Now and then they passed ladies, escorted by gallants, and frequently there were pauses to send second looks after the handsome soldier, and words of pity for his feeble companion. By and by, coming to an intersection of the walk they were pursuing, they were hailed,—“Stay, minstrel, and give us a song.”
By the door of a summer-house they saw, upon stopping, a girl whose beauty was worthy the tribute she sought. The elder sat down upon a bench and replied,—
“A song is gentle medicine for sorrows. Have you such? You are very young.”
Her look of sympathy gave place to one of surprise.
“I would I were assured that minstrelsy is your proper calling.”
“You doubt it! Here is my harp: a soldier is known by his shield.”
“But I have heard your voice before,” she persisted.
“The children of Tenochtitlan, and many who are old now, have heard me sing.”
“But I am a Chalcan.”
“I have sung in Chalco.”
“May I ask your name?”
“There are many streets in the city, and on each they call me differently.”
The girl was still perplexed.
“Minstrels have patrons,” she said, directly, “who—”
“Nay, child, this soldier here is all the friend I have.”
Some one then threw aside the vine that draped the door. While the minstrel looked to see who the intruder was, his inquisitor gazed at the soldier, who, on his part, saw neither of them; he was making an obeisance so very low that his face and hand both touched the ground.
“Does the minstrel intend to sing, Yeteve?” asked Nenetzin, stepping into the light that flooded the walk.
The old man bent forward on his seat.
“Heaven’s best blessing on the child of the king! It should be a nobler hand than mine that strikes a string to one so beautiful.”
The comely princess replied, her face beaming with pleasure, “Verily, minstrel, much familiarity with song has given you courtly speech.”
“I have courtly friends, and only borrow their words. This place is fair, but to my dull fancy it seems that a maiden would prefer the great hall, unless she has a grief to indulge.”
“O, I have a great grief,” she returned; “though I do borrow it as you your words.”
“Then you love some one who is unhappy. I understand. Is this child in your service?” he asked, looking at Yeteve.
“Call it mine. She loves me well enough to serve me.”
The minstrel struck the strings of his harp softly, as if commencing a mournful story.
“I have a friend,” he said, “a prince and warrior, whose presence here is banned. He sits in his palace to-night, and is visited by thoughts such as make men old in their youth. He has seen much of life, and won fame, but is fast finding that glory does not sweeten misfortune, and that of all things, ingratitude is the most bitter. His heart is set upon a noble woman; and now, when his love is strongest, he is separated from her, and may not say farewell. O, it is not in the ear of a true woman that lover so unhappy could breathe his story in vain. What would the princess Nenetzin do, if she knew a service of hers might soothe his great grief?”
Nenetzin’s eyes were dewy with tears.
“Good minstrel, I know the story; it is the ’tzin’s. Are you a friend of his?”
“His true friend. I bring his farewell to Tula.”
“I will serve him.” And, stepping to the old man, she laid her hand on his. “Tell me what to do, and what you would have.”
“Only a moment’s speech with her.”
“With Tula?”
“A moment to say the farewell he cannot. Go to the palace, and tell her what I seek. I will follow directly. Tell her she may know me in the throng by these locks, whose whiteness will prove my sincerity and devotion. And further, I will twine my harp with a branch of this vine; its leaves will mark me, and at the same time tell her that his love is green as in the day a king’s smile sunned it into ripeness. Be quick. The moment comes when she cannot in honor listen to the message I am to speak.”
He bent over his harp again, and Nenetzin and Yeteve hurried away.
The minstrel stayed a while to dress his harp with the vine.
“A woman would have done it better; they have a special cunning for such things; yet it will serve the purpose. Now let us on!” he said, when the task was finished.
To the palace they then turned their steps. As they approached it, the walk became more crowded with guests. Several times the minstrel was petitioned to stay and sing, but he excused himself. He proceeded, looking steadily at the ground, as is the custom of the very aged. Amongst others, they met Maxtla, gay in his trappings as a parrot from the Great River.
“Good minstrel,” he said, “in your wanderings through the garden, have you seen Iztlil’, the Tezcucan?”
“I have not seen the Tezcucan. I should look for him in the great hall, where his bride is, rather than in the garden, dreaming of his bridal.”
“Well said, uncle! I infer your harp is not carried for show; you can sing! I will try you after a while.”
When he was gone, the minstrel spoke bitterly,—
“Beware of the thing known in the great house yonder as policy. A week ago the lord Maxtla would have scorned to be seen hunting the Tezcucan, whom he hates.”
They came to a portal above which, in a niche of the wall, sat the teotl[34] of the house, grimly claiming attention and worship. Under the portal, past the guard on duty there, through many apartments full of objects of wonder to the stranger, they proceeded, and, at last, with a current of guests slowly moving in the same direction, reached the hall dominated by the king, where the minstrel thought to find the princess Tula.
“O my friend, I pray you, let me stay here a moment,” said the warrior, abashed by dread of the sudden introduction to the royal presence. The singer heard not, but went on.
Standing by the door, the young stranger looked down a hall of great depth eastwardly, broken by two rows of pillars supporting vast oaken girders, upon which rested rafters of red cedar. The walls were divided into panels, with borders broad and intricately arabesqued. A massive bracket in the centre of each panel held the image of a deity, the duplicate of the idol in the proper sanctuary; and from the feet of the image radiated long arms of wood, well carved, crooked upward at the elbows, and ending with shapely hands, clasping lanterns of aguave which emitted lights of every tint. In the central space, between the rows of pillars, immense chandeliers dropped from the rafters, so covered with lamps that they looked like pyramids aglow. And arms, and images, and chandeliers, and even the huge pillars, were wreathed in garlands of cedar boughs and flowers, from which the air drew a redolence as of morning in a garden.
Through all these splendors, the gaze of the visitor sped to the further end of the hall, and there stayed as charmed. He saw a stage, bright with crimson carpeting, rising three steps above the floor, and extending from wall to wall; and on that, covered with green plumaje, a dais, on which, in a chair or throne glittering with burnished gold, the king sat. Above him spread a canopy fashioned like a broad sunshade, the staff resting on the floor behind the throne, sustained by two full-armed warriors, who, while motionless as statues, were yet vigilant as sentinels. Around the dais, their costumes and personal decorations sharing the monarch’s splendor, were collected his queens, and their children, and all who might claim connection with the royal family. The light shone about them as the noonday, so full that all that portion of the hall seemed bursting with sunshine. Never satin richer than the emerald cloth of the canopy, inwoven, as it was, with feathers of humming-birds! Never sheen of stars, to the eyes of the wondering stranger, sharper than the glinting of the jewels with which it was fringed!
And the king appeared in happier mood than common, though the deep, serious look which always accompanies a great care came often to his face. He had intervals of silence also; yet his shrewdest guests were not permitted to see that he did not enjoy their enjoyment.
His queens were seated at his left, Tecalco deeply troubled, sometimes tearful, and Acatlan cold and distant; for, in thought of her own child, the beautiful Nenetzin, she trembled before the remorseless policy.
And Tula, next to the king the recipient of attention, sat in front of her mother, never more queenly, never so unhappy. Compliments came to her, and congratulations, given in courtly style; minstrels extolled her grace and beauty, and the prowess and martial qualities of the high-born Tezcucan; and priest and warrior laid their homage at her feet. Yet her demeanor was not that of the glad young bride; she never smiled, and her eyes, commonly so lustrous, were dim and hopeless; her thoughts were with her heart, across the lake with the banished ’tzin.
As may be conjectured, it was no easy game to steal her from place so conspicuous; nevertheless, Nenetzin awaited the opportunity.
It happened that Maxtla was quite as anxious to get the monarch’s ear for the benefit of his friend, the Chalcan,—in fact, for the introduction of the latter’s newly invented drink. Experience taught the chief when the felicitous moment arrived. He had then but to say the word: a page was sent, the liquor brought. Montezuma sipped, smiled, quaffed deeper, and was delighted.
“There is nothing like it!” he said. “Bring goblets for my friends, and fill up again!”
All the lordly personages about him had then to follow his example,—to drink and approve. At the end, Xoli was summoned.
Nenetzin saw the chance, and said, “O Tula, such a song as we have heard! It was sweeter than that of the bird that wakes us in the morning, sweeter than all the flutes in the hall.”
“And the singer,—who was he?”
Neither Nenetzin nor Yeteve could tell his name.
“He charmed us so,” said the former, “that we thought only of taking you to hear him. Come, go with us. There never was such music or musician.”
And the three came down from the platform unobserved by the king. When the minstrel’s message was delivered, then was shown how well the Tezcucan had spoken when he said of the royal children, “They are all beautiful, but only one is fitted to be a warrior’s wife.”
“Let us see the man,” said Tula. “How may we know him, Nenetzin?”
And they went about eagerly looking for the singer with the gray locks and the vine-wreathed harp. They found him at last about midway the hall, leaning on his staff, a solitary amidst the throng. No one thought of asking him for a song; he was too old, too like one come from a tomb with unfashionable stories.
“Father,” said Tula, “we claim your service. You look weary, yet you must know the ancient chants, which, though I would not like to say it everywhere, please me best. Will you sing?”
He raised his head, and looked at her: she started. Something she saw in his eyes that had escaped her friends.
“A song from me!” he replied, as if astonished. “No, it cannot be. I have known some gentle hearts, and studied them to remember; but long since they went to dust. You do not know me. Imagining you discerned of what I was thinking, you were moved; you only pitied me, here so desolate.”
As he talked, she recovered her composure.
“Will you sing for me, father?” she again asked.
“O willingly! My memory is not so good as it used to be; yet one song, at least, I will give you from the numberless ills that crowd it.”
He looked slowly and tremulously around at the guests who had followed her, or stopped, as they were passing, to hear the conversation.
“As you say,” he then continued, “I am old and feeble, and it is wearisome to stand here; besides, my theme will be sad, and such as should be heard in quiet. Time was when my harp had honor,—to me it seems but yesterday; but now—enough! Here it were not well that my voice should be heard.”
She caught his meaning, and her whole face kindled; but Nenetzin spoke first.
“O yes; let us to the garden!”
The minstrel bowed reverently. As they started, a woman, who had been listening, said, “Surely, the noble Tula is not going! The man is a dotard; he cannot sing; he is palsied.”
But they proceeded, and through the crowd and out of the hall guided the trembling minstrel. Coming to a passage that seemed to be deserted, they turned into it, and Nenetzin, at Tula’s request, went back to the king. Then a change came over the good man; his stooping left him, his step became firm, and, placing himself in front, he said, in a deep, strong voice,—
“It is mine to lead now. I remember these halls. Once again, O Tula, let me lead you here, as I have a thousand times in childhood.”
And to a chamber overlooking the garden, by the hand he led her, followed by Yeteve, sobbing like a child. A dim light from the lamps without disclosed the walls hung with trophies captured in wars with the surrounding tribes and nations. Where the rays were strongest, he stopped, and removed the hood, and said, earnestly,—
“Against the king’s command, and loving you better than life, O Tula, Guatamozin has come to say farewell.”
There was a great silence; each heard the beating of the other’s heart.
“You have passed from me,” he continued, “and I send my grief after you. I look into your face, and see fade our youth, our hopes, and our love, and all the past that bore it relation. The days of pleasantness are ended; the spring that fed the running brook is dry. O Tula, dear one, the bird that made us such sweet music is songless forever!”
Her anguish was too deep for the comfort of words or tears. Closer he clasped her hand.
“O, that power should be so faithless! Here are banners that I have taken. Yonder is a shield of a king of Michuaca whom I slew. I well remember the day. Montezuma led the army; the fight was hard, the peril great; and after I struck the blow, he said I had saved his life, and vowed me boundless love and a splendid reward. What a passion the field of fighting men was! And yet there was another always greater. I had dwelt in the palace, and learned that in the smile of the noble Tula there was to my life what the sunshine is to the flower.”
He faltered, then continued brokenly,—
“He had honors, palaces, provinces, and crowns to bestow; but witness, O gods, whose sacred duty it is to punish ingratitude,—witness that I cared more to call Tula wife than for all the multitude of his princeliest gifts!”
And now fast ran the tears of the princess, through sorrow rising to full womanhood, while the murky chamber echoed with the sobs of Yeteve. If the ghost of the barbarian king yet cared for the shield he died defending, if it were there present, seeing and hearing, its revenge was perfect.
“If Guatamozin—so dear to me now, so dear always—will overlook the womanly selfishness that could find a pleasure in his grief, I will prove that he has not loved unworthily. You have asked nothing of me, nor urged any counsel, and I thank you for the moderation. I thank you, also, that you have spoken as if this sorrow were not yours more than mine. Most of all, O ’tzin, I thank you for not accusing me. Need I say how I hate the Tezcucan? or that I am given away against my will? I am to go as a price, as so much cocoa, in purchase of the fealty of a wretch who would league with Mictlan to humble my father. I am a weak woman, without tribes or banner, and therefore the wrong is put upon me. But have I no power?” And, trembling with the strong purpose, she laid her hand upon his breast. “Wife will I never be except of Guatamozin. I am the daughter of a king. My father, at least, should know me. He may sell me, but, thank the holy gods, I am the keeper of my own life. And what would life be with the base Tezcucan for my master? Royal power in a palace of pearl and gold would not make it worth the keeping. O ’tzin, you never threw a worthless leaf upon the lake more carelessly than I would then fling this poor body there!”
Closer to his heart he pressed the hand on his breast.
“To you, to you, O Tula, be the one blessing greater than all others which the gods keep back in the Sun! So only can you be rewarded. I take your words as an oath. Keep them, only keep them, and I will win for you all that can be won by man. What a time is coming—”
Just then a joyous cry and a burst of laughter from the garden interrupted his passionate speech, and recalled him to himself and the present,—to the present, which was not to be satisfied with lovers’ rhapsodies. And so he said, when next he spoke,—
“You have answered my most jealous wish. Go back now; make no objection to the Tezcucan: the betrothal is not the bridal. The king and Iztlil’ cannot abide together in peace. I know them.”
And sinking his voice, he added, “Your hand is on my heart, and by its beating you cannot fail to know how full it is of love. Take my blessing to strengthen you. Farewell. I will return to my gardens and dreams.”
“To dreams! And with such a storm coming upon Anahuac!” said Tula. “No, no; to dream is mine.”
Up, clear to his vision, rose the destiny prophesied for him by Mualox. As he pondered it, she said, tearfully,—
“I love my father, and he is blind or mad. Now is his peril greatest, now most he needs friendship and help. O ’tzin, leave him not,—I conjure you by his past kindness! Remember I am his child.”
Thereupon he dropped her hand, and walked the floor, while the banners and the shields upon the walls, and the mute glory they perpetuated, whispered of the wrong and shame he was enduring. When he answered, she knew how great the struggle had been, and that the end was scarcely a victory.
“You have asked that of me, my beloved, which is a sore trial,” he said. “I will not deny that the great love I bore your father is disturbed by bitterness. Think how excessive my injury is,—I who revered as a son, and have already put myself in death’s way for him. In the halls, and out in the gardens, my name has been a jest to-night. And how the Tezcucan has exulted! It is hard for the sufferer to love his wrong-doer,—O so hard! But this I will, and as an oath take the promise: as long as the king acts for Anahuac, not imperilling her safety or glory, so long will I uphold him; this, O Tula, from love of country, and nothing more!”
And as the future was veiled against the woman and dutiful child, she replied simply, “I accept the oath. Now lead me hence.”
He took her hand again, and said, “In peril of life I came to say farewell forever; but I will leave a kiss upon your forehead, and plant its memory in your heart, and some day come again to claim you mine.”
And he put his arm around her, and left the kiss on her forehead, and, as the ancient he entered, conducted the unhappy princess from the chamber of banners back to the hall of betrothal.
“If you have there anything for laughter, Maxtla, I bid you welcome,” said the king, his guests around him.
And the young chief knelt on the step before the throne, and answered with mock solemnity, “Your servant, O king, knows your great love of minstrelsy, and how it delights you to make rich the keeper of a harp who sings a good song well. I have taken one who bears him like a noble singer, and has age to warrant his experience.”
“Call you that the man?” asked the king, pointing to Guatamozin.
“He is the man.”
The monarch laughed, and all the guests listening laughed. Now, minstrels were common on all festive occasions; indeed, an Aztec banquet was no more perfect without them than without guests: but it was seldom the royal halls were graced by one so very aged; so that the bent form and gray locks, that at other places and times would have insured safety and respect, now excited derision. The men thought his presence there presumptuous, the women laughed at him as a dotard. In brief, the ’tzin’s peril was very great.
He seemed, however, the picture of aged innocence, and stood before the throne, his head bowed, his face shaded by the hood, leaning humbly on his staff, and clasping the harp close to his breast, the vines yet about it. So well did he observe his disguise, that none there, save Tula and Yeteve, might dream that the hood and dark gown concealed the boldest warrior in Tenochtitlan. The face of the priestess was turned away; but the princess sat a calm witness of the scene; either she had too much pride to betray her solicitude, or a confidence in his address so absolute that she felt none.
“He is none of ours,” said the king, when he had several times scanned the minstrel. “If the palace ever knew him, it was in the days of Axaya’, from whose tomb he seems to have come.”
“As I came in from the garden, I met him going out,” said Maxtla, in explanation. “I could not bear that my master should lose such a promise of song. Besides, I have heard the veterans in service often say that the ancient chants were the best, and I thought it a good time to test the boast.”
The gray courtiers frowned, and the king laughed again.
“My minstrel here represented that old time so well,” continued Maxtla, “that at first I was full of reverence; therefore I besought him to come, and before you, O king, sing the chants that used to charm your mighty father. I thought it no dishonor for him to compete with the singers now in favor, they giving us something of the present time. He declined in courtliest style; saying that, though his voice was good, he was too old, and might shame the ancient minstrelsy; and that, from what he had heard, my master delighted only in things of modern invention. A javelin in the hand of a sentinel ended the argument, and he finally consented. Wherefore, O king, I claim him captive, to whom, if it be your royal pleasure, I offer liberty, if he will sing in competition before this noble company.”
What sport could be more royal than such poetic contest,—the old reign against the new? Montezuma welcomed the idea.
“The condition is reasonable,” he said. “Is there a minstrel in the valley to call it otherwise?”
In a tone scarcely audible, though all were silent that they might hear, the ’tzin answered,—
“Obedience was the first lesson of every minstrel of the old time; but as the master we served loved us as his children, we never had occasion to sing for the purchase of our liberty. And more,—the capture of a harmless singer, though he were not aged as your poor slave, O king, was not deemed so brave a deed as to be rewarded by our master’s smile.”
The speech, though feebly spoken, struck both the king and his chief.
“Well done, uncle!” said the former, laughing. “And since you have tongue so sharp, we remove the condition—”
“Thanks, many thanks, most mighty king! May the gods mete you nothing but good! I will depart.” And the ’tzin stooped till his harp struck the floor.
The monarch waved his hand. “Stay. I merely spoke of the condition that made your liberty depend upon your song. Go, some of you, and call my singers.” A courtier hurried away, then the king added, “It shall be well for him who best strikes the strings. I promise a prize that shall raise him above trouble, and make his life what a poet’s ought to be.”
Guatamozin advanced, and knelt on the step from which Maxtla had risen, and said, his voice sounding tremulous with age and infirmity,—
“If the great king will deign to heed his servant again,—I am old and weak. There was a time when I would have rejoiced to hear a prize so princely offered in such a trial. But that was many, many summers ago. And this afternoon, in my hut by the lake-shore, when I took my harp, all covered with dust, from the shelf where it had so long lain untouched and neglected, and wreathed it with this fresh vine, thinking a gay dress might give it the appearance of use, and myself a deceitful likeness to the minstrel I once was, alas! I did not think of my trembling hand and my shattered memory, or of trial like this. I only knew that a singer, however humble, was privileged at your banquet, and that the privilege was a custom of the monarchs now in their halls in the Sun,—true, kingly men, who, at time like this, would have put gold in my hand, and bade me arise, and go in peace. Is Montezuma more careless of his glory? Will he compel my song, and dishonor my gray hair, that I may go abroad in Tenochtitlan and tell the story? In pity, O king, suffer me to depart.”
The courtiers murmured, and even Maxtla relented, but the king said, “Good uncle, you excite my curiosity the more. If your common speech have in it such a vein of poetry, what must the poetry be? And then, does not your obstinacy outmeasure my cruelty? Get ready, I hold the fortune. Win it, and I am no king if it be not yours.”
The interest of the bystanders now exceeded their pity. It was novel to find one refusing reward so rich, when the followers of his art were accustomed to gratify an audience, even one listener, upon request.
And, seeing that escape from the trial was impossible, this ’tzin arose, resolved to act boldly. Minstrelsy, as practised by the Aztecs, it must be remembered, was not singing so much as a form of chanting, accompanied by rhythmical touches of the lyre or harp,—of all kinds of choral music the most primitive. This he had practised, but in the solitude of his study. The people present knew the ’tzin Guatamo, supposed to be in his palace across the lake, as soldier, scholar, and prince, but not as poet or singer of heroic tales. So that confident minstrelsy was now but another, if not a surer, disguise. And the eyes of the princess Tula shining upon him calmly and steadily, he said, his voice this time trembling with suppressed wrath,—
“Be it so, O king! Let the singers come,—let them come. Your slave will fancy himself before the great Axaya’, or your father, not less royal. He will forget his age, and put his trust in the god whose story he will sing.”
Then other amusements were abandoned, and, intelligence of the trial flying far and fast, lords and ladies, soldiers and priests crowded about the throne and filled the hall. That any power of song could belong to one so old and unknown was incredible.
“He is a provincial,—the musician of one of the hamlets,” said a courtier, derisively.
“Yes,” sneered another, “he will tell how the flood came, and drowned the harvest in his neighborhood.”
“Or,” ventured a third, “how a ravenous vulture once descended from the hills, and carried off his pet rabbit.”
By and by the royal minstrels came,—sleek, comely men, wearing long stoles fringed with gold, and having harps inlaid with pearl, and strung with silver wires. With scarce a glance at their humble competitor, they ranged themselves before the monarch.
The trial began. One after another, the favorites were called upon. The first sang of love, the next of his mistress, the third of Lake Tezcuco, the fourth of Montezuma, his power, wisdom, and glory. Before all were through, the patience of the king and crowd was exhausted. The pabas wanted something touching religion, the soldiers something heroic and resounding with war; and all waited for the stranger, as men listening to a story wait for the laughter it may chance to excite. How were they surprised! Before the womanly tones of the last singer ceased, the old man dropped his staff, and, lifting his harp against his breast, struck its chords, and in a voice clear and vibratory as the blast of a shell, a voice that filled the whole hall, and startled maid and king alike, began his chant.
QUETZAL’.
The singer rested a moment; then, looking in the eyes of the king, with a rising voice, he continued,—
At that name Montezuma started. The minstrel noted well the sign.
And now the priests were glad,—the singer sung of Heaven; and the warriors were aroused,—his voice was like a battle-cry, and the theme was the proud tradition of the conquering march of their fathers from the distant North. Sitting with clasped hands and drooped head, the king followed the chant, like one listening to an oracle. Yet stronger grew the minstrel’s voice,—
At this point the excitement of the audience rose into interruption: they clapped their hands and stamped; some shouted. As the strong voice rolled the grand story on, even the king’s dread of the god disappeared; and had the ’tzin concluded then, the prize had certainly been his. But when the silence was restored, he resumed the attitude so proper to his disguise, and, sinking his voice and changing the measure of the chant, solemnly proceeded,—
Slowly the ’tzin repeated the last sentence, and under his gaze the monarch’s face changed visibly.
The improvisation, if such it was, now wrought its full effect upon Montezuma, who saw the recital coming nearer and nearer to the dread mysteries of the golden chamber in the old Cû. At the beginning of the last sentence, the blood left his face, and he leaned forward as if to check the speech, at the same time some master influence held him wordless. His look was that of one seeing a vision. The vagaries of a mind shaken by days and nights of trouble are wonderful; sometimes they are fearful. How easy for his distempered fancy to change the minstrel, with his white locks and venerable countenance, into a servant of Quetzal’, sent by the god to confirm the interpretation and prophecies of his other servant Mualox. At the last word, he arose, and, with an imperial gesture, cried,—
“Peace—enough!”
Then his utterance failed him,—another vision seemed to fix his gaze. The audience, thrilling with fear, turned to see what he saw, and heard a commotion, which, from the further end of the hall, drew slowly near the throne, and ceased not until Mualox, in his sacrificial robes, knelt upon the step in the minstrel’s place. Montezuma dropped into his throne, and, covering his eyes with his hands, said faintly,—
“Evil betides me, father, evil betides me! But I am a king. Speak what you can!”
Mualox prostrated himself until his white hair covered his master’s feet.
“Again, O king, your servant comes speaking for his god.”
“For the god, Mualox?”
The hall became silent as a tomb.
“I come,” the holy man continued, “to tell the king that Quetzal’ has landed, this time on the sea-shore in Cempoalla. At set of sun his power was collected on the beach. Summon all your wisdom,—the end is at hand.”
All present and hearing listened awe-struck. Of the warriors, not one, however battle-tried, but trembled with undefined terror. And who may accuse them? The weakness was from fear of a supposed god; their heathen souls, after the manner of the Christian, asked, Who may war against Heaven?
“Rise, Mualox! You love me; I have no better servant,” said the king, with dignity, but so sadly that even the prophet’s heart was touched. “It is not for me to say if your news be good or evil. All things, even my Empire, are in the care of the gods. To-morrow I will hold a council to determine how this visit may be best met.” With a mighty effort he freed his spirit of the influence of the untimely visitation, and said, with a show of unconcern, “Leave the morrow to whom it belongs, my children. Let us now to the ceremony which was to crown the night. Come forward, son of ’Hualpilli! Room for the lord Iztlil’, my friends!”
Tula looked down, and the queen Tecalco bowed her face upon the shoulder of the queen Acatlan; and immediately, all differences lost in loving loyalty, the caciques and chiefs gathered before him,—a nobility as true and chivalric as ever fought beneath an infidel banner.
And they waited, but the Tezcucan came not.
“Go, Maxtla. Seek the lord Iztlil’, and bring him to my presence.”
Through the palace and through the gardens they sought the recreant lover. And the silence of the waiting in the great hall was painful. Guest looked in the face of guest, mute, yet asking much. The prince Cacama whispered to the prince Cuitlahua, “It is a happy interference of the gods!”
Tecalco wept on, but not from sorrow, and the eyes of the devoted princess were lustrous for the first time; hope had come back to the darkened soul.
And the monarch said little, and erelong retired. A great portion of the company, despite his injunction, speedily followed his example, leaving the younger guests, with what humor they could command, to continue the revel till morning.
Next day at noon couriers from Cempoalla confirmed the announcement of Mualox. Cortes had indeed landed; and that Good Friday was the last of the perfect glory of Anahuac.
Poor king! Not long now until I may sing for thee the lamentation of the Gothic Roderick, whose story is but little less melancholy than thine.
The ’tzin’s companion the night of the banquet, as the reader has no doubt anticipated, was Hualpa, the Tihuancan. To an adventure of his, more luckless than his friend’s, I now turn.
It will be remembered that the ’tzin left him at the door of the great hall. In a strange scene, without a guide, it was natural for him to be ill at ease; light-hearted and fearless, however, he strolled leisurely about, at one place stopping to hear a minstrel, at another to observe a dance, and all the time half confused by the maze and splendor of all he beheld. In such awe stood he of the monarch, that he gave the throne a wide margin, contented from a distance to view the accustomed interchanges of courtesy between the guests and their master. Finding, at last, that he could not break through the bashfulness acquired in his solitary life among the hills, and imitate the ease and nonchalance of those born, as it were, to the lordliness of the hour, he left the house, and once more sought the retiracy of the gardens. Out of doors, beneath the stars, with the fresh air in his nostrils, he felt at home again, the whilom hunter, ready for any emprise.
As to the walk he should follow he had no choice, for in every direction he heard laughter, music, and conversation; everywhere were flowers and the glow of lamps. Merest chance put him in a path that led to the neighborhood of the museum.
Since the night shut in,—be it said in a whisper,—a memory of wonderful brightness had taken possession of his mind. Nenetzin’s face, as he saw it laughing in the door of the kiosk when Yeteve called the ’tzin for a song, he thought outshone the lamplight, the flowers, and everything most beautiful about his path; her eyes were as stars, rivalling the insensate ones in the mead above him. He remembered them, too, as all the brighter for the tears through which they had looked down,—alas! not on him, but upon his reverend comrade. If Hualpa was not in love, he was, at least, borrowing wings for a flight of that kind.
Indulging the delicious revery, he came upon some nobles, conversing, and quite blocking up the way, though going in his direction. He hesitated; but, considering that, as a guest, the freedom of the garden belonged equally to him, he proceeded, and became a listener.
“People call him a warrior. They know nothing of what makes a warrior; they mistake good fortune, or what the traders in the tianguez call luck, for skill. Take his conduct at the combat of Quetzal’ as an example; say he threw his arrows well: yet it was a cowardly war. How much braver to grasp the maquahuitl, and rush to blows! That requires manhood, strength, skill. To stand back, and kill with a chance arrow,—a woman could do as much.”
The ’tzin was the subject of discussion, and the voice that of Iztlil’, the Tezcucan. Hualpa moved closer to the party.
“I thought his course in that combat good,” said a stranger; “it gave him opportunities not otherwise to be had. That he did not join the assault cannot be urged against his courage. Had you, my lord Iztlil’, fallen like the Otompan, he would have been left alone to fight the challengers. A fool would have seen the risk; a coward would not have courted it.”
“That argument,” replied Iztlil’, “is crediting him with too much shrewdness. By the gods, he never doubted the result,—not he! He knew the Tlascalans would never pass my shield; he knew the victory was mine, two against me as there were. A prince of Tezcuco was never conquered!”
The spirit of the hunter was fast rising; yet he followed, listening.
“And, my friends,” the Tezcucan continued, “who better judged the conduct of the combatants that day than the king? See the result. To-night I take from the faint heart his bride, the woman he has loved from boyhood. Then this banquet. In whose honor is it? What does it celebrate? There is a prize to be awarded,—the prize of courage and skill; and who gets it? And further, of the nobles and chiefs of the valley, but one is absent,—he whose prudence exceeds his valor.”
In such strain the Tezcucan proceeded. And Hualpa, fully aroused, pushed through the company to the speaker, but so quietly that those who observed him asked no questions. Assured that the ’tzin must have friends present, he waited for some one to take up his cause. His own impulse was restrained by his great dread of the king, whose gardens he knew were not fighting-grounds at any time or in any quarrel. But, as the boastful prince continued, the resolve to punish him took definite form with the Tihuancan,—to such degree had his admiration for the ’tzin already risen! Gradually the auditors dropped behind or disappeared; finally but one remained,—a middle-aged, portly noble, whose demeanor was not of the kind to shake the resolution taken.
Hualpa made his first advance close by the eastern gate of the garden, to which point he held himself in check lest the want of arms should prove an apology for refusing the fight.
“Will the lord Iztlil’ stop?” he said, laying his hand on the Tezcucan’s arm.
“I do not know you,” was the answer.
The sleek courtier also stopped, and stared broadly.
“You do not know me! I will mend my fortune in that respect,” returned the hunter, mildly. “I have heard what you said so ungraciously of my friend and comrade,”—the last word he emphasized strongly,—“Guatamozin.” Then he repeated the offensive words as correctly as if he had been a practised herald, and concluded, “Now, you know the ’tzin cannot be here to-night; you also know the reason; but, for him and in his place, I say, prince though you are, you have basely slandered an absent enemy.”
“Who are you?” asked the Tezcucan, surprised.
“The comrade of Guatamozin, here to take up his quarrel.”
“You challenge me?” said Iztlil’, in disdain.
“Does a prince of Tezcuco, son of ’Hualpilli, require a blow? Take it then.”
The blow was given.
“See! Do I not bring you princely blood?” And, in his turn, Hualpa laughed scornfully.
The Tezcucan was almost choked with rage. “This to me,—to me,—a prince and warrior!” he cried.
A danger not considered by the rash hunter now offered itself. An outcry would bring down the guard; and, in the event of his arrest, the united representations of Iztlil’ and his friend would be sufficient to have him sent forthwith to the tigers. The pride of the prince saved him.
“Have a care,—’tis an assassin! I will call the guard at the gate!” said the courtier, alarmed.
“Call them not, call them not! I am equal to my own revenge. O, for a spear or knife,—anything to kill!”
“Will you hear me,—a word?” the hunter said. “I am without arms also; but they can be had.”
“The arms, the arms!” cried Iztlil’, passionately.
“We can make the sentinels at the gate clever by a few quills of gold; and here are enough to satisfy them.” Hualpa produced a handful of the money. “Let us try them. Outside the gate the street is clear.”
The courtier protested, but the prince was determined.
“The arms! Pledge my province and palaces,—everything for a maquahuitl now.”
They went to the gate and obtained the use of two of the weapons and as many shields. Then the party passed into the street, which they found deserted. To avoid the great thoroughfare to Iztapalapan, they turned to the north, and kept on as far as the corner of the garden wall.
“Stay we here,” said the courtier. “Short time is all you want, lord Iztlil’. The feathers on the hawk’s wings are not full-fledged.”
The man spoke confidently; and it must be confessed that the Tezcucan’s reputation and experience justified the assurance. One advantage the hunter had which his enemies both overlooked,—a surpassing composure. From a temple near by a red light flared broadly over the place, redeeming it from what would otherwise have been vague starlight; by its aid they might have seen his countenance without a trace of excitement or passion. One wish, and but one, he had,—that Guatamozin could witness the trial.
The impatience of the Tezcucan permitted but few preliminaries.
“The gods of Mictlan require no prayers. Stand out!” he said.
“Strike!” answered Hualpa.
Up rose the glassy blades of the Tezcucan, flashing in the light; quick and strong the blow, yet it clove but the empty air. “For the ’tzin!” shouted the hunter, striking back before the other was half recovered. The shield was dashed aside; a groan acknowledged a wound in the breast, and Iztlil’ staggered; another blow stretched him on the pavement. A stream of blood, black in the night, stole slowly out over the flags. The fight was over. The victor dropped the bladed end of his weapon, and surveyed his foe, with astonishment, then pity.
“Your friend is hurt; help him!” he said, turning to the courtier; but he was alone,—the craven had run. For one fresh from the hills, this was indeed a dilemma! A duel and a death in sight of the royal palace! A chill tingled through his veins. He thought rapidly of the alarm, the arrest, the king’s wrath, and himself given to glut the monsters in the menagerie. Up rose, also, the many fastnesses amid the cedared glades of Tihuanco. Could he but reach them! The slaves of Montezuma, to please a whim, might pursue and capture a quail or an eagle; but there he could laugh at pursuit, while in Tenochtitlan he was nowhere safe.
Sight of the flowing blood brought him out of the panic. He raised the Tezcucan’s arm, and tore the rich vestments from his breast. The wound was a glancing one; it might not be fatal after all; to save him were worth the trial. Taking off his own maxtlatl, he wound it tightly round the body and over the cut. Across the street there was a small, open house; lifting the wounded man gently as possible, he carried him thither, and laid him in a darkened passage. Where else to convey him he knew not; that was all he could do. Now for flight,—for Tihuanco. Tireless and swift of foot shall they be who catch him on the way!
He started for the lake, intending to cross in a canoe rather than by the causeway; already a square was put behind, when it occurred to him that the Tezcucan might have slaves and a palanquin waiting before the palace door. He began, also, to reproach himself for the baseness of the desertion. How would the ’tzin have acted? When the same Tezcucan lay with the dead in the arena, who nursed him back to life?
If Hualpa had wished his patron’s presence at the beginning of the combat, now, flying from imaginary dangers,—flying, like a startled coward, from his very victory,—much did he thank the gods that he was alone and unseen. In a kind of alcove, or resting-place for weary walkers, with which, by the way, the thoroughfares of Tenochtitlan were well provided, he sat down, recalled his wonted courage, and determined on a course more manly, whatever the risk.
Then he retraced his steps, and went boldly to the portal of the palace, where he found the Tezcucan’s palanquin. The slaves in charge followed him without objection.
“Take your master to his own palace. Be quick!” he said to them, when the wounded man was transferred to the carriage.
“It is in Tecuba,” said one of them.
“To Tecuba then.”
He did more; he accompanied the slaves. Along the street, across the causeway, which never seemed of such weary length, they proceeded. On the road the Tezcucan revived. He said little, and was passive in his enemy’s hands. From Tecuba the latter hastened back to Tenochtitlan, and reached the portico of Xoli, the Chalcan, just as day broke over the valley.
And such was the hunter’s first emprise as a warrior.
It is hardly worth while to detail the debate between Hualpa and Xoli; enough to know that the latter, anticipating pursuit, hid the son of his friend in a closet attached to his restaurant.
That day, and many others, the police went up and down, ferreting for the assassin of the noble Iztlil’. Few premises escaped their search. The Chalcan’s, amongst others, was examined, but without discovery. Thus safely concealed, the hunter throve on the cuisine, and for the loss of liberty was consoled by the gossip and wordy wisdom of his accessory, and, by what was better, the gratitude of Guatamozin. In such manner two weeks passed away, the longest and most wearisome of his existence. How sick at heart he grew in his luxurious imprisonment; how he pined for the old hills and woodlands; how he longed once more to go down the shaded vales free-footed and fearless, stalking deer or following his ocelot. Ah, what is ambition gratified to freedom lost!
Unused to the confinement, it became irksome to him, and at length intolerable. “When,” he asked himself, “is this to end? Will the king ever withdraw his huntsmen? Through whom am I to look or hope for pardon?” He sighed, paced the narrow closet, and determined that night to walk out and see if his old friends the stars were still in their places, and take a draught of the fresh air, to his remembrance sweeter than the new beverage of the Chalcan. And when the night came he was true to his resolution.
Pass we his impatience while waiting an opportunity to leave the house unobserved; his attempts unsuccessfully repeated; his vexation at the “noble patrons” who lounged in the apartments and talked so long over their goblets. At a late hour he made good his exit. In the tianguez, which was the first to receive him, booths and porticos were closed for the night; lights were everywhere extinguished, except on the towers of the temples. As morning would end his furlough and drive him back to the hated captivity, he resolved to make the most of the night; he would visit the lake, he would stroll through the streets. By the gods! he would play freeman to the full.
In his situation, all places were alike perilous,—houses, streets, temples, and palaces. As, for that reason, one direction was good as another, he started up the Iztapalapan street from the tianguez. Passengers met him now and then; otherwise the great thoroughfare was unusually quiet. Sauntering along in excellent imitation of careless enjoyment, he strove to feel cheerful; but, in spite of his efforts, he became lonesome, while his dread of the patrols kept him uneasy. Such freedom, he ascertained, was not all his fancy colored it; yet it was not so bad as his prison. On he went. Sometimes on a step, or in the shade of a portico, he would sit and gaze at the houses as if they were old friends basking in the moonlight; at the bridges he would also stop, and, leaning over the balustrades, watch the waveless water in the canal below, and envy the watermen asleep in their open canoes. The result was a feeling of recklessness, sharpened by a yearning for something to do, some place to visit, some person to see; in short, a thousand wishes, so vague, however, that they amounted to nothing.
In this mood he thought of Nenetzin, who, in the tedium of his imprisonment, had become to him a constant dream,—a vision by which his fancy was amused and his impatience soothed; a vision that faded not with the morning, but at noon was sweet as at night. With the thought came another,—the idea of an adventure excusable only in a lover.
“The garden!” he said, stopping and thinking. “The garden! It is the king’s; so is the street. It is guarded; so is the city. I will be in danger; but that is around me everywhere. By the gods! I will go to the garden, and look at the house in which she sleeps.”
Invade the gardens of the great king at midnight! The project would have terrified the Chalcan; the ’tzin would have forbade it; at any other time, the adventurer himself would rather have gone unarmed into the den of a tiger. The gardens were chosen places sacred to royalty; otherwise they would have been without walls and without sentinels at the gates. In the event of detection and arrest, the intrusion at such a time would be without excuse; death was the penalty.
But the venture was agreeable to the mood he was in; he welcomed it as a relief from loneliness, as a rescue from his tormenting void of purpose; if he saw the dangers, they were viewed in the charm of his gentle passion,—griffins and goblins masked by Love, the enchanter. He started at once; and now that he had an object before him, there was no more loitering under porticos or on the bridges. As the squares were put behind him, he repeated over and over, as a magical exorcism, “I will look at the house in which she sleeps,—the house in which she sleeps.”
Once in his progress, he turned aside from the great street, and went up a footway bordering a canal. At the next street, however, he crossed a bridge, and proceeded to the north again. Almost before he was aware of it, he reached the corner of the royal garden, always to be remembered by him as the place of his combat with the Tezcucan. But so intent was he upon his present project he scarcely gave it a second look.
The wall was but little higher than his head, and covered with snowy stucco; and where, over the coping, motionless in the moonshine, a palm-tree lifted its graceful head, he boldly climbed, and entered the sacred enclosure. Drawing his mantle close about him, he stole toward the palace, selecting the narrow walks most protected by overhanging shrubbery.
A man’s instinct is a good counsellor in danger; often it is the only counsellor. Gliding through the shadows, cautiously as if hunting, he seemed to hear a recurrent whisper,—
“Have a care, O hunter! This is not one of thy familiar places. The gardens of the great king have other guardians than the stars. Death awaits thee at every gate.”
But as often came the reply, “Nenetzin,—I will see the house in which she sleeps.”
He held on toward the palace, never stopping until the top, here and there crowned with low turrets, rose above the highest trees. Then he listened intently, but heard not a sound of life from the princely pile. He sought next a retreat, where, secure from observation, he might sit in the pleasant air, and give wings to his lover’s fancy. At last he found one, a little retired from the central walk, and not far from a tank, which had once been, if it were not now, the basin of a fountain. Upon a bench, well shaded by a clump of flowering bushes, he stretched himself at ease, and was soon absorbed.
The course of his thought, in keeping with his youth, was to the future. Most of the time, however, he had no distinct idea; revery, like an evening mist, settled upon him. Sometimes he lay with closed eyes, shutting himself in, as it were, from the world; then he stared vacantly at the stars, or into those blue places in the mighty vault too deep for stars; but most he loved to look at the white walls of the palace. And for the time he was happy; his soul may be said to have been singing a silent song to the unconscious Nenetzin.
Once or twice he was disturbed by a noise, like the suppressed cry of a child; but he attributed it to some of the restless animals in the museum at the farther side of the garden. Half the night was gone; so the watchers on the temples proclaimed; and still he stayed,—still dreamed.
About that time, however, he was startled by footsteps coming apparently from the palace. He sat up, ready for action. The appearance of a man alone and unarmed allayed his apprehension for the moment. Up the walk, directly by the hiding-place, the stranger came. As he passed slowly on, the intruder thrilled at beholding, not a guard or an officer, but Montezuma in person! As far as the tank the monarch walked; there he stopped, put his hands behind him, and looked moodily down into the pool.
Garden, palace, Nenetzin,—everything but the motionless figure by the tank faded from Hualpa’s mind. Fear came upon him; and no wonder: there, almost within reach, at midnight, unattended, stood what was to him the positive realization of power, ruler of the Empire, dispenser of richest gifts, keeper of life and death! Guilty, and tremulously apprehensive that he had been discovered, Hualpa looked each instant to be dragged from his hiding.
The space around the tank was clear, and strewn with shells perfectly white in the moonlight. While the adventurer sat fixed to his seat, watching the king, watching, also, a chance of escape, he saw something come from the shrubbery, move stealthily out into the walk, then crouch down. Now, as I have shown, he was brave; but this tested all his courage. Out further crept the object, moving with the stillness of a spirit. Scarcely could he persuade himself at first that it was not an illusion begotten of his fears; but its form and movements, the very stillness of its advance, at last identified it. In all his hunter’s experience, he had never seen an ocelot so large. The screams he had heard were now explained,—the monster had escaped from the menagerie!
I cannot say the recognition wrought a subsidence of Hualpa’s fears. He felt instinctively for his arms,—he had nothing but a knife of brittle itzli. Then he thought of the stories he had heard of the ferocity of the royal tigers, and of unhappy wretches flung, by way of punishment, into their dens. He shuddered, and turned to the king, who still gazed thoughtfully over the wall of the tank.
Holy Huitzil’! the ocelot was creeping upon the monarch! The flash of understanding that revealed the fact to Hualpa was like the lightning. Breathlessly he noticed the course the brute was taking; there could be no doubt. Another flash, and he understood the monarch’s peril,—alone, unarmed, before the guards at the gates or in the palace could come, the struggle would be over; child of the Sun though he was, there remained for him but one hope of rescue.
As, in common with provincials generally, he cherished a reverence for the monarch hardly secondary to that he felt for the gods, the Tihuancan was inexpressibly shocked to see him subject to such a danger. An impulse aside from native chivalry urged him to confront the ocelot; but under the circumstances,—and he recounted them rapidly,—he feared the king more than the brute. Brief time was there for consideration; each moment the peril increased. He thought of the ’tzin, then of Nenetzin.
“Now or never!” he said. “If the gods do but help me, I will prove myself!”
And he unlooped the mantle, and wound it about his left arm; the knife, poor as it was, he took from his maxtlatl; then he was ready. Ah, if he only had a javelin!
To place himself between the king and his enemy was what he next set about. Experience had taught him how much such animals are governed by curiosity, and upon that he proceeded to act. On his hands and knees he crept out into the walk. The moment he became exposed, the ocelot stopped, raised its round head, and watched him with a gaze as intent as his own. The advance was slow and stealthy; when the point was almost gained, the king turned about.
“Speak not, stir not, O king!” he cried, without stopping. “I will save you,—no other can.”
From creeping man the monarch looked to crouching beast, and comprehended the situation.
Forward went Hualpa, now the chief object of attraction to the monster. At last he was directly in front of it.
“Call the guard and fly! It is coming now!”
And through the garden rang the call. Verily, the hunter had become the king!
A moment after the ocelot lowered its head, and leaped. The Tihuancan had barely time to put himself in posture to receive the attack, his left arm serving as shield; upon his knee, he struck with the knife. The blood flew, and there was a howl so loud that the shouts of the monarch were drowned. The mantle was rent to ribbons; and through the feathers, cloth, and flesh, the long fangs craunched to the bone,—but not without return. This time the knife, better directed, was driven to the heart, where it snapped short off, and remained. The clenched jaws relaxed. Rushing suddenly in, Hualpa contrived to push the fainting brute into the tank. He saw it sink, saw the pool subside to its calm, then turned to Montezuma, who, though calling lustily for the guard, had stayed to the end. Kneeling upon the stained shells, he laid the broken knife at the monarch’s feet, and waited for him to speak.
“Arise!” the king said, kindly.
The hunter stood up, splashed with blood, the fragments of his tilmatli clinging in shreds to his arm, his tunic torn, the hair fallen over his face,—a most uncourtierlike figure.
“You are hurt,” said the king, directly. “I was once thought skilful with medicines. Let me see.”
He found the wounds, and untying his own sash, rich with embroidery, wrapped it in many folds around the bleeding arm.
Meantime there was commotion in many quarters.
“Evil take the careless watchers!” he said, sternly, noticing the rising clamor. “Had I trusted them,—but are you not of the guard?”