Part 12

Cristoval put his mouth to the crack of the door. "It is I--the Viracocha Cristoval. I would say a word to Nuyalla. Be quick! It is important."

"Stars of heaven!" he heard her exclaim. "The Viracocha Cristoval! Nuyalla, Nuyalla! He would speak with thee."

A moment, then the door was unfastened and opened a finger's breadth. "I am Nuyalla," said a low voice, trembling. "What would you, Viracocha Cristoval?"

"Lead me to the Nusta Rava. Quickly! Quickly! Hear'st thou?"

"But, Viracocha--I will ask her."

"Then haste, Nuyalla! There is danger."

The door was closed, and he heard it barred. It seemed hours before it was reopened, and he chafed and swore to himself in the darkness. At last Nuyalla peered out with a lamp above her head. Cristoval had forgotten the removal of his beard, and stepped forward that he might be recognized. At the first glimpse the girl recoiled, and Cristoval saw that she did not know him. She made a frantic effort to close the door, calling to the others to assist.

"Oh, _Madre_!" groaned Cristoval, in desperation as he remembered his disguise. He threw his weight against the door, forced it open, and stepped inside, closing it behind him. The movement was greeted by a scream from the frightened maids.

"Silence!" he commanded, sternly. "I am Cristoval, I tell you. Lead me to your mistress. There is danger, and no moment to lose. Where is the Nusta Rava?"

His only answer was a chorus of shrieks from the women, who had stampeded into a corner. Nuyalla had dropped her lamp, leaving the room in complete darkness, and adding to the panic. Their cries would inevitably bring the guard, as Cristoval knew. He was stupefied as he realized the danger of the situation and felt his own impotence to cope with it; but at the crisis a door was suddenly flung open, and he beheld, to his unspeakable relief, the Princess, a lamp in hand, and pallid to her lips.

Cristoval sank upon his knee, removing his sombrero and speaking with bowed head in the hope that his voice might be recognized before she should behold his altered appearance.

"Will the Nusta Rava forgive a rough intrusion--and in the name of Heaven, still these women before the guard is roused?"

She raised her hand for silence to the maids who had already crowded about her, then turned to him with imperious dark eyes demanding explanation.

"I have come to offer my aid, Nusta Rava," said the cavalier.

She found voice with an effort, beginning thrice before she was able to steady it sufficiently to say, somewhat at random, in her perturbation, "They told me you were a prisoner, Viracocha Cristoval."

"I was a prisoner an hour ago. I have broken my bonds."

He looked up, and she started, scrutinizing his face with anxiety. But she recovered quickly, and he arose. After this no ceremony, and he went on, speaking directly and as rapidly as his knowledge of the Quichua would allow:--

"I am a fugitive, Nusta Rava. My aid may avail you little, but I know your danger. There is a hope to escape it. Once clear of this unhappy town you will be among your own people. Are you ready to flee? Will you trust me? You must say quickly, for seconds are worth hours, and we must lose not one."

She made no reply, but stood regarding him intently, her clenched hand pressed to her heart. He saw that she was violently trembling, and said quietly: "Before the dawn we can be well away. It is not yet midnight, but we must hasten."

"Oh, Viracocha Cristoval!" she murmured, looking at him piteously, struggling in agony between fear and hope. Should she trust him? Could she trust one of these terrible strangers? Were they not all beasts of prey? Yet this one seemed to have a human heart, and had been her brother's friend. She sought the depths of his soul through his eyes. Their expression was intensely earnest, but frank and solicitous, and they met her own with un-reserve and quiet steadiness. Still--like the others he was a Viracocha.

Cristoval read her thoughts. "Nusta Rava," he said gently, "I promised to your brother that with the aid of Heaven I would guard you from harm. I am ready to do so at the cost of life. But we are wasting precious moments--"

He paused abruptly. The faint, quick notes of a trumpet were sounding in the distance.

"What is that?" whispered the Nusta, turning her head.

"The alarm," replied Cristoval, quietly. "My flight is discovered." He strode forward, and taking her by the hand, turned her toward her door. "Go! Robe yourself warmly--and make haste!"

He urged her gently forward, but she turned, crying in anguish: "Fly, oh, fly, while there is yet time! You have risked your life in coming hither. Go! Save yourself!"

Cristoval turned to Nuyalla with authority: "Quick! Her cloak!"

It was brought in a second, and he threw it over Rava's shoulders. The maids were kneeling about her, weeping, clasping her knees, frantically pressing her hands, their lamentations threatening to rise again to the danger point. She stood like a statue, seeing none of them nor hearing their words.

"Come!" said Cristoval. "We have yet time."

She cast a glance at his masterful, serious face, extended her hands impulsively to her women, then tore herself from their embraces with a sob, and followed him to the door. The cavalier turned.

"If you value the life of your Princess, see that you be silent. Make fast behind us, and open to no one before the morning." He stepped out into the darkness, followed by his ward.

He led rapidly across the patio, sword in hand. They felt their way through the blackness of the corridor, and halted at its entrance upon the outer court while Cristoval listened. There was a confusion of men's voices in the guard-room, but the great court was vacant, and save for the drip and patter of the rain, was silent.

Cristoval took her hand, and they hurried toward the garden. Here he drew her from the walk into the shrubbery, picking his way under the low branches of the trees, which showered them with icy drops at every step. They were a few paces from the postern when the heavy report of one of the falconets on the redoubt stopped them with a shock, and startled a faint scream from the girl. The alarm gun! Rava pressed the folds of her cloak over her lips, and Cristoval shook her hand warningly, then hastened on in silence.

They reached the postern, and with the utmost caution he set it ajar and looked out. From the direction of the square came the tread of the sentinel, moving away. Cristoval turned to Rava. "Now, we go. Courage!" he whispered, and led her faltering into the street.

Sounds came from the square; lights were flitting, horsemen galloping. They hurried across to the nearest corner, turned into the side-street, then again to the right in the direction of the suburbs.

"Can you run?" he whispered. "Then we must do so." At every corner he halted, listening. The town was up. Several parties passed on nearby streets, hurrying toward the outskirts. "They will guard the ways," muttered Cristoval. "_Bien_! We shall see!" A door opened--but behind them--and a belated soldier hastened toward the square, buckling as he ran, while the two stood against a wall until he was well away. They pressed on.

At a corner they almost ran upon a squad of soldiers just entering the street they were following. But the party was going toward the suburbs, and the fugitives shrank back into the shadow unobserved, starting on again warily when the footfalls had died away. Soon the houses grew meaner, with vacant spaces between, fences of rough wicker enclosing gardens, and here and there a quinuar tree. They were in the purlieus of the town, and presently turned into a lane which wound among the scattered cottages and led off somewhat to the right, less directly toward the fields. Here they left the pavement and travelled with greater difficulty, splashing into puddles and occasionally stumbling into a fence or wall at a turn in the way, but evidently getting into a more and more thinly peopled quarter. It was an obscure thoroughfare, and as Cristoval surmised, not so likely to be guarded, so they went with less caution. Suddenly his feet struck a pavement, and he knew they were on another street.

"Halt!"

The command burst fiercely through the gloom, from what direction the startled cavalier could not tell, and he dashed forward, dragging the Nusta, vainly hoping to evade the challenger.

"Halt!" was shouted again, more sharply, this time almost in his face, and he staggered back from a terrific thrust of a pike full in the chest. Rava's shriek answered the rough summons, and Cristoval lost her hand. The soldier sprang forward, thrust again, and missed. Down the street toward the town was a shout, the quick, confused uproar of the hoofs of horses suddenly spurred, then the rhythm of the gallop. The soldier lunged wildly in the darkness, and now Cristoval's blade engaged his pike. It was over in a second. The fellow thrust a few times with ferocity, instantly aware of dangerous skill in front of him, ceased abruptly, and went down with a choking cry. Cristoval whirled away from him.

"Rava!" he shouted.

An answer came faintly from the roadside, and striding in the direction of her voice, Cristoval found her leaning, half swooning, against the wall. "Quick!" he cried, seizing her hand. "We must run. For your life, run!"

The fierce energy of his tone gave her vigor. Behind was the clamor of horsemen, and fear winged her feet. Cristoval's strength seemed to lift her from the ground, and as she sped beside him, seeing nothing, barely touching the earth, and blindly confident of his guidance, there were a few brief minutes of exhilaration.

They ran until Cristoval heard the horses reined up at the wounded soldier, then he turned to the right of the road. Here was a low wall, surmounted in a moment, and the cavalry roared past outside.

They found themselves surrounded by shrubbery and trees which rendered the night more inky black than it had been in the streets. A few paces, however, brought them to an open of some extent, and beyond rose another shadowy mass of foliage. They were in the garden of one of the numerous villas by which the town was surrounded, and they crossed the sward at a run. A few yards farther, and they came to the villa, quite deserted and dark. They passed it close and saw the doors were down. Cristoval remembered that it had been plundered months ago by the soldiery. The place served to give him his bearings, and he knew they were not far from the fields. As they stumbled through the garden in the rear they heard shouts and the gallop of the horsemen returning. They had lost the scent.

A few hundred yards brought them to the rear wall of the garden. They were as quickly over as at the other, and in the open. Now they paused a moment to listen, but save for the wind and rain the night was silent. There was no sign of pursuit, though once they heard a shout and answer, far in the rear, probably on the road where they had encountered the sentinel.

They pushed on. Vacant, sodden fields were all about, very low and level, as if the land had once been the bed of an ancient lake. This was the ground swept by the enclosing lines of the Inca's army on the day of the massacre.

*CHAPTER XVI*

_*Pedro in the Thumbscrews*_

Cristoval's escape was promptly uncovered in this wise. After he had staggered away, the guard found the sentinel in a corner, comfortably asleep with Pedro's bottle. Half an hour's work and several bucketfuls of water brought him on his feet and aware of his transgression, impressed upon him by the sergeant by a vigorous train of invective. He was taken to the guard-room and put in irons.

When Zapato returned the sergeant reported a man drunk, and the need for a substitute. He promptly received his quota of invective for having a man drunk, and Zapato went to his office to meditate upon the circumstance of having a sergeant who had a man drunk on guard, and on the raking-over which he in turn would receive. He had settled himself to reflect upon the hardships and chagrins in the life of a soldier, when he was assailed by a thought. He threw open the door, and demanded:--

"Sergeant, where was this man when he became drunk?"

"On his post, _Senor Teniente_."

"What post?"

"In front of Peralta's door."

Zapato paled, seized a lantern, and rushed across the patio to Cristoval's door, followed by the sergeant. Two or three of the guard rose and sauntered after. Zapato entered the hastily opened door, raising his lantern and glancing about. He muttered his relief. On the bench lay a form, apparently sleeping. Pedro moved slightly, clinking the manacles, and Zapato was satisfied. He turned to go; was at the door when a fresh doubt seized him, and he went back. Pedro lay quite still, face to the wall; but Zapato espied his pinioned hands. He looked closer, swinging the light upon the face, and raised a howl of rage and consternation.

"Furies! This is not Peralta! It's Pedro! Look, Sergeant--look, thou idiot! Oh, thou doubly, triply accursed model of witlings! Thou unspeakable effigy of imbecility! It's Pedro, dost hear? Pedro! Oh, saints and devils, we're skinned alive already!"

He rolled the cook over while the sergeant stood silently making crosses. Others hurried in and gathered round the cook, who snored, bulky and peaceful. They hauled him off the bench, every man shouting, but Pedro slept calmly on, gurgling gently when some one prodded his ribs, but giving no other sign of consciousness. There was his stump of a leg, its peg gone, vanished, evaporated. But Peralta--alas, no Peralta!

"Ho, the trumpeter!--the alarm!" roared Zapato, collaring the sergeant and running him to the door. The sergeant disappeared, and in a moment the call sounded which Cristoval had heard in the Nusta's apartment. Its first notes were ragged and discordant, telling the musician's disorder of mind. Then it rose clear and stirring, startling many a Spaniard out of dreams. A soldier scurried across the plaza to the redoubt, carrying a lighted gunner's match, and presently the flash and bang of the falconet split the mist. Now individuals and groups came running to the square, some half-dressed, others buckling and buttoning, all pale, tousled, and breathless.

Pizarro was one of the first out of doors. A messenger stammered the news, and withered in the general's blast of fury. Commands followed quickly. Guards to every exit from the town. Patrols for every street. Cavalry for the suburbs and roads. A thousand _castellanos_ reward for the recapture. Squads formed and went flying down dark streets, halting every moving man and woman. Soon, horsemen in twos, fours, and half-dozens left the square at the gallop in all directions. Groups of natives gathered, silent and wondering, their impassive faces dimly seen in the light of passing lanterns. Caxamalca had no more sleep--unless Pedro's. He apparently slept on, untroubled, under the eyes of one of the guard who swore ever afterward that he had seen him disembodied on that gusty Peruvian night.

Toward the eighth hour of the morning Pizarro, accompanied by his secretary, with Almagro, Riquelme, Rogelio, and Father Valverde, entered the prison. Pedro heard the clatter of thumbscrews as they were set upon the floor by the squad of halberdiers who followed. The cook was sitting with bowed head, absorbed in misery. He glanced up as the party came in, saw that De Soto was not with it, and his heart sank. The captain had been ordered out with the rest in search of the fugitive. He had gone willingly enough, and had succeeded in tactfully reducing the chances of discovery by leading his men in what he guessed was the wrong direction. But at that moment he would have been a welcome sight to Pedro. The cook, however, gave no sign, but invoked the aid of the Virgin in consuming time until De Soto might return.

The court--for it was a court, duly organized and sworn, albeit summarily--first examined the apartment with minuteness and deliberation. The secretary recorded its findings. The fetters were inspected, and the conclusion was arrived at, agreed to, and set down, that they had been undone by a file or similar instrument. Thereupon the tribunal proceeded to interrogate those suspected of complicity. First came Pedro. After him would come the sentinel found drunk on post, the two artificers who had been at work on the fastenings of the door, and others. Thus far the process had been carried on with dignity and order. Now Rogelio, who, with Riquelme, was to conduct the examination, prepared to begin, swelling himself pompously, pursing his lips, puffing his cheeks, and rolling his eyes from one to another of the court, until Riquelme exclaimed impatiently: "_Infierno_! Commence, _Veedor_, before the morning is spent!"

Rogelio opened his mouth at him, then turned to Pedro. "Prisoner," he piped. Pedro made no sign of hearing him.

"Prisoner!" he repeated, and Pedro looked up, scowling.

"Ho! Art addressing me, _Veedor_? Then change my title. I am a cook. A cook, look thou! A cook bereft, plundered, despoiled, and ravished of a leg! Pray, hast seen it--my missing member?"

Rogelio hesitated, snuffled, and with dignity began again.

"Prisoner--"

"Cook, I tell thee!" Pedro interrupted, explosively. "Thy prisoner hath flown--flown with three legs, one a stolen, and that one mine--not my best, in truth, only my second best; but nevertheless most grievously wanted. Hast seen it, Veedor?"

Rogelio's mind was not alert. It could pursue a single line of thought with a sort of porcine tenacity, but the intrusion of a second idea produced derangement requiring time to readjust. His attention, now drawn to Pedro's lost peg and his uncanny-looking stump, was not readily disengaged. He stood surveying the cook's maimed member with fascination until in the slow revolution of his thoughts they should come back to their former connection. This achieved, he began again.

"Prisoner--"

"Cook!" shouted Pedro, jerking himself erect and glaring at the _veedor_. The latter stopped, and Pizarro interfered.

"Be done, Pedro!" he commanded, angrily. "Cease interruptions and allow the _veedor_ to proceed. Continue, _Veedor_."

"Prisoner!" squeaked the _veedor_.

"Cook!" roared Pedro, savagely.

"Oh, in the devil's name, let him have his way!" Almagro broke in. "Call him cook--anything--but begin, Rogelio!"

"Well--cook," said Rogelio, wiping his forehead, "thou art charged with having guilty knowledge of the means whereby the late prisoner, Cristoval de Peralta, hath effected his escape."

Pedro nodded gloomily. "So I have!" he assented. "'T is, alas, true! Unhappily I have such knowledge, _Veedor_. I know that he effected his escape on three legs, as I have said. May the third help him into hell! It was mine, I tell thee, and I want it back. What! Am I a centipede, thinkest thou, to go sloughing legs here and yon, all my days on earth? I've lost three, already--one of them mine inheritance of flesh and bone, the other twain hewn from good oak of Aragon. All gone! Stew me, I sicken of losing legs!"

The response produced a new tangle in Rogelio's thread, and before he had it straightened Riquelme growled and took up the questioning.

"Here, Pedro," he said sternly, "Peralta had a file wherewith he filed his fetters. Thou wast the only man save the guard and the artificers who had access to him. How came he by it?"

"Ah, a file had he!" returned Pedro, with irritation. "Well, curse it! let him have his file--or files, or rasps, or grindstones! May he chew them! But he filed not my leg off, I tell thee that, Senor Treasurer! He took it all--peg, socket, straps, and buckles. May it stick in his gullet! But look at me, thou who hast two good legs! Am I in a condition of mind or legs to sing to thee of files? Am I a newsmonger of files? A murrain on all files and filers! I want my leg!"

Riquelme grew red, and Almagro grinned maliciously; but Pizarro was angry. "Answer the question, thou eternal babbler!" he commanded. "How came Peralta by that file? Thou knowest, and we'll have it out of thee. Answer!"

Pedro turned from him. "Oh, a curse upon Peralta and his file! What care I who gave him his file? Have I not mine own peculiar grief? And is it not grief enough but that I must be assailed with scare-devil bellowings by madmen who have lost a file? A surceasance of it! Ye have talked enough to grow me another leg. Ye rasp my nerves with your bully-ragging about a file. I've lost a leg!"

Pizarro stamped with fury and ordered the screws. Almagro protested, and was ignored. The instrument was brought forward, and the general demanded: "Once more, cook, and finally--wilt give information?"

Pedro had braced himself for what he had known was inevitable, though he had hoped that delay might bring De Soto. No word escaped him. He took the torture, a hero, with hardly a groan. Thrice he fainted, and at the end of an atrocious hour, Almagro interfered.

"Faugh, Pizarro! Enough! Enough! For the sake of Heaven, give over! It groweth sickening. Pass him and take another. Curse me! he is entitled to be let go for his fortitude, whether he knoweth aught or naught! Put it to the drunken sentinel. He is the man to be squeezed, if any--and the two artificers. If thou canst narrow the matter down to this crackle-pated cook, then come back to him and rack him, or hang him if 't is worth thy while. But now, have done. Off with those screws, men! I'm a thief if I'll see more of it! Off with them!"

Pedro had fainted for the third time. The soldiers looked to Pizarro. He glanced surlily at his partner, whose single eye met his own with an expression which he had seen it wear before. It promised a quarrel. Father Valverde joined Almagro's protest. The _veedor_ alone yelped an objection, and it decided the question in Pedro's favor. Pizarro hesitated and said coldly:--

"_Bien_! So be it! Release him, soldiers. We can come to him again; and by the Eternal, do we find him guilty I'll draw-and-quarter him in the square! Take off the screws."

Within the hour the sentinel was haled before the court, followed by the two artificers and several of the guard. All swore willingly against Pedro,--too willingly, said Almagro, with vehemence; but for the cook the affair looked grave.

He was left in prison, horribly sick from the ordeal, but determined not to betray the man who had sent the file,--the rack, fire itself, could not have forced it from him.

De Soto returned late in the afternoon. Jose sought him while he was disarming, and shocked him with the news that Pedro had been tortured, and was in danger of worse. The captain had taken off his helmet, but he replaced it, buckled on his sword, and started toward the door. The old Morisco halted him with a hand upon his arm.

"Hold, Soto!" he said. "What dost intend?"

"To have Pedro released. I promised to protect him, and by my soul, I will do so! Pizarro hath gotten ahead of me, but he shall go no farther, or I'll--"

"Wait!" urged Jose, detaining him. "Be not rash, young man, or thou'lt draw suspicion upon thyself. Hear me! I will claim the blame if need be, and flee into the mountains. But first, do thou see Almagro. He did not favor the torture, and together you may be able to prevent by persuasion what thou canst easily precipitate by heat and defiance. If you fail, then accuse me, who sent the file."

"No sooner thee than myself, who am equally involved, Jose!" responded De Soto, stoutly. "I'll make no accusation."

"Then see Almagro, and keep me informed."