Stronghand: or, The Noble Revenge
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Nothing can describe the hideous aspect of this infamous Pandemonium, the refuge of all the vices of the province, overlooked by the gentle, smiling face of the statue of the Virgin, whose features, in the light of the tapers, assumed an expression of wondrous pity and sorrow.
At the moment when we invite the reader to enter this drinking shop with us the fun was at its height, the room was full of drinkers and dancers, and the whole mob laughed, yelled, and made a row which would have rendered the saint herself deaf. On the left, near the door, a man, wrapped up in a thick cloak, one end of which was raised to his face, and completely concealed his features, was sitting motionless at a separate table, looking absently and carelessly at the dancers who whirled round him. When a newcomer entered the tendajo, this man looked toward the door, and then turned his head away with an air of ill humour when he perceived that the newcomer was not the person that he had been so long expecting, for he had been sitting alone at this table for upwards of two hours. Still no one paid, or seemed to pay, any attention to him – all were too much absorbed in their own occupations to think about a man who obstinately remained gloomy and silent amid this revelry. The stranger, so often deceived in his expectations, at length gave up looking toward the door; he let his head fall on his chest and went to sleep, or pretended to do so, either for the sake of not attracting attention, or else to indulge with greater freedom in his reflections.
All at once a formidable disturbance broke out at one end of the room; a table was upset by a vigorous blow; oaths crossed each other in the air, and knives were drawn from boots; musicians and dancers stopped short, and a circle was formed round two men who, with frowning brows, eyes sparkling with intoxication and passion, a zarapé rolled as a buckler round the left arm, and a navaja in their right hand, were preparing, according to all appearance, to attack each other vigorously. The tendajero, or master of the house, then proved himself equal to the position he occupied – he leaped like a jaguar over the counter behind which he had hitherto stood coldly and indifferently, merely engaged in watching his waiters and serving customers; he closed the front door, against which he leant his powerful shoulders, in order to prevent any customer bolting without payment of his score, and prepared with evident interest to witness the fight.
The two men, with outstretched legs, left arm advanced, bodies bent forward, and knife held by the middle of the blade, were standing looking in each other's eyes, ready for attack, defence, or parry. All at once the mysterious sleeper appeared to wake with a start, as if surprised by the voice of one of the adversaries, took a hasty glance at the combatants, and then darted between them.
"What is the matter?" he asked, in a firm voice, the sound of which affected the duellists, who were astounded at an interference they had been far from expecting.
"This man," one of them answered, "has lost three ounces to me at monte, through the unexpected turn up of the ace of spades."
"Well?" the stranger interjected.
"He refuses to pay me," the gambler continued; "because he declares that the cards were packed, and that consequently I cheated him, which is not true, for —viva Dios; I am known to be a caballero."
At this affirmation, which was slightly erroneous, a smile of singular meaning, but which no one saw, curled the stranger's lip; he continued, in a more serious voice – "It is true that you are a caballero, and I would affirm it were it necessary; but the most honest man is subject to deceive himself, and I am convinced that this has happened to you. Hence instead of fighting with this caballero, whose honour and loyalty cannot either be doubted, prove to him that you recognise your error by paying him the three ounces, which you claimed of him through an oversight; this gentleman will apologize for having used certain ugly expressions, and all will then be settled to the general satisfaction."
"Certainly, I am convinced that this caballero is a man of honour; I am ready to proclaim it anywhere, and I regret with all my soul the misunderstanding which momentarily divided us," said the individual who had not yet spoken, though he remained on the defensive, a position that slightly contradicted the apparent good humour of his remark.
The stranger then turned to the man whose friend he had so unexpectedly made himself, and gave him a sign which the other appeared to understand.
"Well, caballero," he said, with an irony whose expression was hardly noticeable, "what do you think of this apology? For my part, I consider it complete and most honourable."
The man thus addressed hesitated for a moment; a combat was evidently going on in his mind; his furious glances seemed to challenge the company; and had he perceived on the face of one of the spectators an expression of contempt, however fugitive it might have been, he would doubtless have immediately picked another quarrel. But all the persons who surrounded him were cold and indifferent; curiosity alone was legible on their features. He unrolled his cloak, returned the knife to his boot, and held out his hand to his adversary at the same time that he gave him three ounces.
"Pardon me an involuntary error at which I am trully confused," he said, with a courteous bow, but with a sigh he could not restrain.
The other took the ounces without pressing, thrust them away in his capacious pockets with far from ordinary dexterity, returned the salute, and mingled with the crowd, who, through a lengthened acquaintance with the two men, did not at all comprehend this peaceful result.
"Now, Master Kidd," the stranger continued, as he laid his hand on the shoulder of the adventurer, who stood motionless in the middle of the room, "I suppose that all your business here is settled; so, with your permission, we will withdraw."
"As you please," Kidd answered, carelessly, for this man was no other than the bandit we came across in the opening of our story.
The groups had broken up, the crowd had dispersed, musicians and dancers had returned to their places, and the two men could consequently leave without attracting attention. The stranger, when he reached the purer atmosphere of the street, took several deep inspirations, as if trying to expel from his lungs the vitiated air he had been constrained to swallow for so long. Then he turned to his companion, who was walking silently by his side.
"¡Cuerpo de Cristo! Master Kidd," he said, in a tone of ill humour, "you are, it must be confessed, a singular fellow; you compel me, the commandant of this pueblo, to come and hunt you up at this filthy den, where, on your entreaty, I consented to meet you, and instead of watching for my arrival, you leave me among the most perfect collection of bandits I ever saw in my life."
"Excess of zeal, captain; so you must not be angry with me for that," the bandit answered, with a cunning look. "In order to be punctual at the rendezvouz I gave you, I had been for nearly four hours at worthy Señor Cospeto's. Not knowing how to spend my time, I played at cards. You know what month is; once I have the cards in my hand, and the gold on the table, I forget everything."
"Good, good," the stranger answered. "I am willing to believe you. Still, I pledge you my word, that if you dupe me in the affair you have proposed, and the information you offer to sell me is false, you will repent it. You know me, I think, Master Kidd?"
"Yes, Captain Don Marcos de Niza, and I suppose that you know me too; but of what use is this discussion? Let us settle our business first, and then you can act as you think proper."
The Captain gave him a suspicious glance. "It is well," he said, as he rapped at the door; "come in, this is my house; I prefer treating with you here to the tendajo."
"As you please," the bandit said, and followed the Captain into his house, the doors of which were closed behind them.
CHAPTER XIV
THE BARGAIN
Captain Don Marcos de Niza, whom we left commanding the post of San Miguel, and defending it against the Indians, had been a few days previously summoned to the political and military government of the Mineral of Quitoval, by an order that arrived from Mexico, and emanated from the President of the Republic himself. The fact was, that during the last few days certain events had occurred which demanded energetic action on the part of the President. All at once, at a moment when no discontent was supposed to exist among the Indians, the latter, after long councils they had held together, revolted, and had, without any declaration of war, invaded the Mexican territory at several points simultaneously. This revolt suddenly assumed serious proportions; and had become the more formidable within a short time, because the revolters were the Gilenos, that is to say, the Comanches, Apaches, and Axuas, whose dangerous country is known by the name of the Papazos.
The General commanding Sonora and Sinaloa, the two states most exposed to the depredations of the Indians, saw that he must oppose to the Indians a man who, through a lengthened residence on the borders, had acquired great experience as to their way of fighting and the tricks they employ. Only one officer fulfilled these conditions, and that officer was Captain de Niza; he, therefore, received orders to quit the post of San Miguel after dismantling it, and proceed immediately to the Mineral of Quitoval. The Captain obeyed with that promptitude which old soldiers alone can display in the execution of the orders they receive. His first care, on reaching the Mineral, was to protect the pueblo, as far as was possible, from a surprise, by digging a large trench, throwing up entrenchments, and barricading the principal streets.
Unfortunately, the general commanding the provinces had but a very limited military force at his disposal; scarce amounting to six hundred infantry and two hundred cavalry, without field artillery. Hence, in spite of his lively desire to give the Captain a respectable force, as he was obliged to scatter his troops along the whole seaboard of the two states, he found it impossible to send to Quitoval more than one hundred infantry and fifty cavalry. In spite of the numerical weakness of his troops the Captain did not despair. He was one of those men to whom the performance of duty was everything; and who carry out without a murmur the most extraordinary order.
Still, as he expected to be attacked at any moment by an army of ten or fifteen thousand veteran Indians, amply supplied with firearms, and who, through being accustomed to fight with Spaniards, could not be easily terrified, he had to augment the number of his soldiers, so as to have men enough to line the entrenchments he had thrown up round the town. He had two means by which to obtain this result, and he employed them. The first consisted in making the great mine owners understand that they must participate in the defences of the pueblo, either personally or by arming and placing under his orders a certain number of the peons they employed; for if the Indians succeeded in seizing the Mineral, the source of their wealth would be at once dried up.
The great owners understood the Captain's reasons the more easily because their interests were at stake. They therefore enthusiastically followed his advice, and raised at their common charge a corps of one hundred and fifty Opatas – brave soldiers, thoroughly devoted to the Whites. They placed this corps under the Captain's orders, pledging themselves to pay and support it so long as the danger lasted. Don Marcos thus doubled his army at one stroke. This success, which he had been far from expecting, owing to his profound knowledge of the apathy and selfishness of his countrymen, induced him to try the second plan.
This was very simple. It consisted in enlisting, for a certain bounty, as many as he could of the adventurers who always swarm on the borders, and whose neutrality is at times more formidable than declared enmity. The sum offered by the Captain was two ounces per man, one payable on enlistment, the other at the termination of the campaign. This offer, seductive though it was, did not produce all the effect the Captain expected from it. The adventurers responded but feebly to the appeal made to them. These men, in whose hearts patriotic love does not exist, and who only care for pillage, saw in the insurrection of the Indians a source of disorder, and, consequently, of rapine. They cared very little about defending a state of things which their predacious instincts led them, on the contrary, to attack.
Thirty or forty adventurers, however, responded to the call; and these immoral men, who were impatient at the yoke of discipline, were rather an embarrassment than an assistance to the Captain; still as, take them altogether, they were sturdy fellows, and thoroughly acquainted with Indian warfare, he attached them to his cavalry, which was thus raised to a strength of one hundred men. Don Marcos thus found himself at the head of two hundred and fifty infantry and one hundred horse – a force which appeared to him, if well directed, more than sufficient to withstand, behind good entrenchments, the effort of the whole Indian army.
We are aware that this number of men defending a town will produce a smile of pity among European readers, who are accustomed to see on battlefields masses of three hundred thousand men come into collision. But all is relative in this world. In America, where the population is comparatively small, great things have often been decided at the bayonet's point by armies whose relative strength did not exceed that of one of our line regiments. In the last battle fought between the Texans and Mexicans – a battle which decided the independence of Texas, the two armies together did not amount to two thousand men, and yet the collision was terrible, and victory obstinately disputed. In the actions between white men and Indians, the latter, in spite of their indomitable valour, were almost always defeated in a pitched battle, in spite of their crushing superiority of numbers. Not through the courage of their enemies, but by their discipline and military skill. The latter is certainly very limited, but sufficient for adversaries such as they have to combat.
One night, when the Captain returned home after his usual visit to the pueblo to assure himself that all was in order, a ragged lepero, more than half intoxicated with mezcal and pulque, handed him with an infinitude of bows a dirty slip of paper folded up in the shape of a letter. Don Marcos de Niza was not accustomed to neglect anything. He attached as much importance to apparently frivolous events as to those which seemed to possess a certain gravity. He stopped, took the letter, gave a real to the lepero, who went away quite satisfied, and entered his house, which was situated on the Plaza Mayor, in the centre of the pueblo.
After throwing his cap and sword on a table, the Captain opened the letter. He read it at first rather carelessly; but ere long he began frowning, and read the letter a second time, attentively weighing each word. Then at the end of a moment he folded up the letter, and said in a low voice – "I will go."
This letter came from Kidd. The Captain had been long acquainted with the bandit, and knew certain peculiar facts about him which would have been most disagreeable to the bandit, had the latter suspected that the Captain was so thoroughly initiated in the secrets of his vagabond life. Hence Don Marcos fancied he had no right to neglect the overtures the other was pleased to make; while keeping on his guard and determined to punish him severely if he deceived him. The Captain, therefore, proceeded without hesitation to the place where the adventurer appointed to meet him. He had waited for him for several hours with exemplary patience, and would probably have waited longer still, had not chance suddenly brought them face to face in the way we have described.
When the two men had entered the house, and the door closed after them, Don Marcos de Niza, still closely followed by the bandit, who, in spite of his impudence, looked around him timidly, like a wolf caught in a sheepfold, led him into a room the door of which he carefully closed. The Captain pointed to a chair, sat down at a table, laid a brace of pistols ostentatiously within his reach, and said —
"Now I am ready to hear you."
"¡Caray!" the bandit said, impudently; "that is possible; but the point is whether I am disposed to speak."
"And why not, pray, my excellent friend?"
"Hang it, Captain," he said, as he pointed to the pistols, "there are two playthings not at all adapted to set my tongue wagging."
Don Marcos looked at him in a way that made the adventurer involuntarily let his eyes fall, and then leant his elbows on the table.
"Master Kidd," he then said, in a stern voice, though a certain tone of sarcasm was perceptible in it, "I like a distinct understanding; let us therefore, before anything establish our relative positions. You have led a very agitated life, Master Kidd; your vagabond humour, your mad desire to appropriate certain things to which you have a very dubious claim have led you into a few mistakes, whose results might prove remarkably disagreeable to you."
The bandit shook his head in denial.
"I will not dwell," the Captain continued, mockingly, "on a subject which must make your modesty greatly suffer, and will come at once to the motives of your presence here, and the positions we must hold towards each other. I am commandant of this pueblo, and in that capacity compelled to watch over its external safety as well as its internal tranquillity, I think you will agree with me."
"Yes, Captain," the bandit answered, somewhat reassured at finding the conversation turned away from such delicate topics.
"Very good; you wrote me this letter, appointing a meeting and offering to sell – that is your own word – certain most important information, as you say, for the continuance of the safety and tranquillity which I am bound to maintain. Another man might have treated you in the Indian fashion. After having you arrested, he would have ordered a cord to be fastened round your temples; or your suspension by your thumbs – as you have done yourself, if report be true, on various occasions with less valid reasons; and have so thoroughly loosened your tongue that you would not have kept a single secret back. I have preferred dealing with you as an honest man."
The bandit breathed again.
"Still, as you are one of those persons with whom it is advisable to take precautions, and in whom a confidence cannot be placed, as they would not scruple to abuse it on the first opportunity, I retain not only the right, but also the means of blowing out your brains if you have the slightest intention of deceiving me."
"Oh, Captain, what an idea! Blow out my brains!" the bandit stammered.
"Do you fancy, my dear Señor," the Captain continued, still sarcastically, "that your friends will pity you greatly, if such a misfortune happened to you?"
"Hum! to tell you the truth, I do not exactly know," the adventurer answered, with at attempt to jest; "people are so unkind. But, since you accept the bargain offered to you – for you do accept it, I think, Captain?"
"I do."
"What then, will you give me in exchange for what I shall tell you?"
"You sell; I buy; it is your place to make your conditions; and, if they are not exorbitant – if, in a word, they seem to me fair, I will accept them; so, speak, what do you ask?"
"¡Caray! Captain; it is a delicate question, for I am an honest man."
"That is allowed," Don Marcos interrupted him with a laugh. "Name your price."
"Fifty ounces; would that be too much?" the bandit ventured.
"Certainly not, if the thing be worth it."
"Then," Kidd exclaimed, joyfully, "that is understood, fifty ounces."
"I repeat, if it be worth it."
"Oh, you shall judge for yourself," he remarked, rubbing his hands.
"I ask nothing better but to buy, and to prove to you that I have no intention of cheating you," he added, as he opened a drawer and took out a rather heavy purse, "here is the amount."
And the Captain made two piles each of twenty-five ounces, exactly between the pistols. At the sight of the gold the bandit's eyes sparkled like those of a wild beast.
"¡Rayo de Dios! Captain," he exclaimed; "There is a pleasure in treating with you. I will remember it another time."
"I ask nothing better, Master Kidd. Now speak, I am listening."
"Oh, I have not much to say; but you will judge whether it is important."
"Go on; I am all ears."
"In two words, this is the matter; the Papazos have not elected a chief, but an emperor!"
"An emperor?"
"Yes."
"What do they assert, then?"
"They mean to be free, and wish to constitute their Independence upon a solid basis."
"Do you know this emperor?"
"I have seen him, at least."
"Who is he?"
"A man who is the more formidable because he appears to belong to the white rather than the red race; and is thoroughly conversant with all the means hitherto employed by the Indians."
"Is he young?"
"He is sixty; but as active as if he were only twenty."
"Very good; proceed."
"Is that important?"
"Very important. But not worth fifty ounces, for all that."
"The Yaquis, Mayos, and Seris have allowed themselves to be seduced, and have entered the Confederation. They have taken up again their old plans of 1827 – you remember, at the time of their great revolution?"
"Yes; go on."
"The first expedition the Chief of the Confederation means to undertake is the capture of the Real de Minas."
"I am aware of it."
"Yes; but do you know, Captain, that the Indians have spies even among the garrison; that all is ready for the attack, and that the Papazos intend to surprise you within the next two days?"
"Who gave you this information?"
The bandit smiled craftily.
"What use my telling you, Captain," he answered, "if the information is correct?"
"Do you know the men who have entered into negotiations with the enemy?"
"I do."
"In that case tell me their names."
"It would be imprudent, Captain."
"Why so?"
"Judge for yourself. Suppose I were to tell you their names, what would happen?"
"¡Viva Dios!" the Captain sharply interrupted him. "I should shoot them like the miserable dogs they are, and to serve as a warning to others."
"Well, that is the mistake, Captain."
"How a mistake?"
"Why, yes; suppose you shoot ten men?"
"Twenty, if necessary!"
"Say twenty, it is of no consequence to me; but those who remain, whom neither you nor I know, will sell you to the Indians, so that the only result will be precipitating the evil instead of preventing it."
"Ah, ah!" the Commandant said, with an expressive glance at the bandit. "And what would you do in my place?"
"Oh, a very simple thing."
"Well, what is it?"
"I would leave the scamps at liberty to prepare their treachery, while carefully watching them; and when the moment for attack arrived, I would have them quietly arrested; so that the Indians would be surprised, instead of surprising us, and we should cheat the cunning cheats."
The Captain appeared to reflect for a moment, and then said – "The plan you recommend seems to me good, and for the present I see no inconvenience in carrying it out. Give me the names of the traitors."
Kidd mentioned a dozen names, which the Captain wrote down after him.
"Now," Don Marcos continued, "there are your fifty ounces, and I shall give as many each time you bring me information as valuable as that of today. I pay you dearly, so it is your interest to serve me faithfully; but remember, that if you deceive me, nothing can save you from the punishment I will inflict on you, and that punishment, I warn you, will be terrible."
The adventurer bounded on the money like a wild beast on a prey it has long coveted, concealed it with marvellous dexterity in his wide pockets, and said to the Captain with a bow – "Señor Don Marcos, I have always thought that in this world gold was the sovereign master, and that it alone had the right to command."
After accompanying these singular words with a smiling and almost mocking expression, Kidd bowed for the last time and disappeared, leaving the Captain to his reflections.