The Rover of the Andes Part 15

"Will any of them die if you don't stay to nurse them?" asked the guide, with a grave, almost stern, expression.

"Why, no; not exactly," returned Lawrence; "but many of them will want their wounds dressed, and all of them will be the better for a little more skilled attendance."

"Will they not survive under ordinary attendance?" asked Pedro, with increasing severity of expression.

"Doubtless they will, but--"

"Would you like," interrupted the inflexible guide, "to have them all roused up at this early hour to hear a little farewell speech from you, explaining the absolute necessity for your going away, and your extreme regret at leaving them?"

"Not if there is such necessity," returned Lawrence, yawning, and raising himself on one elbow.

"There _is_ such necessity, senhor. I have been down to the village where my friend lives, and have got fresh horses. Manuela and Quashy are already mounted. I let you sleep to the last moment, seeing you were so tired. Don't forget your pistols; you may need them."

Without waiting for a reply, he rose and left the room. The young doctor hesitated no longer. Regret at quitting the poor people around him was overborne by the fear of being left behind, for he had by that time begun to entertain a vague suspicion that the stern and peculiar man by whom he was led would not permit any object whatever to stand in the way of what he believed to be his duty.

In a few seconds he issued from the hut, armed with his pair of double-barrelled pistols and the faithful cudgel. The cavalry sabre, however, had been lost, not much to his regret.

The grey light of dawn was just sufficient to give a ghostly appearance to what may be truly termed the ghastly ruins around them, and to reveal in undefined solemnity the neighbouring mountains. Smoke still issued from the half-smothered fires, and here and there a spectral figure might be seen flitting silently to and fro. But all was profoundly still and quiet, even the occasional tremors of the earth had ceased for a time, when they issued from the enclosure of the hut.

Without speaking, Lawrence mounted the horse which stood ready for him, and they all rode silently away, picking their steps with great care through the upheaved and obstructed streets. It was a scene of absolute and utter ruin, which Lawrence felt could never be effaced from his memory, but must remain there burned in deeply, in its minutest details, to the end of time.

When they had pa.s.sed the suburbs, however, and reached the country beyond, the depressing influences pa.s.sed away, and, a certain degree of cheerfulness returning with the sun, they began to chat and to explain to each other their various experiences.

"Of course, when I felt the earthquake," said Pedro to Lawrence, "I knew that, although little damage was done to the village to which I had gone in search of my friends, it must have been very severe on the town with its spires and public buildings; so I saddled up at once, and set off on my return. I met Quashy just as I left the village, and we both spurred back as fast as we could. When we came in sight of it, we saw at once that the place was destroyed, but, until we reached it, had no idea of the completeness of the destruction. We could not even find the road that led to the inn where we had left you and Manuela; and it was not till the following morning that we found the inn itself, and came up, as you know, just in time to help you, though we had sought diligently all night."

"Das so, ma.s.sa," broke in Quashy, who had listened with glittering eyes to Pedro's narrative, which of course was much more extended and full, "an' you's got no notion how we's banged about our poor s.h.i.+ns among dese ruins afore we founded you. S'my b'lief but for de fires we'd nebber hab founded you at all. And dem scoundrils--oh! dem scoundrils--"

Quashy's feelings at this point failed to find vent in words sufficiently expressive, so he relieved them to some extent by shaking his fist at scoundreldom in general, and grinding his teeth. No words could have expressed his feelings half so well. By way of changing a subject that appeared to be almost too much for him, he turned abruptly to the Indian girl; and said, in Spanish quite as bad as that of Lawrence--

"But where were _you_, senhorina, all the time?"

"Ay, Manuela, let's hear how it was that you escaped," said Pedro quickly, in Indian.

"I escaped through the mercy of G.o.d," replied the girl, in a low voice.

"True, Manuela, true," replied the guide, "you never said a truer word than that; but by what means was His mercy displayed?"

"I can scarcely tell," returned the girl; "when the earthquake came I was sitting on my bed. Then the wall of the room seemed to fall on me, and my senses were gone. How long I lay so, I cannot tell. When I recovered my mind I felt as if buried alive, but I could breathe, and although unable to rise, I could move. Then I heard cries, and I replied; but my strength was gone, and I think no one heard me. Then I prayed, and then, I think, I slept, but am not sure. At last I heard a spade striking the earth above me. Soon an opening was made, and I was dragged rudely out. The rest you know."

On this being interpreted to her companions, Quashy gave it as his decided opinion that a miracle had been performed for her special deliverance; but Lawrence thought that, without miraculous interference, G.o.d had caused a ma.s.s of wall to fall over and protect her in much the same way that he himself had been protected.

While they were talking thus, and slowly descending one of the numerous richly-wooded, though rugged, paths which traverse the lower slopes of the Andes, they encountered a party of hors.e.m.e.n from the Pampas. They were well-armed, and from their looks might have been another troop of banditti, coming like human vultures from afar to swoop down on the carca.s.s of the unfortunate town.

To have shown the slightest hesitancy or fear--supposing them to have been what they looked--would have been to invite attack, but, as the reader knows, our travellers were not the men to betray themselves thus.

Before starting, they had carefully examined their weapons, and had bestowed them about their persons somewhat ostentatiously. Pedro had even caused Manuela to stick a brace of small pistols and a large knife in her belt; and, as Indian women are sometimes known to be capable of defending themselves as vigorously as men, she was by no means a cipher in the effective strength of the party.

With a dignified yet free-and-easy air that would have done credit to a Spanish Don of the olden time, Pedro saluted the party as he rode past.

His aspect, and the quiet, self-possessed air of the huge Englishman, with the singularity of his cudgel, coupled with the look of graceful decision about the Indian maiden, and the blunt bull-doggedness of the square negro, were sufficient to ensure a polite response, not only from that party, but from several other bands of the same stamp that were met with during the day.

Diverging from the main road in order to avoid these bands, they followed a track well-known to the guide. Towards the afternoon, from the top of a rising ground, they descried a solitary foot traveller wending his way wearily up the hill.

He was a man of middle age, and powerfully-built, but walked with such evident difficulty that it seemed as if he were either ill or exhausted.

Pedro eyed him with considerable suspicion as he approached. In pa.s.sing, he begged for a.s.sistance. As he spoke in French, Lawrence, whose sympathies, like those of Quashy, were easily roused, asked in that tongue what was the matter with him.

He had been robbed, he said, by that villainous bandit, Conrad of the Mountains, or some one extremely like him, and had been nearly killed by him. He was on his way to San Ambrosio, where his wife and family dwelt, having heard that it had been greatly damaged, if not destroyed, by an earthquake.

"It has been utterly destroyed, my poor fellow," said Lawrence, in a tone of pity; "but it may be that your family has escaped. A good number of people have escaped. Here are a few dollars for you. You will need them, I fear. You can owe them to me, and pay them when next we meet."

The gift was accompanied with a look of pleasantry, for Lawrence well knew there was little chance of their ever meeting again.

Pedro sat regarding them with a grim smile. "You are a stout fellow,"

he said, in a tone that was not conciliatory, after the beggar had accepted the dollars with many expressions of grat.i.tude; "from all I have heard of Conrad of the Mountains, you are quite a match for him, if he were alone."

"He was not alone, senhor," replied the beggar, with a look that told of a temper easily disturbed.

To this Pedro replied contemptuously, "Oh, indeed!" and, turning abruptly away, rode on.

"You doubt that man?" said Lawrence, following him.

"I do."

"He looked honest."

"Men are not always to be judged by their looks."

"Das a fact!" interposed Quashy; "what would peepil judge ob _me_, now, if dey hoed by looks?"

"They'd say you were a fine, genial, hearty, good-natured blockhead,"

said Lawrence, laughing.

"True, ma.s.sa, you's right. I'm all dat an' wuss, but not _always_ dat.

Sometimes I'm roused; an' I'm _awrful_ w'en I'm roused! You should see me w'en my back's riz. Oh _my_!"

The negro opened his eyes and mouth so awfully at the mere idea of such a rising that his companions were fain to seek relief in laughter. Even the grave Manuela gave way to unrestrained merriment, for if she failed to thoroughly understand Quashy's meaning, she quite understood his face.

That night they found welcome shelter in a small farm.

"Did you fall in with the notorious bandit, Conrad of the Mountains?"

asked their host, after the ceremonious reception of his guests was over.

"No, senhor," answered Pedro. "Is that fellow in this neighbourhood just now?"

"So it is said, senhor. I have not seen him myself, and should not know him if I saw him, but from descriptions I should think it must be he. I have a poor fellow--a peon--lying here just now, who has been robbed and nearly murdered by him. Come, he is in the next room; you can speak to him."

Saying this, the host introduced Pedro and Lawrence into an inner chamber, where the wounded man lay, groaning horribly. He was very ready, indeed eager, to give all the information in his power. Fear had evidently given the poor fellow an exaggerated idea of the appearance of the man who had waylaid him; nevertheless, from his description our travellers had no difficulty in recognising the poor bereaved beggar whom they had met and a.s.sisted.

"Was he a large man?" asked Pedro.