It soon became evident that they had startled more than the echoes, for a son of the Cacique, a tall, powerfully-built man, rushed out to ascertain the cause of the commotion, and looked ready enough to add the Spaniards' heads to his father's collection when he perceived them thus braving him, as it were, on his own ground.
Not being versed in the laws of chivalry, he took the notary at unawares with a blow which nearly sent him headlong down the hill, and Montoro almost as suddenly dashed forward with doubled fists to revenge his companion; but Mendez was far from desiring to be so championed. Recovering his footing, he grasped the boy by the shoulder and pulled him back, saying hastily,—
"My friend! patience is a virtue—when it is expedient."
Thus pocketing the affront for the present in a way that was very astonishing to Montoro, the notary by signs complimented his antagonist on his vigour, and ended by winning the powerful young savage over to the side of peace and good-will by presenting him with a comb, a pair of scissors, and a looking-glass, and giving him a lesson in hair-dressing. So delighted was the great Quibian's heir with that new accomplishment, that he fairly hugged his instructor, and although he could not obtain the bold Spaniards an interview with the angry, invalid monarch, he sufficiently showed his gratitude by despatching them safe back again to the waiting Admiral, and their anxious comrades.
He ended by winning the powerful young savage over to the side of peace and good-will by presenting him with a comb, a pair of scissors, and a looking-glass.
Thus began and ended Montoro de Diego's first great adventure in the New World, and from henceforth he was marked out as one of those for whom the new scenes were to be scenes of renown. With the bitter termination, for others, of that exploit he had no concern. He was lying in his berth in the unconsciousness of fever when, a few days later, the Adelantado and eighty men, guided by Diego Mendez, seized the unfortunate Cacique, and carried off his wives, children, and chief friends to die miserable deaths of despair and broken-heartedness. Well might the poor creatures long to prevent even the least cruel of the white invaders from landing on their shores.
Even in the present day it is hard to teach civilized people that the uncivilized have rights equal with their own, and as sacred. In those days it was impossible.
CHAPTER XIV.
MASTER PEDRO'S DOGS IN DANGER.
It was still high day when Mendez the notary, and Montoro de Diego, returned from their expedition to the heart of the Cacique's territory, and reported themselves once more on board the Admiral's ship; but by the time the history of their doings and discoveries was ended, it was too late for any further undertakings in the building line that afternoon. Fernando got hold of his chosen friend and comrade as the interview with the Admiral came to an end, and said resolutely—
"Come now, Diego, I take upon myself to say that thou hast earned a holiday for the next twelve hours, and those not given to sleep I intend shall be devoted to me; or, if it please you better, to me and those dogs of thine."
"My dogs, indeed!" laughed Montoro. "I have told thee before, and I tell thee again, that they are no more mine than thine. Had I but known in time that I was to go ashore at Hispaniola, they should have been landed there for their rightful owner, I can tell thee, and I had been quit of their care once for all."
"Ay, and of their love too," retorted Fernando slyly.
Montoro shrugged his shoulders; but his affectation of indifference went for nought. The mutual affection existing between the couple of young bloodhounds, and their young keeper, was too well known by every one on board for his occasional pretence of carelessness about them to go for anything. His companion soon proved its present shallowness.
"Oh, well," he said, in his turn shrugging his shoulders, "if you have left off caring about them it's all right. But I do pity the poor brutes a little myself, having nothing to eat for the past—well, there's no saying how many hours. But you know you didn't feed them before you went off yesterday."
"Of course I did not," returned Montoro angrily, all his coolness utterly vanished. "It was much too early then to feed them; but I did not suppose I left behind me a set of heartless wretches, who would let poor dumb animals suffer."
Fernando Colon's lip twitched with something uncommonly like a smile as he expostulated—
"Nay then, you know perfectly that you choose always to feed them yourself. You have ever given small thanks to those who have dared to do so in your place."
"Ah!" exclaimed Montoro with rising passion. "And so because, forsooth, I choose to attend to the dogs myself, when I am on board, if I were dead you would let them starve?"
"Nay, for I should not then have to fear your scowl," was the answer ending with a laugh. But Nando added the next moment with a good-natured smile—
"Even the Admiral himself was not afraid of your wrath anent those doggies, when you were safe out of the way, for he fed them with his own hands."
As those last words were uttered Montoro turned sharply away and brushed his sleeve across his eyes. He turned back again almost as quickly, and laid a tolerably hard grip of his strong fingers on his companion's arm as he muttered huskily—
"You'll never let me get a hold over my temper, Nando, if you torment me thus. But did—did thy noble father in very truth think upon the wants of the poor doggies?"
Ferdinand's eyes were glistening too as he replied—
"Ay, that he did indeed. And know'st thou, Toro, half I feel jealous of thee, for verily I believe that it was as much on thy account as for the dogs' sake that my father did them so much honour. But hark to the storm they are making. They have found out thou art on board. Come away, and let them loose."
The next minute the two dogs of Master Pedro, the spice and curiosity dealer of El Cuevo, were bounding up on deck, giving vent to a succession of excited hurrahs in their own especial tongue.
Those half-unconscious caresses bestowed upon the hounds by Doña Rachel Diego at the hour of parting, those tears with which, in trying to conceal them, she had bedewed the dogs' heads, had so endeared the animals to her son, that from the outset of his long journeyings he ever considered their comfort before his own, and reaped the just reward in their fidelity and strong attachment to himself. But that evening he was destined to pay a somewhat heavy penalty for the friendship.
"Toro, you never give the dogs a swim," said Ferdinand suddenly, when, after a regular romping match, boys and animals had tumbled themselves down together in a promiscuous heap, to get back breath and energy for further proceedings. The dogs were so enormously strong that playing with them was not easy work like playing with kittens.
"I feel as if I had been engaged in a pretty stiff wrestling match," said Montoro, laughing, and stretching his arms, "and oh! how warm it's become, or I."
"You may as well add that 'or I,'" laughed back the other; "for I suspect, as the sun is going down, that the air must be somewhat cooler than when you came on board. But the hounds really do look hot, poor creatures, and they could get such a splendid bathe here in the river—and so could we."
"Umph!" growled that rather tired-out young Don Diego. "I think it would have been a much more sensible suggestion that we could have a splendid turn-in to our berths. But you are such a horrible fellow. I don't believe you ever know what it is to feel done up."
"Nor you either, generally," said Ferdinand with another laugh.
But his companion was not going to be weak enough to echo it, not he.
"'Generally' isn't 'never,'" he returned. "But here goes, you energetic plague. In with you as hard as you like, I'll follow."
And so saying he rolled himself over with a very good imitation of used-up laziness, and got himself slowly up from his hands and knees on to his feet, with the wind-up of a solemn, self-satisfied "Oh!"
"Oh, indeed!" came the mocking echo from half-a-dozen deep throats, followed by shouts of laughter.
Montoro was just a trifle disconcerted. He had not known of these extra witnesses of his performance.
"Pity but thy mother were here," said Diego Mendez, one of the group. "Then wouldst thou have surely had such another lollipop as must have rewarded thy first triumph in this exhibition."
"Nay then," came the reply, for the performer had not taken long to recover his self-possession; "nay then, Señor, if you are pleased to bestow that lollipop for the show it will be the first, seeing that on that other past occasion of which you speak I returned myself to the floor with a suddenness that bumped my forehead, and my reward, therefore, was a plaster."
"Thy impudent mouth deserves a hot plaster now, methinks," muttered a surly hidalgo in the background.
But fortunately hot-tempered Montoro did not hear the mutter, and no one else heeded it. The group of men moved off, and left the lads once more to their own devices. Montoro stepped up to the side of the vessel and looked over at the clear, bright waters of the river. The dogs shook themselves and followed him, Don rearing himself up on his hind legs on the right hand to look over, and Señor resolutely pushing himself in between the two boys, and rearing himself up on Montoro's left hand, with forepaws resting on the vessel's edge.
"How different the river looks now to the dingy-coloured, troubled stream we sailed up such a short time ago," said Montoro.
"Yes," answered Ferdinand; "the fair weather has given the mud and sand time to settle. That is why I think it looks so tempting for a bathe."
The dogs gave their answers also in an expressive fashion of their own, like the hurrah business, hunching up their shoulders, and settling their heads down between them with noses pushed forward, and intent eyes that meant anything you like to imagine, except disagreement with their friend. Still that same friend hesitated. His human companion glanced at him with some wonder.
"Toro—"
"Ay, Nando, what now?"
"Only—the banks are very nigh on either hand, and thou canst swim now, I take it, as well as any one on board these caravels?"
"Hey, what sayest thou?" said Montoro, with a bewildered stare in his eyes, which was very nearly reproduced in the other pair when he suddenly recollected himself, and exclaimed with a short laugh—"Why now, Nando, you may fairly think that I have lost my wits; but in truth they had but gone travelling on their own account hence to El Cuevo, and—Come. I can swim, saidst thou? Truly can I then, and I'll prove it by beating you and the dogs in a match from here to the shore yonder, and back again."
"Done with you," exclaimed the sailor's son, beginning his disrobing with eager haste as he spoke. "Antonio," he shouted to the pilot, "Antonio! be good-natured; drop us over a rope, and bide here to summon us back if we are wanted."
"A crocodile, maybe, will have you first," answered Alaminos as he sauntered up.
"In saying so you belie your own boasted knowledge that these ugly brutes will not, unprovoked, attack a human being," was the quick retort.
"Even so," was the calm reply; "neither will they. But I said not they would hesitate to make a snap at imps."
However, there were no crocodiles—to give the alligators the name given to them at that time—to be seen, neither were other more dangerous enemies to be seen, when the two boys and the two dogs took their simultaneous plunge, with a splutter and dash and commotion that drew two or three of the crew to keep watch beside the pilot.
Once in the water, Montoro quite forgot that he was tired, and struck out vigorously for the shore. Unfortunately, however, for the fulfilment of his boast, his four-footed admirers would insist upon trying to help him, first to get back to the caravel, which they appeared to consider the wisest proceeding; and when he had at last thoroughly convinced them that he intended to keep his face for the present turned the other way, their attentions were little less retarding. One would get a whole bunch of the curly black locks between his teeth firmly, if not exactly comfortably to their owner, while the other made perpetual lip-nibbles at his ears and shoulders. Montoro was not at all sorry at last to join the laughing and exultant Ferdinand on the river bank.
"Don and Señor shall go back first when we return," he said with a reproachful shake of his head at the four-footed individuals in question. "I should have beaten you easily but for them."
"Poor old doggies!" said Ferdinand, stroking the great head nearest to him as he spoke. "Good old fellows; you'd better far make friends with me, as he is so ungrateful to you."
As though the dogs understood the address made to them, when Nando took his hand from Señor's head, and rolled himself down the bank back into the water again, with a great souse, and forthwith set to work floundering and swimming and diving and jumping, Señor jumped up, gave a hasty lick to Diego's hand, and then followed the other boy into the water, and the two together began to hurry back to the ship, actuated at first by a spirit of mischief, and then, by the sharply-uttered orders of the Admiral.
And while Columbus shouted his commands to his young son to return to him, others were trying to obey the orders to man a boat instantly, and put off from the ship for the shore Fernando and Señor had just left.
"But there is no boat! they are all yonder!" groaned Antonio de Alaminos as he wrung his hands. "And the bravest and brightest spirit of us all will die unrevenged."
CHAPTER XV.
NOISE TO THE RESCUE.
That Montoro Diego should die 'unrevenged' was Antonio the pilot's only moan. To wish for his life might well seem useless. How should he live without aid, and how should aid be got to him in time, even should there be a dozen boats available! Arrows were flying around him, and arrows fly faster than any rowers yet heard of can ply their oars.
The fact of the matter was this. Very few people care now-a-days, nor ever have cared, for uninvited guests; and the Cacique of Veragua and his people were no exceptions to the general rule. When Columbus and his four caravels appeared off their coasts, they were as pleased with the novel exhibition as we are with a sight of the Persian Shah, an elephant called Jumbo, or a king of the Cannibal Islands. And they treated the exhibitors very well, giving them much more than enough for one feast; and then, when they were satisfied with the sight, and had found that enough of that was certainly, so far as they were concerned, as good as a feast, they gave their visitors some very valuable little presents, and courteously hinted—"Now you may go."
But, instead of taking the unacceptable hint, they didn't go. On the contrary, they coolly took possession of other people's land, built a considerable number of houses upon it, and showed plainly enough that they meant to take up their abode there without an invitation. These Spaniards would never have dreamt of trying to treat their home neighbours, the Portuguese or the French, with such scant ceremony. But these Veraguans were "only savages, heathen, miserable dark-skinned creatures, with no rights at all." No claims to halfpence, only to kicks.
Unfortunately, these poor heathen savages thought differently. Quibian, with his bad leg laid up in his uncivilized palace, growled forth his orders to his painted warriors to expel the impudent intruders; and all his able-bodied subjects turned themselves into volunteers for the furtherance of the same purpose. Here, there, and everywhere around that bit of coast, and between the two rivers, lurked the Spaniards' foes, and half-a-dozen particularly malicious ones were concealed just within the borders of the forest, facing the Admiral's ship, when Montoro and Ferdinand forsook its safety for their ill-advised bathe. The spies grinned at each other with silent delight when they saw the boys swim straight for the bank, mount it, and actually place themselves in the full power of the enemy. The arrows would have left the bows at once, and both the lads might have suffered but for the dogs.
The Veraguans, like their neighbours on the great new continent, had no domestic animals, and the gambols and tricks of Don and Señor were most fascinatingly wonderful to those hidden spectators, who almost forgot their desire to kill the dogs' companions in delighted attention to the dogs themselves. But suddenly Fernando, in that very unexpected way, rolled himself down the bank and disappeared,—he and one of the four-footed friends,—only to reappear to their eyes half-way back to the ship. The Indians were furious at his escape and their own stupidity, and, darting out of their hiding-place, shot off all six arrows simultaneously at the two hoped-for victims still remaining in their power.
Rather, it should be said, the one hoped-for victim, for the Indians would have rather preferred to spare Don had it been possible. But the animal, obeying its instincts, sprang forward on seeing the strangers, and received three out of the six arrows in its own body. The others fell harmless, for Montoro, on seeing the unexpected adversaries, had obeyed his natural human instincts, and sprung on one side.
In so springing he involuntarily followed Fernando's example, and rolled down the bank. Had he then and there set off swimming back to his friends, he would in all probability have got off uninjured; but the help Master Sancho, the merchant, had many a time in El Cuevo seen him render to those more helpless than himself he was ready with now, almost as much as a matter of instinct as the actions that preceded the unselfish act.
As he disappeared down the bank the Veraguans uttered yells of disappointed rage; but through those sounds there fell upon his ears, with an accent of bitter disappointment, a most piteous moan. Poor Don had given his body as a shield for his companion, and now that he lay suffering, perhaps dying, his companion was forsaking him. Don felt that to be very hard lines, and so he howled out his sorrow. He certainly would not have treated his friend so, and though his friend was only a human being, and not a faithful dog, he had imagined this especial human being to be different to most. It seemed he was mistaken, and so he howled for his disappointment. And Montoro heard the mournful howl, and understood all it said as well as if it had been the very longest and most comprehensive German word that even Bret Harte ever got hold of.
Ten seconds later the spectators on board the ship saw the lad remounting the bank with a wild bound, actually returning towards his enemies—one unarmed, defenceless boy against half-a-dozen fierce warriors.
"And all for the sake of a dog," said Alaminos to him some time later with a touch of anger.
"All for the sake of a creature that cried to me for aid," was the reply. "And ere I cease to care for such, I trust that I may no longer cumber the earth."
But during those present moments, while Montoro was climbing the bank, the pilot was standing with wide eyes gazing across at him, and wondering greatly as to the motives for his strange proceeding. He had forgotten about the dog, or thought it was dead and done for.
Poor old Don himself knew better. He was lying there helpless, with three arrows in his faithful side; but he was not yet too dead or done for to be able to give vent to an ecstatic weak squeak of a bark when he caught sight again of his beloved master.
So astounded were the Indians that they beat a momentary retreat into the forest, while Montoro knelt down and pulled the arrows out of the dog's wounds, Don the while alternately licking his hands and moaning. But it was no time just then for delicate handling. The three arrows were out in little more than as many seconds, and then with an inspiriting "Hi, good dog," Diego roused up the poor animal and pulled it down the bank with him once more, just as a second flight of arrows sped more truly to their intended mark. This time Diego quivered, and uttered one sharp, irrepressible cry as four of the darts struck and pierced his unprotected flesh. Pulling out the one most accessible, he plunged into the water, the dog with him. The Indians rushed forward. For those past few seconds they had imagined he must have some means of defence at hand to make him so daring, but now they were undeceived, and proportionably brave, themselves. Another flight of arrows was launched, this time happily with such eager, excited haste as to be harmless. But what advantage was that? The foe had plenty more arrows, and would apparently have plenty more time to shoot them at their wished-for target, for both the lad and the dog were evidently much hurt, and were swimming very slowly and feebly.
Then it was that Antonio de Alaminos wrung his hands and groaned over his favourite's impending fate. But the Admiral did something better than groan. There was no possibility of getting a boat across from the building-ground in time to be of any use, and the position was imminent. One more glance was cast by the father at his young son rapidly nearing the vessel, and still unconscious of his friend's danger, and then the order was shouted forth—"Fire off the guns—wait not to take aim."
Answering shouts of comprehension greeted the order, and as the guns were now always in a state of readiness for immediate use, it was obeyed with almost incredible speed, so great was the eagerness to save the young life now in jeopardy. Even while the exhausted Montoro was plunging himself and Don under water to escape another shower of arrows, there came the flash, the roar of the four falconets, followed by peal upon peal of the most frantic screechings from the Indians. Whether they were hurt was very doubtful, but it was evident enough that they were madly terrified. Flinging away their weapons, they decamped into the shelter of the forest again, and it was only by the fading sound of the continued shrieks that the direction of their retreat towards the village could be learnt.
"That was a lucky thought—to fight by fear," said Diego Mendez with a sigh of relief, as he prepared to spring into the river to the further aid of the rescued Montoro; but the Admiral checked him one moment, saying reverently—
"It was a blessed thought, my friend, for it was inspired by God."
Twenty minutes later Montoro was safe in his berth; the arrows had been extracted, and the wounds dressed, and poor Don lay dozing uneasily at his feet. It had just been suggested that the dog should be put out of its sufferings forthwith by a blow on the head. But Columbus would not have it done. The lad had nearly lost his life to save the animal's, and it should not prove such a useless service.
"You will at any rate, my father, allow me a little time to try to get him well?" said Ferdinand eagerly.
"Most assuredly, my son," answered the Admiral. "For thy friend's sake, and for the dog's, it shall be so."
And thus it came to pass that while Montoro lay ill of fever from his torn wounds and over-fatigue, many weighty things befell his companions and the Indians of Veragua, and faithful Don lay at his master's feet and licked himself back into wholeness. In fact, Don's surgical appliances did him good far more speedily than those made use of on behalf of Montoro. And when his comrade Señor's bones lay bleaching in the American forest some few weeks later, he was bounding about the deck in full strength and health, and utter disregard of the calamities that had befallen nearly every other living creature any way connected with him.
When Montoro again recovered consciousness the Admiral's caravel was once more on the way to Hispaniola. The settlement at Veragua had been half destroyed, wholly abandoned; the poor Cacique of Veragua and his people were slain, dead or dispersed; and once more Montoro de Diego, and many of his companions, had to turn their hopes of fortune to the island colony that had already, in the short space of eight years, been so frequently the hotbed of envy, hatred, malice, and all uncharitableness.
CHAPTER XVI.
I AM 'DON ALONZO.'
It was a splendid evening one day towards the end of the year 1503, when a tall, plainly-attired, handsome youth drew near the home of a Spanish colonist to whom he had notes of introduction. He had walked out to it from San Domingo, a distance of some five miles, and now stood still to survey the scene, his hand resting on a dog's head the while that had accompanied him.
"It is a glorious place, old Don," he muttered in a tone of considerable satisfaction, although it betokened great surprise as well.
And a glorious place it was, and most especially beautiful now that the long, low houses of stone and earth, the waving palms, and all the other luxuriance of that southern clime, were bathed in the golden glory of a southern sunset. In a cushioned reclining chair, placed in a shady spot of the broad verandah, lounged a young man, handsome, but for a Spaniard coarse-featured and rather thick-set. However, all defects of person were thrown into the background by a sumptuousness of attire that fairly startled the youth as he at length approached, and delivered his letters.
"And you are the son of Master Pedro, the spice-dealer of El Cuevo!" he breathed forth at last.
The words of that ejaculation were common-place enough, but the tone in which they were uttered, and the look with which they were accompanied, made them so inexpressibly gratifying, and at the same time comical, to the man to whom they were addressed, that he burst into a loud, long laugh before vouchsafing them any other answer.
"Yes, yes," he said at last, recovering himself with an easy nonchalance. "Yes, yes, youngster, I do not mind confessing to you, since you know the fact before my confession, that the worthy old gentleman yonder, with his frugal fare, and his better stuff cloak for holidays, is my father, and a rare good old miser he is, to save the maravedis for my spending. But mind ye, that is between you and me and Saint Peter."
A wondering gaze from a great pair of thoughtful, brilliant eyes was the questioning reply to this intimation. "And for the rest of the world," asked the owner of the eyes after a short pause, "who is your father for the rest of the world?"
Another laugh greeted this query.
"Why, for the rest of the world, being what you have found me, Don Alonzo de Loyala, my father is, like thine own, some long-deceased grandee of Spain, who neglected his duty towards his son as regarded the due endowment of riches to maintain my rank in mine own land."
As this mocking speech ended, Montoro de Diego's cheeks flushed angrily, and he exclaimed—
"Do you then imply that my claims to noble birth are thus also assumed? By St.—"
"Nay then, nay," good-humouredly interrupted the other. "In these latitudes it is not well for health to heat thyself for nought. Keep thy passion for the red rascals, who are so lazy that they'll die rather than live and work. I imply nothing to thy detriment. Wert thou placed as I am, then wouldst thou also have a wealthy father at thy back, to help thee to maintain that rank out here it should pleasure thee to claim. Meantime, I do no more than half of those around me, and with better right; for I am no released felon, and I deal honestly by those I trade with. I will deal honestly with you. Twice have I had advices from my father, and from good master Sancho, that I should try to secure you for a companion and aid, should you elect to remain here on the Admiral's return to Spain. And I like you at first sight well enough to be willing to take their advice. Will you stay with me then, or shall I help you to find friends elsewhere?"
Montoro looked at the man from head to foot slowly and earnestly, as he lounged there before him, so great a contrast to himself, and then as slowly and earnestly said—
"I agree to stay—for a time."
"Umph!" muttered the self-styled Don Alonzo, somewhat taken aback in his turn. "Umph! my noble youngster, methinks from your air you suppose the obligation to be rather more mutual than I esteem it. You are a beggar and friendless, and I—am not."
However, Montoro was not now so friendless as his new colleague assumed. Had he returned to Spain, even there he might now have been found some sort of employment, and out in the Colony the spirited young adventurer, with a pair of hands both able and willing to work, could have easily found some more indolent seeker after wealth willing to go into partnership with him. But Rachel de Diego was sheltered under the roof of the spice-merchant, and her son had a hidden eagerness that he might be able to find shelter under the roof of the spice-merchant's son. It was to that motive that 'Don Alonzo' owed the easy settlement of his agreement with his new young partner, and not, as he imagined, to the promising air of luxurious comfort in his surroundings. That offered more allurements to a third party to the affair.
Don threatened for a few minutes to upset the amiable arrangements between his real owner and his self-adopted master, for poor Don had very faint notions of the rights of property and ownership, and Don was thirsty and Don was hungry, and, moreover, Don was as fond of grapes as any Christian Don, real or pretended, to be found in or out of Spain. All of a sudden, while Montoro was gazing thoughtfully out at the silver line of distant sea, and Don Alonzo was muttering to himself the remark mentioned above, tired Don caught sight of a piled-up dish of grapes on a table in the verandah. He licked his dry lips, and went on eyeing them. Then he licked his dry lips again, and ventured upon a small whine. That sound recalled Montoro's wandering wits so far that he turned round and nodded to his four-footed friend, and said dreamily—
"Yes, yes. All right, good old Don."
That was enough. Don was in that state of longing that a very small amount of encouragement was enough to induce him to help himself to the desired feast, and before either of his companions knew well what he was about, he had bounded up to the table, scrunched up one juicy, deliciously refreshing bunch of grapes, and had a second in his mouth about to be treated in the same way. But "there's many a slip 'twixt the cup and the lip," and in this instance there proved to be a slip 'twixt the lip and the throat.
Don Alonzo quickly became aware of what was going on, and, seizing a heavy bottle, he flung it with full force angrily at the dog; and it hit, not the dog, but the dog's champion, happily only a touch, and then fell crashing on the floor of the verandah.
The next instant Montoro's first dash forward to save the dog was followed by a second to save Don Alonzo; for the huge animal had made a furious spring at his antagonist, accompanied by a growl that gave full promise of his intentions. Montoro's most resolute and stern command was needed before the hound was brought to crouch down by his side, with red-lit eyes still glaring at his unrecognized owner.
"That brute shall be shot before he's an hour older," came the surly declaration at last, as Montoro knelt on the stone pavement soothing the animal back into good temper. At the sharp announcement he looked up quickly.
"Then you shall shoot him through me," he said passionately, "as you struck me just now instead of him. He is my only friend out here, and we will live or die together."
Don Alonzo shook himself irritably. He was good-hearted enough if over-indulgent parents in the first instance, and superabundant good fortune since, had not rather spoilt him. Besides, four years' sojourn on the island of Hispaniola had not tended to teach regard for any life but his own; that he esteemed at quite a high enough rate, and he answered Montoro now with angry remonstrance—
"It is all very fine to talk heroics, youngster; but thinkest thou that I am going to be browbeaten into keeping my own dog, to stand in danger of being mauled by it any time its tempers up, as if I were a wretched native!"
Montoro stood up and folded his arms.
"Neither you nor any other man, Indian or European, shall suffer from Doffs teeth. Or, if perchance that sounds too proud a boast, for the first human being that Don injures he shall die. He shall be as a lamb to you now—see—hold out your hand."
With some scarcely-disguised trepidation Alonzo obeyed. Don cast a beseeching glance of remonstrance at his friend; but instead of any encouragement to rejection of the offered fellowship, he got a grave shake of the head; and with a very crestfallen aspect he rose, walked dolefully along the verandah, and put his paw into the outstretched hand, and looked up with mute appeal for forgiveness.
Don Alonzo was wise enough to seal the new compact with a freely-generous gift of more of the coveted grapes. If Montoro for Don, and Don for himself, would engage that Don Alonzo should never feel the sharpness of that animal's teeth, his owner was only too willing that it should live. For it was quite the fashion now to use these powerful dogs out in the new world, not only as terrible aids in battle against the poor, half-defenceless Indians, but also to hunt down the miserable, wholly-defenceless slaves who sometimes dared to run away to die in peace in their native forests, instead of beneath the short-sighted, as well as brutal, taskmaster's lash.
The young Diego had declared that Don should never be so employed, but that declaration Don Alonzo comfortably decided in his own mind was all nonsense. He himself had had qualms about the treatment of the natives when he first came out, but he had long since got rid of all such inconvenient scruples; and so of course would this new arrival get speedily rid of his. Every one did, with the exception of that impracticable idiot of a neighbour of his, that young fellow Las Casas, who had come out from Spain with his head so full of theories and bookish ideas that he had no room in it for common sense.
CHAPTER XVII.
GOOD OLD DON.
Time passed on. In Spain good Queen Isabella died, and two years later the poor, neglected noble-hearted, pious old Admiral, Christopher Columbus, recommending himself to God, and his two sons, Diego and Ferdinand, to King Ferdinand's tardy justice and each other's brotherly love, also bade a final farewell to an ungrateful world.
And in Hispaniola also time passed on. Many there grieved over the Admiral when he was dead, who had tormented him in every possible way when living,—that is the way with poor, stupid human nature. But he had one true mourner, who had loved and served him with all his heart during the year that they were together, and whose memory for those he cared for was not a short one. Montoro de Diego, amidst his many new interests, felt a very keen pang of sorrow when the news was brought out to the island, towards the end of the year 1506, of the loss the world had sustained.
"Ah! Señor Las Casas," he sighed one morning, some months later; "ah! then, if he had lived, and the queen, you might then have had hope even yet to work some good for these wretched, rightful owners of these lands. But now—"
"Ay, indeed!" exclaimed Bartholomew Las Casas with heaving chest, as he rose and strode hastily up and down his terrace. "You may well pause upon that but now, Diego. For now one might more wisely waste breath in calling upon wolves and wild cats to cease from fierceness, than in pleading with one's fellow-men for mercy, justice, or compassion. 'Give us yourselves,' is the fierce cry that echoes all around us. 'Give us yourselves, your wives and daughters, for our humble slaves; give us your gold, your lands, all you hold most valuable; resign your wills, your faith, your souls into our keeping, and we will give you leave to live as long as unremitting toil and cruelty will let you. But resist us, fight for your country or your liberty, contradict our lightest caprice, and we will shoot you down as though you were so many rabbits, we will hunt you to death with our dogs as though you were vermin or wild beasts.'"
The young man came to a sudden stop, with a face glowing with generous indignation, and literally panting for breath with his burst of righteous wrath. Montoro's cheeks were flushed with sympathy as he said in quick reply—
"It is so. I can but too terribly vouch for the truth of your bitter accusation. But, Señor, your brethren the priests, can they not—"
Las Casas turned upon him with sharp interruption.
"Can they not help me, you would ask? Ay, verily," with indignant scorn; "well indeed do they help the cause I have at heart! This is one of the proclamations allowed by some of those same brethren the priests—'Your souls are doomed to eternal perdition, your bodies belong to those who have conquered your soil!' Much good my brethren the priests will do!"
There was a short silence, and then he continued more calmly, and laying his hand upon a pile of papers, "But after all, Diego, I do hope to work some good for the poor natives. I have written out a strong case for them, and I am intending to return to Spain shortly, there to plead their cause myself."
"And you shall have my testimony, if you will," said Montoro eagerly. "For it is our Don Alonzo's will that I should take a journey to Spain this coming season, in charge of a somewhat richer freight than usual. And if you start not immediately we may go together."
"And Don?" said Las Casas, in smiling interrogation.
"Ay, truly," was the laughing answer, although something of a blush accompanied it. "But in faith," he added the next moment, "it is not only for love of the animal that I have it for my constant companion. Since I have discovered the horrible use to which its fellows are put, I live in fear of a coming day when I may regret having saved its life."
"Then," continued his friend, "you will leave it behind you in Spain perchance, when you return hither?"
"That is so long to look ahead," said Montoro, feeling not a little glad that he was not called upon for an immediate decision.
When it really came to the point he did what he thought much better than leaving Don behind in El Cuevo. He got Master Pedro to transfer all property in it to himself. His services to the old spice-dealer and his son had well merited so much of a reward. And as for Don, he deserved not only a good master, but almost as many bunches of grapes besides as he chose to eat, when, a couple of years later, he was the means of saving Montoro's life and a bag full of gold-dust to the value of many thousand pesos.
Diego's first return journey to Spain proved so successful, owing to his scrupulous honesty and intelligence, that Don Alonzo speedily sent him on a second, and others also most eagerly availed themselves of so upright a messenger to transmit their golden gleanings to their own country.
But, as it happened, with Diego there voyaged also to Spain three ne'er-do-wells. They had gambled away all their slaves, all their grants of land, all their gathered-up spoils, and then, having finally gambled away all their future prospects of wealth in Hispaniola, the miscreants, as mean as they were bad, slipped away from the island and their creditors on the first ship back to Spain.
"And mind ye," muttered one of the number to his companions one evening, as they drew near the end of their two months' voyage,—"mind ye, if we follow that insolent, set-up fellow Diego a day or two's journey up the country after landing, we shall not be losing time, neither shall we have cause to regret having left Hispaniola in his company."
"How so?" questioned one of the two eager listeners doubtfully. "My child yonder, little Bautista, told me when I questioned him some days ago anent Diego's gold, that the bags were to be sent by other hands to Madrid."
"And you credit the tale!" exclaimed the first speaker scornfully. "You'll believe next that the Garden of Paradise has been found."
"And so I will," was the retort, "when the news is given me by Montoro de Diego. He would not lie to save his life, and least of all would he lie to a child."
"By all the saints," sneered the third of the group, "but Don Diego hath a warm advocate in you! Doubtless it were useless to expect you to touch his gold, even though it lay by the wayside to be picked up."
"Doubtless under those circumstances," was the sharp reply, "there should be little left for you to snatch. All the same, he hath shown kindness to my boy, and he tells him nought but truth."
"Well, well," said Almado, the first speaker, more softly, "there is no need that we should wrangle over the fellow's virtues, they sicken me forsooth. Ne'er the less, he shall be a very saint if you will, so we do but get his merchandise. As for the gold that is to go to Madrid, that is but that small part, of what he carries, which is for the king's coffers. Of that I am well assured. So you see thy little son yonder hath been told the truth indeed, but only in part, and maybe to mislead us."
"Umph," muttered Bautista's father, also more quietly. "That may well be."
"Ay," agreed the third of the company, "that may well be."
And for the next few hours they all redoubled their efforts to be on good terms with Don. They flattered themselves, indeed, that he regarded them quite in the light of friends, for Don, like most very strong creatures, whether going on two legs or four, never troubled himself to show uncalled-for fierceness. As long as no one interfered with him or his master, and his master gave him no orders to interfere with others, he maintained the grave indifference of manner worthy of a highborn Spaniard. But woe betide those who should presume upon this calmness.
Arrived at Cadiz, Montoro delivered up the royal revenue to the authorized messengers awaiting it, and then he and his dog and his bags set out on their journey up the country, in company with worthy Master Sancho, who had come to meet him, and two or three other traders from the interior.
"Farewell, my little Bautista," said Montoro; "I shall pray for our future meeting."
"Nay," said the child hurriedly, and with a frightened look round, "do not that, Señor. I love you, you have been good to me, and so I pray the Virgin to grant we may not meet again."
Montoro opened his eyes wide.
"How so, little man? Love me, and yet pray that we may not again cross each other's paths? How is that, tell me?"
But the boy shook his head, and began to tremble violently.
"Do not ask me," he muttered with white lips; "they will kill me. Only keep away from us. They do not know I have heard——"
"Ha!" exclaimed Montoro, a look of intelligence now taking the place of bewilderment. Then he stooped and kissed the child's forehead, as he said in low tones, "Blessings on thee for thy true heart, my little lad, and my thanks. May the Lord have thee in His keeping, and guard thy hands from sin."
And so they parted, each, as poor little Bautista fondly thought, to go widely different ways, but in reality to take two routes leading to the same goal.
For the first two days' journey inland the party to which Montoro joined himself was a particularly strong one, too strong for the three gamblers to care to meddle with; accordingly they withdrew themselves from notice, until the travelling company was reduced to Montoro himself, Master Sancho and his thick-headed attendant, and a couple of poor-spirited merchants, who would have rather hidden themselves in their bales at the appearance of danger, than tried to defend them. But then—there was Don.
The third day was drawing to a close, when Diego and his companions reached a wretched little inn, the worst on their route, and with considerable grumbling on the part of comfort-loving Master Sancho, they put up there for the night. To make matters worse, the amount of available accommodation was even less than usual, for another party of travellers had arrived before them, and taken the chief and largest room.
However, there was no help for it. Master Sancho had to make the best of a bad bargain, and as nothing would induce him to share a room with Don, and nothing would induce Montoro to dispense with Don's company as a guardian under present circumstances, he and the dog had one room, and the worthy burgess of El Cuevo and the two merchants from Saragossa had to crowd into the other.
"One night," explained Master Sancho to his companions, "that young rascal I've taken a fancy to, persuaded me to share a sleeping apartment with him and that great brute, and in the night I snored,—I'm given to snore,—and the creature didn't approve, and woke me up with a sounding thump of its great paw. And there, behold! it stood reared up over me, with glaring eyes and a growling mouth. I warrant you, I prayed in one minute to more saints in the calendar than I've prayed to in many a long year before."
"Doubtless," assented one of the merchants with paling cheeks. "I have ever thought it a fearful great beast, and unsafe. But hearken! Methinks it is now quarrelling even with its own master. Ah!" with startled breathlessness—"it is shot."
Then there was a sudden rushing all over the inn. Screams, shrieks, shouts, slamming of doors, and above all, the continuous roar of Don's deep growling bark.
At length men and lights were gathered in Montoro's room, and there stood Montoro holding in a firm grip one of the smugglers. But the hero of the fray, and the conqueror, was grand old Don standing with one great fore-paw on the breast of one robber, the other fore-paw on the breast of Bautista's father, who lay weltering in his blood, shot by the other of his comrades in the attempt to shoot the dog.
"But my child, my little son," murmured the wretched, dying man.
"I will guard and care for him," said Montoro huskily.
He had been rescued from misery himself once, now he was the rescuer.
CHAPTER XVIII.
DEATH FOR DON.
It was the early part of the year 1511, when Montoro, become now quite an experienced islander and man of business, left Don Alonzo's place, Palmyra, one morning for the neighbouring town of San Domingo. The object of the visit was to arrange some important matters with certain foreign merchants, who had lately arrived with tempting offers to the planters for the produce of their estates.
"And don't hurry thyself," said Don Alonzo with unusual consideration. "Take thy pleasure for a few days when thou art in the town, for verily this dog's hole of a place is dull enough to make a man long to shuffle off life with a native's readiness."
"If those same natives should get the upper-hand," answered Montoro drily, "I doubt not they would help you. Meantime, I will trust to find you still in the flesh, and well, when I return, and so—adios."
"And for you, fair journeyings and good bargains," said the indolent superior, as he lay lounging in his low chair sipping a cool lime-juice beverage. Little enough of the work he did himself towards accumulating his own wealth.
But, lazy and self-indulgent as he was, it had not escaped Montoro that there was a certain scarcely-suppressed eagerness, and barely-hidden hope of some sort, underlying his present declared wishes for his subordinate's comfort. As Montoro left the verandah and passed through the house he called to his rescued protégé, who had proved useful enough to secure himself a home beneath Don Alonzo's roof. No work had seemed to come amiss to him, excepting that of aid to the overseers in the gold mines, in which he had been recently employed. But the brutal task-masters had just sent the boy back, saying that he was no good to them whatever, worse than no good indeed, for he pitied the rascally workers instead of flogging them.
Bautista came readily enough when he heard his beloved Señor Diego's voice.
"Am I to go with you, my Señor?" he exclaimed beseechingly. "Ah! but I will be to you eyes and hands and feet, if I may."
"I prefer to use my own, thank you," answered Montoro smiling, as he patted the boy's head. "But look not so disappointed, Bautista, for if I cannot trust myself to thee, I am going to leave in thy charge one I hold almost dearer. I leave thee guardian of our faithful old Don. And see thou that he comes to no harm, and—that he does no harm. I have guarded him from that sin hitherto; do thou guard him in my absence."
A deep breath, almost a groan, burst from the boy's lips.
"My Señor," he muttered anxiously, "give me some other duty to perform for you. This may be too hard."
Diego frowned.
"I trust not," he said sternly. "It shall be worse for others if it prove so. And remember, you have my orders, and if need be you must declare them."
So saying he nodded his farewell to the boy and departed, leaving Don's new guardian in a very doleful frame of mind, for he knew well enough the cause of Don Alonzo's desire to be a short time rid of Montoro.
The spice-merchant's son was good-natured enough so long as he was crossed in nothing, but Montoro's settled refusal to have Don used as a hunter of runaway slaves had roused Alonzo's spite, and for the past year, ever since the return of Montoro and the dog from Spain, he had been seeking some chance to gratify his malice. Hitherto where Diego had gone the dog had gone, but at last this expedition to the town was arranged, and for various circumstances it was more convenient to leave Don behind.
"And at last," declared Don Alonzo with a malicious chuckle, "at last the brute shall be set to its proper work."
Bautista was in the apartment at the time, as well as one of the overseers, and as a significant warning to him the words were added—"And it shall have its first taste of the flesh of any one, be he Spaniard or native, who betrays my purpose to Señor Long-face."
No wonder the boy desired that some other duty might be commuted to his charge by his patron, in test of his affection. As Montoro rode off with a party of attendants, Bautista made his way to Don, and poured out his fears to an apparently perfectly intelligent pair of ears.
"But all the same, you know quite well, Don," said Bautista reproachfully, "you do know quite well, that in spite of your good Christian bringing up, you would seize a poor redskin by the leg if you were set at him."
"Of course he would, like the sensible thoroughbred he is," shouted a well-known voice not a couple of yards distant. And Bautista sprang to his feet with a terrified look on his face, as he saw the hateful head overseer, Jerome Tivoli, had come up to him unperceived.
The man now stood intently regarding the dog, with a more sinister expression than usual upon his cruel face, and the boy could scarcely restrain himself from flying away from the spot. Nothing short of his loyal devotion to his patron could have kept him there. At last he said huskily—
"It is useless so to examine this dog, for, strong or weak, you can have nought to do with it, since it belongs to the Señor Diego, and he chooses not that it should be used for your purposes."
De Tivoli uttered a short, hard laugh, and his eyes glittered as he said slowly—
"Ah! yes. It is the Señor Montoro de Diego's dog—-his favourite. And verily it is a fine animal, and powerful, and will do a day's work well for us. That dog of a slave Guatchi has run away, and, dead or alive, yon pet of our Señor Diego shall bring him back to us."
Bautista flung himself down again beside the dog, and threw his arms about its neck, as he exclaimed with the courage of affection—
"No! I tell thee no, Señor Tivoli. Señor Diego has left it to me to guard his dog from doing harm, and I will keep my charge."
De Tivoli's thin lips curled; but ere he could reply other footsteps were heard approaching, and Don Alonzo himself appeared upon the scene.
"How now, De Tivoli," he exclaimed hastily. "Why dost thou waste time? The idle rascal Guatchi hath had start enough, I trow, to breathe the dog e'en now; why dost thou delay?"
"It is but for a minute, Don Alonzo," replied the other coolly. "Yon boy declares that, for Don Diego's sake, it shall not be sent hunting."
"And I," retorted Don Alonzo, "swear by St. Jago that it shall."
"And I, in the name of one higher," exclaimed Montoro de Diego, thus unexpectedly making his own appearance on the scene again, "I declare, with Bautista, that it shall not go."
Don Alonzo started slightly, and his face flushed for a moment with ill-restrained annoyance and uneasiness as he saw that set, resolute countenance before him; but he tried to assume an air of carelessness, and to laugh away the matter with an off-hand—
"Why, my mentor, how have you contrived to accomplish the business you had in hand so quickly? What brings you back so soon?"
"Your good genius, I feel inclined to imagine," was Montoro's answer, in tones somewhat quieter than those of his first exclamation. But the fading sparkle in his eyes rekindled as his companion replied irritably—
"Then I wish the meddlesome beast had minded its own business, instead of sending you back here to pull a long face over what I mean to do in spite of it."
As he spoke he walked up to where the dog Don lay tethered, held a strip of cotton cloth to its nose, and then muttering viciously—
"Find him, Don, find him!" pressed his finger hastily on the spring of the dog's collar, and set it free.
The great animal bounded forward. The next instant there was a howl, a moan, and Don lay dying at Montoro's feet; rather, one should say, at Montoro's knees, for the young man had sunk on to them almost as soon as his own fist had fallen with that lightning stroke, and the same hand that had dealt the death-blow was now soothing the poor brute's last agonies. It was Montoro de Diego who had killed it, and yet it was to Montoro's face that the pleading brown eyes were lifted with their last gaze of affection, and it was Montoro's hand that the dying tongue licked with the last breath.
"My poor old Don," muttered Montoro huskily, as he tenderly pressed the side quivering with the death struggle; "poor old Don."
"It's fine for thee to pity the poor brute when it owes its sufferings to thy malice," exclaimed Don Alonzo furiously, and with fingers on the hilt of his dagger, as though they itched to lay his companion beside the animal.
But Diego paid no seeming heed to the show of rage. Maintaining his kneeling position for a while longer, he replied quietly—
"Yes, it once owed its life to me, and now it owes its death to me, and better so than it should have been the innocent cause of suffering to one of our human brethren, for whom the cross rose on Calvary."
And then he rose from beside the dog's dead body, and turned slowly away with a saddened face. In spite of its ferocious nature, the animal had always been most docile with him; and besides, it had been that oft-felt link with his mother's home. How long ago now seemed that first day of parting from his country, when Rachel de Diego's slender fingers had rested for a few moments on the animal's head. Her son would far rather have a second time undergone some peril to save its life, than have had to destroy it for the prevention of a crime.
"Ah, Señor," murmured Bautista, as he crept out on to the verandah after him a few minutes later. "Ah, Señor, you have saved poor Guatchi's limbs from being mangled; but I doubt me you have made an enemy for yourself."
"You were willing to do the same in the same cause, Bautista," was the answer with a grave smile of approval. "I knew not that thou wast so staunchly ranged on the side of justice and mercy. Henceforth we are friends."
The boy sprang forward to clasp the hand held out to him, and said eagerly—
"To follow in your steps, Señor, I began to remind myself that the Indians' flesh had feelings like our own, but my past month in the mines has been a black lesson in horror that I would not repeat to escape the pains of purgatory. These Indians are tenfold weaker than we are, and their sufferings are tenfold more, for they have learnt nothing of manhood to sustain them. You have seen them die here in the plantations, Señor, and that has roused your pity; but in those mines it is not that some die, but that none survive. A few days of that dismal work beneath cuffs and lashes, and their strength is spent—"
"And then?" came the short query.
"And then," ended the boy with a sort of gasp for breath, "they sink to the ground, and the brutal kick given to rouse them up to continued labour, is the accompaniment of their last breath. It is little wonder, Señor, that I should wish poor Guatchi to get away free, now that he has escaped such toil alive."
The whole fervour of the boy's susceptible nature was aroused, and Montoro felt more than ever convinced that he was in the presence of one whose spirit was akin to his own.
"Hearken, Bautista," he said, after a short pause. "I have within the past few hours copied out part of a commission against the miserable inhabitants of this new world, lately granted by our king, and framed by the greatest divines and lawyers of our old home. Alonso de Ojeda and Diego de Nicuessa bear drafts of this commission with them, and be well assured that they will not spare its execution. But stay; I will read thee the very words themselves, addressed for peremptory orders to these poor heathen, ignorant of the very language in which we call upon them to obey our faith and laws:—'If you will not consent to take our Church for your Church, the holy father the Pope for your spiritual head, our king for your king and sovereign lord over your kings and countries, then, with the help of God, I will enter your country by force; I will carry on war against you with the utmost violence; I will subject you to the yoke of obedience; I will take your wives and children and will make them slaves; I will seize your goods, and do you all the mischief in my power, as rebellious subjects, who will not submit to their lawful sovereign. And I protest that all the bloodshed and calamities that shall follow shall be due to you, and not to us.'"[2]
As Montoro came to the end of his sheet he folded and replaced it in his pocket, and then, utterly forgetful of his companion in his reawakened indignation, he wandered away from the verandah, and betook himself to the simple dwelling of the good clerigo, Bartholomew de las Casas, who was now finally settled in Hispaniola, by royal desire, as a missionary to the natives.
"But of what use," he exclaimed this afternoon in sorrowful despair to his equally weary-hearted visitor, "of what use, Diego, to waste our time and strength, in trying to teach the sublime truths of religion to men whose spirits are broken, and their minds weakened by oppression?"
"Of what use, indeed," assented Montoro with passion, "to try to teach men to believe in a religion professing itself the religion of love and mercy, while they are slaves to those calling themselves its followers, and who are acting at the same time the part of demons!"
"You speak strongly," said the true-hearted, good Christian bishop. "But verily I cannot say you have not reason. Knowest thou, my friend, that when first we settled ourselves upon this fertile fragrant island, not yet fifteen years ago, the inhabitants numbered above three millions, and now they scarcely amount to fifteen thousand. Scarcely fifteen thousand!" he repeated slowly, and in awe-struck tones, as though he scarcely could endure to recall the awful fact to his own remembrance.
Montoro de Diego looked at his informant with a startled countenance, and then suddenly bent his eyes upon the ground as though he expected to see the 'brothers' blood' crying for vengeance from the soil.
"It is no good," he exclaimed at last. "I will stay in this accursed place no longer. To my restlessness I might have opposed a sense of duty; but to fight any longer against my miserable disgust at the scenes around me is beyond my strength."
The bishop mused awhile before replying slowly,—
"And yet, good example is valuable."
"Elsewhere it may be, but not here," returned Diego hastily. "Else, Riverenza, must your own bright example long since have turned devils into saints, murderers into good Samaritans. What good did your example do, even in the matter of the repartimientos? Did your giving up your share of these unjustly and basely-enslaved creatures serve any other purpose than that of impoverishing one who ever uses his wealth for the relief of suffering? Nay, further, your good example on this accursed island worked actually on the side of evil."
"How so?" asked Las Casas. But he looked as though he knew the answer, even before his companion said heavily,—
"Even we reaped some miserable advantage at 'Palmyra' from your renunciation. Some half-dozen poor creatures who had thriven under your mild rule were made over to us to die. But see," Montoro suddenly exclaimed, interrupting himself and springing to his feet, "the day is passing, and I should have been in San Domingo hours ago. I started early enough, but some suspicion that I was leaving mischief behind me brought me back, and now poor Don is dead."
It was only a dog that was dead, but that dog was Don—the dog on whose head his mother's tears had fallen—the dog for whose sake he had once endangered his own life; and with these thoughts suddenly recalled to his mind, Montoro de Diego was glad to beat a hasty retreat from further observation.
Las Casas remained deep in earnest ponderings long after his friend had left him, for he too had begun to think that it was vain to continue his efforts of philanthropy any longer on the island of Hispaniola, and that he would do wisely to exert his influence as protector of the Indians in new fields, less overcrowded with the refuse population of his own country.
Meantime Montoro reached the town, and was instantly accosted by a young man of about his own age, and tall, bright, and handsome as himself, but with a dash of off-hand daring about his person and manner instead of Montoro's lofty dignity.
"Diego!" he exclaimed, as soon as he caught sight of him, "you are just the comrade I most desire in our coming campaign. Throw thy paltry bales into the sea, man, and enrol thyself under our captain's standard."
"But who then is thy captain?" asked Montoro with some interest, "and what is this new campaign? Thou art ever mad, my Cortes, upon some fresh undertaking."
The handsome young notary laughed.
"Better that than sticking to the same spot till thy feet bid fair to grow to the soil, like thy money-grubber, Don Alonzo, yonder. But, I warrant thee, this undertaking now on hand is no mere pastime for a summer's evening. Our captain, Don Diego Velasquez, hath it in commission to conquer an island, the island of Cuba."
"Ay, doubtless," returned Montoro bitterly. "And hath also leave and licence, and perchance it may be even orders likewise, to kill off the inhabitants there, like so many mosquitoes, as hath been done here!"
The other shrugged his shoulders rather contemptuously.
"Verily, Diego, thou and our bishop yonder have been bitten by the same dog. But to comfort thy heart, know that Bartholomew Las Casas is to be invited to go with us to guard thy pets, lest one of us should so much as slap one of their brats to still its overmuch squalling at strange faces. So, what say'st thou now?"
Montoro's face cleared to a smile.
"This is what I say—that if Las Casas goes, then do I go also."