Part 29

"Come, Cristoval! Up and helm. The thing's a-ready to simmer. Stir, man! Thou hast piped, bassooned, and hautboyed until the night hath shuddered and my mule hath wept. Stew me! Cristoval, had I a sleeping-voice like thine I'd gag myself with a saddle-bag, or wear a coffin for a night-robe. Wake up, thou scorched hurdy-gurdy! 'T is the prime hour of chilly misery and the last watch of ghosts and goblins. Ah, curse it! I would I were a barber, and no cook. See what it hath led to, this culinary art! _Hola_! Art awake at last? Well, here is a bite I've spread for thee. Eat, and ballast thy treason, since thou 'rt on treason bent, whilst I look to our saddles."

He went out into the darkness where Ocallo and Markumi waited with their steeds, while Cristoval, now alive, attacked a cold luncheon laid by his thoughtful comrade. He finished hurriedly, and left the tent.

The two Spaniards were quickly in saddle, and with Ocallo and Markumi following, crossed the camp toward the Antisuyu road. This highway, connecting the capital with the eastern provinces, becomes the street in which Cristoval and the Antis encountered the patrol on the first night of the fire. A few minutes' ride brought them to the road, now occupied by a waiting column. Turning toward the city, they were presently in its outskirts. Here they found Mocho with his staff, and dismounting to join them, Cristoval felt his arm touched. He glanced round and beheld a tall figure, clad and armed like the Antis, but wearing a turban.

"Abul Hassan!" exclaimed the cavalier, extending his hand. "I am rejoiced to see thee, old friend. Dost take part with us? I would thou hadst a horse and thine accoutrements."

"With the help of Allah I shall have both before the sun setteth again," replied the Morisco, calmly. He motioned toward a group of twenty or more men with lassos standing near. "Thy herdsmen, Cristoval. I have heard of thine expedient--a most excellent one!"

"I pray it will prove so," said the other, "and that we soon shall see thee mounted. When equipped, seek us. We'll find thee occupation."

The Morisco nodded grimly, and Cristoval and Pedro passed on to Mocho. In front were men at work in the darkness, and the general gave his hand, saying, "The task is well advanced, Viracocha Cristoval. Let us move forward."

He led the way into the street, which had been made, in pursuance of Cristoval's instructions, a confusion, of half-burned timbers, pieces of furniture which had escaped the fire, and all manner of _debris_. Heaped, lashed together, and interlaced, they formed an entanglement difficult for men on foot, and for cavalry barely surmountable. The adobe walls on each side had been pierced with loopholes for the archers, and the side-streets barricaded against flanking.

The party picked their way slowly, climbing over here, bending to pass under there, while Cristoval inspected, commended, or advised, until they had penetrated far into the suburb, where the workmen were still toiling. Until near dawn they directed the Antis pouring silently into the suburb and occupying the ruined buildings along the obstructed way. Cristoval saw the men with lassos properly placed, and the party returned to the outskirts.

A few minutes later, a company of warriors made its way through the entanglement into the city, going forward to draw a Spanish attack.

Cristoval and Pedro stood near the group around Mocho. The sky was light when far in the distant streets they heard the war-cry of the Antis. Immediately followed the hoarse shouts of the Spaniards, shots, and trumpets calling to arms. The sounds were faintly borne on the morning breeze, but full of portent, and echoed in many a warlike heart among the ruins of the suburbs. Mocho moved forward, giving Cristoval a wave of the hand as he passed, and a rustling and shuffling rose in the road back of where the two Spaniards stood as the waiting warriors took their places in column.

As Cristoval mounted, he heard a grunt and a sigh from Pedro, then the creaking of the saddle as the cook swung from the ground, and the two picked their way slowly down the littered street. Arquebuses were crackling, and now, the heavier and sharper report of a falconet. The firing ceased, and arose the nearing din of cavalry. The decoying party of Antis was flying before it in a dash for the fatal entanglement upon which the Spaniards were blindly rushing. The Antis reached it; were dimly seen by Cristoval as they leaped into the _debris_; then came the crash of breaking timbers when the pursuing troop struck the obstruction, a confusion of yells and Spanish shouts of warning, drowned by the war-cries of the tribesmen behind the walls as they delivered their terrible volley. A wild, tossing disarray of horses and riders, plunging and falling among the snapping beams, ridden over by the resistless torrent from behind. Men and animals down and struggling in the wreckage, crushed beneath those borne onward by the momentum of the charge, and assailed by the hordes of Antis rushing from the buildings. Riderless steeds, maddened by fear and wounds, careered wildly forward, or turned to the rear and added to the chaos. Troopers retaining their seats were blinded by the tempest of arrows and javelins, and could only shelter themselves behind their shields, bending low over saddle-bows to avoid the hail. Still they were forced on up the narrow, encumbered street, which roared with tumult indescribable.

Now Cristoval heard a Spanish voice rising above the clamor: "Forward! Forward! Forward!" and the notes of a trumpet, broken and faltering before it could blow the command. The column must fight through, or be crushed by those in the rear. The leading riders pressed on, sabring at the multitude crowding from all sides. Cristoval advanced with Pedro to meet them. A lasso serpentined through the haze of flying arrows, settled over the foremost trooper, and jerked him from his saddle, to be lost among the Antis as if swallowed by the sea. Other sinuous lines shot out, fastening upon the Spaniards and dragging them to quick obliteration. Those in advance paused, fear-struck by a weapon against which their blades were powerless. They saw comrades totter and go down; turned in panic, and Cristoval was among them.

Fell and relentless purpose in this cavalier; his arm nerved and strength doubled by thought of Rava. The nearest troopers, dismayed and disordered, opposed feeble resistance to the furious onslaught of Cristoval and his comrade; while those behind, aware of a new check to the advance, the cause of which they could not see, raised the cry, "To the rear!" It was caught up at once; and now, panic and disorder tenfold.

As Cristoval fought he heard a cry rising shrill, "_Allah il Allah! Allah il Allah!_" and Abul Hassan was beside him, mounted on the steed of some fallen Spaniard. Into the fray the Morisco, reckless of want of armor, fighting with the ferocity of a demon.

The retreat was more disastrous than the advance; but slowly the troop fought back to the open street, shook itself free, and fled. The jaunty sorties were to be made no more.

At Hernando's council that night, once more glum taciturnity. From dawn there has been, on every hand, sharp repulse unexampled since the siege began: many saddles empty for result, and a general call for surgery. Every street by which many a brisk sally has been made in previous weeks, now impassable for cavalry; and barricades pushed within bowshot of the square. The abrupt change in the tactics of the besiegers is ominous. The presence of Peralta--for the identity of the cavalier seen, and felt, fighting among the Antis, is not doubted--is significant, and the price on his head is doubled.

Toward evening Cristoval was joined by Pedro at the edge of the barricade. The cavalier had laid off his helmet and was begrimed to the roots of his hair with ashes and black dust from the charred timbers, his face streaked with perspiration, his reddened eyes gleaming strangely through their surrounding sootiness. He turned to his comrade and said with a grim smile:--

"Aha! Pedro, we seem to have put them on the defensive, yonder in the square. What sayst thou?"

"Why, I say first," returned Pedro, eying him sharply, "that if I caught myself with a grin as weird as that of thine, I'd wear a wooden face as well as a wooden leg. Untwist thy features, man! Thou hast the look of a devil. Ah! Now, I'll reply to thine observation by saying that I'm hungry; and as for those knaves in the square, we have them where they will stay for a spell, or longer, without being told. So let us go and eat."

Cristoval, about to reply, noted a sudden silence among the Antis. Every one of them was on his knees and bending toward the three or four nobles who had just drawn near.

"_Madre_! The Inca!" exclaimed Pedro, then he growled beneath his breath, "Now look at these pagans! Every man doubled up like a razor, and everything dropped without a word of warning! Suppose the Inca had come about this morning, Cristoval! We had been undone."

Cristoval made no answer, for an officer recognized as Quehuar was beckoning.

The two Spaniards halted a few paces from the monarch and saluted, awaiting his pleasure to speak. His countenance, more bronzed and sterner in its lines, wore a trace of friendliness not there before. The Inca studied the grim, murky visage of the cavalier before he spoke.

"Viracocha Cristoval," he said, at length, "General Mocho hath told me of thy gallantry to-day--and thine, Viracocha Pedro--and I see evidence here of thy zeal and soldierly skill. My warriors owe thee a measure of success and hope thus far wanting. What thou hast accomplished hath mine appreciation and gratitude, as hath all thou hast done hitherto. There is more that I would say to you, Viracochas, but at a fitter time. To-night you will sup with me, both."

The Inca gave a hand to each, and turned to continue his tour of the suburbs.

The two Spaniards supped with the Inca at dark, in the open, at a table lighted by a circle of fires. Of the score present several were officers met at Ollantaytambo; among the strangers the Villac Vmu, now in warrior's garb. A number besides Mocho bore marks of recent fighting. The formality imposed by the presence of the monarch was lacking, and he met his guests with a revelation of his personality unexpectedly agreeable to Cristoval. As guest of honor the cavalier had opportunity to correct the impression gained at their first interview, that the young potentate was a mere barbarous tyrant. By the end of the meal, when Manco pledged first him, then Pedro, clinking their cups of _chicha_ with his own, a friendliness was established which neither Cristoval nor his host could have foreseen.

In quiet moods the resemblance of Manco to his sister Rava was pronounced, and there were moments acutely painful to Cristoval, when some inflection of the Inca's voice, some gesture, or an evanescent expression of his eyes, brought a quick vision of the loved one. But the Nusta Rava was not mentioned. Indeed, the captives within the city were not referred to, nor any of the losses sustained since the beginning of the siege. This was demanded by Peruvian stoicism; and for all said that night the misfortunes of Tavantinsuyu might have been unfelt. As they scorned manifestation of physical pain, so they hid mental suffering beneath an exterior of grave impassibility.

At Mocho's tent, some hours later, when Cristoval was taking leave for the night, the general said abruptly: "Viracocha Cristoval, thou hast done for us to-day that for which words cannot thank thee. I will not try. But the Antis, their officers, and their general, are thine. Command them. Lead them whither thou wilt, and thou'lt find the last living man of them behind thee."

The cavalier replied with a grip of the hand. He had few words. But when he went to his quarters he felt a sudden hope. With those fierce battalions might he not search every nook of Cuzco? Mocho knew the object of his quest when he entered the burning city, and his tender was significant. That night there was little sleep for Cristoval.

At dawn he sought the prisoners, found one whom he knew, and questioned him concerning the Nusta Rava. Was she alive? Alive, and safe in the Acllahuasi with the rest of the royal household, Father Valverde guarding like a hawk. All had been removed from the Amarucancha before it burned, and the Acllahuasi was one of the few buildings to escape the conflagration.

Cristoval waited to ask few more questions. With Mocho and Pedro he held council for an hour. At the end of it the two Spaniards mounted, and making a detour of the suburbs, entered the Rimac Pampa, crossed the Tullamayu, and reached the square called Coricancha, in front of the Temple of the Sun. This quarter was held by the Piros and Conibos, and once more Cristoval greeted Matopo, whom he had not seen since leaving the Urubamba. From the Coricancha a street led north to the square occupied by the Spaniards, and from the barricade thrown up by Matopo could be seen the Acllahuasi at the head of the thoroughfare, with the Amarucancha on its left, across the way. Plainly visible, also, was a Spanish breastwork defending the square, with a falconet scowling from its single embrasure.

That night Cristoval and Mocho consulted with the Inca regarding the captives within the city.

Day came with a heavy sky and threat of rain. During the morning sorties were attempted by the Spaniards, evidently for reconnaissance, for after brief skirmishing in the littered streets, the attacking parties withdrew. The afternoon was spent by Cristoval in making a tour of the suburbs with the Inca, inspecting the barricades, suggesting improvements, and perfecting or advancing the investment.

With darkness came rain and a rising wind. The night would favor. Toward midnight Cristoval rode with Pedro to the Coricancha. The square was massed with Antis, and in advance, near the barricade across the street to the Acllahuasi, was a picked body, among them their general, equipped with captured arms and armor--a resolute band, which Cristoval surveyed with satisfaction.

*CHAPTER XXXVII*

_*A Night Attack and a Deliverance*_

The rain fell drearily, driven and swished by flaws of the wind, which, as the night deepened, increased to a gale, moaning and whistling mournfully through the ruins. The hours lagged, measured by the brusque challenging of the Spanish sentinels at each relief, distinctly heard above the storm. Still the cavalier withheld the word for the advance, biding the night's most sinister hour.

He waited with apparent patience. But outwardly calm, within was a turbulence of mingled hope and anxiety, eagerness and doubt; throngs of dear anticipations, and clouds of dark misgivings. He was a lover with the possibility of meeting his beloved ere the night was spent; but while his heart palpitated at the thought, it sank at the attending uncertainties, and at all that must intervene. He turned abruptly, not daring to dwell upon a happiness so unassured. Mocho looked toward him. "Do we move, Viracocha Cristoval?"

"In God's name, yes! Let us go!"

Mocho muttered a word to the nearest Antis; as it passed to the rear of the column a movement followed, barely audible. Cristoval unsheathed his sword and laid aside belt and scabbard. Pedro imitated with a sigh and murmured, "Well, this is what cometh of being a cook! Would I were--" He did not finish. He had muffled his peg, and followed the cavalier noiselessly as the latter stole out through a breach in the barricade to the open street. Mocho, Abul Hassan, and the squad of mail-clad Antis, were close behind; then, the main body. With the advance were two men armed with sledges.

Cristoval moved forward in the darkness with caution, pausing at moments to bate his breath and listen. Along the wall of the roofless palace of the Priesthood of the Sun, past black doorways full of subdued echoings of the dismal plash and drip in the courts within, until they reached an intersecting street. Only this short distance covered! He seemed to have travelled an hour. Looking back he found his party close upon him, motionless, dimly seen in the faint light of the crossing. Forward again, counting his steps. Three hundred paces, and he halted. Here was the Acllahuasi, its thatch saved from the fire by miracle. On his left, the Amarucancha--blank walls with a few roof-timbers vaguely outlined against low-hanging clouds. The gate of the convent must be near, and he waited to allow the tribesmen to pass the barricade. The movement of those nearest him ceased; there was no sound from the rear, and for a time, as he stood looking back into the gloom, Cristoval feared the Antis were not following. A figure appeared before him as silently as a phantom, and stretching forth his hand, he felt a quilted tunic. At once another was beside him, and a third, and the cavalier could see the stealthy movement of hundreds, creeping forward with the still tread of pumas. Slowly they massed, and touching Pedro's arm, Cristoval advanced.

In front, through the cleft between the black walls on either hand, was a pale flickering from the square, where the fires were struggling in the rain, ruddily lighting the mist when a blast started a few scattered sparks, subsiding to a feeble glow until the buildings melted into obscurity. He could descry the breastwork across the head of the street, and the embrasure from which a falconet commanded the approach. He looked in vain for a sentinel. But presently, the faint ring of a grounded halberd: the sentinel was there, and awake.

Groping along the wall on his right, he came to a recess,--the gate! Pedro and Mocho halted beside him. Passing his hand over the doors, Cristoval felt the padlock, which rattled slightly under his trembling fingers, and he drew back. Mocho pushed the two sledge-men into the gateway, and they placed themselves with hammers poised.

The Antis were now moving past, led by Abul Hassan, and a detail detached themselves and halted, ready to follow into the Acllahuasi. Minute after minute fled, and the warriors crept on toward the square, while Cristoval waited, shivering with excitement until he clenched his teeth to prevent their rattling. Hours, hours, he stood before the gates behind which he should find joy or despair, listening for what would be the signal. The movement of the Antis was hardly audible above the wind and rain, though as one after another brushed past he heard their breathing, strained with the tension of coming battle. The street was dense with them, their bent bodies and constrained, fearfully slow advance as expressive of fierce intentness as if it could be read in their faces. But, gods! would they never reach the square? Had the Morisco halted? Cristoval leaned forward and glanced up the street: a quivering level of brazen helmets, half luminous in the reflection from the firelit haze ahead.

As he looked, a shout rose from the sentinel, hoarse and startled, cut short by the deafening war-cry of the Antis as they rushed.

"Strike! Strike!" shouted Cristoval, and the gates thundered and crashed under the sledges. Stroke after stroke fell upon the resonant panels, shattering them to fragments. The street bellowed and howled. From the square, wild shouts, the sharp blasts of a trumpet, the roar of the assaulting Antis. A shot, then a second, and a broken fusillade. A flash lighted the dripping walls, and an ear-stunning report rent the heavy air. The rampart was high, and before the Antis were over a soldier had seized a brand, rushed to the piece, uncovered the vent and fired. Unheeding wounds and death, the Antis were on the parapet, and the gun dismounted. They were over the work and into the square, driving the half-formed infantry before them. But for days no horse had been unsaddled, no trooper out of his armor. In a moment the earth was trembling with their onset, and the Antis were hurled back to the barricade. Here they stopped and fought, hand to hand. At other points, now, the yells and turmoil of assault, the flash and roar of guns. A few defences were carried, and the Peruvians plunged into the square, to be met and broken by flying squads of horse, driven back into the streets and slaughtered by the artillery.

But the Antis held the rampart, and the gate of the Acllahuasi was broken through. Followed by Pedro, Mocho, and a score of warriors, Cristoval dashed into the enclosure. The darkness was pitchy, and he went headlong into a copse of shrubbery, stumbled through into a path, lost it at once, and lost himself in another thicket. Half a minute had separated him from his friends. He groped about in bewilderment, blundering on. Heard voices, and shouted: answered, as it seemed, from every point of the compass. One voice was Pedro's, but Heaven alone could have sent a clue to its direction. He was in a great garden, dark with foliage intersected by a maze of paths. He crashed forward into another gravelled walk, and brought up against a wall. He was across the enclosure, and felt a pavement beneath his feet. He could discern doorways, numbers of them, all alike; some open, with empty dark chambers, some closed. He followed to the right, trying the closed ones, finding them unlocked and the rooms vacant. No sign of life, and he hurried on with sinking heart, sick with the fear that he had come too late. The night was hideous with the clamor outside, but he gave little heed, intent only on his quest. He heard a step, and ran against someone in the gloom, who sprang back with a familiar exclamation and engaged him. "Pedro!" he shouted, and the cook responded: "Thou, Cristoval! Heaven be praised! Where the fiend are we? Where are the others?"

"Only the fiend knoweth. Come!" They hastened along, throwing open doors, but finding everywhere darkness and vacancy. Cristoval's hope was fast going. "Oh, my God! Oh, my God!" he muttered over and over. "Where is she? Rava! Rava!" he called. "Answer, in the name of Heaven!"

Suddenly a gruff voice commanded in Spanish, "Halt!" Cristoval sprang forward. Again the summons, "Halt!" and a burly form loomed in the darkness with a mace raised to strike. "Halt! I command you in the name of the Holy Church!"

"Father Valverde!" cried the cavalier. "Hold, man! I am--"

The mace descended with sturdy force, dexterously caught on Cristoval's buckler. In an instant the priest's heels were kicked from under him, and Cristoval strode past, while Pedro seated himself upon the prostrate ecclesiastic. Without hesitation Cristoval tried the door Valverde had been guarding. It was fast, and he hurled his weight against it. At the second assault it yielded, burst open at the next, and the cavalier found himself in a dimly-lighted room, facing a group of shrieking women clinging about one who confronted him with unwavering, courageous eyes, but with no sign of recognition.

He stepped forward and halted, strove to speak, and failed, and stood overcome, while the women, made hysterical by the tumult beyond the convent walls, wailed at his dread appearance. He had forgotten his lowered visor, his bared sword, and the seeming menace of his attitude, and could only murmur hoarsely as he advanced: "Rava! Rava! Dost not know me--Cristoval?"

She cowered away, glaring in terror and anger, but with no word. He halted again, and lost his voice, standing before her helpless in a sudden fear. "Rava!" he cried in desperation. "Rava! in God's name, child, hast forgotten me?"--Then thought of his visor and raised it.