The Romance of Golden Star ...

  CHAPTER VI

  THE WAKING OF GOLDEN STAR

  'There is your royal, would-be lover, Ruth! Come, if you don't believeme, you can hear from his own lips that upon you, and you alone, dependsGolden Star's return to life. Is not that so, Your Highness?'

  It was Djama who said this, and as he said it, he caught Joyful Star bythe hand and half led, half dragged her towards me from between theother two. But before he had come half the length of the room, FrancisHartness had overtaken him in a few swift strides. I saw his hand fallheavily on his shoulder, and with his other hand he took Ruth's out ofhis. His blue eyes were nearly black with anger, and his bronzed facewas grey and set and pale with the passion that his strong will washolding back, and his voice was low and clear, and vibrating like thesound of a distant bell when he spoke and said,--

  'I can't stand that, Djama. Are you forgetting that your sister is awoman, and that you have brought her into the presence of the dead?'

  'You must be mad, Laurens!' said Joyful Star, before her brother couldreply. 'Surely this dreadful work of yours has turned your brain.Vilcaroya, what does all this mean? Is Golden Star dead or alive? Ah,how beautiful she is now! No, surely she cannot be dead!'

  She had broken away from both her brother and Francis Hartness, and asshe said the last words she was leaning over Golden Star's pillow,softly stroking her hair; and then she stooped lower and kissed herforehead. Then the others came up to the bedside, Francis Hartness andDjama in front, and the professor standing silent and wondering behindthem.

  'If Djama won't speak, will you, Vilcaroya?' said Hartness, looking atme with eyes that were still angry. 'What is that dagger in your handfor, and what is the meaning of this story that he has been telling me?'

  'The meaning is of life or death,' I said. 'Laurens Djama will not giveGolden Star's life back to her if I will not swear to give her to himwhen she lives again, and I have sworn that he shall not restore her tolife unless he swears to give Joyful Star to me, for I love her, andwill have neither life nor empire without her.'

  As I listened to my own voice saying these bold words, it seemed to meas though another were speaking, for, even in that hot moment of passionand desperate resolve, I could scarce believe them mine. For theinstant, I thought Hartness would have struck me down where I stood, norcould I have used my dagger against him, for he was a man and I lovedhim, though I saw now that we both loved the same woman. But beforeeither of us could move, Ruth had risen erect and come between us, hercheeks burning with shame and her eyes aglow with anger.

  'What!' she said, 'Laurens give me to you, Vilcaroya! Don't you know yetthat no one can give an English girl away except herself, and that sheonly gives herself to the man she chooses of her own free will? Do youthink I am a slave or a human chattel to be bartered away like that?Nonsense! And you, Captain Hartness, don't look so fiercely atVilcaroya. Remember that he is your friend and mine, or has been, andhas not the same ideas as we have. If he had--'

  'He has,' I said, breaking in upon her speech, 'since Joyful Star hasspoken. He is not her lover but her slave, and she has shamed him. Iwill eat the words that should never have been spoken. Let Golden Starlive! I will keep my oath and ask nothing in return.'

  So the savage within me was tamed, and I, who but a few minutes beforehad been ready to take two lives at the prompting of a single word,dropped my dagger and stood with bowed head, humble as a chidden childbefore her whose lightest word was then my most sacred law. I raised myeyes and looked at her to see if my words had pleased her. As our eyesmet she gave me a glance that I would have died to win from her, andthen, pushing me and Francis Hartness gently aside, yet with a forcethat neither of us could have resisted, she took her brother by the armand, leading him to the bedside with one hand, she laid the other onGolden Star's brow, and said,--

  'Laurens, can you really bring her back to life?'

  'Yes,' he answered, and I could see that he did not dare to raise hiseyes to hers, 'but--'

  'But you will only do it for a price, you think. For shame! Is that theway you would use this terrible power that you possess? Is my brother somean a creature as that? You love her, you say, even as she lies there,neither dead nor alive? Well, when she lives, she will be worthy of anyman's love, but only of a man's, Laurens, and you would not be a man,with all your learning and power, if you insisted on so mean anadvantage as your skill gives you. Do you mean to tell me that you canlook on such a beauty as that, knowing that you can restore it to life,and yet ask a price before you will do it? Come, Laurens, that is notlike your old self. Use your power with the same generosity that it hasbeen given to you, and then win Golden Star like a man if you can.'

  Where my strength had been vanquished, her sweet wisdom conquered. Theman who had laughed at my threats, and told me without a quiver in hisvoice how he could, and would, slay himself rather than I should do whathe knew I could do, stood humbled and abashed before the righteous andyet gently-spoken reproach of her who was pleading for the life of asister woman.

  I saw Djama's hands meet behind his back, and his fingers begin to twineabout each other. I saw him look from Ruth to Golden Star, from theliving woman who was his sister to her lifeless counterpart. Then cameover him one of those swift changes of mood which we had so often seenbefore. All the cold cruelty of his long-chained-up passion vanished.His face, from being stone, became flesh again. The fierce glitter, asof a sword's point, died out of his eyes, and they grew warm and softagain, and his voice was almost as sweet and gentle as Ruth's, andstrangely like it, too, as he answered her and said,--

  'You are right, Ruth. I was not myself. I was a brute, unworthy eitherof love or power. Let her die! Good God, I would die myself a thousandtimes rather than do that! I must have been out of my senses even tothink of such a crime for a moment, but if you were a man and had livedthrough what I have lived through for the last two days and nights, youwould understand me, and perhaps forgive me. Yes, she shall live. Howcould I ever have thought of letting her die!'

  Then he rose from his half-stooping posture over the bed, and came towhere I stood at the foot, and, with his hand outstretched and a smileon his lips, said,--

  'You have heard what I have just said, Vilcaroya. You have withdrawnyour conditions; now I will take back mine. It is no use for you and meto be enemies. We have had our fight, and I confess myself beaten. Nowlet us try to be friends for Ruth's sake and Golden Star's, and Ipromise you that to-morrow morning you shall be telling her the story ofyour resurrection and her own.'

  For a moment I stared at him in, speechless wonder, striving tounderstand how it could be that those eyes, which had, but a short timebefore, been glaring hate at me, could now be looking so kindly andfrankly into mine; and how those lips, which had just been sneering socoldly and cruelly alike at my love and my hate, could shape suchfriendly and honest-sounding words. Then I looked at Ruth, asking herwith my eyes what she would have me do, and in instant obedience to whatI saw took Djama's hand in mine and said,--

  'So be it! The evil in our hearts has spoken, now let the good that isthere speak, and let us be friends; and, when Golden Star awakes, withmy lips she shall bless you and her who has made peace between us wherethere was strife.'

  'Miss Ruth, you really must allow me to congratulate you on your successas a peacemaker,' said the professor, speaking now for the first timesince he had come into the room, and coming forward to where Joyful Starstill stood by the bedside. 'It would have been ten thousand pities ifthis--ah--this little affair had ended any other way, for all of theexquisitely perfect subjects--'

  '_Subjects_, professor?' said Ruth, interrupting him with a laugh. 'Doyou venture to call Golden Star a subject, just as you do those awfulthings in your dissecting-rooms? Look at her--a _subject_ indeed! Don'tcall her that again in my hearing, please!'

  'Oh, ah, of course, I beg your pardon a thousand times, and HerHighness's too. Really, I spoke quite thoughtlessly and mostimproperly.' he answered, laughing at her mock displeasure, 'And
now,Djama, since we have had two declarations of love and a peacemaking,don't you think it would be cruel to keep Her Highness waiting anylonger on the threshold of her new life? Come, Hartness, you and I haveno more business here at present. Don't you think we had better go andwait somewhere else for the working of the miracle?'

  'Just what I was going to say,' replied Hartness, who had gone away alittle distance from the bed while we were talking, and had beenstanding by the table, seeming to examine the strange instruments thatwere scattered about it. 'Of course the doctor will wish to finish hiswork alone.'

  'May not Vilcaroya and I stay, Laurens?' asked Joyful Star, looking athim with appealing eyes. 'You know it will be much better for her to seeanother woman by her when she awakes, and then she will recogniseVilcaroya, and that will tell her that she is among friends.'

  But Djama shook his head and said,--

  'No, Ruth, not yet. There is something else to be done beforethat--something, well, something that only a medical man ought to see ordo, and you really must leave me to do it alone. You forget, it is notmerely a matter of waking. She is not alive yet; but if you will leaveme alone for about half-an-hour, I promise you that I will call you andVilcaroya back before she actually wakes.'

  'Very well,' she said, moving away from the bedside. 'I don't want topry into your mysteries.' Then she turned to me, and said, with a faintsmile on her lips, 'Vilcaroya, come into the dining-room, I havesomething to say to you.'

  She went down the room after the professor and Francis Hartness, and Ifollowed her with beating heart and anxious thoughts, wondering what newlesson it was she was about to teach me.

  Djama closed and locked the door after us. She led the way to thedining-room, where there was a light burning. It was empty, for theothers, hearing what she had said to me, had gone out into thecourtyard. Then she turned and faced me with her back to the light; butin spite of that I could see that her eyes were bright, and her fairface flushed as she said to me in a low voice that trembled a little,--

  'Vilcaroya, I am going to forget everything that was said in the roomyonder, and--and you must forget it too. It was no time or place forsuch things to be said, and you and Laurens were not yourselves when yousaid them. If you do not forget them, we cannot be friends any more. Youunderstand me, don't you?'

  Gentle and sweetly spoken as the words were, they fell upon my heartlike snow upon a fainting flame; yet I felt that, like all her words,they were true and just. I crossed my hands on my breast with one of myold-world gestures, and, standing so before her with bowed head, Isaid,--

  'The will of Joyful Star is my law. Let what I spoke in my madness beforgotten as you have said. Who am I that I should say such things?--apoor savage that has wandered from his own world into hers, where he isa stranger!'

  'No, not a savage, Vilcaroya. You must never say that word again. Howcould Golden Star's brother be a savage? How could I--but there, we havesaid enough for the present. We have other things to think of now.'

  With that she turned away and sat down in a long, low chair, resting hercheek upon her hand, and looking out of one of the windows at thestars, while I went and stood before another to look at the same starsthat she was looking at, and so we waited in silence until the dooropened, and we heard Djama's voice telling us that the long-expectedmoment of Golden Star's awakening had come at last.

  As Joyful Star went to the door I stood aside and waited for her to passme and go out first. As she went by our eyes met for a moment, and I sawthat hers were bright with tears. My heart leapt at the sight, and thenfell still again and well nigh fainting. What had she said to me but afew minutes before? How dare I dream that those sweet tears could be forme?

  I followed her and Djama into the room, but half-way between the doorand the bed I stopped, not daring to go on, held back by some impulse Icould not name. I saw her lean over the pillow for a moment in silencethat for me was breathless. Then came a soft, sweet sound, and then alittle cry. Was it her's or Golden Star's?

  Djama beckoned to me. I went with swift, silent steps to the foot of thelittle bed, and saw Golden Star's eyes wide open and looking wonderinglyup into Ruth's face, and her red lips smiling at her. The miracle hadbeen completed. She had awakened her with a kiss.

  'Come and give her your welcome back to life, Vilcaroya,' she whispered,rising and turning her fair face with its wet cheeks and smiling lipstowards me. I went and stood over the pillow, and laid my trembling lipson Golden Star's brow, and then I said, in the words that had been thefirst of my own new life,--

  '_Cori-Coyllur Nustallipa, Nusta mi!_'

  She looked at me, but there was no more recognition in her gaze than inthat of a newborn child, nor was there any answering smile upon herlips. Unheeding this for the moment, I went on and said, still speakingvery gently and softly in our own tongue,--

  'Thou art thrice welcome back from the shades of night into the brightpresence of our Father the Sun, oh, Golden Star! Dost thou not rememberme, Vilcaroya, thy brother, who went into the darkness with thee longago, and has been permitted to return before thee that he might greetthee and bid thee welcome?'

  Her eyes wandered from my face to Joyful Star's, and then she smiledagain, but no answering words came from her parted lips. Now, as welooked from one another to her, a great fear came into all our hearts,and Ruth gave it voice.

  'Laurens,' she whispered, laying her hands upon his arm, 'what is thematter? Vilcaroya spoke at once, didn't he? Why doesn't she speak? Oh,surely it can't be that she is--that she has come back to life withoutmemory or--or her reason? What is it?'

  I waited for Djama's answer as a man might wait for words that were totell him whether he was to live or die. He put us both gently away fromthe bed, and then, laying his hand on Golden Star's brow, he looked longand steadfastly into her eyes. It seemed to me as though Ruth and Icould hear each other's hearts beating and counting off the secondsuntil he raised his head again and said in the slow, even tones of theman of science who, for the time, had overcome and banished the lover,--

  'Memory, perhaps, even probably; but reason, no. These are not the eyesof an imbecile or an idiot, but they _are_ the eyes of a child. It ispossible that when she fully recovers we may find her mind a perfectblank--a virgin page on which the story of her new life will have to bewritten.'

  'Thank God for that!' she murmured, and I, too, echoed her words in myheart, though I did not know then how much she meant by them.

  Then once more she turned and went to Golden Star's pillow, laying herhand upon her brow again, and looking fondly for a moment on the silentand yet eloquent face that was looking up at her. Then she said to herbrother,--

  'But is she well now? I mean, is her physical life certain? Will shelive and grow well and strong again?'

  'Yes,' he answered. 'I have done everything that it is in my power todo. I have fulfilled my promise to His Highness. The rest is, as it waswith him, merely a matter of care and nourishment and nursing.'

  'Then,' she said, with a swift, subtle change coming over her manner,'the care and the nursing must be mine, and you two must say good-bye toher for the present, until I have nursed her back to health. Of courseyou may see her when necessary, as her doctor, but only as her doctor,mind. And you, Vilcaroya, must possess yourself with what patience youcan until my part of the work is done as well. Now, go away, both ofyou. I am mistress here for the present. Laurens, you go and get readythe nourishment that you think she should take, and come back inhalf-an-hour, and tell me how it is to be taken.'

  It was easy for us to see the deep yet kindly meaning of herlightly-spoken words, for in them she had told us that Golden Star wasnow once more a living woman. No longer a mummy, or a corpse, or a'subject,' as the professor had called her--no longer an inanimate thingthat had neither sex nor claim to human rights--but a sister woman ofher own kind whose wants could only be supplied by her. So we obeyedher, and went away, leaving her there to perform the most sacred tasksave one that a loving woman could perform.
br />   Djama went to prepare the food that Golden Star would soon need, and Iwent in search of the professor and Francis Hartness, and told them allthat had happened, and then, when the professor had gone to bed tofinish his broken night's rest, I and he who was my rival in love, andwho was to be my brother-in-arms, went out from the courtyard into the_patio_ which lay in front of the house, sloping down towards theentrance of the little valley in which the hacienda lay, and there,walking to and fro side by side, we talked long and earnestly of manythings upon the doing of which my heart was set, and which might now befreely entered upon, seeing that the first object of our journey wasalready achieved.

  Our talk, as you may well believe, was of war and not of love, though itwould be hard to say which of the two at that hour most filled oursecret thoughts; but, as I have told you, this English soldier was atrue man, and I trusted him, knowing well that though, when the imperialLlautu once more encircled my brows, I might find courage to seek openlythe love of her into whose eyes I had already seen him look with love,yet no falsehood or hatred could ever come between us. So I told himfreely of the treasures that I had only to take from their hiding-placesto make them mine, and spoke once more of the use that I would make ofthem, and took his advice as to the best method of that use.

  This he was well able to give me, for I soon found that since he hadresolved to throw in his lot with us, he had applied himself diligentlyto the task of studying the work that was to be ours, and seeking thebest and readiest means of doing it. In Lima and Arequipa he had boughtbooks and papers from which he had learned, as far as could be learned,the resources and power of the government of Peru, the number of itssoldiers and their stations, the names and characters of the men whomade the government, and of those who were opposed to them, seeking, ashe told me was now ever the case in the countries of South America, tooverturn the government and to take for themselves the honours and theprofits of rule.

  He told me--which events soon proved to be the truth--that not manymonths would pass by before civil war once more broke out. The Presidentand the ministers, who were the tools of his tyranny, had oppressed thepeople with grievous burdens till they could endure them no longer, andalready people in the towns of the interior were refusing to pay taxes,and were arming themselves in secret and meeting in bands among themountains to practise themselves with their weapons, and make ready forthe war which was so soon to come.

  All this, as he soon showed me, was happening as though the Fates whichrule the world had especially prepared it for my coming. The people hadno leader save a man who had been himself a tyrant before, and nonetrusted him, but looked to him only to serve their own ends. Those whohad the power were hated, and those who sought to seize it weredistrusted.

  But better than all was the utter, and, as far as all men, saveourselves, could see, the hopeless poverty of the country. Long years ofplundering had emptied the treasury. Commerce was leaving the shores,and industries were languishing throughout the land. No man trusted hisneighbour, for nearly all were in debt, and none could get paid, and myown people, the slaves of the children of the Spaniards, and the sportof their blind and brutal jesting, had borne their heavy burdens tilltheir backs were sore, sore as their patient hearts were, and they wouldbear them no longer.

  From the country which is called Ecuador, and which in my other life hadbeen Quito, the kingdom of Atahuallpa, to the southern confines ofBolivia, which had once been part of the Land of the Four Regions, thedominions of my own father, all were ready to throw down theirlong-borne burdens and turn and rend their oppressors and those whosefathers had robbed them of the land that had once been theirs.

  I well remember the very words in which Francis Hartness told me allthis at much greater length than I have set it down here; and this iswhat he said when, as the stars were paling in the sky above us and theeastern mountains were beginning to stand out sharply against thegrowing light of the coming dawn, our long talk drew to its close,--

  'In short, Vilcaroya, if I were given to that sort of thing, I couldbelieve that the very Fates themselves had conspired to prepare the wayfor you. You have come back to the world and to your own country at thevery moment that these miserable wretches are getting ready to tear eachother to pieces. The government is as hopeless as it is impossible, andthe popular party, as they call themselves, have neither a leader thatthey can trust, nor money to buy weapons and pay their soldiers with.The treasury is empty, for, so to speak, almost the last dollar had beenstolen. The native troops have had no regular pay for months, and Ibelieve they would desert to a regiment if they once believed that youare what you are, and that you possess, as you do, the means of payingthem well and honestly for their help.

  'And, after all, I don't know that even I, as a soldier, could call itdesertion under such circumstances. You are of their own blood, the sonof one of their ancient kings. These people, these Peruvians, are onlymongrel descendants of those who have plundered and oppressed them forcenturies. They owe them no allegiance that is worth the name; but youthey would hail, not only as their lawful king, but almost as a god--as,indeed, they could well be pardoned for doing, seeing what a marvellousfate yours has been.

  'The only thing to do at present, and the only thing in which I see anydifficulty, is to get into communication with them in such a way thatthey shall come to know you without the authorities knowing anythingabout you or your treasures. If that could be done, I think all the restwould be easy, and then I believe that the moment you raised the flag ofthe old Incas, they would flock to it in thousands, and after that itwould only be a matter of military management and leadership.'

  'And if I will charge myself with that, my friend,' I said, as he pausedfor a moment; 'if I will promise you that before six more suns haverisen and set, the news of my coming shall be spread far and widethrough the land, and yet in such a manner that none but the faithful,the Children of the Blood themselves, shall know anything that couldwork us harm, will you give me the help of your skill and your knowledgeof the arts of this new warfare which is so strange to me? Will you leadmy armies to battle against the oppressors of my people? Will you helpme to free this land of my fathers from the yoke of its tyrants, and bethe war-chieftain of my people, and stand by my throne in the days whenthe Rainbow Banner shall once more float over the battlements of theSacsahuaman and the City of the Sun? If you will, you shall have richesand power and all that the heart of man can desire.'

  'Not all, I am afraid, Vilcaroya!' he said, interrupting me with a laughthat had but little mirth in it. 'Not all; but that would not be in yourhands to give. Never mind, it is the fortune of war, or perhaps I shouldrather say of love. But for the rest, yes. I believe your cause is ajust and righteous one, and what I can do to help it I will. Henceforthwe are brothers-in-arms, even though we may perhaps be rivals in love.There, you have my hand upon it, and with it the word of an Englishmanwho never broke his word yet to man or woman.'

  How shall I tell you of the great joy with which those brave,honest-spoken words of his filled me? He, the man whom I had fearedmost, even as I had learned to love him most, was the first to bid mehope--and hope I did now, in spite of all things. So, saying nothing,for my heart was too full for speech, I put my hand in his, and there,as the dawn brightened over the mountains, we clasped hands in silenceand sealed our compact, and when the sun rose swiftly over the nowglittering peaks, I let go his hand and bowed myself before it, greetingit as the bringer of a new day which was to end the long night that hadfallen over my land and my people when the light of my last life wasquenched in the darkness of my death-sleep.