towards it; and on looking in, they beheld the assembled conclave of the
worthies they were in search of, but found them more numerous than
Lazaro Gomez had given them to believe. In the crypt, or lower vaults
of the chapel, stood upwards of twenty--perhaps thirty, black-browed and
swarthy desperadoes, clustered around the marble pedestal of a tomb,
upon which were displayed a great quantity of coin, jewelry, and various
articles of value, all glittering in the streaming blaze of a huge oil
lamp placed amid them. Most of the fellows were attired in embroidered
jackets, adorned with rich military lace torn from the uniforms of the
dead, laced hose, and high-crowned sombreros adorned with feathers, or
long cloth head-dresses resembling a night-cap. Some, however, were in
absolute rags; none appeared to have been shaven for a month at least,
and had their ferocious faces covered with masses of black glossy
hair,--probably as a disguise, to be removed as occasion required. All
carried pistols and poniards in their sashes or waist-belts, and most of
them were armed with military carbines, musquets, and accoutrements,
French and English, thousands of which were in these days to be found on
every battle-field, and to be had for the trouble of taking them away.
Trunks, portmanteaus, mails, and innumerable articles of plunder lay
piled in various corners.
Fastened by strong cords to the pillars which supported the groined roof
of the crypt, appeared five or six fierce Spanish mastiff dogs, animals
of a reddish colour generally, larger and stronger than British
greyhounds. They seemed aware of the approach of strangers: every
moment they made the hollow vaults ring with their hoarse yells, while
they rolled about their fierce red eyes, and shook the snow-white foam
from their jet-black muzzles as they strained and strove, almost
strangling themselves in the attempt, to snap the cords which bound them
to the stone columns.
"Senor, we must retire, if it please you," whispered Pedro; "it would be
worse than Moorish rashness if three of us were to encounter thirty such
devils. And then the dogs--"
"I fear we must abandon the attempt," replied the officer in a voice of
stern regret. "Discretion is the better part of valour, and Narvaez and
I may meet again; but now--"
"It is just a temptin' o' Providence, sir," said Evan, "to bide here,
wi' sic a nest o' born deils below us. What an awfu' looking gallows
rogue the chield is that counts oot the siller!"
The light fell fully upon the robber's face as Evan spoke.
"It is,--it is the very villain who fired at me near Merida," muttered
Ronald almost aloud, in a tone of uncontrollable passion, and feeling
scarcely able to restrain himself from shooting Cifuentes dead upon the
spot; but he repressed the fierce sentiments of intense hatred,
indignation, and horror which he entertained for him, and paused even
when his hand was on the lock of the musquet which he carried.
"Whelp!" exclaimed one furiously to Narvaez, "think you I will thus
tamely submit to be defrauded of my share in this matter? Remember, you
are not at your old work of dealing out sour wine at Albuquerque! The
rings I took from the image of our Lady at Majorga were alone worth two
hundred _duros_."
"_Pesetas_, you mean, Julian Diaz,--_pesetas_; they were copper trash."
"I say _duros_; they were pure and beaten gold, embossed richly.
Methinks I should best know: I have prayed at that shrine some hundred
times ere--" He paused and grew pale.
"Bethink you, Julian, of my last night's work, and--"
"Bah! The stabbing of an old _abogado_."
"Old? Perdition seize him! he fought fiercely for his ill-gotten gold.
I broke the blade of a choice knife on the bones that cover his hard
heart. But silence, Diaz, my pet! Though we may eat flesh in Lent, and
rifle our Lady of Majorga, we would scorn to cheat each other. Honour
among--among--"
"Thieves! End the adage at once, driveller," cried he whom they named
Julian Diaz, a wild-looking fellow, with a broken nose and a frightful
squint. "Honour," he added impatiently, "sounds strangely indeed in
such a rogue's mouth as thine, Narvaez,--the broken keeper of a wine
casa."
"Why not?" cried a third. "Every man, from the king and the soldier
down to the lowest _abogado_, swears now by his word of honour; and why
may not we?"
"Agreed, agreed. Go on, _diavolo!_ go on with the distribution," cried
the others impatiently.
"Fiend take these dogs! what do they growl at? Some one surely
approaches."
"Impossible," answered Diaz. "Lazarillo is watching the only approach,
and all is right; so count on, Narvaez."
"Where was I? Ay--three hundred and ninety-eight, three hundred and
ninety-nine, four hundred _reals_," continued Narvaez, counting the
money, "are one hundred _pesetas_; now, we are thirty in number,
including Lazarillo--"
"But the necklace and rings which I took from the old lawyer's
daughter?" interrupted the avaricious Julian.
"San Jago of Compostella wither your accursed tongue!" exclaimed
Cifuentes, grasping fiercely the hilt of his poniard; "how often am I to
lose count by your interruptions? Allow me to deal to each man his
share, and then preach, as of old, until you are weary. When you left
your cloister at San Juan, you should have left there your monkish greed
with your beads and cowl. One hundred pesetas, then, is--is--twenty
duros," &c. &c.; and so on he continued to reckon and count, while his
brother desperadoes watched round in silence, with louring looks of
eagerness, ferocity, and avarice, their hard-featured countenances
appearing like those of demons, as the yellow lustre of the lamp fell on
their harsh outlines.
"Let us retire now, while we may do so in safety," whispered Ronald.
"But how now, Pedro! what is the matter with you?" he asked, on
observing that the face of the Spaniard was pale, fierce, and betrayed
symptoms of deep excitement.
"Ah! _senor officiale_," he replied in a scarcely audible voice, "Julian
Diaz, the wretch who was this moment disputing with the master rogue,
has done me more wrong than even his life can atone for."
"How--how so? Speak low and quickly."
"Two years ago I was about to be wedded to a girl of Merida, Isobel
Zuares,--a fair creature, senor, and of good birth, for her grandfather
had been an alcalde. The very evening before our marriage, this fiend
Julian Diaz, who was then a monk in the Convento de San Juan,
sacrilegiously conceived a passion for her at the confessional, and bore
her that night by force to the forest of Albuquerque. _Dios! O Dios!_
senor, I never again beheld her,--never again in life at least: poor
Isobel!" He paused a moment, and the quivering muscles of his face,
which appeared pale as that of a spectre in the moonlight, showed the
inward agony of his soul.
"Well, Pedro, and this Diaz--"
"Since that day has been a robber and outlaw: as such he has eluded my
search. But now--" He cocked and raised his carbine.
"For Heaven's sake--for our own sakes, beware what you do, Gomez! We
must retreat rather than attack. Our lives would pay for our rashness
in encountering so many."
"God be wi' us! Would ye be temptin' Providence by firing on sic a nest
o' caterans?" said Evan angrily, as he dragged Pedro from the wall
towards the gloomy dingle. "Come awa, ye desperate loon. If ye haud
your life at a bawbee only, I haud mine dearer than a' the goud in the
hill o' Keir; and there lies the ransom o' seven crowned kings."
"_Diavolo_! I will not be restrained," cried the dragoon fiercely,
disengaging himself from the grasp of the Highlander. "I will revenge
Isobel Zuares, or die!" He rushed to the loop-hole, and fired at the
group of bandits. Julian Diaz, shot through the heart, fell dead among
his terrified comrades.
"Follow me, senors! I know every pass and thicket of the wood, and will
easily elude their pursuit," exclaimed Pedro, dashing into the bushes,
and threading his way at random through the maze of dark thickets and
entangled underwood. The two mountaineers, acting on the first impulse
of the moment, also sought safety by retiring, and followed Pedro with
ease and rapidity through every obstacle, having been accustomed from
their boyhood to thread the dense pine forests of the Scottish
highlands.
Onward they hurried at random, pressing aside the heavy bushes and
branches, getting themselves bruised and torn by sharp brambles and hard
stumps; but wounds and contusions were unfelt or unheeded in the
excitement of the moment, as they pressed forward regardless of
immediate consequences. Ronald was boiling with inward rage and
vexation to find himself retiring thus from wretches whom he so heartily
hated and despised, and more than once he almost resolved to stand and
fight against them to the death; but his discretion overruled his
desperate resolution, pointing out that flight and deferring his revenge
till another time would be the most prudent course to pursue; but that a
future time would ever be, seemed at present very doubtful. Fiercely in
pursuit, following their path with scrupulous precision, came the
outlaws, eager for plunder and revenge. These savage desperadoes had,
however, been distanced by some hundred yards; but their shouts,
outcries, and the tread of their feet were distinctly heard as they
pursued with the speed and accuracy of men accustomed to the ground, and
to the irregular warfare of guerillas.
Now and then the gloom of the dark wood was illumined by a lurid flash,
as a random shot was fired in the direction of the fugitives, who more
than once had narrow escapes from being killed or wounded; the latter
was to be dreaded, as it would have ensured, perhaps, a death of torture
from the poniards of the bandits. A part of the forest was now gained
where the trees grew thinner and the ground was more open; but their
path was embarrassed by piled masses of rocks, roots and stumps of
decayed trees, entwined bushes, fallen cork-trees, deep gorges and
holes, and here and there the stony bed of some bubbling brook.
Nevertheless they still kept their pursuers at the same distance, and
trod on quickly and in silence.
The moon, which had been obscured for some time, now broke forth and
lighted the wild scenery with the pale splendour of its silvery light.
"These wretches are undoubtedly gaining upon us," said Ronald, pausing a
moment to listen and draw breath. "Your ill-timed rashness, Pedro, will
certainly cost us our lives."
"For my own I care not; but I regret that yours, noble senor, or that of
my gallant comrade, should be placed in such deadly peril by me."
"It was a temptin' o' Providence to attack sic a gang," observed Evan,
who had begun to comprehend Spanish a little. "O'd, sir! gin we had but
ten o' our ain braw fellows here, we would soon gar them ca' a halt."
"Yes; oh! had we but so many of the Gordon Highlanders here, I would
soon give these vagabonds fight,--thirty of them though there be."
"Twenty-eight, senor; my hand has struck two from the muster-roll," said
Pedro, ducking his head to avoid a shot which whistled past.
"There they are now. How it stings me to the heart's core to fly thus
before such a despicable crew!"
As the moon shone forth again, their pursuers were distinctly seen
behind, bounding over rocks and leaping through bushes, clearing every
impediment with the activity of roes, while the wild yells,
maledictions, and blasphemy with which they startled the far echoes of
the lonely forest, imparted to the scene a singular and exciting, but
certainly terrible effect. Some becoming weary, or missing the track,
their numbers were now diminished to about a score, and shot upon shot
they sent after the three fugitives, the glitter of whose polished
appointments they could plainly discern in the moonlight.
"Fire on them! take a cool and deliberate aim, that every shot may take
down its man!" cried Ronald, in a voice which had become hoarse with
passion and fatigue; while, by way of example, he levelled the musquet
of the dead robber over a fragment of rock, and let fly its contents at
the nearest pursuer, who fell with a shriek that started the wild birds
in the farthest recesses of the wood, and gave a temporary check to the
ardour of the banditti, who still followed them closely but more
warily,--firing at them from behind rocks and bushes, maintaining a
running skirmish which, notwithstanding the danger, had something very
exciting in it, and pleased Ronald's bold and fiery disposition better
than the unresisting manner of their previous flight.
"Our Lady of Majorga, assist us!" cried Pedro in a voice of dismay. "We
are lost now, senor: the fiends have brought up the dogs to their
assistance."
"Pause not a second, but fire and reload; we have steel and lead for the
dogs, as well as for their less noble masters. Excellent! that shot
told well, Evan."
"Ay, sir, the fallow is kicking up his shoon like a red-rae. I see his
legs in the moonlicht dangling ower the cairn o' stanes," replied the
other, coolly trailing his piece, and ramming another charge hard home.
"But o'd, sir, look at thae awfu' black tykes, louping ower scaur and
bush, bank and brae like fairies, or sic-like awsome things.
Sleuth-dugs, I declare! the born deevils!"
"_Demonios! senors_. I tell you we are lost," said Pedro, in a tone of
anger and impatience. "You know not the unmatched ferocity of our
Spanish mastiffs. They are yet far off; but should they reach us, all
the rotten bones in the relicario of San Juan would not save us, if we
had them here."
"Take courage, sargento! I place more reliance upon a strong hand and a
bold heart, than all the relicarios in Spain: but, certes, these are
most devilish antagonists."
Leaping over every intervening obstacle with incredible speed, onward
came the six mastiff dogs, yelling and growling as if Pandemonium had
broken loose. Clearing rock and bush at a bound, on they came, their
glossy skins and starting eyes shining and gleaming in the light, which
showed distinctly one that had outstripped its comrades. Its growls
were deep and hoarse; the snow-white foam was dropping on the grass and
leaves from its red open mouth, as it came careering forward with the
fearlessness, ferocity, and determination of some diabolical spirit.
"For this one I will reserve my fire," said Stuart, knowing himself to
be a deadly shot; "meanwhile blaze away, and aim steadily, brave
hearts!"
"A minute more and it will be upon us; one must certainly become its
victim," replied Pedro: "that victim must be me, if my poniard fails to
dispatch it. My rashness brought this about, and I am ready to pay the
penalty."
"Pshaw! never despond. Mark that fellow with the red cap."
"He is down, senor," replied the other coolly, as he shot the man dead.
"I can die content. I have gained vengeance on Julian Diaz, and I should
have been no true Spaniard had I not revenged myself."
"I will hold you but _medio Espanol_, if you talk thus. Courage, good
Pedro! I will rid us of this pursuer,--my aim is deadly."
"Could we but escape this one, our safety would be secured. On the
other side of this stream is a cavern, the mouth of which is concealed
and overgrown with wild vines; but I know it well, as I do every foot of
ground hereabout. Let us but gain it, and we can remain there in safety
until some assistance arrives. We are now close on the road that leads
from La Nava to Albuquerque."
They found themselves on the brink of a rushing torrent, which, hurrying
down from the summits of the Sierra de Montanches, swept over its rugged
channel towards the Guadiana, seeking the most unfrequented and solitary
gorges and defiles to wander through.
"Let us jump into the burn, sir," cried Evan eagerly. "Let us jump in,
and gang up the water a wee bit, and the sleuth hounds will sune tyne
the scent. My faither, the piper, aye telled that was the only way to
get rid o' evil speerits and sic-like, to put a rinnin water between
them and yoursel."
"Right, Evan! we are almost safe. Plunge in: follow me!" cried Ronald,
springing into the stream, which rose to his waist: the others followed.
Keeping close under some weeping willows, that thickly overhung the
water, they eluded the search of the ferocious dog, which at that
instant gave a yell of disappointment as it shook the foam from its
chaps, and stood panting and growling on the bank above them. It next
ran fiercely to and fro, snorting and snuffing the air, and tearing up
huge pieces of turf with its sharp fangs, as if to discover the lost
prey.
"We must cross and gain the cavern now, senor, while the rogues are so
far in our rear," said Pedro Gomez, after they had advanced up the bed
of the current a little way, treading with difficulty on the slippery
pebbles. "I know the path, _senor officiale_; follow me promptly, if
you please,--now is the critical time to elude them altogether." Pedro
sprang with agility up the steep bank; Ronald followed, but poor Evan,
encumbered by his wet tartan kilt, which in the hurry he had neglected
to lift in the Highland manner, stumbled in the centre of the rushing
torrent, and at the moment he fell backwards the fierce quadruped sprung
upon him from the bank above with a wild yell, and seizing him by the
thick folds of his filledh-beg, drew him under water. He was so much
disconcerted at finding himself grasped by the terrible foe, that he was
only able to utter a faint cry when the stream closed over him; but yet
he struggled fiercely with his growling antagonist.
"God, he is lost!" exclaimed Ronald, when on looking back he beheld the
danger of his faithful follower. Half swimming, he hurried to the spot,
with his broad-sword shortened in his hand, and grasping the dog by the
throat, plunged the sharp weapon twice through its body. Its teeth
relaxed the hold of Evan's tartan, and the quivering carcase floated
bleeding down the stream; while the rescued Highlander, propping himself
with his musquet, (which luckily he had never relinquished,) sprang up
the bank, where he shook himself like a water-dog, the wet streaming
from his bonnet and every part of his dress.
"_Viva!_ noble cavalier; gallantly done! Follow me, this is the
cavern," exclaimed Pedro; and rushing up a steep ascent, they followed
his example in plunging at once through a thicket of dark green bushes,
and found themselves in a gloomy hole, the extent or height of which it
was impossible to discover, being involved in utter darkness. The
densely thick foliage around the entrance formed a complete exclusion to
the light of the moon, which now revealed a dozen or more of their
pursuers on the opposite bank of the stream, about which they hunted in
every direction for some trace of those they had pursued, and urged on
their dogs, which, now completely at fault, ran up and down scenting
among the willow trees and shelving rocks, mingling their hoarse baying
with the loud and bitter curses of the banditti.
*CHAPTER XVI.*
*A SIEGE.*
"Fore-doomed is every felon Scot,
Who stains our native land.
* * * *
In ambush, near this darksome stream,
Five hundred rifles lay;
The water-kelpie stroaked his beard,
And nichered for his prey."
_Daniel Vedder._
"They must be somewhere hereabout," cried Cifuentes with a horrible
oath, speaking at intervals, while he panted with exhaustion and
fatigue. "But where in the name of Beelzebub can they have concealed
themselves?"
"They crossed the stream, I can swear," replied one fellow while he
loaded his musquet. "I saw them descend the bank with my own eyes."
"You could scarcely see them well with another man's, Puerco Vadija; but
there is no trace of them on the opposite bank. One of the dogs is
missing, too."
"There it lies, floating among the rocks and foam yonder," replied a
third ruffian.
"Dead?"
"Ay, dead as Judas."
"_Demonios_! How can these cursed fiends have escaped us?"
"Fiends they appear to be, certainly. They were but three in number,
and a hundred shots have missed them, while they have slain some of our
best men."
"By all the might of hell!" exclaimed Narvaez, in a voice of bitter
rage, "they shall not escape us, if we once more gain sight of them. To
the gay bravo with the large black feathers I bear a hatred, that every
drop of blood in his coward heart only can quench. To think that they
should escape us scathless, after having slain so many!"
"Poor Julian Diaz!" said Vadija. "A more jolly monk was not in
Estremadura, where there are well nigh six thousand of the cord and
cowl."
"_Dios!_ it maddens me!"
"And then the brave Lazarillo de Xeres de los Cavalleros--"
"How, Vadija! what of him?"
"I found him lying dead in the pathway, stabbed twice in the heart."
"_Hombres_! Close round me, comrades; we must fall on some plan to seek
vengeance. It is evident they have not crossed the stream,--we must
have seen them had they done so; therefore they must be close at hand,
and--" The rest was lost in the clamour of the others, who clustered
round Cifuentes, each delivering his opinion, and holding forth
obstinately against those of his brother rogues, many more of whom were
coming straggling up from the rear, panting and almost breathless with
exertion. Meanwhile the three fugitives had thrown themselves, wet as
they were, upon the damp floor of the cavern, happy to find rest and
time to breathe with some regularity and composure.
From behind their screen of thick foliage Ronald heard all that passed,
and watched with increasing interest the picturesque appearance of the
bandits, whom he could plainly discern in the radiant moonlight, that
shed its clear cold lustre through the dark blue vault, where myriads of
stars were twinkling. Meanwhile Iverach, who had quite recovered from
the dismay caused by his recent immersion, was busily employed drying
his wetted musquet, and preparing for action by fixing a new flint and
reloading, rejoicing to find that his thick leather pouch had kept his
ball cartridges perfectly dry.
"Thanks to Santa Maria, we are safe, senors," said Pedro; "they can
never discover this cavern, which is so admirably adapted for
concealment. It was in ancient days the retreat of a holy hermit, who
was drowned one dark night in the river below,--but that came of eating
flesh upon a Friday, they say."
"I wish we had gone to Majorga with your brother Lazaro; this cursed
adventure would then have been avoided. This hole is very damp, and
cold as the grave."
"But then it is so secure, senor; and we can defend it to the last, and
sell our lives dearly, should they attack us." Before Ronald could
reply,
"Bah! Lope Ordonez," cried Narvaez, "how should they know of this
concealed cavern which you say is up yonder? Are they not British? and
two of them belong to those savages that go with their limbs bare."
"The same guide that led them to the ruins of Santa Lucia, might show
them the cavern."
"Right, Ordonez. I thought not that there was so much wit in that empty
calabash of thine."
"They have a Spaniard with them," said he whom they named Vadija; "I saw
the moon reflected on his steel helmet."
"A dragoon! Had he a plume of red horsehair?"
"He had; but I think he has left the half or whole of it among the
bushes in his flight."
"_Caramba!_ then 'tis either Don Alvaro, or one of his rascally troop!
I shall have revenge for the night they made me spend in the Convento de
San Juan at Merida. We will search this cavern, and take a true Spanish
vengeance on whoever we find there. Look well to your knives and
flints, comrades."
"I perceive," said Ordonez, "some alteration has taken place among the
vines which conceal the entrance. They are all broken and trodden down;
I can swear they were not so this morning."
"Then there it is they are concealed. Tie up the dogs; bind them to the
trees; cross the stream. Let whoever thirsts for vengeance, follow me!
let whoever is concealed there tremble, for their hour is come!" said
Narvaez, concluding with one of those frightful Spanish maledictions
with which their conversation was so freely interspersed. The reader
may suppose with what feelings of excitement and desperation the three
weary fugitives beheld their remorseless pursuers boldly cross the
stream to storm their hiding-place. But perhaps Cifuentes and his
followers would have advanced less courageously, had they been perfectly
assured that those of whom they were in search were really so close at
hand.
"Thank Heaven, and our own caution, the ammunition is dry," said Ronald;
"and the sixty rounds we have among us will last until to-morrow, if we
are sparing and aim well. Let us fire on them as they cross the stream;
'tis neck or nothing with us now. See that you make sure of your men: I
will aim at Cifuentes,--the scoundrel with the long feather and
high-crowned hat."