Part 35 (1/2)
”Let not one of them escape! Slay them as Israel slew Amalek!” cried Yeo, as he bent over; and ere the wretches could reach a place of shelter, an arroas quivering in each body, as it rolled lifeless down the rocks
”Now then! Loose the Indians!”
They found armorers tools on one of the dead bodies, and it was done
”We are your friends,” said Aold down to the Magdalena, and then you are free”
Sorovelled at his knees, and kissed his feet, hailing him as the child of the Sun: but the most part kept a stolid indifference, and when freed fro into vacancy The iron had entered too deeply into their soul They see
But the young girl, as last of all in the line, as soon as she was loosed, sprang to her father's body, speaking no word, lifted it in her thin arms, laid it across her knees, kissed the fallen lips, stroked the furrowed cheeks,of a woodland dove, of which none knew thesince fled Suddenly the truth flashed on her; silent as ever, she drew one long heaving breath, and rose erect, the body in her arms
Another moment, and she had leaped into the abyss
They watched her dark and slender limbs, twined closely round the old man's corpse, turn over, and over, and over, till a crash a the birds, told that she had reached the trees; and the green roof hid her from their view
”Brave lass!” shouted a sailor
”The Lord forgive her!” said Yeo ”But, your worshi+p, we must have these rascals' ordnance”
”And their clothes too, Yeo, if ish to get down the Magdalena unchallenged Now listen, h to serve us the rest of our lives, and that without losing a single ood But oh, my friends, reift our ruin, by faithlessness, or greediness, or any mutinous haste”
”You shall find none in us!” cried several eneral”
”Thank God!” said Amyas ”Now then, it will be no sha the women, whoh the very heart of the Spanish settlements, and by the town of Saint Martha itself So the clothes and weapons of these Spaniards we must have, let it cost us what labor it may How many lie in the road?”
”Thirteen here, and about ten up above,” said Cary
”Then there are near twentyup the spoil of them?”
”I, and I, and I;” and a dozen stepped out, as they did alhen A done; for the si of it himself
”Very well, then, follow me Sir John, take the Indian lad for your interpreter, and try and comfort the souls of these poor heathens Tell them that they shall all be free”
”Why, who is that comes up the road?”
All eyes were turned in the direction of which he spoke And, wonder of wonders! up caun in hand, bow on back, and bedecked in all her feather garht's woodland travel
All stoodAmyas, she uttered a cry of joy, quickened her pace into a run, and at last fell panting and exhausted at his feet
”I have found you!” she said; ”you ran away from me, but you could not escapewho has found his master, and then sat down on the bank, and burst into wild sobs
”God help us!” said A his hair, as he looked down upon the beautiful weeper ”What am I to do with her, over and above all these poor heathens?”
But there was no tiirl, seeing that the lish remained, sat down on a point of rock to watch him
After half-an-hour's hard work, the weapons, clothes, and armor of the fallen Spaniards were hauled up the cliff, and distributed in bundles a the men; the rest of the corpses were thrown over the precipice, and they started again upon their road toward the Magdalena, while Yeo snorted like a war-horse who s powder and ball
”We can face the world now, sir! Why not go back and try Santa Fe, after all?”
But Aood as a feast, and they held on doards, while the slaves folloithout a sign of gratitude, butnow and then by a sign or a grunt, their surprise at not being beaten, or ht of the little calabashes of coca which the English carried That woke the abjectly (and not in vain) for a taste of that miraculous herb, which would not only s to endure that keen mountain air, but would rid the foe, the ht
As the cavalcade turned the corner of the mountain, they paused for one last look at the scene of that fearful triu out of infinite space, as if created suddenly for the occasion A few hours and there would be no trace of that fierce fray, but a fehite bones amid untrodden beds of flowers
And now Ae appearance He wished her anywhere but where she was: but now that she was here, what heart could be so hard as not to take pity on the poor wild thing? And Amyas as he spoke to her had, perhaps, a tenderness in his tone, fro her, which he had never used before Passionately she told hiht, and had every eveningher, and either waiting for her, or co back to see what caused the noise
A which had followed them
”Noises? What did you er with an air of most self-satisfied mystery, and then drew cautiously from under her feather cloak an object at which Amyas had hard work to keep his countenance
”Look!” whispered she, as if half afraid that the thing itself should hear her ”I have it--the holy trumpet!”
There it was verily, that mysterious bone of contention; a handsolazed, and painted with quaint grecques and figures of animals; a relic evidently of some civilization now extinct
Brimblecombe rubbed his little fat hands ”Brave maid! you have cheated Satan this time,” quoth he; while Yeo advised that the ”idolatrous relic” should be forthwith ”hove over cliff”
”Let be,” said A of this, Ayacanora? And why have you followed us?”
She told a long story, from which Amyas picked up, as far as he could understand her, that that tru in the tribe superior to her; the one thing which she was not allowed to see, because, forsooth, she was a woood as a e, and her Amazonian exploits But still the Piache would not show her that tru to seek it, even she feared the superstitious wrath of the tribe at such a profanation But the day after the English went, the Piache chose to express his joy at their departure; whereon, as was to be expected, a fresh explosion betweenthe old rogue's hut over his head, fro-tackle, and fled raging into the woods, vowing that he would carry off the tru tribe Whereon, by a sudden i lady took plenty of coca, her weapons, and her feathers, started on his trail, and ran hi the precious ht (she confessed) she was horribly afraid, and half inclined to run; but, gathering courage froh at the whole matter, she rushed upon the hapless conjuror, and bore off her prize in triumph; and there it was!
”I hope you have not killed hiht you would not let me kill him”
Amyas was half amused with her confession of his authority over her; but she went on-- ”And then I dare not go back to the Indians; so I was forced to come after you”
”And is that, then, your only reason for co after us?” asked stupid Ah what it was he was too busy to inquire The girl drew herself up proudly, blushi+ng scarlet, and said: ”You never tell lies Do you think that I would tell lies?”
On which she fell to the rear, and followed the to no one, but evidently determined to follow thehroad; and for several days held on doards, hewing their path slowly and painfully through the thick underwood On the evening of the fourth day, they had reached the in of a river, at a point where it seeation For those three days they had not seen a trace of huh for the of their canoes They began to spread the the stream, in search of the soft-wooded trees proper for their purpose; but hardly had their search begun, when, in the ht which filled them with astonishment Beneath a honeycombed cliff, which supported one enormous cotton-tree, was a spot of so down to the streanificent banana-plants, full twelve feet high, and bearing a fruit; while, under theirluxuriantly, the whole being surrounded by a hedge of orange and scarlet flowers There it lay, streaked with long shadows fro sun, while a cool southern air rustled in the cotton-tree, and flapped to and fro the great banana-leaves; a tiny paradise of art and care But where was its inhabitant?
Aroused by the noise of their approach, a figure issued fro at thearden towards them He was a tall and stately old man, whose snohite beard and hair covered his chest and shoulders, while his lower limbs rapt in Indian-web Slowly and sole of beads in the other, the living likeness of soend He bowed courteously to Amyas (who of course returned his salute), and was in act to speak, when his eye fell upon the Indians, ere laying down their burdens in a heap under the trees His mild countenance assumed instantly an expression of the acutest sorrow and displeasure; and, striking his hands together, he spoke in Spanish: ”Alas! miserable me! Alas! unhappy senors! Do my old eyes deceive me, and is it one of those evil visions of the past which haunt old, the ruin of my race, penetrated even into this my solitude? Oh, senors, senors, know you not that you bear with you your own poison, your own fah for you, senors, to load yourselves with the wedge of Achan, and partake his doom, but you reed and cruelty, and forestall for them on earth those torments which may await their unbaptized souls hereafter?”
”We have preserved, and not enslaved these Indians, ancient senor,” said Amyas, proudly; ”and to-morroill see them as free as the birds over our heads”
”Free? Then you cannot be countrymen of mine! But pardon an old man, my son, if he has spoken too hastily in the bitterness of his own experience But who and whence are you? And why are you bringing into this lonely wilderness that gold--for I know too well the shape of those accursed packets, which would God that I had never seen!”