The Tiger Hunter

Chapter Sixty Six.
Don Cornelio a Captive

Almost as soon as Clara had ridden out of sight, Don Cornelio began to count the minutes. The quarter of an hour appeared a whole one; and, when it had passed, with no signs of either returning, he became more than uneasy – he felt alarm.

In order to create some distraction for his thoughts, he rode gently forward – on the same path by which his two companions had gone. Not meeting either, he kept on for another quarter of an hour. Becoming still more alarmed, he was about to make a halt, when he saw lights that seemed to go and come along the summits of the trees that appeared at some distance before him. These lights had flashed into view at a turn of the road.

On looking more attentively, he perceived that the ground sloped up from the place which he occupied; and he was now enabled to distinguish the outlines of a vast building, the windows of which were so brilliantly illuminated from the inside, that one might have fancied the house to be on fire. Outside, upon the azotéa, blazing torches appeared to be carried backward and forward. It was these that had first attracted the eye of Don Cornelio, who, on account of the elevation at which they were seen, fancied them to be moving among the tops of the trees!

There was something too unnatural in these blazing torches, agitated by the night breeze – but more especially in the strange lights that shone through the windows – now red, now blue, and then of a pale violet colour, and in an instant changing from one hue to another – something so fantastically singular, that Don Cornelio suddenly drew up, without daring to advance a pace further.

The superstitious ideas with which Costal had entertained him during their journey now came into his mind; and, despite his disbelief in them, he could not help conjuring up fancies almost as absurd. He remembered the bull fulminated against the insurgents by the Bishop of Oajaca – representing them as spirits of darkness – and he began to fancy there must be some truth in it, and that he was now within view of these very demons. The silence that reigned around tended to strengthen this fancy – which was now further confirmed by the sight of a phantom-like figure clothed in white, seen for a moment gliding among the trees, and then as suddenly vanishing out of sight. The phantom appeared to have come from the direction of the illuminated building – as if fleeing from some danger that there menaced it.

The Captain made the sign of the cross, and then sat motionless in his saddle – uncertain whether to remain where he was, or to gallop back to the ford.

While thus irresolute, and asking himself whether the phantom he had seen might have been a stray reflection of one of the torches, the lights all at once disappeared from the upper part of the building.

At the same moment four or five horsemen issued forth from the shadow of the walls, and galloped towards him, uttering loud yells. Don Cornelio perceived that his presence was discovered; but to put this beyond doubt, a light at the moment flashed up among the horsemen, followed by the report of a carbine, and the hissing of a bullet, which passed close to his ears.

He no longer hesitated as to whether he should stand or fly. The bullet was sufficient cue for flight; and, wheeling round, he set off in full gallop towards the river.

Trained by the misfortunes which had occurred to him, from the mistaken economy of his worthy father, Don Cornelio had ever since felt an aversion to second-rate horses, and on the present journey he had taken care to provide himself with a good one. Knowing the fact, he had fair hopes of being able to distance his pursuers. Driving his spurs deeply into the ribs of his horse, he permitted the animal to choose its own course – so long as it carried him in a direction opposite to that from which he was pursued.

Forgetting all about Costal and Clara, he rode away like the wind; and, in all likelihood, would have got clear beyond the reach of his pursuers, but for an unforeseen misfortune. In passing a gigantic cypress his horse stumbled upon its projecting roots, and came head foremost to the ground – flinging his rider out of the saddle with such force that, but for the softness of the spot on which he fell, some of his bones would undoubtedly have suffered fracture.

He was but little damaged by the fall, and, before he could get to his feet, and recover his horse, one of the pursuers had ridden up, and casting out a lazo, noosed him round the body.

To whom was the captain a prisoner?

Of this he was completely ignorant, still uncertain as to who were in possession of the hacienda. As soon as he had regained his feet, however, a voice cried out, interrogatively, “For Spain, or the Independence?”

Before making answer, Don Cornelio looked up. Half-a-dozen men had arrived upon the ground, and encircled him in their midst, forming a menacing cordon around him. Of one and all the aspect was sinister and doubtful.

“Spain, or the Independence?” repeated the voice, in a more threatening tone.

Thus brusquely called upon to proclaim his colours, the Captain, not knowing those of the party who surrounded him, hesitated to make answer.

“Very well, cavallero!” cried one of the men, “answer or not, as you please. No doubt of it,” he continued, addressing himself to a comrade, “this fellow is in company with the other two. Bring him along to the hacienda!”

At these words one of his captors seized Don Cornelio by the arm, and commenced dragging him along toward the illuminated building.

“Hold!” cried the first speaker, as, under the glare of the distant lights, he saw that their prisoner was neither negro nor Indian. “Por Dios! this fellow is white.”

“Red, black, and white!” added another. “We want only a mestizo to complete the collection.”

From these speeches Don Cornelio conjectured that his comrades, Costal and Clara, had been already captured by the same party who were making him their prisoner.

He was still ignorant, however, as to whether his captors were royalists or insurgents; and, before proceeding further, he determined, if possible, to settle that question.

“What do you want with me?” he inquired, in the hope of obtaining some clue in the answer.

“Not much,” replied the spokesman of the party. “Only to nail your head in the place of that of Lantejas.”

“Lantejas!” exclaimed Don Cornelio, inspired with a fresh hope. “That is my name. It is I who am the insurgent Lantejas, sent here to Oajaca, by General Morelos.”

The declaration was received with a burst of savage laughter.

“Demonio!” cried one of the guerilleros, coming up with the horse of Don Cornelio, “I have had trouble enough in catching this accursed brute. It is to be hoped he carries something to repay me for it.”

Don Cornelio fancied he knew the tone of this voice, but he had no time to reflect upon where he had heard it, before its owner again cried out, “Alabado sea Dios! (Blessed be the Lord!) there is my cloak!”

Don Cornelio recognised the man who the day before had taken such a fancy to his cloak. In a word, the speaker was Gaspacho.

“What a lucky fellow I am to meet you again,” continued the brigand; “that cloak is much too large for you. I told you so yesterday.”

“Such as it is, it satisfies me,” meekly responded the Captain.

“Oh! nonsense,” rejoined Gaspacho, at the same time throwing off his own tattered scrape, and making a significant gesture to Don Cornelio to uncloak himself.

The latter hesitated to comply with this rude invitation; but almost on the instant Gaspacho snatched the garment from his shoulders, and coolly wrapped it round his own.

“Now, amigo,” cried one of Gaspacho’s confrères, “surely a man without a head has no need of a hat? Yours appears as if it would just fit me,” and saying this, the bandit picked the hat from Don Cornelio’s head, at the same time flinging his own battered sombrero to the ground.

As there was nothing more upon the person of the prisoner to tempt the cupidity of the brigands, the lazo was unloosened from around his arms, and he was ordered to accompany his captors to the hacienda. This he did willingly enough: for the presence of Gaspacho told him that he was in the hands of the guerilleros of Arroyo.

“Can I see the Captain?” he inquired.

“What Captain?”

“Arroyo.”

“Ah! you wish to see him?” responded Gaspacho. “That rather surprises me. You shall have the pleasure of seeing him soon enough, I fancy. Come along!”

The guerilleros continued on to the house, conducting their prisoner along with them.

As they drew near to the walls, the attention of Don Cornelio was again attracted to the singular lights that seemed to be burning within the house. It could not be the flame of a conflagration, else the building would long since have been consumed.

A few minutes brought them up to the gate. It was shut, and one of the men knocked against it with the hilt of his sabre, at the same time giving utterance to a password, which Don Cornelio did not understand. What he did comprehend was, that the moment had come when, bon gré mal gré, he was called upon to acquit himself of the commission with which Morelos had entrusted him.

It often happens that danger in prospective is more dreaded than when it is present; and so was it in this instance: for, on his arrival at the gate, Don Cornelio felt less embarrassed with apprehensions than he had been ever since his departure from the camp at Huajapam.

The huge door turned upon its heavy hinges to admit the horsemen – in the midst of whom the prisoner was carried into a large, paved courtyard, illuminated by the flames of several fires that burned in the open air. Around these fires could be distinguished the forms of men – to the number of one hundred or more – grouped in different attitudes, or lying asleep upon the pavement. Along the walls stood as many horses, completely equipped for the road. The bridles only were off, and hanging suspended over the saddle-bow – in order that the animals might consume their rations of maize, served to them in wooden troughs. Here and there, stacks of carbines, lances, and sabres, glanced under the light of the fires, and Don Cornelio could not help shivering with terror as he looked upon these fierce bandits, in the midst of their picturesque accoutrements.

Most of them remained as they were, without offering to stir. The sight of a fresh prisoner was nothing new to them. One only coming forward, asked Gaspacho, in a tone of indifference, what had taken him out at that hour of the night.

“Well!” exclaimed the cloak-robber in reply. “They say that the mistress of the hacienda has escaped by a window. Her husband says she is absent. I don’t care whether it’s true or not. All I know is, that we can see nothing of her without; and we should have returned empty-handed, if good fortune hadn’t thrown into our hands this gentleman here. I have no doubt he is a royalist spy, since he wanted to pass himself off for our old comrade – the Lieutenant Lantejas.”

“Ah!” rejoined the other, “he would ill like to be Lantejas just now.”

And as the man said this he returned to the fire, which he had for the moment forsaken.

The captors of Don Cornelio were soon lost amidst the groups of their associates – Gaspacho alone staying to guard him.

Only a few seconds did the cloak-robber remain in the courtyard; after which, making a sign to his prisoner to follow him, he commenced reascending the stone escalera that led to the second storey of the building.

Chapter Sixty Seven.
The Colonel of Colonels

The day upon which these various events took place was anything but a happy one for Arroyo. It appeared to him as if the re-appearance in the neighbourhood of his deadliest foe – Don Rafael Tres-Villas – had been the signal for the series of disappointments which had occurred to him. Ten of his followers had fallen in a sortie of the besieged, besides two more killed by the hand of Don Rafael – who had himself escaped, as well as the prisoner Gaspar and the deserter Juan el Zapote.

The bloodthirsty disposition of the guerilla chief had been strengthened by these disappointments, and in order to give solace to his vexed spirit, he resolved to possess himself of the hacienda of San Carlos without further delay.

In addition to the wicked desires – which the promptings of Bocardo had excited within him – there was another reason urging him to carry out this design. The hacienda of San Carlos, with a little labour, could be converted into a fortress of considerable strength, and such as he might yet stand in need of.

He saw that he had miscalculated the power of resistance of the royalist garrison of Del Valle; and, still ignorant of its real strength, he deemed it better to call off the besieging force until after the taking of San Carlos. Then he could go back with his whole band, and make a determined assault against the place.

He had, for these reasons, ordered the besiegers to return to camp; and, striking his tent, had marched with all his followers to the capture of San Carlos. This will explain why Don Cornelio and his companions had been able to pass the hacienda Del Valle – and afterwards the ford of the Ostuta – without seeing anything of Arroyo or his band – Gaspacho alone excepted.

Numerous as were the servants of Don Fernando Lacarra – the proprietor of San Carlos – their master did not for a moment dream of making resistance. It would have been worse than useless against an experienced guerilla numbering in all above a hundred men. At the first summons, therefore, the gates of the hacienda were opened to Arroyo and his followers.

Having hitherto practised a strict neutrality, and being known to have a strong sympathy with the cause of the Independence, the young Spaniard believed that Arroyo only intended demanding from him a contribution in provisions – and perhaps money – for the support of his troops; and that with this he would be contented.

Although not suspecting the designs of the brigand in regard to his wife, he had deemed it prudent, before opening the gates, that she should conceal herself in one of the secret chambers of the mansion – where he was also in the habit of keeping his money and plate. There he fancied she would be safe enough – unless, indeed, the whole building should be ransacked and pillaged.

To strengthen this precaution, Don Fernando had informed the brigands on their entering the house, that his wife, Marianita, was not at home.

Unfortunately for him, it was not a mere levy of blackmail that was now to satisfy the partisan chieftains. One was determined upon robbing him of his wife – while the other coveted his money – and therefore the subterfuges of Don Fernando were not likely to avail him.

It was just at the time that the wretched husband was endeavouring to mislead his visitors as to the hiding-place of his wife and his treasure, that Don Cornelio Lantejas had come within view of the building, the lights of whose windows had so mystified him. That mystery was now to be cleared up, and the ex-student was to find the explanation of those bright coloured flames with their changing hues.

Following Gaspacho up the stone stairway, Don Cornelio reached a door upon the landing. It was closed; but inside, a tumult of voices could be heard, accompanied by cries as of some one in pain.

His conductor unceremoniously opened the door, and pushed Don Cornelio into a large room, the atmosphere of which almost suffocated him.

Several torches of resin, set in candelabras, were burning round the walls, but the reddish light which these produced was almost eclipsed under the glare that proceeded from a keg of brandy that stood near the middle of the floor, and which, having been set on fire, was completely enveloped in violet-coloured flames.

The heat, the smell of blood, and the effluvia of the burning alcohol, constituted an atmosphere horrid to endure; but even this was less painful to Don Cornelio than the sight which met his eyes as he entered the room. On one side was a group of guerilleros – clustered around some object which they were regarding with the most vivid interest – all seemingly pleased with the spectacle.

It was that of an unfortunate man, stripped almost naked, and tied with his face to the wall, while another man stood over him, grasping a strong cow-hide whip, with which, at intervals, he struck the wretched victim, apparently with all the strength that lay in his arms.

He who handled the whip was a man of the most sinister aspect; and the blue flames of the alcohol flashing over his countenance added to its demoniac expression. Gouts of blood, that had spurted from the back of the sufferer, spotted the wall on both sides of him; and the number of those spots showed that the punishment had been continued for some length of time.

By the side of the man who was inflicting the stripes – and whom Lantejas supposed to be some common executioner – stood a woman of a still more hideous aspect; who, by her gestures and words, kept exciting the wretch to still greater cruelty – as though he stood in need of such encouragement.

Gaspacho, perceiving that no one heeded his entrance, cried out, so as to be heard above the tumult —

“Señor Captain! we have captured the comrade of the negro and the Indian. Here he is.”

To the astonishment of Don Cornelio, the person thus addressed as the captain was no other than the hideous individual who was handling the whip.

“Very well,” responded the latter, without turning round. “I shall attend to him presently, as soon as I have made this coyote confess where he has hidden his wife and his money.”

The whip again whistled through the air, and came down upon the back of the wretched sufferer, without producing any other manifestation than a deep groan.

It is scarcely necessary to say that the victim of this barbarous treatment was Don Fernando Lacarra. The words of Arroyo have already made this known to the reader.

Perfectly indifferent to the spectacle, Gaspacho, having introduced his prisoner to the presence of Arroyo, walked out of the room.

As regards Don Cornelio, he stood where the robber had left him, paralysed with horror. Independently of the compassion he felt for the sufferer, he was under the suspicion that both Costal and Clara had already perished, and that his own turn might come next.

While these fearful reflections were passing through his mind, a man whom he had not before noticed now came up to him. This was an individual with a jackal-like face, and the skulking mien of that animal, with all its ferocious aspect.

“My good friend,” said this man, addressing himself to Don Cornelio, “you appear somewhat lightly clad for one who is about to present himself before people of distinction.”

Lantejas, in reality – thanks to the bandits who had captured him – was almost naked: a torn shirt and drawers being all the clothing they had left him.

“Señor Captain,” – said he, addressing the jackal-like individual, and intending to account for the scantiness of his costume.

“Stop,” interrupted the other, “not captain. Call me Colonel of Colonels, if you please. It is a title which I have adopted, and no one shall deprive me of it.”

“Well then, Colonel of Colonels! if your people had not robbed me of my broad cloth cloak, my hat of Vicuña wool, and various other articles of clothing, you would not have seen me so lightly dressed. But it is not only that which grieves me. I have other serious complaints to make – ”

“The devil!” exclaimed the Colonel of Colonels, without heeding the last remarks. “A broad cloth cloak and Vicuña hat, did you say? Two things of which I stand particularly in need. They must be recovered.”

“I have to complain of violence offered to my person,” continued Don Cornelio. “I am called Lantejas – Captain Lantejas. I serve the junta of Zitacuaro, under the orders of General Morelos; and I bear from him a commission, of which the proofs – ”

A sudden thought interrupted the speech of Don Cornelio – a terrible thought, for it just now occurred to him that his despatches, his commission as captain, his letters of credence – in short, all the papers by which he could prove his identity – were in the pockets of the stolen cloak!

“Ho!” exclaimed the Colonel of Colonels, in a joyful tone, “you call yourself Lantejas, do you? I am delighted to hear it, and so will our captain be. It is the luckiest circumstance in the world for us, and for you, too, as you shall presently be convinced. Look here!”

The speaker raised the corner of a serape that was spread upon one of the tables standing near, and pointed to some objects lying underneath. Don Cornelio saw they were human heads.

There were three of them.

“Now, my good friend,” continued the Colonel of Colonels, “there you see the head of our old comrade, Lieutenant Lantejas, which we have brought away from where it was nailed over the gate of the hacienda Del Valle. Conceive, then, what a lucky thing for us! What a splendid revanche we shall have when, in place of the head of the insurgent Lantejas, we shall nail up that of Lantejas the royalist spy!”

“But it is a mistake,” cried Don Cornelio, rubbing the cold sweat from his forehead. “I am not a royalist nor a spy neither. I have the honour to serve the cause of the Independence – ”

“Bah! everybody says the same. Besides, without any proofs – ”

“But I have proofs. They are in the pocket of my cloak, of which I have been robbed.”

“Who took your cloak?” inquired the Colonel of Colonels.

“Gaspacho,” replied Don Cornelio, who had incidentally learnt the name of the brigand who had despoiled him.

“Ah! that is a terrible misfortune. Gaspacho has just received orders to go in all haste to Las Cruces. He is off by this time, and will not likely be back in less than ten days. You, by that time will have lost your head, and I my cloak and Vicuña hat. Both of them, I know, would have fitted me, since you and I are both of a size. What a damnable misfortune for both of us!”

A fearful cry interrupted the dialogue between Don Cornelio and the Colonel of Colonels. The cry came from the wretched sufferer, who fainted as soon as uttering it.

Almost at the same instant the alcohol shot up its last flickering flame – as the spirit itself was consumed; and in the reddish light of the torches Don Cornelio could perceive the men flitting about like shadows, or rather like demons assisting in the horrible drama that was being enacted.