The Crimson Conquest 31

The Crimson Conquest 31

"Come along, thou lazy—ambling—lop-eared—bedeviled—misbegotten—and

wholly damned son—of a cow!" De Valera was addressing his languid steed.

 

Cristoval grinned and laid aside his sword. "Bah! Why kill the wretch?"

he thought, but loosed his dagger and gathered for a spring, his alert

eyes upon the trail. De Valera appeared, lance over his shoulder, his

face purple with irritation and shouting, tugging his reluctant horse.

Cristoval was upon him like an avalanche.

 

"Whoof!" blurted De Valera, with sudden aspiration as he received the

charge. Cristoval grappled, and he dropped his lance, slipped, clutched

the neck of his assailant’s mail, and both rolled down the face of the

rock. The horse reared and turned, lost his footing and regained it,

and tore back up the canyon at a run.

 

Rava heard the brief struggle with palpitating heart: the crash of the

fall of the armored man, the mad gallop of the horse, and then only the

roaring of the torrent. She rose from her knees. There was no sign of

Cristoval or his adversary, and only distant hoof-beats to vary the

monotonous din of the stream. She leaned against the rock, weak and

shaking. For a moment she stood with straining ears. The gallop had

died away, and she was alone. Minute after minute fled, and at last she

could endure no longer. Unheeding the pain of every step, she sped to

the trail. No slightest evidence of life. She ran a few steps down the

canyon, halted trembling, and turned to the jutting rock. Here she

stopped and looked down, transfixed. There lay a man in armor,

inanimate; beside him the form of Cristoval, face upward and marred by a

stream of blood from his forehead. She tottered, and parted her lips to

scream, but her voice failed. How she descended from the path she never

knew; but in a moment she was kneeling with his head in her lap, calling

his name in agony, and wiping away the crimson stream. She thought of

the water, and in a second was carrying it in her hands and bathing his

face, praying, praying for a sign of animation. Tears blinded her while

she worked, hurrying to and from the edge of the torrent, dashing the

too meagre handfuls into the still face, chafing his wrists, beating the

nerveless hands, sobbing and moaning his name. He lay without a quiver.

She thought she looked upon death, and her fear became wild, frenzied

despair. She cast a shuddering look of horror at the grim desolation

surrounding her, and threw herself upon him, her hands at his throat, on

his cheeks, in his hair, wailing his name in the extremity of mortal

anguish.

 

He sighed. Ah, merciful Sun!—most beneficent Inti! She stifled her sobs

and brushed away her tears that she might see. His eyelids trembled,

and now a moan, most faint, barely audible, but—he lived! More water,

and more, and when she came again his eyes were open, blankly at the sky

at first, then at her. She wept for joy, pressing his hands to her

bosom, while he regarded her vaguely, striving to arrange his muddled

thoughts.

 

"Courage!" murmured Cristoval, and closed his eyes again, to be startled

to his senses by a shriek from the girl. De Valera had moved, and was

feebly groaning. Cristoval turned his head at the sound, and the sight

of his fallen enemy aroused him.

 

"_Cielo!_" he gasped. "He had slipped my mind." He crawled to the

trooper, found his dagger, and tossed it out of reach. De Valera moved

again, but Cristoval rose unsteadily and seated himself upon his

adversary’s chest. "Water, _carita_!" he whispered, and bowed his

reeling head upon his hands. Rava brought her hands full and dashed it

into his face. "Ah! _Bueno_!" he muttered, and looked down upon De

Valera. The visor of the helmet was thrown back, and the prostrate

soldier was staring up at him. Cristoval glowered, rubbing an aching

head, and the two Spaniards regarded one another for a time in silence,

neither in full possession of his faculties. At last De Valera moaned

faintly, "Mercy, Cristoval!"

 

Cristoval made no reply, scowling blackly at the pallid face and wiping

away the blood which still trickled into his own eyes from the gash in

his forehead.

 

"Mercy, Cristoval! Give me time for a prayer."

 

The words brought Cristoval more fully to consciousness, and he replied,

angrily: "Time for a prayer! Time for a prayer! What dost think?—that

I will murder thee, lying on thy back and hands down? If thou hast the

thought, dismiss it, or I’ll have it out of thee roughly."

 

The soldier faltered weakly: "What! Thou wilt spare me, good Cristoval?

Oh, blessed Virgin!" and tears of gratitude filled his eyes. "But I

might have known it of thee, Cristoval."

 

"Ah!" replied Cristoval, scornfully. "But see thou liest still, lest I

lose the whim." He rubbed his head again, struggling to order his

thoughts. De Valera lay motionless, and at length Cristoval said

sternly:—

 

"Now attend, thou unfortunate—I am going to plunder thee. I’ve need of

thy horse, which is up yonder—and of thy harness. Thou’lt be wise to

make no hindrance. Dost comprehend? _Bien_! Then sit up whilst I

unhelm thee. Ware, now!—no sudden movement!"

 

Cristoval rose to his feet, still giddy, and set to work, De Valera

submitting quietly, while Rava looked on in wonder.

 

"_Alli!_" quoth Cristoval, as he tossed the last piece upon the heap of

armor. "Now, Ñusta Rava, thy girdle, I pray thee, to bind him. No

groaning, Señor! It doth misbecome thee. Now, thy hands behind thy

back. So! Now for thy feet.—Good! Hast a kerchief? Then we’ll have a

choke-pear.—Silence! Dost think I’ll have thee waking mournful echoes

through the night? Thou hast shouted more than is good for thee

already. And next, whilst I make the choke-pear I’ll question thee—and

see thou makest cheerful response, or— First, hast cherished against me

any peculiar animosity? I mean before this solemn afternoon."

 

"No, good Cristoval," replied De Valera, with candor.

 

"Then why partaking this hunting holiday?" demanded Cristoval, eying him

severely.

 

"The reward, _amigo_. A thousand _castellanos_ to a poor man—"

 

"A thousand!" exclaimed Cristoval, with contempt. "Is that all Pizarro

hath offered? By the saints, he’ll double it before I have done! Well,

_bastante_! Thou didst seek reward! _Bien_! But now thou ’rt unhorsed

thou canst hope for reward no longer and canst answer freely. How many

are in pursuit?"

 

"Nearly all have been, saving Juan and Gonzalo Pizarro, De Soto, José,

and a few more.—But hold, Cristoval, the Cañares are out and after thee.

I give thee warning."

 

Cristoval drew a long breath, his face darkened, and he stood in

reflection. He threw down the choke-pear with which he had purposed

gagging his captive. "We’ll not trouble thee with it. Thy news is not

welcome, Valera, but thy warning is. We will go, Ñusta Rava."

 

"First, I will attend to your wound," she said, and tearing a strip from

her robe, soon had it bandaged. In a few minutes Cristoval was in his

enemy’s armor, and taking up the lance he said: "_Adiós_, Valera! Thy

comrades will find thee in the morning." He assisted Rava to the trail,

secured his sword and belt, and once more they were on their way,

leaving De Valera leaning mournfully against a rock, a prey to varied

fears.

 

A mile up the canyon Cristoval captured the horse, and found De Valera’s

mace and buckler hanging on the saddle. The first care was to examine

the contents of the saddlebags.

 

"Ah!" exclaimed the cavalier, with satisfaction. "Praise Heaven, they

are well stocked. Here is _charqui_, bread, and parched maize, and

grain for our steed in the other—with discretion, some days’ supply.

But I was more sure of De Valera’s providence than of his honesty. Now,

we’re equipped, Ñusta Rava, and now we’ll mount."

 

It was a trial of her courage, but soon she was seated upon the horse’s

croup, holding her place with the aid of the cavalier’s belt.

 

 

 

 

*CHAPTER XVIII*

 

_*The Vale of Xilcala*_

 

 

In Rava’s memory, afterward, the toil, suffering, and peril of the

succeeding days remained as fragments of an anguished dream. There were

dim recollections of unmeasured hours of weariness, of journeying upward

through huge defiles, along the verge of precipices, and out upon barren

stretches of tableland which seemed, in their desolation, the abode of

Despair and Death: the moaning of the wind, their voices. Here was

infinite loneliness, the dreary solitude of a world forgotten of God.

Over these lofty wastes, gasping and dizzy in the rarified air, their

brains pierced by the fierce rays of a sun which gave no warmth, their

lips split and bleeding, their faces raw and smarting in the eager wind,

they labored on. Cristoval, silent, walked and led, his eyes rarely

lifted from the faint trail left by herdsmen and their flocks of llamas.

This once lost, there would be slight hope. Followed, it might lead to

safety.

 

But through all her recollections of hunger, exhaustion, and torture,

was that of the dauntless spirit who shared them with her, ever

watchful, ever solicitous, and of unfailing gentleness in the most

desperate hours. A memory of a brave, kindly face, growing haggard as

one day of struggle followed another, but with never a sign of failing

courage or resolution, never a shadow of impatience at her plaints, her

tears, or when her weakness compelled the loss of precious time. Often

she had been delirious, or in a half stupor, but never unconscious of

his presence and tender guardianship. She had a memory, too, of a

tempest, of snow and deadly cold, when they had sought shelter among the

drifts of a gorge and he had held her in his arms through the night,

wrapped in his cloak, his armor removed that she might have his warmth.

But she only half remembered the long battle through the snow of a pass

to which Providence had led their steps when they had finally lost the

trail.

 

After this, a descending valley, a lonely hut at last, and she came to

her senses surrounded by the warmth and frugal comforts of a herdsmen’s

lodge. Here Cristoval learned from the two occupants of the hut that a

village called Xilcala lay within three days’ journey through the

mountains. The younger of the herders, named Mati, would guide them;

and after tarrying for some days until food and rest should fit them to

resume their way, they set out.

 

In the late afternoon of the third day of travel from the hut they were

descending into the Vale of Xilcala. Since morning they had been

creeping down a canyon which broadened at last at its junction with

another, and their haven lay before them. A turn in the trail brought

it into sudden view, and they halted, struck by a scene of so rare and

tranquil beauty that even Cristoval, not easily impressed, muttered an

exclamation. Assisting Rava to dismount, he led her out upon an

overhanging ledge. Hundreds of feet below spread a rolling plain

surrounding an alpine lake of limpid emerald and blue which gleamed in

its setting of spring verdure like some fair jewel. From the water the

shores gently rose to the encircling mountains, traceried with walls and

hedges, and sparkling with the silver inlay of numberless rivulets and

miniature canals. Far up the slopes of the sheltering masses of the

Cordillera clung cultivated terraces, the _andenes_, the lines of their

retaining walls sweeping in and out with the contour of the rugged scarp

until they broke at a distant cleft in the rampart, through which flowed

the outlet of the lake. Half-way down the western shore was the village,

crowning a rocky promontory, its white walls reflected on the placid

water, and to the weary eyes of the refugees hardly more real or

permanent, in its quiet beauty, than the inverted and blended image at

its feet. Nearer were scattered cottages, a villa with its park, and

shaded lanes and groves of trees just breaking into leafage or blossom.