CHAPTER III.
Departure of the Convoy.—Victoriano, the Muleteer.—His sudden Disappearance.—The Convoy is attacked by Robbers.
I purposed leaving Mexico now that order appeared established and commerce had returned to its wonted channels. I learned that the conducta was already in motion. I still held by my purpose of making part of the escort under the command of the Lieutenant Don Blas; and on the morning after a day spent in taking leave of my friends, I traversed the streets of Mexico for the last time, attended by my valet Cecilio.
Upon reaching the open country, the joy that had taken possession of me at the idea of my speedy return to Europe was slightly tinged by a vague feeling of sadness. Mexico is still surrounded with lakes as in the time of the Conquest; but the appearance of these still waters, traversed by a magnificent road, has been completely changed. The time is gone by when they bore on their bosom the brigantines of Cortez and the pirogues of the ancient inhabitants. Partly lessened by evaporation and partly by drainage, the lakes of Mexico preserve nothing of their former splendor. The distant report of some sportsman's gun, and the wild songs of the Indians, whose pirogues may some times be seen making their way through the bending reeds, at rare intervals break the mournful silence which broods over the fields in their vicinity. Some white aigrets—sitting motionless on the surface of the water—white as the flowers of the water-lily, a few water-hens, wild ducks, and huge reptiles which shake the aquatic plants as they pass, and here and there an Indian angler standing up to the middle of his legs in water, are the only living beings to be seen in these solitudes. The heavens and the mountains are alone unchanged; and the same volcanoes, their tops covered with eternal snow, still shoot up aloft into the air as they did three hundred years before.
Having arrived at Buena Vista, which commands a view of the whole valley of Mexico, I stopped to take a last look of the beautiful plain at my feet. In the midst of a belt of blue hills and small villages, whose white houses contrasted beautifully with the green of the willows, the lakes assumed, owing to the distance, something of their ancient glory. Mexico seemed still the city of the New World. I stopped for a moment to contemplate the distant domes with a feeling of in voluntary dejection. I looked for the last time upon. a city to which I had come with all the curiosity and enthusiasm peculiar to youth. Mexico was my halting place when I returned from my excursions in the country round. It was like a second country to me; for, if infancy has its souvenirs dear to that state of childhood, youth can not forget the place where the flower of adolescence has shot up, and withered, alas! too soon. I looked again at this fertile valley, where smiles an eternal spring; and, to escape from the sadness which possessed me, put my horse to the gallop, and the lofty towers of that city which I was never more to behold were soon quickly lost to my view.
After passing a night at the venta of Cordova, my road lay through the woods of Rio Trio, so notorious for the robberies committed there in broad daylight, and the smiling plains of San Martin, which strongly remind one of those of the Bajio. The snowy peaks of the volcanoes in the vicinity of Mexico were lighted up by the last rays of a sun that sparkled like an expiring beacon-fire when I rode into Puebla. The conducta had passed through that town the same evening. Puebla, the lofty towers of its convents, churches, and cupolas all covered with enameled tiling, looks at a distance like an Oriental town overtopped with minarets. I halted a short time to rest myself, and on the third day after my departure from Mexico descried from a distance the red pennons of the lancers who escorted the convoy.
In the first cavalier to whom I addressed myself after overtaking the escort I could scarcely recognize the asistente of Don Blas. The desires of this worthy lépero on becoming a soldier had been completely satisfied, for, except that he had only a bottine on one foot, a shoe on the other, and no straps to his trowsers, his cavalry uniform left him nothing to desire. In consonance, also, with military discipline, he had parted with his hair.
"Tell me, friend," said I, accosting him, "are you still in the service of Lieutenant Don Blas?"
"Captain Don Blas, if you please for he has been promised this rank as a reward for his heroic conduct on your azotea; and I have got my stripes also now. I am his servant no longer. He is a captain in a regiment of lancers. You see a detachment of them here."
I proceeded onward, and, in spite of his new uniform, had little difficulty in recognizing Don Blas. The captain was riding gloomily at the head of his troop. I congratulated him on his promotion, and inquired about his wound. He reddened slightly when he told me it had quite healed, and hurriedly asked me if I had counted the cost of traveling with him. I assured him it was my unalterable intention to accompany the convoy to Vera Cruz. Don Blas affected much joy at my resolution, after which the conversation fell quite naturally upon the dangers of the road, the mishaps of which I thought I should escape in his company. The captain shook his head.
"I am not so sure of that," said he. "I fear that you are jumping from the frying-pan into the fire, for the late troubles have increased the number of guerillas.[1] And folks say that we shall probably have a hard fight with the highwaymen in the gorges of the Amozoque. The time is gone by when, under a certain viceroy, the standard of Castile, floating above a silver caravan, was sufficient to protect it in its passage."
"I hope," I replied, "that the troop of lancers under your command will make up for the want of the Spanish flag."
"God grant it!" returned Don Blas. "Although I am not blind to the dangers we shall have to run, I shall do my duty in every case."
The long file of richly-laden mules, each having a burden of five thousand dollars in coined money, over every one of which the guardians of the convoy kept an incessant watch, was, in fact, a prize worth striking a blow for. The road to Mexico presents the most striking scenes incident to beauty in landscape, but the thick woods, the deep gorges, and the narrow de files which we had to traverse might be swarming with robbers. I had scarcely passed a few hours among my new companions ere I began to feel the want of some amusement to dissipate the ennui attendant upon a slow and monotonous march through a desert country. The captain was assuredly a merry companion, but his jokes were trite and commonplace. The stories and songs of a muleteer who took the lead in that kind of entertainment in our little troop were infinitely more agreeable to me. He was a man of about thirty years of age, called Victoriano. He had traveled this road for several years, and had a story for every halting-place. In the evening, under a starry sky, when the mules, relieved from their burdens, munched their maize under the mantas which served them for a rack; when round the bivouac fires the sentinels mounted guard over the treasure committed to their care, and the other soldiers slept upon their arms, the captain and I always had a new pleasure in listening to Victoriano, whose unflagging spirit found vent in pleasant stories, or in songs accompanied by the mandolin.
I pitied then the travelers I saw whirled along in the diligence like a flash of lightning, their horses galloping at the top of their speed, while the passengers very likely would be pointing us out to their friends as the only remnant existing of the old Mexican manners. A few more vices, I said to myself, and a few less charms, are the only results of this parody of civilization, which, up to the present time, has destroyed every thing and constructed nothing. On these evenings, round our watch-fire, living at once the life of a muleteer and that of a soldier, I still experienced with out alloy, even though on my way to Europe, the feelings incident to life in the Eastern deserts.
Since our departure from Puebla, Acajete, the hacienda of San Juan, Tepeaca, and Santa Gertrudis (for we had deviated from the ordinary route) had been so many resting-places, marked by a certain quiet in which the fatigue of the body is transferred to the mind, and which seems to prove that the happiness of a man consists in physical motion as much as in thought. We had just passed the town and fort of Perote. "Señor Cavalier," said Victoriano to me, "you ought to go to see the fort. I can easily accompany you to the gate, and, upon my recommendation, you will be admitted without difficulty. You can rejoin us afterward at Cruz Blanca, a little village about two leagues from here, where we shall pass the night, and on your return I shall tell you a story about it which made a great noise some years ago."
I took the advice of the muleteer, who, according to promise, introduced me into the fort, the interior of which I ran over at my pleasure in the company of an officer, who was glad to attend me in the capacity of guide. I was about an hour in the place, and, as the sun was beginning to set, galloped at full speed to join the convoy.
I passed over one of those arid and desolate plains, bristling with volcanic scoriæ, known by the name of mal pais, upon which a scanty layer of earth allows only a few stunted plants to grow. The wind, blowing in sudden gusts, seemed to moan as it struck the sonorous leaves of the nopal and the clumps of juniper. The wolves also began to howl frequently, and the fog which was falling was so dense and cold that I thought I was long in reaching the watch-fire at which I expected Victoriano to fulfill his promise. However, the fear of losing my way in the fog, which hid the horizon, joined to the roughness of the ground, forced me to slacken my pace, and night had fallen before I arrived at our halting-place—Cruz Blanca. In the small number of houses which composed the village, it was not difficult to find where the conducta had stopped. To my great astonishment, I learned that Victoriano had not made his appearance. This circumstance had alarmed every body. Some accident of a serious nature must have happened to prevent a man, whose habitual punctuality was well known, from rejoining the cavalcade, and every one was lost in conjectures as to his absence, when a stranger presented himself, and requested to speak with the chief arriero. The new-comer was dressed in a well-worn stable-coat, and an apron such as is generally worn by mule conductors. He told us that Victoriano, whose horse had come down, had been much injured by the fall, and that they had conveyed him to Perote, where the utmost care would be taken of him. The unknown added that it was by his express desire that he had come to supply his place till he should be in a fit state to rejoin the convoy. The chief arriero, who had only the number of men strictly necessary, accepted his offer perhaps a little too inconsiderately. The new-comer was a stout fellow of about the same age as Victoriano, but the sinister expression of his countenance did not inspire me with the same feeling of confidence as the arriero.
The next morning we resumed our march, intending to pass the night at Hoya, a little village about five leagues from Cruz Blanca. The journey, though slow as ever, seemed more fatiguing, as Victoriano was not there to enliven it with his stories. Every thing seemed to go wrong after his departure. On arriving at Barranca Honda, about a league from where we had started in the morning, a mule cast its shoe, then a second, and afterward a third. Very long halts were necessary for re-shoeing the animals. Victoriano's substitute acquitted himself as a farrier with great zeal and intelligencé, to the great delight of the arriero, who continued, however, to discharge as many oaths as there were saints in the calendar. For my part, I must say that I could not look upon our new companion with the same satisfaction as the muleteer.
"Does it not seem to you," said I to Don Blas, "that this fellow, who shoes the mules so cleverly, might not show an equal address in unshoeing them?"
The captain looked on my suspicions as ridiculous. "I am perfectly disinterested in the matter," I replied, "for, fortunately, none of the precious boxes belong to me; but I can't help regretting the absence of Victoriano."
The convoy put itself again in motion. Still, although it was necessary that the pace should be quickened, the mules appeared to have lost all their former energy, as if some enervating drug had been mixed with their food. Just when we were passing through Las Vigas, the arriero held a sort of conference with the chief of the escort. The former advised that we should pass the night in the village; Don Blas, however, thought it would be better to push on to Hoya, alleging that a delay in a convoy so soon expected in Vera Cruz, especially when the stages in advance were well known, would tend to spread a prejudicial uneasiness. Unluckily for the muleteer, this advice prevailed, and we resolved to push on to Hoya.
There is, perhaps, no part of Mexico in which the difference between the temperature of the plains and that of the more elevated regions is more keenly felt than in the approaches to the Vigas. A few seconds before reaching the village, you were in an instant transported into the vegetation peculiar to cold climates. There the warm breeze and blue heavens were gone, and in their stead a cold north wind blew sharply through the icy vapor which floated around us. Our eyes met only a dull sky, and an arid soil torn up and thickly covered with volcanic boulders. The fog, which at first crept along the surface of the ground, and rolled about in volumes like dust under the feet of our horses, was not long in mounting aloft, and hiding from our view the tops of the tall pines. We could scarcely distinguish one another in the dense mist which the icy wind was driving right in our faces. Deep ravines ran parallel with the road, which was of volcanic formation, and it was a difficult matter to prevent the mules from straggling in a path so hard to follow. I could not help admiring the calmness of Don Blas, the great importance of whose trust absolutely frightened me. As for the arriero, he was in great perplexity, and he galloped incessantly up and down the whole length of the convoy, the sparks flying from his mule's feet at every stroke. The poor man inspired me with a lively interest, for every thing he had in life was at stake; an immense responsibility rested upon him, and he counted and recounted his mules every minute with an anxiety painful to behold. When night had fully come on, Don Blas divided his escort into two bodies. With one he rode at the head of the convoy, and left the other under the charge of Juanito, his ex-asistente. The march was gloomy and silent, the chief noise heard being the tinkle of the bell of the leading mule, the songs of the soldiers, and the clattering of the mules' feet on the stony road. Riding alone on the flank of the convoy, I passed through my mind the various incidents of the morning; the disappearance of our favorite, the unshoeing of the mules, and the dull listlessness with which they now marched, appeared to me, in the midst of the fog which enveloped us, alarming in the highest degree. At the very moment I was asking myself if some treachery was not at work around us, I was joined by my valet Cecilio.
"Señor," said Cecilio, in a low voice, "if you will believe me, we ought not to stay here a moment longer. Something strange is going to happen."
"And where are we to go," said I, "when we can not see two paces before us among these rocks and ravines? But what is the matter?"
"The matter is, Señor, that Victoriano has just slipped in among us, and perhaps I am the only one that has remarked his presence; but his coming bodes no good. The story of his accident appears to be only a falsehood."
"Are you sure of it?"
"Yes, quite; but that is not all. About a quarter of an hour ago, I was in the rear, as I have been generally all the march, owing to this confounded beast of mine, when two mounted cavaliers passed without seeing me, as I was concealed behind a mass of rock. One of them bestrode a magnificent black horse, and was otherwise too well equipped for a peaceable traveler."
"A magnificent black horse?" I said, interrupting him, thinking of the ranchero in Mexico who had looked so coolly, on the departure of the convoy.
"The other," continued Cecilio, "rode a mule, and had the costume of a muleteer; and, if I rightly understood what they said, Victoriano must be an accomplice.""And what became of the horsemen?"
"I have no doubt that, under cover of the darkness, they mingled with the escort. It is easy to guess why; and, probably, they are not alone, for these ravines could conceal an entire cuadrilla (band). If your lordship will be guided by me, we shall let the convoy go on without us."
"Not at all," I answered; "I must go and tell the captain."
"And who told you, Señor, that the captain is not also an accomplice?"
I made no answer. It was not the time for discussion, but for acting. Without considering whether Cecilio's suspicions of Don Blas were well or ill founded, I spurred my horse to warn at least the chief arriero. With some trouble I made up to the rear guard, passed it and some of the mules, the others still forming a long line in front. In the midst of the fog I was guided by the clank of their hoofs on the rocky ground. At last I distinguished the tinkling of the leading mule a few hundred yards in advance. At the same moment I fancied I recognized in the cavalier by my side the sinister countenance of Victoriano's substitute. Some seconds after, the voice of a muleteer rose in the darkness.
"What's the meaning of this?" cried he. "Halloo! Victoriano, is that you? It is, by heavens! and by what chance?"
There was no reply, and the question was not repeated. I shuddered. I thought I heard a stifled cry, followed by a heavy fall. I listened again attentively, but the only sounds were the whistling of the wind, and the echo of the mules' feet upon the stony road. A few seconds after my horse shied violently, as if he had distinguished in the darkness some thing that had alarmed him. Desirous of clearing up the terrible doubts that harassed my mind, I took out my tinder and steel as if to light a cigar, and to warm me by the exercise it afforded. I fancied for a moment that I was the sport of a dream. By the momentary light it sent forth, I thought I saw some strange figures marching along with the soldiers of our escort and the muleteers. Silent phantoms seemed to have glided mysteriously out of the darkness, and were traveling along with us, some clad in lancers' uniform, others wearing the striped frocks of the muleteers. All at once the bell of the leading mule ceased to sound; in a few seconds it recommenced, but in quite a different direction, and similar sounds issued from the ravines on the left of the road. I had seen enough—nay, too much; treachery surrounded us on every side. But what could one do in the midst of a thick fog, and on a road bordered by ravines? How could one distinguish friends from foes in the deep gloom? Astonished and disconcerted, I stopped my horse; then, at the risk of breaking my neck in the darkness, I galloped to the front of the convoy; it was now too late. A cord whistled over my head and encircled me; my horse made a bound forward; but, instead of being dragged from my saddle, and thrown under the animal's feet as I expected, I felt myself bound to my horse with a terrible tightness. The noose intended for me alone had also enlaced him. My right arm was so tightly bound to my body that I could not disengage myself sufficiently to allow me to draw my knife from my boot to cut the lasso. I dug my spurs into my horse's flanks. The noble animal neighed, and tore forward with irresistible vigor. I felt the lasso tighten till it almost cut me, then suddenly slack. A snap of broken girths, an imprecation of rage, and all at once I found myself free, almost before I could fully realize the danger I had escaped. A vigorous bound of my horse almost unseated me. I kept my saddle, however, and galloped furiously on. Some shots were heard, and a ball whistled close to my ears; at the same moment, cries of alarm arose in the dark ness. The repercussion of the firing was fearful, and the confusion indescribable. The mules, deceived by the bells which rang in various directions, ran against each other, and jostled one another in the darkness. The flashes of the fire-arms tore through the fog, and the reports died away among the rocks. By the glare of the musketry you could see the lancers, in their red uniforms, huddled together in confusion, and firing away at random in the thick darkness; the balls went whistling through the air, and the cries of despair of the muleteer were heard distinctly above the din of the tumult.
My frightened horse had carried me far from the scene of combat. I pulled him in immediately and returned. When I rejoined the convoy the contest was over and the bandits had disappeared. Don Blas, who had kept himself very cool during the whole affair, grasped me silently by the hand. I had no time to question him, for a man threw himself between us, a torch in his hand, imploring the captain's assistance. By its light I recognized the discomposed features of the poor muleteer. Some of the soldiers, dismounting, cut branches off the fir-trees and lighted them. We could then survey the sad spectacle which met our eyes. The mozos, among whom Victoriano's substitute was no longer to be seen, watched the poor animals that were standing in groups round the leading mule, whose bell had disappeared. Several mules were bleeding from large wounds: two soldiers, very likely hit by the balls of their comrades, were bandaging their legs with their pocket-handkerchiefs. In a shallow ravine, which the torches reddened with a melancholy glow, a poor muleteer lay writhing in the death agony. This was the man who had recognized Victoriano; he had expiated the fault of having seen too well. The arriero, torch in hand, walked from one mule to another, tearing his hair the while, and wiping off the sweat, which, in spite of the coldness of the night, dropped profusely from his face. "I am lost—ruined!" cried the poor devil, who appeared scarcely to have sufficient courage to ascertain his precise loss with exactness. He commenced, however. Don Blas, who seemed very pale even by the reddish glare of the torches, sat motionless in his saddle. I scrutinized his features as I thought over Cecil's words, but nothing in his countenance betrayed the painful emotion of a man who, by negligence or misfortune, had failed in the execution of his duty.
"Don't you think," said I to him, "that it would be no bad thing to pursue the robbers who have carried off their booty, and who are every moment increasing their distance from us?"
Don Blas seemed to wake out of his reverie.
"Doubtless," he cried, roughly; "but who told you that they have carried off any thing?"
"Heaven help this poor man!" said I, pointing to the muleteer, who uttered a doleful cry.
"May God pity me!" cried he, "for I shall never survive it. Five, Señor Captain! five are gone!" he continued, in a choking voice. "I have lost in one night the fruit of twenty years' toil! Ah! Señor Don Blas, by the life of your mother, try to recover them for me; the half shall be yours. Ah! why did you advise me to proceed to-night? Why did I listen to you?"
And the poor muleteer, dashing his torch upon the road, rolled in the dust.
The captain being thus forced to make some reparation for the misfortune which he had either ignorantly or designedly caused, picked out a dozen of his best mounted horsemen, ordered them to cut some pine branches to serve for torches, and to commence the pursuit without delay. I did not anticipate any very successful issue to the expedition, although I had been the first to advise him to it. Persuaded, however, that, though there was little chance of success, there was little risk to be run; desirous, besides, to witness the wonderful sagacity of the Mexicans in following even the faintest traces, I insisted upon accompanying Don Blas and his band. The captain agreed without much difficulty, and we set out immediately for Hoya.
- ↑ Bands of robbers.