Last of the Incas: A Romance of the Pampas

The young man was dressed in the latest Parisian fashion, and the candles lit up his splendid face.

Father and daughter started.

Don Torribio walked up to Doña Concha, bowed to her gracefully, and offered her a superb bouquet of exotic flowers. She thanked him with a smile, took the bouquet, and almost without looking at it, laid it on a table.

In succession were announced the governor, Don Antonio Valverde, accompanied by his whole staff, and two or three other families, or altogether some fifteen persons. By degrees the conversation grew animated.

"Well, colonel," Don Valentine asked the governor, "What news from Buenos Aires?"

"Our great Rosas," the colonel answered, who was stifling in his uniform, "has again defeated Oribe's Unitarian savages."

"Heaven be praised! Perhaps that victory will procure us a little of that tranquillity which commerce requires."

"Yes," a colonist remarked, "the communications are becoming so difficult that nothing can be sent by land."

"Can the Indians be stirring?" a merchant asked anxiously, on hearing the observation.

"Oh!" the stout commandant interrupted, "There is no danger; the last lesson they received was rude, they will remember it a long time, and not dream of invading our frontiers for many a day to come."

An almost invisible smile played round Don Torribio's lips.

"In case of an invasion, do you consider them capable of seriously troubling the colony?"

"Hum!" Don Antonio answered, "Take them altogether they are poor scrubs."

The young man smiled again in a bitter and sinister manner.

"Excellency," he said, "I am of your opinion; I believe the Indians will do well in remaining at home."

"I should think so," the commandant exclaimed.

"Señorita," Don Torribio said, turning to Doña Concha, "would it be too great a favour to ask you to sing that delicious air from the Black Domino which you sang so exquisitely the other evening?"

The young lady, without farther pressing, sat down to the pianoforte, and sang the romance from the third act in a pure voice.

"I heard that sung in Paris by Madame Damoreau, a nightingale who has flown away, and I cannot say which of you displays more grace or simplicity."

"Don Torribio," Doña Concha answered, "you lived too long in France."

"Why so, señorita."

"Because you have come back a detestable flatterer."

"Bravo!" the governor said with a hearty laugh. "You see, Don Torribio, that our creoles are equal to the Parisian ladies in quickness of repartee."

"Incontestably, colonel," the young man replied; "but leave me alone," he added with an undefinable accent, "I shall soon take my revenge."

And he gave Doña Concha a look that made her shudder.

"I trust, Don Torribio," the governor said, "that you will be present tomorrow at the Te Deum chanted in honour of our glorious Rosas?"

"Impossible, colonel; this very evening I start on a compulsory journey."

"What, another of your mysterious excursions?"

"Yes, but this one will not be long, and I shall be back soon?"

"All the better."

"¿Quién sabe?" the young man murmured in a sinister voice.

Doña Concha, who had heard the last words, was not mistress of her terror.

The visitors took leave one after the other, and Don Torribio Carvajal was at length left alone with his hosts.

"Señorita," he said on taking leave, "I am setting out on a journey in which I shall doubtless incur great dangers. May I hope that you will deign to remember the traveller in your prayers."

Concha looked at him for a moment in the face, and replied with a frankness which was natural to her: —

"Señor Caballero, I cannot pray for the success of an expedition whose object I do not know."

"Thanks for your frankness, mademoiselle," Don Torribio answered without the slightest emotion, "I shall not forget your words."

And after the customary compliments he retired.

"The capataz of San Julian, Don Blas Salazar wishes to speak with Señor Don Valentine Cardoso on important business."

"Let him come in," Don Valentine said to the servant who had announced the capataz in so lengthy a fashion. "Conchita, come and sit by my side on this sofa."

Don Torribio was extremely agitated when he left the house; he turned round and darted a viper glance at the windows of the drawing room, across which Doña Concha's light shadow flitted.

"Proud girl," he said in a hollow and terrible voice, "I shall punish you for your disdain."

Then, wrapping himself in his cloak, he went at a rapid pace to a house situated a short distance off, where he generally lived when at Carmen. He knocked twice; the gate opened and closed after him.

Twenty minutes later the gate opened again to let two horsemen pass out.

"Master, where are we going?" one asked.

"To the tree of Gualichu," the other replied; and added in a whisper, "to seek vengeance."

The two horsemen entered the darkness, and the furious gallop of their horses was soon lost in the silence of night.

CHAPTER IV.

THE TREE OF GUALICHU

As a general rule, the Southern natives have a divinity, or to speak more correctly, a genius, sometimes benevolent, but more frequently maleficent, and their worship is less veneration than fear. This genius is called Achellenat Kanet by the Patagonians, Quecuba by the Aucas, and Gualichu by the Puelches. And, as the latter have more especially traversed the country in which the sacred, tree stands, they have perpetuated the name of their evil genius by giving it to the tree, to which they attribute the same power.