CHAPTER FIFTY FIVE.
"ONLY EMPTY BOTTLES."
About the time the Free Lances were burying their comrade in thecemetery of the convent the gate of San Antonio de Abad was opened topermit the passage of a squadron of Hussars going outward from the city.There were nigh 200 of them, in formation "by fours"--the wide causewayallowing ample room for even ten abreast.
At their head rode Colonel Santander, with Major Ramirez by his side,other officers in their places distributed along the line.
Soon as they had cleared the _garita_, a word to the bugler, with a noteor two from his trumpet quick succeeding, set them into a gallop; thewhite dusty road and clear moonlight making the fastest pace easilyattainable. And he who commanded was in haste, his destination beingthat old monastery, of which he had only lately heard, but enough tomake him most eager to reach it before morning. His hopes were high; atlast he was likely to make a _coup_--that capture so much desired, solong delayed!
For nearly an hour bridles were let loose, and spurs repeatedly plied.On along the _calzada_ swept the squadron, over the bridge Churubusco,and past the _hacienda_ of San Antonio de Abad, which gives its name tothe city gate on that side. Thenceforward the Pedregal impinges on theroad, and the Hussars still going at a gallop along its edge, anotherbugle-call brought them to a halt.
That, however, had naught to do with their halting, which came fromtheir commander having reached the spot where he had left the hunchbackin charge of the two soldiers.
He need not hail them to assure himself they were still there. Thetrampling of horses on the hard causeway, heard afar off, had long agoforewarned the corporal of what was coming; and he was out on the roadto receive them, standing in an attitude of attention.
The parley was brief, and quick the action which accompanied it.
"Into your saddle, _cabo_!" commanded the colonel. "Take that curiosityup behind you, and bring it along."
In an instant the corporal was mounted, the "curiosity" hoisted up tohis croup by Perico, who then sprang to the back of his own horse. Oncemore the bugle gave tongue, and away they went again.
The cavalcade made no stop in San Augustin. There was no object forhalting it there, and delay was the thing its commander most desired toavoid. As they went clattering through the _pueblo_, its people werea-bed, seemingly asleep. But not all. Two at least were awake, andheard that unusual noise--listened to it with a trembling in theirframes and fear in their hearts. Two ladies they were, inside a housebeyond the village, on the road running south. Too well they knew whatit meant, and whither the galloping cohort was bound. And themselvesunseen, they saw who was at the head; though they needed not seeing himto know. But peering through the _jalousies_, the moonlight revealed tothem the face of Don Carlos Santander, in the glimpse they got of it,showing spitefully triumphant.
He could not see them, though his eyes interrogated the windows while hewas riding past. They had taken care to extinguish the light in theirroom.
"_Virgin Santissima_! Mother of God!" exclaimed one of the ladies,Luisa Valverde, as she dropped on her knees in prayer, "Send thatthey've got safe off ere this!"
"Make your mind easy, _amiga_!" counselled the Condesa Almonte in lessprecatory tone. "I'm good as sure they have. Jose cannot fail to havereached and given them warning. That will be enough."
A mile or so beyond San Augustin the southern road becomes too steep forhorses to go at a gallop, without risk of breaking their wind. So therethe Hussars had to change to a slower pace--a walk in fact. There wereother reasons for coming to this. The sound of their hoof-strokesascending would be heard far up the mountain, might reach the ears ofthose in the monastery, and so thwart the surprise intended for them.
While toiling more leisurely up the steep, any one chancing to look inthe hunchback's face would there have observed an expressionindescribable. Sadness pervaded it, with an air of perplexity, asthough he had met with some misfortune he could not quite comprehend.
And so had he. Before leaving the spot where the stiletto was takenfrom him, he had sought an opportunity to step back into that shadyniche in the cliff where he had lost his treasures. The _monte_players, unsuspicious of his object, made no objection. But instead ofthere finding what he had expected, he saw only a pair of horse-halters:one lying coiled upon the ground, the head-stall of the other caughtover the rock above, the rope end dangling down!
An inexplicable phenomenon, which, however, he had kept to himself, andever since been cudgelling his brains to account for.
But soon after he had something else to think of: the time havingarrived when he was called upon to give proof of his capability as aguide. Heretofore it had been all plain road riding; but now they hadreached a point spoken of by himself where the _calzada_ must beforsaken. The horses, too, left behind; everything but their weapons;the path beyond being barely practicable for men afoot.
Dismounting all, at a command--this time not given by the bugle--andleaving a sufficient detail to look after the animals, they commencedthe ascent, their guide, seemingly more quadruped than biped, in thelead. Strung out in single file--no other formation being possible--asthey wound their way up the zig-zag with the moonlight here and there,giving back the glint of their armour, it was as some great serpent--amonster of the antediluvian ages--crawling towards its prey. Silentlyas serpent too; not a word spoken, nor exclamation uttered along theirline. For, although it might be another hour before they could reachtheir destination, less than a second would suffice for their voices toget there, even though but muttered.
One spot their guide passed with something like a shudder. It was wherehe had appropriated the dagger taken from a dead body. His shudderingwas not due to that, but to fear from a far different cause. The bodywas no longer there. Those who dwelt above must have been down andborne it away. They would now be on the alert, and at any moment hemight hear the cracking of carbines--a volley; perhaps feel the avengingbullet. What if they should roll rocks down and crush him and the partybehind? In any case there could be no surprisal now; and he wouldgladly have seen those he was guiding give up the thought of it and turnback. Santander was himself irresolute, and would willingly have doneso. But Ramirez, a man of more mettle, at the point of his swordcommanded the hunchback to keep on, and the cowardly colonel dare notrevoke the order without eternally disgracing himself.
They had no danger to encounter, though they knew not that. Neithervidette nor sentinel was stationed there now; and, without challenge orobstruction, they reached the platform on which the building stood, thesoldiers taking to right and left till they swarmed around it as bees.But they found no honey inside their hive.
There was a summons to surrender, which received no response. Repeatedlouder, and a carbine fired, the result was the same. Silence inside,there could be no one within.
Nor was there. When the Hussar colonel, with a dozen of his men, atlength screwed up courage to make a burst into the doorway, and on tothe Refectory, they saw but the evidence of late occupancy in thefragments of a supper, with some dozens of wine bottles "down among thedead men," empty as the building itself.
Disappointed as were the soldiers at finding them so, but still moretheir commanding officer at his hated enemies having again got away fromhim. His soul was brimful of chagrin, nor did it allay the feeling tolearn how, when a path was pointed out to him leading down the otherside, they must have made off. And along such a path pursuit was idle.No one could say where it led--like enough to a trap.
He was not the only one of the party who felt disappointed at thefailure of the expedition. Its guide had reason to be chagrined, too,in his own way of thinking, much more than the leader himself. For notonly had he lost the goods obtained under false pretences, but the hopeof reward for his volunteered services.
Still the dwarf was not so down in the mouth. He had another arrow inhis quiver--kept in reserve for reasons of his own--a shaft from whichhe expected more profit than all yet sp
ent. And as the Hussar colonelwas swearing and raging around, he saw his opportunity to discharge it.
With half a dozen whispered words he tranquillised the latter; afterwhich there was a brief conference between the two, its effect uponSantander showing itself in his countenance, that became all agleam, litup with a satisfied but malignant joy.
When, in an hour after, they were again in their saddles riding inreturn for the city, a snatch of dialogue between Santander and Ramirezgave indication of what so gratified the colonel of the Hussars.
"Well, Major," he said, "we've done road enough for this day. You'll bewanting rest by the time you get to quarters."
"That's true enough, Colonel. Twice to San Augustin and back, with theadditional mileage up the mountains--twenty leagues I take it--to saynothing of the climbing."
"All of twenty leagues it will be when we've done with it. But our ridewon't be over then. If I'm not mistaken, we'll be back this way beforewe lay side on a bed. There's another nest not far off will claim avisit from us, one we're not likely to find so empty. I'd rob it now ifI had my way; but for certain reasons, mustn't without permit fromheadquarters; the which I'm sure of getting! _Carajo_! if the cockbirds have escaped, I'll take care the hens don't."
And as if to make sure of it, he dug the spurs deep into the flanks ofhis now jaded charger, again commanding the "quick gallop."