Part 19 (1/2)

In truth, he had but little to tell, for his adventures had been of a very simple kind. Upon his arrival in the canoe at the water-gate he had been at once recognized and admitted, and had been carried directly to the building in which, on our first coming into the city, we all had been confined. And there he had been imprisoned until he was led up to the temple to take part in the triumph that El Sabio's violence so seriously had marred, and so once more was in our company. Of the Priest Captain he had seen nothing at all; nor had any answer come back to him from that dignitary to his urgent plea that, inasmuch as he had thus surrendered himself, his companions--that is, ourselves--should be suffered to leave the valley in peace; which silence on the part of the Priest Captain was not surprising, however, in view of the brave defiance in words sent by the Tlahuicos, who afterwards were such cowards in deeds.

In fact, during the brief time of his imprisonment Fray Antonio had not spoken to a soul save the man who brought him drink and food. Yet his talk with this man, scant though it had been, had filled him with the hope that, could he only hold free converse with the people at large, even as he had done at Huitzilan, the purpose that he had in mind in coming into the valley would be fulfilled. Although a priest of the temple, his jailer had listened with a most earnest and hearty attention to the expounding of Christian doctrine that was opened to him, and had shown a very cheering willingness to recognize the shortcomings of his own idolatrous belief as compared with the principles of this purer and n.o.bler faith. And he had told Fray Antonio that many of his companions in the service of the temple, having heard somewhat of the new creed from those who had tome up from Huitzilan, were eager to know more concerning it; so that it would seem, Fray Antonio declared, as though there were a harvest there ready to be reaped to Christianity by his hand. The case was such, he thought, that could he but speak publicly to the mult.i.tude, and especially could there but be vouchsafed from Heaven some sign by which the verity of his words might be established, he yet would win to the glorious Christian faith this whole community, that, through no fault of its own, until that time had remained lost in heathen sin.

Rayburn and I exchanged glances as Fray Antonio spoke of aid being given him in his work by a sign from Heaven, for to our notions the time of miracles was a long while past. But Fray Antonio, as we knew (for once or twice we three had spoken together of this matter), did not at all hold with us in believing that miracle-working had come to an end; and indeed his faith was entirely logical; for, as he himself put it, those who believed that miracles ever had been wrought for the advancement of Christianity could not reasonably draw a line at any year since the Christian Church was founded, and say that in that year miracles ceased to be. In this matter, as in many others, the resemblance between Fray Antonio and the founder of his Order, Saint Francis of a.s.sisi, was very strong.

Pablo's experience as a prisoner had been of a far more trying sort; for the priests had sought earnestly, he said, by most stringent means, to pervert him from Christianity to their own faith. When we had been so rudely separated that day, after our interview with the Priest Captain, he, and El Sabio with him, had been hurried up the stairs to the temple, and thence to the Treasure-house; and there, though not in the part of it in which we then were, he had been ever since confined. Strong measures certainly had been taken to make a heathen of him. He had been starved for a while, and he had been deprived of water, and he had been cruelly scourged, and very harrowing presentments had been made to him of the death that he must die should he much longer refuse to yield.

That the lad had remained firm in his faith, he told us, sobbing a little at memory of his hards.h.i.+ps, was because of the sorrow that he knew his yielding would bring upon Fray Antonio and upon me; which certainly was not the reason that Fray Antonio most would have approved, but it did not in the least detract from the steady courage that he had shown in holding out firmly under pressure that would have made many a man succ.u.mb. In all the time that so many cruelties had been practised upon him, only one man had shown him kindness--an old man, who seemed to be in charge of the archives that the Treasure-house contained, who twice had risked his own life by secretly giving him water and food. But he never had been separated from El Sabio, Pablo said joyfully, in conclusion, nor had his mouth-organ been taken away from him; and these blessings had done much to lessen the misery that he was compelled to bear.

When, in our turn, Rayburn and Young and I had told of the far more stirring adventures that we had pa.s.sed through, and of our high hopes seemingly so well founded that had suffered so dismal a downfall, we all of us wisely refrained from speculating at all upon the future; instead of which profitless and painful topic we strove to speak cheerfully of indifferent matters; and this we did not only that we might the better keep our hearts up, but that we might not excite Rayburn, who already was in a dangerously feverish condition by reason of his wound. But, though we spoke not of it, we none of us doubted what our fate would be; nor did we imagine that the death that surely awaited us would be long delayed.

It was a source of wonder to us, therefore, that day after day went by without bringing the end that we so confidently expected. From the man who brought us our food we could learn nothing; but this was not from ill-will on his part, but because he himself knew nothing of the Priest Captain's plans. This man, though a priest, was not unkindly disposed towards us, and he even listened to the words which Fray Antonio addressed to him touching Christian doctrine; but while he listened--being made of a sterner stuff than the priest who previously had been Fray Antonio's jailer--he gave no sign of a.s.sent. The only other person whom we had a chance to speak with, and this but rarely, was the old man who had shown kindness to Pablo, the guardian of the archives--who, by right of his official position, had free access to that portion of the Treasure-house from which the second grating cut us off. At the grating he and I had some very interesting conversations together upon archaeological matters; but Fray Antonio took but little interest in him when he found how slight was the impression made upon him by the most serious of doctrinal talk. In truth, this old fellow--wherefore my own heart warmed to him--was wholly given to the study of antiquities; and so full was his mind of this delightful subject that there was no room left in it for thoughts about religions of any sort. He was entirely catholic in this matter, for his unconcern respecting Christianity was neither more marked nor less marked than was his unconcern toward his own avowed faith.

Many curious things this old man told me touching the history of his people; and he showed me, also, the manner in which their annals were kept--an obvious evolution from the picture-writing of the Aztecs that had advanced to a stage closely resembling the cross between ideaographs and an alphabet that the Coreans use--all of which I have dealt with exhaustively in my larger work. And he told me also, with a wonder that did not seem uncalled for, that several times in each year the Priest Captain retired to the very place in which we then were imprisoned, and remained there sometimes for as much as a whole month cut off from his people, without food or drink, while he communed with the G.o.ds.

But what seemed strange to me, and also bitterly disheartening, was that this old man, notwithstanding the office that he held and his hungry love for ancient things, could tell me nothing of the treasure that King Chaltzantzin had stored away. He knew of this treasure, he said, only as a vague tradition; and although, at one time or another, he had explored every chamber in the Treasure-house, he never had found of this ancient deposit the smallest trace; for which excellent reason he had concluded that if ever there had been such a treasure it long since had been dispersed. No doubt--considering how useless to me, beyond the mere gratification of my own curiosity, would have been its discovery--my regret at this abrupt ending of my hopes was most unreasonable; but I confess that, so far as I myself was concerned, the very keenest pang of sorrow that I suffered through all that sorrowful time was when I thus learned that the archaeological search that I had entered upon so hopefully, and that I had so laboriously prosecuted, had been but a fool's errand from first to last.

x.x.xIV.

A MARTYRDOM.

Heavily and wearily the days dragged on as we lay in that dismal prison hewn from the mountain's heart; and as they slowly vanished there stole upon us a new sorrow, that was deeper and more searching than the doubting dread by which we were beset touching the cruel ending of our lives.

Rayburn's wound--a very savage cut in the thigh, made by the jagged edge of a maccahuitl--from the first had been a dangerous one; and the danger had been aggravated by inflammation that had followed that long, hot journey across the lake, and by the rough handling that his bearers had given him, and by the excitement that had attended El Sabio's fiery outburst beside the sacrificial stone. Even Fray Antonio's skill in surgery, without which he a.s.suredly would have quickly died, only barely sufficed to keep him alive while the fever was upon him; and when at last the fever left him, the little strength remaining to him grew less with every pa.s.sing day. It was pathetic to see this man, who until then had been the very embodiment of rugged vigor, so worn with suffering that without Fray Antonio's tender a.s.sistance he scarce could move; and still more pathetic was it to hear him moaning in his pain, and uttering heart-sick longings for sunlight and fresh air, for need of which, Fray Antonio affirmed, he was dying there quite as much as because of his wound. Indeed, the chill chamber in the rock where he was lying was no fit place even for a well man at that time to dwell in; for the season of rains had come, and all the nights were cold and damp, while through the afternoons and in the night-time, during which portions of the day the rain fell in torrents, the whole mountain was shaken by the tremendous peals of thunder which roared and crashed about its crest.

It was after one of poor Rayburn's pitiable outbreaks of weak moaning that Young led me away into the oratory, with the evident intention of delivering himself of some matter that pressed heavily upon his mind.

”See here, Professor, I just _can't_ stand this any longer,” he said, when we were alone. ”I'm goin' t' send word t' th' Priest Captain t'

ask him if finis.h.i.+n' me off in short order won't make him willin' t' let Rayburn out o' this damp hole into some place where he can be comfortable, an' where in th' mornin's he can get some sun an' air.

Rayburn won't mind bein' squarely killed after he's healthy again. He ain't th' kind t' be afraid of anything when he's feelin' all right. But it's just infernal cruelty t' kill him this way--it wouldn't be fair to a dog. So I'm goin' t' try what I can do. It's nothin' much t' do, any way--only runnin' a little ahead o' th' schedule, that's all.”

Oddly enough, something of a like purpose had been for some time past slowly forming in my own mind--though what I intended to do would have, I hoped, still better consequences; for my notion was to urge that for the pleasure that could be had from killing me, my companions should be given such freedom as was to be found in that rock-bound region beyond the Barred Pa.s.s. Therefore, when Young thus brought up the matter openly between us, I told him of my own intention; and with some emphasis I advised him that inasmuch as I first had thought of it, to me belonged the right to carry this project into execution; and especially was this right mine, I urged, because but for me neither he nor any of the rest of us--saving only, possibly, Fray Antonio--ever would have come into that valley at all. Thereupon we fell to wrangling somewhat hotly; for Young was a most pig-headed man when his mind was set upon anything, and his notions of argument even at the best of times were of the loosest kind.

How our talk might have ended I cannot tell, for each of us most resolutely was determined to have his own way; but it actually did end because of an interruption by which we presently learned that a will finer and stronger than either of ours had been acting, while we had been only thinking, in a fas.h.i.+on that cut the ground completely from under us both. And all that followed within the next hour or two came upon us with so startling a suddenness that it seemed less like reality than like a terrible dream.

The first intimation that we had that anything was upon us out of the common run of our drearily dull prison life was hearing a creaking noise that we knew must be caused by the raising of the grating that shut us in; and as we hurried out from the oratory into the long pa.s.sage-way we saw a company of soldiers coming towards us, at the head of which was a priest. Fray Antonio and Pablo, startled as we had been by the sound caused by the opening of the grating and the tramp of feet, also had come out into the pa.s.sage; but while Pablo evidently was wondering, even as we were wondering, what might be the purpose that these men had come to execute, the look upon the monk's face was of expectation rather than of surprise. And without waiting for the others to speak, he asked, eagerly: ”Is it to be?”

”It is to be,” the priest answered; and it seemed to me that there was sorrow in the look that went with his words, and sorrow also in the tone of his voice; and that this man truly was sorrowful because of the message that he brought I doubt not, for he was the priest who had been jailer to Fray Antonio, and whose mind had seemed so open to receive the doctrine that Fray Antonio taught.

But there was only joy in the bearing of the monk as his question thus was answered; and there was a ringing gladness in his voice as he replied--being most careful first to draw us away from the room in which Rayburn was lying--to our looks of wondering inquiry. ”The Priest Captain has granted my request,” he said, and added quickly: ”Do not sorrow for me, my friends. Dying for the Faith is the most glorious ending that life can have; and happier still is he to whom, with this rare privilege, is given also that of dying that those whom he loves may yet be saved alive. The Priest Captain has promised that when I have paid this little debt of life you whom I love so greatly shall go free--”

”Don't you believe him! He's a blasted liar from the word go!” Young struck in, clean forgetting, in the pa.s.sionate sorrow that was rising in his breast, that what Fray Antonio so plainly had in mind to do he himself had been most strongly bent upon doing but a moment before. But Young spoke in English, and without heeding him Fray Antonio went on: ”You two, and the boy, surely will live; and perhaps life may be given also to our friend. He is in G.o.d's hands. And then, until----”

But further speech was not permitted to him. Two soldiers stepped forward and grasped his arms, yet first suffering him for a moment to clasp hands with us, and so led him towards the open grating; and behind him Young and I and Pablo were conducted in a like fas.h.i.+on by the guards. As we pa.s.sed the room in which Rayburn lay we heard him moaning faintly; and so weak was he that it seemed to me a very likely thing for us to find him dead there upon our return--if, indeed, we ever returned at all.

As we pa.s.sed out into the inner court of the temple, where the sum shone joyously--for the day still was young, and the rain-clouds had but begun to gather about the mountain peaks--we heard a murmur in the air like the distant sound of bees buzzing; and as we entered the rear portal of the temple this sound grew louder, yet still was soft and blurred. In the temple, Fray Antonio was separated from us, being led towards the inner entrance of that subterranean pa.s.sage which opened into the pit of the amphitheatre; and as we went onward to the great portal in the temple's front we cast towards him sorrowful looks, in which all the bitter pain that was in our hearts was concentrated, but had in answer from him, as he walked with elate bearing between his guards, only looks of most joyful hope in which was also a very tender love.