The Crimson Conquest 58

The Crimson Conquest 58

Exhausted, desperate at the catastrophe which had so abruptly blocked

his project, the cavalier entered the court to seek the fountain whose

plash had been torturing his thirst. The place, evidently one of the

numerous palaces, was quite deserted. Doors stood open upon dark

chambers, but there was neither light, sound, nor sign of life, and he

traversed the dusky courts in solitude.

 

 

 

 

*CHAPTER XXXIV*

 

_*In the Burning Palace*_

 

 

On the rampart of the Sachsahuaman, apart from his generals, wrapped in

his cloak, and shrouded more impenetrably by something which forbade

approach; a dark silhouette against a sky wilder and more terrible than

words can describe; unspeakably solemn before the havoc wrought at his

command, stood the Inca. In his grim silence and immobility, in his

relentless wielding of a power little less absolute than that of a god,

he took on the sinister majesty of the spectacle his fiat had created.

 

When flame followed the fall of the first arrow, he had buried his face

in his cloak. Slowly lowering his arm, he had looked on with

countenance inflexible as bronze while destruction progressed in leaps

and bounds. After this, not the tremor of a muscle. To his nobles,

quailing and awe-stricken at the sublime horror of the scene, he was

never before so much a king.

 

Such his aspect. For the emotions sternly repressed, but racking him to

the soul—what words! The sacred city, the favored of the Sun, the home

and the monument of the loving care of a mighty line of monarchs,

perishing under his hand. The city whose splendor had been the work of

generations of great kings; for whose glory countless thousands of their

subjects had toiled, had fought, had died, given by him to

demolition!—doomed by the mandate of one who had received the _llautu_

from the profane hand of a ravager; who had suffered the scorn of an

ignoble band of licentious and greedy invaders and had lived; who had

worn fetters like a criminal and had lain in prison under the eyes of

scoffing guards! That he—O, Inti!—that he, still wearing the marks of

his bonds like a released slave, should be the destroyer! Could Cuzco

but have fallen beneath the hand of a hero, even an enemy, and could he

have fallen with it, its defender, he had been worthy to take his place

with the shades of his ancestors. But he had himself led the enemy to

its palace doors, had seen them plunder its temples, ravish its vestals,

and befoul its most sacred spots. And now he was giving Cuzco to the

flames! Would the Sun ever rise upon him again?

 

Ah—but—could he dare to address a prayer to that god while Cuzco

remained unpurged? By the great Inti, the fire should do its purifying

work! From cottage, palace, and temple, the stench of the Viracocha

should be burned! Should the last wall be levelled to the earth, the

last stone of its streets upturned, no vestige of their defilement

should remain. Cuzco would rise again, and the Viracochas be forgotten.

Let the dead Incas look on whilst he wiped out the stain of the ancient

city’s dishonor and his own!

 

When at length the sky was graying and he turned away, facing his

generals, but seeing none of them, they beheld a countenance aged as by

years since he had last spoken. In a night the torture of mind and

heart had moulded lines usually beaten in only by the blows of long and

hard experience.

 

At the door of his apartments he dismissed his attendants with a word.

But, alas! a king before men, alone he was a mortal man. He knelt and

prayed for tears. Resting upon his shoulders, with the burden of an

empire, was now the weight of a monstrous tragedy; but upon his heart,

the unutterable sorrow of a brother and a lover. Within that dread

circle of fire were loved ones, and among them the sweetest of consorts.

No man looked upon his grief. No man but can know what his grief must

have been.

 

The sun rose upon a scene of devastation shorn of its splendor. Around

the city was a belt of blackened ruins from which rolled a volume of

smoke which partly obscured the fiercer burning within. To the

westward, the direction from which the wind had blown, this district was

broad. The fire had been driven rapidly across the suburbs toward Cuzco

proper, and the houses being largely of adobe, the destruction was

complete. Below the fortress, in the quarter of the palaces, the fire

had to fight its way across the wind, and its advance had been less

swift. Here the buildings were of stone, and through breaks in the murk

were visible walls intact, surrounding desolate courts with charred

skeletons of trees. To the east the city was hidden in the huge surging

cloud drifting sluggishly off toward the mountains. From the ramparts

little could be seen of the fire except occasional glimpses of flame

through the rifts; and as Pedro stumped to and fro on the parapet,

fuming and praying, harassed by fears, he could only guess at the perils

by which Cristoval was surrounded. Before the sun had lifted above the

mountains the Antis began straggling in, smoked, scorched, and many of

them wounded, bearing the tale of their encounter. Ten or more did not

return. Rimachi was one of the last to come, and having reported to

Mocho, the latter sought the cook with the news of the probable fate of

the cavalier. Pedro made no reply, but turning with his face painfully

twitching, he hastened to his quarters—to be seen no more that day.

 

Once more to Cristoval. Assuring himself that he was the sole occupant

of the building, he explored the several courts for its exits, and

found, in the rear, the door of a passage which led to the broad street

he had recently crossed. This might serve as a line of retreat. Patrols

were still moving in the streets, and fixing the location of the passage

among the intricacies of dark chambers and courts, he sought next, like

a prudent soldier, for the kitchens and larder. This quest was

difficult, for the operation of making a light, even could he have found

a lamp, would have demanded more time than he could spare. Trusting to

his sense of smell, blunted though it was by smoke, he wandered from one

room to another, his steps, the rustle of his armor, and the clank of

his sword rousing uncanny echoes from the lofty walls of stone. At last

he stumbled upon a table still spread with an abandoned supper, and

groping among the viands, he hastily made a meal.

 

A glance at the sky from the court showed a noticeable advance of the

fire, though the direction of the wind held it in check and carried the

sparks and brands off to the eastward. While he stood he heard the

clatter of troopers in the street; but it died away presently, and he

made his way to the postern. At the end of the passage he reconnoitred

the street, now more brightly illumined than before, and was about to

leave his hiding, when two horsemen trotted into the light and halted at

the crossing, their lance-heads glittering in the firelight. They were

too near to leave a possibility of his quitting the passage unseen.

Furthermore, he recognized the unwelcome fact that they were there _en

vedette_, and would remain. Evidently, the attack upon the patrol had

made the Spaniards vigilant. Cristoval set his teeth. Here was a

situation, by the fighting saint! Trapped in a building which would be

afire before many hours, with a prospective choice of being burned

alive, or run through by a Spanish lance in the effort to escape! For a

bad quarter of an hour he watched the troopers with an interest his

countrymen had seldom roused in him before, consigning them in vigorous

whispers to divers painful fates, until, observing one of them hitch

himself in his saddle into a lounging seat, he gave it up and groped

back into the palace.

 

There was one other exit: the door by which he entered. The darkness of

that street might favor. He would try it. In the main court nearest

the entrance was the fountain, a pool of some ten feet in diameter with

steps descending to the water a yard below the level, and surrounded by

seats and parterres full of shrubbery. He stopped there and drank deep,

for the fire and cinders would not out from his throat. Then to the

door. He laid aside his buckler and put hand to the bar. Cautiously

now, Cristoval; for with sentinels near, this business should be of an

inconspicuous kind. The timber stuck slightly, then yielded, slipped

from his grasp, and fell with a crash loud as the crack of doom.

 

It was answered at once by the sound of a horse spurred to a trot, and

snatching up his buckler, Cristoval retreated to the parterres. He

gained the shelter just as the trooper pushed open the door. He rode in

and halted near the entrance; peered about in the obscurity, called

twice or thrice, then rode slowly about the enclosure, looking into the

darkness of the open doors. Cristoval watched him, praying that he

might push on into the interior courts, or that he might dismount. In

the latter event he should find what he sought with a vengeance, and

that horse would change owners. But the trooper soon returned, scanning

the parterres as he passed. At the entrance he halted and surveyed the

place again, only half satisfied. Finally he rode out. Cristoval

followed cautiously, to have a look at the street. No hope there. The

soldier had taken position a few yards away, and there remained, while

the prisoner returned to the fountain and had another bad quarter of an

hour. There was no choice but to stay where he was and pray that the

sentinels might be withdrawn at daylight, or be driven from their posts

by the approaching fire. Then, provided he was not roasted to death in

the meantime, he might escape.

 

He sat through the night, going at intervals to the doors in faint hope,

returning with disquietude more profound, to watch the relentless

nearing of the conflagration. At last came the dawn, more depressing in

its ghastly light than the night. He stretched himself beneath the

shrubbery. As the morning advanced the wind veered farther to the

south, and this, he hoped, would retard the progress of the fire in his

direction until the evening.

 

Cristoval was blessed with a sanguine temperament, and was, moreover,

like most men who follow peril, a fatalist. Death had stood so often

beside him, and had so often withheld the blow, that he had lost the

appreciation of danger while he could look forward to another minute of

life. Now, there were hours before him, at least, and faith that good

fortune or resourcefulness would open a way of deliverance. Therefore,

why not be comfortable while comforts were at hand? He remembered the

spread table. He crept from concealment, went to the door for another

look at the sentinels, and entered the dining-hall. He had seated

himself when he perceived that the tableware was silver. He rose

abruptly. "Oho! that meaneth the tenant will return, else the tenant is

not a Spaniard." He selected a generous double handful of the victuals

and returned to the fountain. Going to another chamber, he brought

forth a rug which he deposited beneath the thickest of the shrubbery,

and there made his breakfast calmly.