would not consent, and Salvador says that as he has promised to take part
in it he cannot go back on his word. And I said I would ask you to give it
up--Salvador did not like--he said it would be such a great
disappointment; and I am so glad you have consented."

"I beg your pardon, señorita, I have not consented."

"But you said only a minute ago that you would do as I desired, and that
my will should be your law."

"Nay, señorita, I put it merely as a supposition, I said if I did make
your wish my law, how then? Less than ever can I renounce this
expedition."

"Then you were only mocking me! Cruel, cruel!"

"Less than ever can I renounce this expedition. But I will do what will
perhaps please you as well. I will release Carmen from his promise. He has
found his fortune; let him stay. I have mine to make; I must go."

"O señor, you have made me happy again. I thank you with all my heart. We
can now speak to my father. But you are mistaken; it is not the same to me
whether you go or stay so long as you release Salvador from his promise. I
would have you stay with us, for I know that he and you are great friends,
and that it will pain you to part."

"It will, indeed. He is a true man and one of the bravest and most
chivalrous I ever knew. I can never forget that he risked his life to save
mine. To lose so dear a friend will be a great grief, even though my loss
be your gain, señorita."

"No loss, Señor Fortescue. Instead of one friend you will have two. Your
gain will be as great as mine."

My answer to these gracious words was to take her proffered hand and press
it to my lips.

"_Caramba!_ What is this? Juanita? And you, señor, is it the part of a
friend? Do you know?"

"Don't be jealous, Salvador," said Juanita, quietly to her lover, who had
come on the balcony unperceived. "Señor Fortescue is a true friend. He is
very good; he releases you from your promise. And he seemed so sorry and
spoke so nobly that the least I could do was to let him kiss my hand."

"You did right, Juanita. I was hasty; I cry _peccavi_ and ask your
forgiveness. And you really give up this expedition for my sake, dear
friend? Thanks, a thousand thanks."

"No; I absolve you from your promise. But I shall go, all the same."

Carmen looked very grave.

"Think better of it, _amigo mio_," he said. "When we formed this project
we were both in a reckless mood. Much of the country you propose to
explore has never been trodden by the white man's foot. It is a country of
impenetrable forests, fordless rivers, and unclimbable mountains. You will
have to undergo terrible hardships, you may die of hunger or of thirst,
and escape the poisoned arrows of wild Indians only to fall a victim to
the malarious fevers which none but natives of the country can resist."

"When did you learn all this? You talked very differently a few days ago."

"I did, but I have been making inquiries."

"And you have fallen in love."

"True, and that has opened my eyes to many things."

"To the dangers of this expedition, for instance; likewise to the fact
that fighting Spaniards is not the only thing worth living for."

"Very likely; love is always stronger than hate, and I confess that I hate
the Spaniards much less than I did. Yet, in this matter, I assure you that
I do not in the least exaggerate. You must remember that your companions
will be half-breeds, men who have neither the stamina nor the courage for
really rough work. When the hardships begin they are almost sure to desert
you. If we were going together we might possibly pull through, as we have
already pulled through so many dangers."

"Yes, I shall miss you sorely. All the same, I am resolved to go, even
were the danger tenfold greater than you say it is."

"I feared as much. Well, if I cannot dissuade you from attempting this
enterprise, I must e'en go with you, as I am pledged to do. To let you
undertake it alone, after agreeing to bear you company were treason to our
friendship. It would be like deserting in the face of the enemy."

"Not so, Carmen. The agreement has been cancelled by mutual consent, and
to leave Juanita after winning her heart would be quite as bad as
deserting in face of the enemy. And I have a right to choose my company.
You shall not go with me."

Juanita again gave me her hand, and from the look that accompanied it I
thought that, had I spoken first--but it was too late; the die was cast.

"You will not go just yet," she murmured; "you will stay with us a little
longer."

"As you wish, señorita. A few days more or less will make little
difference."

Several other attempts were made to turn me from my purpose. Don Esteban
himself (who was greatly pleased with his daughter's betrothal to Carmen),
prompted thereto by Juanita, entered the lists. He expressed regret that
he had not another daughter whom he could bestow upon me, and went even so
far as to offer me land and to set me up as a Venezuelan country gentleman
if I would consent to stay.

But I remained firm to my resolve. For, albeit, none perceived it but
myself I was in a false position. Though I was not hopelessly in love with
Juanita I liked her so well that the contemplation of Carmen's happiness
did not add to my own. I thought, too, that Juanita guessed the true state
of the case; and she was so kind and gentle withal, and her gratitude at
times was so demonstrative that I feared if I stayed long at Naparima
there might be trouble, for like all men of Spanish blood, Carmen was
quite capable of being furiously jealous.

I left them a month before the day fixed for their marriage. My companions
were Gahra, and a dozen Indians and mestizoes, to each of whom I was
enabled, by Don Esteban's kindness, to give a handsome gratuity
beforehand.

To Juanita I gave as a wedding-present my ruby-ring, to Carmen my horse
Pizarro.

Our parting was one of the most painful incidents of my long and checkered
life. I loved them both and I think they loved me. Juanita wept
abundantly; we all embraced and tried to console ourselves by promising
each other that we should meet again; but when or where or how, none of us
could tell, and in our hearts we knew that the chances against the
fruition of our hopes were too great to be reckoned.

Then, full of sad thoughts and gloomy forebodings, I set out on my long
journey to the unknown.

CHAPTER XX.

THE HAPPY VALLEY.

My gloomy forebodings were only too fully realized. Never was a more
miserably monotonous journey. After riding for weeks, through sodden,
sunless forests and trackless wastes we had to abandon our mules and take
to our feet, spend weeks on nameless rivers, poling and paddling our canoe
in the terrible heat, and tormented almost to madness by countless
insects. Then the rains came on, and we were weather-stayed for months in
a wretched Indian village. But for the help of friendly aborigines--and
fortunately the few we met, being spoken fair showed themselves
friendly--we must all have perished. They gave us food, lent us canoes,
served us as pilots and guides, and thought themselves well paid with a
piece of scarlet cloth or a handful of glass beads.

My men turned out quite as ill as I had been led to expect. Several
deserted at the outset, two or three died of fever, two were eaten by
alligators, and when we first caught sight of the Andes, Gahra was my sole
companion.

We were in a pitiful plight. I was weak from the effects of a fever, Gahra
lame from the effects of an accident. My money was nearly all gone, my
baggage had been lost by the upsetting of a canoe, and our worldly goods
consisted of two sorry mules, our arms, the ragged clothes on our backs,
and a few pieces of silver. How we were to cross the Andes, and what we
should do when we reached Peru was by no means clear. As yet, the fortune
which I had set out to seek seemed further off than ever. We had found
neither gold nor silver nor precious stones, and all the coin I had in my
waist-belt would not cover the cost of a three days' sojourn at the most
modest of _posaderos_.

But we have left behind us the sombre and rain-saturated forests of the
Amazon and the Orinoco, and the fine country around us and the magnificent
prospect before us made me, at least, forget for the moment both our past
privations and our present anxieties. We are on the _montaña_ of the
eastern Cordillera, a mountain land of amazing fertility, well wooded, yet
not so thickly as to render progress difficult; the wayside is bordered
with brilliant flowers, cascades tumble from rocky heights, and far away
to the west rise in the clear air the glorious Andes, alps on alps, a vast
range of stately snow-crowned peaks, endless and solemn, veiled yet not
hidden by fleecy clouds, and as cold and mysterious as winter stars
looking down on a sleeping world.

For a long time I gaze entranced at the wondrous scene, and should
probably have gone on gazing had not Gahra reminded me that the day was
well-nigh spent and that we were still, according to the last information
received, some distance from the mission of San Andrea de Huanaco,
otherwise Valle Hermoso, or Happy Valley.

One of our chief difficulties had been to find our way; maps we had none,
for the very sufficient reason that maps of the region we had traversed
did not at that time exist; our guides had not always proved either
competent or trustworthy, and I had only the vaguest idea as to where we
were. Of two things only was I certain, that we were south of the equator
and within sight of the Andes of Peru (which at that time included the
countries now known as Ecuador and Bolivia).

A few days previously I had fallen in with an old half-caste priest, from
whom I had heard of the Mission of San Andrea de Huanaco, and how to get
there, and who drew for my guidance a rough sketch of the route. The
priest in charge, a certain Fray Ignacio, a born Catalan, would, he felt
sure, be glad to find me quarters and give me every information in his
power.

And so it proved. Had I been his own familiar friend Fray Ignacio could
not have welcomed me more warmly or treated me more kindly. A European
with news but little above a year old was a perfect godsend to him. When
he heard that I had served in his native land and the Bourbons once more
ruled in France and Spain, he went into ecstasies of delight, took me into
his house, and gave me of his best.

San Andrea was well named Valle Hermoso. It was like an alpine village set
in a tropical garden. The mud houses were overgrown with greenery, the
rocks mantled with flowers, the nearer heights crested with noble trees,
whose great white trunks, as smooth and round as the marble pillars of an
eastern palace, were roofed with domes of purple leaves.

Through the valley and between verdant banks and blooming orchards
meandered a silvery brook, either an affluent or a source of one of the
mighty streams which find their homes in the great Atlantic.

The mission was a village of tame Indians, whose ancestors had been
"Christianized," by Fray Ignacio's Jesuit predecessor. But the Jesuits had
been expelled from South America nearly half a century before. My host
belonged to the order of St. Francis. The spiritual guide, as well as the
earthly providence of his flock, he managed their affairs in this world
and prepared them for the next. And they seemed nothing loath. A more
listless, easy-going community than the Indians of the Happy Valley it
were difficult to imagine. The men did little but smoke, sleep, and
gamble. All the real work was done by the women, and even they took care
not to over-exert themselves. All were short-lived. The women began to age
at twenty, the men were old at twenty-five and generally died about
thirty, of general decay, said the priest. In my opinion of pure laziness.
Exertion is a condition of healthy existence; and the most active are
generally the longest lived.

Nevertheless, Fray Ignacio was content with his people. They were docile
and obedient, went regularly to church, had a great capacity for listening
patiently to long sermons, and if they died young they got so much the
sooner to heaven.

All the same, Fray Ignacio was not so free from care as might be supposed.
He had two anxieties. The Happy Valley was so far untrue to its name as to
be subject to earthquakes; but as none of a very terrific character had
occurred for a quarter of a century he was beginning to hope that it would
be spared any further visitations for the remainder of his lifetime. A
much more serious trouble were the occasional visits of bands of wild
Indians--_Indios misterios_, he called them; what they called themselves
he had no idea. Neither had he any definite idea whence they came; from
the other side of the Cordilleras, some people thought. But they neither
pillaged nor murdered--except when they were resisted or in drink, for
which reason the father always kept his _aguardiente_ carefully hidden.
Their worst propensity was a passion for white girls. There were two or
three _mestizo_ families in the village, some of whom were whiter, or
rather, less coppery than the others, and from these the _misterios_ would
select and carry off the best-looking maidens; for what purpose Fray
Ignacio could not tell, but, as he feared, to sacrifice to their gods.

When I heard that these troublesome visitors generally numbered fewer than
a score, I asked why, seeing that the valley contained at least a hundred
and fifty men capable of bearing arms, the raiders were not resisted. On
this the father smiled and answered, that no earthly consideration would
induce his tame Indians to fight; it was so much easier to die. He could
not even persuade the _mestizoes_ to migrate to a safer locality. It was
easier to be robbed of their children occasionally than to move their
goods and chattels and find another home.

I asked Fray Ignacio whether he thought these robbers of white children
were likely to pay him a visit soon.

"I am afraid they are," he said. "It is nearly two years since their last
visit, and they only come in summer. Why?"

"I have a curiosity to see these; and I think I could save the children
and give these wild fellows such a lesson that they would trouble you no
more--at any rate for a long time to come."

"I should be inexpressibly grateful. But how, señor?"

Whereupon I disclosed my scheme. It was very simple; I proposed to turn
one of the most likely houses in the village into a small fortress which
might serve as a refuge for the children and which Gahra and I would
undertake to defend. We had two muskets and a pair of double-barrelled
pistols, and the priest possessed an old blunderbuss, which I thought I
could convert into a serviceable weapon. In this way we should be able to
shoot down four or five of the _misterios_ before any of them could get
near us, and as they had no firearms I felt sure that, after so warm a
reception, they would let us alone and go their way. The shooting would
demoralize them, and as we should not show ourselves they could not know
that the garrison consisted only of the negro and myself.

"Very well," said the priest, after a moment's thought. "I leave it to
you. But remember that if you fail they will kill you and everybody else
in the place. However, I dare say you will succeed, the firearms may
frighten them, and, on the whole, I think the risk is worth running!"

The next question was how to get timely warning of the enemy's approach. I
suggested posting scouts on the hills which commanded the roads into the
valley. I thought that, albeit the tame Indians were good for nothing
else, they could at least sit under a tree and keep their eyes open.

"They would fall asleep," said Fray Ignacio.

So we decided to keep a lookout among ourselves, and ask the girls who
tended the cattle to do the same. They were much more wide-awake than the
men, if the latter could be said to be awake at all.

The next thing was to fortify the priest's house, which seemed the most
suitable for our purpose. I strengthened the wall with stays, repaired the
old _trabuco_, which was almost as big as a small cannon, and made ready
for barricading the doors and windows on the first alarm.

This done, there was nothing for it but to wait with what patience I
might, and kill time as I best could. I walked about, fished in the river,
and talked with Fray Ignacio. I would have gone out shooting, for there
was plenty of game in the neighborhood, only that I had to reserve my
ammunition for more serious work.

For the present, at least, my idea of exploring the Andes appeared to be
quite out of the question. I should require both mules and guides, and I
had no money either to buy the one or to pay the other.

And so the days went monotonously on until it seemed as if I should have
to remain in this valley surnamed Happy for the term of my natural life,
and I grew so weary withal that I should have regarded a big earthquake as
a positive god-send. I was in this mood, and ready for any enterprise,
however desperate, when one morning a young woman who had been driving
cattle to an upland pasture, came running to Fray Ignacio to say that she
had seen a troop of horsemen coming down from the mountains.

"The _misterios_!" said the priest, turning pale. "Are you still resolved,
señor?"

"Certainly," I answered, trying to look grave, though really greatly
delighted. "Be good enough to send for the girls who are most in danger.
Gahra and I will take possession of the house, and do all that is
needful."

It was further arranged that Fray Ignacio should remain outside with his
tame Indians, and tell the _misterios_ that all the good-looking
_mestiza_, maidens were in his house, guarded by braves from over the
seas, who would strike dead with lightning anybody who attempted to lay
hands on them.

By the time our preparations were completed, and the frightened and
weeping girls shut up in an inner room, the wild Indians were at the upper
end of the big, straggling village, and presently entered a wide, open
space between the ramshackle old church and Ignacio's house. The party
consisted of fifteen or sixteen warriors mounted on small horses. All rode
bare-back, were naked to the waist, and armed with bows and arrows and the
longest spears I had yet seen.

The tame Indians looked stolidly on. Nothing short of an earthquake would
have disturbed their self-possession. Rather to my surprise, for he had
not so far shown a super-abundance of courage, Fray Ignacio seemed equal
to the occasion. He was tall, portly, and white-haired, and as he stood at
the church door, clad in his priestly robes, he looked venerable and
dignified.

One of the _misterios_, whom from his remarkable head-dress--a helmet made
of a condor's skull--I took to be a cacique, after greeting the priest,
entered into conversation with him, the purport of which I had no
difficulty in guessing, for the Indian, laughing loudly, turned to his
companions and said something that appeared greatly to amuse them. Neither
he nor they believed Fray Ignacio's story of the great pale-face chief and
his death-dealing powers.

The cacique, followed by a few of his men, then rode leisurely toward the
house. He was a fine-looking fellow, with cigar-colored skin and features
unmistakably more Spanish than Indian.

My original idea was to shoot the first two of them, and so strike terror
into the rest. But the cacique bore himself so bravely that I felt
reluctant to kill him in cold blood; and, thinking that killing his horse
might do as well, I waited until they were well within range, and, taking
careful aim, shot it through the head. As the horse went down, the cacique
sprang nimbly to his feet; he seemed neither surprised nor dismayed, took
a long look at the house, then waved his men back, and followed them
leisurely to the other side of the square.

"What think you, Gahra? Will they go away and leave us in peace, or shall
we have to shoot some of them?" I said as I reloaded my musket.

"I think we shall, señor. That tall man whose horse you shot did not seem
much frightened."

"Anything but that, and--what are they about now?"

The wild Indians, directed by their chief, were driving the tame Indians
together, pretty much as sheep-dogs drive sheep, and soon had them penned
into a compact mass in an angle formed by the church and another building.
Although the crowd numbered two or three hundred, of whom a third were
men, no resistance was offered. A few of exceptionally energetic character
made a languid attempt to bolt, but were speedily brought back by the
_misterios_, whose long spears they treated with profound respect.

So soon as this operation was completed the cacique beckoned peremptorily
to the _padre_, and the two, talking earnestly the while, came toward the
house. It seemed as if the Indian chief wanted a parley; but, not being
quite sure of this, I thought it advisable, when he was about fifty yards
off, to show him the muzzle of my piece. The hint was understood. He laid
his weapons on the ground, and, when he and the padre were within speaking
distance, the _padre_, who appeared very much disturbed, said the cacique
desired to have speech of me. Not to be outdone in magnanimity I opened
the door and stepped outside.

The cacique doffed his skull-helmet and made a low bow. I returned the
greeting, said I was delighted to make his acquaintance, and asked what I
could do to oblige him.

"Give up the maidens," he answered, in broken Spanish.

"I cannot; they are in my charge. I have sworn to protect them, and, as
you discovered just now, I have the means of making good my word."

"It is true. You have lightning; I have none, and I shall not sacrifice my
braves in a vain attempt to take the maidens by force. Nevertheless, you
will give them up."

"You are mistaken. I shall not give them up."

"The great pale-face chief is a friend of these poor tame people; he
wishes them well?"

"It is true, and for that reason I shall not let you carry off the seven
maidens."

"Seven?"

"Yes, seven."

"How many men and women and maidens are there yonder, trembling before the
spears of my braves like corn shaken by the wind--fifty times seven?"

"Probably."

"Then my brother--for I also am a great chief--my brother from over the
seas holds the liberty of seven to be of more account than the lives of
fifty times seven."

"My brother speaks in riddles," I said, acknowledging the cacique's
compliment and adopting his style.

"It is a riddle that a child might read. Unless the maidens are given
up--not to harm, but to be taken to our country up there--unless they are
given up the spears of my braves will drink the blood of their kinsfolk,
and my horses shall trample their bodies in the dust."

The cacique spoke so gravely and his air was so resolute that I felt sure
he would do as he said, and I did not see how I could prevent him. His men
were beyond the range of our pieces, and to go outside were to lose our
lives to no purpose. We might get a couple of shots at them, but, before
we could reload, they would either shoot us down with their bows or spit
us with their spears.

Fray Ignacio, seeing the dilemma, drew me aside.

"You will have to do it," he said. "I am very sorry. The girls will either
be sacrificed or brought up as heathens; but better so than that these
devils should be let loose on my poor people, for, albeit some might
escape, many would be slaughtered. Why did you shoot the horse and let the
savage and his companion go scathless?"

"You may well ask the question, father. I see what a grievous mistake I
made. When it came to the point, I did not like to kill brave men in cold
blood. I was too merciful."

"As you say, a grievous mistake. Never repeat it, señor. It is always a
mistake to show mercy to _Indios brutos_. But what will you do?"

"I suppose give up the girls; it is the smaller evil of the two. And
yet--I promised that no evil should befall them--no, I must make another
effort."

And with that I turned once more to the cacique.

"Do you know," I said, laying my hand on the pistol in my belt--"do you
know that your life is in my hands?"

He did not flinch; but a look passed over his face which showed that my
implied threat had produced an effect.

"It is true; but if a hair of my head be touched, all these people will
perish."

"Let them perish! What are the lives of a few tame Indians to me, compared
with my oath? Did I not tell you that I had sworn to protect the
maidens--that no harm should befall them? And unless you call your men off
and promise to go quietly away--" Here I drew my pistol.

It was now the cacique's turn to hesitate. After a moment's thought he
answered:

"Let the lightning kill me, then. It were better for me to die than to
return to my people empty-handed; and my death will not be unavenged. But
if the pale-face chief will go with us instead of the maidens, he will
make Gondocori his friend, and these tame Indians shall not die."

"Go with you! But whither?"

Gondocori pointed toward the Cordillera.

"To our home up yonder, in the heart of the Andes."

"And what will you do with me when you get me there?"

"Your fate will be decided by Mamcuna, our queen. If you find favor in her
sight, well."

"And if not--?"

"Then it would not be well--for you. But as she has often expressed a wish
to see a pale-face with a long beard, I think it will be well; and in any
case I answer for your life."

"What security have I for this? How do I know that when I am in your power
you will carry out the compact?"

"You have heard the word of Gondocori. See, I will swear it on the emblem
you most respect."

And the cacique pressed his lips to the cross which hung from Ignacio's
neck. It was a strange act on the part of a wild Indian, and confirmed the
suspicion I already entertained, that Condocori was the son of a Christian
mother.

"He is a heathen; his oath is worthless; don't trust him, let the girls
go," whispered the padre in my ear.

But I had already made up my mind. It was on my conscience to keep faith
with the girls; I wanted neither to kill the cacique nor see his men kill
the tame Indians, and whatever might befall me "up yonder" I should at any
rate get away from San Andrea de Huanaco.

"The die is cast; I will go with you," I said, turning to Gondocori.

"Now, I know, beyond a doubt, that my brother is the bravest of the brave.
He fears not the unknown."

I asked if Gahra might bear me company.

"At his own risk. But I cannot answer for his safety. Mamcuna loves not
black people."

This was not very encouraging, and after I had explained the matter to
Gahra I strongly advised him to stay where he was. But he said he was my
man, that he owed me his liberty, and would go with me to the end, even
though it should cost him his life.

CHAPTER XXI.

A FIGHT FOR LIFE.

We have left behind us the _montaño_, with its verdant uplands and waving
forests, its blooming valleys, flower-strewed savannas, and sunny waters,
and are crawling painfully along a ledge, hardly a yard wide, stern gray
rocks all round us, a foaming torrent only faintly visible in the
prevailing gloom a thousand feet below. Our mules, obtained at the last
village in the fertile region, move at the speed of snails, for the path
is slippery and insecure, and one false step would mean death for both the
rider and the ridden,

Presently the gorge widens into a glen, where forlorn flowers struggle
toward the scanty light and stunted trees find a precarious foothold among
the rocks and stones. Soon the ravine narrows again, narrows until it
becomes a mere cleft; the mule-path goes up and down like some mighty
snake, now mounting to a dizzy height, anon descending to the bed of the
thundering torrent. The air is dull and sepulchral, an icy wind blows in
our faces, and though I am warmly clad, and wrapped besides in a thick
_poncho_, I shiver to the bone.

At length we emerge from this valley of the shadow of death, and after
crossing an arid yet not quite treeless plain, begin to climb by many
zigzags an almost precipitous height. The mules suffer terribly, stopping
every few minutes to take breath, and it is with a feeling of intense
relief that, after an ascent of two hours, we find ourselves on the
_cumbre_, or ridge of the mountain.

For the first time since yesterday we have an unobstructed view. I
dismount and look round. Backward stretches an endless expanse of bleak
and stormy-swept billowy mountains; before us looms, in serried phalanx,
the western Cordillera, dazzling white, all save one black-throated
colossus, who vomits skyward thick clouds of ashes and smoke, and down
whose ragged flanks course streams of fiery lava.

After watching this stupendous spectacle for a few minutes we go on, and
shortly reach another and still loftier _quebrada_. Icicles hang from the
rocks, the pools of the streams are frozen; we have reached an altitude as
high as the summit of Mont Blanc, and our distended lips, swollen hands,
and throbbing temples show how great is the rarefaction of the air.

None of us suffer so much from the cold as poor Gahra. His ebon skin has
turned ashen gray, he shivers continually, can hardly speak, and sits on
his mule with difficulty.

The country we are in is uninhabited and the trail we are following known
only to a few Indians. I am the first white man, says Gondocori, by whom
it has been trodden.

We pass the night in a ruined building of cyclopean dimensions, erected no
doubt in the time of the Incas, either for the accommodation of travellers
by whom the road was then frequented or for purposes of defence. But being
both roofless, windowless, and fireless, it makes only a poor lodging. The
icy wind blows through a hundred crevices; my limbs are frozen stiff, and
when morning comes many of us look more dead than alive.

I asked Condocori how the poor girls of San Andrea could possibly have
survived so severe a journey.

"The weaker would have died. But I did not expect this cold. The winter is
beginning unusually early this year. Had we been a few days later we
should not have got through at all, and if it begins to snow it may go ill
with us, even yet. But to-morrow the worst will be over."

The cacique had so far behaved very well, treating me as a friend and an
equal, and doing all he could for my comfort. His men treated me as a
superior. Gondocori said very little about his country, still less about
Queen Mamcuna, whom he also called "Great Mother." To my frequent
questions on these subjects he made always the same answer: "Patience, you
will see."

He did, however, tell me that his people called their country Pachatupec
and themselves Pachatupecs, that the Spaniards had never subdued them or
even penetrated into the fastnesses where they dwelt, and that they spoke
the ancient language of Peru.

Gondocori admitted that his mother was a Christian, and to her he no doubt
owed his notions of religion and the regularity of his features. She had
been carried off as he meant to carry off the seven maidens of the Happy
Valley, for the _misterios_ had a theory that a mixture of white and
Indian blood made the finest children and the boldest warriors. But white
wives being difficult to obtain, _mestiza_ maidens had generally to be
accepted, or rather, taken in their stead.

We rose before daybreak and were in the saddle at dawn. The ground and the
streams are hard frozen, and the path is so slippery that the trembling
mules dare scarcely put one foot before the other, and our progress is
painfully slow. We are in a broad, stone-strewed valley, partly covered
with withered puma-grass, on which a flock of graceful _vicuñas_ are
quietly grazing, as seemingly unconscious of our presence as the great
condors which soar above the snowy peaks that look down on the plain.

As we leave the valley, through a pass no wider than a gateway, the
cacique gives me a word of warning.

"The part we are coming to is the most dangerous of all," he said. "But it
is, fortunately, not long. Two hours will bring us to a sheltered valley.
And now leave everything to your mule. If you feel nervous shut your eyes,
but as you value your life neither tighten your reins nor try to guide
him."

I repeat this caution to Gahra, and ask how he feels.

"Much better, señor; the sunshine has given me new life. I feel equal to
anything."

And now we have to travel once more in single file, for the path runs
along a mountain spur almost as perpendicular as a wall; we are between
two precipices, down which even the boldest cannot look without a shudder.
The incline, moreover, is rapid, and from time to time we come to places
where the ridge is so broken and insecure that we have to dismount, let
our mules go first, and creep after them on our hands.

At the head of the file is an Indian who rides the _madrina_ (a mare) and
acts as guide, next come Gondocori, myself and Gahra, followed by the
other mounted Indians, three or four baggage-mules, and two men on foot.

We have been going thus nearly an hour, when a sudden and portentous
change sets in. Murky clouds gather round the higher summits and shut out
the sun, a thick mist settles down on the ridge, and in a few minutes we
are folded in a gloom hardly less dense than midnight darkness.

"Halt!" shouts the guide.

"What shall we do?" I ask the cacique, whom, though he is but two yards
from me, I cannot see.

"Nothing. We can only wait here till the mist clears away," he shouts in a
muffled voice.

"And how soon may that be?"

"_Quien Sabe?_ Perhaps a few minutes, perhaps hours."

Hours! To stand for hours, even for one hour, immovable in that mist on
that ridge would be death. Since the sun disappeared the cold had become
keener than ever. The blood seems to be freezing in my veins, my beard is
a block of ice, icicles are forming on my eyelids.

If this goes on--a gleam of light! Thank Heaven, the mist is lifting, just
enough to enable me to see Gondocori and the guide. They are quite white.
It is snowing, yet so softly as not to be felt, and as the fog melts the
flakes fall faster.

"Let us go on," says Gondocori. "Better roll down the precipice than be
frozen to death. And if we stop here much longer, and the snow continues,
the pass beyond will be blocked, and then we must die of hunger and cold,
for there is no going back."

So we move on, slowly and noiselessly, amid the fast-falling snow, like a
company of ghosts, every man conscious that his life depends on the
sagacity and sure-footedness of his mule. And it is wonderful how wary the
creatures are. They literally feel their way, never putting one foot
forward until the other is firmly planted. But the snow confuses them.
More than once my mule slips dangerously, and I am debating within myself
whether I should not be safer on foot, when I hear a cry in front.

"What is it?" I ask Gondocori, for I cannot see past him.

"The guide is gone. The _madrina_ slipped, and both have rolled down the
precipice."

"Shall we get off and walk?"

"If you like. You will not be any safer, though you may feel so. The mules
are surer footed than we are, and they have four legs to our two. I shall
keep where I am."

Not caring to show myself less courageous than the _cacique_, I also keep
where I am. We get down the ridge somehow without further mishaps, and
after a while find ourselves in a funnel-shaped gully the passage of
which, in ordinary circumstances, would probably present no difficulty.
But just now it is a veritable battle-field of the winds, which seem to
blow from every point of the compass at once. The snow dashes against our
faces like spray from the ocean, and whirls round us in blasts so fierce
that, at times, we can neither see nor hear. The mules, terrified and
exhausted, put down their heads and stand stock-still. We dismount and try
to drag them after us, but even then they refuse to move.

"If they won't come they must die; and unless we hurry on we shall die,
too. Forward!" cried Gondocori, himself setting the example.

Never did I battle so hard for very life as in that gully. The snow nearly
blinded me, the wind took my breath away, forced me backward, and beat me
to the earth again and again. More than once it seemed as if we should
have to succumb, and then there would come a momentary lull and we would
make another rush and gain a little more ground.

Amid all the hurly-burly, though I cannot think consecutively (all the
strength of my body and every faculty of my mind being absorbed in the
struggle), I have one fixed idea--not to lose sight of Gondocori, and,
except once or twice for a few seconds, I never did. Where he goes I go,
and when, after an unusually severe buffeting, he plunges into a
snow-drift at the end of the ravine, I follow him without hesitation.

Side by side we fought our way through, dashing the snow aside with our
hands, pushing against it with our shoulders, beating it down with our
feet, and after a desperate struggle, which though it appeared endless
could have lasted only a few minutes, the victory was ours; we were free.

I can hardly believe my eyes. The sun is visible, the sky clear and blue,
and below us stretches a grassy slope like a Swiss "alp." Save for the
turmoil of wind behind us and our dripping garments I could believe that I
had just wakened from a bad dream, so startling is the change. The
explanation is, however, sufficiently simple: the area of the _tourmente_
is circumscribed and we have got out of it, the gully merely a passage
between the two mighty ramparts of rock which mark the limits of the
tempest and now protect us from its fury.

"But where are the others?"

Up to that moment I had not given them a thought. While the struggle
lasted thinking had not been possible. After we abandoned the mules I had
eyes only for Gondocori, and never once looked behind me.

"Where are the others?" I asked the _cacique_.

"Smothered in the snow; two minutes more and we also should have been
smothered."

"Let us go back and see. They may still live."

"Impossible! We could not get back if we had ten times the strength and
were ten instead of two. Listen!"

The roar of the storm in the gully is louder than ever; the drift, now
higher than the tallest man, grows even as we look.

Fifteen men buried alive within a few yards of us, yet beyond the
possibility of help! Poor Gahra! If he had loved me less and himself more,
he would still be enjoying the _dolce far niente_ of Happy Valley, instead
of lying there, stark and stiff in his frozen winding-sheet. A word of
encouragement, a helping hand at the last moment, and he might have got
through. I feel as if I had deserted him in his need; my conscience
reproaches me bitterly. And yet--good God! What is that? A black hand in
the snow!

"With a single bound I am there. Gondocori follows, and as I seize one
hand he finds and grasps the other, and we pull out of the drift the
negro's apparently lifeless body.

"He is dead," says the _cacique_.

"I don't think so. Raise him up, and let the sun shine on him."

I take out my pocket-flask and pour a few drops of _aguardiente_ down his
throat. Presently Gahra sighs and opens his eyes, and a few minutes later
is able to stand up and walk about. He can tell very little of what passed
in the gully. He had followed Gondocori and myself, and was not far behind
us. He remembered plunging into the snow-drift and struggling on until he
fell on his face, and then all was a blank. None of the Indians were with
him in the drift; he felt sure they were all behind him, which was likely
enough, as Gahra, though sensitive to cold, was a man of exceptional
bodily strength. It was beyond a doubt that all had perished.

"I left Pachatupec with fifteen braves. I have lost my braves, my mules,
and my baggage, and all I have to show are two men, a pale-face and a
black-face. Not a single maiden. How will Mamcuna take it, I wonder?" said
Gondocari, gloomily. "Let us go on."

"You think she will be very angry?"

"I do."

"Is she very unpleasant when she is angry?"

"She generally makes it very unpleasant for others. Her favorite
punishment for offenders is roasting them before a slow fire."

"And yet you propose to go on?"

"What else can we do? Going back the way we came is out of the question,
equally so is climbing either of those mountain-ranges. If we stay
hereabout we shall starve. We have not a morsel of food, and until we
reach Pachatupec we shall get none."

"And when may that be?"

"By this time to-morrow."

"Well, let us go on, then; though, as between being starved to death and
roasted alive, there is not much to choose. All the same, I should like to
see this wonderful queen of whom you are so much afraid."

"You would be afraid of her, too, and very likely will be before you have
done with her. Nevertheless, you may find favor in her sight, and I have
just bethought me of a scheme which, if you consent to adopt it, may not
only save our lives, but bring you great honor."

"And what is that scheme, Gondocori?"

"I will explain it later. This is no time for talk. We must push on with
all speed or we shall not get to the boats before nightfall."

"Boats! You surely don't mean to say that we are to travel to Pachatupec
by boats. Boats cannot float on a frozen mountain torrent!"

But the cacique, who was already on the march, made no answer.

CHAPTER XXII.

THE CACIQUE'S SCHEME.

Shortly before sunset we arrived at our halting-place for the night and
point of departure for the morrow--a hollow in the hills, hemmed in by
high rocks, almost circular in shape and about a quarter of a mile in
diameter. The air was motionless and the temperature mild, the ground
covered with grass and shrubs and flowers, over which hovered clouds of
bright-winged butterflies. Low down in the hollow was a still and silent
pool, and though, so far as I could make out, it had no exit, two large
flat-bottomed boats and a couple of canoes were made fast to the side.
Hard by was a hut of sun-dried bricks, in which were slung three or four
grass hammocks.

There was also fuel, so we were able to make a fire and have a good
warming, of which we stood greatly in need. But as nothing in the shape of
food could be found, either on the premises or in the neighborhood, we had
to go supperless to bed.

Before we turned in Gondocori let us into the secret of the scheme which
was to propitiate Queen Mamcuna, and bring us honor and renown, instead of
blame and (possibly) death.

"I shall tell her," said the cacique, "that though I have lost my braves
and brought no maidens, I have brought two famous medicine-men, who come
from over the seas."

"Very good. But how are we to keep up the character?"

"You must profess your ability to heal the sick and read the stars."

"Nothing easier. But suppose we are put to the test? Are there any sick in
your country?"

"A few; Mamcuna herself is sick; you have only to cure her and all will be
well."

"Very likely; but how if I fail?"

"Then she would make it unpleasant for all of us."

"You mean she would roast us by a slow fire?"

"Probably. There is no telling, though. Our Great Mother is very ingenious
in inventing new punishments, and to those who deceive her she shows no
mercy."

"I understand.  It is a case of kill or cure."

"Exactly. If you don't cure her she will kill you."

"I will do my best, and as I have seen a good deal of practical surgery,
helped to dress wounds and set broken limbs, and can let blood, you may
truthfully say that I have some slight knowledge of the healing art. But
as for treating a sick woman--However, I leave it to you, Gondocori. If
you choose to introduce me to her Majesty as a medicine-man I will act the
part to the best of my ability."

"I ask no more, señor; and if you are fortunate enough to cure Mamcuna of
her sickness--"

"Or make her believe that I have cured her."

"That would do quite as well; you will thank me for bringing you to
Pachatupec, for although the queen can make things very unpleasant for
those who offend her, she can also make them very pleasant for those whom
she likes. And now, señores, as we must to-morrow travel a long way
fasting, let us turn into our hammocks and compose ourselves to sleep."

Excellent advice, which I was only too glad to follow. But we were awake
long before daylight--for albeit fatigue often acts as an anodyne, hunger
is the enemy of repose--and at the first streak of dawn wended to the
silent pool.

As we stepped into the canoe selected by Gondocori (the boats were
intended for the transport of mules and horses) I found that the water was
warm, and, on tasting it, I perceived a strong mineral flavor. The pool
was a thermal spring, and its high temperature fully accounted for the
fertility of the hollow and the mildness of the air. But how were we to
get out of it? For look as I might, I could see no signs either of an
outlet or a current. Gondocori, who acted as pilot, quickly solved the
mystery. A buttress of rock, which in the distance looked like a part of
the mass, screened the entrance to a narrow waterway. Down this waterway
the cacique navigated the canoe. It ran in tortuous course between rocks
so high that at times we could see nothing save a strip of purple sky,
studded with stars. Here and there the channel widened out, and we caught
a glimpse of the sun; and at an immeasurable height above us towered the
_nevados_ (snowy slopes) of the Cordillera.

The stream, if that can be called a stream which does not move, had many
branches, and we could well believe, as Gondocori told us, that it was as
easy to lose one's self in this watery labyrinth as in a tropical forest.
In all Pachatupec there were not ten men besides himself who could pilot a
boat through its windings. He told us, also, that this was the only pass
between the eastern and western Cordillera in that part of the Andes, that
the journey from San Andrea to Pachatupec by any other route would be an
affair not of days but of weeks. The water was always warm and never
froze. Whence it came nobody could tell. Not from the melting of the snow,
for snow-water was cold, and this was always warm, winter and summer. For
his own part he thought its source was a spring, heated by volcanic fires,
and many others thought the same. Its depth was unknown; he himself had
tried to fathom it with the longest line he could find, yet had never
succeeded in touching ground.

Meanwhile we were making good progress, sometimes paddling, sometimes
poling (where the channel was narrow) and toward evening when, as I
reckoned, we had travelled about sixty miles, we shot suddenly into a
charming little lake with sylvan banks and a sandy beach.

Gondocori made fast the canoe to a tree, and we stepped ashore.

We are on the summit of a spur which stands out like a bastion from the
imposing mass of the Cordillera, through the very heart of which runs the
mysterious waterway we have just traversed. Two thousand feet or more
below is a broad plain, bounded on the west by a range of gaunt and
treeless hills ribbed with contorted rocks, which stretch north and south
farther than the eye can reach. The plain is cultivated and inhabited.
There are huts, fields, orchards, and streams, and about a league from the
foot of the bastion is a large village.

"Pachatupec?" I asked.

"_Si, señor_, that is Pachatupec, a very fair land, as you see, and yonder
is Pachacamac, where dwells our queen," said Gondocori, pointing to the
village; and then he fell into a brown study, as if he was not quite sure
what to do next.

The sight of his home did not seem to rejoice the cacique as much as might
be supposed. The approaching interview with Mamcuna was obviously weighing
heavily on his soul, and, to tell the truth, I rather shared his
apprehensions. A savage queen with a sharp temper who occasionally roasted
people alive was not to be trifled with. But as delay was not likely to
help us, and I detest suspense, and, moreover, felt very hungry, I
suggested that we had better go on to Pachacamac forthwith.

"Perhaps we had. Yes, let us get it over," he said, with a sigh.

After descending the bastion by a steep zigzag we turned into a pleasant
foot-path, shaded by trees, and as we neared our destination we met (among
other people) two tall Indians, whose condor-skull helmets denoted their
lordly rank. On recognizing Gondocori (who had lost his helmet in the
snow-storm and looked otherwise much dilapidated) their surprise was
literally unspeakable. They first stared and then gesticulated. When at
length they found their tongues they overwhelmed him with questions, eying
Gahra and me the while as if we were wild animals. After a short
conversation, of which, being in their own language, I could only guess
the purport, the two caciques turned back and accompanied us to the
village. Save that there was no sign of a church, it differed little from
many other villages which I had met with in my travels. There were huts,
mere roofs on stilts, cottages of wattle and dab, and flat-roofed houses
built of sun-dried bricks. Streets, there were none, the buildings being
all over the place, as if they dropped from the sky or sprung up
hap-hazard from the ground.

About midway in the village one of the caciques left us to inform the
queen of our arrival and to ask her pleasure as to my reception. The other
cacique asked us into his house, and offered us refreshments. Of what the
dishes set before us were composed I had only the vaguest idea, but hunger
is not fastidious and we ate with a will.

We had hardly finished when cacique number one, entering in breathless
haste, announced that Queen Mumcuna desired to see us immediately,
whereupon I suggested to Gondocori the expediency of donning more courtly
attire, if there was any to be got.

"What, keep the queen waiting!" he exclaimed, aghast. "She would go mad.
Impossible! We must go as we are."

Not wanting her majesty to go mad, I made no further demur, and we went.

The palace was a large adobe building within a walled inclosure, guarded
by a company of braves with long spears. We were ushered into the royal
presence without either ceremony or delay. The queen was sitting in a
hammock with her feet resting on the ground. She wore a bright-colored,
loosely-fitting bodice, a skirt to match, and sandals. Her long black hair
was arranged in tails, of which there were seven on each side of her face.
She was short and stout, and perhaps thirty years old, and though in early
youth she might have been well favored, her countenance now bore the
impress of evil passions, and the sodden look of it, as also the
blood-streaks in her eyes, showed that her drink was not always water. At
the same time, it was a powerful face, indicative of a strong character
and a resolute will. Her complexion was bright cinnamon, and the three or
four women by whom she was attended were costumed like herself.

On entering the room the three caciques went on their knees, and after a
moment's hesitation Gahra followed their example. I thought it quite
enough to make my best bow. Mamcuna then motioned us to draw nearer, and
when we were within easy speaking distance she said something to Gondocori
that sounded like a question or a command, on which he made a long and, as
I judged from the vigor of his gesture and the earnestness of his manner,
an eloquent speech. I watched her closely and was glad to see that though
she frowned once or twice during its delivery, she did not seem very
angry. I also observed that she looked at me much more than at the
cacique, which I took to be a favorable sign. The speech was followed by a
lively dialogue between Mamcuna and the cacique, after which the latter
turned to me and said, as coolly as if he were asking me to be seated:

"The queen commands you to strip."

"Commands me to strip! What do you mean?"

"What I say; you have to strip--undress, take off your clothes."

"You are joking."

"Joking! I should like to see the man who would dare to take such a
liberty in the audience-chamber of our Great Mother. Pray don't make words
about it, señor. Take off your clothes without any more bother, or she
will be getting angry."

"Let her get angry. I shall do nothing of the sort--No, don't say that;
say that English gentlemen--I mean pale-face medicine-men from over the
seas, never undress in the presence of ladies; their religion forbids it."

Gondocori was about to remonstrate again when the queen interposed and
insisted on knowing what I said. When she heard that I refused to obey her
behest she turned purple with rage, and looked as if she would annihilate
me. Then her mood, or her mind, changing, she laughed loudly, at the same
time pointing to the door and making an observation to the cacique.

Having meanwhile reflected that I was not in an English drawing-room, that
this wretched woman could have me stripped whether I would or no, and that
refusal to comply with her wishes might cost me my life, I asked Gondocori
why the queen wanted me to undress.

"She wants to see whether your body is as hairy as your face (I had not
shaved since I left Naperima), and your face as fair as your body."

"Will it satisfy her if I meet her half-way--strip to the waist? You can
say that I never did as much for any woman before, and that I would not do
it for the queen of my own country, whatever might be the consequence."

The cacique interpreted my proposal, and Mamcuna smiled assent. "The queen
says, 'let it be as you say;' and she charges me to tell you that she is
very much pleased to know that you will do for her what you would not do
for any other woman."

On that I took off my upper garments and Mamcuna, rising from her hammock,
examined me as closely as a military surgeon examines a freshly caught
recruit. She felt the muscles of my arms, thumped my chest, took note of
the width of my back, punched my ribs, and finally pulled a few hairs out
of my beard. Then, smiling approval, she retired to her chinchura.

"You may put on your clothes; the inspection is over," said Gondocori. "I
am glad it has passed off so well. I was rather afraid, though, when she
began to pinch you."

"Afraid of what?"

"Well, the queen is rather curious about skin and color and that, and does
curious things sometimes. She once had a strip of skin cut out of a
mestiza maiden's back, to see whether it was the same color on both sides.
But she seems to have taken quite a liking for you; says you are the
prettiest man she ever saw; and if you cure her of her illness I have no
doubt she will give you a condor's skull helmet and make you a cacique."

"I am greatly obliged to her Majesty, I am sure, and very thankful she did
not take a fancy to cut a piece out of my back. As for curing her, I must
first of all know what is the matter."

"Shall I ask her to describe her symptoms?"

"If you please." In reply to the questions which I put, through Gondocori,
the queen said that she suffered from headache, nausea, and sleeplessness,
and that, whereas only a few years ago she was lithe, active, and gay, she
was now heavy, indolent, and melancholy, adding that she had suffered much
at the hands of the late court medicine-man, who did not understand her
case at all, and that to punish him for his ignorance and presumption she
made him swallow a jarful of his own physic, from the effects of which he
shortly afterward expired in great agony. The place was now vacant, and if
I succeeded in restoring her to health she would make me his successor and
always have me near her person.

I cannot say that I regarded this prospect as particularly encouraging;
nevertheless, I tried to look pleased and told Gondocori to assure the
queen of my gratitude and devotion and ask her to show me her tongue. He
put this request with evident reluctance, and Mamcuna made an angry reply.

"I knew how it would be," said the cacique. "You have put her in a rage.
She thinks you want to insult her, and absolutely refuses to make herself
hideous by sticking out her tongue."

"She will of course do as she pleases. But unless she shows me her tongue
I cannot cure her. I shall not even try. Tell her so."

To tell the truth I had really no great desire to look at the woman's
tongue, but having made the request I meant to stand to my guns.

After some further parley she yielded, first of all making the three
caciques and Gahra look the other way. The appearance of her tongue
confirmed the theory I had already formed that she was suffering from
dyspepsia, brought on by overeating and a too free indulgence in the wine
of the country (a sort of cider) and indolent habits.

I said that if she would follow my instructions I had no doubt that I
could not only cure her but make her as lithe and active as ever she was.
Remembering, however, that as even the highly civilized people object to
be made whole without physic and fuss, and that the queen would certainly
not be satisfied with a simple recommendation to take less food and more
exercise, I observed that before I could say anything further I must
gather plants, make decoctions, and consult the stars, and that my black
colleague should prepare a charm which would greatly increase the potency
of my remedies and the chances of her recovery.

Mamcuna answered that I talked like a medicine-man who understood his
business and her case, that she would strictly obey my orders, and so soon
as she felt better give me a condor's skull helmet. Meanwhile, I was to
take up my quarters in her own house, and she ordered the caciques to send
me forthwith three suits of clothes, my own, as she rightly remarked, not
being suitable for a man of my position.

"Now, did not I tell you?" said Gondocori, as we left the room. "Oh, we
are going on swimmingly; and it is all my doing. I do believe that if I
had not protested that you were the greatest medicine-man in the world,
and had come expressly to cure her, she would have had you roasted or
ripped up by the man-killer or turned adrift in the desert, or something
equally diabolical. Your fate is in your own hands now. If you fail to
make good your promises, it will be out of my power to help you. You heard
how she treated your predecessor."

CHAPTER XXIII.

YOU ARE THE MAN.

Early next morning I sent Gahra secretly up to the lake on the bastion for
a jar of chalybeate water, which, after being colored with red earth and
flavored with wild garlic, was nauseous enough to satisfy the most
exacting of physic swallowers. Then the negro sacrificed a cock in the
royal presence, and performed an incantation in the most approved African
fashion, and we made the creature's claws and comb into an amulet, which I
requested the queen to hang round her neck.

This done, I gave my instructions, assuring her that if she failed in any
particular to observe them my efforts would be vain, and her cure
impossible. She was to drink nothing but water and physic (of the latter
very little), eat animal food only once a day, and that sparingly, and
walk two hours every morning; and finding that she could ride on horseback
(like a man), though she had lately abandoned the exercise, I told her to
ride two hours every evening. I also laid down other rules, purposely
making them onerous and hard to be observed, partly because I knew that a
strict regimen was necessary for her recovery, partly to leave myself a
loop-hole, in the event of her not recovering, for I felt pretty sure that
she would not do all that I had bidden her, and if she came short in any
one thing I should have an excuse ready to my hand.

But to my surprise she did not come short. For Mamcuna to give up her
cider and her flesh pots, and, flabby and fat as she was, to walk and ride
four hours every day, must have been very hard, yet she conformed to
regulations with rare resolution and self-denial. As a natural consequence
she soon began to mend, at first slowly and almost imperceptibly,
afterward rapidly and visibly, as much to my satisfaction as hers; for if
my treatment had failed, I could not have said that the fault was hers.

Meanwhile I was picking up information about her people, and acquiring a
knowledge of their language, and as I was continually hearing it spoken I
was soon able to make myself understood.

The Pachatupecs, though heathens and savages, were more civilized than any
of the so-called _Indios civilizados_ with whom I had come in contact.
They were clean as to their persons, bathing frequently, and not filthy in
their dwellings; they raised crops, reared cattle, and wore clothing,
which for the caciques consisted of a tunic of quilted cotton, breeches
loose at the knees, and sandals. The latter virtue may, however, have been
due to the climate, for though the days were warm the nights were chilly,
and the winters at times rather severe, the country being at a
considerable height above the level of the sea. On the other hand, the
Pachatupecs were truculent, gluttonous, and not very temperate; they
practised polygamy, and all the hard work devolved on the women, whose
husbands often brutally ill-used them. It was contrary to etiquette to ask
a man questions about his wives, and if you went to a cacique's house you
were expected either to ignore their presence or treat them as slaves, as
indeed they were, and the condition of captive Christian girls was even
worse than that of the native women.

Considering the light esteem in which women were held I was surprised that
the Pachatupecs consented to be ruled by one of the sex. But Gondocori
told me that Mamcuna came of a long line of princes who were supposed to
be descended from the Incas, and when her father died, leaving no male
issue, a majority of the caciques chose her as his successor, in part out
of reverence for the race, in part out of jealousy of each other, and
because they thought she would let them do pretty much as they liked. So
far from that, however, she made them do as she liked, and when some of
the caciques raised a rebellion she took the field in person, beat them in
a pitched battle, and put all the leaders and many of their followers to
death. Since that time there had been no serious attempt to dispute her
authority, which, so far as I could gather, she used, on the whole, to
good purpose. Though cruel and vindictive, she was also shrewd and
resolute, and semi-civilized races are not ruled with rose-water. She
could only maintain order by making herself feared, and even civilized
governments often act on the principle that the end justifies the means.

Mamcuna had never married because, as she said, there was no man in the
country fit to mate with a daughter of the Incas; but as Gondocori and
some others thought, the man did not exist with whom she would consent to
share her power.

The Pachatupec braves were fine horsemen and expert with the lasso and the
spear and very fine archers. They were bold mountaineers, too, and
occasionally made long forays as far as the pampas, where, I presume, they
had brought the progenitors of the _nandus_, of which there were a
considerable number in the country, both wild and tame. The latter were
sometimes ridden, but rather as a feat than a pleasure. The largest flock
belonged to the queen.

By the time I had so far mastered the language as to be able to converse
without much difficulty, the queen had fully regained her health. This
result--which was of course entirely due to temperate living and regular
exercise--she ascribed to my skill, and I was in high favor. She made me a
cacique and court medicine-man; I had quarters in her house, and horses
and servants were always at my disposal. Had her Majesty's gratitude gone
no further than this I should have had nothing to complain of; but she
never let me alone, and I had no peace. I was continually being summoned
to her presence; she kept me talking for hours at a time, and never went
out for a ride or a walk without making me bear her company. Her
attentions became so marked, in fact, that I began to have an awful fear
that she had fallen in love with me. As to this she did not leave me long
in doubt.

One day when I had been entertaining her with an account of my travels,
she startled me by inquiring, _à propos_ to nothing in particular, if I
knew why she had not married.

"Because you are a daughter of the Incas, and there is no man in
Pachatupec of equal rank with yourself."

"Once there was not, but now there is."

I breathed again; she surely could not mean me.

"There is now--there has been some time," she continued, after a short
pause. "Know you who he is?"

I said that I had not the slightest idea.

"Yourself, señor; you are the man."

"Impossible, Mamcuna! I am of very inferior rank, indeed--a common
soldier, a mere nobody."

"You are too modest, señor; you do yourself an injustice. A man with so
white a skin, a beard so long, and eyes so beautiful must be of royal
lineage, and fit to mate even with the daughter of the Incas."

"You are quite mistaken, Mamcuna; I am utterly unworthy of so great an
honor."

"You are not, I tell you. Please don't contradict me, señor" (she always
called me 'señor'); "it makes me angry. You are the man whom I delight to
honor and desire to wed; what would you have more?"

"Nothing--I would not have so much. You are too good; but it would be
wrong. I really cannot let you throw yourself away on a nameless
foreigner. Besides what would your caciques say?"

"If any man dare say a word against you I will have his tongue torn out by
the roots."

"But suppose I am married already--that I have left a wife in my own
country?" I urged in desperation.

"That would not matter in the least. She is not likely to come hither, and
I will take care that I am your only wife in this country."

"Your condescension quite overwhelms me. But all this is so sudden; you
must really give me a little time--"

"A little time! why? You perhaps think I am not sincere, that I do not
mean what I say, that I may change my mind. Have no fear on that score.
There shall be no delay. The preparations for our wedding shall be begun
at once, and ten days hence, dear señor, you will be my husband."

What could I say? I had, of course, no intention of marrying her--I would
as lief have married a leopardess. But had I given her a peremptory
negative she might have had me laid by the heels without more ado, or
worse. So I bowed my head and held my tongue, resolving at the same time
that, before the expiration of the ten days' respite, I would get out of
the country or perish in the attempt. Whereupon Mamcuna, taking my silence
for consent, showed great delight, patted me on the back, caressed my
beard, fondled my hands, and called me her lord. Fortunately, kissing was
not an institution in Pachatupec.

One good result of our betrothal, if I may so call it, was that the
preparations for the wedding took up so much of Mamcuna's time that she
had none left for me, and I had leisure and opportunity to contrive a plan
of escape, if I could, for, as I quickly discovered, the difficulties in
the way were almost if not altogether insurmountable. I could neither go
back to the eastern Cordillera by the road I had come, nor, without
guides, find any other pass, either farther north or farther south.
Westward was a range of barren hills bounded by a sandy desert, destitute
of life or the means of supporting life, and stretching to the desolate
Pacific coast, whence, even if I could reach it, I should have no means of
getting away.

There was, moreover, nobody to whom I could appeal for counsel or help.
Gondocori thought me the most fortunate of men, and was quite incapable of
understanding my scruples. Gahra, albeit willing to go with me, knew no
more of the country than I did, and there was not a man in it who could
have been induced even by a bribe either to act as my guide or otherwise
connive at my escape; and I had no inducement to offer.

Nevertheless, the opportunity I was looking for came, as opportunities
often do come, spontaneously and unexpectedly, yet in shape so
questionable that it was open to doubt whether, if I accepted it, my
second condition would not be worse than my first.

CHAPTER XXIV.

IN THE TOILS.

Five days after I had been wooed by the irresistible Mamcuna, and as I was
beginning to fear that I should have to marry her first and run away
afterward, I chanced to be riding in the neighborhood of the village, when
a woman darted out of the thicket and, standing before my horse, held up
her arms imploringly. I had never spoken to her, but I knew her as the
white wife of one of the caciques.

"Save me, señor!" she exclaimed, "for the love of heaven and in the name
of our common Christianity, I implore you to save me!"

"From what?"

"From my wretched life, from despair, degradation, and death." And then
she told me that, while travelling in the mountains with her husband, a
certain Señor de la Vega, and several friends, they were set upon by a
band of Pachatupecs who, after killing all the male members of the party,
carried her off and brought her to Pachacamac, where she had been
compelled to become one of the wives of the cacique Chimu, and that
between his brutality and the jealousy of the other women, her life, apart
from its ignominy, was so utterly wretched that, unless she could escape,
she must either go mad or be driven to commit suicide.

"I should be only too glad to rescue you if I could. I want to escape
myself; but how? I see no way."

"It is not so difficult as you think, señor; if we can get horses and a
few hours' start, I will act as guide and lead you to a civilized
settlement, where we shall be safe from pursuit. I know the country well."

"Are you quite sure you can do this, señora? It will be a hazardous
enterprise, remember."

"Quite sure."

"And you are prepared to incur the risk?"

"I will run any risk rather than stay where I am."

"Very well, I will see what can be done. Meet me here to-morrow at this
hour. And now, we had better separate; if we are seen together it will be
bad for both of us. _Hasta mañana_."

And then she went her way and I went mine.

I had said truly "a hazardous enterprise." Hazardous and difficult in any
circumstances, the hazard and the difficulty would be greatly increased by
the presence of a woman; and the fact of a cacique's wife being one of the
companions of my flight would add to the inveteracy of the pursuit. I
greatly doubted, moreover, whether Señora de la Vega knew the country as
well as she asserted. She was so sick of her wretched condition that she
would say or do anything to get away from it--and no wonder. But was I
justified in letting her run the risk? The punishment of a woman who
deserted her husband was death by burning; were Señora de la Vega caught,
this punishment would be undoubtedly inflicted; were it even suspected
that she had met me or any other man, secretly, Chimu would almost
certainly kill her. Pachatupec husbands had the power of life and death
over their wives, and they were as jealous and as cruel as Moors. Yet
death was better than the life she was compelled to lead, and as she was
fully cognizant of the risk it seemed my duty to do all that I could to
facilitate her escape.

Then another thought occurred to me. Could this be a trap, a "put up job,"
as the phrase goes. Though the _caciques_ had not dared to make any open
protest against Mamcuna's matrimonial project, I knew that they were
bitterly opposed to it, and nothing, I felt sure, would please them better
than to kindle the queen's jealousy by making it appear that I was engaged
in an intrigue with one of Chimu's wives.

Yet no, I could not believe it. No Christian woman would play so base a
part. Señora de la Vega could have no interest in betraying me. She hated
her savage husband too heartily to be the voluntary instrument of my
destruction, and she was so utterly wretched that I pitied her from my
soul.

A creole of pure Spanish blood and noble family, bereft of her husband,
forced to become the slave of a brutal Indian, and the constant associate
of hardly less brutal women, painfully conscious of her degradation,
hopeless of any amendment of her lot, poor Señora de la Vega's fate would
have touched the hardest heart. And she had little children at home! My
suspicions vanished even more quickly than they had been conceived, and
before I reached my quarters I had decided that, come what might, the
attempt should be made.

The next question was how and when. Clearly, the sooner the better; but
whether we had better set off at sunrise or sunset was open to doubt. By
leaving at sunset we should be less easily followed; on the other hand, we
should have greater difficulty in finding our way and be sooner missed. It
was generally about sunset that Mamcuna sent for me, and I knew that at
this time it would be well-nigh impossible for Señora de la Vega to leave
Chimu's house without being observed and questioned, perhaps followed. So
when we met as agreed, I told her that I had decided to make the attempt
on the next morning, and asked her to be in a grove of plantains, hard by,
an hour before dawn. I besought her, whatever she did, to be punctual; our
lives depended on our stealing away before people were stirring.

Meanwhile Gahra and I had laid our plans. He was to give out the night
before that we were setting off early next morning on a hunting
expedition. This would enable us, without exciting suspicion, to take a
supply of provisions, arms, and a led horse (for carrying any game we
might kill) and, as I hoped, give us a long start. For even when Señora de
la Vega was missed nobody would suspect that she had gone with us.

In the event--as we hoped, the improbable event--of our being overtaken or
intercepted, Gahra and I were resolved not to be taken alive; but we had,
unfortunately, no firearms; they were all lost in the snow-storm. Our only
weapons were bows and arrows and machetes. I carried the former merely as
a make-believe, to keep up my character as a hunter; for the same reason
we took with us a brace of dogs. If it came to fighting I should have to
put my trust in my _machete_, a long broad-bladed sword like a knife,
formidable as a lethal weapon, yet chiefly used for clearing away brambles
and cutting down trees.

All went well at the beginning. We were up betimes and off with our horses
before daylight. The braves on duty asked no questions, there was no
reason why they should, and we passed through the village without meeting
a soul.

So far, good. The omens seemed favorable, and my hopes ran high. We should
get off without anybody knowing which way we had taken, and several hours
before Señora de la Vega was likely to be missed.

But when we reached the rendezvous she was not there. I whistled and
called softly; nobody answered.

"She will be here presently, we must wait," I said to Gahra.

It was terribly annoying.  Every minute was precious. The Pachatupecs are
early risers, and if Señora de la Vega did not join us before daylight we
might be seen and the opportunity lost. The sun rose; still she did not
come, and I had just made up my mind to put off our departure until the
next morning, and try to communicate with Señora de la Vega in the
meantime, when Gahra pointed to a pathway in the wood, where his sharp
eyes had detected the fluttering of a robe.

At last she was coming. But too late. To start at that time would be
madness, and I was about to tell her so, send her back, and ask her to
meet me on the next morning, when she ran forward with terrified face and
uplifted hands.

"Save me! Save me!" she cried, "I could not get away sooner. I have been
watched. They are following me, even now."

This was a frightful misfortune, and I feared that the señora had acted
very imprudently. But it was no time either for reproaches or regrets, and
the words were scarcely out of her mouth when I lifted her into the
saddle; as I did so, I caught sight of two horsemen and several
foot-people, coming down the pathway.

"Go!" I said to Gahra, "I shall stay here."

"But, señor--"

"Go, I say; as you love me, go at once. This lady is in your charge. Take
good care of her. I can keep these fellows at bay until you are out of
sight and, if possible, I will follow. At once, please, at once!"

They went, Gahra's face expressing the keenest anguish, the señora half
dead with fear. As they rode away I turned into the pathway and prepared
for the encounter. The foot-people might do as they liked, they could not
overtake the fugitives, but I was resolved that the horsemen should only
pass over my body.

The foremost of them was Chimu himself. When he saw that I had no
intention of turning aside, he and his companion (who rode behind him)
reined in their horses. The cacique was quivering with rage.

"My wife has gone off with your negro," he said, hoarsely.

I made no answer.

"I saw you help her to mount. You have met her before. Mamcuna shall know
of this, and my wife shall die."

Still I made no answer.

"Let me pass!"

I drew my _machete_.

Chimu drew his and came at me, but he was so poor a swordsman, that I
merely played with him, my object being to gain time, and only when the
other fellow tried to push past me and get to my left-rear, did I cut the
cacique down. On this his companion bolted the way he had come. I galloped
after him, more with the intention of frightening than hurting him, and
was just on the point of turning back and following the fugitives, when
something dropped over my head, my arms were pinioned to my side, and I
was dragged from my saddle.

The foot-people had lassoed me.

CHAPTER XXV.

THE  MAN-KILLER.

I was as helpless as a man in a strait waistcoat.  When I tried to rise,
my captors tautened the rope and dragged me along the ground. Resistance
being futile, I resigned myself to my fate.

On seeing what had happened, the flying brave (a kinsman of Chimu's)
returned, and he and the others held a palaver. As Mamcuna's affianced
husband, I was a person of importance, and they were evidently at a loss
how to dispose of me. If they treated me roughly, they might incur her
displeasure. The discussion was long and rather stormy. In the result, I
was asked whether I would go with them quietly to the queen's house or be
taken thither, _nolens volens_. On answering that I would go quietly, I
was unbound and allowed to mount my horse.

I do not think I am a coward, and in helping Señora de la Vega to escape
and sending her off with Gahra, I knew that I had done the right thing.
Yet I looked forward to the approaching interview with some misgiving.
Barbarian though Mamcuna was, I could not help entertaining a certain
respect for her. She had treated me handsomely; in offering to make me her
husband she had paid me the greatest compliment in her power; and how
little soever you may reciprocate the sentiment, it is impossible to think
altogether unkindly of the woman who has given you her love. And my
conscience was not free from reproach; I had let her think that I loved
her--as I now perceived, a great mistake. Courageous herself, she could
appreciate courage in others, and had I boldly and unequivocally refused
her offer and given my reasons, I did not believe she would have dealt
hardly with me.

As it was Mamcuna might well say that, having deliberately deceived her, I
deserved the utmost punishment which it was in her power to inflict. At
the same time, I was not without hope that when she heard my defence she
would spare my life.

By the time we reached the queen's house my escort had swollen into a
crowd, and one of the caciques went in to inform Mamcuna what had befallen
and ask for her instructions.

In a few minutes he brought word that the queen would see me and the
people who had taken part in my capture forthwith. We found her sitting in
her _chinchura_, in the room where she and I first met. Bather to my
surprise she was calm and collected; yet there was a convulsive twitching
of her lips and an angry glitter in her eyes that boded ill for my hopes
of pardon.

"Is it true, this they tell me, señor--that you have been helping Chimu's
wife to escape, and killed Chimu?" she asked.

"It is true."

"So you prefer this wretched pale-face woman to me?"

"No, Mamcuna."

"Why, then, did you help her to escape and kill her husband? Don't trifle
with me."

"Because I pitied her."

"Why?"

"Chimu treated her ill, and she was very wretched. She wanted to go back
to her own country, and she has little children at home."

"What was her wretchedness to you? Did you not know that you were
incurring my displeasure and risking your own life?"

"I did. But a Christian caballero holds it his duty to protect the weak
and deliver the oppressed, even at the risk of his own life."

Mamcuna looked puzzled. The sentiment was too fine for her comprehension.

"You talk foolishness, señor. No man would run into danger for a woman
whom he did not desire to make his own."

"I had no desire to make Señora de la Vega my wife. I would have done the
same for any other woman."

"For any other woman! Would you risk your life for me, señor?"

"Surely, Mamcuna, if you were in sorrow or distress and I could do you any
good thereby."

"It is well, señor; your voice has the ring of truth," said the queen,
softly, and with a gratified smile, "and inasmuch as you went not away
with Chimu's pale-faced wife, but let her depart with the negro--"

"The señor would have gone also had we not hindered him," interposed
Chimu's kinsman. "We saw him lift the woman into the saddle, and he was
turning to follow her when Lurin caught him with the lasso."

"Is this true; would you have gone with the woman?" asked the queen,
sternly, her smile changing into an ominous frown.

"It is true; but let me explain--"

"Enough; I will not hear another word. So you would have left me, a
daughter of the Incas, who have honored you above all other men, and gone
away with a woman you say you do not love! Your heart is full of deceit,
your mouth runs over with lies. You shall die; so shall the white woman
and the black slave. Where are they? Bring them hither."

The caciques and braves who were present stared at each other in
consternation. In their exultation and excitement over my capture the
fugitives had been forgotten.

"Mules! Idiots! Old women! Follow them and bring them back. They shall be
burned in the same fire. As for you, señor, because you cured me of my
sickness and were to have been my husband I will let you choose the method
of your death. You may either be roasted before a slow fire, hacked to
pieces with _machetes_, or fastened on the back of the man-killer and sent
to perish in the desert. Choose."

"Just one word of explanation, Mamcuna. I would fain--"

"Silence! or I will have your tongue torn out by the roots. Choose!"

"I choose the man-killer."

"You think it will be an easier death than being hacked to pieces. You are
wrong. The vultures will peck out your eyes, and you will die of hunger
and thirst. But as you have said so let it be. Tie him to the back of the
man-killer, men, and chase it into the desert. If you let him escape you
die in his place. But treat him with respect; he was nearly my husband."

And then Mamcuna, sinking back into her _chinchura_, covered her face with
her hands; but she showed no sign of relenting, and I was bound with ropes
and hurried from the room.

The man-killer was a nandu[1] belonging to the queen, and had gained his
name by killing one man and maiming several others who unwisely approached
him when he was in an evil temper. Save for an occasional outburst of
homicidal mania and his abnormal size and strength, the man-killer did not
materially differ from the other nandus of Mamcuna's flock. His keeper
controlled the bird without difficulty, and I had several times seen him
mount and ride it round an inclosure.

    [1] The American ostrich.

The desert, as I have already mentioned, lies between the Cordillera and
the Pacific Ocean, stretching almost the entire length of the Peruvian
coast, with here and there an oasis watered by one or other of the few
streams which do not lose themselves in the sand before they reach the
sea. It is a rainless, hideous region of naked rocks and whirling sands,
destitute of fresh water and animal life, a region into which, except for
a short distance, the boldest traveller cares not to venture.

After leaving the queen's house I was placed in charge of a party of
braves commanded by a cacique, and we set out for the place where my
expiation was to begin. The nandu, led by his keeper and another man, of
course went with us. My conductors, albeit they made no secret of their
joy over my downfall, did their mistress's bidding, and treated me with
respect. They loosed my bonds, taking care, however, so to guard me as to
render escape impossible, and, when we halted, gave me to eat and drink.
But their talk was not encouraging. In their opinion, nothing could save
me from a horrible death, probably of thirst. The best that I could hope
for was being smothered in a sandstorm. The man-killer would probably go
on till he dropped from exhaustion, and then, whether I was alive or dead,
birds of prey would pick out my eyes and tear the flesh from my bones.

About midday we reached the mountain range which divides Pachatupec from
the desert. Anything more lonesome and depressing it were impossible to
conceive. Not a tree, not a shrub, not a blade of grass nor any green
thing; neither running stream nor gleam of water could be seen. It was a
region in which the blessed rain of heaven had not fallen for untold ages,
a region of desolation and death, of naked peaks, rugged precipices, and
rocky ravines. The heat from the overhead sun, intensified by the
reverberations from the great masses of rock around us, and unrelieved by
the slightest breath of air, was well-nigh suffocating.

Into this plutonic realm we plunged, and, after a scorching ride, reached
the head of a pass which led straight down to the desert. Here the cacique
in command of the detachment told me, rather to my surprise, that we were
to part company. They were already a long way from home and saw no reason
why they should go farther. The desert, albeit four or five leagues
distant, was quite visible, and, once started down the pass, the nandu
would be bound to go thither. He could not climb the rocks to the right or
the left, and the braves would take care that he did not return.

As objection, even though I had felt disposed to make it, would have been
useless, I bowed acquiescence. The thought of resisting had more than once
crossed my mind, and, by dint of struggling and fighting, I might have
made the nandu so restive that I could not have been fastened on his back.
But in that case my second condition would have been worse than my first;
I should have been taken back to Pachatupec and either burned alive or
hacked to pieces, and, black as seemed the outlook, I clung to the hope
that the man-killer would somehow be the means of saving my life.

The binding was effected with considerable difficulty. It required the
united strength of nearly all the braves to hold the nandu while the
cacique and the keepers secured me on his back. As he was let go he kicked
out savagely, ripping open with his terrible claws one of the men who had
been holding him. The next moment he was striding down the steep and stony
pass at a speed which, in a few minutes, left the pursuing and shouting
Pachatupecs far behind. The ground was so rough and the descent so rapid
that I expected every moment we should come to grief. But on we went like
the wind. Never in my life, except in an express train, was I carried so
fast. The great bird was either wild with rage or under the impression
that he was being hunted. The speed took my breath away; the motion make
me sick. He must have done the fifteen miles between the head of the pass
and the beginning of the desert in little more than as many minutes. Then,
the ground being covered with sand and comparatively level, the nandu
slacked his speed somewhat, though he still went at a great pace.

The desert was a vast expanse of white sand, the glare of which, in the
bright sunshine, almost blinded me, interspersed with stretches of rock,
swept bare by the wind, and loose stones.

Instead of turning to the right or left, that is to say, to the north or
south, as I hoped and expected he would, the man-killer ran straight on
toward the sea. As for the distance of the coast from that part of the
Cordillera I had no definite idea--perhaps thirty miles, perhaps fifty,
perhaps more. But were it a hundred we should not be long in going thither
at the speed we were making; and vague hopes, suggesting the possibility
of signalling a passing ship or getting away by sea, began to shape
themselves in the mind. The nandu could not go on forever; before reaching
the sea he must either alter his course or stop, and if he stopped only a
few minutes and so gave me a chance of steadying myself I thought that, by
the help of my teeth, I might untie one of the cords which the movements
of the bird and my own efforts had already slightly loosened, and once my
arms were freed the rest would be easy.

An hour (as nearly as I could judge) after leaving the Cordillera I
sighted the Pacific--a broad expanse of blue water shining in the sun and
stretching to the horizon. How eagerly I looked for a sail, a boat, the
hut of some solitary fisherman, or any other sign of human presence! But I
saw nothing save water and sand; the ocean was as lonesome as the desert.
There was no salvation thitherward.

Though my hope had been vague, my disappointment was bitter; but a few
minutes later all thought of it was swallowed up in a new fear. The sea
was below me, and as the ground had ceased to fall I knew that the desert
must end on that side in a line of lofty cliffs. I knew, also, that nandus
are among the most stupid of bipeds, and it was just conceivable that the
man-killer, not perceiving his danger until too late, might go over the
cliffs into the sea.

The hoarse roar of the waves as they surge against the rocks, at first
faint, grows every moment louder and deeper. I see distinctly the land's
end, and mentally calculate from the angle it makes with the ocean, the
height of the cliffs.

Still the man-killer strides on, as straight as an arrow and as resolutely
as if a hundred miles of desert, instead of ten thousand miles of water,
stretched before him. Three minutes more and--I set my teeth hard and draw
a deep breath. At any rate, it will be an easier end than burning, or
dying of thirst--Another moment and--

But now the nandu, seeing that he will soon be treading the air, makes a
desperate effort to stop short, in which failing he wheels half round,
barely in time to save his life and mine, and then courses madly along the
brink for miles, as if unable to tear himself away, keeping me in a state
of continual fear, for a single slip, or an accidental swerve to the
right, and we should have fallen headlong down the rocks, against which
the waves are beating.

As night closes in he gradually--to my inexpressible relief--draws inland,
making in a direction that must sooner or later take us back to the
Cordillera, though a long way south of the pass by which we had descended
to the desert. But I have hardly sighted the outline of the mighty
barrier, looming portentously in the darkness, when he alters his course
once again, wenching this time almost due south. And so he continues for
hours, seldom going straight, now inclining toward the coast, anon facing
toward the Cordillera but always on the southward tack, never turning to
the north.

It was a beautiful night. The splendor of the purple sky with its myriads
of lustrous stars was in striking contrast with the sameness of the white
and deathlike desert. A profound melancholy took hold of me. I had ceased
to fear, almost to think, my perceptions were blinded by excitement and
fatigue, my spirits oppressed by an unspeakable sense of loneliness and
helplessness, and the awful silence, intensified rather than relieved by
the long drawn moaning of the unseen ocean, which, however far I might be
from it, was ever in my ears.

I looked up at the stars, and when the cross began to bend I knew that
midnight was past, and that in a few hours would dawn another day. What
would it bring me--life or death? I hardly cared which; relief from the
torture and suspense I was enduring would be welcome, come how it might.
For I suffered cruelly; I had a terrible thirst. The cords chafed my limbs
and cut into my flesh. Every movement gave an exquisite pain; I was
continually on the rack; rest, even for a moment, was impossible, as,
though the nandu had diminished his speed, he never stopped. And then a
wind came up from the sea, bringing with it clouds of dust, which
well-nigh choked and half blinded me; filled my ears and intensified my
thirst. After a while a strange faintness stole over me; I felt as if I
were dying, my eyes closed, my head sank on my breast, and I remembered no
more.

CHAPTER XXVI.

ANGELA.

"_Regardez mon père, regardez! Il va mieux, le pauvre homme._"

"_C'est ça, ma fille chérie, faites le boire._"

I open my eyes with an effort, for the dust of the desert has almost
blinded me.

I am in a beautiful garden, leaning against the body of the dead ostrich,
a lovely girl is holding a cup of water to my parched lips, and an old man
of benevolent aspect stands by her side.

"_Merci mademoiselle, vous etes bien bonne_," I murmur.

"Oh, father, he speaks French."

"This passes comprehension. Are you French, monsieur?"

"No, English."

"English! This is stranger still. But whence come you, and who bound you
on the nandu?"

"I will tell you--a little more water, I pray you, mademoiselle."

"Let him drink again, Angela--and dash some water in his face; he is
faint."

"_Le pauvre homme!_ See how his lips are swollen! Do you feel better,
monsieur?" she asked compassionately, again putting the cup to my lips.

"Much. A thousand thanks. I can answer your question now (to the old man).
I was bound on the nandu by order of the Queen of the Pachatupec Indians."

"The Pachatupec Indians! I have heard of them. But they are a long way
off; more than a hundred leagues of desert lies between us and the
Pachatupec country. Are you quite sure, monsieur?"

"Quite. And seeing that the nandu went at great speed, though not always
in a direct line, and we must have been going fifteen or sixteen hours, I
am not surprised that we have travelled so far."

"_Mon dieu!_ And all that time you have neither eaten nor drunk. No wonder
you are exhausted! Come with us, and we will give you something more
invigorating than water. You shall tell us your story afterward--if you
will."

I tried to rise, but my stiffened and almost paralyzed limbs refused to
move.

"Let us help you. Take his other arm, Angela--thus, Now!" And with that
they each gave me a hand and raised me to my feet.

"How was it? Who killed the nandu?" I asked as I hobbled on between them.

"We saw the creature coming toward us with what looked like a dead man on
his back, and as he did not seem disposed to stop I told Angela, who is a
famous archer, to draw her bow and shoot him. He fell dead where he now
lies, and when we saw that, though unconscious, you still lived, we
unloosed you."

"And saved my life. Might I ask to whom I am indebted for this great
service, and to what beautiful country the nandu has brought me?"

"Say nothing about the service, my dear sir. Helping each other in
difficulty and distress is a duty we owe to Heaven and our common
humanity. I count your coming a great blessing. You are the first visitor
we have had for many years, and the Abbé Balthazar gives you a warm
welcome to San Cristobal de Quipai. The name is of good omen, Quipai being
an Indian word which signifies 'Rest Here,' and I shall be glad for you to
rest here so long as it may please you."

"Nigel Fortescue, formerly an officer in the British Army, at present a
fugitive and a wanderer, tenders you his warmest thanks, and gratefully
accepts your hospitality--And now that we know each other, Monsieur
l'Abbé, might I ask the favor of an introduction to the young lady to whom
I owe my deliverance from the nandu?"

"She is Angela, monsieur. My people call her Señorita Angela. It pleases
me sometimes to speak of her as Angela Dieu-donnée, for she was sent to us
by God, and ever since she came among us she has been our good angel."

"I am sure she has. Nobody with so sweet a face could be otherwise than
good," I said, with an admiring glance at the beautiful girl which dyed
the damask of her cheek a yet deeper crimson.

It was no mere compliment. In all my wanderings I have not beheld the
equal of Angela Dieu-donnée. Though I can see her now, though I learned to
paint in order that, however inadequately, I might make her likeness, I am
unable to describe her; words can give no idea of the comeliness of her
face, the grace of her movements, and the shapeliness of her form. I have
seen women with skins as fair, hair as dark, eyes as deeply blue, but none
with the same brightness of look and sweetness of disposition, none with
courage as high, temper as serene.

To look at Angela was to love her, though as yet I knew not that I had
regained my liberty only to lose my heart. My feelings at the moment
oscillated between admiration of her and a painful sense of my own
disreputable appearance. Bareheaded and shoeless, covered with the dust of
the desert, clad only in a torn shirt and ragged trousers, my arms and
legs scored with livid marks, I must have seemed a veritable scarecrow.
Angela looked like a queen, or would have done were queens ever so
charming, or so becomingly attired. Her low-crowned hat was adorned with
beautiful flowers; a loose-fitting alpaca robe of light blue set off her
form to the best advantage, and round her waist was a golden baldrick
which supported a sheaf of arrows. At her breast was an orchid which in
Europe would have been almost priceless, her shapely arms were bare to the
shoulder, and her sandaled feet were innocent of hosen.

I was wondering who could have designed this costume, in which there was a
savor of the pictures of Watteau and the court of Versailles, how so
lovely a creature could have found her way to a place so remote as San
Cristobal de Quipai, when the abbé resumed the conversation.

"Angela came to us as strangely and unexpectedly as you have come,
Monsieur Nigel" (he found my Christian name the easier to pronounce),
"and, like you, without any volition on her part or previous knowledge of
our existence. But there is this difference between you: she came as a
little child, you come as a grown man. Sixteen years ago we had several
severe earthquakes. They did us little harm down here, but up on the
Cordillera they wrought fearful havoc, and the sea rose and there was a
great storm, and several ships were dashed to pieces against our
iron-bound coast, which no mariner willingly approaches. The morning after
the tempest there was found on the edge of the cliffs a cot in which lay a
rosy-cheeked babe. How it came to pass none could tell, but we all thought
that the cot must have been fastened to a board, which became detached
from the cot at the very moment when the sea threw it on the land. The
babe was just able to lisp her name--'Angela,' which corresponded with the
name embroidered on her clothing. This is all we know about her; and I
greatly fear that those to whom she belonged perished in the storm. Even
the wreckage that was washed ashore furnished no clew; it was part of two
different vessels. The little waif was brought to me and with me she has
ever since remained."

"And will always remain, dear father," said Angela, regarding the old
priest with loving reverence. "All that I lost in the storm has he been to
me--father, mother, instructor, and friend. You see here, monsieur, the
best and wisest man in all the world."

"You have had so wide an experience of the world and of men, _mignonne_!"
returned the abbé, with an amused smile. "Sir, since she could speak she
has seen two white men. You are the second.--Ah, well, if I were not
afraid you would think we had constituted ourselves into a mutual
admiration society I should be tempted to say something even more
complimentary about her."

"Say it, Monsieur l'Abbé, say it, I pray you," I exclaimed, eagerly, for
it pleased me more than I can tell to hear him sound Angela's praises.

"Nay, I would rather you learned to appreciate her from your own
observation. Yet I will say this much. She is the brightness of my life,
the solace of my old age, and so good that even praise does not spoil her.
But you look tired; shall we sit down on this fallen log and rest a few
minutes?"

To this proposal I gladly assented, for I was spent with fatigue and faint
with hunger. Angela, however, after glancing at me compassionately and
saying she would be back in a few minutes, went a little farther and
presently returned with a bunch of grapes.

"Eat these," she said, "they will refresh you."

It was a simple act of kindness; but a simple act of kindness, gracefully
performed, is often an index of character, and I felt sure that the girl
had a kind heart and deserved all the praise bestowed on her by the abbé.

I was thanking her, perhaps more warmly than the occasion required, when
she stopped the flow of my eloquence by reminding me that I had not yet
told them why the Indian queen caused me to be fastened on the back of the
_nandu_.

On this hint I spoke, and though the abbé suggested that I was too tired
for much talking, I not only answered the question but briefly narrated
the main facts of my story, reserving a fuller account for a future
occasion.

Both listened with rapt attention; but of the two Angela was the more
eager listener. She several times interrupted me with requests for
information as to matters which even among European children are of common
knowledge, for, though the abbé was a man of high learning and she an apt
pupil, her experience of life was limited to Quipai; and he had been so
long out of the world that he had almost forgotten it. As for news, he was
worse off than Fray Ignacio. He had heard of the First Consul but nothing
of the Emperor Napoleon, and when I told him of the restoration of the
Bourbons he shed tears of joy.

"Thank God!" he exclaimed, fervently, "France is once more ruled by a son
of St. Louis. The tricolor is replaced by the _fleur-de-lis_. You are our
second good angel, Monsieur Fortescue; you bring us glad tidings of great
joy--You smile, but I am persuaded that Providence has led you hither in
so strange a way for some good purpose, and as I venture to hope, in
answer to my prayers; for albeit our lives here are so calm and happy, and
I have been the means of bringing a great work to a successful issue, it
is not in the nature of things that men should be free from care, and my
mind has lately been troubled with forebodings--"

"And you never told me, father!" said Angela, reproachfully. "What are
they, these forebodings?"

"Why should you be worried with an old man's difficulties? One has
reference to my people, the other--but never mind the other. It may be
that already a way has been opened.--If you feel sufficiently rested,
Monsieur Nigel, I think we had better proceed. A short walk will bring us
to San Cristobal, and it would be well for us to get thither before the
heat of the day."

I protested that the rest and the bunch of grapes had so much refreshed me
that I felt equal to a long walk, and we moved on.

"What a splendid garden!" I exclaimed for the third or fourth time as we
entered an alley festooned with trailing flowers and grape-vines from
which the fruit hung in thick clusters.

"All Quipai is a garden," said the abbé, proudly. "We have fruit and
flowers and cereals all the year round, thanks to the great _azequia_
(aqueduct) which the Incas built and I restored. And such fruit! Let him
taste a _chirimoya ma fille chèrie_."

From a tree about fifteen feet high Angela plucked a round green fruit,
not unlike an apple, but covered with small knobs and scales. Then she
showed me how to remove the skin, which covered a snow-white juicy pulp of
exquisite fragrance and a flavor that I hardly exaggerated in calling
divine. It was a fruit fit for the gods, and so I said.

"We owe it all to the great _azequia_," observed the abbé. "See, it feeds
these rills and fills those fountains, waters our fields, and makes the
desert bloom like the rose and the dry places rejoice. And we have not
only fruit and flowers, but corn, coffee, cocoa, yuccas, potatoes, and
almost every sort of vegetable."

"Quipai is a land of plenty and a garden of delight."

"A most apt description, and so long as the great _azequia_ is kept in
repair and the system of irrigation which I have established is maintained
it will remain a land of plenty and a garden of delight."

"And if any harm should befall the _azequia_?"

"In that case, and if our water-supply were to fail, Quipai, as you see it
now, would cease to exist. The desert, which we are always fighting and
have so far conquered, would regain the mastery, and the mission become
what I found it, a little oasis at the foot of the Cordillera, supporting
with difficulty a few score families of naked Indians. One of these days,
if you are so disposed, you shall follow the course of the _azequia_ and
see for yourself with what a marvellous reservoir, fed by Andean snows,
Nature has provided us. But more of this another time. Look! Yonder is San
Cristobal, our capital as I sometimes call it, though little more than a
village."

The abbé said truly. It was little more than a village; but as gay, as
picturesque, and as bright as a scene in an opera--two double rows of
painted houses forming a large oval, the space between them laid out as a
garden with straight walks and fountains and clipped shrubs, after the
fashion of Versailles; in the centre a church and two other buildings, one
of which, as the abbé told me, was a school, the other his own dwelling.

The people we met saluted him with great humility, and he returned their
salutations quite _en grand seigneur_, even, as I thought, somewhat
haughtily. One woman knelt in the road, kissed his hand, and asked for his
blessing, which he gave like the superior being she obviously considered
him. It was the same in the village. Everybody whom we met or passed stood
still and uncovered. There could be no question who was master in San
Cristobal. Abbé Balthazar was both priest and king, and, as I afterward
came to know, there was every reason why he should be.

He kept a large establishment, for the country, and lived in considerable
state. On entering his house, which was surrounded by a veranda and
embowered in trees, the abbé, asked if I would like a bath, and on my
answering in the affirmative ordered one of the servants, all of whom
spoke Spanish, to take me to the bath-room and find me a suit of clothes.

The bath made me feel like another man, and the fresh garments effected as
great a change in my personal appearance. There was not much difficulty
about the fit. A cotton undershirt, a blue jacket with silver buttons, a
red sash, white breeches, loose at the knee, and a pair of sandals, and I
was fully attired. Stockings I had to dispense with. They were not in
vogue at San Cristobal.

When I was ready, the servant, who had acted as my valet, conducted me to
the dining-room, where I found Angela and the abbé.

"_Parbleu!_" exclaimed the latter, who occasionally indulged in
expressions that were not exactly clerical. "_Parbleu!_ I had no idea that
a bath and clean raiment could make so great an improvement in a man's
appearance. That costume becomes you to admiration, Monsieur Nigel. Don't
you think so, Angela?"

"You forget, father, that he is the only caballero I ever saw. Are all
caballeros like him?"

"Very few, I should say. It is a long time since I saw any; but even at
the court of Louis XV. I do not remember seeing many braver looking
gentlemen than our guest."

As I bowed in acknowledgment of the compliment Angela gave me a quick
glance, blushed deeply, and then, turning to the abbé, proposed that we
should take our places at the table.

I was so hungry that even an indifferent meal would have seemed a
luxurious banquet, but the repast set before us might have satisfied an
epicure. We had a delicious soup, something like mutton-cutlets,
land-turtle steaks, and capon, all perfectly cooked; vegetables and fruit
in profusion, and the wine was as good as any I had tasted in France or
Spain. After dinner coffee was served and the abbé inquired whether I
would retire to my room and have a sleep, or smoke a cigarette with him
and Angela on the veranda.

In ordinary circumstances I should probably have preferred to sleep; but I
was so fascinated with Mademoiselle Dieu-donnée, so excited by all that I
had seen and heard, so curious to know the history of this French priest,
who talked of the court of Louis XV., who had created a country and a
people, and contrived, in a region so remote from civilization, to
surround himself with so many luxuries, that I elected without hesitation
for the cigarettes and the veranda.

CHAPTER XXVII.

ABBÉ BALTHAZAR.

Though my wounds had not ceased their smarting nor my bones their aching
my happiness was complete. The splendid prospect before me, the glittering
peaks of the Cordillera, the gleaming waters of the far Pacific, the
gardens and fountains of San Cristobal, the charm of Angela's presence,
and the abbé's conversation made me oblivious to the past and careless of
the future. The hardships and perils I had lately undergone, my weary
wanderings in the wilderness, the dull monotony of the Happy Valley, the
passage of the Andes, my terrible ride on the _nandu_, all were forgotten.
The contrast between my by-gone miseries and present surroundings added
zest to my enjoyment. I felt as one suddenly transported from Hades to
Elysium, and it required an effort to realize that it was not all a dream,
destined to end in a rude awaking.

After some talk about Europe, the revolt of the Spanish colonies, and my
recent adventures, the abbé gave me an account of his life and adventures.
The scion of a noble French family, he had been first a page of honor at
Versailles, then an officer of the _garde du corps_, and among the gayest
of the gay. But while yet a youth some terrible event on which he did not
like to dwell--a disastrous love affair, a duel in which he killed one who
had been his friend--wrought so radical a change in his character and his
ideals that he resigned his commission, left the court, and joined the
Society of Jesus, under the name of Balthazar. Being a noble he became an
abbé (though he had never an abbey) as a matter of course, and full of
religious ardor and thirsting for distinction in his new calling he
volunteered to go out as a missionary among the wild tribes of South
America.

After long wanderings, and many hardships, Balthazar and two fellow
priests accidentally discovered Quipai, at that time a mere collection of
huts on the banks of a small stream which descended from the gorges of the
Cordillera only to be lost in the sands of the desert. But all around were
remains which showed that Quipai had once been a place of importance and
the seat of a large population--ruined buildings of colossal dimensions,
heaps of quarried stones, a cemetery rich in relics of silver and gold;
and a great _azequia_, in many places still intact, had brought down water
from the heart of the mountains for the irrigation of the rainless region
of the coast.

Balthazar had moreover heard of the marvellous system of irrigation
whereby the Incas had fertilized nearly the whole of the Peruvian desert;
and as he surveyed the ruins he conceived the great idea of restoring the
aqueduct and repeopling the neighboring waste. To this task he devoted his
life. His first proceeding was to convert the Indians and found a mission,
which he called San Cristobal de Quipai; his next to show them how to make
the most of the water-privileges they already possessed. A reservoir was
built, more land brought under cultivation, and the oasis rendered capable
of supporting a larger population. The resulting prosperity and the abbé's
fame as a physician (he possessed a fair knowledge of medicine) drew other
Indians to Quipai.

After a while the gigantic undertaking was begun, and little by little,
and with infinite patience and pain accomplished. It was a work of many
years, and when I travelled the whole length of the _azequia_ I marvelled
greatly how the abbé, with the means at his command, could have achieved
an enterprise so arduous and vast. The aqueduct, nearly twenty leagues in
length, extended from the foot of the snow-line to a valley above Quipai,
the water being taken thence in stone-lined canals and wooden pipes to the
seashore. In several places the _azequia_ was carried on lofty arches over
deep ravines: and there were two great reservoirs, both remarkable works.
The upper one was the crater of an extinct volcano, of unknown depth,
which contained an immense quantity of water. It took so long to fill that
the abbé, as he laughingly told me, began to think that there must be a
hole in the bottom. But in the end it did fill to the very brim, and
always remained full. The second reservoir, a dammed up valley, was just
below the first; it served to break the fall from the higher to the lower
level and receive the overflow from the crater.

A bursting of either of the reservoirs was quite out of the question; at
any rate the abbé so assured me, and certainly the crater looked strong
enough to hold all the water in the Andes, could it have been got therein,
while the lower reservoir was so shallow--the out-flow and the loss by
evaporation being equal to the in-take--that even if the banks were to
give way no great harm could be done.

I mention these particulars because they have an important bearing on
events that afterward befell, and on my own destiny.

Only a born engineer and organizer of untiring energy and illimitable
patience could have performed so herculean a labor. Balthazar was all
this, and more. He knew how to rule men despotically yet secure their
love. The Indians did his bidding without hesitation and wrought for him
without pay. In the absence of this quality his task had never been done.
On the other hand, he owed something to fortune. All the materials were
ready to his hand. He built with the stone quarried by the Incas. His work
suffered no interruption from frost or snow or rain. His very isolation
was an advantage. He had neither enemies to fear, friends to please, nor
government officers to propitiate.

On the landward side Quipai was accessible only by difficult and little
known mountain-passes which nobody without some strong motive would care
to traverse, and passing ships might be trusted to give a wide berth to an
iron-bound coast destitute alike of harbors and trade.

So it came to pass that, albeit the mission of Quipai was in the dominion
of the King of Spain, none of his agents knew of its existence, his writs
did not run there, and Balthazar treated the royal decree for the
expulsion of the Jesuits from South America (of which he heard two or
three years after its promulgation) with the contempt that he thought it
deserved. Nevertheless, he deemed it the part of prudence to maintain his
isolation more rigidly than ever, and make his communications with the
outer world few and far between, for had it become known to the
captain-general of Peru that there was a member of the proscribed order in
his vice-royalty, even at so out of the way a place as Quipai he would
have been sent about his business without ceremony. The possibility of
this contingency was always in the abbé's mind. For a time it caused him
serious disquiet; but as the years went on and no notice was taken of him
his mind became easier. The news I brought of the then recent events in
Spain and the revolt of her colonies made him easier. The viceroy would
have too many irons in the fire to trouble himself about the mission of
Quipai and its chief, even if they should come to his knowledge, which was
to the last degree improbable. We sat talking for several hours, and
should probably have talked longer had not the abbé kindly yet
peremptorily insisted on my retiring to rest.

Early next morning we started on an excursion to the valley lake, each of
us mounted on a fine mule from the abbé's stables, and attended by an
_arriero_. North as well as south of San Cristobal (as the village was
generally called) the country had the same garden-like aspect. There was
none of the tangled vegetation which in tropical forests impedes the
traveller's progress; except where they had been planted by the roadside
for protection from the sun, or bent over the water-courses, the trees
grew wide apart like trees in a park. Men and women were busy in the
fields and plantations, for the abbé had done even a more wonderful thing
than restoring the great _azequia_--converted a tribe of indolent
aborigines into an industrious community of husbandmen and craftsmen;
among them were carpenters, smiths, masons, weavers, dyers, and cunning
workers in silver and gold. The secret of his power was the personal
ascendancy of a strong man, the naturally docile character of his
converts, the inflexible justice which characterized all his dealings with
them, and the belief assiduously cultivated, that as he had been their
benefactor in this world he could control their destinies in the next.
Though he never punished he was always obeyed, and there was probably not
a man or woman under his sway who would have hesitated to obey him, even
to death.

The lake was small yet picturesque, its verdant banks deepening by
contrast the dark desolation of the arid mountains in which it was
embosomed. Some three thousand feet above it rose the extinct volcano, the
slopes of which in the days of the Incas were terraced and cultivated.
Angela and I half rode, half walked to the top; but the abbé, on the plea
that he had some business to look after, stayed at the bottom.

The crater was about eight hundred yards in diameter and filled nearly to
the brim with crystal water, which outflowed by a wide and well made
channel into the lake, the supply being kept up by the in-flow from the
_azequia_, whose course we could trace far into the mountains.

The view from our coigne of vantage was unspeakably grand. Behind us rose
the stupendous range of the Andes, with its snow-white peaks and smoking
volcanoes; before us the oasis of Quipai rolled like a river of living
green to the shores of the measureless ocean, whose shining waters in that
clear air and under that azure sky seemed only a few miles away, while, as
far as the eye could reach, the coast-line was fringed with the dreary
waste where I had so nearly perished.

The oasis, as I now for the first time discovered, was a valley, a broad
shallow depression in the desert falling in a gentle slope from the foot
of the Cordillera to the sea, whereby its irrigation was greatly
facilitated.

"How beautiful Quipai looks, and how like a river!" said Angela. "That is
what I always think when I come here--how like a river!"

"Who knows that long ago the valley was not the bed of a river!"

"It must be very long ago, then, before there was any Cordillera.
Rain-clouds never cross the Andes, and for untold ages there can have been
no rain here on the coast."

"You are right. Without rain you cannot have much of a river, and if the
_azequia_ were to fail there would be very little left of Quipai."

"Don't suggest anything so dreadful as the failure of the _azequia_. It is
the Palladium of the mission and the source of all our prosperity and
happiness. Besides, how could it fail? You see how solidly it is built,
and every month it is carefully inspected from end to end."

"It might be destroyed by an earthquake."

"You are pleased to be a Job's comforter, Monsieur Nigel. Damaged it might
be, but hardly destroyed, except in some cataclysm which would destroy
everything, and that is a risk which, like all dwellers in countries
subject to earthquakes, we must run. We cannot escape from the conditions
of our existence; and life is so pleasant here, we are spared so many of
the miseries which afflict our fellow-creatures in other parts of the
world--war, pestilence, strife, and want--that it were as foolish and
ungrateful to make ourselves unhappy because we are exposed to some remote
danger against which we cannot guard, as to repine because we cannot live
forever."

"You discourse most excellent philosophy, Mademoiselle Angela."

"Without knowing it, then, as Monsieur Jourdan talked prose."

"So! You have read Molière?"

"Over and over again."

"Then you must have a library at San Cristobal."

"A very small one, as you may suppose; but a small library is not
altogether a disadvantage, as the abbé says. The fewer books you have the
oftener you read them; and it is better to read a few books well than many
superficially."

"The abbé has been your sole teacher, I suppose?"

"Has been! He is still. He has even written books for me, and he is the
author of some of the best I possess--But don't you think, monsieur, we
had better descend to the valley? The abbé will have finished his business
by this time, and though he is the best man in the world he has the fault
of kings; he does not like to wait."

CHAPTER XXVIII.

I BID YOU STAY.

"You have been here a month, Monsieur Nigel, living in close intimacy with
Angela and myself," said the abbé, as we sat on the veranda sipping our
morning coffee. "You have mixed with our people, seen our country, and
inspected the great _azequia_ in its entire length. Tell me, now, frankly,
what do you think of us?"

"I never passed so happy a month in my life, and--"

"I am glad to hear you say so, very glad. My question, however, referred
not to your feelings but your opinion. I will repeat it: What think you of
Quipai and its institutions?"

"I know of but one institution in Quipai, and I admire it more than I can
tell."

"And that is?"

"Yourself, Monsieur l'Abbé."

The abbé smiled as if the compliment pleased him, but the next moment his
face took the "pale cast of thought," and he remained silent for several
minutes.

"I know what you mean," he said at length, speaking slowly and rather
sadly. "You mean that I am Quipai, and that without me Quipai would be
nowhere."

"Exactly, Monsieur l'Abbé. Quipai is a miracle; you are its creator, yet I
doubt whether, as it now exists, it could long survive you. But that is a
contingency which we need not discuss; you have still many years of life
before you."

"I like a well-turned compliment, Monsieur Nigel, because in order to be
acceptable it must possess both a modicum of truth and a _soupçon_ of wit.
But flattery I detest, for it must needs be insincere. A man of ninety
cannot, in the nature of things, have many years of life before him. What
are even ten years to one who has already lived nearly a century? This is
a solemn moment for both of us, and I want to be sincere with you. You
were sincere just now when you said Quipai would perish with me. And it
will--unless I can find a successor who will continue the work which I
have begun. My people are good and faithful, but they require a prescient
and capable chief, and there is not one among them who is fitted either by
nature or education to take the place of leader. Will you be my successor,
Monsieur Nigel?"

This was a startling proposal. To stay in Quipai for a few weeks or even a
few months might be very delightful. But to settle for life in an Andean
desert! On the other hand, to leave Quipai were to lose Angela.

"You hesitate. But reflect well, my friend, before denying my request.
True, you are loath to renounce the great world with its excitements,
ambitions, and pleasures. But you would renounce them for a life free from
care, an honorable position, and a career full of promise. It will take
years to complete the work I have begun, and make Quipai a nation. As I
said when you first came, Providence sent you here, as it sent Angela, for
some good end. It sent the one for the other. Stay with us, Monsieur
Nigel, and marry Angela! If you search the world through you could find no
sweeter wife."

My hesitation vanished like the morning mist before the rising sun.

"If Angela will be my wife," I said, "I will be your successor."

"It is the answer I expected, Monsieur Nigel. I am content to let Angela
be the arbiter of your fate and the fate of Quipai. She will be here
presently. Put the question yourself. She knows nothing of this; but I
have watched you both, and though my eyes are growing dim I am not blind."

And with that the abbé left me to my thoughts. It was not the first time
that the idea of asking Angela to be my wife had entered my mind. I loved
her from the moment I first set eyes on her, and my love has become a
passion. But I had not been able to see my way. How could I ask a
beautiful, gently nurtured girl to share the lot of a penniless wanderer,
even if she could consent to leave Quipai, which I greatly doubted. But
now! Compared with Angela, the excitements and ambitions of which the abbé
had spoken did not weigh as a feather in the balance. Without her life
would be a dreary penance; with her a much worse place than Quipai would
be an earthly paradise.

But would she have me? The abbé seemed to think so. Nevertheless, I felt
by no means sure about it. True, she appeared to like my company. But that
might be because I had so much to tell her that was strange and new; and
though I had observed her narrowly, I had detected none of that charming
self-consciousness, that tender confusion, those stolen glances, whereby
the conventional lover gauges his mistress's feelings, and knows before he
speaks that his love is returned. Angela was always the same--frank, open,
and joyous, and, except that her caresses were reserved for him, made no
difference between the abbé and me.

"A _chirimoya_ for your thoughts, señor!" said a well-known voice, in
musical Castilian. "For these three minutes I have been standing close by
you, with this freshly gathered chirimoya, and you took no notice of me."

"A thousand pardons and a thousand thanks, señorita!" I answered, taking
the proffered fruit. "But my thoughts were worth all the chirimoyas in the
world, delicious as they are, for they were of you."

"We were thinking of each other then."

"What! Were you thinking of me?"

"_Si, señor._"

"And what were you thinking, señorita?"

"That God was very good in sending you to Quipai."

"Why?"

"For several reasons."

"Tell me them."

"Because you have done the abbé good. Aforetime he was often sad. You
remember his saying that he had cares. I know not what, but now he seems
himself again."

"Anything else?"

"_Si, señor._ You have also increased my happiness. Not that I was unhappy
before, for, thanks to the dear abbé, my life has been free from sorrow;
but during the last month--since you came--I have been more than happy, I
have been joyous."

"You don't want me to go, then?"

"O señor! Want you to go! How can you--what have I done or said?"
exclaimed the girl, impetuously and almost indignantly. "Surely, sir, you
are not tired of us already?"

"Heaven forbid! If you want me to stay I shall not go. It is for you to
decide. _Angela mia_, it depends on you whether I go away soon--how or
whither I know not--or stay here all my life long."

"Depends on me! Then, sir, I bid you stay."

"Oh, Angela, you must say more than that. You must consent to become my
wife; then do with me what you will."