The wide pampa rough with long grass; a vast level disc now growing
dark, the horizon encircling it with a ring as faultless as that
made by a pebble dropped into smooth water; above it the clear sky
of June, wintry and pale, still showing in the west the saffron hues
of the afterglow tinged with vapoury violet and grey. In the centre
of the disc a large low rancho thatched with yellow rushes, a few
stunted trees and cattle enclosures grouped about it; and dimly seen
in the shadows, cattle and sheep reposing. At the gate stands Gregory
Gorostiaga, lord of house, lands and ruminating herds, leisurely
unsaddling his horse; for whatsoever Gregory does is done leisurely.
Although no person is within earshot he talks much over his task, now
rebuking his restive animal, and now cursing his benumbed fingers and
the hard knots in his gear. A curse falls readily and not without a
certain natural grace from Gregory's lips; it is the oiled feather
with which he touches every difficult knot encountered in life. From
time to time he glances towards the open kitchen door, from which issue
the far-flaring light of the fire and familiar voices, with savoury
smells of cookery that come to his nostrils like pleasant messengers.
The unsaddling over at last the freed horse gallops away, neighing
joyfully, to seek his fellows; but Gregory is not a four-footed thing
to hurry himself; and so, stepping slowly and pausing frequently to
look about him as if reluctant to quit the cold night air, he turns
towards the house.
The spacious kitchen was lighted by two or three wicks in cups of
melted fat, and by a great fire in the middle of the clay floor that
cast crowds of dancing shadows on the walls and filled the whole room
with grateful warmth. On the walls were fastened many deers' heads,
and on their convenient prongs were hung bridles and lassos, ropes of
onions and garlics, bunches of dried herbs, and various other objects.
At the fire a piece of beef was roasting on a spit; and in a large pot
suspended by hook and chain from the smoke-blackened central beam,
boiled and bubbled an ocean of mutton broth, puffing out white clouds
of steam redolent of herbs and cummin-seed. Close to the fire, skimmer
in hand, sat Magdalen, Gregory's fat and florid wife, engaged in frying
pies in a second smaller pot. There also, on a high, straight-backed
chair, sat Ascension, her sister-in-law, a wrinkled spinster; also, in
a low rush-bottomed seat, her mother-in-law, an ancient white-headed
dame, staring vacantly into the flames. On the other side of the fire
were Gregory's two eldest daughters, occupied just now in serving maté
to their elders--that harmless bitter decoction the sipping of which
fills up all vacant moments from dawn to bed-time--pretty dove-eyed
girls of sixteen, both also named Magdalen, but not after their mother
nor because confusion was loved by the family for its own sake; they
were twins, and born on the day sacred to Santa Magdalena. Slumbering
dogs and cats were disposed about the floor, also four children. The
eldest, a boy, sitting with legs outstretched before him, was cutting
threads from a slip of colt's hide looped over his great toe. The two
next, boy and girl, were playing a simple game called nines, once known
to English children as nine men's morrice; the lines were rudely
scratched on the clay floor, and the men they played with were bits
of hardened clay, nine red and as many white. The youngest, a girl of
five, sat on the floor nursing a kitten that purred contentedly on her
lap and drowsily winked its blue eyes at the fire; and as she swayed
herself from side to side she lisped out the old lullaby in her baby
voice:--
_A-ro-ró mi niño_
_A-ro-ró mi sol,_
_A-ro-ró pedazos_
_De mi corazon._
Gregory stood on the threshold surveying this domestic scene with
manifest pleasure.
"Papa mine, what have you brought me?" cried the child with the kitten.
"Brought you, interested? Stiff whiskers and cold hands to pinch your
dirty little cheeks. How is your cold to-night, mother?"
"Yes, son, it is very cold to-night; we knew that before you came in,"
replied the old dame testily as she drew her chair a little closer to
the fire.
"It is useless speaking to her," remarked Ascension. "With her to be
out of temper is to be deaf."
"What has happened to put her out?" he asked.
"I can tell you, papa," cried one of the twins. "She wouldn't let
me make your cigars to-day, and sat down out of doors to make them
herself. It was after breakfast when the sun was warm."
"And of course she fell asleep," chimed in Ascension.
"Let me tell it, auntie!" exclaimed the other. "And she fell asleep,
and in a moment Rosita's lamb came and ate up the whole of the
tobacco-leaf in her lap."
"It didn't!" cried Rosita, looking up from her game. "I opened its
mouth and looked with all my eyes, and there was no tobacco-leaf in it."
"That lamb! that lamb!" said Gregory slily. "Is it to be wondered at
that we are turning grey before our time--all except Rosita! Remind me
to-morrow, wife, to take it to the flock; or if it has grown fat on all
the tobacco-leaf, aprons and old shoes it has eaten--"
"Oh no, no, no!" screamed Rosita, starting up and throwing the game
into confusion, just when her little brother had made a row and was in
the act of seizing on one of her pieces in triumph.
"Hush, silly child, he will not harm your lamb," said the mother,
pausing from her task and raising eyes that were tearful with the smoke
of the fire and of the cigarette she held between her good-humoured
lips. "And now, if these children have finished speaking of their
important affairs, tell me, Gregory, what news do you bring?"
"They say," he returned, sitting down and taking the maté-cup from
his daughter's hand, "that the invading Indians bring seven hundred
lances, and that those that first opposed them were all slain. Some say
they are now retreating with the cattle they have taken; while others
maintain that they are waiting to fight our men."
"Oh, my sons, my sons, what will happen to them!" cried Magdalen,
bursting into tears.
"Why do you cry, wife, before God gives you cause?" returned her
husband. "Are not all men born to fight the infidel? Our boys are not
alone--all their friends and neighbours are with them."
"Say not this to me, Gregory, for I am not a fool nor blind. All their
friends indeed! And this very day I have seen the Niño Diablo; he
galloped past the house, whistling like a partridge that knows no
care. Why must my two sons be called away, while he, a youth without
occupation and with no mother to cry for him, remains behind?"
"You talk folly, Magdalen," replied her lord. "Complain that the
ostrich and puma are more favoured than your sons, since no man calls
on them to serve the state; but mention not the Niño, for he is freer
than the wild things which Heaven has made, and fights not on this side
nor on that."
"Coward! Miserable!" murmured the incensed mother.
Whereupon one of the twins flushed scarlet, and retorted, "He is not a
coward, mother!"
"And if not a coward why does he sit on the hearth among women and
old men in times like these? Grieved am I to hear a daughter of mine
speak in defence of one who is a vagabond and a stealer of other men's
horses!"
The girl's eyes flashed angrily, but she answered not a word.
"Hold your tongue, woman, and accuse no man of crimes," spoke Gregory.
"Let every Christian take proper care of his animals; and as for
the infidel's horses, he is a virtuous man that steals them. The
girl speaks truth; the Niño is no coward, but he fights not with our
weapons. The web of the spider is coarse and ill-made compared with
the snare he spreads to entangle his prey." Thus fixing his eyes on
the face of the girl who had spoken, he added; "therefore be warned in
season, my daughter, and fall not into the snare of the Niño Diablo."
Again the girl blushed and hung her head.
At this moment a clatter of hoofs, the jangling of a bell, and shouts
of a traveller to the horses driven before him, came in at the open
door. The dogs roused themselves, almost overturning the children
in their hurry to rush out; and up rose Gregory to find out who was
approaching with so much noise.
"I know, _papita_," cried one of the children. "It is Uncle Polycarp."
"You are right, child," said her father. "Cousin Polycarp always
arrives at night, shouting to his animals like a troop of Indians." And
with that he went out to welcome his boisterous relative.
The traveller soon arrived, spurring his horse, scared at the light and
snorting loudly, to within two yards o£ the door. In a few minutes the
saddle was thrown off, the fore feet of the bell-mare fettered, and the
horses allowed to wander away in quest of pasturage; then the two men
turned into the kitchen.
A short, burly man aged about fifty, wearing a soft hat thrust
far back on his head, with truculent greenish eyes beneath arched
bushy eyebrows, and a thick shapeless nose surmounting a bristly
moustache--such was Cousin Polycarp. From neck to feet he was covered
with a blue cloth poncho, and on his heels he wore enormous silver
spurs that clanked and jangled over the floor like the fetters of a
convict. After greeting the women and bestowing the avuncular blessing
on the children, who had clamoured for it as for some inestimable
boon--he sat down, and flinging back his poncho displayed at his waist
a huge silver-hilted knife and a heavy brass-barelled horse-pistol.
"Heaven be praised for its goodness, Cousin Magdalen," he said. "What
with pies and spices your kitchen is more fragrant than a garden of
flowers. That's as it should be, for nothing but rum have I tasted this
bleak day. And the boys are away fighting, Gregory tells me. Good!
When the eaglets have found out their wings let them try their talons.
What, Cousin Magdalen, crying for the boys! Would you have had them
girls?"
"Yes, a thousand times," she replied, drying her wet eyes on her apron.
"Ah, Magdalen, daughters can't be always young and sweet-tempered,
like your brace of pretty partridges yonder. They grow old, Cousin
Magdalen--old and ugly and spiteful; and are more bitter and worthless
than the wild pumpkin. But I speak not of those who are present, for I
would say nothing to offend my respected Cousin Ascension, whom may God
preserve, though she never married."
"Listen to me, Cousin Polycarp," returned the insulted dame so
pointedly alluded to. "Say nothing to me nor of me, and I will also
hold my peace concerning you; for you know very well that if I were
disposed to open my lips I could say a thousand things."
"Enough, enough, you have already said them a thousand times," he
interrupted. "I know all that, cousin; let us say no more."
"That is only what I ask," she retorted, "for I have never loved to
bandy words with you; and you know already, therefore I need not
recall it to your mind, that if I am single it is not because some men
whose names I could mention if I felt disposed--and they are the names
not of dead but of living men--would not have been glad to marry me;
but because I preferred my liberty and the goods I inherited from my
father; and I see not what advantage there is in being the wife of one
who is a brawler and a drunkard and spender of other people's money,
and I know not what besides."
"There it is!" said Polycarp, appealing to the fire. "I knew that I had
thrust my foot into a red ant's nest--careless that I am! But in truth,
Ascension, it was fortunate for you in those distant days you mention
that you hardened your heart against all lovers. For wives, like cattle
that must be branded with their owner's mark, are first of all taught
submission to their husbands; and consider, cousin, what tears! what
sufferings!" And having ended thus abruptly, he planted his elbows on
his knees and busied himself with the cigarette he had been trying to
roll up with his cold drunken fingers for the last five minutes.
Ascension gave a nervous twitch at the red cotton kerchief on her
head, and cleared her throat with a sound "sharp and short like the
shrill swallow's cry," when----
"_Madre del Cielo_, how you frightened me!" screamed one of the twins,
giving a great start.
The cause of this sudden outcry was discovered in the presence of
a young man quietly seated on the bench at the girl's side. He had
not been there a minute before, and no person had seen him enter the
room--what wonder that the girl was startled! He was slender in form,
and had small hands and feet, and oval olive face, smooth as a girl's
except for the incipient moustache on his lip. In place of a hat he
wore only a scarlet ribbon bound about his head, to keep back the
glossy black hair that fell to his shoulders; and he was wrapped in a
white woollen Indian poncho, while his lower limbs were cased in white
colt-skin coverings, shaped like stockings to his feet, with the red
tassels of his embroidered garters falling to the ankles.
"The Niño Diablo!" all cried in a breath, the children manifesting the
greatest joy at his appearance. But old Gregory spoke with affected
anger. "Why do you always drop on us in this treacherous way, like rain
through a leaky thatch?" he exclaimed. "Keep these strange arts for
your visits in the infidel country; here we are all Christians, and
praise God on the threshold when we visit a neighbour's house. And now,
Niño Diablo, what news of the Indians?"
"Nothing do I know and little do I concern myself about specks on the
horizon," returned the visitor with a light laugh. And at once all the
children gathered round him, for the Niño they considered to belong
to them when he came, and not to their elders with their solemn talk
about Indian warfare and lost horses. And now, now he would finish that
wonderful story, long in the telling, of the little girl alone and lost
in the great desert, and surrounded by all the wild animals met to
discuss what they should do with her. It was a grand story, even mother
Magdalen listened, though she pretended all the time to be thinking
only of her pies--and the teller, like the grand old historians of
other days, put most eloquent speeches, all made out of his own head,
into the lips (and beaks) of the various actors--puma, ostrich, deer,
cavy, and the rest.
In the midst of this performance supper was announced, and all
gathered willingly round a dish of Magdalen's pies, filled with
minced meat, hard-boiled eggs chopped small, raisins, and plenty of
spice. After the pies came roast beef; and, finally, great basins of
mutton broth fragrant with herbs and cummin-seed. The rage of hunger
satisfied, each one said a prayer, the elders murmuring with bowed
heads, the children on their knees uplifting shrill voices. Then
followed the concluding semi-religious ceremony of the day, when each
child in its turn asked a blessing of father, mother, grandmother,
uncle, aunt, and not omitting the stranger within the gates, even the
Niño Diablo of evil-sounding name.
The men drew forth their pouches, and began making their cigarettes,
when once more the children gathered round the story-teller, their
faces glowing with expectation.
"No, no," cried their mother. "No more stories to-night--to bed, to
bed!"
"Oh, mother, mother!" cried Rosita pleadingly, and struggling to
free herself; for the good woman had dashed in among them to enforce
obedience. "Oh, let me stay till the story ends! The reed-cat has said
such things! Oh, what will they do with the poor little girl?"
"And oh, mother mine!" drowsily sobbed her little sister; "the
armadillo that said--that said nothing because it had nothing to say,
and the partridge that whistled and said,--" and here she broke into
a prolonged wail. The boys also added their voices until the hubbub
was no longer to be borne, and Gregory rose up in his wrath and called
on some one to lend him a big whip; only then they yielded, and still
sobbing and casting many a lingering look behind, were led from the
kitchen.
During this scene the Niño had been carrying on a whispered
conversation with the pretty Magdalen of his choice, heedless of the
uproar of which he had been the indirect cause; deaf also to the bitter
remarks of Ascension concerning some people who, having no homes of
their own, were fond of coming uninvited into other people's houses,
only to repay the hospitality extended to them by stealing their silly
daughters affections, and teaching their children to rebel against
their authority.
But the noise and confusion had served to arouse Polycarp from a drowsy
fit; for like a boa constrictor, he had dined largely after his long
fast, and dinner had made him dull; bending towards his cousin he
whispered earnestly: "Who is this young stranger, Gregory?"
"In what corner of the earth have you been hiding to ask who the Niño
Diablo is?" returned the other.
"Must I know the history of every cat and dog?"
"The Niño is not cat nor dog, cousin, but a man among men, like a
falcon among birds. When a child of six the Indians killed all his
relations and carried him into captivity. After five years he escaped
out of their hands, and, guided by sun and stars and signs on the
earth, he found his way back to the Christian's country, bringing many
beautiful horses stolen from his captors; also the name of Niño Diablo
first given to him by the infidel. We know him by no other."
"This is a good story; in truth I like it well--it pleases me
mightily," said Polycarp. "And what more, cousin Gregory?"
"More than I can tell, cousin. When he comes the dogs bark not--who
knows why? his tread is softer than the cat's; the untamed horse is
tame for him. Always in the midst of dangers, yet no harm, no scratch.
Why? Because he stoops like the falcon, makes his stroke and is
gone--Heaven knows where!"
"What strange things are you telling me? Wonderful! And what more
cousin, Gregory?"
"He often goes into the Indian country, and lives freely with the
infidel, disguised, for they do not know him who was once their
captive. They speak of the Niño Diablo to him, saying that when they
catch that thief they will flay him alive. He listens to their strange
stories, then leaves them, taking their finest ponchos and silver
ornaments, and the flower of their horses."
"A brave youth, one after my own heart, cousin Gregory. Heaven defend
and prosper him in all his journeys into the Indian territory! Before
we part I shall embrace him and offer him my friendship, which is worth
something. More, tell me more, cousin Gregory?"
"These things I tell you to put you on your guard; look well to your
horses, cousin."
"What!" shouted the other, lifting himself up from his stooping
posture, and staring at his relation with astonishment and kindling
anger in his countenance.
The conversation had been carried on in a low tone, and the sudden
loud exclamation startled them all--all except the Niño, who continued
smoking and chatting pleasantly to the twins.
"Lightning and pestilence, what is this you say to me, Gregory
Gorostiaga!" continued Polycarp, violently slapping his thigh and
thrusting his hat farther back on his head.
"Prudence!" whispered Gregory. "Say nothing to offend the Niño, he
never forgives an enemy--with horses."
"Talk not to me of prudence!" bawled the other. "You hit me on the
apple of the eye and counsel me not to cry out. What! have not I, whom
men call Polycarp of the South, wrestled with tigers in the desert,
and must I hold my peace because of a boy--even a boy devil? Talk of
what you like, cousin, and I am a meek man--meek as a sucking babe; but
touch not on my horses, for then I am a whirlwind, a conflagration, a
river flooded in winter, and all wrath and destruction like an invasion
of Indians! Who can stand before me? Ribs of steel are no protection!
Look at my knife; do you ask why there are stains on the blade? Listen;
because it has gone straight to the robber's heart!" And with that he
drew out his great knife and flourished it wildly, and made stabs and
slashes at an imaginary foe suspended above the fire.
The pretty girls grew silent and pale and trembled like poplar leaves;
the old grandmother rose up, and clutching at her shawl toddled
hurriedly away, while Ascension uttered a snort of disdain. But the
Niño still talked and smiled, blowing thin smoke-clouds from his lips,
careless of that tempest of wrath gathering before him; till, seeing
the other so calm, the man of war returned his weapon to its sheath,
and glancing round and lowering his voice to a conversational tone,
informed his hearers that his name was Polycarp, one known and feared
by all men,--especially in the south; that he was disposed to live in
peace and amity with the entire human race, and he therefore considered
it unreasonable of some men to follow him about the world asking him to
kill them. "Perhaps," he concluded, with a touch of irony, "they think
I gain something by putting them to death. A mistake, good friends; I
gain nothing by it! I am not a vulture, and their dead bodies can be of
no use to me."
Just after this sanguinary protest and disclaimer the Niño all at once
made a gesture as if to impose silence, and turning his face towards
the door, his nostrils dilating, and his eyes appearing to grow large
and luminous like those of a cat.
"What do you hear, Niño?" asked Gregory.
"I hear lapwings screaming," he replied.
"Only at a fox perhaps," said the other. "But go to the door, Niño, and
listen."
"No need," he returned, dropping his hand, the light of a sudden
excitement passing from his face. "'Tis only a single horseman riding
this way at a fast gallop."
Polycarp got up and went to the door, saying that when a man was among
robbers it behoved him to look well after his cattle. Then he came
back and sat down again. "Perhaps," he remarked, with a side glance at
the Niño, "a better plan would be to watch the thief. A lie, cousin
Gregory; no lapwings are screaming; no single horseman approaching at a
fast gallop. The night is serene, and earth as silent as the sepulchre."
"Prudence!" whispered Gregory again. "Ah, cousin, always playful like
a kitten; when will you grow old and wise? Can you not see a sleeping
snake without turning aside to stir it up with your naked foot?"
Strange to say, Polycarp made no reply. A long experience in getting up
quarrels had taught him that these impassive men were, in truth, often
enough like venomous snakes, quick and deadly when roused. He became
secret and watchful in his manner.
All now were intently listening. Then said Gregory, "Tell us, Niño,
what voices, fine as the trumpet of the smallest fly, do you hear
coming from that great silence? Has the mother skunk put her little
ones to sleep in their kennel and gone out to seek for the pipit's
nest? Have fox and armadillo met to challenge each other to fresh
trials of strength and cunning? What is the owl saying this moment to
his mistress in praise of her big green eyes?"
The young man smiled slightly but answered not; and for full five
minutes more all listened, then sounds of approaching hoofs became
audible. Dogs began to bark, horses to snort in alarm, and Gregory rose
and went forth to receive the late night-wanderer. Soon he appeared,
beating the angry barking dogs off with his whip, a white-faced,
wild-haired man, furiously spurring his horse like a person demented
or flying from robbers.
"_Ave Maria!_" he shouted aloud; and when the answer was given in
suitable pious words, the scared-looking stranger drew near, and
bending down said, "Tell me, good friend, is one whom men call Niño
Diablo with you; for to this house I have been directed in my search
for him?"
"He is within, friend," answered Gregory. "Follow me and you shall see
him with your own eyes. Only first unsaddle, so that your horse may
roll before the sweat dries on him."
"How many horses have I ridden their last journey on this quest!" said
the stranger, hurriedly pulling off the saddle and rugs. "But tell
me one thing more; is he well--no indisposition? Has he met with no
accident--a broken bone, a sprained ankle?"
"Friend," said Gregory, "I have heard that once in past times the moon
met with an accident, but of the Niño no such thing has been reported
to me."
With this assurance the stranger followed his host into the kitchen,
made his salutation, and sat down by the fire. He was about thirty
years old, a good-looking man, but his face was haggard, his eyes
bloodshot, his manner restless, and he appeared like one half-crazed
by some great calamity. The hospitable Magdalen placed food before him
and pressed him to eat. He complied, although reluctantly, despatched
his supper in a few moments, and murmured a prayer; then, glancing
curiously at the two men seated near him, he addressed himself to
the burly, well-armed, and dangerous-looking Polycarp. "Friend," he
said, his agitation increasing as he spoke, "four days have I been
seeking you, taking neither food nor rest, so great was my need of your
assistance. You alone, after God, can help me. Help me in this strait,
and half of all I possess in land and cattle and gold shall be freely
given to you, and the angels above will applaud your deed!"
"Drunk or mad?" was the only reply vouchsafed to this appeal.
"Sir," said the stranger with dignity, "I have not tasted wine these
many days, nor has my great grief crazed me."
"Then what ails the man?" said Polycarp. "Fear perhaps, for he is white
in the face like one who has seen the Indians."
"In truth I have seen them. I was one of those unfortunates who first
opposed them, and most of the friends who were with me are now food for
wild dogs. Where our houses stood there are only ashes and a stain of
blood on the ground. Oh, friend, can you not guess why you alone were
in my thoughts when this trouble came to me--why I have ridden day and
night to find you?"
"Demons!" exclaimed Polycarp, "into what quagmires would this man lead
me? Once for all I understand you not! Leave me in peace, strange man,
or we shall quarrel." And here he tapped his weapon significantly.
At this juncture, Gregory, who took his time about everything, thought
proper to interpose. "You are mistaken, friend," said he. "The young
man sitting on your right is the Niño Diablo, for whom you inquired a
little while ago."
A look of astonishment, followed by one of intense relief, came over
the stranger's face. Turning to the young man he said, "My friend,
forgive me this mistake. Grief has perhaps dimmed my sight; but
sometimes the iron blade and the blade of finest temper are not easily
distinguished by the eye. When we try them we know which is the brute
metal, and cast it aside to take up the other, and trust our life to
it. The words I have spoken were meant for you, and you have heard
them."
"What can I do for you, friend?" said the Niño.
"Oh, sir, the greatest service! You can restore my lost wife to me.
The savages have taken her away into captivity. What can I do to save
her--I who cannot make myself invisible, and fly like the wind, and
compass all things!" And here he bowed his head, and covering his face
gave way to over-mastering grief.
"Be comforted, friend," said the other, touching him lightly on the
arm. "I will restore her to you."
"Oh, friend, how shall I thank you for these words!" cried the unhappy
man, seizing and pressing the Niño's hand.
"Tell me her name--describe her to me."
"Torcuata is her name--Torcuata de la Rosa. She is one finger's width
taller than this young woman," indicating one of the twins who was
standing. "But not dark; her cheeks are rosy--no, no, I forget, they
will be pale now, white than the grass plumes, with stains of dark
colour under the eyes. Brown hair and blue eyes, but very deep blue.
Look well, friend lest you think them black and leave her to perish."
"Never!" remarked Gregory, shaking his head.
"Enough--you have told me enough, friend," said the Niño, rolling up a
cigarette.
"Enough!" repeated the other, surprised. "But you do not know; she is
my life; my life is in your hands. How can I persuade you to be with
me? Cattle I have. I had gone to pay the herdsmen their wages when the
Indians came unexpectedly; and my house at La Chilca, on the banks of
the Langueyú, was burnt, and my wife taken away during my absence.
Eight hundred head of cattle have escaped the savages, and half of them
shall be yours; and half of all I possess in money and land."
"Cattle!" returned the Niño smiling, and holding a lighted stick to his
cigarette. "I have enough to eat without molesting myself with the care
of cattle."
"But I told you that I had other things," said the stranger full of
distress.
The young man laughed, and rose from his seat.
"Listen to me," he said. "I go now to follow the Indians--to mix with
them, perhaps. They are retreating slowly, burdened with much spoil. In
fifteen days go to the little town of Tandil, and wait for me there.
As for land, if God has given so much of it to the ostrich it is not
a thing for a man to set a great value on." Then he bent down to
whisper a few words in the ear of the girl at his side; and immediately
afterwards, with a simple "good-night" to the others, stepped lightly
from the kitchen. By another door the girl also hurriedly left the
room, to hide her tears from the watchful censuring eyes of mother and
aunt.
Then the stranger, recovering from his astonishment at the abrupt
ending of the conversation, started up, and crying aloud, "Stay! stay
one moment--one word more!" rushed out after the young man. At some
distance from the house he caught sight of the Niño, sitting motionless
on his horse, as if waiting to speak to him.
"This is what I have to say to you," spoke the Niño, bending down to
the other. "Go back to Langueyú, and rebuild your house, and expect
me there with your wife in about thirty days. When I bade you go to
the Tandil in fifteen days, I spoke only to mislead that man Polycarp,
who has an evil mind. Can I ride a hundred leagues and back in fifteen
days? Say no word of this to any man. And fear not. If I fail to
return with your wife at the appointed time take some of that money
you have offered me, and bid a priest say a mass for my soul's repose;
for eye of man shall never see me again, and the brown hawks will be
complaining that there is no more flesh to be picked from my bones."
During this brief colloquy, and afterwards, when Gregory and his
women-folk went off to bed, leaving the stranger to sleep in his rugs
beside the kitchen fire, Polycarp, who had sworn a mighty oath not to
close his eyes that night, busied himself making his horses secure.
Driving them home, he tied them to the posts of the gate within
twenty-five yards of the kitchen door. Then he sat down by the fire and
smoked and dozed, and cursed his dry mouth and drowsy eyes that were so
hard to keep open. At intervals of about fifteen minutes he would get
up and go out to satisfy himself that his precious horses were still
safe. At length in rising, some time after midnight, his foot kicked
against some loud-sounding metal object lying beside him on the floor,
which on examination, proved to be a copper bell of a peculiar shape,
and curiously like the one fastened to the neck of his bell-mare.
Bell in hand, he stepped to the door and put out his head, and lo!
his horses were no longer at the gate! Eight horses: seven iron-grey
geldings, every one of them swift and sure-footed, sound as the bell in
his hand, and as like each other as seven claret coloured eggs in the
tinamou's nest; and the eighth the gentle piebald mare--the _madrina_
his horses loved and would follow to the world's end, now, alas! with a
thief on her back! Gone--gone!
He rushed out, uttering a succession of frantic howls and imprecations;
and finally, to wind up the performance, dashed the now useless bell
with all his energy against the gate, shattering it into a hundred
pieces. Oh, that bell, how often and how often in how many a wayside
public-house had he boasted, in his cups and when sober, of its mellow,
far-reaching tone,--the sweet sound that assured him in the silent
watches of the night that his beloved steeds were safe! Now he danced
on the broken fragments, digging them into the earth with his heel; now
in his frenzy, he could have dug them up again to grind them to powder
with his teeth!
The children turned restlessly in bed, dreaming of the lost little
girl in the desert; and the stranger half awoke, muttering, "Courage,
O Torcuata--let not your heart break.... Soul of my life, he gives you
back to me--on my bosom, _rosa fresca, rosa fresca_!" Then the hands
unclenched themselves again, and the muttering died away. But Gregory
woke fully, and instantly divined the cause of the clamour. "Magdalen!
Wife!" he said. "Listen to Polycarp; the Niño has paid him out for
his insolence! Oh, fool, I warned him, and he would not listen!" But
Magdalen refused to wake; and so, hiding his head under the coverlet,
he made the bed shake with suppressed laughter, so pleased was he at
the clever trick played on his blustering cousin. All at once his
laughter ceased, and out popped his head again, showing in the dim
light a somewhat long and solemn face. For he had suddenly thought of
his pretty daughter asleep in the adjoining room. Asleep! Wide awake,
more likely, thinking of her sweet lover, brushing the dews from the
hoary pampas grass in his southward flight, speeding away into the
heart of the vast mysterious wilderness. Listening also to her uncle,
the desperado, apostrophizing the midnight stars; while with his knife
he excavates two deep trenches, three yards long and intersecting
each other at right angles--a sacred symbol on which he intends, when
finished, to swear a most horrible vengeance. "Perhaps," muttered
Gregory, "the Niño has still other pranks to play in this house."
When the stranger heard next morning what had happened, he was better
able to understand the Niño's motive in giving him that caution
overnight; nor was he greatly put out, but thought it better that an
evil-minded man should lose his horses than that the Niño should set
out badly mounted on such an adventure.
"Let me not forget," said the robbed man, as he rode away on a horse
borrowed from his cousin, "to be at the Tandil this day fortnight, with
a sharp knife and a blunderbuss charged with a handful of powder and
not fewer than twenty-three slugs."
Terribly in earnest was Polycarp of the South! He was there at the
appointed time, slugs and all; but the smooth-cheeked, mysterious,
child-devil came not; nor, stranger still, did the scared-looking de la
Rosa come clattering in to look for his lost Torcuata. At the end of
the fifteenth day de la Rosa was at Langueyú, seventy-five miles from
the Tandil, alone in his new rancho, which had just been rebuilt with
the aid of a few neighbours. Through all that night he sat alone by the
fire, pondering many things. If he could only recover his lost wife,
then he would bid a long farewell to that wild frontier and take her
across the great sea, and to that old tree-shaded stone farm-house in
Andalusia, which he had left a boy, and where his aged parents still
lived, thinking no more to see their wandering son. His resolution was
taken; he would sell all he possessed, all except a portion of land
in the Langueyú with the house he had just rebuilt; and to the Niño
Diablo, the deliverer, he would say, "Friend, though you despise the
things that others value, take this land and poor house for the sake of
the girl Magdalen you love; for then perhaps her parents will no longer
deny her to you."
He was still thinking of these things, when a dozen or twenty
military starlings--that cheerful scarlet-breasted songster of the
lonely pampas--alighted on the thatch outside, and warbling their gay,
careless winter-music told him that it was day. And all day long, on
foot and on horseback, his thoughts were of his lost Torcuata; and
when evening once more drew near his heart was sick with suspense and
longing; and climbing the ladder placed against the gable of his rancho
he stood on the roof gazing westwards into the blue distance. The sun,
crimson and large, sunk into the great green sea of grass, and from all
the plain rose the tender fluting notes of the tinamou-partridges, bird
answering bird. "Oh, that I could pierce the haze with my vision," he
murmured, "that I could see across a hundred leagues of level plain,
and look this moment on your sweet face, Torcuata!"
And Torcuata was in truth a hundred leagues distant from him at that
moment; and if the miraculous sight he wished for had been given, this
was what he would have seen. A wide barren plain scantily clothed with
yellow tufts of grass and thorny shrubs, and at its southern extremity,
shutting out the view on that side, a low range of dune-like hills.
Over this level ground, towards the range, moves a vast herd of cattle
and horses--fifteen or twenty thousand head--followed by a scattered
horde of savages armed with their long lances. In a small compact body
in the centre ride the captives, women and children. Just as the red
orb touches the horizon the hills are passed, and lo! a wide grassy
valley beyond, with flocks and herds pasturing, and scattered trees,
and the blue gleam of water from a chain of small lakes! There full in
sight, is the Indian settlement, the smoke rising peacefully up from
the clustered huts. At the sight of home the savages burst into loud
cries of joy and triumph, answered, as they drew near, with piercing
screams of welcome from the village population, chiefly composed of
women, children and old men.
It is past midnight; the young moon has set; the last fires are dying
down; the shouts and loud noise of excited talk and laughter have
ceased, and the weary warriors, after feasting on sweet mare's flesh to
repletion, have fallen asleep in their huts, or lying out of doors on
the ground. Only the dogs are excited still and keep up an incessant
barking. Even the captive women, huddled together in one hut in the
middle of the settlement, fatigued with their long rough journey, have
cried themselves to sleep at last.
At length one of the sad sleepers wakes, or half wakes, dreaming that
some one has called her name. How could such a thing be? Yet her own
name still seems ringing in her brain, and at length, fully awake,
she finds herself intently listening. Again it sounded--"Torcuata"--a
voice fine as the pipe of a mosquito, yet so sharp and distinct that
it tingled in her ear. She sat up and listened again, and once more it
sounded "Torcuata!" "Who speaks?" she returned in a fearful whisper.
The voice, still fine and small, replied, "Come out from among the
others until you touch the wall." Trembling she obeyed, creeping out
from among the sleepers until she came into contact with the side of
the hut. Then the voice sounded again, "Creep round the wall until you
come to a small crack of light on the other side." Again she obeyed,
and when she reached the line of faint light it widened quickly to an
aperture, through which a shadowy arm was passed round her waist;
and in a moment she was lifted up, and saw the stars above her, and
at her feet dark forms of men wrapped in their ponchos lying asleep.
But no one woke, no alarm was given; and in a very few minutes she was
mounted, man-fashion, on a bare-backed horse, speeding swiftly over
the dim plains, with the shadowy form of her mysterious deliverer some
yards in advance, driving before him a score or so of horses. He had
only spoken half-a-dozen words to her since their escape from the hut,
but she knew by those words that he was taking her to Langueyú.