THE CRIMSON CONQUEST (continued 7)

"What!" exclaimed the cavalier. "Doth he not sleep? It is near the morning."

"He hath not slept," said Mocho.

Cristoval threw his cloak over his shoulders and followed him out.

CHAPTER XXXI

Inca and Conquistador

The Inca Manco did not sleep. His attendants dismissed, he found himself alone with torturing thoughts. Lashed, stung, and seared by the recollection of a thousand Spanish outrages, of the humiliations during his imprisonment, his mind seethed with purpose of vengeance, with plans of action, and impatience for their execution. Most merciless of all was the thought that beneath his very roof were sheltered two of the hated aliens, harbored through the demands of a gratitude which he could not feel. And one of them (the one who had seduced Rava from her faith in the ancient gods, whom he had seen her mourning with he knew not—O, Inti!—what secret cause of grief, and whom he would have gladly given to death) had imposed upon him the final obligation! The sense of it bit to his proud soul like the thrust of a javelin. He would have seen this Viracocha hurled from a precipice as he would a common criminal, but the debt was there, burdening his heart like a monstrous incubus. He strode about, clutching his head, now resolved to issue a fell command, now restrained by the stern injunction of honor. The Viracocha was his guest; had, moreover, said Mocho, been zealous for storming the Sachsahuaman; had served Tavantinsuyu in other ways, and professed a wish to serve still further. With what motive, this allegiance? Ah! what motive could a Viracocha have but one?—the hope of gold! He was merely more astute than his fellows, and of deeper cunning; but the incentive was, could be nothing else. Then this debt could be acquitted!—should be acquitted that very hour! The Viracocha should have his gold and be gone. At once! Before the sun should find him beneath the roofs of Yucay!

Manco hastened to the door. He threw it open, restrained the sentinels with impatience from their obeisance, and sent one in hot haste for Mocho. The general was soon in the royal chamber. Manco stood in the middle of the floor, hot-eyed and scowling.

"Fetch the Viracocha!" he cried, impetuously, as Mocho appeared. "Hasten—the one called Cristoval—and—I will see him alone, Mocho."

Mocho hurried away, wondering and disturbed. The Inca saw the door closed, and became active. On his table was his untouched supper, served on plates and salvers of massive gold. He seized them, opened an outer door, flung out their contents, and stacked the utensils in a glowing heap. In an adjoining room were toilet articles of precious weight. They were piled beside the table service. From the niches in the walls he snatched the vases, hurled out the plants and soil, and bore them, an armful of wealth, to the stack on the table. From a chest he tossed out a fortune in jewelled armlets, wristlets, and girdles. From the walls he tore their decorations, bending and crushing them into shapelessness.

He worked eagerly, casting the articles upon the heap with scorn for the object for which they were being collected, and hating them for their worth to his enemies. As he deposited the last he heard steps, and turned to face the unwelcome guest. Cristoval was ushered in by Mocho, who retired at once, closing the door. The cavalier saluted, observing the half-suppressed agitation on the Inca's face. The monarch made slight acknowledgment, noting quickly that he wore the native costume. Manco stood beside the treasure, darkly watchful for the Spaniard's expression at sight of the gold. Cristoval glanced at the pile as he entered, but gave it no further look, regarding Manco with calm attentiveness. Unexpectedly the latter found it not easy to begin. There was a dignity in the bearing of this Viracocha which forbade the tender of the treasure and abrupt dismissal ready to his tongue a second before. The silence had become onerous when he said at last:—

"Viracocha, I have summoned you to say once more that I am in your debt. Lord Mocho hath told me all he knoweth. I am aware of your service to—to one of my kin. Yesterday you added further to my obligation, and I desire to discharge it immediately, and if possible, to your satisfaction."

The bitterness in the words and the curl of lip did not escape the cavalier, who replied, coldly: "Lord Inca, there existeth no obligation to be discharged. You will pardon my denial that any act of mine hath imposed a debt upon the Inca Manco."

The Inca made no pretence of concealing the disdain with which he received the answer and waved it aside. Stepping back from the table, he pointed at the pile of gold and said brusquely, "Take it!"

But the execrable lighting of the Spaniard's face for which he looked, and had seen so often on those of Pizarro and his companions, was absent. Cristoval ignored the treasure, but the color flashed into his face in resentment of Manco's tone and manner. "Your gold hath no worth to me, my Lord Inca," he said, with slow emphasis. "I ask no favor but your authority to pass, to-night, the guards about the palace."

"Do you reject it?" demanded Manco, with a frown.

"I beg my Lord Inca's gracious leave to decline it."

"It is not enough!" exclaimed Manco, with contempt. "Then I will increase it."

"I fear my lord doth not get my meaning," replied Cristoval, with an even voice that would have cautioned one acquainted with its significance. "I repeat, the gold is of no use to me."

Manco's frown darkened. "Then what will you, Viracocha?" he cried, impatiently. "Name it! It shall be yours. If this gold is not enough, I will load your beast with all he can bear away. But let me acquit this debt before the sun riseth upon it again."

The scorn was now Cristoval's. It burned in his steady eyes as he replied quietly: "I fear, my lord, that you will compel me to speak plainly, and I would not. If I have been of service, I beg you will believe that I should feel it depreciated by the acceptance of reward. It should be unnecessary for me to say more to a soldier, my Lord Inca."

Manco scarcely heeded his words. In his impatience to be done their sense was quite lost. His experience with the sordid and greedy Spaniards made it impossible for him to believe this one less so. He rejoined hotly: "You saved my life, Viracocha! Why?"

Cristoval answered with patience. "I was unaware that it was you, my lord. It calleth not even for your thanks."

Manco flushed, but went on. "You were about to take part in an undertaking to release me from prison. Again, why? Lord Mocho hath said that you would offer your sword to Tavantinsuyu. Why, Viracocha? Is it without hope of reward, all this? Are you of so different fibre from the plunderers of Cuzco?" He turned away with a gesture of contemptuous disbelief.

Cristoval eyed him in silence, struggling to restrain his anger at the imputation of venality. When he spoke the Inca faced him again, and met a look grown intense.

"Lord Inca Manco," said the cavalier, "you have questioned my motives. It is not my wont to defend them—with words; nor will I defend them now further than to say that it was my purpose to offer my sword without thought of reward, and less to aid you and your cause, just though it is, than to rescue one whom you hold dear—the Ñusta Rava."

At the name the Inca's face grew livid. "Ah!" he exclaimed, his voice lowered and husky with passion. "One whom I hold dear! One whom I held dear above all on earth until she came to me defiled by your accursed love, broken-hearted, wearing the symbol of your damnable belief!"

His rage was not more quick than that of Cristoval, but the latter's years gave him better self-control. The cavalier, pausing to hold himself, replied: "Defiled, my Lord Inca! 'T is a black and shameful word, applied to the Ñusta Rava, and by the great Heaven, the man with whom I could fight on equal footing should not leave this room alive with the word unswallowed!"

The Inca snatched the llautu from his head and cast it aside. He went out, returning instantly with a pair of the short native swords. He thrust the hilts toward the cavalier.

"Choose!" he cried, hoarsely.

Cristoval's eyes blazed, and he stretched out his hand to seize the weapon. Arrested the motion, and drawing back, stood surveying the maddened youth in silence. Fight this prince, already laden with unnumbered cares, the victim of inconceivable wrongs, and on the eve of leading a life-and-death struggle to save his people? Turn a sword upon the brother of Rava?

"Choose!" commanded Manco, passionately. "Doth the Viracocha hesitate?"

Cristoval grasped a sword, and as the Inca stepped back to guard, threw it upon the table. "My lord," he said, "I have no mind to fight."

Manco's surprise gave way to quick access of anger. "What mean you, Viracocha?" he demanded, hotly. "Is this some new form of insult?"

"God forbid!" said Cristoval.

For a moment the monarch glared at him, speechless with rage and uncertainty. "Do I look upon a coward?" he asked, slowly, the scorn deepening in his eyes.

Cristoval knew that the stigma must follow his refusal, yet he started and reddened at the word. "A coward! No, my Lord Inca, not that!" he replied, meeting steadily the look of contempt and enmity. "Not a coward; and I believe you cannot think it." During a fraction of a second he felt the penetrating gaze which might have been Rava's. It passed, and Manco's brow darkened again. He was about to speak, but Cristoval raised his hand. "Lord Inca Manco," he said, gravely, "we have no quarrel. I divined but now the nature of what you hold as grievance. I call upon Heaven to witness that the Ñusta Rava hath had from me naught but honor in mine every thought."

"Honor!" repeated Manco, with renewed scorn. "Honor in a Viracocha?"

"Nay, my lord! You have heard me say that I will not fight," returned the cavalier. Manco colored under the reproof, and Cristoval went on, "There is honor even among Viracochas, and something more than lust of gold, God knoweth!" He paused again. "You spoke of the symbol the Ñusta Rava wore. I tell you, Prince, that if you come not to the faith, it betokeneth you will go upon your bended knees on the hot pavement of hell and give up thanks that your sister hath been spared your fate!" Then, with a gesture: "But I say once more, Lord Inca, we have no quarrel. We have a common enemy."

Again Manco's searching look, but he was silent, studying the man before him. Here, assuredly, was a Viracocha who differed from his kind. He had neither swaggered nor sneered. He spoke with a dignity and candor that forced respect. In his bearing was a calm pride and consciousness of strength which had baffled the unconcealed hate and bitterness with which he had been received. The frank honesty of his eyes had lent support to his words. Manco's youth had not given him a knowledge of men, and least of all could he fathom a Spaniard; but his own ingenuous temperament, shamefully as it had been abused, made him quick in an intuition that he had misjudged. But this was in his thoughts as an under-current. Before him still was a Viracocha. He tossed his sword beside its fellow, and demanded:—

"Why are you here? Of what concern to you is the rescue of the Ñusta Rava?"

Candidly Cristoval faced the rights of a brother. "Of deep concern, my lord. So deep that I overlook the manner of your questions and answer them," he replied, bluntly. "So deep that I have proffered my service, my life, if need be, to Tavantinsuyu in her behalf."

Hostility returned to Manco's eyes. He surveyed the cavalier for a moment before replying coldly, "The Ñusta Rava is the daughter of an Inca, Viracocha."

"I am a caballero of Spain, my Lord Inca."

In silence contended the pride of two races. On the one hand, an autocrat absolute, master of an empire, ruler of multitudes—but an Indian. On the other, a soldier, an adventurer, but a Caucasian—a Conquistador. Upon the monarch, unseen, unfelt, fell the shadow of Destiny.

There was no wavering in the eyes of either. In the stern, self-possessed cavalier the Inca saw and was compelled to acknowledge, an indefinable superiority which eluded him—the genius of a breed of subjugators. Withal, there was no arrogance in this Spaniard's face; only the grave serenity of a lofty mind, a strength of spirit which rose above the distinction of the temporal rank of the Peruvian and all his might. On his own part, Cristoval beheld a kingliness ingrained: a majesty as natural as the air that Manco breathed.

Cristoval broke the pause. "My Lord Inca, I requested, a moment ago, your gracious leave to pass the guards."

Manco seemed not to have heard, but stood in gloomy meditation. Cristoval was about to speak again when the Inca replied with abruptness, "It is my will, Viracocha, that you remain within the palace."

Cristoval bowed, and again encountered the look of profound scrutiny. Manco inclined his head, and the cavalier withdrew.

CHAPTER XXXII

The Storm Breaks

Pedro was asleep in his chair, but roused when Cristoval laid a hand upon his shoulder.

"Old friend," said the latter, "we are prisoners."

Pedro sat up, regarding his companion with incredulity. "Prisoners again, sayst thou, Cristoval?"

"Prisoners! I asked the Inca's leave to quit the palace at once, and was denied."

"At once! To-night?" demanded Pedro. "Well, then stew me if I'm not glad thou wast denied! Here is our supper, scarce touched. Here are two beds, immaculate. Cristoval, thou 'rt rash, hot-headed, and too impetuous by far! Now what if the Inca had given thee thy leave?"

"We should have taken it and gone," replied Cristoval.

"Como asi! Just so," said the cook, in a tone of reproach. "We should have taken it and gone—supperless, bedless, two wanderers by night. As for being prisoners, the news would have kept until morning, and I for one, would have slept none the worse."

Cristoval regarded him moodily. "Gods, but thou hast philosophy, for a captive cook!"

"Philosophy!" retorted Pedro; "'t is common sense. But come! Let us fall to, and thou tell me whilst we eat."

They fell to, and Cristoval recounted the interview. At its close Pedro remarked comfortingly: "Well, if this is durance, Cristoval, I've experienced worse, and so hast thou. Which bed wilt have? They're alike. Shall we toss for it? I have a maravedi."

"Madre! Thou'rt a cheerful cook," returned Cristoval, glumly.

They tossed for beds, sought them presently, and while Cristoval lay restless and pondering, Pedro's peaceful snore resounded through the halls of the Incas.

The cavalier was awakened next morning by the voice of Pedro in the outer room, addressing an attendant and apparently amending his salutation into Christian terms.

"Say, rather, 'May the Virgin guard you'; or, more briefly, 'Dominus vobiscum.' Either is good, and the sooner thou learnest them the better for thy soul. Is that our breakfast? Art sure? Hast not strayed into the wrong room? Hum! Well, it hath little of the look of the prison fare I've—heard tell of, for a surety! Pleased with it, boy! Why, I'm pleased from crop to tail-feathers, and that's clear through! A mere saying, my lad. Heed it not. Ah! My leg? It hath thine admiration? In my country 't is worn as a mark of transcendent virtue. Few attain it. That will do. Just leave the door open when thou goest out."

Presently Cristoval heard a low whistle of surprise, and Pedro stumped hurriedly to his door. "Cristoval!" whispered the cook, "Cristoval! He did it!"

"He did what?" demanded Cristoval.

"Left the door open, or I'm a scullion! Stir thyself!"

The cavalier stepped out. The door was broad open, admitting sunlight, perfume, and the sound of the fountain in the court. "Move, man, and we're free!" exclaimed Pedro, urgently. "There is not a soul in the patio."

"Useless, Pedro!" said Cristoval, turning away. "The place is surrounded by guards, and the valley full of troops. We should not stir five hundred yards."

"Oh, the fiend! We can try. 'T is a flaunt in the face of Providence not to try!" He looked stealthily into the court and drew back with an exclamation. "Here cometh Mocho! Shall I throttle him?"

"No!" thundered Cristoval.

Pedro shrugged. "Amigo, thou 'rt an ass!—with asinine propensities for thorns and thistles." He pegged across the room and seated himself with some violence, muttering, "This is what cometh of being a cook."

Mocho entered. "My friends," said he hastily, after their greetings, "we move in an hour toward Cuzco. The Inca hath gone to Ollantaytambo with Quehuar and Yumaquilque, who came this morning. The Antis are on the march."

"We, my Lord Mocho!" said Cristoval. "We—Pedro and myself—are prisoners. The Inca refused liberty to leave the palace."

Mocho shook his head with a smile. "No, Viracocha Cristoval. There was a council at dawn when the generals arrived, and the Inca hath accepted your service. In truth, you were not prisoners. The Inca could not so soon forget."

Within the hour the two Spaniards were leading down through the park to the valley with Mocho, and the latter said, "Viracocha Cristoval, the Antis are to take the Sachsahuaman."

Cristoval nodded. "Count us with them, Lord Mocho," he said briefly.

A few days later a foraging party of Spanish pikemen and Cañares leaving Cuzco by the Cuntisuyu road at dawn found its way opposed outside the suburb of Chaquill-Chaca by a body of Peruvian archers. The sergeant in command halted in astonishment, then with an imprecation ordered his men forward to cut a way through. Before half-a-dozen paces had been covered a flurry of arrows whizzed into their ranks. The sergeant ordered a charge, met at quarter bow-shot by a volley, and the head of his detail melted. Another discharge, and the foragers reeled, broke, and stampeded toward the city. They dashed through the dim streets crying the alarm and reached the square just as the garrison of the Sachsahuaman rushed into it from the north in wild disorder. The fortress had been surprised by an overwhelming force, and the Spaniards had fled without a blow. A few minutes later half a score of wounded straggled in, some borne by comrades. A number had been left within the fortification, dead or captive, and others had dropped along the road. Now, from the suburbs on the west and south came the distant howling of the Cañares. A soldier burst into the sleeping-room of Hernando Pizarro, admitting with him a confusion of shouts from the square and the blare of trumpets sounding to arms.

"We are attacked!" cried the soldier. "The fortress hath fallen, and the city is surrounded."

Hernando was out of bed at a bound. As he rushed out half-dressed, a horde of retreating Cañares swarmed into the square, some wounded, some naked, many unarmed, and all in panic, their savage clamor drowning the shouts of the Spanish officers struggling to form the companies. For a space it was a scene of madness. The Cañares, part terror-stricken by the suddenness of the attack, part infuriated by wounds and the sight of blood, whirled in the square like wild cattle, breaking the forming lines of the infantry, struck at by angry pikemen, fighting back, and howling. In a moment began a sputtering zip of arrows from outside, with here and there an answering shriek and plunge of some man hit, and the confusion rose to pandemonium. The sputtering increased; became a steady rain of missiles searching every yard of the place, their flight invisible in the twilight, making the vicious whir, or sharp, angry snap as they glanced on the pavement or from the walls, the more sinister. The Cañares broke for shelter in the halls of the palace of Viracocha, followed by the infantry and Candia's men dragging their guns. Here the lines were hastily reformed. A few cavaliers were in the court, already mounted; but a few only, for Juan Pizarro had gone, three days before, with almost the entire strength of the horse in a fruitless pursuit of the Inca Manco, whose rescue had been reported by the battered Mendoza and his companion.

Hernando had gotten into armor in some fashion, and was now in the saddle, adjusting his helmet while he bellowed commands. His handful of cavalry clattered after him into the hail-swept square. The infantry, not two hundred of them in all, closed in behind. No hesitancy here, but grim resolution to fight whatever odds they might find; an unreserved, deadly willingness to fight, though the legions of all heathendom were arrayed against them.

For an hour the plaza roared, thundered, and trembled; was finally cleared. The warriors of the Inca had fought with courage almost superhuman, but had been met with steel, by the crushing weight of cavalry, by the fire and havoc of guns. They retreated to the streets, and the streets were swept by falconet and arquebus. They were driven to the suburbs—and the attack had failed.

But gloom, almost despair, was with the victors. Toward night, as the city grew quiet, Hernando summoned his officers in council in the square. They gathered about him, wounded, exhausted, and filthy with carnage, scowling sullenly beneath their lifted visors, morose and taciturn. The little said was scarcely heeded, their sombre glances turning to the grim walls of the Sachsahuaman, or to the hills around the city, now dark with the legions of the Inca. Hernando heard the reports of the wounded and dead, made no comment, and the council grew dumb. The storm had broken with such fury, with unexpectedness so entire, and its apparent magnitude was so great, that hearts before unknown to fear were filled with dread. The minds of the counsellors were stunned. The few words ventured by one or another were flat in their inadequacy, and were answered by silence. Hernando at last forced some phrases of encouragement, issued instructions for the disposition of what force there was, and the council gradually dissolved without words of dismissal.

Cuzco was invested. To oppose the thousands Hernando had only his infantry, a battery short of ammunition, with a thousand or more Cañares whom nothing could induce to go into action that day, and whose fidelity in the emergency was doubtful. Of the infantry, only the arquebusiers had signal superiority over the foe, and these were few, their powder limited. What fate had befallen Juan Pizarro and his troopers he feared to guess. Whether they should be able to make their way back to the city was a conjecture which gave little cheer.

As evening came on patrols were kept moving through the deserted streets, saluted with an occasional flight of arrows when they approached the suburbs, but there seemed no disposition on the part of the Peruvians to renew encounter. Night fell as calmly over the brooding mountains as if it were not curtaining the prelude of a weary length of tragedy whose last act would mean the destruction of a civilization.

For one heart within the besieged city, crushed and broken by sorrows that had searched and torn its every fibre, the rise of the sun upon the outburst of clamor of conflict saw the last flickering of the desire to live. Shocked and terrified by the tumult outside, the yells of fighting men, the roar of charging horse, and the thunder of guns—dread sounds which told her of agony and death for her beloved people—she closed her ears and prayed to die. Life was too full of horrors. Hers had been shadowed by a pall, lifted once by love, only to fall again with deepened blackness. Behind closed doors, with darkened windows, surrounded by cowering and weeping maids, she knelt through the long hours of anguish, offering up shuddering appeals to be taken away.

The Auqui Paullo came, flushed with excitement and fierce cheerfulness. He knew the dire significance of the turmoil, and bade Rava partake his own hope. The army of the Inca was afield, and deliverance at hand. Alas! no deliverance to Rava from her bondage of grief. She waved him away and wept afresh.

Late in the day came Father Valverde from his ministrations to dying Spaniards, and she knelt at his feet, imploring his prayers for her relief. The good priest, shocked at her longing for death, hastened to banish this vestige of her barbarism; prayed beside her for the renewing of her resignation; told her again of His agony and gentle patience, of the Mother bereaved, and gave her support. Once more he spoke of the saintly lives of nuns, and she listened with yearning for their holy peacefulness. He left her at last with new hope and a resolution fast growing. Rava would take the veil.

The night which closed the first day's struggle was without alarm. The Spaniards slept beside their arms, the troopers in armor and at the picket line of their saddled steeds. Guards were doubled, and patrols kept the streets. The stars came out, but they seemed rivalled in multitude and brilliancy by the fires of the besieging army, sparkling in a vast circle on the surrounding hills, and beheld with awe by the beleaguered conquistadors.

To one Spaniard, however,—to Cristoval,—viewing them from the ramparts of the Sachsahuaman, they gave hope and promise. Beside Mocho, and followed by Pedro as closely as his wooden member would permit, he had taken part in the storming of the fortress. Later, they watched the struggle in the streets below, and Mocho pointed out the Amarucancha, beneath whose roof was Rava. With strained nerves and fevered blood the cavalier had seen the conflict raging at the very doors of the palace, hardly to be withheld from descending to join in the battle, and deterred only by the manifest impossibility of reaching its front through the masses in the streets. Sick at heart he had witnessed the repulse, but with new resolution and a solemn, whispered oath. All day he had lingered on the parapet studying the city spread out like a map below him, and at nightfall the sight of the great girdle of campfires brought fresh courage. With such a host the Inca must triumph.

The next morning news came that Manco had engaged the Spanish cavalry near Yucay. Later, that the Spaniards were in full retreat toward Cuzco, and an order was received from the Inca permitting them to enter the city. On the following day they appeared on the Chinchasuyu road, uncovered for their passage. The highway passed at the foot of a spur of the hill Sachsahuaman, and from the height Cristoval and Pedro watched the entry of the cavalcade. Had it not been for a dozen empty saddles and the litters borne by Cañares in the rear, the return might have been from a victory. Pennons fluttered, plumes tossed jauntily on helmets, and as they passed the lines a trumpeter blew a quickstep.

Shortly after the column had entered the city a chasqui arrived at the fortress announcing the approach of the Inca, and Mocho paraded his Antis to receive him. Messengers were sent to the several generals of the divisions surrounding the city, and the afternoon was spent in council with the monarch in the citadel.

CHAPTER XXXIII

The Doomed City

About two hours after darkness had fallen Pedro appeared at Cristoval's door and beckoned him out. The cook's face was grave.

"What is it, amigo?" asked Cristoval, as they stepped upon the terrace surrounding the tower.

"I know not, nor can I learn; but something is afoot. Come!" He led toward the rampart nearest the city.

The plain within the fortress was now covered with tents, but as they traversed the encampment its streets were deserted. From the midst rose the pile of the citadel, Moyoc Marca, dimly outlined in the starlight, and showing a single lighted window below the battlements. At the edge of the camp they passed the embers at the kitchens, and beyond these were a few silent groups of camp attendants looking toward the south, where presently Cristoval descried the motionless masses of the garrison drawn up under arms and facing the ramparts. The cavalier looked about in surprise.

"What is the meaning of it, Pedro?" he demanded.

Pedro shook his head and stumped on without reply. Passing between two of the battalions, they reached the margin of the plain, and skirting it, drew near the battlements. Three fires were burning brightly, and the two Spaniards caught the pungent, resinous odor of boiling pitch rising from kettles suspended over the flames. Between these and the parapet was a group of officers, and a few paces in their front stood a cloaked figure, motionless and alone. The firelight flashed on the golden eagle of the helmet, and Cristoval recognized the Inca. Halting at a short distance from the fires, the cavalier looked over the scene in mystification. Again he demanded:—

"What is to do, Pedro? Canst guess? They are heating pitch! Madre! Is there to be torture?"

"God knoweth!" said Pedro. "Wait!"

With the exception of a small party of soldiers around the kettles, no man was moving. No word was spoken, unless by these, and their tense, suppressed tones added to the pervading air of mystery. Two were feeding the fires, while the rest were kneeling or bending over some task whose nature Cristoval could not discern. Presently he saw three or four rise to string their bows. Aside from their whispers and muttering and the crackling of the fires, the only sound was the sighing of the rising wind; and now, from the shadowy city far below, the sweet, distant wail of a Spanish bugle blowing an evening call. Out in the dark valley, beyond the dim reticulation of black streets and pale roofs, was the great cincture of watch-fires, glimmering and twinkling as cheerfully as if their omen were as peaceful as the stars. But the night, even in its placidity, seemed portentous, and Cristoval felt a sense of dread as he glanced from the kettles with their wizard-like attendants to the silent, muffled figure of the Inca.

"God's mercy, Pedro!" he whispered, with a sign of the cross, "what is doing? What hell's broth do they brew? Not—"

Pedro gripped his arm as a soldier stepped to a kettle, holding an arrow swathed in cotton, and turned toward the Inca. The monarch made a sign, and thrusting the missile into the boiling pitch, the archer drew it forth and held it to the flames. It burst into instant blaze, and he strode hastily to the parapet, set it to his bowstring, and drew until the flame licked his hand. He shot, and with a fluttering hiss the burning arrow soared high into the darkness, leaving a trail of falling sparks, paused for an instant against the firmament, and fell with ever-increasing swiftness into the city.

Cristoval had uttered an exclamation of horror as the meaning burst upon him, and had taken a stride forward, to be jerked forcibly back by Pedro with a hand over his mouth.

"Silence!" muttered the cook. "Dost think to hinder?"

"They are firing the city!" gasped the cavalier.

"Canst prevent it? Beware!"

"Rava—"

"Safe with Valverde! Come!" Pedro dragged him out of ear-shot of the Inca, warning him to hold his tongue. A second arrow sped its flaming course, then a third; and at once, from a hundred points around the doomed capital, mounted thin pencillings of fire answering those from the fortress and falling like a shower of meteors. Arrow after arrow flashed out from the parapet into the surrounding gloom, and Cristoval gazed spellbound. Below, where the first had descended, was a tiny, wavering flame. While he watched, speechless, breathless, it grew with every second, its base spreading rapidly with ragged outline over the tinder-like thatch of one of the nearer buildings. Beyond, another feeble blaze was springing, and not far from this, a third. The first was now leaping, sending up a tenuous column of smoke which grew ruddy momentarily, and was seized by the wind and swept away toward the eastern hills. The flame waxed with incredible swiftness, lost its brilliance, turned deep and angry, with a lurid veil around it, through which darted red tongues, whipping plumes, and forked lashes. In a moment the smoke was rolling upward in volumes, showing whirling gaps with depths of murky incandescence, masses of black rising heavily after eddying sprays of sparks and burning fragments of straw. Where the first arrow had fallen was a volcano of fire with smaller craters bursting out on every hand.

In the distant suburbs were splashes of flame and towers of smoke in a huge, infernal circle, and the watch-fires on the hills were gradually blotted out by a broken, rufous curtain. Now the roofs of palaces stood out in pallid relief against the inky blackness of the streets, and the golden thatch of the Temple of the Sun was gleaming fitfully in the wavering illumination. From the square, at the first outbreak of the fire, had risen shouts of alarm, the startled clamor of trumpets, then the dismal howling of Cañares. But shortly these had ceased, the beleaguered stricken into dumbness by the terrific vengeance with which they were menaced. The city had grown strangely still, as if waiting, aghast, for its fate.

Cristoval gazed in stupefaction, held in a paralysis by thought of the danger to the loved one within the swiftly growing chain of conflagration. It seemed an age before his tense muscles obeyed his will. A suppressed exclamation from Pedro at last dissolved the spell, and with a groan he dashed toward his quarters.

Mocho was approaching, and the cavalier ran against him. "Whither, friend?" demanded the general, detaining him forcibly.

Cristoval made a wild gesture toward the fire. "To arm—into the city—the Ñusta Rava!" He broke away.

Mocho looked after him, dumbfounded, then hastened to his command and called an officer. "Take fifty, Rimachi," he said, hurriedly, "and follow the Viracocha Cristoval. Obey his orders as mine. He goeth into Cuzco in aid of the Ñusta Rava. Go first to his quarters in the Paucar Marca. Speed!"

Rimachi entered Cristoval's apartment and reported his orders. Pedro followed him in. The cook had come at his best speed, but the cavalier was finishing his arming as he entered.

"Wait for me, Cristoval!" he panted, as he donned his corselet.

"Nay!" said Cristoval, latching his helmet and seizing his buckler. "This time we part, good old comrade. Thou hast risked thyself too often for friendship's sake. I go alone. Farewell!" Pedro wrung his extended hand, swearing and almost weeping at being left behind, but before he could protest, Cristoval was gone.

Outside, the whole world to the south seemed aflame. A monstrous, reddened cloud leaped and surged toward the heavens, apparently against the very ramparts of the fortress. The plain, its tents, the towers, the battalions of the garrison, and every inequality of the ground, were as clearly marked in the ruddy, reflected glow as if by dawn. Cristoval paused for an instant, overcome by the terrible magnificence of the spectacle and the grewsome roar and crackle of the fire, which had grown apace in the short time it had taken him to arm; then consigned himself to the Virgin's care and hurried to the southernmost gate, followed by the Antis.

Here the road drops abruptly down the cliff to the terraces of the Colcampata, several hundred feet below. Part of the way was by steps made treacherous by the unusual lights and shadows, and uncertain by the dense smoke drifting from the western suburbs; but Cristoval descended at a run, and was soon at the foot of the declivity. Here he was overtaken by his party, and paused to consider with Rimachi the possible avenues of entry. In front, the nearest buildings were a mass of flames. To the right, he could see the district called Huaca Puncu, already burning fiercely in a score of places. On the left, he remembered, was the stream Tullamayu, and after a brief consultation they hastened across the terraces. Through gardens and over walls, they were presently following a street to the eastward, stumbling in the murk. At the edge of the ravine was a low wall, surmounted in a second, and they rushed down the terraced bank to the stream. Cristoval was harrowed by a fear that the almost solid belt of fire before him would prove impassable. The few gaps were closing momentarily, forming a nearly continuous sheet of leaping, whirling flame whose heat reached even to where he stood. The narrow course of the Tullamayu presented the only breach, and this was already perilous, dense with smoke and illumined by a storm of falling sparks and burning brands. He glanced about at the Antis. Their faces were alight and their eyes gleaming with the fire, but they showed no sign of fear, and with a word to Rimachi, Cristoval started down the stream.

Shortly they were within the fire-belt, heads bent forward, groping through the stinging smoke and rain of embers, blundering and slipping on the water-worn bowlders, under an appalling canopy. The bed of the stream was pent between walls of masonry with a narrow quay along either bank. The structures on both sides were now topped with spouting flames whipped out overhead by the wind in huge streamers and pennons. The sound of the stream was drowned by the roar and snapping of the conflagration, the crash of falling timbers, and the incessant hiss of firebrands showering into the water. The air grew hotter and more stifling, until they breathed in gasps, but pushed on, dashing water over their apparel to save themselves from being burned alive. Panting and floundering, kneeling from time to time to cool his scorching armor and fill his lungs from the lower air, Cristoval led onward.

At length he could see that the glare in advance was growing less. They had gained the inner edge of the fire-zone. A few yards more, and they were in a freer atmosphere and partial darkness, and they halted, leaning against the walls or crouching in the stream to recover from the exhaustion of the ordeal. Cristoval anxiously counted his men. None were wanting, and they groped on, presently passing beneath a bridge. Below was a flight of steps leading to the quay. Cristoval mounted, and motioned the Antis to follow. The air was thick with smoke beaten down by the wind, but still dangerously light from the blazing buildings they had passed, and the cavalier felt the insecurity. A few yards away was the entrance of a street leading westward, somewhat darker by reason of being parallel to the line of fire, and he ran his men into its shadow. Now he wished with fervency that he had a guide; for he learned that neither Rimachi nor his Antis were acquainted with Cuzco.

Cristoval knew where the Amarucancha must lie, and that the street they were on would lead toward it; further than this he was ignorant. He knew, moreover, that the palace stood beside the stream Huatenay, and trusted that, the rivulet once gained, he could find his objective with little difficulty. Once within with his Antis, he could wait for a favorable moment to escape with Rava.

Cristoval pushed forward through the half-dark, straining eyes and ears. Little could be seen but dim walls looming on either side, with a flying drift of smoke above, racing before the wind and weirdly lighted, curling over roofs, and sucked down in ghostly swirls into the street before them. Now, it happened that, deceived by the apparent length of time during which they had struggled down the course of the Tullamayu, Cristoval fancied himself in the lower part of the city. But the street they were following was the one in all Cuzco which should have been avoided. It was the highway leading from the Antisuyu road directly to the great square. It was deserted now, however, and Cristoval pressed rapidly on, passing cavernous doorways of palaces, many of them standing broad open as they had been left by their Spanish occupants when the starting conflagration had hastened them to the open plaza. Cristoval passed them cautiously, peering into the dark courts to make sure there were no lingerers. But all seemed vacant, and save for the murmur of fountains caught occasionally, all were silent.

At a broad street crossing he halted, half disposed to make farther toward lower Cuzco, suspecting from the nearness of the fire, now only a few hundred yards to the north, that he was closer to the square than was prudent. But the brighter illumination of the intersecting street decided him to continue his way. He was about to advance when Rimachi seized his arm. The keener ears of the Indio had caught a sound. The cavalier listened with concentration. From somewhere in the obscurity came the ordered tramp of soldiers and the murmur of voices, but in the confusion of sounds from the fire he was unable to determine the direction. Anxious, above all things, to avoid the mishap of an encounter that would be most certain, whatever the result, to abort his plans, he turned to motion the Antis back into the shadow of the street from which they had emerged, when an abrupt challenge from the darkness ahead left no doubt of the source of the sounds. Standing in the half-light of the crossing, he and the group about him were more plainly visible than he had thought. Before he could effect a retirement, he received a second challenge, and a party advanced from the darkness at a run. It was too late to retreat. A score of pikes and halberds charged into the light. With a shout to his men Cristoval drew and attacked.

The Antis, excited by the conflagration, and maddened by burns, needed but the word. They rushed with a yell that startled even Cristoval by its ferocity, and drove into the Spanish patrol with a savage impetus which would have shaken a regiment.

The fight was terribly brief. Cristoval had hardly flashed his blade in the first collision before the party was swept away from him by the charge of the Antis. The Spaniards recovered, resisted sharply for an instant, then broke for the square with the Antis in hot pursuit.

But a stubborn opposition would have been less disastrous than this victory. Already a trumpet was sounding, alarmingly close at hand. In quick realization, Cristoval rushed after his men, ordering them back, collaring a few whom he was able to overtake, only partly successful in staying the chase. Before he ceased he saw the dim lights of the open square a few steps distant, heard the shouts of the startled Spaniards and the uproar of moving cavalry. The Antis in front, aware of their peril, came flying back, and he joined their retreat just as a party of horse entered the head of the street.

It was a dash, now, for life. Cristoval noted the interval before the trot behind broke into a gallop. Weighted by his armor, his speed was slow, and he heard the Antis pass him in the darkness. The street was clamoring with the din of hoofs, nearing every instant. He stumbled over a prostrate form and almost fell; recovered, and sped on. The fleet Antis had left him far behind, and he was flying alone with death at his back. Now the troop was almost upon him. He was lost!—No! A doorway! He flung himself into its shadow headlong, and the charging column went past with a roar that shook the earth. By the grace of Heaven, he had not been seen. Or, if seen by the foremost troopers, those behind had forced them past, and for a moment he was safe. For a moment only, for infantry would follow; and as the last files thundered by he staggered to his feet and hurried after.

Ahead was the broad thoroughfare where he had stood with Rimachi, and in its light he could see the glint of the helmets of the troop. An instant, and they had vanished into the darkness beyond. Could he cross the lighted space unseen? He was panting with the weight of his steel and the previous exertion, and his pace slackened. When he reached the corner he was stumbling and plunging with weariness, and he paused to breathe and reconnoitre before venturing to cross. Toward the Tullamayu he heard the uproar of the still receding troop, and a glance up and down the lighted street showed him that all had kept on in that direction. But behind was the rushing of many feet. The infantry were following. He dashed across the open, conscious of the fierce glare in the north, already perceptibly more intense, and gained the farther obscurity. He remembered the open doorways, and struggled forward with desperation. As he turned into the shelter of one of them at last, a glance over his shoulder showed him morions gleaming in the firelight at the crossing.

He had strength to swing the ponderous door and place the bar, but no more, and sank down beneath armor that weighed a ton. He lay straining to suppress his heavy breathing that he might listen for the approach of the infantry. He heard them presently, and rose to his knees, gripping his sword. They seemed so long in passing that he fancied they were gathering about the door; and expecting every instant to hear it assaulted, he gained his feet, praying for new strength to fight. But they passed, and the street grew quiet. Still he hearkened, minute after minute, for sounds which might indicate whether the Antis had been struck, until, after what must have been an hour, he heard the troop straggling by on its return to the square. An interval, and a party of the infantry tramped by in the same direction, and he surmised from the smallness of the number that it had divided into squads to search the streets. After this, a welcome silence.

Exhausted, desperate at the catastrophe which had so abruptly blocked his project, the cavalier entered the court to seek the fountain whose plash had been torturing his thirst. The place, evidently one of the numerous palaces, was quite deserted. Doors stood open upon dark chambers, but there was neither light, sound, nor sign of life, and he traversed the dusky courts in solitude.

CHAPTER XXXIV

In the Burning Palace

On the rampart of the Sachsahuaman, apart from his generals, wrapped in his cloak, and shrouded more impenetrably by something which forbade approach; a dark silhouette against a sky wilder and more terrible than words can describe; unspeakably solemn before the havoc wrought at his command, stood the Inca. In his grim silence and immobility, in his relentless wielding of a power little less absolute than that of a god, he took on the sinister majesty of the spectacle his fiat had created.

When flame followed the fall of the first arrow, he had buried his face in his cloak. Slowly lowering his arm, he had looked on with countenance inflexible as bronze while destruction progressed in leaps and bounds. After this, not the tremor of a muscle. To his nobles, quailing and awe-stricken at the sublime horror of the scene, he was never before so much a king.

Such his aspect. For the emotions sternly repressed, but racking him to the soul—what words! The sacred city, the favored of the Sun, the home and the monument of the loving care of a mighty line of monarchs, perishing under his hand. The city whose splendor had been the work of generations of great kings; for whose glory countless thousands of their subjects had toiled, had fought, had died, given by him to demolition!—doomed by the mandate of one who had received the llautu from the profane hand of a ravager; who had suffered the scorn of an ignoble band of licentious and greedy invaders and had lived; who had worn fetters like a criminal and had lain in prison under the eyes of scoffing guards! That he—O, Inti!—that he, still wearing the marks of his bonds like a released slave, should be the destroyer! Could Cuzco but have fallen beneath the hand of a hero, even an enemy, and could he have fallen with it, its defender, he had been worthy to take his place with the shades of his ancestors. But he had himself led the enemy to its palace doors, had seen them plunder its temples, ravish its vestals, and befoul its most sacred spots. And now he was giving Cuzco to the flames! Would the Sun ever rise upon him again?

Ah—but—could he dare to address a prayer to that god while Cuzco remained unpurged? By the great Inti, the fire should do its purifying work! From cottage, palace, and temple, the stench of the Viracocha should be burned! Should the last wall be levelled to the earth, the last stone of its streets upturned, no vestige of their defilement should remain. Cuzco would rise again, and the Viracochas be forgotten. Let the dead Incas look on whilst he wiped out the stain of the ancient city's dishonor and his own!

When at length the sky was graying and he turned away, facing his generals, but seeing none of them, they beheld a countenance aged as by years since he had last spoken. In a night the torture of mind and heart had moulded lines usually beaten in only by the blows of long and hard experience.

At the door of his apartments he dismissed his attendants with a word. But, alas! a king before men, alone he was a mortal man. He knelt and prayed for tears. Resting upon his shoulders, with the burden of an empire, was now the weight of a monstrous tragedy; but upon his heart, the unutterable sorrow of a brother and a lover. Within that dread circle of fire were loved ones, and among them the sweetest of consorts. No man looked upon his grief. No man but can know what his grief must have been.

The sun rose upon a scene of devastation shorn of its splendor. Around the city was a belt of blackened ruins from which rolled a volume of smoke which partly obscured the fiercer burning within. To the westward, the direction from which the wind had blown, this district was broad. The fire had been driven rapidly across the suburbs toward Cuzco proper, and the houses being largely of adobe, the destruction was complete. Below the fortress, in the quarter of the palaces, the fire had to fight its way across the wind, and its advance had been less swift. Here the buildings were of stone, and through breaks in the murk were visible walls intact, surrounding desolate courts with charred skeletons of trees. To the east the city was hidden in the huge surging cloud drifting sluggishly off toward the mountains. From the ramparts little could be seen of the fire except occasional glimpses of flame through the rifts; and as Pedro stumped to and fro on the parapet, fuming and praying, harassed by fears, he could only guess at the perils by which Cristoval was surrounded. Before the sun had lifted above the mountains the Antis began straggling in, smoked, scorched, and many of them wounded, bearing the tale of their encounter. Ten or more did not return. Rimachi was one of the last to come, and having reported to Mocho, the latter sought the cook with the news of the probable fate of the cavalier. Pedro made no reply, but turning with his face painfully twitching, he hastened to his quarters—to be seen no more that day.

Once more to Cristoval. Assuring himself that he was the sole occupant of the building, he explored the several courts for its exits, and found, in the rear, the door of a passage which led to the broad street he had recently crossed. This might serve as a line of retreat. Patrols were still moving in the streets, and fixing the location of the passage among the intricacies of dark chambers and courts, he sought next, like a prudent soldier, for the kitchens and larder. This quest was difficult, for the operation of making a light, even could he have found a lamp, would have demanded more time than he could spare. Trusting to his sense of smell, blunted though it was by smoke, he wandered from one room to another, his steps, the rustle of his armor, and the clank of his sword rousing uncanny echoes from the lofty walls of stone. At last he stumbled upon a table still spread with an abandoned supper, and groping among the viands, he hastily made a meal.

A glance at the sky from the court showed a noticeable advance of the fire, though the direction of the wind held it in check and carried the sparks and brands off to the eastward. While he stood he heard the clatter of troopers in the street; but it died away presently, and he made his way to the postern. At the end of the passage he reconnoitred the street, now more brightly illumined than before, and was about to leave his hiding, when two horsemen trotted into the light and halted at the crossing, their lance-heads glittering in the firelight. They were too near to leave a possibility of his quitting the passage unseen. Furthermore, he recognized the unwelcome fact that they were there en vedette, and would remain. Evidently, the attack upon the patrol had made the Spaniards vigilant. Cristoval set his teeth. Here was a situation, by the fighting saint! Trapped in a building which would be afire before many hours, with a prospective choice of being burned alive, or run through by a Spanish lance in the effort to escape! For a bad quarter of an hour he watched the troopers with an interest his countrymen had seldom roused in him before, consigning them in vigorous whispers to divers painful fates, until, observing one of them hitch himself in his saddle into a lounging seat, he gave it up and groped back into the palace.

There was one other exit: the door by which he entered. The darkness of that street might favor. He would try it. In the main court nearest the entrance was the fountain, a pool of some ten feet in diameter with steps descending to the water a yard below the level, and surrounded by seats and parterres full of shrubbery. He stopped there and drank deep, for the fire and cinders would not out from his throat. Then to the door. He laid aside his buckler and put hand to the bar. Cautiously now, Cristoval; for with sentinels near, this business should be of an inconspicuous kind. The timber stuck slightly, then yielded, slipped from his grasp, and fell with a crash loud as the crack of doom.

It was answered at once by the sound of a horse spurred to a trot, and snatching up his buckler, Cristoval retreated to the parterres. He gained the shelter just as the trooper pushed open the door. He rode in and halted near the entrance; peered about in the obscurity, called twice or thrice, then rode slowly about the enclosure, looking into the darkness of the open doors. Cristoval watched him, praying that he might push on into the interior courts, or that he might dismount. In the latter event he should find what he sought with a vengeance, and that horse would change owners. But the trooper soon returned, scanning the parterres as he passed. At the entrance he halted and surveyed the place again, only half satisfied. Finally he rode out. Cristoval followed cautiously, to have a look at the street. No hope there. The soldier had taken position a few yards away, and there remained, while the prisoner returned to the fountain and had another bad quarter of an hour. There was no choice but to stay where he was and pray that the sentinels might be withdrawn at daylight, or be driven from their posts by the approaching fire. Then, provided he was not roasted to death in the meantime, he might escape.

He sat through the night, going at intervals to the doors in faint hope, returning with disquietude more profound, to watch the relentless nearing of the conflagration. At last came the dawn, more depressing in its ghastly light than the night. He stretched himself beneath the shrubbery. As the morning advanced the wind veered farther to the south, and this, he hoped, would retard the progress of the fire in his direction until the evening.

Cristoval was blessed with a sanguine temperament, and was, moreover, like most men who follow peril, a fatalist. Death had stood so often beside him, and had so often withheld the blow, that he had lost the appreciation of danger while he could look forward to another minute of life. Now, there were hours before him, at least, and faith that good fortune or resourcefulness would open a way of deliverance. Therefore, why not be comfortable while comforts were at hand? He remembered the spread table. He crept from concealment, went to the door for another look at the sentinels, and entered the dining-hall. He had seated himself when he perceived that the tableware was silver. He rose abruptly. "Oho! that meaneth the tenant will return, else the tenant is not a Spaniard." He selected a generous double handful of the victuals and returned to the fountain. Going to another chamber, he brought forth a rug which he deposited beneath the thickest of the shrubbery, and there made his breakfast calmly.

Now began a weary watch, broken by short spells of uneasy sleep and startled awakenings. Once, roused by voices in the court and hurried steps, he saw two Cañares, evidently servants, enter the dining-hall. They came out with the silver, just as a cavalier, a stranger to Cristoval, emerged from another room with a bundle of papers and wearing apparel. The man was in full armor and looked haggard and anxious, but seemed intent only upon the movements of the Cañares, whom he ordered impatiently to hasten. He followed them out at length, and again the court was quiet. After a glance at the whirling bank of smoke to the north, Cristoval stretched himself out once more and soon was slumbering.

Toward midday he started out of a tortured dream and sat up. The sun was high in the north, rushing, as it seemed to his bewildered eyes, madly across the sky, a mere disc of burnished copper, now deepening into bronze, now flashing into a brazen glare through the scurrying cloud, but unutterably strange and unnatural. Before he had fully gained his startled senses, he was on his feet and had crossed himself a dozen times, only to grin blankly at his own consternation. Another instant revealed the real peril, grave enough. The flames seemed leaping from the roofs across the street, and the sinister roar and crackle were terribly distinct. Cristoval crossed himself again, took up sword and buckler, and ran to the door. The roofs opposite were untouched, but their immunity would be short. The crossing where the sentinels had stood was vacant. A glance in the opposite direction promptly dashed his hope. The street partly cleared of smoke for a moment, and at its foot were cannoneers and one of Candia's guns covering the bridge across the Tullamayu. They were looking alertly toward the suburbs, and one held a lighted match. Cristoval rushed to the door in the rear. A survey from the end of the passage was sufficient. At the first corner to the south was a cluster of pikemen, evidently part of a column which occupied the cross-street. The prisoner slowly regained his concealment. For the next hour he gloomily watched the fire, until, convinced by the rate of its approach that it was farther away than he had thought, he dozed again. While he slept, the wind shifted to the north.

Sometime in the afternoon—late, it seemed from the uncertain light—he was awakened by the report of a falconet, and smiled grimly. "The Inca's forces are attacking," he muttered. "May no man of them fail to duck in time—and may they come this far! It would—Mother of God!"

A crackling sound, heard vaguely, had started him to his feet. He struck aside the foliage. There was no sky!—only a flying mass of gray and white, near enough, it looked, to be touched with his hand. The palace was afire. At a bound he was clear of the shrubbery. The roof over the entrance was a solid flame. While he stood, transfixed, it swept forward right and left with the speed of wind. He dashed through a shower of fire to the doors. The building opposite was a furnace. "Bang!" snapped the falconet at the foot of the street.

He rushed to the rear, racing with the flames roaring along the roofs on both sides of the court, and reached the passage, now full of smoke. From its mouth he saw the pikemen looking toward him at the fire. Should he venture a dash to cut through their lines? Hopeless, hopeless! But to be burned alive! Yet the main court was broad. Would he not be out of reach of the flames in its centre? It was the one chance. A flash of fire overhead drove him back into the palace. The passages and rooms were dense and stifling, and once he lost his way; found it again, and crept the rest of the distance to the court on his hands and knees; reached it, blind, and half stupefied.

Gasping and choking, he dragged himself to the shrubbery, only half conscious of the leaping, blazing tumult surrounding him. The entrance had disappeared, curtained by burning thatch fallen from the eaves. The air was growing hot, and the open doorways which before had been obscure, now showed a dull illumination. For a few minutes the atmosphere was fairly free to breathe, but as the roof timbers began to give way the rooms filled with burning straw from above, and great spurts and volumes of smoke rolled into the court from the doors and windows.

Cristoval lay with face pressed to the earth for its coolness and the stratum of purer air. Overhead the leaves were shrivelling and drooping. Burning wisps of thatch, then sheaves and armfuls, were soaring upward in the blast and strewing the ground about him. He was protected by his armor, but in danger of suffocation, and his breathing grew momentarily more labored, until every inspiration was like a draught of fire itself.

Cristoval was coughing and breathing stertorously, sweating in his mail. Nothing was visible now but the hot, white shroud through which the nearest shrubs showed like dim skeletons. Strangely, at times they were all in motion, going round and round; vanishing for moments, to reappear slowly and resume their wavering reel. He wondered at it very little, occupied mostly with the effort to breathe, the pain of it, and the torture of the heat. He had ceased to think, connectedly, of anything; but a series of rapidly moving pictures traversed his brain, chiefly of Rava and Xilcala, with others interspersed, of no relevancy. His head was aching, and singing wildly—or, was it the whistling of wind through a ship's rigging? It was that, for he felt the roll and plunge. Madre!—dreaming! He saw Pedro, then Father Tendilla, then Rogelio. Something was burrowing beneath his chest, squeaking pitifully, and roused him. A coy—guinea pig! Another scurried past, and languidly he wondered whither. Toward the fountain! Jesu! At once his mind cleared. Why had he not thought of it before? He began crawling toward the water, reanimated by hope which, but now, had gone. Slowly, for his way was strewn with fire, and his steel of crushing weight. Miles away, the pool; hardly to be attained, but reached at last, and he rolled in at full length.

The shock revived him, but before he could struggle to his knees he thought he must drown. Once upright, he found the air cooler and far less stifling. As he knelt, the water came to his breast, and now he was safe at least from being burned to death, if not from asphyxiation. It was minutes before his thoughts became connected, and then he saw the coys cowering on the steps in front of him.

Beyond the rim of the pool nothing could be seen for the smoke. On every side was the roar of the burning and the muffled crash of falling beams. The air was full of dropping brands, spitting and hissing as they touched the water, or starting frenzied squeaks when they fell upon the rodents. Moved by their common suffering with himself, he dashed water over them with his hands, only half sensible of the mercy of the impulse.

The smoke thickened from minute to minute, and the heat, even in the pool, grew maddening; but by frequent immersions of his head and face he retained his senses, wondering in a stupid, dreamy way, how long he could endure.

At last, daylight was waning. The thatch had burned out by this, and the smoke become less dense, permitting occasional glimpses of the flames still tossing about him. He was growing chilled and stiffened by long immersion, and rose to his feet from time to time, first dropping his visor to protect his face. Through the obscurity he could see the dull red of the doorways, and the walls with their topping of fire, but as evening came on the heat grew less intense, and he found that he could stand, dipping at intervals to cool his armor.

Night fell and grew late. The worst of the fire had passed to the southward. Around him the flames barely reached above the blackened walls, though the glare from the doors revealed the desolation of the court. It was hideous and infernal, and he was seized with a frantic longing to be away from its horror, but hours dragged before he could even quit the pool. Slowly, however, the fire subsided, and he mounted the steps unheeded by his fellow refugees. Now he could see the entrance, with fragments of the doors hanging to the hinges and still feebly burning. He would attempt it.

He found his sword and shield, among the leafless stalks of the bushes, and after a final plunge in the pool, left the court. Filling his lungs, he bolted through the door and into the street. It was full of embers, starting into flame and swirled about by eddies of hot wind. He could see but a short distance ahead, but with a hurried prayer he dashed forward through the stifling heat. The end of the street was not far, but before he had reached it his feet and legs were blistered. In his struggles for breath, and in the dread doubt whether he would attain his goal, he hardly felt the pain, but rushed blindly on, ploughing up a spray of fire in his passage. At length, the foot of the street, and he staggered into the open, across the quay, and down the steps to the stream.

At the farther end of the bridge was the falconet with its gunners. The fire had not crossed the rivulet, but the heat had driven them to the opposite side. One of the cannoneers beheld Cristoval rushing through the fiery dusk of the street, and his affrighted exclamation drew the attention of his mates. They saw the arch-fiend, clad in red-hot steel, with blazing eyes, and brandishing a sword of flame, charging toward them through a burst of fire. There was one gasping yell, and they fled into the darkness.

CHAPTER XXXV

The Lurking Morisco

During the half-hour it took the sergeant commanding the gun to reassemble his panic-stricken cannoneers, Cristoval was passing slowly down the Tullamayu, secure in its shadows. In his thankfulness for escape from death his scorched feet and legs seemed naught, and he was eager only to pass the fire ahead, cross the city to the other stream, and find the Amarucancha. To find the Amarucancha; for not an instant did his purpose flag, nor would while he had strength to creep.

He reached the point where the stream is bridged by the Rimac Pampa, climbed a stairway, and found himself at the edge of that square. The entire district south and east had burned the night before, and the ruins were still smouldering, with small fires here and there in the débris lighting up the plaza, but rendering its greater extent the more obscure. To the north-east, the suburbs of Toco Cachi and Munay Cenca were burning fiercely, but the advance of the conflagration thence had been retarded by the wind, so that between the burning zone and the Tullamayu lay an area yet untouched, while the fire which had swept over him was now in the rear. In the west was a huge, roseate bank of smoke, rolling upward in colossal and endless transformation. Overhead were fragments of sky, densely black, with sickly stars briefly seen, then extinguished by the pallid fleece whirled and driven by the wind. Everywhere above the horizon, a stupendous activity impressive in its silence.

Cristoval turned from it oppressed, to listen and reconnoitre before venturing from shelter. About him, gloom and stillness profound, the desolation of vacant streets, the mournfulness of abandonment; and over all, a wan, unnatural twilight. He felt the weight of loneliness and a vague dread of the shadowy thoroughfares and sombre buildings. He shook it off with resolution, and stole out into the street. Not far ahead an intersecting way admitted a narrow illumination from the north. He was within fifty paces of this when a dim figure crossed the light and vanished in the darkness beyond. It appeared and disappeared so quickly and silently that he was uncertain lest he had been deceived by a swirl of smoke. He paused uneasily, unresolved whether to advance or go back. "No Spaniard, that," he reflected, "and cierto, not a sentinel! A mere rag of a figure—if not a rag of mine imagination. But what an unholy, shivery manner of gait!—a flit, and 't was gone. Murder! I had liefer seen a pikeman." He stood for a moment peering and hearkening, then advanced with drawn sword.

Arriving at the strip of light, he crossed it hastily, and halted by the wall. Farther up the street was another lighted spot, and he watched it with vigilance. Again the form, seen for an instant, and lost in the gloom. Now, Cristoval's courage was proof as his own mail against tangible danger, but volatile as ether before the uncanny or mysterious. The fleeting form was both. The cavalier was daunted, and admitted it to himself. But he braced himself with a sign of the cross and stole forward. "After all," he muttered, "belike 't is naught but some poor devil of a native, burned out and homeless. But the fiend take a man who moveth with so ghastly locomotion! Neither a walk, trot, nor canter. Anyway, he seemeth to have as little appetite for me as I for him, and man or spook, I'll not crowd him, I swear it!"

At the next corner he halted, inspecting the dimly lighted street for signs of soldiery, but no living being moved. The spectre-like stranger had vanished. While the cavalier stood, he heard distant cavalry. It was wholesome and earthly at least; and although it called for caution, yet it was in some sort reassuring, and he went on in greater ease of mind. A few minutes later he entered another square flanked on the left by a large edifice recognizable by the glow on its gilded roof as the Temple of the Sun. He had his bearings, and knew that the Huatenay was not far beyond. The plaza was the ancient Coricancha, or Place of Gold.

Half-way across he heard horses once more, approaching, and not distant. The great door of the temple stood open. He hurried to its shelter as a patrol of cavalry trotted into the square. They were coming in his direction, and he entered the building. The darkness was absolute, but opposite was another door, faintly lighted by the reflection from the heavens. He stole toward it with reluctance, awed by the vastness of the hall, whose walls sent back sepulchral echoes of his furtive tread. High up indistinctly outlined windows revealed the loftiness of the interior, which seemed to be unceiled. The place was lugubrious, as if tenanted by ghosts of votaries of the ancient faith, mourning its desecration. So thought Cristoval, and hastened his steps—then stopped. There had been a movement in the doorway in front of him: a mere blur, and gone, noiseless as a shadow. There was a trickling chilliness under his back-plate, and again he made a sign of the cross. The place was unholy—accursed by pagan rites. He must out of it! Should it be to face the patrol, or—the other? The open air of the court was nearer, and he quickened his pace to gain it, assailed by a multitude of whispered reverberations; chased, as he knew, by devils, spooks, goblins, and lemures.

In the court, he was sweating, but cold. It was bare, ghostly, and surrounded by buildings with broad, open doors into which he did not look as he sped across toward a gate that stood ajar. Outside, he breathed more freely. He was in a garden with trees and shrubbery, and these, even in the dark, are always friendly. There were avenues, but the ground had been upturned by his countrymen for buried treasure, and he could follow none. He turned across what had been a lawn, descending from terrace to terrace, burdened by the sense of being watched by the lurking stranger; nor paused until he had placed distance between himself and the unhallowed temple. Now he could hear the ripple of a stream, and knew that he was at the Huatenay; but kept on, looking for a stout bush he could have at his back, and with a vigilant outlook for the other tenant of the garden. He was now fully aware of his burns, but dared not remove a jambe to ease them. He seated himself presently, but after a minute's rest the sensation of being under espionage became unendurable. It chafed him, and with the irritation of his burning feet and legs, roused a bloodthirsty desire to hunt the lurker and determine whether he was substance or shadow. He thought better of it.

A few minutes, now, would bring him to the Amarucancha, and impatience pushed him on. He had gained the lowest terrace when the mysterious form appeared again, directly in his path, a hundred feet away. It rose as if out of the earth, retreated a few paces, and vanished into the shadow of the gully, leaving Cristoval in dismay.

"Santa Madre!" he gasped, and stood irresolute, wishing with ardor for a crucifix. The figure was so wholly spectral that the thought of following it into the darkness started his courage oozing as quickly as it did the perspiration. Yet there was no help for it unless to return through the temple. The stout cavalier was in a wavering frame of mind. Then it stole over him that this shadowy creature was interposing between him and Rava. He sprang down the bank with an oath. Were it Satan himself he would dispute such hindrance.

He stumbled among the bowlders, straining his eyes for a sight of the figure, furious to test its reality. But he plunged forward resolutely. Above the temple he came to a stairway leading to the quay, and mounted it, intending, if the streets were quiet, to leave the stream. As he raised head and shoulders above the parapet, an arrow, coming with terrific force, struck the bars of his lifted visor and splintered with a crash that made his ears ring within his helmet. At the same instant the figure rose a few yards ahead and sped away through the darkness. Notwithstanding the shock, Cristoval's dread vanished in a flash. "Aha! thou flitting, gliding, misty son of an imp of perdition, then thou 'rt real!" He dropped his visor. "By the saints! 't is a burden off my mind. I thought thee a ghost, but that was no ghostly arrow, my word for it! And 't was good archery. Bien! I'll keep thee in mind until I can teach thee thou 'rt shooting at a friend." Convinced now that the stranger was a native bent on vengeance on his own account, Cristoval descended again and pushed on up the stream, infinitely relieved in spirit. But thereafter he kept his visor closed.

At length the black buildings on either bank came to an end at the great square, and with beating heart the cavalier recognized the pile on the right as the Amarucancha. He crept cautiously up the steps by which the Inca and Mayta had descended on the night of their attempted escape. Here he could look out upon the plaza, so near that he heard the Spaniards' voices. The fire had eaten from the direction of the Sachsahuaman to its margin, and like the Rimac Pampa, it was partly illuminated by burning ruins. In the middle were awnings and tents occupied by his beleaguered countrymen. Near the camp was the picket line with the steeds saddled, and in front of it, a detachment standing to horse, ready for instant action. Cristoval took it in at a glance, then his eyes sought the palace before him. Immediately opposite was a door. Would it be locked? Locked, no doubt!—and would he dare to knock? First he would try its fastenings. Cristoval was shaking at the knees, and so intent that he had forgotten prudence. He was about to steal across the quay when he was arrested by the tread of an approaching sentinel. The cavalier retreated down the steps with a flash of sudden heat over his body. Ten thousand devils! Here was a condition unforeseen. Standing in the water and leaning against the shadowed wall, he thought with diligence and many whispered interjections. With the square so near he could not overcome the sentinel without an alarm. The attempt might serve as a last resort; but he put it aside to debate a hundred impracticabilities. After a time he crept up the steps again and stole a look at the soldier. The latter was keeping close to the palace wall, and for a pikeman his vigilance seemed preternatural. Had he divined his surveillance by a pair of watchful eyes in a head simmering with plans for his quick extinction!—but he had not. He paced so many paces to the south, turned with a glance at the sky; paced so many more to the north, turned with a glance at the sky; and so for an hour, when he challenged the relief.

Meanwhile, Cristoval descended and stood meditating furiously. Assuredly the chance for entrance here was slight. He picked his way carefully down the stream, ascended by the first flight of steps to the opposite bank, and started toward the square in the shadow of the buildings. At its edge he descried another sentinel, and turned back. At a bridge passed going up, he crossed the rivulet. At the farther side he glanced back up the street toward the western line of fire, now sweeping rapidly forward, and once more caught sight of the flitting figure crossing the light, slinking toward the plaza, but lost at once in the darkness. "Aha! my friend," muttered Cristoval, "thou 'rt off the scent. Keep off it, thou heathen, or I may warm thy legs with the flat of my blade."

He moved up the quay with a slight hope of finding an unguarded door into the palace. Twenty paces more and he was startled by a long-drawn yell of agony from the direction of the square. The stranger had attacked a sentinel. "Holy Mother!" he exclaimed, "the skulking archer hath scored."

The whispered words had not been said before a second cry arose, fiercely exultant, "Allah il Allah!" Cristoval started at the words, and crossed himself.

The cry was answered by a shout and a rush of soldiers. Cristoval glanced about for a stairway to descend to the stream. None at hand, and no time to search. He dropped his buckler over the parapet, lowered himself by his hands, and let go. An instant to regain his shield, and he fled down the rocky bottom as a platoon galloped along the edge of the square, divided at the quay, and a party clattered toward him, following the bank on his right. It divided again at the first street, but as he blundered on through the darkness a squad passed him, going down the stream. The square was in an uproar.

Far off somewhere Cristoval heard the cry again, "Allah il Allah!" and stopped. "José, as I'm a Christian!" He reached the temple garden, blown by the flight, and threw himself upon the bank, nearer despair than he had been since entering the city. Only a miracle would admit him to the Amarucancha.

He lay for an hour listening to the patrols, now near, now far, before he rose heavily and looked about. It was necessary to seek a shelter for the coming day; but where he should find security at once from the fire, from Spaniards, and from the equally hostile Morisco, was a question which taxed him to answer. He now had a wholesome dread of buildings, and finally decided upon the garden itself, whose thickets would afford concealment against any but a systematic search.

He found a coppice on one of the upper terraces; and having removed his jambes and sollerets, bandaged his blistered feet with his torn-up kerchief, and crawled into the lair. Physically tortured by burns, mentally by anxiety, he lay broad awake until after sunrise, watching the advancing fire, laboring with the problem before him, and wondering at the presence and hostility of José.

It was late in the day when he awoke and looked out. A strong westerly wind was blowing, and he saw at once that the conflagration was making rapid headway toward the quarter of the palaces. Would reach it by nightfall, if not before. He groaned at his helplessness, forgot his pain, forgot the hunger and thirst now assailing him, and lay the day through, feverishly watching the progress of destruction.

The hours dragged. The air was hot, dry, and stinging with the reek of burning. His throat was parched, his lips split and bleeding, and his face, from the heat in the palace, was raw and so badly swollen that his eyes were almost closed. His burns were maddening. But all his torture of body was a trifle, was nothing, to the agony of beholding the inexorable approach of the fire to the Amarucancha.

By evening he was feverish, and lay reënacting every minute circumstance of the preceding day and nights; went through new struggles quite as real and of worse torment; and suffered horrors unspeakable.

When night fell he awoke bewildered, unable for a time to untangle the actual from his delirium, and lay staring at the ruddy light, straining to comprehend its meaning. It came like a flash, and he sat up, groping for his arms. Greaved and shod, he staggered out, aching and giddy. His first glance was toward the north.—God of Heaven! The Amarucancha! The fire had crossed the stream!

The temple loomed black against an appalling background of flame. He reeled and went upon his knees, weak with fear; was up and rushing forward, crashing through shrubbery, colliding blindly with tree-trunk and branch, until he reached the court; across it, and into the hall of the temple, its ghostly terrors forgotten. Through the entrance streamed a broad light from the Coricancha. The centre of the city was a vast furnace, a hell, with flames leaping and whirling with the roar of breaking surf.

The long night which followed seemed as unreal in its horror as his delirium. Cristoval went fire-mad.

When he came to his senses, hours later, it was as if awakening from a hideous dream. He had indistinct memories of insane dashes into flame-swept streets, beneath infernal, incandescent canopies, past doorways belching red-hot blasts; of terrible repulse and flights for life; of renewed attempts, and bewilderment in fiery labyrinths whence escape seemed impossible; of weeping, laughing, and shouting frantically for Rava while he battled; of a long detour, later, through dark, fuliginous thoroughfares, hot and stifling as ovens; of finding himself wallowing in a stream, drinking and praying; and at last, of bursting from the darkness upon a squad of startled soldiers and of fighting with the fury of a maniac. How he escaped he knew not; but while he fought, welcoming wounds that seemed to ease his burns, he heard again the shrill, weird cry, "Allah il Allah!" saw a pikeman fall with an arrow in his brain, then another and another; and fled alone, unpursued.

After this, dim wanderings through a Cimmerian wilderness of streets, black, desolate, stinking of dead embers, and of eternal length and intricacy, but cool. At last he heard a fountain; staggered into a ruined patio, drank deep, and dropped into the nearest corner, asleep in an instant.

High noon roused him to consciousness of suffering. His swollen eyes would hardly open, and as he moved and groaned he heard a voice beside him:—

"Allah akbar! I thought thou wouldst sleep to thy death. Hola! Canst see, Cristoval? Dost know me?"

Cristoval's smarting eyes came open with a start, and he stared up at a lank figure in burnoose and turban, bending over him. "José!" he exclaimed, thickly, his lips cracking with the effort, and he sat up, feeling for his sword.

"No need for that, my friend!" said the old armorer. "But look thou, Cristoval: call me not José. A curse be upon the name! I am Abul Hassan Zegri. Be thankful that 't is Abul Hassan Zegri, and not one of thy countrymen. What, Cristoval! Dost doubt me? Man, had it been my purpose to do thee harm, I would have saved thee the trouble of awakening!"

Cristoval regarded him distrustfully a moment, and offered his hand. He was in a roofless, blackened apartment, off the court he had entered in search of water. The armorer had dragged him from the fountain into better concealment.

"Canst drink?" asked Abul Hassan, tendering a smoke-stained vessel.

The cavalier drank with avidity, nodding his thanks. Never a draught more delicious; never a drinker more grateful. The Morisco watched him in glum silence, brought more water, and more, and still not enough. "Ho! Let that suffice, Cristoval," he said, at length.

Cristoval groaned, but yielded. "Madre!" he mumbled, conscious of his weakness, "what aileth me?"

"What aileth thee! Thou 'rt a fool—a madcap," replied the Morisco, bluntly. "What hare-brained motive hath possessed thee, Cristoval? For two nights and a day I've seen thee in the city, careering like a santon pursued of devils."

"Por Dios!" growled Cristoval; "thou wast not far from putting an estoppel upon it, Abul Hassan."

"When I split an arrow on thy casque? I did not know thee, Cristoval, save as a Spaniard—and thou hadst followed me. For what purpose?"

"I was not in purpose to follow thee. It was a chance."

"Then it might have been a costly chance, for I had it in mind to kill thee, until I found thee killing pikemen. What dost seek in Cuzco?"

"The Ñusta Rava."

"Ah!" Abul Hassan studied him narrowly, then asked, "Hast friends outside, among the Indios?" Cristoval nodded.

"As soon as thou canst move we'll seek them," said the other.

The cavalier shook his head. "I must find the Ñusta Rava," he answered, with resolution.

"Galimatias! Bosh! Thou'lt find the garrote. Dost know how long thou hast lain thus among these cinders? This is the second day. I found thee yester morning. But, canst eat?"

The Morisco had a pouch well supplied, and the cavalier broke his long fast. He wasted no time in words while a morsel remained of his prudent allowance; but finished and refreshed, he asked, "And thou, Abul Hassan, why art thou in Cuzco?"

"I am here to be near mine enemies."

"Thine enemies!"

"The enemies of my race," said Abul Hassan, with a quick flash in his eyes; then, regarding the cavalier steadily, he added, with increasing energy, "and of my faith! For, hear me, Cristoval, I am no more a Christian! I am a follower of Mahomet—an unworthy Mussulman whom Allah hath punished for his apostasy!"

Cristoval stared at him, horrified, and crossed himself. At the gesture the old man spat upon the ground in sudden rage.

"Ah! The Cross!" he cried, his face drawn in repugnance. "The Cross! The sign accursed! The sign which hath been stamped upon every atrocity the minds of fiends—of Christians—can invent! The sign under which murder, torture of body and soul, wreck of hearts and minds, have been works of piety! I scorn it, spurn it, and hate it with a living hatred!" He spat again and turned away, his gaunt form trembling with passion.

Cristoval had gained his feet, suspecting a madman. Abul Hassan controlled himself, and faced the cavalier. "Forget the words, Cristoval—if thou canst. I would not offend thee, but—I have suffered much. Behold me, an old and broken man, but hunted, hunted! Once I had loved ones— O, Allah, thy wrath is hard to bear!"

He bowed his head, and Cristoval said hastily: "Say no more, old friend! I owe thee much, and thy words shall not stand between us—nor thy faith, for, by Heaven! I've known other gallant men who were not Christians. Let it pass, Abul Hassan." Cristoval changed the subject, and presently the Morisco resumed his usual composure.

All that day they remained in hiding. Food and rest restored some of the cavalier's strength, but realizing the futility of a hope to accomplish his purpose in his present condition of body, he agreed reluctantly to the wisdom of leaving the city. Late in the evening they started, but though they were in the western suburbs, Cristoval was so crippled by his burns that notwithstanding his companion's assistance they were long in clearing the ruined outskirts. In the open country at last, the Morisco left him concealed while he went to the Peruvian lines for help. He returned with a hamaca and bearers, and Cristoval was borne to a hamlet among the foothills on the western margin of the Bolson of Cuzco. Here they found simple medicaments, and when Pedro appeared, two days later, he found his friend much as he had come upon him in Xilcala.

The cook stumped into the cottage without a word. Cristoval was lying, smeared to his eyes in grease, with bandaged limbs, and Pedro looked him over with great severity.

"Well, stew me!" he exclaimed, with bitterness. "If thou 'rt not done brown, Cristoval, then I'm no cook to judge! Broiled to a turn! Roasted with a crust!—and a complexion like a boiled ham in the summer sun. Damnation, man! thou'rt overdone, dost not know it?" He paused, regarded the cavalier for a moment with increased sternness, then resumed reproachfully: "Ah, but no! Thou hadst no need for Pedro, an experienced cook who would have taken thee out in time, and mayhap saved the gravy—but must go and cook thyself, like a bedeviled Phoenix!" He paused again, and Cristoval smiled slightly, waiting for the storm to pass.

"Grin!" blurted the cook, with irritation. "Thou 'rt as cheerful-looking as a smoked herring. But what the fiend dost think I have had to grin about these several days? 'T is the second time I've mourned for thee as dead, and twice too often!"

Cristoval extended a bandaged hand, and presently the severity faded from Pedro's countenance. He touched the hand, swore a little, and seated himself. "Well, curse it! I'm glad to see thee once more, Cristoval, cooked or raw. But I tell thee, old friend, my belt hath gone loose from worriment!"

CHAPTER XXXVI

The Barricades

The fire had burned itself out and left two-thirds of Cuzco in ruins long before Cristoval was in condition to mount. In the meantime, it had required all of Pedro's persuasion, entreaty, expostulation, and threats, to keep him on his couch. Haunted by the conflagration and visions of Rava in the perils which he had just escaped, he taxed the cook's abundant patience to extremity. The Spaniards' daily sorties were inflicting heavy losses upon the Inca's devoted troops, most of whom, for the first time confronting cavalry and firearms, were led by ignorance into useless sacrifice. When Pedro brought accounts of these engagements the cavalier groaned and fumed, fumed and groaned, and at last declared vehemently that he would lie inactive no longer. The brunt of his unrest fell upon Pedro, for the old Morisco, having seen him in good hands, had stolen away with replenished quiver, to lurk among the ruins and spread death and terror among the ancient enemies of Granada.

One day, intelligence came that the Sachsahuaman had been stormed by the Spaniards and taken. Juan Pizarro had lost his life leading the assault. Mocho and his Antis had been relieved a few days before, and Mayta, the new commander of the fortress, driven with a remnant of its defenders into the citadel, and seeing that the place was lost, had wrapped himself in his cloak and plunged from the battlements to death.

Pedro brought the tidings,—a double sorrow to Cristoval, for Juan Pizarro had been steadfastly his friend. The cavalier rose abruptly. "Look thou, Pedro! To-morrow I ride. These poor devils of Indios are throwing brave lives away for want of knowledge. 'T is as if they were children dashing themselves over a precipice without warning. They know not even where a Spaniard is vulnerable in his armor. Why, man, were they mine enemies 't would sicken me to see them fight at such hopeless odds! And now, with Juan dead, Rava will be more than ever in danger. I go to-morrow."

Pedro scrubbed his forehead vigorously and growled: "Cristoval, thou 'rt an unringed bull-calf, and I'm of a notion to choke-pear and strait-jacket thee. What canst do in thy condition? Thou'rt sore-footed from thy burns, and wilt shed thy blisters like a lizard his skin before thou 'rt in the saddle an hour. Thou 'rt bad enough, and not over-amusing as it is; but what wilt be with legs like two peeled carrots?"

"No worse than now," replied Cristoval, doggedly, "and at least not idle."

"But what dost think to do?—to fight thy way to the Ñusta Rava?"