The Freebooters Part 16

Loyal Heart took a rapid glance at the paper. "The letter is laconic,"

he said, "but explicit. Listen:

"'The Jaguar has kept his word. Of all the Mexicans who accompanied the conducta, only one is alive free and unwounded--Captain Don Juan Melendez de Gongora. Will the friends of the Jaguar have a better opinion of him?'"

"Is that all?" Tranquil asked.

"Yes."

"Well," the hunter exclaimed, "people may say as they please, but, by Heavens! The Jaguar is a fine fellow."

"Is he not, father?" a gentle voice murmured in his ear.

Tranquil started at this remark, and turned sharply round. Carmela was by his side, calm and smiling.

CHAPTER IX.

HOSPITALITY.

We have said that night had fallen for some time past, and it was quite dark under covert. In the black sky a chaos of clouds, laden with the electric fluid, rolled heavily along. Not a star glistened in the vault of heaven; an autumnal breeze whistled gustily through the trees, and at each blast covered the ground with a shower of dead leaves.

In the distance could be heard the dull and mournful appeals of the wild beasts proceeding to the drinking place, and the snapping bark of the coyotes, whose ardent eyes at intervals gleamed like incandescent coals amid the shrubs. At times lights flashed in the forest and ran along the fine marsh gra.s.s like will-o'-the-wisps. Large dried up sumach trees stood at the corners of the clearing, in which the bivouac was established, and in the fantastic gleams of the fire waved like phantoms their winding sheets of moss and lianas. A thousand sounds pa.s.sed through the air; nameless cries escaped from invisible lairs, hollowed beneath the roots of the aged trees; stifled cries descended from the crests of the quebradas, and our adventurers felt an unknown world living around them, whose proximity froze the soul with a secret terror.

Nature was sad and melancholy, as when she is in travail with one of those terrible overthrows so frequent in these regions. In spite of themselves, the hunters underwent the influence of this discomfort of the desert. There are black hours in life, in which, either through the action of external objects, or the common and mysterious disposition of the inner being, that _me_ which cannot be defined, the strongest men feel unconsciously mastered by a strange contagion of sadness which they seem to breathe in the air, and which overpowers them without power of defence. The news brought by Quoniam had further augmented this tendency of the hunters to melancholy; hence the conversation round the fire, ordinarily gay and careless, was sad and short. Everyone yielded to the flood of gloomy thoughts that contracted his heart, and the few words exchanged at lengthened intervals between the hunters generally remained unanswered.

Carmela alone, lively as a nightingale, continued in a low voice her conversation with Singing-bird, while warming herself, for the night was cold, and not noticing the anxious sideglances which the Canadian at times gave her. At the moment when Lanzi and Quoniam were preparing to go to sleep, a slight crackling was heard in the shrubs. The hunters, suddenly torn from their secret thoughts, raised their heads quickly.

The horses had stopped eating, and with their heads turned to the thicket, and ears laid back, appeared to be listening.

In the desert, everything has a reason; the wood rangers, accustomed to a.n.a.lyse all the rumours of the prairie, know and explain them without ever making a mistake; the rustling of the branch on which the hand rests, the noise of the leaf falling on the ground, the murmur of the water over the pebbles--nothing escapes the marvellous sagacity of these men, whose senses have acquired an extraordinary delicacy.

"Someone is prowling round us," Loyal Heart muttered in a voice not above a breath.

"A spy, of course," said Lanzi.

"Spy or no, the man who is approaching is certainly a white," said Tranquil, as he stretched out his arm to clutch the rifle lying by his side.

"Stay, father," Carmela said eagerly, as she seized his arm; "perhaps it is a poor wretch lost in the desert, who needs help."

"It may be so," Tranquil replied after a moment's reflection; "at any rate, we shall soon know."

"What do you intend doing?" the girl exclaimed, terrified at seeing him rise.

"Go and meet the man, and ask him what he wants, that is all."

"Take care, father."

"Of what, my child?"

"Suppose this man were one of the bandits who traverse the desert?"

"Well, what then?"

"And he were to kill you?"

The Canadian shrugged his shoulders.

"Kill me, girl, nonsense! Rea.s.sure yourself, my child, whoever the man may be, he will not see me unless I deem it necessary. So let me alone."

The maiden tried once more to prevent his departure, but the Canadian would listen to nothing. Freeing himself gently from Carmela's affectionate clutch, he picked up his rifle and disappeared in the chaparral with so light and well-measured a step, that he seemed rather to be gliding on a cloud, than walking on the gra.s.s of the clearing.

So soon as he reached the centre of the thicket, from which the ill-omened sound he had heard came, the hunter, ignorant as he was as to how many enemies he had to deal with, redoubled his prudence and precautions: after a hesitation which lasted only a few seconds, he lay down on the ground, and began gently crawling through the gra.s.s, without producing the slightest rustling sound.

We will now return to the monk, whom we left proceeding toward the hunters' bivouac, accompanied by Blue-fox. The Apache Chief, after giving him the instructions he thought best adapted to inspire him with a wholesome terror, and compel him to serve his plans, left him alone, and disappeared so suddenly, that the monk could not guess in what direction he had gone. When he was alone, Fray Antonio took a timid glance around him; his mind was perplexed, for he could not conceal from himself how delicate and difficult of accomplishment was the mission with which the Chief had entrusted him, especially when dealing with a man so clever and well versed in Indian tricks as the tiger killer.

More than once the monk cursed the malignity of his planet which led him into such traps, and seemed to take a delight in acc.u.mulating on his head all the annoyances and tribulations possible. For a moment, he thought of flight, but he reflected that he was doubtless carefully watched, and that at the slightest suspicious movement he attempted, the invisible guardians who were watching him would suddenly appear before him, and compel him to carry out the adventure to the end.

Fortunately for himself, the monk belonged to that privileged cla.s.s of men whom even the greatest annoyances but slightly affect, and who, after feeling wretched for a few moments, frankly make up their minds, saying to themselves that when the moment arrives in which they run a risk, an accident will perhaps draw them from their trouble, and turn matters to their advantage, in lieu of crushing them.

This reasoning, false though it be, is employed more frequently than may be supposed by a number of people, who, after saying to themselves "when it comes, we shall see," push boldly onwards, and, extraordinary to say, generally succeed in getting out of the hobble, without the loss of too many feathers, and without themselves knowing what they did to have so lucky an escape.

The monk, therefore, resolutely entered the covert, guiding himself by the light of the fire as a beacon. For some minutes he went on at a tolerable pace, but gradually as he approached, his alarm returned; he remembered the rough correction Captain Melendez had administered to him, and this time he feared even worse.

Still, he was now so near the bivouac that any backsliding would be useless. For the purpose of granting himself a few minutes' further respite, he dismounted, and fastened his horse to a tree with extreme slowness: then, having no further plausible pretext to offer himself for delaying his arrival among the hunters, he decided on starting again, employing the most minute precautions not to be perceived too soon, through fear of receiving a bullet in his chest, before he had time to have an explanation with the persons he visited at so awkward an hour.

But Fray Antonio, unluckily for himself, was extremely obese; he walked heavily, and like a man accustomed to tread the pavement of a town; moreover, the night was extremely dark, which prevented him seeing two yards ahead, and he could only progress with outstretched hands, tottering at each step, and running against every obstacle that came across his path.

Hence he did not go far, ere he aroused the persons he desired so much to surprise, and whose practised ear, constantly on the watch, had at once noticed the unusual sound which he had himself not noticed. Fray Antonio, extremely satisfied with his manner of progression, and congratulating himself in his heart at having succeeded so well in concealing himself, grew bolder and bolder, and began to feel almost entirely rea.s.sured, when suddenly he uttered a slight cry of terror, and stopped as if his feet had been rooted in the ground. He had felt a heavy hand laid on his shoulder.

The monk began trembling all over, though not daring to turn his head to the right or left, for he was persuaded in his heart that his last hour had arrived.

"Hilloh, Senor Padre, what are you doing in the forest at such an hour?"

a hoa.r.s.e voice then said to him.

But Fray Antonio was unable to answer; terror had rendered him deaf and blind.

"Are you dumb?" the voice went on a minute after in a friendly voice.

"Come, come, it is not wise to traverse the desert at so late an hour."

The monk did not reply.

"Deuce take me," the other exclaimed, "if terror has not rendered him idiotic. Come, bestir yourself, canarios."

And he began shaking him vigorously.

"Eh, what?" the monk said, in whom a species of reaction was beginning to take place.