THE LAST OF THE INCAS.
The principal houses of the town were only spared from pillage; and
Nocobotha, in order to save their riches, adjudged them to the most
powerful Ulmens. As for himself, he established his headquarters in
his own mansion in Old Carmen. Don Valentine and his daughter took
possession of their house, which had escaped the fury of the Indians.
The town, crowded with Patagonians, offered an image of desolation.
A week after the capture of the colony, at about ten in the morning,
three persons were conversing in a low voice in Don Valentine Cardoso's
saloon. They were Don Valentine himself, his daughter, and the Capataz
Don Blas Salazar. The latter, in his gaucho dress, had the look of
a thorough bandit. Mercedes, standing as sentry at a window was
laughing heartily at him, to the great despair of the capataz, who most
sincerely wished his confounded disguise at the deuce.
"Blas, my friend," Don Valentine was saying, "get yourself ready for a
dance."
"Then the ceremony is to take place today?"
"Yes, Blas. I must confess that we live in singular times, and a
singular country. I have seen several revolutions, but this one beats
them all."
"From the Indian point of view," Concha said, "it is very logical."
"Which of you, a month ago, expected such a sudden re-establishment of
the empire of the Incas?"
"Not I," the capataz replied. "Still, it seems to me that Nocobotha is
not at all magnanimous for a future emperor."
"What do you mean by that, my friend?"
"Has he not written to Don Sylvio that, if he does not leave the colony
in three days, he will have him hung?"
"Before hanging people," said Doña Concha, "it is necessary to catch
them."
"All that is very fine, Blas, but you will return to the estancia.
Above all, do not forget my instructions."
"Trust to me for that, Excellency; but I am anxious about Pedrito,"
he added, in a low voice, not to be overheard by Mercedes; "he has
disappeared for the last six days, and we have heard nothing about
him."
"Don Pedro," Concha remarked, "is not the man to be lost without
leaving traces. Reassure yourself, we shall see him again."
"Nocobotha!" Mercedes exclaimed, turning round.
"Blas, my friend, decamp," Don Valentine said.
"Come again soon," Mercedes added.
Nocobotha walked in. The great chief of the Aucas, dressed in his
magnificent Indian costume, had a thoughtful brow and anxious look.
After the first compliment, Doña Concha, alarmed by the chiefs
gloomy appearance, bent forward gracefully to him, and said, with an
affectionate air, which was admirably assumed--
"What is the matter with you, Torribio; you seem troubled? Have you
received any unpleasant news?"
"No, madam; I thank you. If I were ambitious, all my wishes would be
fulfilled. The Patagonian chiefs have resolved on re-establishing the
Empire of the Incas, and they have elected me, who am the direct heir,
to succeed the unfortunate Athahualpa; but--"
"They have done you justice."
"This distinction terrifies me, and I fear I cannot bear the weight of
an empire. The wounds dealt my race by the Spaniards are old and deep.
The Indians have been brutalized by a long servitude. What a task it is
to command these disunited tribes! Who will carry on my work if I die
in twenty years, two years, tomorrow, perhaps? What will become of the
dream of my life?"
"Heaven means you to live long, Don Torribio," Doña Concha answered.
"A diadem on my brow! Stay, señorita, I am discouraged, weary of life;
it seems to me that the crown will press my temples like a band of
iron, and crush them, and that I shall be buried in my triumph!"
"Dismiss these vain presentiments," the girl remarked, giving a side
glance full of meaning.
"As you know, madam, the Tarpeian Rock is close to the Capitol."
"Come, come! Don Torribio," Don Valentine said, gaily; "Let us take our
places."
A splendid breakfast had been laid. The first moments passed in
silence. The guests seemed embarrassed, but by degrees, thanks to Doña
Concha's efforts, the conversation became more animated, Nocobotha, it
could be easily seen, was making a violent effort to drive back the
flood of thoughts that ran to his lips. Toward the end of the repast he
turned to the young lady.
"Señorita," he said to her, "this evening all will be over. I shall
be Emperor of the Patagonians, and enemy of the Spaniards, who will
doubtless return with arms in their hands to overthrow our empire. What
they most dread in an Indian insurrection is the reprisals, that is to
say, the massacre of the white men. My marriage with an Argentine is a
pledge of peace for your countrymen, and a security for their commerce.
Doña Concha, give me your hand."
"What hurry is there at this moment, Don Torribio?" she asked. "Are you
not sure of me?"
"Ever the same vague and obscure answer," the chief said with a frown.
"Child, you are playing with a lion, and I see to the bottom of your
heart. Imprudent girl, you are rushing on your own destruction; but
no, you are in my power; and after saving your life ten times, I offer
you half a throne. Tomorrow, madam, you will and must marry me. Your
father's and Don Sylvio's heads will answer for your obedience."
And seizing a crystal bottle full of limpid water, he filled his glass
to the brim, and emptied it at a draught, while Doña Concha gazed at
him fixedly; this look contained a cruel and concealed joy.
"In an hour," he added as he placed the glass on the table again, "you
will be present at the ceremony by my side; I insist on it."
"I will be there," she replied.
"Farewell, madam."
The young lady rose quickly, seized the bottle, and walked up to the
window.
"What are you going to do there?" Don Valentine asked.
"I am watering my flowers, father."
While pouring out the water, Concha, whose eye sparkled with a gloomy
fire, muttered to herself--
"Don Torribio, you told me one day that there's many a slip betwixt the
cup and the lip; well, listen to me in my turn; between your forehead
and a crown there is death!"
She then placed two flower pots near the balustrade on the terrace of
the house. This was doubtless a signal, for in a few minutes Mercedes
entered the saloon hurriedly, saying--
"He is here."
"Let him come in," Don Valentine and his daughter said simultaneously.
Pedrito made his appearance. The estanciero recommended the utmost
vigilance to Mercedes, closed the door, and then seated himself by the
bombero's side.
"Well?" he asked him.
The Plaza Mayor on this day offered an unexpected sight. In the centre
rose a tall scaffold covered with red velvet tapestry, on which a
chair of carved nopal wood was placed. The back was surmounted by
a massive gold sun flashing with diamonds; a vulture of the Andes,
the sacred bird of the Incas, also of gold, held in its bent beak an
imperial crown, while in its claws it had a sceptre terminating in a
trident, and a hand of justice holding a dazzling sun. This vulture,
with outstretched wings, seemed hovering over the chair, to which there
was an ascent of four steps. On the right of this chair was another,
somewhat lower, but more simple.
At midday, the moment when the day star at its zenith darts forth
all its beams, five cannon shots, fired at regular intervals, boomed
forth majestically. At the same moment the different Patagonian tribes
debouched through each of the entrances of the square, led by their
Ulmen, and dressed in their robes of state. Only fifteen thousand
warriors were assembled, for, according to the Indian custom, so soon
as Carmen was taken, the booty was sent under safe escort to the
mountains, and the Patagonian troops disbanded and returned to their
tolderías, ready to come back, however, on the first signal.
The tribes drew up on three sides, leaving the fourth vacant, which
was soon occupied by five hundred gauchos. The latter were mounted and
well armed, while the Indians were on foot, and had only their machetes
in their girdle. The windows were lined with spectators, behind whom
Indian women, irregularly grouped, thrust out their heads over their
shoulders.
The centre of the square was free. In front of the scaffolding, and
at the foot of a clumsy altar shaped like a table, with a deep gutter
running down it and a sun above it, stood the great matchi of the
Patagonians and twenty priests, all with their arms crossed, and their
eyes fixed on the ground.
When all had taken their places, five more gunshots were fired, and a
brilliant cavalcade came up. Nocobotha, who marched at their head, with
Doña Concha on his right and Don Valentine on his left, held his totem
in his hand. After them came the principal Ulmens and caraskens of the
united nations, with their brilliant ornaments of gold and precious
stones.
Nocobotha got off his horse, held out his hand to Doña Concha to help
her to dismount, mounted the scaffold, led her to the second chair,
and himself stopped before the first one, though without sitting down.
His ordinary pale features were inflamed, his eyes seemed swollen by
watching, and he incessantly wiped away the perspiration that stood on
his forehead. Something unusual was going on within him. Doña Concha's
pallor was extreme, but her face was tranquil.
The Ulmens surrounded the scaffold, and at a third cannonade, the
priests stepped on one side and displayed a securely bound man lying on
the ground in their midst. The matchi turned to the crowd.
"All you who listen to me, the Sun, our ancestor, has smiled on our
arms, and Gualichu himself fought for us. The empire of the Incas
is established, the Indians are free, and the supreme chief of the
Patagonian nation, Nocobotha, is about to place on his head the diadem
of Athahualpa. In the name of the new emperor and ourselves we are
about to offer to the Sun from whom he is descended, the most grateful
of all sacrifices. Priests, bring up the victim."
The priests laid the unhappy wretch in the trough of the altar. He was
a colonist made prisoner at the taking of Población del Sur; indeed
the pulquero in whose shop the gauchos were accustomed to drink their
chicha.
In the meanwhile Nocobotha trembled as if smitten with ague. He had
a buzzing in his ears; his temples beat violently, and his eyes were
suffused with blood. He supported himself on one of the arms of his
chair.
"What is the matter?" Doña Concha asked him.
"I do not know," he answered; "the heat, the excitement, perhaps--I am
stifling; I hope it will be nothing."
The unfortunate pulquero had been stripped of all his clothes, with
the exception of his trousers, and he uttered heart-rending cries. The
matchi approached him, brandishing his knife.
"Oh, it is frightful!" Doña Concha exclaimed, burying her face in her
hands.
"Silence!" Nocobotha murmured; "It must be."
The matchi, insensible to the yells of the victim, selected the spot
where he was to strike, looked at the day star with an inspired air,
raised his knife, and laid open the pulquero's chest. Then, while the
victim writhed in agony, and the priests collected the blood which
poured in a stream, the matchi plucked out his heart, and held it up
to the sun, like the host in Catholic churches.
At this moment all the Ulmens mounted the scaffold, and seating
Nocobotha on the throne, raised him on their shoulders, shouting
enthusiastically--
"Long live the new Emperor! Long live the Son of the Sun!"
The priests sprinkled the crowd with the blood of the victim, and the
Indians filled the air with deafening shouts.
At length Nocobotha exclaimed, "I have restored the Empire of the
Incas, and freed my race!"
"Not yet!" Doña Concha said to him, triumphantly. "Look!"
The gauchos, who had hitherto been impassive spectators of the
ceremony, suddenly dashed at a gallop upon the defenceless Indians,
while through all the streets poured Argentine troops, who had arrived
from Buenos Aires, and all the windows were lined with white men, who
fired at the mob. In the centre of the square could be recognized
Don Sylvio d'Arenal, Blas Salazar Pedrito and his two brothers, who
pitilessly massacred the Indians with shouts of "Exterminate the
Pagans!"
"Oh!" Nocobotha exclaimed, brandishing his totem with a trembling hand,
"What treachery!" He tried to fly to the help of his people, but he
tottered and fell on his knees; his eyes were covered by an ensanguined
mist; a devouring fire burnt his entrails. "What is the matter?" he
asked himself in despair.
"You are dying, Don Torribio," Doña Concha whispered in his ear, as she
seized his arm forcibly.
"Woman, you lie," he said, striving to rise. "I will help my brothers."
"Your brothers are being slaughtered; did you not mean to kill my
father, my affianced husband, and myself? Die, villain! Die by a
woman's hand! I love Don Sylvio--do you hear me?--And I am avenged."
"Woe, woe!" Nocobotha shrieked, dragging himself on his knees to the
edge of the platform, "I am the murderer of a people I wished to save."
The Indians fell like ripe corn before the sickle of the reapers. It
was no longer a combat, but a butchery. Several chiefs flying before
Pedrito the capataz and Don Sylvio rushed to the platform as a last
refuge.
"Oh!" Nocobotha howled, as he took a tiger bound and seized Don Sylvio
by the throat, "I too will revenge myself."
There was a moment of terrible anxiety.
"No," the chief added, letting loose his enemy and falling back; "it
would be cowardly, for this man has done me no injury."
Doña Concha, on hearing these words, could not restrain tears of
admiration, tardy tears; tears of repentance, or of love, perhaps!
Pedrito fired his rifle into the chest of the chief, who was lying
stretched out at his feet. At the same instant Pincheira fell, his
head cleft asunder by Don Sylvio. Don Valentine struck by a straggling
bullet, sank into his disconsolate daughter's arms.
"My God," Nocobotha murmured, "you will judge me!" He locked up
to heaven, moved his lips again as if in prayer, and suddenly his
countenance became radiant; he fell back and expired.
"Perhaps this man's cause was just," Doña Concha said, overwhelmed with
remorse.
It is not the first time that a woman has, through the decree of
Heaven, arrested a conqueror.
THE END.