CHAPTER XIX.
THE WAY TO TREAT THE REDSKINS.
"Montoro! I say, Montoro, I have news for thee."
"Out with it then," came the answer from our friend, who was once more engaged in his occupation of eight years before at Veragua. Houses were built there for a colony that was never founded, and now Montoro and his companions were building houses on the island of Cuba, with a very fair prospect of inhabiting them.
Only one chief had offered any determined resistance to the invaders, and even his followers were not numerous enough to excite much anxiety. He had fled from his native land of Hispaniola to escape the Spanish rule, and now he was brought to bay, and compelled to make a final effort for independence. It had just been decided to send out a party against him, strong enough, as Velasquez put it, "To conquer the rebel once for all, and have done with it."
"And I am to be one of the party," said Juan de Cabrera, excitedly. "And if you choose you also are to have a hand in catching this Hatuey, and helping to make him an example."
"He is that already," replied Montoro gravely. "Would that the poor sheep, his countrymen, knew how to profit by it."
"By my faith," exclaimed Cabrera impatiently, "you are a queer fellow, Diego. Wouldst thou then that these 'poor sheep,' who are as a hundred to one of us, should know their strength, and shoot us down like vermin in a barn?"
Montoro flung down the great wooden hammer with which he had been driving stakes, and came forward, his face set with mingled sternness and sorrow.
"Ay, truly, Juan de Cabrera, less would it shame me that the heathen should thus treat us, than to know that we Christians have acted that hideous part towards them. Hast thou heard of the late campaign in Trinidad, where our countrymen have burnt alive in cold blood—to save trouble!—nigh upon two hundred men and women, and innocent babes scarcely more helpless than their kind and gentle-natured fathers? How shall Spanish tears or Spanish blood, thinkest thou, ever wash out that foul stain?"
Juan de Cabrera turned away for a moment, for he had no answer ready. When he turned round again he said, with an assumption of flippancy he was for once far from feeling,—
"Ah, well, I have not heard this shady tale before, and I don't suppose that it has lost any of its shadows by coming through thy lips. Doubtless it was but a toss up whether our brethren should be killed, or should kill."
"Not so," said Montoro, sternly. "Juan Bono hath confessed, himself, that the unhappy creatures whom he thus repaid had been as fathers and mothers to him, and to all his party; but he had been sent to make slaves, and he made them the more readily by burning part of the population before resistance was dreamt of."
He stopped abruptly, and stooped to pick up his tool. Then once more raising his eyes to his companion's face, he said slowly and quietly—
"That is all; but a ghastly all; and I would to God that the heathen had shot me ere I heard it."
There was a long silence after this ere Cabrera ventured once more to ask—
"But, Diego, for all this thou wilt join us, wilt thou not? Even for the sake of thine own feelings thou shouldst do so to help in the promotion of fair play."
"If I were the Governor himself," said Montoro hastily, "I should exert myself in vain for justice where this unfortunate Hatuey is concerned. He has been as a king in his own land, and now we dare to proclaim him a rebel because he proves himself a patriot, and in the face of despair fights for his country and his people's liberty. No; I will have nought to do with 'catching' this noble-hearted heathen Cacique, and aiding to throw him into slavery."
Cabrera cast a keen, furtive glance at his companion at the utterance of that last word. Evidently, although Diego had heard that horrible Trinidad news, he had not yet heard of the doom pronounced against the troublesomely desperate Cacique of Hispaniola, when he should be once safely caught in the hands of the Cuban governor. As for Don Juan de Cabrera, he had no inclination to give the information. To turn the subject, he said after a short pause—
"Well then, friend Diego, if thou comest not with us, what is it thou hast a mind to? Something nobler, I trust, than wood-cutting, as though thou wert born a boor in a German forest rather than a Spanish nobleman."
"I feel little inclined to boast just now of my Spanish birthright, I can tell thee," said Montoro heavily. "But to answer thy question—Ay; I have other plans on hand than my present employment. I accompany Las Casas on his progress of pacification through the island, and we hope great things from our efforts, both for the natives and the colony."
Cabrera's shoulders went up in a slight shrug, almost in spite of himself.
"It is to be hoped that you and the clerigo have picked your associates carefully for your peaceful expedition," he said, with a touch of scorn. "Otherwise I fear me there may chance some rubs to your tender consciences ere it is accomplished."
"Little danger," answered Montoro, confidently, adding with a smile, "for we have, as you say, chosen our companions with due thought. You see, we have not invited you."
Juan de Cabrera laughed.
"Thanks for the compliment, my friend. I would a hundred-fold rather be found guilty of too much impetuosity, than of a calm, cold-blooded calculation."
The smile died out of Montoro's face as he now exclaimed hotly—
"It is easy at all times for men to sneer at right and justice, and to clothe evil with grand words. In Spain our impetuosity has been a sword in the hand of honour; why is it here a weapon that would be disdained even by the paid tool of an assassin? But there, Juan, I but waste my breath on thee. This is no true impetuosity, no true impulsive daring, that robs and massacres the harmless peoples of these lands; but rather is it the base, despicable, grovelling fruit of cold-blooded reckonings of ounces of gold against lives. By heaven, I—"
"There, there, Toro," interrupted the light-hearted cavalier, with unusual quietness of manner, "do not spend thy eloquence upon an unworthy mortal like me. And for thy solace learn that, although methinks thou and the clerigo draw the line too fine, I loathe some of our doings out here well-nigh as greatly as thou canst do thyself. But adios, for my party will be starting on the Hatuey hunt without me if I do not hasten."
So saying, the gay adventurer departed with an air as jaunty as though he were bound for one of the Court tournaments of Spain, to be rewarded by winning kingly smiles and his lady's scarf. And shortly after his friend Montoro de Diego, with Las Casas, departed on their Cuban tour, accompanied by a number of armed followers, who were intended, by their formidable appearance, to ensure unbroken peace, not to win it after battle. But unhappily Juan de Cabrera's prognostications proved truer than Diego's hopes.
"Well, comrade," said a soldier to a companion at the evening halt of the first day's march; "well, comrade, thou hast then recovered health and strength in time to have another try for fortune; at any rate for such flimsy fragments as our present soft-hearted leaders will permit us to accept. For my part, I had fain that I had been rather sent off after the rebel Cacique. There will be more pickings to be gathered up there I doubt, than we shall be able to find baskets for in this direction. But as for saving souls—"
"As for saving souls," interrupted the man addressed in a deep, fierce tone; "as for that matter, Guzman, we will save our own souls by clearing God's earth of these vile, idol-serving vermin. Joshua was sent forth of old, as Father Gonzalo saith, to rid the world of the heathen, and so have we the like mission now. And for one Andrea Botello will obey."
Guzman stared.
"My faith, Botello, let not the noble Señor Diego hear thee speak thus, or thou wilt most assuredly get ordered back to the settlement again!"
But Botello's eyes blazed with a yet fiercer fire, and his brow grew blacker, as he muttered:
"Against those who have a mission from on high, man's orders avail nought. The commands to slay and destroy, and leave not one remaining, have come to me from authority, supreme e'en over the Governor Velasquez himself. Speak not to me of orders!"
"Nay, then, that will I not," murmured Guzman to himself, as he went off to more cheerful companions. "I will spend no more words on thee, friend Botello," he continued in soliloquy, "so long as it appears that the remnants of thy late fever are yet burning in thy veins. It might chance thou wouldst find thou hadst an order to stick thy poniard into me."
A few minutes later the prudent soldier was consulting with some friends, whether a warning hint respecting Botello's aspirations should not be given to their priest commander.
"But say, then," laughed another, "what need to trouble the good clerigo for nought? What can one man's moody fancies do of harm, with so many against him on the other side?"
"Umph, no," said another, somewhat less confidently; "if all the rest are on the other side; but one fanatic can make an army of disciples, if his feelings be but strong enough."
"Just so," was the off-hand reply. "If they be strong enough, but not if they be the half-delirious fancies of a sick man, who ought still to be in his bed at St. Jago yonder, instead of travelling with us. But come on, let's hurry up to that party of redskins over there; they seem well laden, and for my part I prefer to dine on their providing than on my own, or that of our commanders. They treat us better."
The whole of the little expedition, including Las Casas and Montoro, appeared to be of the same way of thinking, to judge by the way the hospitable and kind-hearted Indians were soon surrounded. Whether owing to the absence of newspapers and telegrams in those days, or to the hopes of the poor inhabitants of the New World that kindness would gain kindness, at any rate in their own case, cannot now be said; but while the refugee Cacique, who had fled from the barbarities of the Spaniards on his own island, was being hunted down in one part of Cuba, in another the gentle, courteous natives were treating their invaders with the most true-hearted friendliness.
"They must, verily, be worse than the tigers of the forests who harm these simple creatures!" exclaimed Montoro one day, as a number of Indians hastened to the new encampment with the farewell offerings of fruit, rice, cooked food, and various little presents as tokens of peace and good-will, accepting smiles for thanks with inborn graciousness.
Las Casas smiled at his friend's ardour.
"I feel now," he said joyously, "that I can afford to smile, for all things here are going forward as I would wish. The natives are learning that there are at least some amongst the white men who have a knowledge of right and wrong. And for these with us, Montoro, thinkest thou not that they have begun to find it pleasant to continue in well-doing, and to awaken smiles instead of tears? For myself, I do hope so, I confess."
"And I," assented Montoro earnestly. "I do believe, my father, that thy noble example has reaped at length the good fruit it has so long merited."
The two friends passed on, nor marked a pallid-faced, fierce-eyed man, who had stood near them, and now muttered between his teeth, gazing after the clerigo:
"Tremble, thou Saul, who wouldst spare Agag, and the chief of the spoil, when thou shouldst destroy! Guard thyself, lest the vengeance that falls upon the enemies of the Cross encompass thee also, as were meet."
CHAPTER XX.
THE MASSACRE AT CAONAO.
Some weeks had passed, and all had hitherto gone well, when one day, on arriving at the suburbs of the native town of Caonao, Las Casas announced it to be his intention to remain there two or three days, making it the limit of his present expedition, and then to return to the head-quarters of Velasquez, with the report of their doings and adventures.
"Meantime," he said, with the cheerful good-humour proper to his nature when at ease for others—"meantime we will make holiday for the next forty-eight hours."
"And," said Diego smiling, "thanks to our good red brothers here, we can also give our holiday its proper accompaniment of feasting."
"Just so," agreed Las Casas, with an answering smile. "I confess the truth; it was the sight of the abundant supplies of all kinds with which we are provided, that led me to resolve on marking this terminus of our pleasant expedition with something of the nature of a festival. Gather the men for me, Diego, some into the surrounding houses, the remainder may well encamp out here in these gardens, fit for Paradise itself."
"And for yourself, father?" asked Montoro. "Are you bent on other explorations?"
"Not very distant ones," was the bright answer. "I am but about to explore yon temple, and endeavour to use my stammering tongue for God's glory with its inmates. They may now better believe, I trust, that we come as bearers of a message of mercy."
"Truly I hope so," replied Montoro, as he nodded the brief adieu to his friend, and then turned quickly to execute the duties committed to him. In thus hastily turning, he almost knocked over a man who, unobserved, had silently moved up close to the two chiefs of the party, until he stood almost shoulder to shoulder with de Diego.
Diego was about to administer a sharp and haughty reproof to the presumptuous intruder on the society of his superiors, but a second look at his companion checked the words on his lips; and he stood a listener instead of a speaker, as the man uttered, through drawn lips that scarcely moved, a wild denunciation of the Amorites, the Hivites, the Canaanites, the Hittites, the Perizzites, the Gergashites, and the Jebusites.
Those who hear of the matter now may feel tempted to smile, but there was no smile on the countenance of the young nobleman, no feeling of mirth in his heart, as he stood facing the mad fanatic. The man's eyes were fixed in a glassy stare that saw nought then visible; and his eager, bloodthirsty curses against those he denounced as the enemies of God, and of his Christ, made Montoro's blood run cold.
"Friend," he began at last—"friend, rouse thyself. Recall thy scattered thoughts. Those enemies of God's people, and daring breakers of His laws, have perished for their iniquities more than two thousand years ago. What priestly tales from the Holy Scriptures have been startling thy ears of late?"
"He hath been ill, at death's door with malarious fever, but a few days before joining this expedition, Señor," answered another of the soldiers coming forward now, and hastily putting his hand on his comrade's arm, as though to draw him away, but at the same time with an air of secret warning which, at another time, would not have escaped the keen eyes of the young officer. Now, however, Montoro was anxious to get the clerigo's wishes carried out before his return on the scene, and he was more intent on taking a view of the ground around him, as to its capabilities for comfortable encampment, than in noting the actions of individuals.
"See," he said kindly, but somewhat absently, "yonder come our kind Indian friends with supplies of water; doubtless thy comrade is suffering from thirst. Go forward with him, and see that his wants are well attended to."
The man bowed, and quickly pulled his companion on to hinder the word answer he seemed about to give.
"Thou art a very fool, Botello," he muttered angrily, when out of earshot of Diego. "Of what good to rouse us up to help fulfil thy purpose, when thy blabbing lips must go well-nigh to betray it, to the one of all others most keen to hinder it. The clerigo hath some thoughts to spare from his red lambs to his own comfortable living, but this Señor Diego carrieth the vile heathen on his back to his own greatest detriment. Verily, methinks he would far sooner have that sword of thine pierce him than one of them."
Botello turned, with those dull-burning, sullen eyes of his fixed upon his friend.
"If it is thus with him," he said between his clenched teeth, "then will he receive due punishment in witnessing the slaughter of those he thus dares to cherish. But come, the hour has arrived, and the victims."
And suddenly, with a wild cry, he dashed forward towards a group of some hundreds of defenceless Indians—men, women, and children—laden with fruits, and jars of water for their Spanish guests. Snatching his sword from its sheath it flashed for a few moments in the sun, as he brandished it on high, and then, with a madman's howl, he plunged it into the bodies of an infant and its mother who was advancing with a timid smile to offer drink to the thirsty travellers.
Tearing the reeking weapon from his first quivering victims he rushed on over them, dealing death and wounds frantically around him. For some moments he was alone in his dread activity. The Indians were spellbound with the dismal horror. Even his own fellows were awe-struck with the impetus of the hideous onslaught.
But quickly the scene changed. In his fatal career the wretched madman cut down the beloved young squaw of a tall and unusually powerful Indian, before he could fling himself before her as a cover. Baffled of his loving effort he threw himself upon the Spaniard, utterly regardless, in his despairing fury, of the blood-dripping sword. Snapping it with his hands as though it had been a thread from his native cotton plants, he tossed away the pieces, and then, with those sinewy, disengaged fingers, throttled his antagonist, and cast the dead body of the wretched Botello beside that of the murdered Indian.
The red man's ferocious shout of triumph was the signal for answering shouts of fury from the Spaniards. They had looked on while innocent and gentle women and children were ruthlessly slaughtered, but the sight of one of their own number slain was one that aroused all their fiercest feelings of revenge, and ere it could be well said that they had had time for thought swords and daggers were flashing in the light, the fair, flower-bestrewn earth was streaming with blood, and mangled bodies of dead and dying creatures, some still clasping their simple offerings, that pleaded for good-will, in their stiffening hands, were piled in awful heaps around the camping ground.
To this drear, sickening sight Montoro de Diego rushed forward as he saw the tumult that was raging. Guzman, one of the few who remained faithful to his leader's trust in him, flew to the temple to summon Las Casas. The redskins' friend was just issuing from the building when his follower reached it, breathless with haste, pallid with horror, and bespattered with gore from the pitiful victims who had been falling in wholesale crowds around him. The countenance of the clerigo turned pale also as he caught sight of the panting soldier.
"What is it?" he exclaimed. "Our brethren—what of them? Is it a massacre?"
Guzman nodded. He could not speak; one word he managed to gasp out—"Go." For a massacre it was indeed, though not of the nature imagined by Las Casas; not a massacre perpetrated by ignorant heathen of those from whom they had scarce ever received ought but wrong, but a massacre barbarously committed by Christians on those from whom they had received nought but kindness and submissive respect. But Las Casas waited not to learn more from his breathless retainer. He saw the wild tumult surging in the distance; he heard the confused roar of mingled shrieks, shouts, yells, and groans; and whatever was going forward that concerned his company his place was in their midst, to die with them if their rescue were no longer possible.
In a moment of time this decision had darted through his brain, and the next instant he was flying over the ground that intervened between the temple of Caonao, and the open plain where the deadliest of the uproar was in awful progress.
Two or three huts of less pretensions than the houses in the town were scattered here and there. Close to the fighting, dying, struggling multitudes stood one of these wooden buildings somewhat larger than the rest. In it a number of the hospitable Indian women had been gathered, a few minutes since, cooking and preparing food for their cruel invaders. Now a panic-stricken, shrieking rabble of both sexes and all ages was dashing into it, Indians pursued by Spaniards—Indians, as Las Casas perceived at the first horror-stricken glance, with nothing but crushed fruits and flowers in their hands, or wounded infants moaning in their arms, Spaniards with blood-dropping, crimsoned swords. Then he knew all. A groan of bitterest anguish burst from his lips—
"Oh, my God!"
The words were a prayer, an abject prayer to the Most High for mercy. Had the earth at that moment opened her black jaws and swallowed up every Spaniard present, had fire from heaven licked them up and carried them to hell, Las Casas would have felt no wonder. He wondered more that an all-powerful God should spare.
One moment he gave to that groan, one moment to that prayer, and then, throwing himself in the doorway of the hut, he dashed aside a half-frenzied soldier who was entering in pursuit of the wretched fugitives, and uttered a mighty, furious shout:
"Back, Spaniards, back, you dastardly mean hounds, every one of you, or run your swords thus hallowed with the blood of the innocents into your leader's body. I invite you to it, fiends every one of you rather than men, that I may the more speedily close mine eyes for ever on this scene fit only for the shades of hell."
Then he looked into the hut upon the huddled flock of trembling, weeping, wounded human sheep. Some had climbed, for refuge from their bloodthirsty pursuers, to the rafters of the roof, and hung there, with their wild eyes gleaming, through their long black hair, down upon events below, and their white teeth chattering for fear.
The sudden appearance of Las Casas upon the spot, and the change of his usual mild demeanour to one of such haughty, biting indignation, had created a temporary, rapid lull about the spot where he stood. A permanent arrest of the massacre in that direction, he all too fondly believed, and so he began to soothe and reassure the poor creatures gathered together for death within the walls of that humble little dwelling. Some few words of comfort in their own language he knew, and spoke most eagerly, but the deep sympathy of his countenance, his pitying eyes, spoke still more eloquently, and above all, his fame had come before him even here, as a father and friend of the helpless.
Gradually some put back the hair from their faces and ventured to look around them, mothers loosened their convulsive grasp of their children, and the climbers on the rafters swung themselves down to the ground again. But even Las Casas could see that all was not yet achieved for the restoration of peace. At a few hundred yards' distance the horrible, shameful work of slaughter still continued, and once more quitting the hut and its defenceless multitude, Bartholomew Las Casas dashed onwards to repeat his efforts at arresting the wholesale murder of defenceless men, helpless women, the aged and the infant.
"Oh, Montoro!" he ejaculated as to himself, as he neared this fresh scene of horror. "Alas! Montoro de Diego, where canst thou have been to allow such things!"
A voice from beside his feet answered him—"I am here, my friend. Disabled at the first moment. But do not heed me. Hasten to save what poor remnant there may yet remain of these unhappy victims."
Las Casas looked at his half fainting friend, then at the dreadful mêlée beyond, and with a hurried—"I will return immediately," he ran on, and a second time hurled his furious commands at his followers to cease their cowardly slaughter of their helpless prey.
A second time the leader's voice and the leader's presence cowed the Spaniards back to order—momentarily. From the rear where the hut lay there suddenly broke upon the air wilder shrieks and yells than had been heard before. Deep oaths and curses of Spanish throats were mingled with the shrill Indian cries, and off darted the soldiers gathered about Las Casas to join their other comrades. They were like so many score of bloodhounds, with the taste for blood so aroused that it could no more be satisfied. Not again could the friend of the Indians reach the doorway of that hut until it had become a charnel-house, so crammed with the dead and dying, that the stoutest heart might turn away from the ghastly task of learning if there were yet any, amongst those heaps of mangled bodies, to whom it might be possible to speak last words of pity.
There had been five hundred living human beings crowded into that building when Las Casas left it ten minutes ago, now there lay there five hundred mangled bodies lying in crimson pools, some already stiff and stark, some writhing in the death agonies, none ever to see the sun in this world again, or to learn on earth that the religion called the Christian faith, which those white intruders came to spread, was not the religion of a demon more vile than any their untaught imaginings had ever dared portray.
A poor mother's despairing wail over her mortally wounded child, had been the slight spark needed to rekindle the blind rage of the Spanish soldiers. A soldier had held a crucifix before the infant's dying eyes, and the mother, fearing fresh cruelties, had wildly dashed it from the man's hand. That was more than provocation enough for gold-seekers who salved their greed for wealth and fame with the plea, that their journeyings were to widen the limits of Christ's kingdom.
Scarcely had the crucifix fallen to the ground ere the murdered woman fell beside it. Many a dead body had the man to move the following day ere he recovered the treasured symbol of an immortal love. All that night the leader of the expedition knelt, alone, in prayer.
All that night Montoro de Diego lay praying, faint and weak from loss of blood, shed at the commencement of the hideous fray in the vain effort to arrest the massacre. Never, so long as Montoro lived, did he hear the name of the little town of Caonao without a shudder, never did he remember the sounds of those women's wails, the sounds of those children's cries of dying agony, without a moan escaping his own lips, and a shivering horror overwhelming him that such things should have been.
One day for a day of burial, and then, in a solemn hush as though a funeral cortége, or a train of vanquished fugitives, the expedition formed again for marching, and retraced its steps to St. Jago. Montoro made one attempt to cheer his friend, but the soothing words were hurriedly put aside.
"Nay, nay, Diego. Speak not to me of comfort in our shame and bitter affliction. I came forth confident in my own strength, in my own power to rule man and to guide those under me in the ways of peace, and the Lord of Hosts has thus humbled my presumptuousness in the dust. Speak not to me of comfort; there is none save in prayer."
CHAPTER XXI.
THE PATRIOT CACIQUE HATUEY.
The march back to the Cuban seat of government was made more rapidly than the march out had been. Then, all had been gaiety and brightness. A band of picked men under a favourite and joyous-natured leader, peace and good-will for their motto, and friendly natives hovering ever around them as they journeyed, to turn each day into one of pleasant feastings.
Now the leader had but stern, grief-stricken eyes to turn upon those under his command, and the men walked on bowed with a sense of well-merited disgrace. Few and far between were the offerings made to them now, and those were bestowed with trembling hands, and countenances marked by abject terror. None of the circumstances of the homeward way tempted the explorers to linger.
But full as was the generous-hearted Montoro's cup of sorrow, it was not yet so full but that it was to be called upon to hold more, even to overflowing.
The shadows of the marching men were beginning to lengthen as they moved along, as though the shades had learnt the art of deception with each hour of the growing day, and wished to startle the whole race of earth's crawlers, beetles, snakes, worms, and their fellows, with the semblance of an oncoming race of giants. The air was full of humming insects, quivering heat, and the rich scent of leaves and flowers.
The Spaniards stepped onwards slowly. They were near the end of their journey now, and their eyes were tired with gazing at that
A hot shimmer over all things, such as Tennyson had never seen when he wrote a line which almost makes one feel warm even on a cold winter's day.
Montoro was feeling depressed and weary, and sentiments of gladness and regret were pretty equally mingled in his breast as he saw the various roofs close before him of the newly-founded town of St. Jago. But personal sorrow cannot be indulged by leaders.
"Put your best feet forward, my friends," cried Bartholomew Las Casas at this moment. However bitterly he might grieve over recent occurrences, there was still sufficient of the spirit of the commander in him to rebel against the notion of reappearing before Velasquez, Cortes, and the rest of their fellow-adventurers, like a company of whipped dogs; but he need not have troubled himself, for an event was taking place at that hour in St. Jago that absorbed all interests.
Hatuey, the Cacique of Hispaniola—Hatuey, the noble, untutored patriot—had been taken prisoner whilst fighting his last battles for freedom and his country, and Hatuey was adjudged to suffer as a rebel! He was to be made an example of, so the Governor declared—to be the scarecrow to frighten all others of his race and the surrounding nations from daring to perform one of the most sacred duties of mankind. The Spaniards acknowledged it to be so for themselves; but then—Hatuey was a heathen, and had refused to be forced into Christianity at the point of the sword.
Las Casas, Montoro, and their followers were close to the town when Montoro de Diego was suddenly almost thrown to the ground by an Indian woman, who flung herself before him with a wild, heart-rending cry, and clasped his knees convulsively.
Already Diego had become known on the island as a friend of the friendless, an eager helper of the helpless, and this poor, despairing creature had been on the look-out for him, during the past hours of that day, with a gnawing agony of longing that had made the hours seem like weeks. He was her last hope, and now, catching sight of him, she flew forward with a wildness of look and manner that made those around believe her to be mad.
And in truth the favourite wife of Hatuey was well-nigh frantic with dread and horror at the threatened fate of the one she loved.
Las Casas and the whole of the small band of warriors drew around as she poured forth her lamentable tale, with groans and sighs and streaming tears, and the countenances of the two leaders glowed with deepening indignation as they listened. At length Montoro lifted himself up with flashing eyes, and turning to his friend exclaimed passionately—
"It seems that we Spaniards are bent on accumulating sins upon our heads, until the measure of Heaven's wrath shall be attained. Give me your permission that I leave you now on the instant, and hasten to avert at any rate this threatened iniquity."
"If it be possible, with the grace of God," murmured Las Casas; but Montoro had hastened away with the Indian woman before the words were uttered, and was already on his road to the Governor's house. The others followed.
"What! returned, my very esteemed friend Diego?" exclaimed the laughing voice of Juan de Cabrera from the verandah of the Governor's residence as the other approached.
Montoro sprang forward more quickly.
"Well met, Cabrera," he cried, in tones so stern that their ordinary melody was lost; "well met, for thou canst tell me where I may most wisely seek the Governor."
"That can I," was the reply more seriously, "or rather, I can tell thee where thou mayest seek him and find him; but as to the wisdom of the search, verily that is another matter. For my part, I am thankful to maintain my present distance between myself and him just now. And if you are prudent you will remain with me, and ask no further questions."
Montoro strode forward still more hastily, and his face paled with emotion as he asked huskily—
"Toy not with me, Juan. Thou canst not surely mean that yon diabolical act of which this woman speaks is already in progress?"
Cabrera bowed, murmuring at the same time—
"Ah! then thou hast heard. I would have spared thee."
Montoro shook himself wrathfully.
"Exert thyself to spare the deeds, not the hearing of them after. Where is the spot that is to be made foul for ever by this crime?"
Cabrera raised his hand, and pointed.
"But, Diego, stay with me. Spare thyself a needless agony. Wert thou eloquent as the archangel Gabriel himself thou wouldst avail nought to turn Velasquez from his present purpose."
Diego was already going off to the place indicated, but he turned back a moment.
"I am not purposing to use my words on Velasquez, but on his prisoner. This poor creature tells me that Hatuey is offered life on one condition. It shall be my office as a humble suppliant to implore him to accept it."
So saying, with a sign to the weeping Indian woman, he darted off with a fiery speed that gave the poor creature at least the comfort of feeling that she had one with her who sympathized with her hapless misery. They were not long in reaching their destination.
Scattered groups of men and women, chiefly Indians, they came up with first, and then there was a dense crowd around a central space occupied by the Governor, a small group of counsellors, and a tall and noble-looking Indian, so still, so silent, so immovably calm of face, that he seemed rather a life-like statue of a Stoic than a human being.
Yet more central still was a great stake surrounded by a pile of faggots, beside which stood two Indian slaves, who were to feel the bitterest sting of slavery in doing to death their champion.
Had Hatuey been a slave, and assigned this post, he would have joined the victim at the stake rather than perform it; but all are not thus noble-minded. Life is sweet, even with floggings, or rather, death has terrors for all men, excepting such as are steeled by doggedness, or for such as are sustained by the hidden strength from on high, a strength to which the Cacique may now have owed his courageous calm, although his Christian murderers scorned him as a heathen.
But his poor, heart-stricken squaw felt no courage, no grand sentiments of resignation, as she caught sight of her chief and husband being now dragged towards the giant pile, and saw the ropes which were to bind his body to the stake. With a piercing cry she tore a way for herself through that dense circle of pitiless Spanish warriors, and cast herself at Hatuey's feet uttering dry gasping moans worse to hear than any weeping. Montoro de Diego followed her through the crowd, and strode up to Velasquez.
"Señor!" he exclaimed, in a voice that vibrated to the depths of many a callous heart of even those hardened listeners by whom he was surrounded; "Señor, already are we as so many Cains in this land; pause ere you give Satan yet another plea against us in the courts above. Lay upon me what burden or what fine you will, and let me ransom yon grand example to all patriots. Give me his life, that the heathen may learn that Spaniards prize true greatness."
He came to a pause in his rapid speech from breathlessness, and then for the first time gave himself full opportunity to notice his hearer's face.
Cynicism and contemptuous indignation were united in the Governor's expression, but there was no hope to be read there for the success of Montoro's prayer.
There was a sarcastic sharpness in Velasquez' voice as he replied—
"Methinks, Señor Diego, you take somewhat too much upon yourself. I trust to teach Spaniards, and the heathen too, to prize true greatness, in the person of one who knows how to punish those who dare to set themselves in defiance to his country. For the rest, ill news travels apace, and we have heard of the brave doings of your peaceful expedition at Caonao. It were a pity that ere you hastened to the rescue of one man you did not spare those hundreds."
"I would have laid down my own life to do so," was the low, hurried answer. "But do not add to my remorse by refusal of this petition."
Velasquez turned himself about to his officers with a scornful laugh, exclaiming—
"Verily, my Señors, 'petition' he calls his demand, backed up by threats of Heaven's thunderbolts for refusal. Humility and arrogance could not well be more perfectly combined."
The great man's laugh was subserviently echoed by some throats, whilst some other of the faces showed shame, or indifference to the spectacle before them.
Montoro de Diego stood yet for some moments gazing with deep, solemn eyes at the Governor. Years before, his father had pleaded for a life with the Inquisitor, Arbues de Epila, and vainly, and had left a true prophecy behind him when he left. So now the son. Turning his eyes slowly from one to another of the group, and then of the wide circle, Montoro raised his hand and cried aloud—
"As that man stands there doomed most basely to a barbarous and cruel death, so may many standing here now, at no long distant date, know what it is to await a horrible death at the pitiless hand of savages."
"He is offered mercy if he will become a Christian," suddenly said the Governor with some change of tone, and an involuntary shudder at the horrible mental pictures conjured up by the denunciation.
Montoro started. Yes; he had forgotten that. He had forgotten there was yet a hope, and that it was to that he had intended to cling when he accompanied the Indian woman to the scene of judgment. Wasting neither time nor words on ceremony, he turned his back on the Governor, and followed the woman to the edge of the faggot-pile, in the centre of which Hatuey stood, already bound to the stake, and utterly calm as ever, excepting when his eyes seemed constrained to rest upon the sobbing woman at his feet.
The priest, Father Olmedo, now stood beside him, exhorting him to change his faith and save his soul. But the admonitions were as though spoken to the wind, for all the heed the Cacique appeared to pay.
The priest, Father Olmedo, now stood beside him, exhorting him to change his faith and save his soul. But the admonitions were as though spoken to the wind for all the heed the Cacique appeared to pay.
"It is useless," said Father Olmedo at last. "I have done all I can for mercy's sake, and for the glory of our most holy faith, but he is obstinate and irreclaimable. He will not hearken to me. He will not be saved. Slaves, light the pile."
The Indians raised their torches, a thrill ran through the assembled multitude, the crouching woman sprang to her feet with a piercing shriek, flinging her arms above her head, and Montoro sprang forward, shouting in stentorian tones to the faggot-lighters,
"Hold!"
There was a moment's pause. Some gleam of thankfulness began to come into the executioners' eyes. The woman dropped her arms to clasp her hands with renewed hope and entreaty. A shade of half-impatient curiosity gathered on the Cacique's face. He had betrayed no agitation at impending death, but this reprieve troubled him. And it was only a reprieve.
The passionate earnestness of Montoro did touch some answering chord in the Indian's breast which the priest had not known how to reach, and, but for that swift-flying news from Caonao, Hatuey might have consented to look forward to the Paradise which Montoro painted in such glowing colours. But, as he listened with some signs of yielding on his face, recollections crowded back upon his mind, and suddenly turning full to Montoro, he asked with startling abruptness—
"But tell me then, assure me of this. There are two of these abodes of bliss, are there?—two of these glorious, sunlit homes of paradise?"
Diego's eyes widened with wonder. So earnest, so eager were the tone and manner of the questioner as he put his singular query, that the answer was not at once forthcoming. He repeated it impatiently.
"Tell me then, and truly, if one of the white-faces knows how to speak the truth—has this gracious Lord of whom you speak provided one Paradise for those of your race, another for His children here? I would know that before I hear ought else, or give my answer to your plea."
Yet again Montoro paused an instant, and then he replied slowly and distinctly—
"They shall be one fold under one Shepherd. Spaniards and Indians who have been good, and loved their Lord, will live there together in love."
As that last word was uttered the Cacique drew himself up to his full height once more, and with curling lip exclaimed—
"In love, you say! Ah! in love such as that which murdered my people in Haiti, and drove me from my home! In love such as that which has hunted me to death, and will look on now to note exultingly if my tortured body writhes! In love such as that which has slain the hundreds of the innocent and the helpless at Caonao! The love of the wild cat or of the rattle-snake! I spurn your love! I hate your love! and will none of your Lord nor of your Paradise. Our gods teach us not such love. Light your fires quickly. I welcome your faggots and their flames. I long to escape from the sight of the faces of the dastard white men to my own heaven, where nought so vile as a Spaniard can ever hope to enter."
Montoro fell back stunned from before the dark face working with mortal hatred. Stumbling against the woman, who once again lay moaning on the ground, he stooped to raise her, and the next moment he himself, with his swooning charge, was dragged back from the lighted pile, and forced by friendly hands to the outside of the wide circle; while Hatuey, the heathen patriot, was burnt to death by Spaniards claiming to do all things "for the glory of the Christian faith."
"And thus," murmured Las Casas as he withdrew, sick-hearted, from the dismal scene,—"thus do they let the light of the Gospel shine, even with a lurid light that makes it to be abhorred."
"As I abhor this land," groaned Montoro. "I have fled from the horrors of Hispaniola, and now I am driven forth once more to find, if it be possible, a land where I may dare without shame to confess myself a Spaniard."
CHAPTER XXII.
ANOTHER STORM FOR THE PILOT ALAMINOS.
It was the 18th day of February, 1519, an eventful day for many a one besides Montoro de Diego.
The sun was sparkling on the wavelets in the bay, and on the sails of the little fleet riding at anchor in the harbour of the so-called town of Cape St. Vincent, at the westerly extremity of the island of Cuba. The brilliant rays of that southern sun were also shining on an eager assemblage of possibly nine hundred men, who considered themselves quite sufficient for the conquering of great nations.
Dark native faces with smooth cheeks and chins, and surrounded by lank black hair, showed conspicuously amongst the greater numbers of their Spanish comrades. Guns, crossbows, gleaming armour, and a small, precious little troop of sixteen hardly-acquired horses, were also gathered there on the strand awaiting embarkation. And over all waved the great banner of black velvet with its embroiderings of gold.
Many of those stern great Spanish eyes were raised with devout gaze to its crimson cross, set in flames of azure and white, and to its Latin motto:—
"Friends, let us follow the cross; and under this sign, if we have faith, we shall conquer."
Once, as Montoro de Diego lifted his glance to those words, he quietly clasped his hands in silent prayer. But the action had not been secret enough to escape the observation of that scoffing, sharp-sighted Juan de Cabrera, and he muttered flippantly—
"Nay then, comrade, lower your looks a little. There yonder is the sign I follow, and so long as we all hold together and have faith in that, never you fear but we'll conquer, if even that gay-gilt red and black thing should fall overboard."
Instinctively Montoro followed the direction of his companions glance towards the "sign" indicated—a man about his own age, slightly above middle height, and singularly handsome, both in face and figure. His complexion was pale, and his large dark eyes gave an expression of gravity to a countenance otherwise indicating cheerfulness. His figure was slender, but his chest deep, his shoulders broad, his frame muscular and well-proportioned, presenting a union of agility and vigour that qualified him to excel in fencing, horsemanship, and the other generous exercises of chivalry, and to bear with well-known indifference any amount of toil and privation.
This strikingly handsome form and countenance were further set off with all the advantages of rich, well-studied dress, and a few magnificent ornaments of great value. All combined to mark the frank, gay-hearted soldier, the cool, resolute, calculating man, born to command, and determined to be obeyed.
Such was Hernando Cortes, the commander of this present expedition to the mainland of America, which was destined to be so memorable for those engaged in it, and for the world. And such as he was, he possessed the almost unbounded love and confidence, not only of Juan de Cabrera, but of all those now enlisted under his standard. Officers and privates, any or all of them, would have cheerfully laid down their lives for him.
Nevertheless, with some few of them the Cross came first. Gold, renown, adventure, excitement for themselves, honour for their leader, but above all, triumph for the Cross; and so ready ears hearkened to him as he stood there, splendid in hope and beauty and strength, radiant in the clear morning light, and exclaimed—
"My brothers, we are entering on an enterprise that shall make our names famous to after-ages. We go from this tiny bay as the conquerors of nations vaster than our own country, and fit to be the gardens of Paradise. I hold out to you a glorious prize, but it is to be won by incessant toil. Great things are achieved only by great exertions, and glory was never the reward of sloth. If I have laboured hard, and staked my all on this undertaking, it is for the love of that renown which is the noblest recompense of man. But if any among you covet riches more, be but true to me as I will be true to you, and I will make you masters of such as our countrymen have never dreamed of. You are few in number, but strong in resolution; and, if this does not falter, doubt not but that the Almighty, who has never deserted the Spaniard in his contest with the infidel, will shield you, though encompassed by a cloud of enemies; for your cause is a just cause, and you are to fight under the banner of the Cross."[3]
"God grant," murmured Diego, "that that sign of Divine love may wave over scenes less dismal in our future conquests, than it has done in the past."
But with the exception of the good priest, Father Bartolomé de Olmedo, none were in a humour to pay attention to the sigh. The spirited speech of the general had set all the chords of ambition, avarice, and religious zeal vibrating, and the whole force was burning with impatience to set out, without a moment's loss of time, on the promised career of triumphant conquest. Solemn mass was forthwith celebrated by the two priests accompanying the expedition, the fleet was placed under the immediate protection of St. Peter, the commander's patron saint, and, weighing anchor, it took its departure for the coast of Yucatan.
A glorious day for Spain, as men count glory, was that February day of 1519, but so black a day for the unhappy native kingdoms of America that one learns, almost with a thrill of thankfulness, that it was not to be all sunshine for the ruthless conquerors. Bright weather gave place to hurricanes, and the ships were scattered in every direction in that unknown sea. Only on board the general's own ship was a pilot who could pretend to any accurate knowledge of those storm-tossed waters, and even he looked grave, that old Antonio de Alaminos, who had acted as pilot to the great Columbus in his last voyage in 1502, and who regarded the fact as the greatest glory of his chequered life.
In the height of the tempest a voice beside his elbow, a voice singularly clear and sweet even for that Spanish tongue, said calmly, and with no shade of anxiety in the tones—
"Thinkest thou, Alaminos, that we shall live out the storm?"
The old pilot turned, and cast a hasty glance at the speaker's face. It was one worth looking at—a noble face, with the stamp of uprightness on the brow, and a perfect peacefulness in the eyes, even at that moment when Death's lean claws seemed already to have the cranky ship in his clutch, and to be dragging it, and its helpless living freight, into the vortex of those whirlpool depths.
That first swift glance Alaminos repeated with a longer one—one that had a sudden question in it, and a puzzled memory. At last he asked quickly—
"Have you been on board this vessel, captain, since we cast off from St. Jago? Have I seen you, or heard you speak, during the past few days?"
"Never a word of speech hast thou heard from my lips until now, since I enrolled myself under the banner of Hernan Cortes," was the answer, with a passing smile.
"And I have only since yesterday been chosen to form one of the company on board this ship. Nevertheless, thou hast seen me before, good Alaminos, and heard my voice, and then," with another of those fleeting smiles, "thou wast pleased to give me good words in return, as also did our great and grand old Admiral."
Again that keen, swift, puzzled glance from the old pilot's eyes, ere he passed his sleeve over them, to get rid of the sudden tribute they paid to the memory of that same grand old Admiral who had died nearly thirteen years ago. Montoro blinked his own eyelids for a moment before he added—
"Ay, Antonio, it is now within a couple of months of seventeen long years since a lean-cheeked, ignorant boy stole up to thy side one day in these same waters, and asked thee for the first time that question: 'Thinkest thou that we shall live out this storm?'"
"And as then, so now," answered Antonio de Alaminos, with wondering recollection, "the storm begins to fall to calm, even as the words are spoken. Your eyes, Señor, and your voice are the same as then; is the fearless, holy faith the same that made that wise, noble boy so calm and brave in the face of death? or—doth the man but mock his boyhood by the repetition of those words?"
The privileged old pilot put his queries sturdily, and backed them with one of those clear, searching glances that had the faculty of reading men as cleverly as shores, shoals, and quicksands. But the heart of Montoro de Diego had little to hide; the flush that burnt in the bronzed cheeks was the flush of humility, not shame, as he replied in tones so lowered as scarcely to be audible against the wind—
"The man is, I fear, no wiser, no nobler, than the boy could claim to be, but he does hold fast to his boyhood's one little bit of wisdom, in clinging to the fount of all wisdom and salvation."
"Salvation!" exclaimed a voice close at hand from one who had come forward unobserved, and had caught the last word; "ay, indeed, this lull hath been our salvation, I verily believe. Thanks be to St. Peter for his guardianship. I vow the first handful of gold-dust to his shrine, if we ride safely at anchor off the shores of Cozumel by nightfall."
So spoke Hernando Cortes, and as he spoke he laid his hand with friendly familiarity on Montoro's shoulder.
"Dost recollect, Diego," he said, smiling, "how I prevailed upon thee, now six years ago, to be one of Velasquez' followers in the conquest of Cuba? Little we thought then of the time to come, when thou shouldst be a follower of mine for a far greater enterprise."
Montoro's face reflected his companion's smile as he replied—
"Perhaps it were best to beware of boasting until we are beyond Velasquez' reach."
Cortes laughed outright.
"Ah ah! how sorely he repents him already, the poor Governor, that he gave me this command. Verily, Montoro, I think I owe you as many thanks as myself for getting away from Cuba before his messengers could stop us. You are the quickest, readiest fellow I ever saw."
"In flight," exclaimed Juan de Cabrera, sauntering up, and with a mischievous nod of his head. "Will he be as good, think you, captain, at a fight?"
"Stand forth and learn," cried Montoro, as he drew his sword, and flashed it in his friend's face with a suddenness which made that worthy start back against the vessel's side.
Montoro and Cortes joined in a shout of laughter.
"Well, my friend," said Cortes, "thou hast well earned thy answer and received it."
For once the temper of the easy-going cavalier seemed somewhat ruffled as he growled out—
"The beggar brats in the streets of Madrid can be ready enough in their onslaughts on defenceless foes. They are as swift another way when an officer of justice shows his face."
Montoro de Diego restored his sword to its sheath, and stepped up to the angry knight with outstretched hand.
"Forgive my jest, Don Juan," he said with a smile. "You should do so the more easily, inasmuch as you must remember that I did but turn your own against yourself. I have little fear that when need comes either you or I will be found wanting in due bravery."
"And I have still less," added Cortes. "Meantime I confess that I should turn coward, did I find my best friends drawing on me."
Thus cleverly did the Commander of the present bold enterprise heal any little remnant of soreness that might have rankled in the breast of one of his retainers.
With enemies of his own countrymen behind him, and a nation likely to prove filled with formidable foes before him, Hernando Cortes felt anxious enough to have good fellowship reigning in his camp.
"How else," he said a little later on to Montoro, between jest and earnest—"how else, friend Diego, thinkest thou that I shall be able to obtain for our gracious and royal master those 'comfortable presents of gold, pearls, and precious stones,' which are required of us, as proofs of the natives' good-will and the success of our expedition?"
Montoro shrugged his shoulders with some haughty impatience.
"Methinks, Captain, with our countrymen now-a-days it is gold before all things. If possible, no doubt, gold and glory both; but if not, gold at any rate, even with disgrace."
This time it was the handsome face of the Commander that flushed hotly.
"Diego, you use hard words."
"But just ones," was the firm reply; "although I apply them not to you. Left free to the dictates of your own noble nature, I shall not fear the having bound myself to follow you. But"—with a look around, and in lower tones—"there are those in your band may be too strong for you—those whose one article of faith for themselves is, 'I believe in the delights of wealth!' whose one article of belief for the natives of these regions is, 'Beggar yourselves for us, and you shall be saved as future footstools for our feet in heaven. Do otherwise, and you shall be slaughtered here and damned hereafter.' Am I not right?"
For answer Cortes imitated his companion's shrug of the shoulders.
"But I promise you this," he added—"I will make an example of the very first who transgress."
"Thanks for the assurance," said the other.
And then, a disabled barque coming in sight, Cortes went off to give orders as to aiding it to gain the port of Cozumel.
CHAPTER XXIII.
A SYMBOL WITH TWO MEANINGS.
"Captain," said Juan de Cabrera some few hours after his momentary disagreement with Montoro, and now once more with a smiling countenance. "See, Captain Cortes, I have but stepped forward to remind you that St. Peter hath well earned that handful of gold-dust, you vowed a while since to his shrine. And if you will be advised, you will entrust the gift, with an added pinch or two, to me."
Don Juan de Cabrera had inherited a good fortune from his father, who had been killed during the siege of Zarento in 1501, under the great Captain Gonsalvo. Cabrera was a child at that date; and by the time he was old enough to understand the use of wealth, and to wish to have the spending of some of that he had been brought up to believe he should enjoy, his mother and other guardians had so wasted the greater part, that they were glad to try if they could banish disappointment by filling his brain with other thoughts.
In those days of wonderful and incessant discovery, all ranks were tempted from time to time to try a turn of Fortune's wheel. Even the rich and prosperous frequently left luxury and friends and home, for many a long year, behind them, while they wandered about the world, seeking they scarcely knew what—change and variety, it might be, perhaps—change from slothful ease to the novel sensation of vigorous discomfort. And that they certainly obtained.
But however that might be, when his mother and his uncles and his confessor talked of the glorious voyagings, and journeyings, being now enjoyed by so many of his countrymen, the young Cabrera caught at the bait eagerly enough, and had very soon started off to make a new fortune for himself.
That fortune, however, was as far away from his hands now as when he set out to find it! But he took things easily, and looked bright enough as he stood there, with his laughing face, before Hernando Cortes, offering himself as gold-bearer to the shrine.
But Cortes was in no humour for a joke.
"I will get my handful of gold for St. Peter from St. Peter's namesake," he said sternly, and with his large brilliant eyes fixed on the glum, crestfallen Pedro de Alvarado, captain of one of the vessels, who had contrived to reach the shores of the island of Cozumel before the Captain-General of the expedition.
"And if you make such use of Fortune's favours in the future," said Hernando Cortes still more sternly, "it will prove a bad day for you, my worthy Señor, when you came under my command."
"What has he done?" muttered Cabrera to Diego, who was standing by with a wrathful countenance.
"Done!" was the retort. "Why, done like the rest of our Spanish wolves—spent the first hours of his arrival here in showing the natives what good thieves we make."
"Ay, verily," added the good Father Bartolomé de Olmedo. "And he hath added blows and beatings, doubtless, that the lesson may be the better remembered."
"Or," muttered that Juan de Cabrera beneath his breath, "to make some amends by those gifts for what he hath taken away."
But Señor Juan took some care that his companions should neither hear the words, nor see their author's smile at his own small witticism. He turned away from the groups collected together on the shore, and set off for a short walk inland.
"Whither away there?" questioned a voice behind him a few moments later.
Montoro and the priest had followed him.
"My son," said Father Olmedo, "methinks lonely saunters may be scarcely wise in a strange land at any time; but to indulge them now, when Pedro de Alvarado hath so angered and terrified the people, is too imprudent, I should have thought, even for thy careless courage."
"Say rather, for my careless indifference, father," said the young man with a touch of honest reverence for once. "I can lay no claim just now to brave fearlessness. I had even forgotten there was aught to fear. But see, who goes yonder?"
The three men stopped, as three other men, all Indians, passed them at a light run. One turned a few yards ahead and nodded gaily to Montoro.
"Why, Diego," exclaimed Cabrera in surprise, "surely that is thy man Melchorejo, whom thou hast had so many years?"
"Ay," was the reply, "even from his childhood, when I bound up his wounded hand for him. My slight deed of kindness hath reaped a rich reward since then."
"So it seems," rejoined the other, "if it is to be crowned by desertion, so soon as he has the fair chance of return to his own home."
"But it is not to be so crowned," answered Montoro quietly. "At any rate not now. He has but gone with those poor Indians just taken prisoners by Alvarado, to restore them to their friends."
"And to act as our interpreter from Hernando Cortes," added Olmedo; "to assure the Indians of his good-will towards them, and earnest desire for the maintenance of peace."
"And behold!—behold its emblem," suddenly cried Cabrera with an unusual expression of wondering awe upon his face.
And before his companions could question him, he had sprung forward and flung himself on his knees on the ground, with hands raised in adoration.
"What hast thou?" called Father Olmedo eagerly, and for the moment standing still in his amazement.
"What hast thou found?" called also Montoro de Diego equally bewildered.
And then the two hastened onwards a few paces; in their turn caught sight of some most unexpected object, and also in their turn sprang to their companion's side. One instant the eyes of the priest met those of the Spanish nobleman with an expression of deep rapture in them, and then Bartolomé de Olmedo was about to sink down on his knees beside Cabrera. But his purpose was arrested.
"Do it not, my father," hastily murmured Montoro. And clutching at the priest's arm he drew him sharply back to stand beside himself, where he remained gazing down at a stone cross about three feet high, erected in the outer court of a small temple they had reached.
The priest looked round at him for a moment reproachfully. The next a sort of mingled fear and horror showed themselves growing in his countenance. And he wrenched himself free from the detaining hand.
"Art thou a renegade from the most Holy Faith?" he asked in stern and heart-grieved tones.
"Not so," was the short and absent-minded answer, while eyes and thoughts were still equally fixed, it was very evident, upon that cross.
Father Olmedo was greatly puzzled, but very doubtful, he hardly knew of which—whether of his suspicions, or of Diego. In his turn laying a hand on the other's arm, he said impatiently—
"Rouse thyself, my son, and answer me like a man, and, if it may be, the Blessed Virgin grant it, like a true son of the Church—"
"Which I am."
"May the saints grant it, I have said."
"Why, father, I would vouch for that grave Toro's allegiance to Holy Mother Church with my life!" cried Juan de Cabrera springing to his feet to take part in the question.
There was a scarcely perceptible pause, and then Cabrera added—
"Why do you doubt him, my father?"
Montoro answered the question with quiet gravity.
"Because I hindered him from an act which, although innocent from its ignorance, I feared that his conscience would regret. I have prevented the father from paying adoration to the God of rain."
"What?" shouted Cabrera, retreating from the cross as if he had been stung, but at the same time staring at it with all his might.
"What?" repeated the priest with equal wonder, but more soberly. "What can be the reading of your strange riddle, my son?" he asked in amazement. "You stay me from the due reverence I would have hastened to pay to this most blessed symbol of our faith, and then you tell us—verily, my brain is perplexed—I know not what it is thou wouldst say!"
"I would say only that I have said," was the earnest answer. "Marvellous as it must appear to you, my father, marvellous as even yet it appears to me, it is nevertheless true, that the symbol, to us so sacred as the Christian symbol of salvation, is to these poor heathen people of this world the symbol of the God of rain."
"Umph," muttered Cabrera, eyeing the cross somewhat ruefully. "Father, I ever have so many penances lying upon my shoulders; shall I have yet another for having thus knelt in worship to a heathen god, and will it be a heavy one?"
"I were fain to say 'Yes' for thy levity," came the reply.
"Levity, i' faith!" ejaculated the young Spaniard. "My question arose from no careless merriment, I can assure you. But if I draw not a long face, like Toro yonder, with each word I say, I am ever twitted with my levity."
He turned away in one of his short-lived huffs, while the priest looked at him with no unkindly smile, and said more freely—
"Nay then, my son, pardon me. I do believe that now thou art something wounded in thy spirit, as I myself by now had likewise been, but for the ready thought and hand of our good friend here."
"Good to you, bad to me," retorted Cabrera. "If he could not speak in time to spare me the sin, and mortification, of bowing down to an idol he might have held his peace, and not thus have proclaimed my shame."
"Shame, nonsense," said Montoro good-humouredly. "In my boyhood, when I first came out here under the great Admiral, I and others paid loving reverence to our Saviour before one of these native crosses. And doubtless, He who sees the hearts of men accepted our prayers and praises, for the spirit with which they were offered."
Cabrera's superstitious fears seemed somewhat relieved.
"What sayest thou, father?" he asked.
Father Olmedo paused a few moments. He was a good and merciful man, and a good priest; but his training had cramped his intellect, and he could not quite as readily as Diego grasp at true and noble thoughts. Until now he had felt almost as horrified as the worshipper himself, that Christian prayers should have been offered up at an idol's feet. But Cabrera was impatient.
"Say, father, do you also think that I have placed my soul in no jeopardy?"
Bartolomé de Olmedo must reply.
"Thy soul in jeopardy?" he repeated hastily. "Nay, then, nay; there is here no question of thy soul, my son, seeing thou didst it but in ignorance; and for those who sin in ignorance our Lord hath said the stripes shall be few."
"But still, then, there will be those few," muttered the young Spaniard, eyeing the small cross vindictively, before he turned back to Montoro with the reproachful query—
"Diego, thou couldst stop the father from kneeling to false gods, why wert thou too careful of thy breath to spare me a word of warning?"
Montoro smiled at his unreasonable companion.
"Well thou knowest, Juan, or at any rate can guess, that I saw neither the cross, nor thine intention to do it reverence. The trees hid it from our view."
"And the waters of yon stream shall henceforth hide it from the view of all," exclaimed the discomfited disciple of Rome, as he stooped, and prepared to exert all his strength in uprooting it from its present position. But the politic priest stopped him.
"Hold!" he exclaimed quickly. And then more tranquilly: "My son, we will leave the sacred symbol of our faith standing where'er we meet with it. Only, cleansing it from its past unhallowed memories, we will reconsecrate it to Him who died thereon. Our conversion of the heathen shall thus be rendered easier, by seeing that we also reverence the cross."
Cabrera looked doubtful for a few moments.
"Dost thou not think, father, that, whatever thou mayst do to these crosses, they will still remain to the redskins their god of rain; and that, whatever thou mayst try to teach them, and they may profess, it will be still as the god of rain they will worship them?"
"So I should fear," murmured Montoro thoughtfully.
But the priest said sententiously—
"My son, those questions are for the blessed saints, and the pope."