Part 52 (1/2)

CHAPTER FORTY EIGHT.

PADRE JARAUTA.

We were not long in learning into whose hands we had fallen; for the name ”Jarauta” was on every tongue. _They were the dreaded ”Jarochos”

of the bandit priest_.

”We're in for it now,” said Raoul, deeply mortified at the part he had taken in the affair with the cure. ”It's a wonder they have kept us so long. Perhaps _he's_ not here himself, and they're waiting for him.”

As Raoul said this the clatter of hoofs sounded along the narrow road; and a horseman came galloping up to the rancho, riding over everything and everybody with a perfect recklessness.

”That's Jarauta,” whispered Raoul. ”If he sees _me_--but it don't matter much,” he added, in a lower tone: ”we'll have a quick shrift all the same: he can't more than _hang_--and that he'll be sure to do.”

”Where are these Yankees?” cried Jarauta, leaping out of his saddle.

”Here, Captain,” answered one of the Jarochos, a hideous-looking griffe [Note 1] dressed in a scarlet uniform, and apparently the lieutenant of the band.

”How many?”

”Four, Captain.”

”Very well--what are you waiting for?”

”To know whether I shall _hang_ or _shoot_ them.”

”Shoot them, by all means! _Carambo_! we have no time for neck-stretching!”

”There are some nice trees here, Captain,” suggested another of the band, with as much coolness as if he had been conversing about the hanging of so many dogs. He wished--a curiosity not uncommon--to witness the spectacle of hanging.

”_Madre de Dios_! stupid! I tell you we haven't time for such silly sport. Out with you there! Sanchez! Gabriel! Carlos! send your bullets through their Saxon skulls! Quick!”

Several of the Jarochos commenced unslinging their carbines, while those who guarded us fell back, to be out of range of the lead.

”Come,” exclaimed Raoul, ”it can't be worse than this--we can only die; and I'll let the padre know whom he has got before I take leave of him.

I'll give him a _souvenir_ that won't make him sleep any sounder to-night. _Oyez, Padre Jarauta_!” continued he, calling out in a tone of irony; ”have you found Marguerita yet?”

We could see between us and the dim rushlight that the Jarocho started, as if a shot had pa.s.sed through his heart.

”Hold!” he shouted to the men, who were about taking aim; ”drag those scoundrels. .h.i.ther! A light there!--fire the thatch! _Vaya_!”

In a moment the hut of the contrabandista was in flames, the dry palm-leaves blazing up like flax.

”Merciful Heaven! _they are going to roast us_!”

With this horrible apprehension, we were dragged up towards the burning pile, close to which stood our fierce judge and executioner.

The bamboos blazed and crackled, and under their red glare we could now see our captors with a terrible distinctness. A more demon-like set, I think, could not have been found anywhere out of the infernal regions.

Most of them were zamboes and mestizoes, and not a few pure Africans of the blackest hue, maroons from Cuba and the Antilles, many of them with their fronts and cheeks tattooed, adding to the natural ferocity of their features. Their coa.r.s.e woolly hair sticking out in matted tufts, their white teeth set in savage grins, their strange armour and grotesque att.i.tudes, their wild and picturesque attire, formed a _coup d'oeil_ that might have pleased a painter in his studio, but which at the time had no charm for us.

There were Pintoes among them, too--spotted men from the tangled forests of Acapulco--pied and speckled with blotches of red, and black, and white, like hounds and horses. They were the first of this race I had ever seen, and their unnatural complexions, even at that fearful moment, impressed me with feelings of disgust and loathing.