Remember the Alamo Part 10

In another hour, the rest of the leaders had gathered their detachments, and every man had turned his face to the Texan prairies. Crockett was already far advanced on the way. Sam Houston was known to be kindling the fire on the spot; "and I suppose you know, father," said Jack, sinking his voice to a whisper, "that we have still more powerful backers."

"General Gaines?"

"Well, he has a large body of United States troops at Nacogdoches. He says they are to protect the people of Navasola from the Indians."

"But Navasola is twenty-nine miles west of Nacogdoches."

"Navasola is in Texas. Very well! If the United States feel it to be their duty to protect the people of Navasola, it seems they already consider Texas within their boundary."

"You think the Indians a mere pretext?"

"Of course. Crockett has with him an autograph letter from President Jackson, introducing him as 'a G.o.d-chosen patriot.' President Jackson already sees Texas in the Union, and Gaines understands that if the American-Texans should be repulsed by Santa Anna, and fall back upon him, that he may then gather them under his standard and lead them forward to victory--and the conquest of Texas. Father, you will see the Stars and Stripes on the palaces of Mexico."

"Do not talk too fast, Jack. And now, go lie down on my bed. In four hours you must leave, if you want to reach Gonzales to-night!"

Then Dare was called, and the lovers knew that their hour of parting was come. They said nothing of the fears in their hearts; and on Antonia's lifted face there was only the light of love and of hope.

"The fight will soon be over, darling, and then!"

"And then? We shall be so happy."

CHAPTER VI. ROBERT WORTH IS DISARMED.

"Strange sons of Mexico, and strange her fate; They fight for freedom who were never free; A kingless people for a nerveless state."

"Not all the threats or favors of a crown, A Prince's whisper, or a tyrant's frown, Can awe the spirit or allure the mind Of him, who to strict Honor is inclined.

Though all the pomp and pleasure that does wait On public places, and affairs of state; Though all the storms and tempests should arise, That Church magicians in their cells devise, And from their settled basis nations tear: He would, unmoved, the mighty ruin bear.

Secure in innocence, contemn them all, And, decently arrayed, in honor fall."

"Say, what is honor? 'Tis the finest sense Of justice which the human mind can frame."

The keenest sufferings entailed by war are not on the battle-field, nor in the hospital. They are in the household. There are the maimed affections, the slain hopes, the broken ties of love. And before a shot had been fired in the war of Texan independence, the battle had begun in Robert Worth's household.

The young men lay down to rest, but he sat watching the night away.

There was a melancholy sleepiness in it; the mockingbirds had ceased singing; the chirping insects had become weary. Only the clock, with its regular "tick, tick," kept the watch with him.

When it was near dawn, he lifted a candle and went into the room where Jack and Dare were sleeping. Dare did not move; Jack opened his eyes wide, and smiled brightly at the intruder.

"Well, father?"

"It is time to get up, Jack. Tell Dare."

In a few minutes both came to him. A bottle of wine, some preserved bears' paws, and biscuits were on the table. They ate standing, speaking very little and almost in whispers; and then the doctor went with them to the stable. He helped Jack to saddle his horse. He found a sad pleasure in coming so close to him. Once their cheeks touched, and the touch brought the tears to his eyes and sent he blood to his heart.

With his hand on the saddle, Jack paused and said, softly, "Father, dear, tell mi madre my last look at the house, my last thought in leaving it, was for her. She would not kiss me or bless me last night.

Ask her to kiss you for me," and then the lad broke fairly down. The moment had come in which love could find no utterance, and must act. He flung his arm around his father's neck and kissed him. And the father wept also, and yet spoke brave words to both as he walked with them to the gate and watched them ride into the thick mist lying upon the prairie like a cloud. They were only darker spots in it. It swallowed them up. They were lost to sight.

He thought no one had seen the boys leave but himself. But through the lattices two sorrowful women also watched their departure. The Senora, as wakeful as her husband, had heard the slight movements, the unusual noises of that early hour, and had divined the cause of them. She looked at Rachela. The woman had fallen into the dead sleep of exhaustion, and she would not have to parry her objections and warnings. Unshod, and in her night-dress, she slipped through the corridor to the back of the house, and tightly clasping her rosary in her hands, she stood behind the lattice and watched her boy away.

He turned in his saddle just before he pa.s.sed the gate, and she saw his young face lifted with an unconscious, anxious love, to the very lattice at which she stood: In the dim light it had a strange pallor. The misty air blurred and made all indistinct. It was like seeing her Jack in some woful dream. If he had been dead, such a vision of him might have come to her from the shadow land.

Usually her grief was noisy and imperative of sympathy. But this morning she could not cry nor lament. She went softly back to her room and sat down, with her crucifix before her aching eyes. Yet she could not say her usual prayers. She could not remember anything but Jack's entreaty--"Kiss me, mi madre! Bless me, mi madre!" She could not see anything but that last rapid turn in the saddle, and that piteous young face, showing so weird and dreamlike through the gray mist of the early dawn.

Antonia had watched with her. Dare, also, had turned, but there had been something about Dare's att.i.tude far more cheery and hopeful. On the previous night Antonia had put some sprays of rosemary in his hat band "to bring good, and keep away evil on a journey"; and as he turned and lifted his hat he put his lips to them. He had the belief that from some point his Antonia was watching him. He conveyed to her, by the strength of his love and his will, the a.s.surance of all their hopes.

That day Doctor Worth did not go out. The little bravado of carrying arms was impossible to him. It was not that his courage had failed, or that he had lost a t.i.ttle of his convictions, but he was depressed by the uncertainty of his position and duty, and he was, besides, the thrall of that intangible anxiety which we call PRESENTIMENT.

Yet, however dreary life is, it must go on. The brave-hearted cannot drop daily duty. On the second day the doctor went to his office again, and Antonia arranged the meals and received company, and did her best to bring the household into peaceful accord with the new elements encroaching on it from all sides.

But the Senora was more "difficult" than even Rachela had ever seen her before. She did not go to church, but Fray Ignatius spent a great deal of time with her; and his influence was not any more conciliating than that of early ma.s.ses and much fasting.

He said to her, indeed: "My daughter, you have behaved with the fort.i.tude of a saint. It would have been more than a venial sin, if you had kissed and blessed a rebel in the very act of his rebellion. The Holy Mary will reward and comfort you."

But the Senora was not sensible of the reward and comfort; and she did feel most acutely the cruel wound she had given her mother love. Neither prayers nor penance availed her. She wanted to see Jack. She wanted to kiss him a hundred times, and bless him with every kiss. And it did not help her to be told that these longings were the suggestions of the Evil One, and not to be listened to.

The black-robed monk, gliding about his house with downcast eyes and folded hands, had never seemed to Robert Worth so objectionable. He knew that he kept the breach open between himself and his wife--that he thought it a point of religious duty to do so. He knew that he was gradually isolating the wretched woman from her husband and children, and that the continual repet.i.tion of prayers and penances did not give her any adequate comfort for the wrong she was doing her affections.

The city was also in a condition of the greatest excitement. The soldiers in the Alamo were under arms. Their officers had evidently received important advices from Mexico. General Cos, the brother-in-law of Santa Anna, was now in command, and it was said immense reinforcements were hourly looked for. The drifting American population had entirely vanished, but its palpable absence inspired the most thoughtful of the people with fear instead of security.

Nor were the military by any means sure of the loyalty of the city. It was well known that a large proportion of the best citizens hated the despotism of Santa Anna; and that if the Americans attacked San Antonio, they would receive active sympathy. Party feeling was no longer controllable. Men suspected each other. Duels were of constant occurrence, and families were torn to pieces; for the monks supported Santa Anna with all their influence, and there were few women who dared to disobey them.

Into the midst of this turbulent, touchy community, there fell one morning a word or two which set it on fire. Doctor Worth was talking on the Plaza with Senor Lopez Navarro. A Mexican soldier, with his yellow cloak streaming out behind him, galloped madly towards the Alamo and left the news there. It spread like wildfire. "There had been a fight at Gonzales, and the Americans had kept their arms. They had also put the Mexicans to flight."

"And more," added a young Mexican coming up to the group of which Robert Worth was one, "Stephen Austin has escaped, and he arrived at Gonzales at the very moment of victory. And more yet: Americans are pouring into Gonzales from every quarter."

An officer tapped Doctor Worth on the shoulder. "Senor Doctor, your arms. General Cos hopes, in the present extremity, you will set an example of obedience."

"I will not give up my arms. In the present extremity my arms are the greatest need I have."

"Then Senor,--it is a great affliction to me--I must arrest you."

He was led away, amid the audible murmurs of the men who filled the streets. There needed but some one to have said the word, and they would have taken him forcibly from the military. A great crowd followed him to the gates of the Alamo. For there was scarcely a family in San Antonio of which this good doctor was not an adopted member. The arrest of their favorite confessor would hardly have enraged them more.

Fray Ignatius brought the news to the Senora. Even he was affected by it. Never before had Antonia seen him walk except with thoughtful and deliberate steps. She wondered at his appearance; at its suppressed hurry; at a something in it which struck her as suppressed satisfaction.

And the priest was in his heart satisfied; though he was consciously telling himself that "he was sorry for the Senora, and that he would have been glad if the sins of her husband could have been set against the works of supererogation which the saints of his own convent had ama.s.sed."

"But he is an infidel; he believes not in the saints," he muttered; "then how could they avail him!"

Antonia met him at the door. He said an Ave Maria as he crossed the threshold, and gave her his hand to kiss. She looked wonderingly in his face, for unless it was a special visit, he never called so near the Angelus. Still, it is difficult to throw off a habit of obedience formed in early youth; and she did not feel as if she could break through the chill atmosphere of the man and ask: "For what reason have you come, father?"