swung the child up to his hip, where he sat astride, securely
held by Andres's strong arm, and descended the veranda steps.
"Come and tell me when it is done," Silencio called after them.
"Si, Señor. Buen' noch', Señor."
"Buen' noch', Señor," echoed El Rey's piping voice.
"Here, Andres." From his height on the veranda floor Don Gil tossed a
key to Andres. "Open the boat-house, and run the boat out upon the
southern ways. The southern ways, do you hear? Those nearest the Port of
Entry."
Andres looked up wonderingly.
"Ah! you are trying to think. Do not try. It is useless. Obey! that is
all."
Blindly faithful, Andres, having caught the key, turned away with an "As
the Señor says," and disappeared down the camino which led toward the
ocean cliff.
When he reached the headland of Palmacristi he suddenly diverged from
the cliff path and ran hurriedly down the bank. The boat-house stood
upon a safe eminence in the middle of the sand spit, with ways running
down to the water on either side. Andres set El Rey down in the warm
sand, and unlocked the boat-house door. He then pushed the boat to the
end of the ways. The tide was still falling; it was nearly low water. He
laid the oars ready; then he arose and looked southward along the coast.
Ah! There shone the signal upon Los Santos headland. Old Gremo was at
his post, then. Andres raised his shoulders to his ears, turned the
palms of his hands outward, and said:
"Thy labour is of no use to-night, Gremo." He then took El Rey up from
his nest in the warm sand, swung the child again to his hip, and
remounting the bank, proceeded on his way.
So soon as Andres had departed Don Gil entered the comidor, and going to
the table, struck a bell hanging above it. Jorge Toleto lounged to the
doorway, against the side of which he propped himself.
"Tell Piomba to go over to the bodega at once, and ask the padre to dine
with me this evening. Piomba has little time. Tell him to be off at
once."
Jorge Toleto shuffled away, with the remnant of what in his youth had
been a respectful bow. When he was gone Don Gil crossed the living-room,
passed through two long passages, and entered a door at the end of the
second. Here was a sort of general storeroom. When he emerged he carried
in one hand a lantern, in the other he held a flat parcel. "A new
lantern will burn more brightly," he said to himself.
It was growing dusk now. Don Gil descended the veranda stair and
followed in the footsteps of Andres. As he crossed the rough grass
beyond the veranda, old Guillermina espied him from a further window.
She was engaged in opening the Señor's bed for the night, searching
among the snowy linen to make sure, before tucking the rose-coloured
netting beneath the mattress, that no black spider had hidden itself
away, to prove later an unwelcome bedfellow to her adored Don Gil. For
your tarantula will ensconce itself in unexpected corners at times, and
is at the best not quite a desirable sleepmate.
"And for the love of the saints, where is our Don Gil departing to at
this hour of the night? The dinner nearly ready, old Otivo watching the
san coch' to see that it does not burn! The table laid, everything fine
enough for a meal for the holy apostles! Aie! aie! for our Don Gil is
one who will have it as fine for himself as for the alcade, when--pouff!
off he goes, and we breaking our hearts while we wait. Ay de mi! ay de
mi!"
The Señor, unconscious that he had been observed, passed hurriedly along
the camino, and shortly struck into the little path or sendica which
Andres had traversed but a short time before. As Don Gil glanced over
the cliff, he saw that the sea was still; almost calm. Even the usual
ocean swell seemed but a wavelet, as it reached weakly up the beach,
expending itself in a tiny whirl of pebbles and foam whose force was
_nil_, and lapsed in a retreat more exhausted than its oncoming.
A walk of ten minutes brought Silencio to the headland which bounded his
property on the south. It was growing so dark that he could hardly
distinguish the staff upon which it had been Andres's custom to hang
each night his _lanterna de señales_, to send forth its white beam of
cheer across the sea. When, after passing the red light of Los Santos
Head, the pilot steered for the open ocean, the remark to the captain
was always the same stereotyped phrase:
"Ah! There is the Palmacristi lantern bidding us Godspeed."
It is a sad thing when the habit of years must be changed. When a
custom, fixed as the laws of the Medes, must be broken, chaos is often
the result. Thus thought Silencio, as he reached the foot of the _asta_.
It is, however, not necessary to say that his hand was not retarded by
the thought. He groped for the cords which dangled from the top, and
found them. He lighted a fusee and searched for and found the red slide,
which he had laid on the ground. This was all that he wanted. By
feeling, almost entirely, he removed the white pane from the lantern and
replaced it by the red one, which he took from its wrapping. He then
lighted the lantern, passed the cords through the metal hasps, and drew
the signal to the top of the staff. The cords were so arranged as to
permit of no swaying of the lantern. The light was fixed, and now from
the top of the staff a red beam shone southward.
When Don Gil mounted the steps of his veranda at Palmacristi a tall,
thin figure arose to greet him.
"Ah, padre, I am glad that Piomba succeeded in finding you. My dinners
are lonely ones."
The padre laughed in the cracked voice of an old man.
"Better is the stalled ox where love is, than a dinner of herbs and
poverty therewith."
"Just enough learning to misquote," quoted Don Gil, laughing also, but
in a preoccupied manner.
"Perhaps it would be better to say 'just enough appetite.' My dinners
are bad enough, since Plumero left me."
"Better to have him leave you, even if under a guard of soldiers, padre,
than to let him put you where you can eat no more dinners. What was
that, padre? Did you hear anything?"
"Nothing, my boy, but Jorge Toleto calling us to dinner. The willing
ear, you know."
Don Gil ushered the old man into the comidor. His tall figure was bent
and thin. The shabby black coat, whose seams shone with a generation's
wear, flapped its tails about the legs of his scant white trousers. The
good priest's figure was one in which absurdity and dignity were
inextricably combined. The padre showed his years. He had never quite
recovered from the attack made upon him by his trusted servant Plumero,
the Good--Plumero, who now languished in the cep' over at Saltona.
The savory meal was ended. The night was warm and close.
"Let us sit upon the veranda and enjoy our cigarillos, padre."
Silencio seemed unlike himself. He was nervous, ill at ease. He had no
sooner seated himself than he arose and paced the long veranda, the
spark of his cigarette, only, showing his whereabouts. He looked often
out to sea, and often in the direction of the _lanterna de señales_,
whose ray was hidden from sight by the near hill.
"Do you hear anything, padre? Anything like a cry or a--"
"No, nothing! my boy. And as I was saying, there was my poor fighting
cock lying in the corner, worse maltreated than he had ever been in any
garito, and when I awoke--"
"That was certainly a gun. You are not rising to leave, padre; why,
your cigarillo is not even half finished. I expect you to stay the
night. No, no! I will take no denial. Guillermina, prepare the western
room for the Padre Martinez."
"You know my weaknesses, muchacho mio. Very well, then, I will." But
Silencio was down the steps and some feet away in the darkness,
straining his ear for the sound which he knew must come. He took out his
watch, and by the light of the veranda lantern noted the time. "Early
yet," he muttered under his breath.
"Pardon, my son, you spoke to--"
"I was but saying that the moon is very late to--hark!"
"You are restless, Gil."
"It is this muggy weather. There! you certainly heard something?"
"Nothing, Gil; nothing but the nightingale yonder."
A cuculla flew into the padre's face. He brushed it gently away. It
returned to wander over the long wisps of grey hair which straggled over
the collar of the hot, dignified coat. The padre took the cuculla in his
fingers, and placed it gently upon the leaves of the bougainvillia vine.
"I certainly think that the sweetest songsters I ever heard are the
nightingales in this enclosure."
A footstep sounded on the graveled pathway which ran close to the
veranda.
"Buen' noch', Señor."
Silencio started nervously.
"Ah! It is you, Andres? Buenas noches." Silencio raised his hand with a
warning gesture. Andres's stolid face expressed as stolid acquiescence.
"Buen' noch', Señor. We did not find her at the _asta de lanterna_,
Señor."
"Andres, take the child home; he is weary."
The tone was curt, unlike the kindly Don Gil. It was as if he had laid
his hands on Andres's shoulders and were pushing him along.
"I should like to remain here, Señor. Perhaps she may come to-night. Who
knows? Perhaps the good God will send her. He knows that
I--cannot--bear--it, I can _not_ bear--" The child's voice broke in a
sob.
Silencio's kindly nature was touched. "Take him round to Guillermina,
Andres, and get dinner; both of you."
The two disappeared in the darkness.
Then Piombo brought a flaring Eastern lamp, at which Don Gil relighted
his often extinguished cigarette.
"How still the night! How far a sound would carry on a night like this."
The padre had but just uttered these words when a long, booming sound
struck upon the listening as well as the unexpectant ear.
Silencio bounded from his chair. He caught up a cloak which was lying
conveniently ready.
"A steamer ashore!" he shouted. The old padre struggled to his feet. "Do
not come. Go round to the quarters. Send the men to help. It must be at
the sand spit. Follow me to the headland," and he was gone in the
darkness. The padre wondered somewhat at Silencio's suspecting at once
the locality of the stranded steamer, if that were the cause of the gun
of distress. As he wondered, it spoke again, and gathering his wits
together, he hastened round to the quarters.
Silencio bounded along the camino and up the cliff pathway. His feet
seemed winged. The familiar local knowledge of childhood stood him in
good stead at this crucial moment. He reached the staff. It was short
work to release the cord and lower the lantern, extinguish the light,
replace the red slide with a white one, and hoist the darkened signal in
place again. Then he turned and ran quickly down the sandy bank.
"Now the light has simply gone out," he said to himself as he ran. His
boat was where Andres had left it, the rising water making it just
awash. A glance seaward showed to Silencio a steamer's lights. There
came to him across the water bewildered shouts, the sounds of running
feet, and evidences of confusion. He pushed his boat into the water, and
bent to the oars. The steamer was, at the most, not more than a quarter
of a mile distant. He pulled with desperation. He heard the sound of the
foam as the propeller turned over, and he feared that with every
revolution the vessel would back off into deep water. When he rowed
alongside he was not noticed in the dark and confusion of the moment. He
held his long painter in his hand, and as he climbed up over some
convenient projections of the little vessel, fastened it securely.
He drew himself up hurriedly to the taffrail, and slid down to deck,
mixing with the crew. He looked about now for the bewitching cause of
the disaster. Some dark forms were standing by the companion door, and
going close he discovered her whom he sought. He laid his hand on her
arm to draw her away. At first she started fearfully, but even in
darkness love is not blind, and she hurriedly withdrew with him to the
side of the vessel.
"Stand here for a moment, Raquel," he whispered. "I am afraid that I
cannot get you over the side without aid."
She stood where he placed her, and he ran forward with much bustle and
noise, seeking the captain, calling him by name.
"Ah! the saints preserve us! Is that you, Señor Silencio? Where are we,
Señor? There is no light anywhere to be seen. Where are we, for the love
of God?"
"I am afraid that you have run aground on my sand spit, Señor Capitan."
"On your sand spit, Señor! Where, then, is Los Santos Head?"
"Some miles further down the coast, Señor Capitan."
"Ay de mi! I knew that pilot was no good. This is the first light that
we have seen, and now that has gone out. This was a red light, Señor."
"Red light? You are dreaming, Señor Capitan."
The captain took this rejoinder in its literal meaning.
"It is true that I was dreaming, Señor. I beg of you not to mention it
at the port. I have suffered with a fearful toothache all day. The pilot
said that he was competent; we have never had any trouble." Silencio cut
him short.
"I am here to offer my services, Señor Capitan. Can I be of any use? You
may have a storm from the southward. To-day has been a weather-breeder.
I think you have women on board. I could take them--"
"Gracias! gracias! my kind Señor Silencio. That will help me above all
things."
"And if the wind does not rise, Señor Capitan, the tide will. Keep your
engines backing, and there will be no harm done. I will take whom I can,
and send for the others." Which proves that love, if not blind, may,
however, be untruthful upon occasion.
How Silencio got Raquel over the side he never knew. Some one aided him
at the captain's order, but he realized at last the blessed fact that
she was there beside him, and that they were gliding from the vessel's
hull as fast as he could impel the boat.
"Some miscreant has done this," roared the captain above the noise, as
he leant over the side and strained his eyes after Silencio. "I beg you,
Señor, to look for him, and when you have caught him, hand him over to
me."
"I shall remember your words, Señor Capitan."
"I will have him shot in the market-place of the Port of Entry, and send
for all the natives to see."
"I will remember your words, Señor Capitan, you may be sure of that,
when I catch him--" But the last words of Don Gil were lost in the
renewed efforts of the engineer to back the steamer from the sand spit.
No words passed at first between Raquel and her rescuer. If love is not
always blind and sometimes not truthful, he is apt to be silent. Raquel
needed no explanation. As the boat glided through the darkness, Silencio
dropped the oars. He took her hands in his. His lips were pressed to
hers. What question should she ask? What more did she crave to know?
Here were life and liberty and love, in exchange for slavery, pollution,
and worse than death.
When he lifted her slight form from the boat, he did not release her at
once, but held her in his arms for a moment. He could hardly believe
that his daring act had met with the one result for which he had hoped.
"Your uncle, where is he?"
"Escobeda? In the cabin, ill. There is a slight swell. He is always ill.
I had not noticed it, the swell, on board the steamer. But he is not my
uncle, Señor."
"I have proof of it in his own written words, dear heart. But uncle or
not, he shall never separate us now."
"When can they get the steamer off the sand spit, Señor? I heard you say
that the water is rising."
"They will float off by twelve o'clock to-night, Sweetheart. I hope they
will forget you. But whether they do or not, they shall not have you
ever again, beloved. No, never again! You are mine now."
"He has none of those men with him," said Raquel. "They went back to
Troja. But, Señor, he will come back from the capital, and
then--Señor--then--"
"We will reckon with that question when it arises, dear one. At present,
let us not think of Escobeda and his crew."
Half-way up the sandy slope they met the tall form of the padre
descending. Silencio said shortly what he chose. Explanations were not
in order, for, whatever had happened, and whatever might happen, this
young girl could not remain unmarried in the house of her lover. "You
must marry us this evening, padre; and we will go to the little church
at Haldez to-morrow," said Don Gil, "if that will salve your
conscience."
"My conscience needs no salving, my son. Yours rather. Perhaps, if you
have anything to confess, I had better receive your confession before--"
"Ah, padre, what a tempter you are! So holy a man, too! No, let them do
their worst. I have nothing to confess. I have won my stake; now let
them come on." But he regarded the beautiful girl at his side with some
uneasiness as he spoke.
"You must let me give you a chime of bells, Padre," said Raquel. The
moon was struggling forth, and Silencio noticed her shy look as she
raised her eyes to his. "That is, if--if the Señor will allow.
"Bribery, bribery!" said the padre in his thin old voice.
Silencio put his arm round Raquel, and they stepped to the edge of the
cliff. With her head pressed close to his shoulder, together they
watched the dancing lights upon the steamer, and listened to the hoarse
orders and shouts which, mingled with the foaming spray under the
vessel's stern, came to them across the water. They had forgotten the
padre, for love adds another to her many bad qualities, that of
ingratitude. The padre had just promised to perform for them the
greatest service that it was his to give, and they had become oblivious
of him, and of everything in the world but each other. They stood so,
and watched the steamer for a little space, and then Silencio gathered
the girl to his breast.
"Come home! dear Heart, come home!" he whispered, and she followed him
down the path, her hand in his.
As they neared the Casa de Caoba they saw that a man was sitting upon
the veranda steps. He had a child in his arms. The man was sleeping
heavily, the slumber of the labouring peon. As Raquel came up the steps
of her new home, the child raised his large eyes wistfully to hers.
"When El Rey saw it was a Señora, El Rey thought it might be Roseta.
When will Roseta come, Señor? When? When?"
Raquel stooped and lifted the boy tenderly from Andres's nerveless arms.
She asked no question. With the instinct of the motherhood lying dormant
within her, she knew that here was a motherless child, and that it
suffered. At that moment she loved all the world. She pressed the boy
close to her heart.
"Stay with me, little one; I will be Roseta to you."
El Rey raised his eyes to the sweet, dark face above him.
"Roseta was not gran', Señora," he said--he scanned her face
critically--"but she was more pretty than the Señora. The Señora will
pardon me if I say that Roseta's gown was much more handsome than the
one the Señora wear."
At the word "señora" the young girl stooped and laid her lips upon the
child's head.
"It was a gown of red. It had green spots--oh, such little green spots,
small, small spots. El Rey used to count them. There were some little
half-spots up there on the shoulder. Roseta said it was where the sewing
came. Roseta did not have shiny drops in her ears. The Señora's drops
are like the bits of glass that Andres shot from the top of the _asta_
to-night. He had a gun, the gun of the Señor."
Raquel looked inquiringly at Silencio.
"It is true," he admitted.
"At Los Santos?"
"At Los Santos."
"They came down in showers, Señor, like little red stars."
"You are a poet, El Rey."
"Rather," said Silencio, smiling down at the child, where he stood
leaning against Raquel, "El Rey is a little story-teller. He promised
not to say a word--"
"It is a Señora who may know everything, all things. She has the good
eyes."
"You are right, El Rey."
"The rings in Roseta's ears were round. They were big and round. She
used to shake them when we went to the circus, so!" The tired head shook
slowly. Andres stirred uneasily. He opened his dull, sad eyes and looked
at El Rey. He had felt the touch on the wound even in his sleep.
"I often put my finger round them, so! Often and often I did."
Raquel took the little fingers between her own. She put them between her
lips and bit them playfully. Her white teeth made tiny indentations in
the tender skin. El Rey smiled faintly, a promise, Raquel hoped, of a
brighter day of forgetfulness to come.
Silencio stood looking on. He loved to see her so, the child leaning
against her knee. Across the water came the sounds of shouts and hurried
orders which disturbed no one. Raquel stroked the thin, straight hair
over and over. She ran her soft fingers down the angular little face and
neck. Tiny tremors of affection ran gently through the child's veins. El
Rey laid his head upon the knee to which she drew him. His wasted hand
shook as he laid it upon hers.
"You are good," said the child. "You are beautiful, you are kind, kind
to El Rey." His tone was patient and old and full of monotony. "But oh!
the Señora will pardon me? You are not Roseta."
There was one other person at the wedding of Don Gil and Raquel, besides
the padre, who united them, and old Guillermina and Andres.
"Who will give you away?" asked Silencio.
"I myself," said she. Silencio laughed. "That cannot be," he said. As he
spoke there was a humble knocking at the door of the salon. Raquel
looked up and bounded from her seat.
"Oh, you dear old thing!" she said. She was fondling and kissing the
bony creature, who stood aghast before her, who in turn was crying and
begging the saints to have mercy upon her.
"And for the good God's sake, tell me how you got here, Señorita, and
will the Señor allow me to sit down? My Sunday shoes have killed me,
nearly. Is there anything that I could wear instead--" Ana stopped
abashed at the sight of so fine a man as Silencio.
"How did the Señor rescue you, my Sweet? Is the Señor Escobeda dead,
then?" Ana looked about her as if she expected to see the bodies of
Escobeda and his followers over there on the edge of the trocha.
"I have been shipwrecked, Ana," said Raquel, smiling down upon the old
woman.
"Ship--the holy saints pres--and you are not even wet--and where, then,
is the Señor Escobe--"
"You seem very much worried about the Señor Escobeda, Ana," said Don
Gil, who at once made Raquel's friend his own. "Do you not hear him off
there now, cursing as usual?"
Ana listened. She heard distant cries, and the sound of the water as it
churned underneath the propeller blades.
Ana shrank to the size of an ant as she answered, her face blanching:
"Indeed! yes, I do hear the Señor, Señor. I have heard the Señor like
that, Señor, many a time. And does the Señor think that the Señor can
come here to the casa of Palmacristi?"
"Not for some time, I think, Ana," said Don Gil, smiling, though a faint
wrinkle was discernible on his brow.
"It always seems to me as if the Señor Escobeda could get anywhere,
Señor," said Ana, simply. "He has only to wish, the Señor, and the thing
is done."
"That would be bad for us," said Silencio. "Ana, will you give this lady
to me?"
"I? And what does the Señor think that I have to do with it?"
"Is the Señor Escobeda a nearer relative than you are, Ana?"
"Indeed, no! Señor," said Ana. "I was her mother's own cousin once
removed, while the Señor Es--"
"Very well!" said Silencio, "that is all that I want. Come! padre, let
us prepare for the wedding."