Chapter X: Part 10

A year has passed away since all that was mortal of Melchior del Salto found a quiet resting-place beneath the shadow of the new church of Callao. To Fray Fernando it has been “the beginning of years,” the first year of a new life. Its days and nights have been filled to overflowing with thought and action. Inward change and progress have kept pace with outward activity; “great searchings of heart” with valiant work of head and hand. And yet the Fray Fernando who raises his eyes from his book, with a pleasant smile of greeting for José as he enters, looks a healthier, happier, and even a younger man than he who brought the dying galley-slave to his home. Nay more: Fray Fernando looks younger now than he did when he bought the best blessing of his life, some fifteen years ago, from Don Ramon de Virves with the tooth of St. Joseph.

The book he is reading—his favourite, almost his only study—is still the Vulgate. From its pages he has learned many things. Important side lights have been thrown upon their teaching by numerous conversations with Walter Grey (now once more at Callao, after a long coasting expedition)—by the simple faith that upheld Melchior del Salto in the hour of death—by Fray Constantino’s well-worn volume. But another light, without which these would have been useless, has illumined the sacred page for Fray Fernando—even “the candle of the Lord,” which is his Spirit. The result of all may be briefly told:—at the year’s end his faith differed widely from the recognized creed of that Church with which he still remained in outward communion.

No man who thinks profoundly and feels keenly can change his ancestral faith for another without many a fear and misgiving and many a pang. In deep soil the roots strike deepest: even to lay the branches low the tempest must put forth the fierceness of its strength; what then if the roots be torn away? Surely the soil will come up with them—the heart itself be convulsed to its depths.

Yet Fray Fernando, who had suffered so much already, suffered less than might have been expected during the progress of this momentous change. It was in his favour that he had grasped truth with a firm hand before he felt the call to abandon error. Moreover, action was with him not only the companion of thought, but its precursor. The cumbrous armour of superstition was not torn from him by violence so much as laid down voluntarily piece by piece, as he found that it hindered instead of helping him in his daily conflict with sin and ignorance. Experience taught him, also, that the truths his own soul lived upon were life and peace to the sick and dying to whom he ministered continually—to the crowd of Negroes, Creoles, and mariners to whom he preached on the shore every Sunday and holiday; and that whatever was not found in the Vulgate was not good for them any more than for himself.

And, added to all, he had José—José, the most appreciative of scholars, the most sympathetic of friends—“answering him like silver bells lightly touched.” Everything he learned was imparted almost immediately to José, and the joy it gave more than doubled by the process. José himself would have originated nothing in this line. He was content, and would have been content, to the end of his days, to eat the heavenly manna as his fathers ate their maize, simply as they got it, without the aid of the stones that bruise or the fan that winnows. He would have gone on, satisfied and happy, loving his King, living for Him, and willing at need to die for Him, but never suspecting the mode of worship he had learned at Cerro Blanco not to be altogether well pleasing and acceptable in His sight. If anything he had been taught had ever chanced to perplex him, as appearing contrary to some other thing that his heart held dear, he would have told himself, “It is a mystery of the faith,” and have rested satisfied.

What Fray Fernando taught him, however, he understood thoroughly, and felt profoundly. Moreover, he was the safest confidant the monk could have chosen. No man ever knew better how to keep his mouth and his tongue, and in so doing to keep his soul from troubles. He was the guardian of many deadly secrets about his own people; and he was just as likely to betray Maricancha or Rimac to the Viceroy, as he was to compromise Fray Fernando with the Inquisition.

His own life at this time was quite as busy, and probably quite as useful, as that of his patron. Most of the surviving members of the Inca family, who had been banished from Cuzco and its neighbourhood, were forced to take up their residence at Lima, where, severed from the associations dear to their hearts, and exposed to the influences of an unhealthy climate, they withered away like trees transplanted into ungenial soil.[51] Every hour that José could spare from attendance on the patre he devoted to the task of comforting and ministering to these his brethren. It is true that the common wants of the body, such as food and clothing, he seldom had to supply. Impoverished though the Incas were, they still had treasures at command in the love and reverence with which every Indian heart regarded them. “We were wrong, indeed,” said the baptized Indians, when taunted by the Spaniards with having worshipped their ancient kings—“we were wrong; for now we know they were not gods, but men. Yet, having received so much good from them, we cannot think them less than of divine race; and if you show us such men now, needs must that we pay them the same veneration.”

Yet much remained that José could do for his friends. His familiarity with the white man’s language, learning, and habits, enabled him to perform many important services for them. But best of all was his power to comfort them with strange sweet words spoken in the tongue of their fathers, and linked in a thousand ways to all their cherished thoughts and traditions, yet strong with a strength and wise with a wisdom that was not theirs. Earnestly did he labour to inspire the hearts of his brethren with his own passionate love and reverence for the King, the great Inca of the East, upon whom all his hopes were resting.

To return to that particular evening, just one year after the death of Melchior del Salto. José came in, hot and tired, from a walk to Lima, undertaken as escort and guide to a Dominican friar, newly arrived from the West Indies. The monk had spent the preceding day and night with Fray Fernando, being ill from the effects of a long and uncomfortable voyage. He was not too ill, however, for much conversation, or rather controversy, with his kind-hearted host.

“Well, José, did you deliver up your charge in safety?” Fray Fernando asked with a smile.

José’s face wore a rather curious expression as he answered, “I did. Two years ago, patre, I should have been pleased to see a Spaniard treat his own countrymen as Spaniards everywhere treat Indians.”

“I had hoped, José,” said Fray Fernando a little sadly, “that those old thoughts of bitterness were of the past.”

“The old bitterness, yes; the old thoughts—_never_!” José was silent a moment, then resumed in a different tone. “This good friar seems to imagine that we of Rimac are all fast asleep, and that he has come to wake us. He thinks we are poor, silly, ignorant folk, understanding nothing; just as the Spaniards think of my people. All the time it is _they_ who cannot understand. How can they, when they despise us? We know secrets that are sealed from them for ever.”

“Did you follow our long argument to-day, José?” Fray Fernando asked somewhat anxiously.

“I followed you,” said José, “and I went before you, and all round you, and away from you, and back again to you, twenty times, at least, while you were talking.”

“Ah, José! I shall never get the slightest idea of logic into your head. How could you possibly think out a chain of reasoning after that fashion?”

“I do not think my thoughts, patre, in chains, with one link holding on to another. My thoughts grow up like flowers—here, there, anywhere they list.”

“Then read this, and tell me what thoughts ‘grow up’ in your mind about it.” And Fray Fernando handed him a letter, a fair, well-written document, with a mitre on its seal. It was in Latin, but that was now no impediment to José.

He laid it down again with a look of satisfaction. Evidently “the words of the wise had been heard in quiet;” the fame of the patre’s simple yet fervid eloquence had reached at last the dignitaries of his Church, and induced them to pay him a high, but well-merited compliment. “My heart is glad,” said José. “You will make the walls of that great cathedral echo to grand, glorious words of truth. And on Easter-day, too! You will tell them Christ is risen!”

But Fray Fernando’s face did not reflect the joy that beamed from the dusky countenance of José. On the contrary, it wore an expression of anxious thought. “How can I tell them Christ is risen,” he said, “without telling them also—Oh, my son, do you not perceive the strait I am in?”

José understood him; and the gladness faded from his face. But he placed his hand on Fray Constantino’s book. “Have you not told me that _he_ preached for years in the cathedral of Seville, and no man even suspected him of believing as you do?”

“Not quite as I do. That last terrible mystery”—his eyes sought the little silver casket, rarely used of late—“having dared to let _that_ go, José—”

“We keep Christ, the King. He will guide us,” José said reverently.

“Perhaps it were best to accept this call, and, once for all, tell out all the truth in the face of the great congregation!”

José shuddered inwardly. He knew the Holy Inquisition as a vague, dark shadow, nothing more. Neither Walter Grey, nor Melchior del Salto, nor Fray Fernando himself, would ever talk of it. Presently he drew close to the patre, laid his hand, as a son might do, on his shoulder, and began to speak—eagerly, fluently—in low, soft, pleading words, that fell from his lips like ripe fruit “dropped in a silent autumn night.”

Tears glistened in Fray Fernando’s eyes. “My son,” he answered tenderly, “it must be God’s will even before yours. If He has given me back—after all those years of anguish—light, joy, hope, liberty,—is it too much that I should bring Him a thank-offering?”

“Many thank-offerings you will bring Him, patre; such as the soul of that poor man who died yester-even calling upon Christ the Saviour.”

“It may be He has other work for me. But I know not. Rest content, José; I will go nowhere, I will do nothing, save as He leads my footsteps.”

“I ought to rest content with that, patre. The King will lead you, and by the right way.”

There was a pause, which Fray Fernando broke at last. “José, do you remember—long ago, on our journey from Cerro Blanco to Cuzco—that moment when, suddenly emerging from the darkness of the rock-hewn passage, we came in sight of the deep ravine of the Apurimac, spanned by the bridge of sogas?”

“I remember it well, patre; but what brings it to your mind just now?”

“At first I knew not. In an instant I saw all—mountains, rocks, river tumbling at their base, slight strong bridge of osiers—as if revealed by a lightning flash. But now I know. It was some chance words of yours, spoken then, ‘Our people trusted the Inca. And they knew that every way he made for them would lead them safely to the Golden City.’”

José smiled, then murmured softly, “Yachani” (I know). He had still a habit of dropping a word or two in his native tongue when anything touched his heart. “I know” in Spanish only meant “I am aware.” “I know” in Quichua meant, “_I feel_, _I am satisfied_.”

XXXV.

Easter-Day.

“Christ hath sent us down the angels;
And the whole earth and the skies
Are illumed by altar candles
Lit for blessed mysteries;
And a Priest’s hand through creation
Waveth calm and consecration.”

E. B. BROWNING.

It was Easter-day in the City of the Kings, the capital of the New World. The bells of the Christian churches rang out glad peals of triumph; banners and tapestry adorned the principal streets, which were thronged by Spaniards, Creoles, and Indians in their gayest costumes. But in the great Square the throng was thickest, and all were pouring onwards in a steady stream towards the new cathedral.

This singular building stood before them, in all the glory of its painted façade of glaring red and yellow, its lath and plaster towers, and its three wide green doors, now thrown open for every one to enter. But once within, the bad taste that planned the exterior was forgotten, and nothing felt but admiration. Decorations of the most costly kind abounded in rich profusion; and the numerous altars literally groaned beneath the weight of silver vessels, massive enough for a monarch’s ransom.

It was very early, yet the spacious building was already filling rapidly. Perhaps rather with eager sight-seers than with devout worshippers or attentive hearers. For there was much to be seen that day, if there was also something to be heard. Places were reserved in the nave for the friars of the four great monasteries—the Dominicans, the Franciscans, the Augustinians, and the Mercedarios; and by-and-by they defiled slowly in, wearing their appropriate costumes. The Franciscans looked the best satisfied and the most interested: the sermon of the day was to be preached by a Franciscan monk.

Few Indians were visible; not that they would not have liked well enough to witness the pageant, but the Spaniards and Creoles, as was natural, had the best places, and left little room for their dusky brethren. One Indian enjoyed, however, by special favour, an excellent seat, whence he could both see and hear everything.

With a heart full of the deepest anxiety, José (who, with Fray Fernando, had come in from Callao the day before) took his place amongst the hearers of his patron’s Easter sermon. He knew that for some days previously the monk had been continually in prayer. But he had spoken little, indeed nothing whatever, about his own intentions, or the possible issues of the day.

High Mass was first celebrated, with more than the usual pomp attendant on that chief ceremonial of the Romish ritual. The solemn tones of the organ, recently brought from Spain; the sweet chants of the white-robed choristers; the gorgeous dresses of the priests, with the bright harmonies of their varied colouring; the beautiful children swinging censers; the clouds of fragrant incense;—all these filled the soul of José—keenly susceptible of such influences—with exquisite pleasure. He gave himself up without reserve to the spell that stole over him. For the time—only for the time—he forgot all Fray Fernando’s anxious questionings, all his great searchings of heart, about the sacrifice of the Mass; and at the elevation of the Host he bowed himself to the ground with as little scruple or hesitation as any man in the vast congregation.

And very soon afterwards he enjoyed the proud triumph of seeing the patre—still in the simple dress of his order, though waited upon by gorgeously attired acolytes—ascend the stately pulpit in the sight of all.

For a few moments, heedless of the crowd beneath, Fray Fernando lifted up his heart in silent prayer. Then in a voice, apparently not loud, but clear enough to be heard throughout the great building, he repeated the few simple words he had chosen for his text, “The Lord is risen indeed.”

The Lord is risen—_the Son of God_. Therefore all He said is true, and His claim to Divine Sonship established for ever.

The Lord is risen—_the Redeemer of man_. Therefore the redemption is accomplished, the debt paid to the uttermost farthing. For the prison gate is thrown open, and the Surety has gone forth in triumph.

The Lord is risen—_the First-fruits of the Resurrection_. Therefore all shall rise; earth and ocean shall give up their dead; not one lacking of the countless millions that are slumbering there. For “since by man came death, by man came also the resurrection from the dead.”

The Lord is risen—_the Head of the Church_. Therefore those who are His body, made one with Him by a living faith, are already by faith risen with Him. Let such “seek those things that are above, where Christ sitteth at the right hand of God.”

These were the thoughts that, clothed in a rich drapery of imaginative, perhaps even to a modern taste fanciful illustration, Fray Fernando presented that day to thousands of wondering hearers. The manner was not strikingly unlike that of his brethren—the gift of fervid eloquence was shared by many amongst them—but the matter of the sermon was new and startling.

Yet two at least of the truths he told, Rome has preserved well and carefully amidst all her errors. Nor were the two others, as he stated them, in any open contradiction to her teaching. But the utter absence of much that they were wont to hear—and, even more, the power and vital force that dwelt in what they heard—awed, impressed, amazed the intelligent amongst his audience. If the comparison be not derogatory to such high personages as the Archbishop and Chapter of Ciudad de los Reyes, it may be said that they felt as felt the witch of Endor, when at her call from the earth arose—no counterfeit, no pale shadowy image,—but dread reality, the very prophet of Israel, come from the world of spirits with a message of doom for those that awaked him.

José’s simple heart, meanwhile, beat high with exultation. Those truths, whatever they might be to others, to him were life and joy and peace. Christ was risen indeed for him.

The preacher also had a place in his thoughts. _Now_, at last, would all men see how great, how wise the patre was! And, casting a triumphant glance around, he read admiration in a thousand faces, whilst his own was saying, “Is not the patre great?”

But amongst the faces upon which his eye rested, he marked _one_—unlike the others—that of the Dominican from Cuba. It did not speak admiration: it was doubtful, dark, anxious. And José felt as if from that moment the light grew dim; and a chill mist of fear rose up and overshadowed everything around.

In his cell in the Franciscan monastery, he had a strange dream that night. He thought that it happened to him to go with the patre on board a ship which lay at anchor in the bay. Alone, they drifted somehow out to sea together. No mariners, no rudder, no compass there. Nothing but white sails set, wild waves around, fast fading land behind. And they looked each on the other in blank dismay.

Then suddenly, as things happen in dreams, the storm arose, the wild wind shrieked and howled, the ship tossed helplessly. José stretched forth his hands and cried aloud, “Lord, save, or we perish!”

When—behold! a Form appeared, treading the stormy deep. And a Hand touched his;—with the thrill of _that_ touch José awoke, and lo! it was a dream.

But he could not forget that dream.

XXXVI.

José’s Mistake.

“Dark lowers our fate,
And terrible the storm that gathers o’er us;
But nothing, till that latest agony
Which severs thee from Nature, shall unloose
This fixed and sacred hold. In thy dark prison-house,
In the terrific face of armed law,
Yea, on the scaffold, if it needs must be,
I never will forsake thee.”

JOANNA BAILLIE.

About sunset one evening, a little more than a fortnight afterwards, Fray Fernando and José were seated at their frugal meal of maize-flour bread and fruit. “O José!” the monk exclaimed suddenly, laying down his knife and looking at his companion with an air of distress, “I have quite forgotten that starving family at Chorillos. I promised to bring them food to-day. _Vae meâ culpa!_ God grant some of them are not dead by this time. I must go to them immediately.” He rose, and began hastily to empty their little store of maize into a cotton cloth.

José rose also, and quietly put on his cap and mantle. “I think I had better take a little flask of sora; some one may be ill,” he said.

“_You!_” exclaimed the monk, looking up from his task of tying the corners of the cloth together. “I am going myself.”

“Excuse me, patre; you know of old I run like the huanucu.”

Under the circumstances, this was an unanswerable argument. José was permitted to depart, well-pleased to save the patre, who had had a hard day’s work already.

Very quickly did his fleet footsteps traverse the rank grass and reeds of the green fields, overhung with drooping willows, that separate Callao from Chorillos, a little hamlet nestling beneath the bold cliff of Marro Solar. He easily found the poor family of Mestizoes, for whom the food was intended, performed his errand of mercy, and set out on his homeward way.

But although he made good speed, the hour was late when he returned. Still, he was rather surprised to see no light in the little latticed window of Fray Fernando’s room. “The patre must have been tired,” he thought, “or he would not have gone to rest ere my return. I am glad I saved him the walk, which, for him, would have been a very long one.”

He knocked gently, and presently heard the approaching footsteps of the old mulatto woman with whom they lodged. Instead of opening the door at once, she stood and asked, with unusual caution, “Quien va?”

“I—Don José.” The door opened. José entered, and passing at once into their little sitting-room, requested a light. When it was brought, he looked around him in surprise and dismay. Where was the patre’s cloak? Where was the Bible—the “Sum of Christian Doctrine”—the little box of sandal-wood, the gift of a grateful mariner, in which the patre used to keep the few papers he had? “What has happened?” he asked.

“About half an hour ago, two hidalgoes came here and took the padre away with them,” said his sable hostess.

“Hidalgoes!” José repeated in amazement. “Friars perhaps you mean?”

“Friars, indeed! I hope I know a holy friar when I see him. I was a Catholic Christian before you were born, young sir; and I have Catholic blood in my veins, which is more than some can say who put ‘Don’ before their names. I tell your Excellency they were Spanish gentlemen, with swords and cloaks.”

“Some one ill, doubtless, on board one of the vessels,” thought José, as he sat down to await the patre’s return. “I wish, however, they could have waited till the morning.—Did he give you any message for me?” asked José as the woman was leaving the room.

“Yes; I was forgetting. It was not much, at all events. He just bade me say to you, ‘Every way He makes for us leads safely to the Golden City.’”

A pang of vague uneasiness shot through the heart of José. He feared—he knew not what. He watched anxiously for the patre’s return. But hour after hour passed away, and he came not. At last it was morning. José threw on his yacollo, and went down to the beach. Few were stirring at that early hour; and none could give him any tidings of Fray Fernando.

“He must have gone to the City,” he said to himself. “At the Franciscan monastery they will surely be able to tell me what has become of him. Perhaps he has suddenly received orders to go to some distant place.” But his alarm was increasing every moment.

José had frequently visited the Franciscan monastery, both with Fray Fernando and by himself; and he was very favourably regarded by its inmates, as an interesting specimen of the educated and Christianized Indian. Two of the brethren readily came to speak with him.

In his usual calm, unimpassioned manner, he told his story; but his hearers gazed at him and at each other in evident blank dismay. Then a rapid Latin colloquy passed between them: they were not aware that José understood the language. “I have feared this for some time,” the elder whispered. “Too clever—too mystical! Ah! the spite of those Dominicans!”

“Had he worn the black cowl, instead of the gray, he might have preached with impunity all the heresies of Luther,” returned the other. “Well, the Holy Office never had a better man or a truer Catholic in its dungeons.”

“Still, you cannot deny that he was very imprudent. _Miserere me!_ We are helpless as sheep against these sons of St. Dominic. If good Fray Tomas de San Martin were but here!”

“He could do nothing in a case of this kind. But—_tace!_ we are forgetting our dark-faced friend.”

“Better he should not suspect the truth. Let us tell him quietly to go his way.—My son,” he said, addressing José in Spanish, “we are led to believe, by what you have told us, that the holy father has been sent, by his spiritual superiors, on some mission of importance requiring haste and secrecy. Where do your kindred reside? Be advised by us, and rejoin them for the present. The Fray’s absence may be lengthened, for anything we know to the contrary.”

José bowed. His lips were silent; nor did his impassive Indian countenance express either the anguish or the resolution that filled his heart. But he said within himself, “God do so to me, and more also, if I go to my people and leave my father alone amongst his enemies.”

From the gate of the Franciscan monastery he went direct to that of the grim dark pile of building called the Santa Casa. Here he rang the bell, and requested an interview with one of their reverences the Lords Inquisitors.

A request heard with surprise, yet granted promptly enough. The Indian might have evidence to give, perhaps important revelations to make.

José glanced coolly around the room to which he was conducted, with its sombre furniture and black tapestry. When the inquisitor, a Dominican monk, made his appearance, he bowed like a Spanish hidalgo, and then with the utmost self-possession preferred his petition. He was Fray Fernando’s servant, he said. The holy father was used to his ministrations, and could not well do without them, more especially as his health was feeble. Might he entreat, therefore, to be permitted to share his imprisonment and to wait on him?

José would gladly have stooped far lower to aid or comfort his adopted father; for love casts out not only fear, but pride.

Whatever astonishment the inquisitor might have felt at his request, he expressed none. He answered courteously that the petition should receive the earliest attention of their reverences, and that he would himself use his best interest to further it. He then asked several questions, which José answered truly, but cautiously, for he was fully alive to the danger of compromising the patre by his admissions.

“The honourable Table of the Holy Office sits to-day,” said this urbane specimen of an inquisitor. “We will try what can be done for you. We hold the character of Fray Fernando in much esteem, and are desirous of showing him all the kindness and consideration in our power.”

“I have been, perhaps, needlessly afraid of these inquisitors,” thought José, who had never heard of “the iron hand within the velvet glove.” He said aloud, “When may I have the honour of waiting on your reverence, in order to be informed of the decision of the holy fathers?”

“You may call to-morrow morning, an hour after matins. Good-day, Señor José.” The last words were spoken with a slight but observable hesitation. The holy father intended to be courteous, but he was really at a loss in what manner to designate a person who adopted the style and title of an Inca, yet described himself as the servant of a Franciscan monk. “Señor José” was a harmless compromise between the much-coveted and high-sounding “Don José” and plain unprefaced “José.”

Next morning, José presented himself at the Santa Casa precisely at the appointed hour. Few ever entered its gloomy gates before or since so willingly. He did not even shudder as he heard them close behind him, he thought only how soon he might be permitted to see the patre.

Unaccountable folly!—are we ready to exclaim, with our ideas of the Holy Inquisition. But from José’s point of view it was nothing of the kind. He knew very well that the Holy Office could pretend to no authority over Indians; the Bull to which it owed its existence in the New World having expressly exempted them from its jurisdiction. Had he chosen to profess a hundred heresies, the dread tribunal could not legally have called him in question for one of them. He had, therefore, on his own account no apprehensions whatever, whilst for Fray Fernando his apprehensions amounted to an agony of fear. He was fully aware that his patron was really guilty of what the inquisitors called heresy, and therefore in deadly peril. Being, moreover, profoundly ignorant of the modes of proceeding adopted by the Holy Office, he could only transfer to it his own ideas of courts of justice and of criminal trials. He supposed that judgment would be given and punishment inflicted speedily and sternly, though possibly in secret. What then remained for love to do save to gain access to the captive, to console, to strengthen, to minister to him—perhaps even (who could tell?) to suggest and carry out some plan of escape? This was the one faint hope he still dared to cherish. The warders and turnkeys of the Santa Casa would surely be of Spanish blood? And might not they be bribed?

It never occurred to him that their reverences the Lords Inquisitors, being of Spanish blood, might be bribed also. So mean a thought of the mysterious dread tribunal he would not have dared to entertain. This was his fatal mistake. When he relinquished his liberty, he relinquished, by the same act, his one real chance of rendering effectual help to Fray Fernando.

He did not enjoy the privilege of a second interview with the suave and courteous inquisitor who conversed with him the evening before. A familiar, in a kind of semi-clerical dress, waited upon him in his stead. This official informed him that his petition had been heard favourably, and then conducted him into a little chamber resembling a monk’s cell. Here he was locked in, and left alone hour after hour, to his great perplexity and annoyance. Evening brought another familiar, who supplied him with food; and of him he inquired the reason of this strange treatment, but was told in answer that the servants of the Holy Office were not permitted to converse with the prisoners.

“_Prisoners!_” José repeated in amazement. “I am no prisoner. I have come here of my own free will.”

But the familiar was not to be entrapped into the violation of a prison rule. He shook his head and left the cell, muttering, as he did so, “Then go away of your own free will.”

As José had come to the Santa Casa with the intention of remaining there (though certainly not as a prisoner), he had brought with him a few necessaries for himself, and some comforts for Fray Fernando. He brought writing materials also; nor did he omit to conceal about his person a sufficient store of the gold he esteemed so necessary to his plans.

Accordingly, the next morning he gave the attendant a little note, praying him to have it transmitted to any one of their reverences the Lords Inquisitors. As the request was not unlawful in itself, and was accompanied by a present, it was not refused; but no answer came, either to that or to the numerous other notes that José sent in the same way, first supplicating, then demanding, explanation and redress.

In this manner weary days passed away, growing at length to long, slow weeks of misery. And José began to give way to despair. He made frequent inquiries about Fray Fernando; and by dint of bribing the familiar who attended him, succeeded in extracting a little information—just enough to increase his uneasiness. The padre had been ill, but was better now. He had undergone two examinations, both of them since José’s incarceration. No one had the least idea what his fate might be. José might be allowed to send him a few trifling presents; but to see him was impossible. It would be as much as the attendant’s life, not to say his place, was worth.

José writhed and struggled like a wild creature caught in a net. It only mocked his misery that he was well fed and carefully attended, and that the few personal requests he thought it worth while to make (as for fresh water and clean garments) were promptly granted. The silence which reigned around him grew insupportable. Often did he compare himself to a traveller in the desert suddenly enwrapped in the folds of a thick mist,—hemming him in like a wall, clinging round him like a garment; while in his wild alarm he calls, and calls again—but in vain—no voice replies, for no human ear is reached by his despairing cry.

Did the last words that had come to him,—that perhaps would ever come to him,—from the loved lips of his father and teacher, return upon his bewildered mind in those dreary hours of pain and perplexity—“Every way He makes for us leads safely to the Golden City”?

XXXVII.

A Disappointed Man.

“Within my breast there is no light
But the cold light of stars;
And I give the first watch of the night
To the red planet Mars.”

LONGFELLOW.

Part of the Santa Casa was fitted up, with due pomp and luxury, as the dwelling-place of his Reverence the Lord Inquisitor-General of the Indies; and was not infrequently the scene of a stately hospitality becoming the high position of its occupant. One day his lordship enjoyed the honour of entertaining several distinguished guests. The party consisted of the archbishop and a few of the canons, the priors of three of the great monasteries, with a sprinkling of military and official personages of exalted rank. But the place of honour was occupied by a young man, a stranger in Lima, to whom all present seemed to pay considerable deference.

The inquisitor’s guests did ample justice to a luxurious repast. They ate the savoury flesh of the huanucu, the Peruvian partridge and wild duck, the brains of the llama, the delicate “Manjar blanco”—compounded of the breasts of capons beaten up with rose-water and white sugar—from dishes of gold and silver; and they drank the choice and costly wines of Spain cooled with the ice of the Andes. They were cheerful, even gay, though within the limits of decorum and of stately Spanish reserve and dignity.

At last, however, they ceased even to toy with the luscious grapes and fragrant melons that, newly introduced into that distant land, had a sweetness far beyond their own for the lips of exiles. The table was deserted, and most of the guests sought the garden, where the evening breeze was blowing cool and fresh from the snow-clad mountains. But the stranger lingered still, standing in the deep embrasure of a window. He looked about thirty, but was really much younger;—a handsome man, with a high, narrow forehead, scornful, petulant lips, and brows so often knit in anger or impatience, that the contraction had almost become permanent. Presently the sleek, good-humoured, sensual, yet intelligent Lord Inquisitor glided softly to his side; the black cowl and white frock of the Dominican making a picturesque contrast with the purple velvet and gold lace of the Castilian noble.

They conversed together upon such topics as the inquisitor thought likely to interest Don Francisco Solis de Toledo, nephew of the Viceroy of Peru, now about to take command of the troops on board a stately Spanish man-of-war.

Such an appointment was not considered derogatory to a person of high birth; though not exactly the provision the world might have expected the Viceroy to make for his sister’s son. But Don Francisco Solis was not a man easily provided for. He was overbearing, impracticable, and obstinate to a degree which made him the terror of his friends and patrons. These qualities were in some degree inherent in his character; but a different training might have subdued or softened them. If ever the wholesome discipline of a life amongst equals might have been beneficial to any man, that man was Don Francisco Solis. But it had never been his. Ere his boyhood was over, he had been sent out to the New World to play the tyrant;—a conqueror amongst a nation of slaves. And the curse of the tyrant fell upon him, and ate into his soul. He became at last unable to do anything, save to tyrannize.

Repeated experiments convinced the Viceroy, to his cost, that his brave and gifted young kinsman—for brave and gifted he really was—had utterly incapacitated himself for any career that necessitated his working under any one, or with any one. An exploring expedition into the interior of the country might have brought him fame and fortune, but it could not be undertaken without money and without companions. What was to be done with a man who was sure to quarrel with the moneylenders, and to fight duels with the gentlemen who volunteered to serve under him? Rich as the Viceroy was, he could not provide each of his needy kinsmen with a silver mine for his sole private use. He was glad, therefore, to relieve himself at last of the troublesome Don Francisco by appointing him to the command of the _Trionfo_.

To return then to the inquisitor. He had just been asking, with much courtesy, after the health of his Excellency’s noble lady, the Princess Doña Victoria,—by which stately name Coyllur nũsta was now known.

Having expressed his gratification at the intelligence that the lady was in good health, the churchman continued, “A young Indian nobleman has been brought under my notice lately, who is, as I believe, a relative, or at least a connection, of the illustrious princess.”

Don Francisco, who regarded all his wife’s relatives with profound disdain, looked just the degree of interest that politeness demanded, and played with the costly lace ruffle which half covered his white hand.

The inquisitor resumed, “I must not conceal from your Excellency that the young man I speak of is in rather an unfortunate situation at present. It has been found necessary to place him, for the good of his own soul and the interests of Holy Church, under a degree of restraint.”

“I thought,” said Don Francisco, who would not have cared if the inquisitor had announced that it had been found necessary to hang him,—“I thought your august tribunal did not interfere with ‘los Indios.’”

“True,” replied the churchman. “We cannot prosecute an Indian as a criminal; but we may lawfully employ one as a witness,—and for that purpose we may detain him, if necessary. At first it was in that way that we found it convenient to place the young man I speak of under a light and temporary restraint; but the case in which we expected to require his testimony having taken a turn that renders it superfluous, he might have been set at liberty, but for certain weighty considerations.”—Here the churchman paused, heaved a little sigh, and looked as if doubtful whether he ought to proceed any further.—However, he presently added, “His name is Don José Viracocha; and he claims the right to quarter the sun proper on the shield tierce in fess.[52] Do you know him, most illustrious señor?”

Don Francisco started, and the colour flashed to his white face. “I have reason to know him,” he said. “He is my enemy.”

“Indeed!” returned the inquisitor, with just as innocent a look of surprise as if he had not been aware of the fact, and made the communication for that very reason. “Don Francisco Solis pays the Indian a higher compliment than any of his race could have expected ever to deserve, when he condescends to call him _his_ enemy.”

Don Francisco bowed, then smiled bitterly. “We have good authority, reverend father,” he said, “for esteeming serpents the enemies of the human race. Indians wound like serpents. I believe that young man—who, I have heard, had once the intolerable presumption to consider himself _my_ rival—could give account, if he pleased it, of certain treasures which ought to have been my wife’s portion.”

“Ah, how is that, señor? But forgive my curiosity, if, unfortunately, it should appear impertinent.”

“No forgiveness needed, father. I am not ashamed of aught that concerns me. I leave that to those who climb up to heaven upon crooked ladders.” (He did not mean anything personal by this remark.) “_Pues_, reverend father, I heard a great deal about the golden hoards of the old Inca noble, my wife’s grandfather and guardian. He was called Yupanqui, or some such barbarous name; and he remained a pestilent heathen almost to the end of his days. And I, as a Christian gentleman of Spain, thought that those heathen spoils of his would come well to hand, and in good time, to give retaining fees to a hundred stout free lances, and to find them arms and horses, for a little expedition I contemplated. St. Jago! with a troop like that at my back, I might have shown my illustrious uncle that there are men yet left alive, though Cortez and Pizarro and Hernan de Soto are with the saints. Perhaps, too, that there are barbarian kings and kingdoms yet to conquer, though Tupac Amaru has lost his head,—as he well deserved. But the malice of fortune, who has always shown herself my enemy, would not permit me so much satisfaction. Of old Yupanqui’s boasted treasures, all that ever came my way was a dungeon of a house, all walls and no windows, and a few paltry gold and silver ornaments.”

“Does the noble lady, your Excellency’s wife, know nothing?”

“_Nothing._ That was soon ascertained.”

“Who were most in the confidence of the old Inca?”

“This Viracocha was as a son to him.”

The inquisitor paused. Then he said, very quietly, and without looking at Don Francisco—“For many reasons, I think it will be our wisest course to send the young man to Spain. I have ascertained that he is in the confidence of all the members of the Inca family who are here at present; and that he spends much of his time in secret cabals and consultations with them, Such proceedings _must_ be stopped.—You understand me, señor?—Yet we have no authority to deal with him after any summary fashion; while to detain him in prison here would cause remark and inquiry, perhaps create a scandal. It is an evil world, Señor Don Francisco. We are closely watched, and have to be careful—very careful—not to expose our Holy Office to obloquy by the slightest, the very slightest overstepping of our legitimate powers. ‘Wise as serpents’—you recollect, señor? Furthermore, there is another prisoner also, whose case we may see it advisable to refer to the authorities at home.—The _Trionfo_ is to form one of this year’s Plate fleet, I believe, most illustrious señor?”

Don Francisco bowed.

“For humanity’s sake,” the inquisitor continued, in a low voice, and still without looking at Don Francisco—“for humanity’s sake, I could wish to send these unfortunate persons to Spain in a good and large vessel. The voyage is long, and the precautions rendered necessary by their unhappy position—”

Here Don Francisco said, suddenly and sharply, though still with an air of affected indifference, “You had better fling the wretches into the sea at once, and have done with them. They will never survive such a voyage under such circumstances.”

“I should be sorry to think that, señor and your Excellency,” said the Dominican. “For I have quite a personal regard for the last-mentioned prisoner, who is a Spaniard and an ecclesiastic. Since we are speaking freely and in confidence, I may acknowledge that it is from motives of clemency, and to give him a chance of saving his life, that we have decided upon referring his case to the Table at Valladolid. As to the Indian”—the inquisitor mused a little—“if he could only be removed to a safe distance from his brethren—sent amongst the barbarians, for instance—nothing more would be required. We really wish him no harm; our object is to get him out of the country without creating a scandal.”

Perhaps it was the position in which he stood, with his back turned to the light, which gave a pallid look to the face of Don Francisco. Yet this could not account for the sudden flush that passed over it, vanishing again as quickly. But after a moment’s pause he answered, in tones of icy coldness, “If your reverence thinks proper to send prisoners to Spain in the _Trionfo_, I shall do myself the honour of introducing the master of the ship to your notice. You can communicate with him at your pleasure. I hear he is a very worthy fellow, well acquainted with his business.” Then he added languidly, “How hot it is, father! Has not this been a very unhealthy season in Ciudad de los Reyes?”

The inquisitor understood that the subject was dismissed, and performed his part in keeping up the conversation which Don Francisco thus directed into another and indifferent channel. Less than half his active mind sufficed for the effort, leaving the rest at liberty to pursue more interesting subjects. Whilst therefore he talked of the weather, the mists, the sunstrokes, and the calentures, an undercurrent of thought ran on, somewhat after this fashion: “Don Francisco Solis is scarcely grateful for one of the fairest chances a man was ever given of recovering a lost or buried fortune. Still, he is a Toledo; one may trust his honour. If he gets the truth out of this Viracocha, whether by fair means or by foul, he will not forget Mother Church. And he shall not want a broad hint or two on the subject of her claims, seasonably administered.

“As to poor Fray Fernando—unhappy man!—it is the only way of saving him from the fire, into which he is too willing to throw himself, even without the friendly aid of some of my colleagues, who have more zeal than discretion. A curse on their officiousness, beginning with that of our meddlesome brother from Cuba! What good end will it serve to bring upon us and our holy tribunal the suspicion and ill-will of all the Franciscans in the country? And what harm could the poor friar’s heresies have done to a pack of negroes and Indians? The sacrament of baptism is valid, even though administered by a heretic; and that is all they require.”

Don Francisco meanwhile was thinking, for his part: “I wonder who was his reverence’s grandfather? Some low person, I doubt not, with a taint of infidel blood in his veins. Every nobody from the Old World sets up here as ‘Don,’ and ‘Excellency,’ and ‘most illustrious.’ Probably he was engaged in trade. This reverend father, beneath his black cowl, has the soul of a trader. As for that Viracocha,—I hate him. I could better pardon him for hiding the old Inca’s treasures, than for his insufferable presumption in supposing that I—_I_—would actually have condescended to fight with him! If ‘los Indios’ begin to take such airs, to Spaniards and gentlemen, this country will very soon become—” (Here Don Francisco said a strong word to himself.) “The inquisitors might as well stretch a point, for once, and fling the wretch into the fire for worshipping his abominable idols, as no doubt they all do in secret. Still, he may burn, hang, or drown, for aught I care. _I_ shall not soil my fingers with him. No! my Lord Inquisitor forgot whom he addressed, when he presumed to hint that I might degrade myself to the part of torture-master, to wring from this luckless wretch the possession of his secret. No! not for all the gold in Peru. My life for gold, any day; my honour for gold—_never!_”

Other Castilian nobles, in Don Francisco’s place, might have read differently the laws of honour. The means that Spanish knights and gentlemen did not scorn to employ in seeking for the hidden treasures of the New World, are not pleasant to contemplate: witness the well-known story of the heroic Mexican Emperor Guatimozin.

The light by which Don Francisco Solis guided his footsteps was a dim, earth-born glimmer. It was not sunlight, not true starlight even; only the gleam of the red planet Mars, called the “star” of chivalry. Yet, for once, it sufficed to make him aware of a deep pit of moral degradation cunningly dug right across his path. And it taught him to avoid it.

XXXVIII.

Fray Fernando’s Words.

“’Twas still some solace, in the dearth
Of the pure elements of earth,
To hear at least each other’s speech,
And each turn comforter to each.”

BYRON.

José’s long agony of suspense had an end at last. One evening after nightfall, the familiar who attended his cell conveyed to him a courteously-worded but peremptory order to put on his cap and mantle and follow him forthwith. José obeyed, wondering; and was yet the more surprised to see the attendant make a package of the clothes and other matters belonging to him which were lying about the cell, preparatory to taking them away.

“Are they going to set me free at last?” he asked.

But, as bitter experience might have led him by this time to anticipate, he received no answer. The familiar, carrying a torch and the packet he had made up, conducted him to a side-door of the Santa Casa. This was opened immediately, and he saw—though dimly, for the night was dark—a little troop of horsemen waiting outside. Then a horse, ready saddled, was brought to the door, and a person who seemed to be the leader of the band directed him to mount; adding, however, as he hesitated a moment before obeying,—

“Be not afraid, Indian; one of these gentlemen shall hold your bridle.”

“I am not afraid,” said José, who, though he had never been on horseback in his life, scorned to show reluctance or timidity before these strangers; “but I should like to know whither you are about to take me.”

The officer bent down from his saddle, and whispered—“Let well alone, Indian. You have been most mercifully dealt with by their reverences. Learn that ‘silence is holy,’ and that your tongue may hurt but cannot mend your case.”

Having given José this significant hint, he turned to the still open door, where the alguazil was standing, torch in hand.

“How long are we to be kept waiting here?” he asked impatiently.

“He is coming, señor,” said the attendant.

José mounted without further demur. Then another horse was brought to the door, and held in readiness for another rider. After a brief delay, one came slowly forth, wrapped in a Franciscan monk’s gray cowl and mantle. José half uttered a cry of surprise, perhaps of joy. It was the patre. But the officer again interposed.

“_Quiton!_” he said, and touched his sword.

Nor was Fray Fernando permitted to utter a word. The rapid ride from Lima to Callao was accomplished in perfect silence. The two captives soon found themselves on the seashore. They were then transferred to a little boat, which conveyed them to a stately galleon lying moored in the bay. They were put on board; and a guard of soldiers received them. One steep ladder after another had then to be descended by their unwilling footsteps, until at last the ship’s hold was reached,—and there they lay in midnight darkness, and for a time, it may almost be added, in despair. Even their reunion, after so long a separation, failed to kindle joy or hope: they seemed brought together again only to die. Fray Fernando was the first to recover himself so far as to speak.

“_You_ here, my son José! Why this? Of what have they accused _you_?” he asked.

“In truth, I know not,” José answered, in a weary, hopeless tone. “I was never informed—never tried—never judged.”

“What! never even examined? That, indeed, is strange.”

“I had an interview once with two black monks.”

“Well, and what said they to you?”