IN WHICH THE STORY GOES BACK.
The lepero's story, true in its foundation, was utterly false and
erroneous in its details. Perhaps, however, he had an interest in
deceiving the Count de Lhorailles, which the reader will be able to
judge of better after reading the following chapter.
After escaping so miraculously from the hands of the Apaches, into
whose power he had fallen, Cucharés dived and sought the centre of the
river. On mounting to the surface again to take breath, he looked around
him: he was alone. The lepero stifled a cry of joy, and, after a
moment's reflection, swam vigorously in the direction of the mangroves,
where Don Martial, warned by the signal he had been compelled to give,
had doubtlessly been awaiting him some time. With a few strokes he
reached the trees, beneath whose shade he disappeared. But another piece
of good luck awaited him there: the canoe, abandoned to itself, had
floated up against the trunk of a tree, and remained stationary.
Cucharés, leaving the water, soon succeeded in emptying the canoe and
making it float again. These boats are so light that they can be easily
emptied, for in these regions they are made of birch bark, which the
Indians strip from the tree by means of boiling water.
He had scarce landed ere a shadow bent over him and muttered in his
ear:--
"You have been a long time."
The lepero gave a start of terror; but he recognised Don Martial. In a
very few words he explained to him all that happened.
"It is all the better, as you have come here," the Tigrero said. "Hide
yourself in the mangroves, and do not stir under any pretext until I
return."
And he rapidly retired. Cucharés obeyed with more zeal because he heard
at no great distance from him the sound of the obstinate contest going
on at that moment between the French and Apaches. Don Martial, dagger in
hand, in readiness for any event, had glided like a phantom up to a
clump of floripondins, where Doña Anita awaited him all trembling. Just
as he was going to pull back the branches that separated him from the
young girl, he stopped with panting breast and frowning brow. She was
not alone. Her voice, quivering with emotion or anger, was harsh and
imperious, whom could she be speaking to? Who was the man that had
succeeded in discovering her in this retired spot, where she fancied
herself so well concealed, and who, it seemed, was trying to force her
to follow him? The Tigrero listened. Soon he made a gesture of anger and
menace. He had recognised the voice of the man with whom Doña Anita was
talking: it was her father.
All was lost!
The hacendero was trying to lead his daughter in the direction of the
buildings; while employing the most convincing reasons. He did not
appear to suspect the motive which had brought his daughter to that
spot. Doña Anita refused to go away, alleging the danger of being met by
an Indian marauder, and thus falling into the danger she so earnestly
wished to avoid.
Don Martial struck his brow; a singular smile played on his lips; his
eyes flashed fire, and he noiselessly slipped back to the river bank.
Still the combat was going on: at times it appeared to draw
nearer--oaths and yells could be distinguished; at others, flashes lit
up the scene, and a shower of bullets whizzed through the air with that
sharp, hissing sound which terrifies novices in warfare.
"In the name of Heaven, my beloved daughter," Don Sylva urged, "come! We
have not a moment to lose; in a few seconds our retreat may be perhaps
cut off. Come, I implore you!"
"No, my father!" she said, shaking her head. "I am resigned: whatever
may happen, I repeat to you, I will not leave this spot."
"It is madness," the hacendero exclaimed in great grief. "You wish to
die, then?"
"What matter to me?" she said sorrowfully. "Am I not condemned in every
way? Heaven is my witness, father, that I would gladly die to escape the
marriage prepared for me."
"My daughter, in the Virgin's name----"
"What do you care, father, whether I fall into the hands of Pagan
savages today, when tomorrow you would surrender me with your own hands
to a man I detest?"
"Speak not to me thus, daughter. Besides, the moment is very badly
chosen, it seems to me, for a discussion like this. Come, the shouts are
growing more furious; it will soon be too late."
"Go, if you think proper," she said resolutely. "I shall remain here,
whatever may happen."
"As it is so, as you obstinately resist me, I will employ force to
compel your obedience."
The girl threw her left arm round the trunk of a cedar tree, and looking
with intense resolution at her father, exclaimed,--
"Do so if you dare, O my father! But I warn you that, at the first step
you take toward me, that will happen which you want to avoid. I will
utter such piercing shrieks that they must reach the ears of the Pagans,
who will run up."
Don Sylva stopped in hesitation: he knew his daughter's firm and
determined character, and that she would at once put this threat in
execution. A few minutes elapsed, during which father and daughter stood
face to face, not uttering a word, or making even a gesture.
Suddenly the branches were noisily parted, yielding a passage to two
men, or rather two demons, who, rushing with panther bounds on the
hacendero, hurled him to the ground. Before Don Sylva was able to
recognise the enemies who attacked him so unexpectedly by the pale beams
of the stars, he was gagged and bound, while a handkerchief twisted
round his head hid from him all external objects, and prevented him
seeing what his daughter's fate might be. The latter, at this sudden
attack, uttered a cry of terror, at once prudently checked, for she had
recognised Don Martial.
"Silence!" the Tigrero hurriedly said in a low voice. "I could manage in
no other way. Come, come, your father, you know, is a sacred object to
me."
The girl made no reply. At a sign from Don Martial, Cucharés seized Don
Sylva, threw him on his shoulders, and went toward the mangroves.
"Where are we going?" Doña Anita asked in a trembling voice.
"To a place where we can be happy together," the Tigrero answered
gently, as he lifted her with a passionate movement, and ran off with her
to the canoe. Doña Anita made no resistance: she smiled and threw her
arms round her lover's neck to keep her balance during this
steeplechase, in which Don Martial leaped from branch to branch, holding
on by the creepers and encouraging his lovely burden by signs and looks.
Cucharés had placed Don Sylva in the bottom of the canoe, and, paddles
in hand, was impatiently awaiting the Tigrero's arrival: for the combat
seemed doubled in intensity, although, from the number of musket shots,
it was easy to see that victory would rest with the French.
"What shall we do?" Cucharés inquired.
"Get into the middle of the river, and slip down with the current."
"But our horses?"
"Let us save ourselves first; we will think of the horses afterwards. It
is evident that the white men are the victors. As soon as the fight is
over, Count de Lhorailles will send everywhere in search of his guests.
It is important not to leave any trail, for the French are demons, and
would find us again."
"Still, I fancy--" Cucharés timidly observed.
"Be off!" said the Tigrero in a peremptory tone, kicking the canoe
vigorously from the bank.
The first moments of the voyage passed in silence: each reflected on the
peculiar position in which he was placed.
Don Martial had assumed a tremendous responsibility by staking, as it
were, on one throw the happiness of the girl he loved and his own.
Besides, the hacendero lying at the bottom of the canoe gave him great
subject for thought. The position was grave, the solution difficult.
Doña Anita, with drooping head and absent glance, was dreamily letting
her dainty hand glide through the water over the side of the canoe.
Cucharés, while paddling furiously, was thinking that the life he led
was anything rather than agreeable, and that he was far happier at
Guaymas, as he lay with his head in the shade, and his feet in the sun,
in the church porch, enjoying his siesta, refreshed by the sea breeze,
and lulled to sleep by the mysterious murmur of the surf on the shingle.
As for Don Sylva de Torrés, he was not reflecting. A prey to one of
those dumb passions which, if they lasted any length of time, must end
in insanity, he frantically bit the gag that shut his mouth, and writhed
in his bonds, while unable to break them.
The various sounds of the contest gradually died out. For some time
longer the travellers remained silent, absorbed not only in their
thoughts, but affected by that gentle melancholy produced on all nervous
natures by that solemn calmness and striking harmony of the wilderness,
whose sublime and majestic grandeur no human pen is capable of
describing.
The stars were beginning to pale in the sky: an opal line was vaguely
drawn in the horizon: the clumsy alligators were quitting the mud and
going in search of their morning meal; the owls, perched on the trees,
were saluting the approaching sunrise; the coyotes glided in startled
bands along the shore, uttering their hoarse barks; the wild beasts were
retreating to their hidden dens, heavy with sleep and fatigue; day was
on the point of breaking. Doña Anita leaned coquettishly on Don
Martial's shoulder.
"Where are we going?" she asked him in a gentle resigned voice.
"We are flying," he laconically answered.
"We have been descending the river in this way for more than six hours,
borne by the current and helped by your four vigorously-pulled paddles.
Are we not out of reach of danger?"
"Yes, long ago. It is not any fear of the French which troubles me
now--"
"What then?"
The Tigrero pointed to Don Sylva, who, having exhausted his strength and
passion, had at length tacitly recognised his powerlessness, and was
sleeping quite exhausted.
"Alas!" she said, "You are right. Things can not go on thus, my friend;
the position is intolerable."
"If you will allow me to act as I think proper, before a quarter of an
hour your father will thank me."
"Do you not know that I am entirely yours?"
"Thanks!" he said. Turning to Cucharés, he muttered a few words in his
ear.
"Ah, ah! That is an idea," the lepero said with a grin. Two minutes
later the canoe ran ashore. Don Sylva, delicately borne by two powerful
hands, was carried ashore without waking.
"Now it is your turn," Don Martial said to the girl: "for the success of
the scheme I have formed you must allow yourself to be fastened to this
tree."
"Do so, my friend."
The Tigrero took her into his vigorous arms, bore her ashore and in a
twinkling had fastened her tightly by the waist to the stem of a tree.
"Now," he said hurriedly, "remember this. Your father and yourself were
carried off from the hacienda by the Apaches; accident brought us in
your way, and--"
"You save us, I suppose?" she said with a smile.
"Quite correct; but utter shrill cries, as if you felt in great alarm.
You understand, do you not?"
"Perfectly."
The play was performed in the way arranged. The girl uttered piercing
shrieks, to which the two adventurers replied by discharging their
rifles and pistols; they then rushed toward the hacendero, whom they
hastened to liberate from his bonds, and to whom they restored not only
the use of his limbs, but also of his eyes and tongue. Don Sylva half
rose, and looked around him: he saw his daughter fastened to a tree,
from which two men were freeing her. The hacendero raised his eyes to
heaven, and uttered a fervent prayer.
So soon as Doña Anita was free she ran to her father, and cast herself
in his arms. As she embraced him she hid her face, which blushed,
perhaps, for shame at this unworthy deception, on the old man's breast.
"My poor darling child," he murmured, with tears in his eyes, "It was
for you, for you alone, I trembled during the whole of this fearful
night."
The girl made no reply, for she felt stung to the heart by this
reproach. Don Martial and Cucharés, judging the moment favourable, then
approached, holding their smoking rifles in their hands. On recognising
them a cloud passed over the hacendero's face--a vague suspicion gnawed
at his heart; he bent a searching glance on the two men and on his
daughter, and rose with frowning brow and quivering lips, though not
uttering a word. Don Martial was embarrassed by this silence, which he
had been far from anticipating. After the service he was supposed to
have done Don Sylva, the duty of speaking first fell upon him.
"I am happy," he said in an embarrassed voice, "to have arrived here so
fortunately, Don Sylva, as I was enabled to save you from the redskins."
"I thank you, señor Don Martial," the hacendero answered dryly. "I could
expect nothing less from your gallantry. It was written, so it seems,
that after saving the daughter, you must also save the father. You are
destined, I see it, to be the liberator of my entire family: receive my
sincere thanks."
These words were uttered with an accent of raillery that pierced the
Tigrero like an arrow: he could not find a word in reply, and bowed
awkwardly in order to hide his embarrassment.
"My father," Doña Anita said in a caressing tone, "Don Martial has
risked his life for us."
"Have I not thanked him for it?" he continued. "The affair was a sharp
one, as it seems, but the heathens escaped very quickly. Was there no
one killed?"
And saying this the hacendero affected to look carefully around him. Don
Martial drew himself up.
"Señor Don Sylva de Torrés," he said in a firm voice, "as chance has
brought us once again face to face permit me to tell you that few men
are so devoted to you as myself."
"You have just proved, caballero."
"Leave that out of sight," he went on hurriedly. "Now that you are free,
and can act as you please, command me. What would you of me? I am ready
to do anything you please, in order to prove to you how happy I should
be in doing you a service."
"That is language I can understand, caballero, and to which I will
frankly respond. Important reasons compel me to return to the French
colony of Guetzalli, whence the heathens carried me off so
treacherously."
"When do you wish to start?"
"At once, if that be possible."
"Everything is possible, caballero. Still, I would call your attention
to the fact that we are nearly thirty leagues from that hacienda; that
the country in which we now are is a desert; that we should have great
difficulty in finding horses: and, with the best will in the world, we
cannot, make the journey on foot."
"Especially my daughter, I presume," the other remarked with a sardonic
smile.
"Yes," the Tigrero said, "especially the señorita."
"What else is to be done? for I must return there--with my daughter," he
added, purposely laying stress on the last three words, "and that so
soon as possible."
The Tigrero did not utter the exact truth in telling Don Sylva they were
thirty leagues from the colony. It was not more than eighteen; but in a
country like this, where roads do not exist, fifteen leagues are an
almost insurmountable obstacle to a man not thoroughly acquainted with
desert life. Don Sylva, though he had never travelled under other than
favourable circumstances--that is to say, with all the comfort it is
possible to obtain in these remote regions--was aware, theoretically, if
not practically, of all the difficulties which would rise before him
with each step, and what obstacles would check his movements. His
resolution was made almost immediately.
Don Sylva, like a good many of his countrymen, was gifted with rare
obstinacy. When he had formed a plan, the greater the obstacles which
prevented its accomplishment, the greater his determination to carry it
out.
"Listen," he said to Don Martial; "I wish to be frank with you. I fancy
I tell you nothing new in announcing my daughter's marriage with the
Count de Lhorailles. That marriage must be performed: I have sworn it,
and it shall be, whatever may be said or done to impede it. And now I am
about to make trial of the devotion you boast of offering me."
"Speak, señor."
"You will send your companion to the Count de Lhorailles; he will carry
him a message to calm his uneasiness and announce my speedy arrival."
"Good!"
"Will you do it?"
"At once."
"Thanks! Now, as regards yourself personally, I leave you at liberty to
follow or leave us at your pleasure; but in the first place, we want
horses, arms, and, above all, an escort. I do not wish to fall once more
into the hands of the heathen. Perhaps I shall not have the good fortune
to escape from them so easily as on this occasion."
"Remain here: in two hours I will return with horses. As for an escort,
I will try and procure you one, although I do not promise it. As you
allow me to do so, I will accompany you till you have rejoined the
_conde_. I hope, during the period I may have the felicity of passing
near you, to succeed in proving to you that you have judged me
wrongfully."
These words were pronounced with such an accent of truth that the
hacendero felt moved.
"Whatever may happen," he said, "I thank you: you will none the less
have done me an immense service, for which I shall be ever grateful to
you."
Don Sylva tore a leaf from his pocketbook, on which he wrote a few lines
in pencil, folded it, and handed it to the Tigrero.
"Are you sure of that man?" he asked him.
"As of myself," Don Martial replied evasively. "Be assured that he will
see the conde."
The hacendero made a sign of satisfaction as the Tigrero went up to
Cucharés.
"Listen," he said aloud as he gave him the paper. "Within two days you
must have delivered this to the chief of Guetzalli. You understand me?"
"Yes," the lepero replied.
"Go, and may Heaven protect you from all evil encounters! In a quarter
of an hour behind that mound," he hurriedly added in a whisper.
"Agreed," the other said with a bow.
"Take the canoe," the Tigrero continued.
Had the hacendero conceived any doubts, they were dissipated when he saw
Cucharés leap into the canoe, seize the paddles, and depart without
exchanging a signal with the Tigrero, or even turning his head.
"The first part of your instructions is fulfilled," said the Tigrero,
returning to Don Sylva's side. "Now for the second part. Take my pistols
and musket. In case of any alarm you can defend yourself. I leave you
here. Pray do not move, and within two hours at the latest I will rejoin
you."
"Do you know where to find horses?"
"Do you not remember that the desert is my domain?" he returned with a
melancholy smile. "I am at home here, as I shall prove to you. Farewell
for the present."
And he went off in a direction opposed to that taken by the canoe. When
he had disappeared from Don Sylva's sight behind a clump of trees and
shrubs, the Tigrero turned sharply to the right and ran back. Cucharés,
carelessly seated on the ground, was smoking a cigarette while awaiting
him.
"No words, but deeds," the Tigrero said. "We have no time to waste."
"I am listening,"
"Look at this diamond;" and he pointed to a ring through which his neck
handkerchief was drawn.
"It is worth 6000 piastres," Cucharés said, examining it like a judge.
Don Martial handed it to him.
"I give it you," he said.
"What am I to do for it?"
"First hand me the letter."
"Here it is."
Don Martial took it and tore it into impalpable fragments.
"Next?" Cucharés continued.
"Next, I have another diamond like that one at your service. You know
me?"
"Yes; I accept."
"On one condition."
"I know it," said the other with a significant sign.
"And you accept?"
"Of course I do."
"It is a bargain."
"He shall never trouble you again."
"Good! But you understand that I shall need proofs."
"You shall have them."
"Good-by, then."
The two accomplices parted, well satisfied with each other. A nod was as
good as a wink in such a case. We have seen how Cucharés acquitted
himself of the mission intrusted to him by Don Sylva. Don Martial, after
his short conversation with Cucharés, went to look for horses. Two hours
later he had returned. He not only brought excellent horses, but had
hired four peons, or men who called themselves so, to act as escort. The
hacendero comprehended all the delicacy of Don Martial's conduct: and
though the air and garb of his defenders were not completely orthodox,
he warmly thanked the Tigrero for the trouble he had taken to supply his
wants. Reassured as to his journey, he breakfasted with good appetite on
a lump of venison, washed down with _pulque_, which Don Martial had
procured. Then, so soon as the meal was over, the little band, well
armed, set out resolutely in the direction of Guetzalli, where Don
Sylva expected to arrive in three days, if nothing thwarted his
calculations.