THE PROMOTION.
We have already given the reader a sufficient idea of Lorenzo Bezan,
for him to understand that he was a person possessed of more than
ordinary manliness and personal beauty. A distinguished and chivalric
bearing was one of his main characteristics, and you could hardly have
passed him in a crowd, without noting his fine manly physical
appearance, and strikingly intelligent features. Fired with the new
ambition which we have referred to in the closing of the last chapter,
Lorenzo Bezan arrived in the capital of his native land, ready and
eager to engage in any enterprise that called for bravery and daring,
and which in return promised honor and preferment.
Tacon, governor-general of Cuba, had marked his qualities well, and
therefore wrote by the same conveyance that took the young soldier to
Spain, to the head of the war department, and told them of what stuff
he was composed, and hinted at the possibility of at once placing him
in the line of his rank, and of giving him, if possible, active service
to perform. Tacon’s opinion and wishes were highly respected at Madrid,
and Lorenzo Bezan found himself at once placed in the very position he
would have desired-the command of as fine a company, of the regular
service as the army could boast, and his rank and position thoroughly
restored.
There was just at that period a revolt of the southern and western
provinces of Spain, which, owing to inactivity on the part of
government, had actually ripened into a regularly organized rebellion
against the throne. News at last reached the queen that regular bodies
of troops had been raised and enlisted, under well known leaders, and
that unless instant efforts were made to suppress the rising, the whole
country would be shortly involved in civil war. In this emergency the
troops, such its could be spared, were at once detached from the
capital and sent to various points in the disaffected region to quell
the outbreak. Among the rest was the company of Lorenzo Bezan and two
others of the same regiment, and being the senior officer, young as he
was, he was placed in command of the battalion, and the post to which
he was to march at once, into the very heart of the disaffected
district.
Having arrived in the neighborhood of the spot to which his orders had
directed him, he threw his whole force, some less than three hundred
men, into one of the old Moorish fortifications, still extant, and with
the provisions and ammunition he had brought with him, entrenched
himself, and prepared to scour and examine the surrounding country. His
spies soon brought him intelligence of the defeat of two similar
commands to his own, sent out at the same time to meet the insurgents;
and, also, that their partial success had very naturally elated them in
the highest degree. That they were regularly organized into regiments,
with their stands of colors, and proper officers, and that one regiment
had been sent to take the fort where he was, and would shortly be in
the neighborhood.
Lorenzo Bezan was a thorough soldier; he looked to the details of all
the plans and orders he issued, so that when the enemy appeared in
sight, they found him ready to receive them. They were fully thrice his
number, but they had a bad cause and poor leaders, and he feared not
for the result. On they came, in the fullness of confidence, after
having already participated in two victories over the regular troops;
but they had, though a younger, yet a far better and more courageous
officer to deal with in Captain Bezan. The fight was long and bloody,
but ere night came on the insurgents were compelled to retire, after
having lost nearly one third of their number in the contest.
The camp of the insurgents was pitched some half mile from the old fort
occupied by Captain Bezan and his followers, just beneath the brow of a
sheltering undulation of ground. Night overshadowed the field, and it
was still as death over the battle field, when Captain Bezan, summoning
his followers, told them that the enemy lay yonder in sleep; they could
not anticipate a sally, and from a confidential spy he had ascertained
that they had not even set a sentinel.
“I shall lead you out this night to attack them; take only your
weapons. If we are defeated, we shall want nothing more; if victorious,
we shall return to our post and our munitions.”
He had lost scarcely two score of his men in the fight, protected as
they were by the walls of the fortress, while the besiegers were
entirely exposed to the fire of musketry, and the two small cannon they
had brought with them, and so they entered into the daring plan of
their commander with the utmost zeal. They were instructed as to the
plan more fully, and at midnight, as the last rays of the moon sank
below the horizon, they quietly filed forth from the fortress and
turned towards the insurgents’ camp. Slowly and silently they stole
across the plain, without note of drum or fife, and headed by their
young commander, until they reached the brow of the little elevation,
beyond which the enemy lay sleeping, some in tents, some on the open
field, and all unguarded.
The signal was given, and the small band of disciplined men fell upon
the camp. Lorenzo Bezan with some fifty picked followers sought the
head quarters of the camp, and having fought their way thither,
possessed themselves of the standards, and made prisoner of the leader
of the body of insurgents, and ere the morning sun had risen, the camp
was deserted, the enemy, totally defeated, had fled, or been taken
prisoners and bound, and the victorious little band of the queen’s
troops were again housed within the walls of the fortress.
But their fighting was not to end here; a second body of the enemy,
incensed as much by the loss of their comrades as elated by various
victories over other detachments of the army, fell upon them; but they
were met with such determined spirit and bravery, and so completely did
Lorenzo Bezan infuse his own manly and resolved spirit into the hearts
of his followers, that the second comers were routed, their banners
taken, and themselves dispersed. These two victories, however, had cost
him dear; half his little gallant band had lost their lives, and there
were treble their number of prisoners securely confined within the
fortress.
Fresh troops were despatched, in reply to his courier, to escort these
to the capital, and an order for himself and the rest of his command to
return to Madrid, forthwith. This summons was of course complied with,
and marching the remnant of his command to the capital, Captain Bezan
reported himself again at head quarters. Here he found his services had
been, if possible, overrated, and himself quite lionized. A major’s
commission awaited him, and the thanks of the queen were expressed to
him by the head of the department.
“A major,—one step is gained,” said the young soldier, to himself; “one
round in the ladder of fame has been surmounted; my eyes are now bent
upward!”
And how he dreamed that night of Cuba, of rank and wealth, and the
power and position they conferred-and still his eyes were bent upward!
With a brief period permitted for him to rest and recover from slight
wounds received in his late battles, Lorenzo, now Major Bezan, was
again ordered to the scene of trouble in the southern district, where
the insurgents, more successful with older officers sent against them,
had been again victorious, and were evidently gaining ground, both in
strength of purpose and numbers. This time he took with him a full
command of four companies, little less than four hundred men, and
departed under far better auspices than he had done before, resolved,
as at the outset, to lead his men where work was to be done, and to
lead them, too, on to victory or utter destruction! It was a fearful
resolve; but in his present state of feelings it accorded with the
spirit that seemed to actuate his soul.
But success does not always crown the most daring bravery, and twice
were Lorenzo Bezan and his followers worsted, though in no way
discouraged. But at last, after many weeks of toil and hardship, he was
again victorious, again routed twice his own number, again captured a
stand of colors, and again despatched his trophies to the feet of his
queen. The civil war then became general, and for nearly a year Lorenzo
Bezan and his followers were in the battle field. Victory seemed to
have marked him for a favorite, and his sword seemed invincible;
wherever he led, he infused his own daring and impetuous spirit into
the hearts of his followers, and where his plume waved in the fight,
there the enemy faltered.
A second and third victory crowned him within another promotion, and a
colonel’s commission was sent to the adventurous soldier after the hard
fought battles he had won for the queen. Once more he paused, and
whispered to himself:
“Another round in the ladder is gained! have patience, Lorenzo Bezan;
fame may yet be thine; she is thy only bride now; alas, alas, that it
should be so! that there cannot be one-one dearer than all the world
beside-to share with thee this renown and honor, this fame won by the
sword on the field of battle; one whose gentleness and love should be
the pillow on which to rest thy head and heart after the turmoil and
whirlwind of war has subsided!”
Scarcely a year had transpired since the condemned soldier had been
banished from Cuba, and now from a captaincy he had risen to wear the
star of a colonel. No wonder, then, that he thus soliloquized to
himself upon the theme of which he dreamed.
The life he led, the fierce contests he engaged in, had no effect in
hardening the heart of the young soldier: one thought, one single word,
when he permitted himself to pause and look back upon the past, would
change his whole spirit, and almost render him effeminate. At times his
thoughts, spite of himself, wandered far away over the blue waters to
that sunny isle of the tropics, where Isabella Gonzales dwelt, and then
his manly heart would heave more quickly, and his pulses beat swifter;
and sometimes a tear had wet his check as he recalled the memory of
Ruez, whom he had really loved nearly as well as he had done his proud
and beautiful sister. The boy’s nature, so gentle, affectionate and
truthful, and yet in emergency so manly and venturesome, as evinced in
his drawing the bullets from the guns that would else have taken the
life of Lorenzo Bezan, was a theme of oft recalled admiration and
regard to the young soldier.
Though he felt in his heart that Isabella Gonzales could never love
him, judging from the cold farewell that had at last separated them,
still fame seemed dear to him on her account, because it seemed to
bring him nearer to her, if not to raise a hope in his heart that she
might one day be his. At times, in the lonely hours of the night, alone
in his tent, he would apostrophize her angelic features, and sigh that
Heaven, which had sent so sweet a mould in human form, should have
imbued it with a spirit so haughty, a soul so proud as to mar the
exquisite creation.
“I have thought,” he amused to himself, “I that I knew her-that the
bright loveliness of her soul would dazzle and outshine the pride that
chance had sown there-that if boldly and truly wooed, she would in turn
boldly and truly love. It seemed to me, that it was the first barrier
only that must he carried by assault, and after that I felt sure that
love like mine would soon possess the citadel of her heart. But I was
foolish, self-confident, and perhaps have deserved defeat. It may be
so, but Isabella Gonzales shall see that the humble captain of
infantry, who would hardly be tolerated, so lowly and humble was he,
will command, ere long, at least, some degree of respect by the
position that his sword shall win for him. Ay, and General Harero, too,
may find me composed of better metal than he supposed. There is one
truthful, gentle and loving spirit that will sympathize with me. I know
and feel that; Ruez, my boy, may Heaven bless thee!”
“Count Basterio, what sort of a person is this Colonel Bezan, whose
sword has been invincible among the rebels, and who has sent us two
stand of colors, taken by himself?” asked the queen, of one of her
principal courtiers, one day.
“Your majesty, I have, never seen him,” answered the count, “but I’m
told he’s a grim old war-horse, covered with scars gained in your
majesty’s service.”
“Just as I had thought he must be,” continued the queen, “but some one
intimated to us yesterday that he was young, quite young, and of noble
family, Count Basterio.”
“He has displayed too much knowledge of warfare to be very young, your
majesty,” said the count, “and has performed prodigies during this
revolt, with only a handful of men.”
“That is partly what has so much interested me. I sent to the war
office yesterday to know about him, and it was only recorded that he
had been sent from Cuba. None of the heads of the department remembered
to have seen him at all.”
“I saw by the Gazette that he would return to Madrid with his regiment
to-day,” said the count, “when, if your majesty desires it, I will seek
out this Colonel Bezan, and bring him to you.”
“Do so; for we would know all our subjects who are gallant and
deserving, and I am sure this officer must be both, from what I have
already been able to learn.”
“Your wish shall be obeyed, your majesty,” said the obsequious
courtier, bowing low, and turning to a lady of the court, hard by,
began to chat about how this old “son of a gun,” this specimen of the
battle-field would be astonished at the presence of his queen.
“He’s all covered with scars, you say?” asked one of the ladies.
“Ay, senorita, from his forehead to his very feet,” was the reply.
“It will be immensely curious to see him; but he must look
terrifically.”
“That’s true,” added the count; “he’s grizzly and rough, but very
honest.”
“Can’t you have him muzzled,” suggested a gay little senorita, smiling.
“Never fear for his teeth, I wear a rapier,” added the count,
pompously.
“But seriously, where’s he from?”
“Of some good family in the middle province, I understand.”
“O, he’s a gentleman, then, and not a professional cut-throat?” asked
another.
“I believe so,” said the courtier.
“That’s some consolation,” was the rejoinder to the count’s reply.
While the merits of Lorenzo Bezan were thus being discussed, he was
marching his regiment towards the capital, after a year’s campaign of
hard fighting; and the Gazette was right in its announcement, for he
entered the capital on the evening designated, and occupied the
regularly assigned barracks for his men.