Part 12

Coyllur’s grief for her sister was poignant. The girls were tenderly attached to each other, and had never since infancy been separated for a single day. Sumac’s sorrow bound them only more closely together; and during her long illness Coyllur had waited on her with the most assiduous affection. She was in consequence little able to bear the severe fasts and strict seclusion which the Peruvian customs imposed upon mourners; and erelong old Yupanqui began to look with keen apprehension on her drooping form—dreading, not without reason, lest the last joy and solace of his declining years should be taken from him. Viracocha’s alarm was not less than his.

Both welcomed the gentle authority with which Doña Beatriz Coya insisted on removing her niece to her own more cheerful dwelling. For the Inca buildings, admirable as they were for “simplicity, symmetry, solidity,”[42] and wonderfully fitted to resist the ravages of time and the shocks of earthquakes, were rather dull places of abode for ladies.

It was new life to Coyllur to welcome the flood of sunshine through the strange luxury of windows; or, seated in the pleasant balcony, to contemplate at her ease the never-ending marvels of the square below. There the stately church processions wound along with all their glittering show; there the Spanish soldiers mustered in shining armour; and, best of all, there rode the splendid, haughty Spanish cavaliers, managing their noble steeds with consummate ease and grace, not quite unconscious of the dark eyes that were watching them with interest. Moreover, Coyllur nũsta had a pretty sleeping-chamber in her aunt’s house, which boasted a window also. It was pleasant, in the delicious tropical nights, to lie waking on a couch draped with dainty stuffs from Spain, and to listen the while to sweet music—more scientific and harmonious than that of the ruder instruments of her native land—from the guitar attuned by a skilful hand to the melodies of Spain.

Had such reached the ear of Viracocha, they would have moved him to indignant sorrow. Better far for both had he laid Sumac’s warning to heart and acted upon it; but sentiments of honour, which ruled his soul as absolutely as that of any “preux chevalier” of the Old World, utterly forbade his claiming the prize he longed for until he had won it by some deed of signal merit. Nor would Yupanqui, in all probability, much as he loved him, have allowed his suit if preferred too soon.

While awaiting the opportunity for this, he bent all his energies to the task of making himself worthy of Coyllur. The grand-daughter of the great Huayna Capac stood very near that golden throne, which, though it existed in imagination only, was about the most real thing in earth or heaven to José Viracocha.

He studied diligently, learning “the Humanities,” as taught in Europe, from a Dominican monk, and the more mysterious and difficult science of the Quipus from an aged Indian, who had been a Quipu-comayoc[43] in the days of the Incas. He procured one of the rare and costly maps of the period, which, full of blunders as it was, yet gave him a better idea of the world he lived in than he had before. Lastly, he became a more accomplished marksman with the Spaniards’ own formidable weapon than many of the Spaniards themselves, and learned to compete successfully with the best of them in fencing and cane-playing.

All this time he had not forgotten Fray Fernando. Not a day passed in which the man who for more than seven years had been to him as a father was not present to his thoughts. Warm and grateful affection, not unmixed with reverential compassion for sorrows vaguely guessed, gathered around his image. Yet not the less did Viracocha belong to his own people and to Coyllur. His place and his work were with these, not with the Spaniards.

It may seem strange that he did not try to communicate with Fray Fernando by letter, since he could write very well; but the idea of writing a letter was so foreign to all his habits and associations, that it never occurred to him. And had he thought of it, whither was he to send the letter when written? Even if the monk’s present address had been known to him, only half of the difficulty would have been obviated; for under the Spanish government no regular system of posts had replaced the admirable and efficient chasquis of the Incas.

Shortly after Coyllur’s departure to the house of her aunt, Viracocha left Cuzco on a mysterious errand. The Spaniards were informed he was going to visit his friends and kinsfolk at Nasca. And not even amongst themselves did the Indians speak freely of his objects or destination. Only the initiated knew that he was to pass in disguise up and down the country, to ascertain the real state of the minds of his people, and to reawaken slumbering hopes of the restoration of the Incas. He had also to give signs and pass-words, to collect and transmit tidings, and to arrange secret meetings; but all these things were shrouded in the greatest possible mystery.

He may have had something both to ascertain and to command on the subject of the hoards of gold and silver which were buried by the Indians at the conquest, to be disinterred whenever a prince of their own race should require them, and not till then. But whatever might be doubtful about Viracocha’s mission, one thing at least was certain,—the young envoy went forth taking his life in his hand.

Ere he left Cuzco, he paid a farewell visit at the mansion of Doña Beatriz Coya. And here, on entering the low and sloping doorway which formed part of the original Inca building—the ground-floor of the present mansion—he encountered his rival, Don Francisco Solis, who was just passing out. They exchanged a cold and haughty salutation; each regarding the other with cordial hatred. Viracocha saw the Spanish knight vault lightly into the saddle of his noble steed, held for him at the door by a mulatto page, and for the hundredth time envied him his mastery over the proud and beautiful creature. Then turning, he sought the apartment where Coyllur was to be found; and as fortune favoured him, she was alone.

His lips at last unsealed by the approaching separation, and the consciousness that he was about to hazard all for the cause dearest to the hearts of both, he said a thousand things in the soft musical “lengua del Inca,” which would not bear translation. The hour was rapturous, but all too brief, and bounded by that terrible parting. Already he had risen from his place at her feet, and received the pretty Spanish “Vaya con Dios,” which she added to the Quichua “Paccaricama,” when his eye rested on a pair of perfumed Spanish leather gloves, embroidered with seedling pearls, lying beside the guitar, her aunt’s recent gift. Instinct revealed the donor: he saw in them the homage of his rival, and the countenance of Viracocha fell.

Coyllur noticed the change, and said, not without confusion, “They are pretty, Viracocha. He would leave them;—but I do not value them.”

“They are not worthy to touch the pure hands of my nũsta,” said Viracocha, with a scornful glance at the dainty trifles. “No Child of the Sun is ever adorned with pearls, since they cannot be obtained without risk of life.” (A beautiful trait, recorded by Garçilasso de la Vega of his Inca forefathers.)

But Coyllur thought not of the old Incas, her forefathers—she thought only of the young Inca standing before her, whose looks were far more eloquent than words.

“I care nothing for such Spanish trumpery,” she said, as, taking the gloves, she flung them from the open window, over the balcony, down into the square beneath.

Viracocha’s countenance softened—brightened into restful assurance. “It is well,” he answered. “Now I go. Will my nũsta give me a token—a flower to keep for her sake?”

And selecting, from a vase which lay before her on the table, a rich crimson tintin, or passion-flower, Coyllur placed it in the hand of Viracocha, who kissed it and laid it in his bosom. So they parted.

XX.

The Star Sets.

“Untrue! untrue! O morning star—O mine! That sitteth secret in a veil of light Far up the starry spaces—say untrue! Speak but so loud as doth a Tyrrhene moon To wasted waters.”

E. B. BROWNING.

About ten months afterwards, Viracocha came back. He bent his steps, in the first instance, to the dwelling of Yupanqui. But there all was changed, except the familiar walls,—those adamantine Inca walls, which still defy the hand of time, and the far less gentle touch of man. Even these, however, were hardly visible through the heaps of stones, of timber, and of mortar that lay around them. With these materials, a second story, after the Spanish fashion, was being added to the Inca’s house. A Spanish master-builder was overlooking the work, and directing the labours of a crowd of Indians and negroes. But no one could give Viracocha any information about the former occupants of the dwelling.

Turning away from them, he crossed the square towards the mansion of Doña Beatriz Coya. On one of the stone footbridges he encountered Sumac’s old attendant, Amancaes. The poor woman threw herself at his feet, and kissed his dress. He raised her, spoke a few kindly words of greeting, and asked for news of the household.

Soon all was told. Less than a month after Viracocha’s departure, old Yupanqui was found one morning, lying dead on the blanket of biscache wool that served him for a couch. But his death was opportune, and saved him much sorrow. Almost immediately afterwards, the storm that had been gathering over the Inca family since the apprehension of Tupac Amaru, broke at last. The suspicion of the Spaniards and the tyranny of the Viceroy found expression in a severe decree, banishing nearly all the Children of the Sun from the beloved city of their fathers. Doña Beatriz Coya took the dejected and sorrowful Coyllur to her own home. Her grief for her grandfather was wild; but her aunt comforted her as best she could, promising to supply the place of a parent to her. From that day forward, the orphan girl was of necessity thrown entirely upon the protection and guidance of Doña Beatriz, and of the Spaniards, or Spaniardized Indians, who surrounded her. So the end could not be wondered at. The next day, in the Church of Santa Aña, Coyllur was to give her hand to the Spanish cavalier, Don Francisco Solis de Toledo.

Don José Viracocha Inca did honour to the memory of his ancestors by his manner of receiving this intelligence. A Spaniard would at least have sworn by all the saints in heaven to have his rival’s blood. But the Inca’s son had trained himself “the fierce extremes of good and ill to brook impassive.” Therefore he spoke no word; he gave no sign. He silently emptied his coca-bag into the withered hands of the poor woman; then he walked quietly on to the door of the stately mansion of Don Marcio Serra de Leguisano.

The door-keeper was an Indian; which is equivalent to saying that he was the humble servant of Viracocha. From him he learned that the nũsta was at that moment in the courtyard. “I would go thither, my brother,” said Viracocha; and the Indian of course admitted him.

The taste of Doña Beatriz had transformed the courtyard into a pretty garden, rich with tropical glories, and having in the centre a fountain of limpid water. Coyllur, who was gathering flowers, still wore her graceful national costume; but a Spanish head-dress of black silk and lace hung down over her pure white mantle of vicuña wool. On seeing Viracocha, she allowed the flowers to fall from her hands, and, trembling from head to foot, cried out in Spanish, “Santa Maria!”

Viracocha approached, knelt before her, and kissed her passive hand. Then he rose, and quietly withdrew a few paces. “Coyllur nũsta,” he said, of course in his native tongue, “I know all.—But will you, for the sake of the past, answer me one question this day? That done, I shall trouble you no more.”

Coyllur hung her head; and clutched nervously at the graceful bells of a tall fuchsia, near which they were standing. A spray came off in her hand, and she tore it to fragments.

Viracocha stood motionless, patiently awaiting her reply. It came at last:—“Ask what you will of me,” she murmured.

“Is this thing your own free choice, Coyllur nũsta?” Viracocha asked, with almost as much outward calmness as if merely inquiring what she meant to do with the flowers that lay neglected at her feet.

“Why ask that?” she faltered, in a very different tone from his.

“Because—if _Yes_—I go home, never more to see your face. If _No_”—his dark eyes kindled, and unconsciously he advanced one step nearer,—“I fling this mantle round you, and thus I bear you safe to the dwellings of my people, let who will bar my way. Coyllur, star of Heaven, trust me—I will save you.”

She shrank a little, as if frightened by his vehemence; and José, instantly recollecting himself, recoiled also.

“I am afraid for you,” she faltered. “If _he_ should come and find you here, he would kill you.”

“Let him try,” said José with a haughty smile. “But fear not. In your presence there shall be no bloodshed. Nũsta, I await your answer.”

Coyllur wrung her hands, as one in pain. “O Viracocha, Viracocha!” she cried at last, “why have you come to torture me? Why do you bring the old times back again to me? And yet—and yet—”

José took from his bosom Sumac’s little book. Carefully preserved and pressed between its leaves lay the crimson passion-flower. This he gently removed, and placed in the trembling hand of Coyllur. “If you think the heart next which it has lain ever since worth your keeping, keep it,” he said. “But if indeed you have given yours to the Spaniard, then give it back to me, for it will be all that I have left on earth.”

Minute after minute passed away, and still the shadows chased each other over the agitated face of the Indian girl, whose heart was torn by contending emotions. But at last the fight was over; the day was won. It was the proud Castilian knight who proved the conqueror;—with his fair face and splendid courtesy, and the masterful ways wherewith he seemed to rule man’s will and woman’s heart as easily as he controlled his noble steed. Pity, esteem, and old familiar kindness Coyllur still felt for the son of her people;—but she loved the Spaniard. Silently, tremblingly, with bowed head and sorrowful heart, she gave the withered flower back again to Viracocha.

Without a word he replaced it in his bosom. Then he said, calmly enough, “God bless you, nũstallay,” and turned to go. But, turning again for a moment, he added, “I shall see your face no more. Unless, indeed, you or yours ever need the help of the children of your people. Then I will know it, and be near you.”

Coyllur watched him until he disappeared in the long dark passage that led to the outer door. Then she fled for refuge to her aunt, whom she actually terrified by an outburst of passionate weeping.

Doña Beatriz Coya, who had laboured much to bring about this Spanish match, soothed and comforted her niece by every tender art in her power. “You have no idea, my child,” she said, “with how many sad misgivings of heart I gave my hand, in my day, to the stranger. Nor was I quite so fortunate as you are. Every one knows Don Francisco Solis is of the best blood in Spain—blue blood, as they say;—while Don Marcio Serra (whom the saints preserve!), you know, was—was not—well, no matter now; he is as good as the best of them, and better. But was it not told you how I braved the anger of Paullu, and of all my kindred, because I could not endure the thought of him? And at last, all that Paullu could wring from me, by prayers and threats and promises, was just this, ‘Perhaps I will have him, and perhaps I will not.’” And the good lady indulged in a laugh at the recollection of her own girlish wilfulness. “But there was no perhaps with my Uncle Paullu,” she continued. “At that time he dared not, for his head, disoblige one of the conquistadors. So I was married, in spite of myself, to the best of husbands. And I have had, since then, everything my heart could desire; besides the power to help my people, which I have not failed to use, God and the saints enabling me.”

Whilst Coyllur was thus receiving from her kind-hearted aunt the time-honoured conventional consolation,

“She herself was not exempt, Doubtless she herself had suffered,”

Viracocha was wandering, with his broken heart, amongst the ruins of his ancestors’ fortress on the Sachsahuaman hill.

At length he threw himself down amongst the tumbled stones, on a patch of emerald grass variegated with blue and golden wild-flowers. Then came his hour of weakness. All his proud stoicism gone, he bowed his head and wept—such tears as a man may weep unblamed who has just lost everything that made life precious.

What dried his tears at last was not any thought of comfort, but the fierce and passionate hatred that like a bitter flood rushed over his heart, leaving no room for softer feelings there. How he hated these enemies of his race—these cruel Spaniards! His own gentler language supplied no words fit for his rage: he was fain to curse them, and that aloud, in the tongue they had taught him to speak. The crushing sense of their all-conquering power, and his and his nation’s impotence, only intensified his hatred a thousandfold.

Now for the first time he thoroughly recognized and acknowledged to himself the strength that God had given to the white man. It was not their fire-breathing clubs, not their horses, not their iron tools, it was their strength that won them the victory—strength not of limb and muscle alone, but of heart and brain. They were not better than his own people,—not braver, truer, kinder,—far otherwise,—but they were stronger. And before this terrible strength, this force and weight of manhood in the pale-faced stranger, had perished, or was perishing, all the gentle grace and beauty of the old time; so fair even in its ruins, yet powerless to touch the hearts of the destroyers.

Viracocha’s outburst of agony ended in a dumb, crushed hopelessness, worse than agony. Wherefore contend with this resistless might? It was the vicuña in the paw of the jaguar, the gentle dove in the talons of the mighty condor of the Andes.

Then came softer thoughts. Had all men united to tell him Coyllur could have proved untrue, he would have flung back a scornful denial. Even now, scarcely her own lips could convince him—lips that had spoken the soft musical “Vaya con Dios!” that haunted his memory still—that would haunt him for ever. O Coyllur, Coyllur! Star of his life, set for ever! And again his tears fell like rain, as over and over he murmured the beloved name.

Yet those tears relieved him; they did him good. They gradually recalled him to himself. He remembered his promise that she should see his face no more. This was the last service he could render her. He would leave Cuzco—and depart—whither? He knew not—he cared not. But ere he went, it behoved him to render account of his stewardship, and make full report of all he had seen and heard during the last ten months. Amancaes had informed him that Maricancha, in spite of the decree of banishment, contrived still to linger in Cuzco, under cover of a disguise, and she had told him where to find him. To him therefore he must go, and at once.

He rose and retraced his steps to the city. He was successful in finding Maricancha; but when his interview with him was over, he wandered once more towards what had been Yupanqui’s house, feeling utterly desolate and alone. But near the door he met a young son of Doña Beatriz Coya’s Indian porter, who had evidently been sent in search of him.

The boy brought him a sealed letter, which he said had been left for him some time ago at his master’s, by a messenger from the house of the gray monks.

It was addressed, “A Don José Viracocha Inca, à Cuzco.” José cut the silk that secured it with his useless Spanish sword, and read these words:—

“MY SON,—I am sick in body and sick at heart. Come to me if thou canst. I need thee. Ask for me here at the Franciscan monastery.

“Thy unworthy father in God,

“Fernando, Brother of the First Order of St. Francis.

“Given at Ciudad de los Reyes, on the vigil of San Antonio, in the year of grace 1573.”

Nearly a year ago! Late in the day as it was already, José Viracocha had put three good leagues between himself and the Golden City ere he saw the sun drop in flame behind the snowy peak of Vilcañota.

XXI.

Old England.

“That mother’s face, Its grave sweet smile yet wearing in the place Where so it ever smiled.”

HEMANS.

It now becomes necessary for us to pass, with the rapidity of thought, from one side of the globe to the other, that we may visit for a little while the shores of “Merrie England”—the England of Queen Elizabeth and the Reformation.

It was a glorious hour in England’s day—the hour that followed the sunrise. Everywhere life was awakening—life of the intellect and imagination, and, through God’s blessing, that yet higher life which is his best and purest gift. Therefore living works were wrought, of which the memory shall last as long as this earth endures.

But our concern is not now with the brilliant workers of that busy age. We shall not visit the starry court of the maiden Queen, nor allow ourselves to linger fondly over names—such as Raleigh, Spenser, Sidney, Shakespeare—which have become “music more than any song” to every English ear. Rather shall we glance at the interior of a modest home, where dwelt in those days an English matron, who, though unknown to fame, was truly one of the noble band without whom the England of Elizabeth and the Reformation never could have been.

In the weald of Kent, where the trim hop-gardens flourish now, there stood at that time a half-ruined keep, built in the stormy age of the Wars of the Roses. It was much out of repair, and quite destitute of what were then accounted modern improvements. Its principal apartment was still the great hall, which was heated by a fire on the hearth, strewn with rushes, and furnished with massive, quaintly-carved oaken benches, cupboards, and tables.

But some women have the faculty of transforming any place, however dreary, formal, or comfortless, into a home. Of such was Marion Grey, widow of Walter Grey, a gentleman of Kent, of ancient lineage and good repute.

It is evening; and Marion Grey sits at the centre table, an oil lamp illuminating the space around her, but leaving the greater part of the gloomy hall in twilight. She is busy adorning the sleeve of a cambric shirt with very fine “pearling;” her deft fingers moving rapidly, while her eyes are seldom raised from her work, save for a hasty glance at the lamp, which scarcely affords the amount of light needful for such delicate embroidery.

“Shall I trim it, mother?” asks her companion, a fair boy, who does not seem equally loath to look up from the pages of a great book he has been reading aloud. The volume, “imprinted at London, by John Day and William Seres,” consists of the collected theological writings of the Reformer Thomas Becon, and certainly is not just what an ordinary boy would have chosen for his private enjoyment. But Walter Grey is not an ordinary boy; and if he had been, those were days in which young people did the pleasure of their elders, not their own.

“I think it needs not,” the mother answered. Then, perhaps surmising that the boy was tired of reading, she asked him, “Dost remember any of thy cousins, Walter?”