Last of the Incas: A Romance of the Pampas

"Come, come, Patito," he said to him, "up with you, my boy, and gallop to the Estancia of San Julian."

"Why, I have just come from there," the gaucho muttered, yawning and rubbing his eyes.

"The better reason; you must know the road. It is Doña Concha who sends you."

"If the señorita wishes it, of course," Patito said, whom the name thoroughly aroused; "what am I to do?"

"Mount your horse and carry this letter to Don Valentine; it is an important letter, you understand?"

"Very good."

"Let nobody take it from you."

"Of course not."

"If you are killed – ?"

"I shall be killed."

"When you are dead it must not even be found on you."

"I will swallow it."

"The Indians will not think of ripping you up."

"All right."

"Be off."

"Only give me time to saddle my horse."

"Good-bye, Patito, and luck be with you." Pedrito left the gaucho, who speedily started.

"It is now my turn," the bombero muttered; "how am I to reach Doña Concha?"

He scratched his head and frowned, but ere long his forehead became unwrinkled, and he proceeded gaily to the fort; After a conference with Major Bloomfield, who had succeeded Don Antonio Valverde in command of the town, Pedrito doffed his clothes, and disguised himself as an Aucas. He set out, slipped into the Indian camp, and shortly before sunrise was back again in the town.

"Well?" his sister said to him.

"All goes well," the bombero answered, "¡Viva Dios! Nocobotha, I fancy, will pay dearly for carrying off Don Sylvio. Oh, women are demons!"

"Am I to go and join her?"

"No; it is unnecessary."

And, without entering into any details, Pedrito, who was worn out with fatigue, selected a place to sleep in, snored away, not troubling himself about the Indians.

Several days elapsed ere the besiegers renewed their attack on the town, which, however, they invested more closely. The Spaniards, strictly blockaded, and having no communication with the exterior, found their provisions running short, and hideous famine would soon pounce on its victims. Fortunately, the indefatigable Pedrito had an idea which he communicated to Major Bloomfield. He had a hundred and fifty loaves worked up with arsenic, water, and vitriol mingled with twenty barrels of spirits; the whole loaded on mules, was placed under the escort of Pedrito and his two brothers. The bomberos approached the Patagonian earthworks with this frugal stock of provisions. The Indians, who are passionately fond of firewater, rushed to meet the caravan, and seize the barrels. Pedrito and his brothers left their burden lying on the sand, and returned to the town at a gallop with the mules, which were intended to support the besieged, if the Patagonians did not make the assault.

There was a high holiday in the camp. The loaves were cut up; the heads of the barrels stove in, and nothing was left. This orgy cost the Indians six thousand men, who died in atrocious tortures. The others, struck with horror, began disbanding in all directions. The chiefs were no longer respected. Nocobotha himself saw his authority wavering before the superstition of the savages, who believed in a celestial punishment. The prisoners, men, women, and children, were massacred with horrible refinements of barbarity. Doña Concha, though protected by the great chief, only owed her escape to chance or to God, who preserved her as the instrument of His will.

The rage of the Indians, having no one left to vent itself on, gradually calmed down. Nocobotha went about constantly to restore courage. He felt that it was time to come to an end, and he gave Lucaney orders to assemble all the chiefs in his toldo.

"Great chiefs of the great nations," Nocobotha said to them, so soon as they were all collected round the council fire, "tomorrow, at daybreak, Carmen will be attacked on all sides at once. So soon as the town is taken the campaign will be over. Those who recoil are not men, but slaves. Remember that we are fighting for the liberty of our race."

He then informed each chief of the place of his tribe in the assault; formed a reserve of ten thousand men to support, if necessary, those who gave way, and, after cheering up the Ulmens, he dismissed them. So soon as he was alone, he proceeded to Doña Concha's toldo. The young lady gave Lucaney orders to admit him. Doña Concha was talking with her father, who, on receiving her letter, through Patito, at once hastened to her.

The interior of the toldo was completely altered, for Nocobotha had placed in it furniture, carried off from the estancias by the Indians. Externally nothing was changed, but inside it was divided by partitions, and rendered a perfect European residence. Here Concha lived pleasantly enough, honoured by the supreme chief and in the company of her father and Mercedes, who acted as her lady's maid.

The Indians, though somewhat astonished at their great Toqui's mode of life, remembered the European education he had received, and dared not complain. Was not Nocobotha's hatred of the white men still equally ardent? Were not his words still full of love for his country at the council fire? Was it not he who had directed the invasion, and led the tribes on the path of liberty? Hence, Nocobotha had lost nothing in the opinion of the warriors. He was still their well-beloved chief.

"Is the effervescence of the tribes appeased?" Doña Concha asked Nocobotha.

"Yes, Heaven be thanked, señorita; but the man commanding at Carmen is a wild beast. Six thousand men have been killed by poison."

"Oh, it is fearful," the young lady said.

"The whites are accustomed to treat us thus, and poison – "

"Say no more about it, Don Torribio; it makes me shudder."

"For centuries the Spaniards have been our murderers."

"What do you intend doing?" Don Valentine asked, in order to turn the conversation.

"Tomorrow, señor, a general assault will be made on Carmen."

"Tomorrow?"

"Yes. Tomorrow I shall have destroyed the Spaniards' power in the Patagonia, or be dead myself."

"God will protect the good cause," Doña Concha said in a prophetic voice.

A cloud passed over Don Valentine's forehead.

"During the battle, which will be obstinate, I implore you, señorita, not to leave this toldo, before which I will leave twenty men on guard."

"Are you going to leave us already, Don Torribio?"

"I must; so excuse me, madam."

"Good-bye, then," Doña Concha said.

"All is over!" Don Valentine murmured, in despair, when Nocobotha had gone out. "They will succeed."

The maiden, who was calm and half smiling, but whose eye was inflamed with hatred, walked up to Don Valentine, clasped her hands on his shoulder, and said, in a whisper —

"Have you read the Bible, father?"