"Ah, Don Estevan," said the elder Mexican, "it is you that have the clear head. I am very much obliged to you. Your plan is the good one."
"Very well, then," answered Stephens, "I'll just run over to the post-office, and get some paper and envelopes and stamps, and draw up those letters; and as Don Andrés had better not go outside the house before the matter is settled, I'll ask Mr. Backus to step around here in the course of an hour, and bring his post-office stamp with him."
He rose from his seat to go towards the door, but Don Nepomuceno hospitably protested. "Wait till you have had your breakfast first, Don Estevan. It is all ready; here is Manuelita bringing it for you;" and as he spoke the girl entered and set the table for him, as Juana had done on the previous day. She smiled at his greeting, but her eyelids were swollen with crying.
At this moment there came a knocking at the outer door, and the master of the house hastened out to see who it was demanding admittance, and was followed by his son.
"He's all right," said Stephens cheerfully to the girl, as he looked into her anxious eyes. "He's safe enough as long as he stays inside here. They'll none bother him while he's protected by these walls. And I've good hopes that we may be able to bring them to a reasonable settlement, so that he can go about again in perfect safety. Don't you fret yourself over it. We'll make these Navajos sing a proper tune before we've done with them." He spoke with the easy confidence of a man accustomed to deal with serious affairs, and conscious of possessing the ability and the experience for handling them successfully. But he was equally astonished and embarrassed when Manuelita, instead of appearing calmed by his reassuring words, flung her hands over her face and burst into a passion of sobs.
At the girl's outburst Stephens was completely taken aback. Tears, a woman's tears, were a novelty to him, and he felt the quick leap of his heart in response. But it was ten years since he had heard a woman sob, and his practical sympathy, or at least the power of expressing it, had become blunted. He did not know what to say; half a dozen phrases struggled to be born in his throat; he wanted to explain at once to the pretty creature that it was all right; to tell her that there was nothing to cry about; to say there was no use in getting into a fuss over it; that after all a man had to take his chances; and that anyhow the milk wasn't spilt yet; that it would be time enough to begin to cry when something really happened. But he felt the brutal stupidity of such remarks, and they remained unspoken, while there arose in him at the same instant the urgent desire to do something; to take her by the hand like a frightened child; to smooth her ruffled hair and staunch her tears; to console her, and, by some means or other, stay the sobs that shook the slender body. But he had no right to do any such thing, and he hesitated to intrude himself on her grief, which, moreover, appeared to him, like a child's, a trifle exaggerated. To him who had lived so many years on the frontier, a violent death had come to seem almost the natural end. Few pioneers expected to die in their beds. Along the trails and around the mining-camps were many mounds, each one of which marked a six-by-two claim that was the last that the holder would ever occupy, one that he needed no ever-ready Winchester to defend. Nameless graves they were for the most part, or if there slanted at the head some rude board with a name and date roughly scribbled to say who lay beneath, the brief legend that gave all that would ever be known of how he came there repeated with monotonous regularity the tale of misadventure or of wrong. "Shot, stabbed, stripped and mangled by Thugs," "Killed by Indians," "Murdered by road-agents," "Lynched by Vigilantes," "Blown up by dynamite", "Crushed by a fall of rock," "Died of starvation," "Died of thirst," "Died of cold,"—these and such as they were the forms of death with which his Odyssey of toils had made him familiar. Small wonder, then, if he who had lived so long face to face with the possibility of such an end, taking the chances of it freely himself, and seeing them taken as freely by others, now felt as if the young man Don Andrés was a trifle overpitied. He was sorry for him himself, he was trying to help him all he knew, and he was ready to turn out and fight for him at any minute, but he could not see why anybody should want to cry about it. And yet here was this startlingly agitating, insistent noise of a girl sobbing beside him that gripped his heart with an emotion he hardly knew the meaning of.
"Don't you fret yourself," he repeated; "we'll see him through, señorita, never fear."
Instinctively he had risen to his feet and was standing by her; and presently she recovered herself and began to speak, though brokenly at first.
"It is very foolish of me, I know, but I cannot help it. It makes me think how my two uncles were killed by the Indians eight years ago up in the mountain. My grandfather found them both lying dead in the trail; the cruel Navajos had shot them both with arrows from an ambush. My poor grandfather was alone, so he could not carry them down; he had to leave them there, while he came back to San Gabriel for help. He cried so much that he grew blind and could hardly find his way to San Gabriel. And then their bodies were brought down here; I was only a child like Altagracia, but I remember it so well, and indeed this was a house of mourning; and now if they kill my brother too, I don't know what I shall do."
Again Stephens felt the odd sense of surprise at the strength of her feelings. Don Andrés was a fine young fellow enough in his way, but why all this display of emotion because he was now to run rather more risk than usual? Dimly he became conscious that her trouble was due to family affection, and that he himself had forgotten what it was like. His mind fled back to his boyhood, when he and a brother and sister, from whom he had now been long parted, used to play together; memories of that early fondness came back with a curious vividness. A hard crust had formed over the gentler side of his nature during the years of isolation and severance from those natural ties; it seemed ready now to dissolve in a moment at a few tears shed by a girl for a brother's peril. Habituated as he was to hold himself firmly in hand, he was half angry with himself for minding anything so much as he minded her sobs.
"Why, how fond you must be of him!" he remarked crudely; and without his intending it, his secret surprise showed itself in his tone.
"But he is my brother," she returned, and her wet eyes met his half indignantly; "don't you understand that I must care for him very much indeed?"
"Surely yes," he rejoined. "Of course I understand that"; but in his heart came a denial that he did really understand it, or had any right to understand it. "If I had been clubbed to death for witchcraft in the ditch yesterday by those Santiago idiots," he thought, "not one human soul would have cared like this about me." Yes; it was quite true. There was no one now who cared for him in this way, with this warmth of feeling, and there was no one for whom he cared or could care. Thence came a new sense of something lacking in his life; even supposing that all his hopes deferred were to be realised at last, supposing that to-morrow, for instance, he became master of a mine worth a million, who would rejoice? No one, unless it were Rocky, his old pard, who really wasn't a bad-hearted sort of fellow, though he could play the fool at times to such exasperating effect. But now he felt a sudden vacancy in his heart; the need of a comradeship that should be entire, absolute, and inalienable.
"And have you no family, Don Estevan?" she asked; "no brother or sister?"
"Yes," he answered, "I have both, but I haven't seen them in ten years. They are married and settled down away back there in the States; they must have half forgotten me by this time; I was no more than a boy when I started for the West, and I've never been back." And at the recollection his lips parted, and his breast heaved gently. An involuntary sigh escaped him before he knew what it was. The sighing mood had not been much in his line. Manuelita looked at him with a question in her eyes.
"But you love them still?" she said.
"Well, yes," he replied, "I suppose I do, if it comes to that. But it is a long time since I saw them, and much water has run under the bridges between then and now."
"Have the Americans no feelings?" she said; "perhaps it is a good thing for some people to have the heart hard."
"Oh, I guess we've got our feelings right enough," he replied, with an uneasy smile, "but it isn't our way to say much about them; at least, with us, the men don't like to show them. As for the American women, I think they show theirs freely enough; but upon my word it is so long since I have seen any of them that I hardly know. No, señorita, our hearts are not hard."
At this moment, Don Nepomuceno entered, bringing with him one of the three Mexicans who had been sitting with him outside. "Here is my brother-in-law, Don Estevan," he began, "who says that he will gladly let me have the pony that ate poison-weed. He says, too, that the Navajos have gone over to the store, and that he suspects the Texan will sell them whiskey. It is very wrong of him, for whiskey makes them very dangerous."
"It's dead against the law," said Stephens bluntly.
"I know," rejoined the other, "but it is not easy to prove it. But you have eaten no breakfast, my friend. Sit down and have your meal." At the entrance of her father, Manuelita had retired to the kitchen, leaving the sitting-room to the men.
"Thank you," answered Stephens, "I will, then, by your leave"; and he sat down and helped himself, while he continued to discuss with the others the conduct of Mr. Backus and the chances of coming to an arrangement with Mahletonkwa. The conversation went on after he had finished his meal, when the sudden sharp report of a rifle-shot was heard not far away. All stopped and listened; a minute or two later it was followed by a second, and then at pretty regular intervals by a number of others.
"It sounds like somebody practising at a mark," said the American; "do you suppose it's Mr. Backus?" He had risen to his feet and stood intent.
"Who knows?" said his host. "For my part I know not much about this Texan. It may be so; they are unaccountable people." To throw away powder and bullets on practice seemed to him a piece of wanton extravagance.
Stephens caught up his rifle into the hollow of his arm. "I think," said he, "I'll just step across and get that paper and envelopes, and I'll be able to see what they're up to over there as well." The Mexicans accompanied him to the big door, which was carefully unbarred to allow of his departure.
The occasional shots continued as the American walked down towards the stage station, and he presently discerned Mr. Backus and the Navajos in a group behind the store. He went up and joined them. They had set up an empty box against a blank wall, and fastened a piece of white cardboard against it with a nail through the centre, and several black circles in different parts of the cardboard showed where bullets had struck. The Indians were laughing and chaffing one another freely about their shooting; their manner had noticeably altered from the moody and sullen attitude they had exhibited at the pow-wow.
Mahletonkwa came close up to Stephens excitedly.
"Now, then, Don Americano, let's see you take a shot."
Stephens smelt him; there was whiskey in his breath. "Not at present, thank you," said he shortly. "Mr. Backus," and he turned abruptly on the storekeeper, "this Indian has had something to drink. I presume you know it is against the law."
"Well, if he has nobody knows where he got it," said the storekeeper defiantly, "nor nobody need know."
He knew very well himself that there were now two beautiful Navajo blankets rolled up in his store which had not been there an hour ago; also that his stock was diminished to the extent of two bottles of whiskey. The whiskey stood him in exactly one dollar. The pair of Navajo blankets were cheap at ten. Nine hundred per cent. profit was good enough business for any man.
It was a good enough profit, at all events, to tempt Mr. Backus; and it needed to be a good one, for he was not ignorant of the risk that he ran. To give, trade, or sell spirituous liquor to an Indian is a penitentiary offence in the United States. The law is a wise one, and, what is more, is approved by popular feeling. A drunken Indian is about as pleasant to meet with as a mad wolf; he is possessed by a demon that prompts him to fly at the throat of any white man, woman, or child he comes across; and an Indian who has tasted liquor will go any length till he has obtained enough of it to throw him into this horrible frenzy, if he can by any means procure it. Trading whiskey to an Indian is like playing with a tiger. Up to a certain point it is pleasantly exciting. Go one step beyond it and his fangs are in your jugular. Mr. Backus was not a novice at the game; he had been there before. For nine hundred per cent. he would let them have just enough to whet their appetites. Two bottles of whiskey to eleven Indians was about the right dose; while half a dozen would send them crazy, he knew.
"I'm just letting them have a few shots at the mark with my rifle," he continued. "It tickles them to death to shoot with a breech-loader; they aint hardly got any themselves, and it's mighty well worth my while to keep in with them." He winked deliberately. "I've been talking with them, and they know all about this mine upon the Cerro de las Viboras, just as well as those stingy Santiago folks. I believe I'll get 'em to show it me. I tell you I understand Indians, I'm an old hand at dealing with them"; he gave a self-satisfied chuckle.
"I should say that last statement of yours was highly probable," returned the prospector. "Personally, I should have said that with this unsettled difficulty on hand with Don Nepomuceno the very worst thing possible was to let them have any drink, and the next worst was to encourage them to go letting off a gun like this right close to where he lives."
"And why the deuce should I be so cursedly particular about the Don?" replied the storekeeper; "he's an uncommon close-fisted old hunks, if it comes to that; he does most of his trading in Santa Fé anyway, and don't encourage local talent. And I'll warrant you he's got a thumping big hoard of silver dollars buried under the floor somewhere in that old casa of his. I don't see why he shouldn't pay a decent compensation to this Mahletonkwa here." The chance of some of those silver dollars passing from Mahletonkwa's hands over his counter had considerably quickened Mr. Backus's sense of "justice for the poor Indian" in this matter. Also he had had a couple of drinks as well as Mahletonkwa, and they had loosened his tongue a little.
"Well, sir," replied Stephens, "I don't propose to argue the matter with you here, but if you can afford to leave those precious customers of yours I should like to have you come into the store and supply me with some paper and envelopes."
He hated to have to ask this man for anything, but he must procure these things, and there was no other house in San Remo where he could get them. There would not be time before the mail passed to return to the pueblo and get them from his own stock.
At this moment Mahletonkwa fired again with Backus's rifle, and a triumphant exclamation followed the shot. The Indians ran to the target, pointing with pride to a bullet-hole within half an inch of the central nail. Mahletonkwa swaggered up to the American. "Now, you shoot," he exclaimed familiarly, "and show us what you can do."
Stephens had not intended to do anything of the sort. He thought the Indian's familiarity, due to the couple of drinks he had taken, most offensive, and he had meant to leave them to their sport with the least possible delay; but there was something irritating about his swagger that put the American on his mettle. He swung himself half round and took a good look at the target, which stood there in a strong light, beautifully distinct, at some five-and-twenty paces distance.
Up came the rifle to his shoulder; for one instant it remained there, poised level, as he glanced down the sights and got a bead on the centre; "bang!" came the report, and down fell the piece of cardboard. He had driven up the nail.
The Navajos dashed in eagerly to pick up the paper, and were loud in their expression of wonder and admiration. But Mahletonkwa's eyes were still fixed on the Winchester; he came forward and touched it lightly with his hand, and turned with a loud laugh to the others who came crowding round them. Mahletonkwa told them a story in the Navajo language which produced roars of laughter from them all, and Stephens's curiosity was excited.
"What's the joke, Mahletonkwa?" said he. "Why can't you tell it in Spanish so the rest of us may have a chance to join in the fun?" The drinks had made the Indian reckless, and he needed but little urging to repeat the story.
"Once there was a man out in the mountains over yonder," said he, pointing to the west, "and he had a 'heap-shoot' gun like this."
"What sort of a man do you mean?" asked Stephens; "an American?"
The Indian looked at him with eyes that were both bold and cunning. "I didn't ask him," said he; "he was just a man."
"I'll bet he was a lone American prospector," returned Stephens.
The Navajo laughed, and there was insolence in his laugh. "He was alone," he continued, "and the people there got after him——"
"What people do you mean?" asked Stephens; "the Navajos?"
The Indian laughed the same laugh as before.
"Oh, leave him finish," interjected Backus in English. "You can bet he means Navajos. Probably he was there himself."
"The people got after him," repeated the redskin, "and he fired away at them a long time with his 'heap-shoot' gun; but he couldn't do them any harm." An insolent chuckle accompanied this last remark.
"Couldn't he!" rejoined Stephens. "If he was an American prospector, and there's no other sort of man ever went there with a Winchester, I'll bet he laid some of them out."
"And then," continued Mahletonkwa, "one of the people shot him with a common rifle here across the face," he drew his hand across his forehead, "and the blood ran into his eyes and he couldn't see, and the blow of the bullet made him stupid, and then the people went up to him and he was a prisoner. And they took his gun and looked at it with much awe, for they had never seen a 'heap-shoot' gun before. But they did not understand how to make it work. So they gave him some water, and wiped the blood from his face so that he could see, and they asked him to show them the secret of the 'heap-shoot' gun. And he was very happy then, and thought that they were going to make friends with him, so he told them how to work the gun, and showed them how to load it and unload it. And then, when they had found out all they wanted to know about it, one of them took the 'heap-shoot' gun and loaded it just as the Amer— the man had shown them how to do, and pointed it at him and pulled the trigger, and it killed him quite dead." He exploded again in a great roar of laughter, and the rest of the party roared in chorus with equal mirth.
Stephens flushed a dark red, and swore under his breath. "They were a d—d treacherous, sneaking lot of coyotes, that's what they were," he said defiantly to Mahletonkwa, who only laughed the more. "A pretty lot of friends you seem to have been making, Mr. Backus. I wish you joy of them."
The latter looked rather uncomfortable. "It was a low-down, dirty mean trick to play," he said, starting to go towards the store, "but Mahletonkwa aint said as he had any hand in it himself."
"I reckon he was there, though," retorted Stephens, "for it was the sight of my Winchester that set him off to tell it. Rifles like that aint quite as common as blackberries around this country. I wish I knew who that prospector was that they murdered," he added meditatively, as he moved off to the store after Backus; "I'd go and bury him decently, anyway, if I could find the place. I hope he laid out a score of them before they got him, the mean hounds. And that's their idea of a funny story!" He ground his teeth in his anger.
In the store Mr. Backus soon supplied the prospector with writing materials, and promised to bring over the post-office stamp presently to stamp Don Andrés's affidavit. He seemed nervously anxious now to conciliate Stephens, and to rub out, if possible, the bad impression his conduct with regard to the Navajos had left. He fetched round Captain Jinks from the stable with profuse thanks for the loan, and even reclaimed his rifle from the Navajos and put a stop to their target practice on the ground that he could not spare any more cartridges.
"Mahletonkwa," said Stephens, gathering up the lariat of his mule and addressing the chief, "I give you notice that I'm going to have you put back on the reservation. Take my advice and lose no time in accepting Don Nepomuceno's offer."
"I want a thousand dollars," said the Indian doggedly.
"And I very much doubt your getting it," said Stephens, turning on his heel and walking off.
But as the prospector made his way towards the Sanchez house the thought of Manuelita's tears came back to him. After all, what was a thousand dollars? It was a lot of money to be sure, but if it would guarantee young Andrés's safety, and put an end to her anxiety, it might be worth while to part with it. The brutal laughter of the Indians over the cruel deception they had so cunningly practised on the wounded American who had the ill fortune to fall into their hands had angered him deeply. He had from the first kicked against the idea of paying them anything, but if some blackmail was to be paid to them, he saw no difference in principle between a thousand dollars and a hundred and twenty-five. And it came into his head Rocky had just offered to repay him the thousand dollars he had lent him in Montana. The idea occurred to him, why not pass it on? He might lend it to Don Nepomuceno to pay off the Navajos with, and the Mexican might repay him at his leisure, or pass it on again on a fitting occasion to some other man in a bad strait. Backus's idea of Don Nepomuceno possessing a great hoard of buried silver dollars seemed to him a wild and improbable conjecture, considering what a stew he was in about raising a hundred and twenty-five.
He stabled his mule alongside the mare, and, after knocking, was admitted to the casa with the same precaution as before. A table and ink were set before him, and a full statement of the case written for the benefit of the governor and also of the general at Santa Fé. An affidavit by Don Andrés was duly drawn up in Spanish and English, and according to his promise Mr. Backus arrived with the stamp of the San Remo post-office to stamp it. Stephens sealed up the letters, and accompanied him to the door and put them in his hands to be forwarded.
"Them Indians have gone off down the river a mile, to where there's grass, to let their horses feed, and to eat a bite themselves," said the storekeeper; "and I reckon likely they'll be more amiable when they get back here again later on. Anyways, I hope as they will. I told that Mahletonkwa as he'd orter be reasonable." All the time Backus had been in the house he had fawned on Don Nepomuceno in a way that had made Stephens sick when he remembered how he had called him a "close-fisted old hunks" an hour before, and he watched the storekeeper returning to his own abode with a feeling of absolute disgust.
Turning back into the patio he found himself in the presence of Manuelita, who was crossing it on some errand. As all the doors gave on the patio, it acted, so to speak, as the passage by which everybody went from any one room to any other, except where two or three rooms opened into each other en suite. "Señorita," he said, "one word with you, if I may. It would really make you very happy, it would make your heart quite free of sorrow, if this money were paid and things settled in that way?"
"Oh, Madre de Dios!" she exclaimed, "but can you doubt it for an instant? I would dance for joy"; and her eyes grew brighter on the instant with the thought.
"Very well," answered Stephens cautiously, "I'll see what can be done. I'll promise you to do my best to bring about a peaceful settlement. I can't say more."
He went back into the sitting-room and wrote a third letter to the cashier of the First National Bank at Santa Fé, where he kept a small balance. He asked the cashier to telegraph to Rockyfeller at Denver to say that he, Stephens, was unavoidably detained at Santiago, and to ask Rockyfeller to send the thousand dollars to his account at the Santa Fé bank, and he likewise wrote a cordial answer to Rocky's letter, explaining matters at length. As soon as he had finished these he hastened with them to the post-office. The ambulance which brought the mail from Fort Wingate stood before the door, and a fresh team was being harnessed to it, while Mr. Backus was in the act of bringing out the little San Remo mail-bag, and at sight of Stephens stowed it hastily inside.
For the little San Remo mail-bag was all but empty. The two fat letters Stephens had entrusted to him for the governor and the general were not inside it; their thin papery ashes lay amid the glowing coals of the cedar-wood fire on Mr. Backus's kitchen hearth, and had helped to cook the stage-driver's dinner. The impeccable United States postmaster had opened and read them; decided on the spot that he did not want these Navajos interfered with just at present; and had taken this summary method of blocking the game.
"Here's a couple more letters," exclaimed Stephens, running up. "Can't you put them in?" and he held them out to Backus in total ignorance of his perfidy.
"Bag's sealed up now," said the postmaster officially. "Contrary to U.S. regulations to open it again."
Stephens turned instantly to the mail-driver. "I wish you'd oblige me by posting these for me when you get to Santa Fé. They're stamped all right."
The driver held out his hand for the letters and shoved them carelessly into the pocket of his overcoat.
"Mind you don't forget to post them," repeated Stephens; "they're important." At this instant there came into his mind a thing that he had forgotten, so absorbed had he become in the troubles of the Sanchez family. Some stage-driver had libelled him to Sam Argles, and he had intended to find out who it was. Probably this was the man. "Say," he began, "do you remember driving a man named Sam Argles, a miner from Prescott, over this line a month or two back?"
"Can't say, I'm sure," replied the driver, who was shortening a trace with some difficulty. "You don't suppose as I can remember the names of all the passengers I take?"
"Well, Argles was over this line recently," said Stephens, "and he reports that a driver on it told him something about me."
"Likely he did," said the driver unconcernedly; "like as not, too, 't warn't me. I aint the only driver on this line."
"Then you deny having told him I was a squawman?" said Stephens.
"Dunno nawthin' about it," replied the driver, gathering up the lines and climbing to his perch. "It's no concern of mine." But he avoided meeting Stephens's eye.
"Well, so long," said the latter; "I'm obliged to you about the letters," and without further comment on the matter he started back towards the Sanchez house.
"A d—d highfalutin, tonified cuss he is," said Backus as soon as the prospector was out of earshot. "If you was to drop them letters in the Rio Grande it'd serve him right for bouncing you like that."
"He dursn't say nuthin' to me," said the driver, "or I'd mash his face in a minute. What do I know about his Sam Argleses? I reckon he is a squawman, aint he?"
"Wal', if he aint, what does he live with them Injuns for? That's what I say," said Backus with an evil laugh. "And I think, if I was you," he added, "I'd be apt to have an accident with them letters crossing the Rio Grande."
"There's a chance for it anyway," said the stage-driver; "the river was rising fast day before yesterday, and I judge 't will be booming by now. I've got to rustle around, for I'm going straight across to San Miguel. I can cross there with the mail, anyway. Get up there, mules." He raised the reins, cracked his whip and departed.
Could Felipe but have known what the stage-driver knew, that the rise of the river had begun two days ago, he would never have made the sad mistake of taking the straight route to Ensenada. Alas, now, when he and Josefa reached the spot where the ford should have been, his cry, "Valgame Dios, the river is up," was only too true. As they passed through the grove of cottonwoods they beheld right from their feet to the farther bank, full a half-mile off, a turbid yellow flood, rolling rapidly southward towards Texas and the Gulf, twelve hundred miles away. All autumn and winter long, a broad expanse of dry water-worn pebbles and boulders, and beds of shingle and sand, through which ran half a dozen easily forded streams of clear water, had been all that lay between La Boca on the west bank and Ensenada on the east. During those seasons both horses and waggons, and people on foot by picking their way through the shallows, could cross almost anywhere without wading much above knee-deep. But all autumn and winter long, on the great mountain ranges of Colorado, two hundred miles away to the north where the river had its sources, the snows of successive storms had been piled up deeper and deeper. And now the sun was well past the vernal equinox, and his growing heat had loosened those snows and was sending their cold floods down ten thousand gulches and tributaries to swell the current of the Rio Grande. This takes place every April, and Felipe ought to have thought of it, but he was young and had not yet learned to think of everything. This was a possibility he had forgotten.
"It must have come down in the last two days," he groaned, as he looked hopelessly at the flood. "I know Juan and Miguel passed here only three days ago from Santa Fé, and it was all light then, and now it is like this."
"We are lost," said Josefa. "What shall we do, Felipe?"—even her brave heart succumbing to this unexpected calamity.
"Don't cry, dear heart, don't cry," said he tenderly, taking her in his arms, and lifting her from the horse. "Perhaps there is a boat. I will go and see." He pulled the bridle from the horse's head. "Do you rest here a minute," he said, spreading his blanket for her to rest her weary limbs, "and let him feed here on the green grass, but don't let him drink. I will run back to La Boca and ask." He threw her the rope, and darted back like the wind in the direction of the houses they had lately passed. The unkempt Mexican was milking a cow in the corral as Felipe dashed up breathless. "Where is the boat?" he asked eagerly. "Is it running? Is it this side?"
"The boat?" said the Mexican slowly, going on with his milking. "No, friend. The river only came down like this yesterday. It was high the day before, but we could still ford it up above. It was yesterday it came down big."
The leisurely manner of the man, and the indefiniteness of his reply, were maddening to the excited Indian.
"Yes, but the boat," he almost shouted, "the boat, where is it?"
The Mexican had finished milking his cow, and putting down the milk jar he began to unfasten the rawhide strap with which her hind legs were tied.
"The boat, friend?" said he; "there is no boat here now. Last year Don Leandro had the boat, but she is hauled up, and they say there is a hole in her. Perhaps he will talk of getting it mended after a while. I suppose the Americano at the mail station in Ensenada will be wanting to send the mail across next week."
"Valgame Dios!" cried the boy. "And will there be no way of getting over the river till next week?"
"The water will have run by in a month, or perhaps in three weeks, if God wills it," remarked the Mexican piously; "and then, friend, you can cross without a boat."
"And is there no boat anywhere up or down the river on this side?" exclaimed Felipe. "Is there no way over?"
"There are the Indians at San Miguel, eight leagues below," said the man, proceeding to take down the bars of the corral for the purpose of turning out the cow to pasture. "They have a bridge of single logs to cross on foot by. I do not know if the river will have carried it down. Probably not. They have land on both sides, and are always crossing."
"Eight leagues below!" cried the young Indian in a despairing voice. "And a sandy road from here they say—deep sand, is it not?" He followed the man and the cow outside the corral.
"Yes, friend," said the man, "it is deep sand along the river. But there is a better way: to take the trail to Santiago as far as the Banded Mesa and then turn to the left. So you keep up on the mesas the whole way, and it is better going."
"Thanks, sir; adios," said Felipe; and without waiting for more discourse he tore along back towards Josefa as fast as he could run.
She was lying on the blanket where he had left her, and holding the end of the lariat. Felipe rushed up to the horse and began to bridle him.
"There is no boat, sweetheart," he panted, "but there is a bridge of the Indians at San Miguel. Let us go there. We can leave the horse with the Indians on this side, and get a horse from some of them on the other, and come on to Ensenada that way. Make haste."
Once more he lifted her to the saddle, and springing up behind her turned the horse's head.
"They must be after us long ago," said he wearily, looking at the sun, which was already well up. "I expect they are half-way here by this time. They will be here in a little while."
"My father will have no horse," suggested Josefa, trying to make the best of it.
"Oh, he will take the Americano's. Don Estevan will lend it to him," said Felipe bitterly. "The cacique can take what he wants."
He revolved their position in his mind. If he rode the back trail as far as the Banded Mesa, and there turned off the trail just where it was hard and stony, he would be almost certain to throw the pursuers off the track. But could he reach the Banded Mesa before they got there? That was the question. He considered it well. It was an up-hill road, and the horse, gallantly as he had carried his double burden, was beginning to flag. He doubted whether to try it did not mean running into the very jaws of the lion. It seemed more hopeful to turn out as soon as they were out of sight of the people at La Boca, and go down parallel to the Rio Grande, trusting to the sand, which was here in drifts almost like the seashore, being so loose that no definite trail of theirs could be traced.
On this idea he acted. But no sooner were they in the deep sand than the tired horse could no longer raise the semblance of a gallop. Felipe sprang off and ran on foot, urging the horse on. Relieved of half his load he went better, but even under the most favourable circumstances the deep sand was very heavy going, and their progress was but slow. Thus they struggled on for two weary miles, and Felipe kept uttering words of encouragement to his mistress, whose silence proclaimed her sinking spirits; but all the time his eyes kept turning in the direction of the Santiago trail, for every moment he expected their pursuers to appear.
Suddenly on the brow of the topmost of the low, rolling hills that rose between the Rio Grande and the mesas, his keen sight discerned a black speck, which he knew had not been there a minute before. In the clear air of New Mexico, and over those bare, open downs far-off things are seen with amazing distinctness; but at that distance it was impossible to say for certain what it was. Felipe said nothing of it to Josefa; what was the use of adding unnecessarily to her terrors. He kept his eye vigilantly on the object of his suspicions.
"It is no use to try to hide," said he to himself. "There isn't cover enough among these scattering juniper bushes to hide a sheep. If it is a man he can see us as plain as we do him, and he will know what we are by our actions. If it is a cow or a horse feeding, it will move slowly about; if it is a man riding, he will move straight on in a minute or two, and then I shall know."
His uncertainty did not last long. Before five minutes elapsed the speck moved again, and this time it descended the hill straight towards the fugitives, till it was lost to sight behind the brow of a nearer ridge. There was no longer any doubt left in Felipe's mind.
"Ay de mi!" said he to his mistress, "we are pursued. It is one man only, as far as I can see. It must be your father," and he urged the horse on freshly.
"Run, run, Felipe!" said the girl. "Hide yourself somewhere! He will kill you if he catches us. Never mind me. He won't kill me, you know."
"No, not that! I can't do that!" he cried; but dark despair came over him. His feet seemed like lead as he struggled forward. He looked over his shoulder again. The black speck had reappeared again much closer and much larger; it was a galloping horseman. His last hope fled. "There he comes!" he cried—and he seized the horse's bridle, and, turning him to the left, headed him straight for the Rio Grande, which was but a few hundred yards away.
"What are you doing? Where are you going, Felipe?" exclaimed Josefa, troubled at this sudden change of direction and at the sudden fury of his face.
"Where am I going?" he echoed bitterly. "Don Estevan told me yesterday that I must come to the Rio Grande to find water enough to drown myself, and I am going to see."
They came near the brink of the rushing river. Behind them the galloping horseman was fast closing up the gap that separated them. Felipe recognised his style of riding. "It is your father! see!" he cried in a voice of despair, "but he sha'n't separate us now," and he urged the horse towards the water's edge.
"Oh stop, Felipe, stop! What madness is this?" cried the girl, and she drew rein and pulled up. Felipe seized the bridle, his face aflame with baffled passion.
"Loose the rein!" he cried to her desperately. "Let the horse come on. He will carry you over. I can swim."
"Oh, you are mad!" said she, gazing on the wide rolling flood and the distant shore beyond. "Don't dream of such a thing. We shall both be drowned."
"Well, let us drown, then; we shall be together," he exclaimed passionately. "Give him the rein. Come on. Better that than to be beaten like dogs and separated." As he spoke he looked over his shoulder and saw that Salvador, his face raging with anger, was within a few yards of them. Felipe raised his arm to strike Josefa's horse, and force him to take the desperate plunge into the boiling current.
The desperate plunge was never taken. A shot cracked. Felipe felt a great blow, and his right arm fell powerless to his side. Salvador was close by with a smoking pistol in his hand. Josefa's terrified horse wheeled round and bounded away in terror from the bank of the dreaded river. Salvador dashed in between her and Felipe and fired at him again. Felipe hardly knew if he was hit again or not, but instinctively he ran off some fifty yards and then stopped. Wounded and weaponless, what could he do against the murderous firearm in the hands of the cacique?
"Yes, run, you villain, you scoundrel!" shouted Salvador. "Run, and don't stop within a hundred leagues of me! If ever I catch you near the village again I'll kill you—I will," and he poured forth a torrent of abuse at the wretched youth who stood there on the river's bank the very picture of misery, the blood running down his right arm and dropping from his hand to the ground. Josefa saw him, and overcome with pity and fear for him turned her horse towards him, but the animal, dreading the water, refused to approach it.
Salvador rode up to her and seized her rein. "Ah, traitress, ungrateful, disobedient!" hissed his angry voice. "I'll settle with you for this piece of work, be sure." And leaving Felipe he started away from the river, dragging the horse and its rider after him across the sand-dunes.
The horse followed not unwillingly, but too slowly for Salvador's impatience. He dropped the rein, pulled his horse behind, and striking the other violently with his whip forced him into a gallop. The position was a tempting one to his passion, and the cruel rawhide fell once and again, not on the horse only but also on his rider. The girl uttered no sound and made no resistance, only she bent forward over the animal's neck before the shower of blows. At this pitiful sight her lover gave a great cry of despair and started forward to the rescue, wounded and unarmed as he was. But bleeding, exhausted, and on foot, it was hopeless for him to attempt to overtake the horses. He made one despairing rush with all his failing strength, then he fell headlong and lay senseless on the sand.
The cacique made straight for the pueblo, driving his wretched prisoner before him. The poor girl, sick at heart and stupefied with grief and fatigue, picturing to herself Felipe dead of his wounds or drowning himself in his despair, submitted unresistingly to the blows and the reproaches of her father. He was the stronger; how could she resist? She let herself be driven back like a strayed beast of burden over the same leagues of burning mesa and sandy ravine that she had traversed in the coolness of the night under the silence of the stars. Then she had her lover's arms round her and his voice whispering words of love in her ear; now she shrank before bitter curses and the stinging lash. Yet never did she open her lips to utter a word in self-defence or a plea for pardon. Only she kept saying over and over to herself in time to the hoof-beats of the horse, "He may beat me, he may kill me, but Ignacio I won't have." Even sunk in misery as she was, she found a surprising comfort in steeling herself to endure, and swearing to be true to herself and to Felipe.
There is a limit to the staying powers of even the toughest of Indian ponies, and by the time the cacique and his captive had covered half the distance back to Santiago, the horse of the storekeeper which he was mounted upon, and his own which carried his daughter, were both showing painful signs of exhaustion. The cacique, unwilling to run the risk of injuring his own animal, left the trail and made for a spring that he knew of a few miles off to one side, near the foot of the mountains, where they found both water and grass. Here, in a sullen silence, they remained, till long after the sun had set and the weary day ended. The cacique was nursing his wrath till he should have got her safely home again, when he would make an example of her. Not till the Great Bear had sunk well below the pole did they remount their now rested steeds and set out once more for the pueblo; it was grey dawn when they came in sight of it at last, and presently the well-known step-like outline of the terraced roofs of Santiago showed sharp and clear among the peach orchards ahead of them. As they entered its precincts they passed through quite a crowd of onlookers; they had been observed descending from the mesas, and natural curiosity had brought numbers to see the excitement. Poor Josefa dropped her head in shame to escape the hard, inquisitive looks.
They stopped at her father's door. He pulled her roughly from the saddle, pushed her inside, and giving the horses to two of the boys, he entered after her, shut the door, and bolted it. He advanced towards her with glowing eyes. The blows he had given her on the road had only whetted his passion. "Now, you she-devil," said he, "I'll teach you to run away from me."
He flung her to the ground and stood over her. The cruel rawhide descended again and again. The eager crowd outside was squeezing up against the door and the little close-barred lattice window, anxious to see as much as possible of the exciting scene inside. They had no notion of interfering. On the contrary, it seemed to them entirely natural that a father should chastise his disobedient daughter. "If he didn't, who was to?"—that was the way they would have put it.
Among the crowd was Tito. Tito was a friend of Felipe's, and what was a source of curiosity to others was maddening to him. There came into his mind the thought of the American, and he resolved to call him to the rescue.
Stephens, after despatching his letters, as he believed, on the previous day, had returned to the house of Don Nepomuceno. He had done all he could to set the proper authorities in motion, and now, finding that the Navajos had taken themselves off and not returned, so that it was impossible to go on with the negotiations, he took his leave of the Sanchez family and hastened back to the pueblo. The more he thought of the fury the cacique had displayed in the morning, the more uneasy he felt as to what might happen when he should overtake Felipe and Josefa. But when he learnt, on his arrival, that nothing further was known since the cacique had galloped away on their tracks, he settled in his mind that no news was good news, and waited quietly for matters to develop themselves. He rose before dawn the following morning, only to be told once more that nothing had been heard of the fugitives or of the cacique, and he was now busy wiping out his rifle, when there came a hasty knock at the door, and, forgetful of the bulldog, Tito burst headlong into the room. "Oh, Don Estevan!" he exclaimed breathlessly, "Salvador is back, and he is beating his daughter like fury. Perhaps he will kill her."
"The dickens you say!" said the American, dropping his work abruptly and making for the door. "Where's Felipe?"
"I don't know," answered Tito. "He's not there. Perhaps the cacique has killed him."
Tito knew nothing of the sort, but the temptation to deepen the shadows of a harrowing tale is quite irresistible.
"Where are they?" said Stephens, as soon as they were in the open air.
"Here, in his house," cried Tito eagerly, leading the way.
Stephens paused and stood irresolute. "After all, it's none of my funeral," growled he to himself. "I haven't any call to interfere. And I haven't got any weapon on me neither." He turned back to get his pistol, but paused again. "No," he said, "I don't want it. Maybe I sha'n't do anything, and if I do, I'd better go through on my nerve." He knew that an appeal to physical force was idle where the odds were one against a hundred, and that his only chance lay in moral influence.
He followed Tito. It was plain enough where the scene was taking place by the crowd at the door. Stephens went up. The sound of blows was audible from inside, but no cry was heard from the victim. "Where are the chiefs? Where are Tostado and Benito and the rest?" he asked. He would gladly have had the support of the seniors of the village, but they were much too dignified to appear at this performance. The mob consisted of boys, young men, and some of the poorer and less well-thought-of people.
No one answered Stephens's question. He listened; the blows continued. "He can't be allowed to murder her," he cried. "The whole pueblo will get into a row with Government if that happens." He collared two or three boys out of the press. "Here you, Jose, Tomas, Juan Antonio, run and fetch Tostado here and the other chiefs. Say I want them to come."
The boys obeyed him; and the American, squeezing into the gap he had made in the crowd, knocked loudly at the door. There was no answer to the knock, but the blows stopped. He knocked again, calling, "Hullo, Salvador! Hullo there!"
"Look out, Don Estevan," called out some of the boys. "He's furious. Maybe he'll go for you."
He listened for an answer, but none was given. Then came the sound of the whip again. Stephens shouted again, but in vain. He looked round for the chiefs. There was no sign of any of them yet.
"I can't stand this any longer," said he. "Give me room, you fellows." He stood back four or five feet from the door, and raising his right foot dashed it against the lock.
The fastenings were old and the door flew open. He stepped over the threshold and entered. The crowd behind him hung back. In the middle of the floor, full length on her face, lay the form of Josefa. Her arms were bare; she had thrown them up to protect her head, and the marks of the whip were only too visible. She lay perfectly silent and still, a slight quivering of her limbs alone showing that she was alive. The Indian stood across her with his uplifted whip in his hand. He glared fiercely at the American who advanced towards him.
Stephens did not meet the cacique's eye. He was looking down at the prostrate figure on the ground. "So you've brought her back, Salvador," he remarked in an unruffled, every-day voice.
"Yes, I have," he replied brutally; "and I've given her something to keep her from ever running away again."
"It looks like it," said Stephens.
He took one hand out of his pocket, stooped down, and felt her head. "It looks like she'd never run anywhere again," he said.
He did not really believe that she was killed, but he thought it politic to assume so. His position placed him absolutely at the mercy of the Indian; but his voice, his manner, and his action conveyed the assumption that it was absolutely impossible that the Indian should dream of attacking him.
His coolness succeeded. The cacique lowered his whip and stepped back, while Stephens moved the girl's arms gently from her head. They fell limp on the earthen floor.
Stephens had seen some wild doings in Californian mining towns, but he never had seen a woman beaten in his life. Those limp arms sent a queer thrill through him. A sudden fury rose within him, but he mastered it. He felt her head all over slowly and carefully to see if the skull was fractured—as indeed it might well have been had she been struck with the loaded whip-handle. This gave him time to think of his next move.
"If you've killed her, you'll be hanged for it, Salvador," he said at last, in a perfectly matter-of-fact tone. "You and she are not citizens, but you'll be hanged all the same. The law of the Americans reaches here; understand that."
The Indian, whose passion was really more under control than seemed to be the case, was somewhat cowed at Stephens's deliberate statement, but he rejoined sullenly, "She's not dead. Lashes don't kill."
"You will have to answer for it if she dies," said Stephens getting up. He had satisfied himself that the girl was not seriously injured.
"Not to you then," said the Indian, his courage reviving, when he realised that the threat was, after all, blank cartridge, seeing that the girl was alive. He tried to work himself into a rage again. "What do you break into my house for and interfere with me? I'll do what I like with my own." He stepped forward close to Stephens, between him and Josefa. "Go out, or I'll kill you!" he said, raising his voice to a tone of fury.
For a moment the American paused, uncertain. The Indian was a powerful man, full as big and strong as himself, well armed with knife, pistol, and loaded whip, to say nothing of his fifty friends outside the door.
The hesitation was momentary. "I can't leave this girl to that brute's mercy," he said to himself. "Perhaps I can back him down."
He looked Salvador square in the eyes. "Where's Felipe?" said he calmly. "You must answer for him, too. Have you killed him?"
"None of your business," said the Indian roughly. "Be off!" and he raised his hand.
At this moment Josefa, hitherto as still as a corpse, turned her face from the floor, but without rising. She looked up at Stephens. "He gave him two shots," she said, in a voice wonderfully steady considering the pain she was enduring. "I saw him fall."
"Then I arrest you for the murder of Felipe. You are my prisoner. Give up your arms."
The only answer the cacique made to this demand was to take out his revolver, but instead of surrendering it he thrust the muzzle in Stephens's face, cocking it as he did so.
The steady gaze of the American met, without quailing, the black, flashing eyes of the Indian. Grey eyes against black, white man against red, the strife is as old as the history of the continent they stood upon; perhaps it will last as long.
"You can kill me, I know, of course," said the American, speaking very slowly and distinctly; "but you can't kill all the soldiers of the Government. You may kill me to-day, but to-morrow the soldiers will come from Santa Fé and take you prisoner; and if you make your people resist they will destroy you. The Navajos were twenty thousand, but the soldiers conquered them. You are only three hundred. They will conquer you and take you away as they did the Navajos, as they did the Jicarillas, as they have done the Modocs." He raised his left hand very gently and took hold of the pistol barrel. "Don't destroy your people, Salvador," he continued. "You know I wish them well. Loose it."
The Indian's grasp relaxed; he drew a deep breath and stepped back. Stephens lowered the pistol to his own right hand, muzzle upwards, uncocked it, and placed it in his waist-belt.
"Now come with me to my room," said he, taking him gently but firmly by the arm. The struggle for the mastery was over; the Indian had yielded; he obeyed unresistingly. As they stepped out of the house, Stephens said to Tito, "Tell the women to see to the girl."
Outside they found Tostado and the other chiefs approaching—not too fast. It was very plain that they did not want to interfere in the matter. Stephens took his man towards them.
"Look here, Tostado," said he as soon as they met, "I have arrested Salvador for shooting Felipe. I am going to take him to Santa Fé, to the agent and to the governor. Now I want some of you to go along and see that it is all right and square."
Stephens had been reflecting during the course of the night on the events of the previous day, and it had occurred to him that accidents did sometimes happen, and that his letters to the governor and the general might possibly go astray. He had no special reason to suspect what Mr. Backus had actually done, but he had a general feeling of uneasiness with regard to the San Remo post-office. The idea had been already in his mind to go to Santa Fé and lay the affair of the Navajos before the authorities in person, and now this difficult matter of the arrest of the cacique was a double reason for doing it.
The Indians began to converse among themselves.
"Come along to my room, then, and talk it over," said Stephens, and he went ahead with his prisoner, reluctantly followed by the chiefs.
The whole party came into Stephens's room and settled themselves round the wall on the floor, much as they had done the night before. Stephens seated his prisoner on a stool in the middle, and taking the cacique's revolver from his belt laid it on the table. As he did so, he drew the attention of Tostado, who was next to him, to the two recently discharged chambers in the cylinder. "Those were the shots," said he.
"Maybe so, Don Estevan," answered the Indian suavely. "Doubtless you are right in what you say, as you always are. We know that your honour is very wise and very just. But before we do anything about it we want to know what Salvador has to say; we have not heard him yet."
"I do not want to conceal anything," said the cacique abruptly. "I saw them from the top of the hill that leads down from the mesas to La Boca. I went straight to the river to them. He was on foot driving my horse, trying to drive him into the river. I fired at him once, twice. He ran away and stopped. I took my horse and my daughter, and I brought them home. He ran after us, but he fell down. I saw him lying there the last thing from the hill. If he is dead, he is dead. I do not know any more."
His story was so straightforward and simple that it was convincing.
"Where did you say all this happened?" asked Stephens.
"On the river, down below La Boca a league," answered the Indian.
The chiefs began to question him about the details of the affair. He described to them the position of the fugitives when he overtook them, and the refusal of the terrified horse to enter the swollen river.
"Then Felipe was not riding your horse," observed Stephens, who was listening, for in deference to him they spoke in Spanish for the time being.
"No, he was on foot. He was driving the horse," was the reply of the cacique.
"I suppose your daughter was on the horse?" said Stephens.
"Yes, he was taking them both along," answered the Indian.
"How old is she?" asked the prospector. "She looks almost a woman grown."
The Indian reflected a little while. "She was a little child so high," he answered at last, "when there was the great war in the States," and he held his hand at a height to indicate a child of ten years old.
"She must be eighteen now, then," said Stephens.
"I suppose so. Yes, if you say so," admitted the Indian.
"Then she is not a child," said Stephens, "and she can marry him or anyone she likes. You have no right to prevent her. Understand that. This is a free country. By the law a woman is as free as a man; she may go where she likes and marry whom she likes. She is not a slave, and don't you think any such thing. No American can strike a woman; that is the deepest of shames."
He paused after this, for him, unusually long speech, which was intended quite as much for the benefit of the other Indians as the cacique. The American felt a little elated at the thought that single-handed he had been able to arrest their cacique in their midst, and he could not resist improving the occasion.
There was a minute's silence, and then Tostado fixed his keen black eyes on the American's face. "Listen to me, Señor Don Estevan," he said. "The Americans have their way; that is good for them. The Mexicans have their way; that is good for them. And the wild Indians,—the Utes, and the Comanches, and the Navajos too,—they have their own ways. And we, we have our laws. We don't change them. I know if one Indian kills another, then the law of the Americans is to judge him; but the rest of the things we manage among ourselves. The Government gives us that right. We have our own alcalde. We have our own customs. And when men and women do wrong together we beat them. Then they are afraid. That is why our women are so good. Not like the Mexicans. That is good for us. We do not want to change."
"But," cried Stephens, "if it is your custom to beat the women like dogs, you ought to change it. Everybody knows that that it is shameful."
"For the Americans," said the old Indian, with the air of a man making an extremely reasonable concession, "I do not say anything. Let them have their ways, and treat their women as seems good to them. So they are content; that is right. But we have our ways; we do not want to change; we are content to be as we are."
Stephens felt nonplused. It seemed to him that he was not much of a success as a missionary on the rights of women, and he felt, too, that in this discussion he had wandered from the main point. After all, he had arrested his man for the murder of Felipe, and not for beating his daughter, though his motive in doing so had been to rescue the helpless woman.
"You have heard Salvador's story," he said to the chiefs abruptly. "Suppose we go and hear that of the witness, if she is able to speak."
They assented at once, and Stephens, bidding Salvador himself remain where he was, led the way. On arriving at the house, they found the girl laid on some skins in an inner room. Stephens went into the room and knelt down beside her, the others remaining beyond the open door.
She opened her eyes, and perceiving who it was gave him a meaning look. "You have saved me once," she whispered; "can you save me again? She is making poison for me. I have seen"; and her eyes turned towards her step-mother, who was mixing something in a gourd at the end of the room.
Stephens gave a low whistle. "This is a queer business," he muttered to himself. "I wonder if the girl's telling lies. Maybe she's off her nut. Likely enough, after such a hammering. The old woman doesn't look such a bad lot. After all," he went on thinking, "perhaps I had better get her away. These folks can be pretty low-down when they try."
"Can you move?" said he to the girl. "Can you walk?"
"Yes," she answered; "I am quite strong. Only I am looking how to escape."
Neither fatigue, nor bodily pain, nor mental torture, had robbed her of her senses, or tamed her spirit. Since the blows which she had endured with such stoical courage had ceased, she had been collecting herself, conquering the pain, and trying to think. She had recognised a friend in the touch of Stephens's hand, and in the tones of his voice. She had made up her mind to appeal to him if possible for aid, and now here he was at her side.
"Can you take me away?" she whispered.
"All right," he answered. "I'll see what I can do."
"Probably," he mused, "they will say all sorts of ugly, low-down things about me for this, but I can't leave her here at the mercy of these woman-beaters, and that's all there is to it. If I can take two or three of the principal men along, I don't see why she shouldn't come to Santa Fé with us, if she's up to it; but I don't want any more confounded scandal than I can help."
He got up and went to the door and addressed Tostado. "She is able to get up, and to talk," he said. "It will be best to have her come over to my room there and hear what she has to say."
They assented. The American felt all through that though the chiefs did not directly oppose him, their feeling was against him. He led the way, and they followed reluctantly. Josefa, a blanket thrown over her, and drawn over her head so as to conceal her face all but the eyes, accompanied Stephens, but so stiffly and painfully did she walk from the effects of the violence she had suffered, that the idea of her being able to undertake a journey became out of the question.
They entered the American's room, and sat down as before, the girl sitting on the ground near the fireplace. She answered the questions put to her in a low but firm voice.
Her statement tallied exactly with the cacique's. She had seen her lover's blood flow, and the last she had seen of him as she looked back was his figure stretched on the sand. After hearing her evidence, Stephens felt no doubt that Felipe had been murdered.
"I must secure her somehow," he said to himself. "She'll be wanted as a witness. I suppose his confession alone won't be enough. And she certainly believes the cacique's wife'll kill her if I leave her there. She aint fit to go to Santa Fé, and it would be simply brutal to ask it of her. No, I'll have to try another plan. The only way to save her is to have them acknowledge that I have the right to protect her."
"Tostado," said he, addressing the fine old man whose wisdom and force of character made him by far the most influential of the chiefs, "you told me just now that you had your own customs that you did not want ever to change."
"Yes, señor," said he.
"Well, it is your custom, is it not, that an unmarried woman belongs to her father, and that he can give her to anyone he pleases?"
"Yes," said Tostado; "that is, he can give her to any man in the pueblo that is not of her family. But we should not allow him to give her to any man in another pueblo. We do not allow the women of Santiago to go away."
"Well," continued Stephens, "last night when I had blasted the ditch for you, you all came here and wanted me to stay with you always; and you said that everything you had was mine, and that whatever I asked you for you would give me. Is not that so?"
"Yes," said Tostado simply. "You speak the truth." A general murmur of assent confirmed his statement.
"Now," said Stephens, "I'm going to ask you for something, and I shall see whether Indians mean a thing when they say it. I ask you for the daughter of Salvador—for Josefa."
There was a general movement of surprise. The Indians talked eagerly to one another, but in their own language, so that they were unintelligible to the American. Presently Tostado spoke.
"How do you mean?" said he, addressing Stephens. "As your wife?"
"As wife, as servant, as anything I like," he answered. "You say now she belongs to Salvador. I want her to belong to me."
The Indians again conversed among themselves.
"But she's promised to Ignacio," said her father to the others. "The padre's coming to-morrow."
"That makes no odds," said one. "Ignacio doesn't want her now she has run off with Felipe."
"It doesn't make any difference if he does," said another. "He's a cowardly old creature; he won't do anything."
"Give him another daughter," said a third, "instead. One that won't run away," he added in an aside for the benefit of the rest. "Perhaps he will give you six cows if you warrant her to stop." The three cows of old Ignacio's bargain were no secret in the pueblo.
The general opinion seemed to be that after the affair of last night both Salvador and Ignacio would be well rid of Josefa on any terms.
"Besides," said the first speaker, with a meaning look towards the American, "if he really wants her, so much the better for you. He will be as good as your son-in-law. He will never give you up to the agent and the governor then. Much better do it at once."