The Crimson Conquest 69

The Crimson Conquest 69

Thus Cristoval passed his convalescence, striving by incessant activity

to hold his impatient longing. Twice only, after his strength returned,

he rode to Yucay for a few brief hours of happiness.

 

The winter months passed and spring was at hand. Within the beleaguered

city conditions grew desperate. Provisions, which had long been growing

scanty, were almost exhausted, and the Spaniards faced starvation. They

had hoped, watched, vowed many a pious vow, prayed many a fervent

prayer, for reënforcements from the coast; but the expeditions sent by

Francisco Pizarro for their relief had been entrapped in the mountains

and driven back or annihilated. A few weeks must seal the fate of the

besieged, and Hernando was already importuned by his cavaliers to lead

in a final effort to cut through the investing lines and escape with his

starveling remnant. Not he! He swore, and the stoutest of his men swore

with him, to fight while strength remained to wield a blade.

 

But while the Spaniards were meeting in gloomy council the Inca was

confronted by a situation no less grave.

 

Near the middle of a chill, clear night in the early spring, in the

fifth month of the siege, Cristoval, now fully recovered, rode across

the parade in front of the Inca’s tent, and dismissed his native

troopers. For a week he had been guarding the Cuntisuyu road,

suspecting a Spanish design to break through the lines. He had laid off

his helmet when a messenger summoned him to the Inca. Cristoval found

Manco alone, pacing his tent with bent head, his face more deeply

clouded than the cavalier had ever seen it. His __EXPRESSION__ lightened at

sight of the man who had become nearer a comrade than any had ever been

before, and he said gravely: "I have sent for thee, Cristoval, to

entrust thee with a mission which, in other circumstances thou wouldst

have found most welcome. Now it will be as painful to thee, I know, my

friend and brother, as it is to me. It is this. Thou wilt ride to

Yucay—wilt set out to-night. Arriving there, thou’lt conduct the

household forthwith to the security of the fortress at Ollantaytambo."

 

Cristoval started. Was Yucay insecure? In Heaven’s name, what could

make it so, with the Spaniards held like starving rats? Manco read his

question, and answered it bluntly:—

 

"We must raise the siege, Cristoval!"

 

Cristoval was aghast, unable to believe.

 

"We must raise the siege!" repeated Manco, steadily.

 

Cristoval put out his hand for the support of the table. When at last

he spoke his voice was harsh and unnatural. "Raise the siege! Raise

the siege—at this moment—when victory is within your grasp? By God,

man, it must not be! Who hath advised this folly?"

 

Manco raised his hand. "It must be! I have held council all this day

and to-night."

 

"Your counsellors—have they been stricken with madness?" cried the

cavalier. "Do they not know—"

 

"My friend," interrupted the Inca, placing a hand upon Cristoval’s

shoulder, "my counsellors know what it is not possible that thou

shouldst know—that Tavantinsuyu is menaced by a foe more ruthless than

the one in yonder city. This hour hath been long foreseen, and now it

is come. Hunger is abroad!"

 

"Your stanchest ally!" interjaculated Cristoval.

 

"An ally, but one ready to turn most cruelly against us! Hear me,

Cristoval! It is not yet with us, with the army, though thou hast seen

the meagre fare our braves have had these many days, and hast been in

want, thyself. But there is a graver peril. Thou knowest, the season of

planting is at hand. The fields are waiting. Every province of the

empire hath been denuded of its men, and only women, children, and the

feeble, are left to till the soil. The time is short, and if the grain

be not sowed, a calamity will follow, blacker in its horror than that of

war, which taketh only lives of men. Starvation recketh neither of sex

nor age. The siege must end."

 

Manco spoke with calmness. His face had paled, but otherwise his

emotion was unbetrayed. Cristoval heard him in silence. The Inca’s

words, he knew, were final, Rhadamanthine; once spoken, not to be

opposed by human tongue. Manco resumed:—

 

"So it must be, Cristoval. The magazines are exhausted—I learned it

finally to-day,—and even the archers are in need of arrows. My warriors

will march to their provinces with famine attendant, but—they must go.

I am defeated! O, great Inti, why—" His words ended, and he turned

abruptly away. Cristoval sank into a chair and bowed his head upon his

hands. To disband the army now would mean disaster irremediable. He

sprang up with fiery, urgent words, but they were stayed by Manco who

faced him again with every trace of agitation gone: "I said, defeated!

Forget that the word was spoken. Whilst life is spared me, and I have a

warrior left to follow, there shall be no defeat. But now, Cristoval,

thou wilt go. By midday to-morrow thou’lt have overtaken a force which

marched to-day. At Yucay, all will be in readiness. Word hath gone

forward, and as soon as the palace is abandoned it will be stripped of

all that yonder vultures crave. Having seen the household safely at

Ollantaytambo, thou’lt return. I will remain near Cuzco with some

force, for the enemy shall find that peace is not yet. Now go, and

Heaven speed thee. Farewell."

 

As Cristoval left the tent he turned. The Inca stood in thought, his

dark, handsome face as calm as if his brave heart were untouched by

disaster, untorn by myriad cares and sorrows. He waved his hand, and

Cristoval left him to the brooding silence of the night—and God alone

knows what hours of anguish.

 

As the cavalier rode forth in the starlight he looked upon a dark,

prophetic vision of the future of the fair empire for which he had been

fighting. Tavantinsuyu was doomed. Doomed—he saw it now—from the

moment Pizarro had set his foot upon its soil. The Spaniards would

crowd to its shores like ravening wolves, and before the army could be

recalled to the field it would be too late. He knew the indomitable

resolution of his countrymen, their resources, and their driving

rapacity, too well to hope the Inca could ever regain the advantage now

to be put aside. Unless crushed at what was yet its beginning, the

conquest would never be abandoned. And too thoroughly did Cristoval

know the nature of his race to foresee anything but cruel oppression for

the conquered. He looked with clearer prevision than could the stricken

monarch into the blackness of the years to come.

 

The meeting of the lovers at Yucay was in joy and grief. Cristoval

strove to inspire a hope he could not share, but when Rava took

sorrowful leave of the palace it was with an intuition that she would

never enter it again. At Ollantaytambo their parting was in grief

alone, and the cavalier rode back to Cuzco followed by many a tearful

prayer.

 

Pedro’s fighting days were done, and as he stood on the rampart of the

fortress, watching his old comrade’s departure, the receding figure grew

dim to him by reason of something more than dust and distance.

 

 

 

 

*CHAPTER XL*

 

_*Glory and Peace*_

 

 

We shall be brief with the last scenes of the tragedy of Tavantinsuyu.

It was night when Cristoval arrived at the heights overlooking Cuzco,

and the city lay dark and silent below. But the vast circle of the

fires of the besieging host sparkled no more. The army had vanished.

He found a remnant among the hills, picked warriors of the empire, led

by Manco, and chosen to die in its last burst of glory.

 

There were long weeks of fighting about the city; fierce dashes by the

Spaniards, driven by famine from their lair among the ruins, more

fiercely resisted by the watchful Manco, to be many times hunted back

with shattered ranks. The Inca’s small body of horsemen grew as steeds

were captured from the foragers, and it met the raiders in more than one

sharp encounter and pursuit ending only in the environs of the city.

 

But at last came reënforcements from Francisco, and Manco withdrew to

Ollantaytambo to rest and recruit his battle-worn warriors, leaving

Cristoval with his riders and a small command of Antis to watch. Not

many days later, it was learned from a captured Cañare that the

Spaniards were planning an attack in force on Ollantaytambo. Assured of

the information, Cristoval joined the Inca for its defence. They had

not long to wait. With a strong body of cavalry and infantry, Hernando

made a stealthy detour through the mountains in the valley of the

Urubamba. He approached the fortress under cover of darkness and

attacked at dawn, confident of taking it by surprise. Before midday his

column was flying for Cuzco, defeated, demoralized, and in utter rout,

with the Inca in hot pursuit.

 

Once more Cristoval’s band of horsemen and Mocho’s Antis were scouring

the valley of Cuzco, lurking in the hills and passes, striking now here,

now there; and intercepting, scattering, or destroying, the parties

which need of food or greed of plunder led from the city. Informed by

vigilant scouts of every move of the enemy, and guided by men familiar

with every ravine and mountain trail, he struck often and with terrible

unexpectedness. Repeatedly the Pizarros sent, and even led, in chase,

always fruitlessly, or with disaster. If the swift-moving band was

encountered, it was in some position of its leader’s own choosing which

more than offset the Spaniards’ advantage of numbers. The cry, "_El

Renegado!_"—for so Cristoval became known—grew to be one of terror; and

raised suddenly in a party of marauders, it carried panic. Impelled by

the wrongs of his adopted people—those suffered in the past, and blacker

ones which he knew were to follow—he fought with reckless fury.

 

One night, while in bivouac a few leagues from Cuzco, a _chasqui_

brought Cristoval a summons to Ollantaytambo with his command. The

first thought of the cavalier was of the joy of seeing Rava. The next,

an undefined disquiet. Before dawn he was on the march.

 

It was late when he entered the fortress, to be taken immediately to

Manco’s chamber. Paullo was with the Inca, and both embraced the

cavalier with affection, the Inca adding a warm appreciation of his zeal

and intrepidity. Paullo retired to apprise Rava. Manco regarded the

march-stained soldier in rusty armor and said with less than his usual

calm, but without the former gloom:—

 

"Cristoval, my brother, I have sent for thee to entrust another mission.

Once more thou wilt take my loved ones to a place of safety. At dawn I

leave with a few followers for a stronghold in the mountains of

Apurimac, there to await the moment for reassembling my army. For the

present, Ollantaytambo must be abandoned, and my few remaining troops

disbanded. My last granary, my last armory, my last resource, have been

exhausted.—But, my friend," he went on, with increased energy, and

taking the cavalier by the arm, "think not that Manco hath

succumbed!—nor that his sword will sleep through the months of waiting."

 

"Then I should be among your followers, my lord," said Cristoval.

 

"Nay! Thou’lt serve me better for the present in another way.

Safeguard my dear ones. It is a trust which I can confide to thee as to

none other. Paullo is but a boy. I ask the greatest service thou canst

render, for thy sword, now, can aid me little."

 

"But when the time cometh—"

 

"Then I will call upon it, brave Cristoval," replied Manco, taking his

hand. "But now, concerning a refuge: I have thought of Xilcala. I was there when a boy."