 | CHAPTER XX.
THE DAGGER AND THE SMILE. The damsel of Darien |  |
20. CHAPTER XX.
THE DAGGER AND THE SMILE.
For three days Vasco Nunez gave himself up to all the
delights inspired by his new situation at Darien, and every
hour of increased converse afforded him new promises
of happiness in the contemplated connexion with Teresa.
That capricious beauty, maintained, in all this time, the
most equable humility of temper; and whatever doubts
her lover might have entertained before, in regard to the
love she bore him, were all dissipated by the gentle confidence
which she now bestowed upon him, and the devoted
pleasure which she seemed to feel in his society.
But the pressing emergencies of his settlement at Acla,
demanded the attention of the adventurer in that quarter,
and as the marriage was appointed to take place at a remoter
period, it became necessary that he should forego
the happiness, however great, which he felt in Darien, and
hurry away to the scene of his labours. This he did
with a reluctance easier imagined than described; and
his regrets at separation were only surpassed by those of
the maiden. Tender, and frequently repeated, were the
assurances which she gave him of lasting fidelity and
warmest love; and whatever may have been his sorrows
at parting with so dear an object, they were all softened
by the fond conviction that she was at length securely
his—that his period of probation would soon be over, and
he, who, long baffled in all respects, had at length
triumphed over fame and fortune, should at length be
followed by no less success in his labours in the field of
love.
The new feelings of hope and love awakened in his
bosom by meeting with Teresa, could now, separated
from the object of his attachment, be quieted by employment
only; and his first care on reaching Acla, was to get
in readiness for transportation over the mountains of the
isthmus the materials of the four brigantines which he intended
to launch into the great south sea. The timber
was felled and hewn upon the Atlantic seaboard, then,
with the anchors and rigging, carried by human labour
over the land. The only roads were Indian paths, which
meandered through forests almost impervious, across
swollen torrents, through rugged defiles, and along the
sides of dangerous precipices. The labourers were
chiefly Indians and negroes. The Spaniards, though
more hardy than their employees, of better muscle, and
better capable of bearing fatigue, were yet few in number.
Together, however, with hearty goodwill, they
toiled forward with their massive burdens, ascending
with slow steps the bronze-like mountains, under the
glaring fervour of a tropical sun. Many of them perished
on their way, but the genius and perseverance of Vasco
Nunez triumphed in the end, and after a thousand delays
and disasters, which tasked all his patience to endure, and
all his genius to remedy, he had the proud satisfaction at
last of launching upon the great ocean he had discovered.
Piece by piece had he carried the materials for his ships
over a wild ridge of mountains, occupied by a savage
people that hung in hostility around his footsteps, and
amidst dangers, fatigues and privations, that might well
have daunted a less ardent spirit. The exultation of his
heart may be fancied by the reader, when he found himself
for the first time upon the bosom of that wondrous
ocean, and in the very pathway, perhaps, to no less wondrous
lands that lay along its borders. “None but
Spaniards,” says Herrera, with a pardonable boast,
“could ever have conceived or persisted in such an
undertaking; and no commander in the new world but
Vasco Nunez could have conducted it to a successful
issue.”
Of the cruise of Vasco Nunez in the southern sea, of
his visit to the Pearl Islands, and his conquests over
hitherto unknown as well as known Indian tribes that
rose in hostility upon his path, it is not within our province
and are already recorded by Irving in his very interesting
chronicles. It may be stated, however, that but for a
change of wind, Vasco Nunez would in his very first
voyage upon the Pacific have discovered Peru,—an adventure
reserved for one of his followers—the least worthy,
though not the least brave, of any among them.
Providence, however, did not seem willing in his case,
any more than in that of Columbus, to permit him, who
led the way to conquest, to perfect its details. There is
a moral justice, perhaps, in reserving for succeeding
times and genius, those achievements which, by increasing
the wonders in one man's performance, might
strengthen too greatly his claims upon the gratitude and
admiration of mankind, insomuch as sometimes to weaken
the hold of the Creator himself upon them. It is enough
for genius to lead the way at first;—if it did not tend to
the evil result already contemplated, it might at least subtract
from the renown of the discoverer, were he to carry
on his labours to the minute developement of all its results.
The ice once broken, the petty voyager may make his
way in safety—it is glory enough for Columbus and
Vasco Nunez, that they possessed the eye to see and the
wing to reach, in advance of all, the realms which they respectively
gave—not to Castile and Leon, merely, as the
epitaph of the former idly expresses it—but to the world.
Let the humbler adventurer penetrate its rivers, dig its
mountains, and cast nets into its seas for the pale, white
jewels of the deep.
While Vasco Nunez was thus triumphantly riding the
billows of the southern sea, the youth, Pedro, watched
all his movements with a hostility duly sharpened by
each day's additional experience. When the former,
with that daring spirit which alone seemed to have
effected all his purposes, was pushing his way to conquest,
as it were, in very spite of fortune, the admiration
of the youth had been superior to his hate. His resolves,
and the influence by which he was wrought upon to suspend
the stroke of his meditated vengeance, are already
known to the reader in the progress of this narrative. It
is also known by what circumstance he was prompted to
renew his oath of hostility, and to forget those more
generous sentiments by which he had hitherto been
into feverish restlessness by the presence of a continually
goading enthusiasm, rendered him fanatical in his angry
mood; and the weaknesses of heart by which Vasco
Nunez had resolved upon an act which would sacrifice
the Indian girl who had confided in him so entirely, provoked
the indignation of the youth anew. He saw nothing
now but the infidelity and baseness of the man
whom he was sworn to slay for a crime which personally
wronged him. He now brooded with constant thought
upon his resolution; the difficulties in the way of performing
which he never disguised from himself.
“I know that I must perish,” he would mutter to himself;
“his arm would crush me at a blow; and even my
stroke, however well aimed, his unarmed hand could
parry if he beheld it. Thus should I lose life, yet fail in
my purposed vengeance. I must do it while he sleeps.
If the blow be just—if the vengeance be due to the crime
—then is the mode most fitting which is most certain and
most secure. There is no dishonour, as fools fancy, in
such a deed. Yet, would it were that I could encounter
with him as the strong man loves to encounter with his
fellow. But the wish is idle—it may not be. This powerless
arm!—what could it hope against the muscle and
sinew of Vasco Nunez?”
He surveyed the small and shrivelled member with a
bitter smile, and his skinny and childlike fingers relaxed
the hold which they had hitherto kept upon the dagger as
he uttered these words. The weapon fell upon the ground
at his feet. He stooped, and without lifting, sat down
beside it, and leaning forward with his elbow upon the
long grass, he looked forth upon the broad ocean purpled
by the setting sun, and dotted in the far distance
by the white sails of one of the brigantines in which
Vasco Nunez was then coasting. They were then upon
the lovely shores of Isla Rica, in which the adelantado
had fixed his temporary abode. The waters of the
ocean were as serene as those of some mountain lake,
locked in by a circlet of protecting hills. The tide, rising,
threw its successive billows upon the bleached sands of
the island with a gentle violence that murmured only and
did not complain. A deep blue sky, almost as transparent
as the waves which reflected its every aspect, relieved,
fleece, hung above him; soft, bright, and beautiful enough
to declare the heavens behind, which it yet curtained from
his gaze. The scene impressed itself upon the spectator,
but did not alter his mood.
“Even now,” said he, gazing upon the distant brigantine
as if he could behold upon her deck the person of
whom he spake—“even now he is looking forth upon
these waters, without a thought that they will change.
He beholds them soft, almost smiling—scarcely less beautiful
than the folding skies above—to him more beautiful,
as they promise to carry him forward to conquests
greater than any he has yet achieved. His fortune, too,
has at length put on an aspect of peace and promise.
His bitterest enemy has become his best friend—the woman
who had scorned, smiles upon him. On all hands
the hostile fates seem to have given up their warfare, and
to have folded their adverse wings in token of amity.
Grown confident of fortune he has now no fears, and he
would as soon—nay, sooner—look for the hurricane in
yonder thin speck of fleece, as look for an enemy in me.
He would laugh—ha! ha!—he would laugh, were he to be
warned against my dagger. He would stretch forth his
arm, and smile as he surveyed it, and dismiss all fear of
mine. Let him not be too sure of his strength and of my
weakness. They must both be tried. This night”—he
resumed the dagger as he spoke—“this night will I seek
him where he sleeps. He hath no guard, and the Indian
girl only sleeps beside him. It were easy to pass among
the leaves which shroud them, yet awaken neither sleeper.
One blow, and thou art avenged, my brother. Thou shalt
chide me no longer with this profitless service in behalf
of thy murderer. Thou shalt haunt me no longer with
thy frowns.”
It was night ere the brigantine drew near to land. That
day Vasco Nunez had made many discoveries, which
filled his heart with joy; but it needed not new discoveries
to produce this sensation in his bosom, now that
he found himself in possession of the desired power, and
in the path of his desired conquests.
“Lo! you,” he said to Micer Codro, as in the mild
breath of that lovely evening they sat together by the
sea-shore, and looked upward and around, beholding in
you, Micer Codro, if I err not, that evil star
of which thou hast spoken to me so oft, still hangs red
and ominous within the rim of my good planet. Is it
not so?”
“It is even so, my son,” replied the other with gravity;
“the aspect is even more evil now than on the night when
I guided thine eye to it at first.”
“Behold then,” continued the adelantado with playful
humour, “the wisdom of those who would suffer such
predictions as thine to baffle them in their labours, and
prevent them in the performance of their most noble
works. Had I put faith in thy predictions, Micer Codro,
I had gone to my prayers rather than to my works, and,
perchance, had suffered the defeats and death which lay
within thy prophecy. Even now what error can be more
clearly shown than this of thine. Looking on that star,
which seems innocent enough to mine eyes, as surely it
hath so far shown itself harmless to my fortunes, thou
wouldst even now declare that I am in imminent peril of
my life;—yet, here am I—within reach of all my wishes,
sound in health, the favoured of Pedrarias, with four
brigantines and three hundred brave men at my bidding.
Nay, more—the hopes of my heart, which had been so
long baffled and denied, now made secure in the acceptance
and the avowed love of Teresa Davila.”
“It is in the calm that the storm has its birth, my son,”
replied the astrologer with increasing gravity—“death
follows life like a shadow, and he only can fall far who is
uplifted high. I rejoice me that thou hast so far triumphed
over the fate which has lain in waiting for thee. It is
my prayer that it may yet be baffled, and that thou mayst
pass from triumph to triumph, and from joy to joy, with a
heart and hope growing younger at every step which thou
takest. But when thou thinkest the fate baffled which
has pursued thee, it may be delayed only. All day the
tiger, that ever-hungry beast, pursueth with hot haste the
affrighted traveller, till, as he reacheth him, he croucheth
low, and for the first time stays him in the pursuit—not
that he relenteth—not that his limbs have grown weary,
or his tooth no longer gnasheth for the feast of bloody
flesh. No! he pauseth but to crouch, and he croucheth
but to spring. Even such is the pursuit of the hounds of
she hath chosen. Be not too bold, then, to think—for
that thou no longer hearkenest to their hungry bark—that
she hath relented of her hate, that she hath called them
in to the leash, and hath altered her resolution. If thou
hopest thus, yet be not so confident in thy hope, as to
forget thy caution, thy moderation, thy humility. He
who would be great enduringly must never forget that
he is human. To secure immortality, it is a condition
that we should also feel our state to be some time mortal.
Oh, Vasco Nunez, my son, think not that I speak to discourage
thee. Though I warn thee, I would not thou
shouldst ever despond. If I speak to thee of gloomy
things, it is because I look on gloomy sights. Thou hast
grown doubtful of the language of those blessed signs
of heaven, which I reverence, and wouldst hear me with
a scornful smile, and give little heed, were I to tell thee
now that thy hour approacheth—that—ha!—”
The adelantado would have spoken—he would have
said in the language of deprecation, that he did not scorn
the science which the old man loved;—but the other suffered
but a few imperfect words to escape ere he interrupted
him with a vehemence, the result of a sudden
impulse, of which he did not himself seem to be conscious—
“Ha! what is it that I see?—the clouds rise, they part
—a curtain is drawn aside—I hear cries and clamours.
Holy Mother, Blessed Jesu! what may this mean?—
what terror grows before me—what danger waits? I
see it now, as once before, when I stood among the iron
mountains. The bloody signs are again before my sight.
Oh, Vasco Nunez, my son, my son!—thou art again threatened
with the smile and the dagger. The axe swings in
air above thee—thy knees bend—thy neck is bare to the
stroke. Spare him—Father of Mercies!—be nigh to save
him. It is not too late. Let the arm be stayed—let the
cruel judge relent—bid the headsman go down from the
altar-place of death. Jesu! the cloud rolls back—the
curtain falls—I am blind—I can see no more. Dost thou
yet live, Vasco Nunez—do I see thee, do I feel thee yet,
my son? Ha! It may be that the danger has gone by.
Thou mayst yet be spared.”
“Nay, Micer Codro, thou dreamest—I am yet beside
thee.”
“Ha! ha! but indeed I saw thee not. That dreadful
sight—that sudden danger—my soul was tossed in terror—my
mind was gone. But I see it no more. It was
a bloody vision.”
Vasco Nunez arose from his recumbent position upon
the grass, as his ear caught the sudden and wild accents
of the excited astrologer. The transition from the grave
and temperate speech with which the old man had begun,
to the impetuous torrent of full and frenzied
rhapsody with which he concluded, absolutely stunned
him for the instant. He drew nigh, and would have interrupted
him in the midst of it, fearing a sudden
paroxysm of madness; for never before, in all his experience,
had he beheld him in such a mood; but the other
heeded him not, and did not seem even to see him.
His looks were elsewhere,—his soul seemed set on far
other objects. He sank upon his knees—his eyes were
wild, staring and starting, as if the bloody vision which
he described was indeed at that instant passing before
them. His hands were convulsively shot out from his
body, as if in arrest of the threatening blow,—his voice—
raised hoarsely, almost shriekingly, as if dreading to be
unheard—excluded all other sounds but its own. Big
drops rose upon his forehead, and stood out clear to the
sight of his companion in the rich evening starlight. His
limbs shivered while he spoke, as some aged and decaying
tree of the forest in the quick, keen blasts of December;
and, at the end, when the scene which his imagination
beheld, seemed shut in from his sight, in the far western
eminence of heaven, he sank and fell forward upon
his face, seemingly without life as he was without motion.
Vasco Nunez lifted him from the ground, and seated him
beside him upon the turf. His eyes were open, but the
expression was wild and vacant; the mouth was wide,
almost spasmodically parted; and the stiffness of all his
limbs was such as to induce an apprehension in the mind
of his companion that they had already become fixed in
the unrelaxing grasp of death. But at that instant, without
speaking, the old man lifted his hand and pointed
suddenly to the quarter of the heavens in which he had
watched the star of his friend's nativity. The eye of
moment, a cloud, which he had no where seen before
in the heavens, passed over the rival stars—the good
and the evil aspect alike—and completely shrouded them
from his gaze. The hand of the astrologer dropped
almost lifelessly beside him; and the strong man and
fearless warrior, however greatly his experience had
moved him to question the certainty of the astrologer's
prediction, was yet moved with a feeling of reverential
awe, which he vainly strove to dispel. He would have
spoken the language of mirth, or indifference, at least,
but his voice failed him—a husky whisper escaped his
lips, and no more. The tongue clove to the roof of the
mouth, and a silence, like that among the stars, hung
over the two for the space of many minutes.
The old man resumed the conversation.
“I cannot mistake these signs, Vasco Nunez. I tell
thee danger awaits thee. The fate which has so long
hunted thee still hangs upon thy heels:—it is for thee
still, by diligent watch and calm wisdom, under God's
smile and sanction, to elude it, as thou hast done heretofore.
Thou hast still to watch and pray, my son:
watch for the foe, and pray for the deliverance. But my
soul is heavy in thy behalf, Vasco. Full fifteen years
have we sped together, and I have loved thee as my own
son. Thou knowest how I have loved thee—with a feeling
no less strange to age than to youth. Thou hast
seemed to me from the first, one commissioned to do
wonders, and I have yearned for thy greatness as if it had
been a greatness of my own. Would I had been called
at the blessed hour when we stood together on the peak
of Darien, and beheld for the first time the silver waters
of the strange sea below. I had been spared a constant
apprehension, which leaves me now, as thou seest, faint,
feeble and cast down, as with a nameless affliction. Give
me thy arm, my son. I need thy help even to the shelter
of yon tree, where I watch, rather than sleep, the starry
evening away.”
“Shall I give thee help, señor?” demanded a voice at
the side of the adelantado, while he assisted the aged man
from the earth.
“Ha! thou there, Pedro?”
The astrologer looked on the youth with a keen, piercing
glance of his light gray eye, and then remarked—
“Surely I have seen that face but now—it has passed
strangely before me to-night.”
“True, my father,” replied Vasco Nunez, “it is Pedro
—thou shouldst know—the secretary.”
“Ay, ay! that I know, my son,” continued the old
man sharply, “but methinks I have seen him elsewhere
to-night—I have not beheld him on the island.”
A fear touched the mind of Vasco Nunez that the
thoughts of the old man wandered, and saying nothing
to provoke farther excitement, he assisted him to the
shady palm, under which his sylvan couch had been prepared.
“Hast thou heard this old man's prophecy to-night,
Pedro?” demanded Vasco Nunez, when they had left
Micer Codro to his repose.
“No, my lord,” answered the other hesitatingly—and
falsely. “I drew nigh at the moment when he claimed
the help of thy arm. What is the prophecy, señor!”
“Nay, Pedro, if thou hast not heard, it will be of little
profit to thee now to hear. Away to Francisco Compañon,
Pedro, and bid him get the brigantines in readiness
by dawn. The breeze will favour us at morning,
and the longest life were too short to see all the wonders
of this vast ocean. I would make the most of mine.
Away,”
“Ay!” exclaimed the youth, as he proceeded on his
way to the brigantines where Compañon commanded—
“Thine will be shorter than thou thinkest. Yet, is it
not strange that this old man, Micer Codro, should hit
so rightly upon the danger of Vasco Nunez? True, as
he would say, never seemed fortune more favourable
to man than his at this hour to him. Should there be,
indeed, a language in the stars which one might read!
Yet why should it be thus imperfectly written? Why
should Micer Codro, if he beheld it, go no farther? He
spoke of a scaffold and public execution, yet of this
there is truly no danger. There was something of a
smile and dagger—the dagger is surely in my hand,
but, Blessed Mary! I have not smiled this season, nor
do I think I shall ever smile again. But here are the
brigantines.”
Meanwhile Vasco Nunez proceeded to the pleasant
grove which had been assigned to Careta, and where, with
a fond but usual impatience, she sleeplessly awaited him.
A rude tent formed the sleeping apartment, in the front of
which, the free use of hatchet and axe had robbed the
primitive wood of another chamber, scarcely less compact
and close. A narrow entrance through the dense
shrubbery was concealed by a heavy dark Spanish cloak
suspended from the branches, and no eyes but those of
the unsuspicious stars were able to penetrate the thick
enclosure.
“Ah, my lord, thou art slow to seek the poor damsel
of Darien. When the great cannon of the big canoe
made thunder to tell of thy coming from the sea, I looked
for thee, but thou camest not.”
“But I am come now, Careta.”
“Ah, yes, my lord, and I should be happy, and should
now forget that thou wert ever gone, but that I fear,
thou lovest not the poor Careta as once thou didst. Thou
art ever in the big canoe, in which I fear to go, and if thou
comest to me at last, it is to leave me soon again.”
The reproaches of the girl were not wanting in truth,
and they went to the heart of the hero, who, whatever
might have been the greater warmth of his feeling toward
Teresa Davila, was too gentle in most respects, and too
conscious of the right, even if he did not pursue it, not to
recognise the justice of her complaints.
The conscience that smote him for his treatment of her,
made him sometimes anxious to avoid her; and to a proud
man the very feeling which sometimes compelled his eye
to sink when it met the sudden glance of hers, was a
source of mortification too humiliating to be felt complacently,
or incurred without regret and disquiet. He
now sought her chiefly at night, when all his emotions
were concealed from all eyes. It was a pang still which
he could not quiet, when he found that there were eyes
in his own soul from which he could conceal nothing.
“But now that I am come to thee, Careta, thou shouldst
forget all things but that I am present.”
“Oh, I do, I do, my lord; even when I tell thee of thy
delay, I tell thee with a smile upon my lips and a joy
within my heart. But now thou wilt not need to delay
so long. Thy ships are built—thou wilt stay here at Isla
Darien, where thy enemies dwell.”
“Nay, I have now no enemies, Careta—thou need'st
suffer these fears no longer. All now are friends to Vasco
Nunez, here and in Darien.”
At that moment the youth, Pedro, lifted the cloak at the
entrance, and slowly crawled within, sheltering himself
among the leaves and branches of the outer apartment.
He heard the words and clutched the dagger
firmly, while he was conscious of a derisive smile that
passed over his features.
“By the Holy Cross, this Micer Codro hath speech of
the devil. Said he not the smile and the dagger? Of a
truth they are here together.” And his resolution of revenge
derived strength in his mind from his remembrance
of the astrologer's prediction.
| CHAPTER XX.
THE DAGGER AND THE SMILE. The damsel of Darien | |