“Five miles!” exclaimed the ex-officer of volunteers, with a sardonic smile; “you would be as safe at fifty, cousin Loo. You are just as likely to encounter the redskins within a hundred yards of the door, as at the distance of a hundred miles. When they are on the war trail they may be looked for anywhere, and at any time. In my opinion, uncle Woodley is rights you are very foolish to ride out alone.”
“Oh! you say so?” sharply retorted the young Creole, turning disdainfully towards her cousin. “And pray, sir, may I ask of what service your company would be to me in the event of my encountering the Comanches, which I don’t believe there’s the slightest danger of my doing? A pretty figure we’d cut – the pair of us – in the midst of a war-party of painted savages! Ha! ha! The danger would be yours, not mine: since I should certainly ride away, and leave you to your own devices. Danger, indeed, within five miles of the house! If there’s a horseman in Texas – savages not excepted – who can catch up with my little Luna in a five mile stretch, he must ride a swift steed; which is more than you do, Mr Cash!”
“Silence, daughter!” commanded Poindexter. “Don’t let me hear you talk in that absurd strain. Take no notice of it, nephew. Even if there were no danger from Indians, there are other outlaws in these parts quite as much to be shunned as they. Enough that I forbid you to ride abroad, as you have of late been accustomed to do.”
“Be it as you will, papa,” rejoined Louise, rising from the breakfast-table, and with an air of resignation preparing to leave the room. “Of course I shall obey you – at the risk of losing my health for want of exercise. Go, Pluto!” she added, addressing herself to the darkey, who still stood grinning in the doorway, “turn Luna loose into the corral – the pastures – anywhere. Let her stray back to her native prairies, if the creature be so inclined; she’s no longer needed here.”
With this speech, the young lady swept out of the sala, leaving the three gentlemen, who still retained their seats by the table, to reflect upon the satire intended to be conveyed by her words.
They were not the last to which she gave utterance in that same series. As she glided along the corridor leading to her own chamber, others, low murmured, mechanically escaped from her lips. They were in the shape of interrogatories – a string of them self-asked, and only to be answered by conjecture.
“What can papa have heard? Is it but his suspicions? Can any one have told him? Does he knew that we have met?”
Chapter 29
El Coyote at Home
Calhoun took his departure from the breakfast-table, almost as abruptly as his cousin; but, on leaving the sala[196] instead of returning to his own chamber, he sallied forth from the house.
Still suffering from wounds but half healed, he was nevertheless sufficiently convalescent to go abroad – into the garden, to the stables, the corrals – anywhere around the house.
On the present occasion, his excursion was intended to conduct him to a more distant point. As if under the stimulus of what had turned up in the conversation – or perhaps by the contents of the letter that had been read – his feebleness seemed for the time to have forsaken him; and, vigorously plying his crutch, he proceeded up the river in the direction of Fort Inge.
In a barren tract of land, that lay about half way between the hacienda and the Fort – and that did not appear to belong to any one – he arrived at the terminus of his limping expedition. There was a grove of mezquit, with, some larger trees shading it; and in the midst of this, a rude hovel of “wattle and dab,” known in South-Western Texas as a jacalé.
It was the domicile of Miguel Diaz, the Mexican mustanger – a lair appropriate to the semi-savage who had earned for himself the distinctive appellation of El Coyote (“Prairie Wolf.”)
It was not always that the wolf could be found in his den – for his jacalé deserved no better description. It was but his occasional sleeping-place; during those intervals of inactivity when, by the disposal of a drove of captured mustangs, he could afford to stay for a time within the limits of the settlement, indulging in such gross pleasures as its proximity afforded.
Calhoun was fortunate in finding him at home; though not quite so fortunate as to find him in a state of sobriety. He was not exactly intoxicated – having, after a prolonged spell of sleep, partially recovered from this, the habitual condition of his existence.
“H’la ñor!” he exclaimed in his provincial patois, slurring the salutation, as his visitor darkened the door of the jacalé. “P’r Dios! Who’d have expected to see you? Siéntese[197]! Be seated. Take a chair. There’s one. A chair! Ha! ha! ha!”
The laugh was called up at contemplation of that which he had facetiously termed a chair. It was the skull of a mustang, intended to serve as such; and which, with another similar piece, a rude table of cleft yucca-tree, and a couch of cane reeds, upon which the owner of the jacalé was reclining, constituted the sole furniture of Miguel Diaz’s dwelling.
Calhoun, fatigued with his halting promenade, accepted the invitation of his host, and sate down upon the horse-skull.
He did not permit much time to pass, before entering upon the object of his errand.
“Señor Diaz!” said he, “I have come for – ”
“Señor Americano!” exclaimed the half-drunken horse-hunter, cutting short the explanation, “why waste words upon that? Carrambo! I know well enough for what you’ve come. You want me to wipe out that devilish Irlandes!”
“Well!”
“Well; I promised you I would do it, for five hundred pesos[198] – at the proper time and opportunity. I will. Miguel Diaz never played false to his promise. But the time’s not come, ñor capitan; nor yet the opportunity, Carajo! To kill a man outright requires skill. It can’t be done – even on the prairies – without danger of detection; and if detected, ha! what chance for me? You forget, ñor capitan, that I’m a Mexican. If I were of your people, I might slay Don Mauricio; and get clear on the score of its being a quarrel. Maldita[199]! With us Mexicans it is different. If we stick our macheté into a man so as to let out his life’s blood, it is called murder; and you Americanos, with your stupid juries of twelve honest men, would pronounce it so: ay, and hang a poor fellow for it. Chingaro! I can’t risk that. I hate the Irlandes as much as you; but I’m not going to chop off my nose to spite my own face. I must wait for the time, and the chance – carrai[200], the time and the chance.”
“Both are come!” exclaimed the tempter, bending earnestly towards the bravo. “You said you could easily do it, if there was any Indian trouble going on?”
“Of course I said so. If there was that – ”
“You have not heard the news, then?”
“What news?”
“That the Comanches are starting on the war trail.”
“Carajo!” exclaimed El Coyote, springing up from his couch of reeds, and exhibiting all the activity of his namesake, when roused by the scent of prey. “Santíssima Virgen[201]! Do you speak the truth, ñor capitan?”
“Neither more nor less. The news has just reached the Fort. I have it on the best authority – the officer in command.”
“In that case,” answered the Mexican reflecting! – “in that case, Don Mauricio may die. The Comanches can kill him. Ha! ha! ha!”
“You are sure of it?”
“I should be surer, if his scalp were worth a thousand dollars, instead of five hundred.”
“It is worth that sum.”
“What sum?”
“A thousand dollars.”
“You promise it?”
“I do.”
“Then the Comanches shall scalp him, ñor capitan. You may return to Casa del Corvo, and go to sleep with confidence that whenever the opportunity arrives, your enemy will lose his hair. You understand?”
“I do.”
“Get ready your thousand pesos.”
“They wait your acceptance.”
“Carajo! I shall earn them in a trice. Adiós[202]! Adiós!”
“Santíssima Virgen!” exclaimed the profane ruffian, as his visitor limped out of sight. “What a magnificent fluke of fortune! A perfect chiripé[203]. A thousand dollars for killing the man I intended to kill on my own account, without charging anybody a single claco[204] for the deed!
“The Comanches upon the war trail! Chingaro! can it be true? If so, I must look up my old disguise – gone to neglect through these three long years of accursed peace. Viva la guerra de los Indios[205]! Success to the pantomime of the prairies!”
Chapter 30
A Sagittary Correspondence
Louise Poindexter, passionately addicted to the sports termed “manly,” could scarce have overlooked archery.
She had not. The how, and its adjunct the arrow, were in her hands as toys which she could control to her will.
She had been instructed in their manège by the Houma[206] Indians; a remnant of whom – the last descendants of a once powerful tribe – may still be encountered upon the “coast” of the Mississippi, in the proximity of Point Coupé and the bayou Atchafalaya[207].
For a long time her bow had lain unbent – unpacked, indeed, ever since it had formed part of the paraphernalia brought overland in the waggon train. Since her arrival at Casa del Corvo she had found no occasion to use the weapon of Diana; and her beautiful bow of Osage-orange wood, and quiver of plumed arrows, had lain neglected in the lumber-room.
There came a time when they were taken forth, and honoured with some attention. It was shortly after that scene at the breakfast table; when she had received the paternal command to discontinue her equestrian excursions.
To this she had yielded implicit obedience, even beyond what was intended: since not only had she given up riding out alone, but declined to do so in company.
The spotted mustang stood listless in its stall, or pranced frantically around the corral; wondering why its spine was no longer crossed, or its ribs compressed, by that strange caparison, that more than aught else reminded it of its captivity.
It was not neglected, however. Though no more mounted by its fair mistress, it was the object of her daily – almost hourly – solicitude. The best corn in the granaderias of Casa del Corvo was selected, the most nutritions grass that grows upon the savanna – the gramma – furnished for its manger; while for drink it had the cool crystal water from the current of the Leona.
Pluto took delight in grooming it; and, under his currycomb and brushes, its coat had attained a gloss which rivalled that upon Pluto’s own sable skin.
While not engaged attending upon her pet, Miss Poindexter divided the residue of her time between indoor duties and archery. The latter she appeared to have selected as the substitute for that pastime of which she was so passionately fond, and in which she was now denied indulgence.
The scene of her sagittary performances was the garden, with its adjacent shrubbery – an extensive enclosure, three sides of which were fenced in by the river itself, curving round it like the shoe of a racehorse, the fourth being a straight line traced by the rearward wall of the hacienda.
Within this circumference a garden, with ornamental grounds, had been laid out, in times long gone by – as might have been told by many ancient exotics seen standing over it. Even the statues spoke of a past age – not only in their decay, but in the personages they were intended to represent. Equally did they betray the chisel of the Spanish sculptor. Among them you might see commemorated the figure and features of the great Condé[208]; of the Campeador[209]; of Ferdinand[210] and his energetic queen; of the discoverer of the American world; of its two chief conquistadores – Cortez[211] and Pizarro[212]; and of her, alike famous for her beauty and devotion, the Mexican Malinché[213].
It was not amidst these sculptured stones that Louise Poindexter practised her feats of archery; though more than once might she have been seen standing before the statue of Malinché, and scanning the voluptuous outline of the Indian maiden’s form; not with any severe thought of scorn, that this dark-skinned daughter of Eve[214] had succumbed to such a conqueror as Cortez.
The young creole felt, in her secret heart, that she had no right to throw a stone at that statue. To one less famed than Cortez – though in her estimation equally deserving of fame – she had surrendered what the great conquistador had won from Marina – her heart of hearts.
In her excursions with the bow, which were of diurnal occurrence, she strayed not among the statues. Her game was not there to be found; but under the shadow of tall trees that, keeping the curve of the river, formed a semicircular grove between it and the garden. Most of these trees were of indigenous growth – wild Chinas, mulberries, and pecans – that in the laying out of the grounds had been permitted to remain where Nature, perhaps some centuries ago, had scattered their seed.
It was under the leafy canopy of these fair forest trees the young Creole delighted to sit – or stray along the edge of the pellucid river, that rolled dreamily by.
Here she was free to be alone; which of late appeared to be her preference. Her father, in his sternest mood, could not have denied her so slight a privilege. If there was danger upon the outside prairie, there could be none within the garden – enclosed, as it was, by a river broad and deep, and a wall that could not have been scaled without the aid of a thirty-round ladder. So far from objecting to this solitary strolling, the planter appeared something more than satisfied that his daughter had taken to these tranquil habits; and the suspicions which he had conceived – not altogether without a cause – were becoming gradually dismissed from his mind.
After all he might have been misinformed? The tongue of scandal takes delight in torturing; and he may have been chosen as one of its victims? Or, perhaps, it was but a casual thing – the encounter of which he had been told, between his daughter and Maurice the mustanger? They may have met by accident in the chapparal? She could not well pass, without speaking to, the man who had twice rescued her from a dread danger. There might have been nothing in it, beyond the simple acknowledgment of her gratitude?
It looked well that she had, with such willingness, consented to relinquish her rides. It was but little in keeping with her usual custom, when crossed. Obedience to that particular command could not have been irksome; and argued innocence uncontaminated, virtue still intact.
So reasoned the fond father; who, beyond conjecture, was not permitted to scrutinise too closely the character of his child. In other lands, or in a different class of society, he might possibly have asked direct questions, and required direct answers to them. This is not the method upon the Mississippi; where a son of ten years old – a daughter of less than fifteen – would rebel against such scrutiny, and call it inquisition.
Still less might Woodley Poindexter strain the statutes of parental authority – the father of a Creole belle – for years used to that proud homage whose incense often stills, or altogether destroys, the simpler affections of the heart.
Though her father, and by law her controller, he knew to what a short length his power might extend, if exerted in opposition to her will. He was, therefore, satisfied with her late act of obedience – rejoiced to find that instead of continuing her reckless rides upon the prairie, she now contented herself within the range of the garden – with bow and arrow slaying the small birds that were so unlucky as to come under her aim.