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- Author: R. M. Ballantyne
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“And this is the result of war!” muttered the young man, at last breaking silence.
“Only one phase of it,” replied a voice at his side, in tones of exceeding bitterness; “you must imagine a few corpses of slaughtered men and women and children, if you would have a perfect picture of war.”
The speaker was the Peruvian, who had quietly approached to say that if they wished to reach the next resting-place before dark it was necessary to proceed without delay.
“But perhaps,” he added, “you do not intend to go further. No doubt this was to have been the end of your journey had all been well. It can scarcely, I fear, be the end of it now. I do not wish to intrude upon your sorrows, Mr Armstrong, but my business will not admit of delay. I must push on, yet I would not do so without expressing my profound sympathy, and offering to aid you if it lies in my power.”
There was a tone and look about the man which awoke a feeling of gratitude and confidence in the forlorn youth’s heart.
“You are very kind,” he said, “but it is not in the power of man to help me. As your business is urgent you had better go and leave me. I thank you for the sympathy you express—yet stay. You cannot advance much further to-night, why not encamp here? There used to be a small hut or out-house not far-off, in which my father spent much of his leisure. Perhaps the—the—”
“Patriots!” suggested the Peruvian.
“The scoundrels,” said Lawrence, “may have spared or overlooked it. The hut would furnish shelter enough, and we have provisions with us.”
After a moment’s reflection the Peruvian assented to this proposal, and, leaving the ruins together, they returned to the road, where they found the Indian girl holding the youth’s mule as well as that of her companion.
Hastening forward, Lawrence apologised for having in the agitation of the moment allowed his mule to run loose.
“But I forgot,” he added, “of course you do not understand English.”
“Try Spanish,” suggested the Peruvian, “she knows a little of that.”
“Unfortunately I have forgotten the little that I had picked up here when a boy,” returned Lawrence, as he mounted, “if I can manage to ask for food and lodging in that tongue, it is all that I can do.”
They soon reached an opening in the bushes at the roadside, and, at the further end of a natural glade or track, observed a small wooden hut thatched with rushes. Towards this young Armstrong led the way.
He was evidently much affected, for his lips were compressed, and he gave no heed to a remark made by his companion. Entering the hut, he stood for some time looking silently round.
It was but a poor place with bare walls; a carpenter’s bench in one corner, near to it a smith’s forge, one or two chairs, and a few tools;—not much to interest a stranger but to Lawrence full of tender associations.
“It was here,” he said in tones of deepest pathos, “that my father showed me how to handle tools, and my mother taught me to read from the Word of God.”
Looking at his companions he observed that the large dark eyes of the Indian girl were fixed on him with an expression of unmistakable sympathy. He felt grateful at the moment, for to most men sympathy is sweet when unobtrusively offered whether it come from rich or poor—civilised or savage.
“Come, this will do,” said the Peruvian, looking round, “if you will kindle a fire on the forge, Senhor Armstrong, Manuela will arrange a sleeping chamber for herself in the closet I see there, while I look after the beasts.”
He spoke in cheering tones, which had the effect of rousing the poor youth somewhat from his despondency.
“Well, then,” he replied, “let us to work, and it is but just, as we are to sup together, and you know my name, that I should be put on an equal footing with yourself—”
“Impossible!” interrupted the other, with a slight curl of his moustache, “for as I am only six feet one, and you are at least six feet four, we can never be on an equal footing.”
“Nay, but I referred to names, not to inches. Pray, by what name shall I call you?”
“Pedro,” returned the Spaniard. “I am known by several names in these parts—some of them complimentary, others the reverse, according as I am referred to by friends or foes. Men often speak of me as a confirmed rover because of my wandering tendencies, but I’m not particular and will answer to any name you choose, so long as it is politely uttered. The one I prefer is Pedro.”
He went out as he spoke to look after the mules, while Lawrence set about kindling a small fire and otherwise making preparations for supper.
The Indian girl, Manuela, with that prompt and humble obedience characteristic of the race to which she belonged, had gone at once into the little closet which her companion had pointed out, and was by that time busily arranging it as a sleeping chamber for the night.
Keeping the fire low in order to prevent its being seen by any of the wandering bands of patriots—alias soldiers, alias banditti—who might chance to be in the neighbourhood, the three travellers thus thrown unexpectedly together ate their supper in comparative silence, Lawrence and Pedro exchanging a comment on the viands now and then, and the handsome Indian girl sitting opposite to them with her eyes for the most part fixed on the ground, though now and then she raised them to take a quick stealthy glance at the huge youth whose appetite did not seem to be greatly affected by his misfortunes. Perhaps she was wondering whether all Englishmen, possessed such innocent kindly faces and such ungainly though powerful frames. It may be that she was contrasting him with the handsome well-knit Pedro at his side.
Whatever her thoughts might have been, the short glances of her lustrous eyes gave no clue to them, and her tongue was silent, save when she replied by some brief monosyllable to a remark or query put in the Indian language occasionally by Pedro. Sometimes a gleam of the firelight threw her fine brown features into bold relief, but on these occasions, when Lawrence Armstrong chanced to observe them, they conveyed no expression whatever save that of profound gravity, with a touch, perhaps, of sadness.
The bench being awkwardly situated for a table, they had arranged a small box, bottom up, instead. Lawrence and his new acquaintance seated themselves on the ground, and Manuela used her saddle as a chair.
Towards the end of their meal the two men became more communicative, and when Pedro had lighted a cigarette, they began to talk of their immediate future.
“You don’t smoke?” remarked Pedro in passing.
“No,” replied Lawrence.
“Not like the most of your countrymen,” said the other.
“So much the worse,” rejoined the youth.
“The worse for them or for you—which?” asked Pedro, with a significant glance.
“No matter,” returned Lawrence with a laugh.
“Well, now,” resumed Pedro, after a few puffs, during the emission of which his countenance assumed the expression of seriousness, which seemed most natural to it, “what do you intend to do? It is well to have that point fairly settled to-night, so that there may be no uncertainty or delay in the morning. I would not urge the question were it not that in the morning we must either go on together as travelling companions, or say our final adieux and part. I am not in the habit of prying into men’s private affairs, but, to speak the bare truth, I am naturally interested in one whose father has on more than one occasion done me good service. You need not answer me unless you please, senhor,” added the man with the air of one who is prepared to retire upon his dignity at a moment’s notice.
“Thanks, thanks, Pedro,” said the Englishman, heartily, “I appreciate your kindness, and accept your sympathy with gratitude. Moreover, I am glad to find that I have been thrown at such a crisis in my fortunes into the company of one who had regard for my dear father. But I scarce know what to do. I will give you my confidence unreservedly. Perhaps you may be able to advise—”
“Stay,” interrupted the other, on whose countenance a slightly stern expression hovered. “Before you give me unreserved confidence, it is but fair that I should tell you candidly that I cannot pay you back in kind. As to private matters, I have none that would be likely to interest any one under the sun. In regard to other things—my business is not my own. Why I am here and what I mean to do I have no right to reveal. Whither I am bound, however, is not necessarily a secret, and if you choose to travel with me you undoubtedly have a right to know.”
Young Armstrong expressed himself satisfied. He might have wished to know more, but, like Pedro, he had no desire to pry into other men’s affairs, and, being of an open confiding nature, was quite ready to take his companion on trust, even though he had been less candid and engaging in manner than he was. After explaining that he had been educated in Edinburgh, and trained to the medical profession, he went on to say that he had been hastily summoned to take charge of the sugar-mill at his father’s death, and that he had expected to find an old overseer, who would have instructed him in all that he had to do in a business with which he was totally unacquainted.
“You see,” he continued, “my father always said that he meant to retire on his fortune, and did not wish me to carry on the business, but, being naturally an uncommunicative man on business matters, he never gave me any information as to details. Of course, I had expected that his manager here, and his books, would reveal all that I required to know, but the soldiers have settled that question. Mill and books have gone together, and as to manager, clerks, and servants, I know not where they are.”
“Scattered, no doubt,” said Pedro, “here, there, and everywhere—only too glad to escape from a neighbourhood which has been given up to fire and sword by way of improving its political condition!”
“I know not,” returned Lawrence, sadly. “But it would be useless, I fear, to try to ferret them out.”
“Quite useless,” said Pedro. “Besides, what would it avail to talk with any of them about the affairs of a place that is now in ashes? But if your father spoke of his fortune, he must have had at least some of it in a bank somewhere.”
“True, but I don’t know where. All I know is that he once mentioned casually in one of his letters that he was going to Buenos Ayres, where he had some property.”
“Indeed!” exclaimed Pedro. “Come, that may help you to decide, for I am myself going to Buenos Ayres, and can guide you there if disposed to go. Only, you will have to make up your mind to a pretty long and hard journey, for duty requires me to go by a devious route. You must know,” he continued, lighting another cigarette, “that I am pledged to take that girl to her father, who lives not far from Buenos Ayres.”
He pointed as he spoke to Manuela, who, having laid her head on her saddle, appeared to have fallen asleep.
“Her father must be a chief, I should think, to judge from her dignified, graceful carriage, as well as her fine features,” said Lawrence in a low tone.
“Yes, he is a chief—a great chief,” returned Pedro, gazing at his cigarette in a meditative mood—“a very great chief. You see, she happened to be living with friends on the western side of
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