The virgin of the sun

by George Chetwynd Griffith

BOOK II

CHAPTER I.
ON THE ROAD TO EL-DORADO

In the late afternoon of a day towards the end of October, in the year 1532, a little company of horse and foot, attended by some twoscore Indian bearers, was plodding slowly and wearily towards the green margin of a thirsty wilderness of red-brown sand and rock, over which it had been toiling almost without rest for sixteen hours past.

Nearly seventy of the company were either mounted or walking beside their parched and weary horses, and four of the strange animals, never before seen in the unknown regions into which the little army was penetrating, were harnessed to wheeled gun-carriages, on each of which was mounted a petrero, or small brass cannon, capable of throwing a ball of about three pounds weight. Besides the seventy horsemen, there were about a hundred men-at-arms, all passably equipped with helmet, breast-plate, and back-piece, sword and dagger and pike, and of these three carried arquebuses and resting-forks, and some twenty of them arbalests, or heavy cross-bows, which at fifty paces would send their short, steel-headed bolts through breast and back of a mailed warrior.

But some of the cavaliers are clad in mail from head to foot, saving only that they have permitted themselves the luxury of exchanging their plumed helmets, which hang at their saddle-bows, for wide-brimmed hats of plaited straw. To many men such a garb in such a place would be intolerable, for there is not a cloud in the sky, and the sun-rays beating down on the parched earth and heated rocks are cast up again as if from a reflector.

There is no breath of wind coming in from the sea twenty leagues away, and in all the wide plain there is not a scrap of shadow save what is cast by the slowly-moving men and horses, and so every bit of steel and iron that the rays catch is hot, so hot that the bare hand can scarcely be laid upon it.

But these men are iron all through, hammered into hardness on the anvil of a fate that none but the sternest and strongest could have endured and yet lived. And good need, too, have they to be stern and strong, for this little army is marching into the heart of an unknown land, fenced in by mighty mountain bulwarks such as no white man has ever crossed before, to confront the master of millions in one of his strong places surrounded by his victorious hosts, and to pluck him from his throne as though he had been but the chief of a petty tribe.

Some of them you have seen before—down on their knees by the water’s edge on the beach at Gallo, grubbing for sea-worms and shellfish to stay the torments of their famine. That was five years ago, and many and great things have happened since then. Yonder cavalier riding alone a little ahead of the troop, armed from head to foot in plate and mounted on a strong black charger, is he who drew that line with his sword-point on the sand and made that famous speech which will be remembered to his honour as long as the history of brave deeds continues to be written.

Then he was but a nameless, base-born adventurer, reckless even to madness in the pursuit of that phantom-land of El-Dorado, whose glittering shores ever receded as the barques of those who sought them struggled against wind and storm and current over the treacherous waters of the unknown sea.

But now El-Dorado is a fact, for the treasures of the golden city of Tumbez have been laid at the foot of his Catholic Majesty’s throne, and Francisco Pizarro is a hidalgo of Spain, a military knight of the Empire who might hang from his shoulders the habit of Sant’ Iago, whose arms are quartered with those of the Crown of Castile, and whose titles are Governor and Captain-General of New Castile, as El-Dorado has been already named though yet unconquered, and Adelantado and Alguacil Mayor, or chief magistrate, of the new land which his sword is to win for his imperial master.

Once more in the history of heroic things the dreamer has confounded the practical men of affairs who had derided and obstructed his schemes till the visions had become realities, and who were now hiding their envy under the mask of eager service.

A little way behind him strides the giant form of Pedro de Candia, leading his horse with his arm through the bridle, and by his side walks Alonso de Molina, also bridle on arm, and with them are six others, all that are left of the gallant band that crossed the line on Gallo, and now hidalgos to a man. But there are some others with them who were not on Gallo, but who are destined to write their names as deeply and redly in the history of El-Dorado as any of them. A fat, white-haired, fiery-faced man, long past the prime of life, who rolls about in the saddle like a full meal-sack, and yet a man of mighty strength and limitless endurance, for all his fat, who can sleep as well on a horse as in a bed, and march and fight and plunder and fight again till he has worn out every man but himself, and then laugh at his troop and curse them for carpet-soldiers and faint-hearts. For this is Francisco Carvahal, the bitterest jester and the bloodiest fighter that you may read of in all the wars of the Conquerors.

Him you will see and hear of again—as you will of Hernando de Soto, stateliest knight of them all, and of Juan and Gonzalo and Hernando, the brothers of the Captain-General—and near him, mounted on a mule and garbed in the black habit of a Dominican friar, rides another of whom the same may be said. From under the cowl that is drawn over his head to shield it from the sun-rays looks out a dark, ascetic face, thin-lipped and peaked-nosed, with small, black, deep-set eyes and high narrow forehead.

That is the face of Fray Vincente de Valverde, sometime to be bishop of Cuzco and Grand Inquisitor of New Castile, a man who, like some others of his cloth that are riding or walking with him, has come out to the new land and its millions of unknown dwellers with the words of the Gospel of Peace on his lips and the fires of fanaticism blazing hot and cruel in his heart.

Yet one more of the company must be signalled out by name, so that what follows may be made the plainer.

He is an Indian youth, slim and agile; a son of the New World clothed in the garb of the Old. Handsome and yet cunning of countenance, he has already learnt to look with something like contempt upon those who were once his people, for this is Filipillo, or little Philip, the lad who was taken away from Tumbez some three years ago and baptized and carried to Spain, being destined, as it appears, to an office which, however poorly performed, nevertheless has given his name a place in the story of the New World, for he is now interpreter to His Excellency Don Francisco, and before many days are passed it shall be his to stand, as it were, between the Old World and the New, and pass through his ears and lips the words which did all that words could do to seal the fate of an empire and the destiny of millions.

Only a bronze-skinned, straight-haired, black-eyed lad who has yet to see his twentieth summer, and yet one who is ere long, for the sake of a pretty face and a pair of eyes brighter and softer than his own, to compass the ruin of one into whose presence his father would scarcely have dared to crawl uninvited through the dust.

Of a sudden Pizarro’s charger raised his head, and after drinking in with widened nostrils a long, deep breath, let out a shrill, whinnying neigh which was instantly taken up by all the other animals in the troop, and with one accord they quickened their pace as though they had drunk in some new principle of life through the air they were breathing.

“Ah,” cried Carvahal, straightening his short, thick legs out from his charger’s flanks, and throwing his arms wide apart, “Cuerpo de Jesu, the good beasts smell the green and the water at last! Carramba! Caballeros, some of us will be glad to get out of this, I fancy, for the good God seems to have made this accursed country in patches with pieces of Paradise and the Inferno, and then, for some wise purpose of His own, left it unfinished at that. It’s a land where one must either get fat and soft and lazy with luxury in valleys that would be no shame to Paradise itself, or else starve and parch in deserts hardly fit for a heretic to die in!”

“It would be a dry desert and a hot one that would melt much of the fat off of that goodly carcase of thine, Carvahal,” said Pedro de Candia, with a laugh, half turning in his saddle towards him; “though doubtless that poor nag of thine would willingly carry thee over a few leagues of desert if thereby he could save himself a few pounds of thy weight to carry. More than once I have seen the poor beast look back at thee to see if thou wert not sweating thyself somewhat smaller.”

“Ay, and I too,” laughed Alonso de Molina; “and yet though this heathen wilderness hath to-day had more rain than it has ever had, and that, too, dripping from good Christian skins, methinks thou, Carvahal, hast done less than any of us to lay the accursed dust.”

“Even so,” growled Carvahal, “and for good reason too, for if there are many more rides like this before us some of ye will get to Atahuallpa’s camp, wherever the heathen may be lodged, with nothing more than your bones rattling inside your mail, and so a man or two with good flesh and blood inside his harness may be wanted when it comes to good honest blows, which the Lord in His mercy send as soon as may be, for this is cheerless work for Christian cavaliers.”

“That is well put, Carvahal,” said Candia, joining in the laugh that the old soldier’s sally raised, and glancing with no little satisfaction from his own mighty frame to the slim, graceful form of Molina, “yet methinks thou wilt not be the only one that gets there unmelted. Ay, it is an accursed land, as thou sayest, and will need a plenteous blessing of heathen gold applied to good Christian profit to sanctify it, for it seems full of evil enchantments.

“Look at those hills yonder. All day we have been riding and walking and labouring alongside them and towards them, and they are no whit nearer than when we started. And as for that green yonder—who knows that we shall reach it to-day or to-morrow? It looks but a couple of leagues away, and yet it may be twenty, or not there at all in reality, but only put there to lure us on by some enchantment of the false gods that these heathens pray to.”

“Thy horse knows better than that, Candia!” snorted Carvahal after a long sniff at the new element that was stealing into the air. “He can smell the grass and water if thou canst not; and so can I, cool and fresh and sweet. Ah, the smell of it is like a good draught of Jerez. I tell thee, to-night we shall camp amidst green fields by cool running waters. Carramba! we have had our bit of Hell to-day for our sins, and to-night we shall see a bit of Paradise for our labours.”

“Labours!” laughed Molina, seeing a chance to turn the tables on the jester. “Call ye these labours, my knight of the ample waistband! Why, it is but a summer’s day’s ride. Hadst thou been with us on Gallo, or on Gorgona or at Puerto de Hambre thou wouldst have learnt more of labour in getting thy breakfast than thou hast done in all this pleasure trip of ours from San Miguel here. And yet, maybe it was well for thee that thou wast swashbuckling in Italy at the time. What say you, Candia? Would it not have been hard for us to refrain when none of us had tasted meat for a month had we had so juicy a morsel within reach?”

“Ay,” said Candia, “that may well be. He would have kept the lot of us on Gallo for a month after the ships sailed away.”

“Carrajo, hombrecito!” Carvahal roared through the laugh that followed, “you are wrong there. It was well for you that I was killing Frenchmen in Italy rather than starving with you on Gallo, for ere I had taken in an inch of my waistband I would have eaten the lot of you and made soup of your bones. But there—a truce to jesting, which is dry work anywhere without wine, and more than ever in a wilderness like this. What think you of the prospects, Candia? Were you ever pledged to a madder-seeming task than this?”

“Mad it may be,” he answered more seriously, “yet those who would do great things must not fear going mad in the daring of them, and we have not done so badly so far. We have our fort at San Miguel and our ships on the coast, with Panama behind us, and El-Dorado in front of us, and more than that, is not all the news we have had good?

“Have not these heathens been fighting amongst themselves for years, and are we not coming like strong men armed into a house that is divided against itself? This Atahuallpa, by all accounts, is a base-born usurper and ruthless tyrant. He has devastated the land with civil war, thrown his half-brother Huascar, the rightful heir, into durance, and made the streets of the Golden City red with the blood of his kindred? Hast thou not seen enough of war and politics to know how great advantage this may be to us?”

“True, true,” said Carvahal, “it looks well enough on paper, as they say of treaties, and we have good swords to turn it into practice. We will take the commission of His Most Catholic Majesty into a land that he would never have heard of but for the Captain yonder, and in his name judge a good judgment of cold steel and hot shot between usurper and rightful heir, for all the world as though we had God’s own right to do it, and then see which can give the most golden reasons for the justice of his cause. Ay, ’tis a merry trade, this adventuring, whether plied by kings at home or simple gentlemen abroad, and the devils must laugh to see how well it goes.”

“Peace, scoffer, peace!” laughed Molina. “Who art thou that thou shouldst deride our holy errand? And knowest thou not that these heathens believe us gods clad in impenetrable armour of light, invulnerable to all earthly weapons, and carrying the thunder and the lightning in our hands?

“Knowest thou not that thou thyself, ugly as thou art, art in their eyes a heaven-descended son of the great god Vira—Vira—what is it, Candia? ah! I have it—the great god Viracocha. Ha, ha! how likes your godship the sound of that? I’ faith, it will be worth all our labours heretofore to see them try and worship thee, good Carvahal.”

“Me a god! ho, ho!” growled Carvahal. “That will be a new trade for an old soldier; yet methinks I shall like it well enough if they do but lay sufficient offerings on my shrine. I will even put off fighting for awhile to see them do it.”

“And if the offerings be not big enough,” said Candia, “I can well picture thee splitting their heathen skulls in punishment for their idolatry.”

“That shows how little thou knowest of Carvahal yet,” he growled again. “Great or small, I would take all the offerings that came and then crack their skulls to boot for following after strange gods, as the Scripture saith.”

“Strange gods, i’ faith!” laughed Molina again. “They would go far before they found a stranger than thou, Carvahal!”

No doubt the old man had a retort ready near his lips, but it was never spoken, and so for a wonder he failed to get the last word, for at that moment Pizarro, who had been looking eagerly ahead with shaded eyes, suddenly pulled up and reined his horse round, holding up his hand as a signal to halt. Instantly the little troop came to a standstill, and Pizarro, riding back to the head of the column, said in a quiet but distinct tone—

“Caballeros, half an hour’s march will take us into the valley, and round the spur of the hill yonder I see a city of some size, and people are coming towards us over the fields; hence it behoves us to enter in due array. So mount and let the ranks be formed.”

CHAPTER II.
HOW THE HORSES FED AT ZARAN

The order had scarcely left the Captain’s lips ere those in the vanguard had already set about obeying it, and it was passed down the line, each rank forming up as it went by, for every man in the little army, from the Captain-General himself to the meanest pike-bearer of them all, knew that on such an errand as theirs each one took his life in his own hands, and more than that, might by his own failure put all the rest in jeopardy.

Two days before all the faint-hearts whose courage had failed them in face of the difficulties and dangers of that unknown march had been given a chance to go back to San Miguel without loss of credit, and they had gone. There were only nine of them out of a hundred and eighty men, and all the rest were staunch and true, for their going had made the little army stronger and not weaker, and the Captain knew that on every man that was with him he could trust without fear for his own life and the honour of the great enterprise.

More than this, every man knew his orders almost before he got them, and so was worth three who might not have known them. So hardly had the word of command reached the other end of the column than every cavalier was in the saddle, helmed and plumed and in his place in the rank, and every footman was marching step for step with his fellow, and the whole army was moving forward over the desert, not limping or straggling now, but firm and close-ranked like a living wall of steel and iron.

The pace was now nearly doubled, for the column was moving with the uniform motion of a machine instead of that of a crowd of straggling units, and not many minutes had gone by before the leading troop of horsemen saw a considerable body of natives emerge from the long low line of straggling thicket which formed, as it might be, the union between the wilderness of rock and dry earth and the green-carpeted, plentifully wooded valley which swept in waves of gentle, rolling wood-crowned hillspurs far away to the eastward where the giant shapes of the mountains beyond loomed dark and vague through the purple haze of the tropical evening.

They could see now, almost right ahead of them but a little to the left-hand side, a considerable town lying in a little side valley between two bold green bluffs, on each of which stood a guardian fortress which all must pass between who would gain the town from that side.

The sun, which was now sending its almost level beams across the desert plain and low hills which the Spaniards had crossed during the day, glinted brightly on polished mail and helm and trappings, so that to the wondering eyes of the natives who were coming to meet them they seemed as though already adorned with the glory of their deity and endowed with unmistakable marks of his favour. So when they came near to the glittering strangers mounted on those wondrous beasts, whose fame had already travelled far through the land, some of them stood back and waited as though awe-stricken, but others came on making gestures of welcome and deference.

When the two companies were within some fifty paces of each other the Captain made the signal for a halt, and called Filipillo to him. As the lad came to his stirrup he said shortly—

“Seek out some one of credible appearance among those yonder. Ask him the name of the valley and town, and how many soldiers there are in it. Then say that we come in peace on an embassy to the Inca, and ask for guides and safe conduct to the town.”

“I obey, Lord!” Filipillo replied, laying his hand lightly on Pizarro’s foot. Then he looked up, and with a half-boyish, half-cunning smile said, in a soft, almost girlish voice, “and may I not say too, Lord, that the sons of Viracocha are coming to do the bidding of their father?”

“Do thou my bidding, boy, and leave these unholy fancies to the heathen. Have we made thee so bad a Christian that thou should still prate of thy false gods and seek to make us their servants? Go and speak only the words that I have put into thy mouth. What else is it for, save to do that and praise the Lord and His saints?”

The red blood showed bright through the clear bronze of the lad’s cheeks as he bent his head again and turned away to do his master’s bidding. But when he knew that none of the troop could see his face there came a smile on his lips which his back would have paid for could Pizarro have seen it.

It did not take many moments for his quick eyes to single out the most promising object for his inquiries. This was a man of middle age, somewhat better dressed than the rest, who was standing apart watching the column with grave face and eager eyes.

From the black turban of wool that he wore he saw that his veins did not boast of the blood of the Sacred Race, so he saluted him with more friendliness than deference and, straightway forgetting or ignoring his master’s orders, told him that the men in shining clothing were the long-promised sons of Viracocha, who had come into the land by command of their Father to give it peace, and that as they only spoke the speech of the gods heard only in the Mansions of the Sun, he, Filipillo, had been endowed by the god with the power of this speech so that he might speak for the celestial messengers, and make plain their intentions to his children. All of which the Indian heard gravely enough, bowing his head every time the name of the god was mentioned, and when he had answered the questions which followed Filipillo went back to his master and made his report.

“The town and valley are called Zaran, Lord. It is a strong place and one that guards the approach from this wilderness and the coast beyond to the roads which lead over very great and high mountains to the heart of El-Dorado itself. But now there are but a few soldiers in the town, not more than a score or so, for the Inca Atahuallpa has drawn all the fighting-men from these regions to swell his armies, so that the way is open to my Lord, and if my Lord will follow, the man yonder whom I spoke to will go before with me and lead you to the causeway by which the river is crossed.”

“That is well, go thou with him,” said Pizarro; “we follow. Keep thine eyes open and be ready to run back to me at need.”

Then the column moved forward again, preceded at about twenty paces by Filipillo and the native, to whom he was talking constantly. They were guided along the edge of the scrub towards the valley, and then a straight, narrow path opened out. This led them through the thicket and a broad belt of trees and then between level fields, well watered by little channels lined with stone, and when they had passed through these the welcome sight of a broad, shallow river rippling smoothly between its green, shady banks cheered their eyes, so long dazzled by the stones and sand, and set their horses whinnying with delight.

From the end of the path a broad, straight causeway of stone, pierced by wide, square openings, ran from shore to shore, and at the end of this Pizarro halted his troop so that men and beasts might slake their thirst. But the Fray Valverde’s mule, with the headstrong self-will of its kind, waited neither for halt nor order, and carried the cleric with unseemly haste through the breaking ranks and waded out till it was knee deep in the water, where, after striving vainly to drink, it looked round at its master and brayed angrily, saying as plain as speech of mule could say it: “I have thirsted all day for you, now take the bit out of my mouth that I may drink.”

But this the Fray could not do without dismounting, nor could he dismount in two feet of running water without inconvenience. So there he sat, pulling this way and that at the bridle, and cursing the mule for a stiff-necked heathen beast, though she was of good Castilian birth, even as he himself was.

At this there was some unseemly tittering from the bank till one of the Friars tucked up his robe and waded in to do what was needful, but he, either not being quick enough to suit the creature’s fancy, or being unskilful at the task, put her so far out of temper that she took him by the breast of his habit with her teeth and pulled him off his feet, so that he, having nothing better to hold on to, grabbed at her ears, and then down went her head and up went her heels, and the holy father on her back took a flying leap head-first and sorely against his will, and with a mighty splash soused his reverence and dignity over head and ears in a pool hard by.

The men of the troop were mostly pious and God-fearing fellows enough, but the Fray, with his strict insistence on fasts and his liberality with penances, had not won over much love from them, and a long hoarse laugh rolled down the river banks, and after it came a roar from Carvahal, who was standing by his horse holding his fat, shaking sides at the sight of the Friar and the mule struggling and kicking together in the water and his reverence rising like a dripping ghost out of his pool, coughing and spitting the water out of his mouth and rubbing it out of his eyes.

“O la diablatita! ohe! ohe! Ah, carramba!—what a devil of a beast to carry so holy a man! Does she think the good father hasn’t been baptized yet, or that this heathen river is the Jordan and she is John the Baptist? Ohe! ohe! the holy father has come out to baptize the heathen and got a dose of his own physic. Ah, well, it is a good thing to see a brace of clerics washed; you don’t see it every day!” and then he roared out his deep laugh, and the rest joined him till a quick, sharp word of command from the Captain brought them back to their discipline.

Now this, though but a simple if laughable thing in itself, yet had somewhat considerable consequences, for it was seen by many of the natives, and from it they got the idea, as in their simplicity they might well have done, that the sad-robed clerics were not true sons of Viracocha at all, since they had no shining raiment or weapons, nor did they see how the god could permit any of his children to be overcome by a beast and put into such a ludicrous and contemptible position.

Another thing, too, they noticed which had a strange result, for after they had watched the horses drink they saw their riders put the bits back into their mouths, and from this they concluded that these wondrous animals fed upon the strange white metal, and afterwards when the troop had been hospitably and with high respect received into the town, which they reached in about another hour, they had spread this rumour abroad, with what consequence shall presently be told.

The men-at-arms and the horse-troopers were lodged in the barracks which the garrison had left, and Pizarro and his chief cavaliers were entertained with great honour in the houses of the Curaca and his officers; but first of all, like the good soldiers that they were, they saw to the comfort of their beasts, which indeed were priceless to them, since not all the gold of El-Dorado could buy one now nearer than far-off Panama.

Now while they were doing this a very strange thing happened, and one that pleased the cavaliers better than the horses, for many of the townspeople, having heard that they ate the strange white metal in which the strangers were clad, came in their kindly, simple way with handfuls of little pieces of gold and silver and prayed Filipillo to get permission for these to be given to the animals, and to this, as the old chroniclers tell us, the cavaliers made no sort of objection, but rather encouraged them to lay the gold and silver among the green stuff that the beasts were eating, bidding Filipillo tell them that these wondrous creatures, sons of those which drew the chariot of the Sun, relished them greatly since they were softer and sweeter than iron, and that they would love them for their gifts. After which, the chroniclers go on to say, they went secretly at night and gathered up the spoil, and so the precious fodder went to fatten their pouches, which pleased them well and did no hurt to the beasts.

That night Don Francisco learnt from the Curaca that at Caxas, a more important town lying some ten leagues off among the mountains, there was a strong garrison under the command of a general of the Inca blood, and after consultation it was decided that Hernando de Soto should take twenty mounted troopers with him and go as an embassy with presents to this general to learn what manner of reception might be expected from him and also to discover the defences of the country, since they were now assured that they were actually within the dominions of the great Inca.

By sunrise the next day de Soto started, and for eight days Pizarro lay in Zaran awaiting his return more and more anxiously as each day went by, for he had ridden away with his little troop into an unknown country amidst those long-dreaded mountains, and it might be that the news had been but a pretence to lure him into some strong place or fearful gorge among the mountains whence neither man nor beast might ever return.

CHAPTER III.
WHAT DE SOTO HAD TO TELL

But while the level beams of the sinking sun were still glancing redly across the low hills that bordered the wilderness to seaward runners came in on the eighth day bringing the welcome news that the sons of Viracocha were returning, and the sun had not long set before the paved causeway that led up to the principal gate of the town was ringing with the music of clanging hoofs, most welcome to the Captain’s ears.

That night, in the principal chamber of the Curaca’s house, by the light of burning cotton wicks floating on oil contained in curiously worked lamps of silver, another council of war was held, and de Soto, most highly bred and gentlest warrior of them all, made the report of his journey.

“Excellency and Caballeros,” he said in the courtly tone which on occasion he could yet raise loud and high above the battle-tumult, “I must first offer you my regrets for the anxiety which, by the needs of my service, I may have caused you, but, this done, I may console myself and you with the information and news that I have brought back. Since there are no listeners here who can take anything away to do us harm, I may speak plainly and as a man among friends and comrades.”

There was a little pause after this, and the assembled cavaliers bowed their heads in sanction and approval, and the Captain, nodding to him with one of his rare, grave smiles, said—

“That is well begun, Don Hernando, and bids fair for what may be to come. Now speak freely, and let your lips show us without fear or restraint all that your eyes have seen and your ears have heard, be it good or evil. There is no need to make the dangers less or the promises of good fortune fairer than in good truth they are, for, as you know, there are none here who can hope more or fear less than good Christian gentlemen who take their lives and their honour hanging to their sword-belts may hope or fear for.”

Again the knightly heads nodded, and Carvahal, bringing his fat fist as gently as might be down on the cedar table round which they sat, said with one of his wholesome, chuckling laughs—

“The Captain-General speaks our minds as ever. Go on, de Soto; thou hast good listeners. There is none here who would turn his back on El-Dorado though to go forward meant instant death, so tell thy story in words as plain as may be. If thou hast been to the mouth of Hell, say so, and we will go and warm ourselves at the blaze, and if thou hast seen the gates of Paradise, or whatever their like may be in El-Dorado, say so too, and we will go none the less speedily to take our share of such of its glories as may be carried away.”

“I have to tell neither of the one nor of the other,” answered de Soto after he had joined in the laugh that followed the old freelance’s sally, “and yet I have that to tell which is worth the telling and the hearing too.

“First, then, we rode up the valley here till the causeway, which is well paved for leagues beyond the town, became a narrow track, winding up out of the valley round hillspurs and in and out of deep, dark gorges, slanting upwards so steeply that we were fain to dismount and lead our chargers by the bridle, taking as much heed to the beasts’ footsteps as we did to our own, and often leading them by the very bit itself round jutting crags where the road went up and down in steps never meant for more than human feet.

“The road sloped so suddenly, and the rock-walls fell away so sheer on the one hand and rose so sharply on the other, that ever and anon our poor frightened beasts stopped and trembled, looking askance down into the abysses, as though knowing that one false step would send them to destruction; and for two days after the first we rode and walked thus, ever ending higher than we had begun, and ever in front of us as each ridge was scaled the mountains beyond rose higher and higher till they seemed like the buttresses of a great wall that rose from earth to Heaven. Yet the valleys were ever green and lovely; and so we travelled on with good cheer till the sunset of the third day brought us to Caxas, which is a sightly town albeit that it is built with nothing better than baked clay.

“The garrison turned out in goodly number to meet us in full and warlike array and, as we thought, with hostile intent; but when we had explained so much of our purpose as we thought fit by the mouth of Filipillo they received us well and lodged us better, and from Caxas the next morning we went on to a most goodly town called Huamacucho, in good sooth as well and solidly built a town as Christian eyes need wish to look upon in such a heathen land as this; for the forts and houses, to say nothing of the temple and the dwelling-place of the Inca noble who rules it, are built, not of clay, but of stone all masoned with marvellous skill, for stone fits on stone and course on course with a precision so perfect that no mortar is needed to bind them together.

“Here we found a garrison stronger by far than at Caxas, and warriors well enough armed after the simple fashion of the land, fit to fight, maybe, with the street lads of Seville and Cordova, though but of poor account as I take it against cavaliers or men-at-arms in mail and plate. Yet their trappings were fine and costly enough, and there were many of them that would be worth a good hundred pesos whether taken alive or found dead on a field of battle.”

Here Carvahal’s eyes began to glitter, nor were they the only ones alight in the company as he growled out—

“Ah! there I see a glimpse of Paradise, or at least of El-Dorado. Go on, de Soto, thou hast good listeners now, I warrant thee.”

But Don Francisco shook his head and said in his quiet, masterful voice—

“Nay, nay, Carvahal, it is early days to talk in that fashion yet. Remember that presently our errand is one of peace. We must not pluck the fruit while it would kill the tree. El-Dorado is not here; we shall find it beyond the mountains where its master is. Know you not the story that the Scripture tells of the strong man armed? We are not in his house yet. Go on with thy story, de Soto.”

A low approving murmur ran round the table and de Soto began again—

“My thoughts were not unlike yours, Don Francisco, even as Carvahal’s would have been had he heard the news that was told me in Huamacucho. The noble who commands the town is no less a personage than one Titu Atauchi, half-brother of the great Inca himself, and from him I learnt that Atahuallpa is presently encamped in the valley of Cajamarca, a great city lying in a broad and verdant plain on the other side of a vast range of mountains compared with which all that we have so far seen are but little more than ant-hills, yet so fast does news fly, by some strange means or other, in this wondrous land, that already he has been informed of our coming, and has sent orders back to the Governor of Huamacucho to receive us with all friendliness and invite you, Excellency, to meet him and confer with him on the subject of your embassy in Cajamarca itself.”

Here de Soto paused for a while, and Don Francisco, slowly nodding his head towards him, said—

“That all sounds well enough so far, de Soto, but heard you any tidings of the war that is being waged between the two Incas, and of what forces Atahuallpa has with him?”

“It was even that that I was coming to, Excellency,” replied de Soto. “All that we have heard so far is true. The armies of Cuzco have been defeated.”

“Cuzco! Where and what is that?” asked Carvahal, again interrupting.

“Cuzco,” said de Soto, “is by all accounts the very city after thine own heart, Carvahal. These heathens call it the Navel of the World, but for thee it may be enough to know that it is the very heart of El-Dorado, the city whose streets are paved with silver and whose palaces and temples are walled and roofed with gold. Art thou content?”

“Nay, not till I get there,” said Carvahal. “Not until I turn my sword into a reaping-hook to garner the harvest that a good Christian should be able to gather there.”

“After the labour the reward, Carvahal. Forget not that!” said Don Francisco, somewhat sharply, as though little pleased by the interruption. “Go on, de Soto, let us know what the labours are first.”

“Well, then, Caballeros, as I was saying,” he continued, “if the armies of Cuzco have been defeated by the armies of Quito. Huascar himself is held in close durance in a strong place called Tumibamba, about half-way between the two capitals, and Atahuallpa is camped in or about Cajamarca with an army—a victorious army, mind ye, of some eighty thousand men.”

“And we are some six score good Christian gentlemen and others!” interrupted Don Francisco with one of his quiet smiles. “Well, the odds are great, but God and Our Lady will defend the right. What more, de Soto?”

“But little more, Excellency,” he said, after he had joined in the laugh that went round the table. “From all I hear these heathens have every disposition to receive us kindly and trustfully. For instance, at Caxas and Huamacucho we drank chicha out of goblets of gold and silver, and ate delicious fruits from dishes of the same, and every man of us might have come back with a golden chain about his neck had I but consented to the taking of them.”

“Ah, de Soto! why was not I sent in thy stead?” growled Carvahal. “Thou art a man of wasted opportunities.”

“Nay,” said Pedro de Candia, “rather say a man of more wisdom than thou, Carvahal. Thou wouldst pluck the feathers from the wings of the bird whose flight would guide thee to El-Dorado just because they were tipped with gold. But de Soto would let it fly and follow it.”

“Ay, that I would!” said he. “All that we have seen is but the fringe of the cloth-of-gold, and if we snatched at it we might never see more of it. But,” he went on more seriously, “I should fail in my duty if I did not warn you, Señor Capitan, that all this kindness may be no better than a blind for our eyes and a snare for our footsteps, nor yet if I did not tell you that from what I have seen of it our road to Cajamarca is of such difficulty and danger that a score of men well placed and resolute might dispute it against a thousand. There are turns where an ambush would mean ruin, where the road might be blocked before and behind and no choice left save surrender or a leap to Heaven over a precipice. Once our feet are treading those mountain paths there is but one road, and that is forward. To come back save as conquerors were death as well as dishonour.”

There was a little pause after this, for the words were grave and serious ears were listening to them. Then Don Francisco, after a quick glance at the sober faces round the table, said quietly, but with a ring in his voice that found an instant echo in every heart.

“The faint-hearts have gone back to San Miguel. Here there are only fearless gentlemen of Spain, and for them the only road is forward. Is not that so, Caballeros?”

“Ay, that is so! Go forward, Chosen of the Lord, go on and do His work! Shall the heathen prevail against you while ye are clad in the armour of righteousness and girded with the sword of faith? Remember Israel in Caanan and Joshua before Ai! If ye have faith ye may remove mountains—how much easier then shall ye cross them! There is not only shame and death behind you should ye turn back, there is damnation too, even that which befalls him who puts his hand to the plough and looks back. Are ye not the chosen messengers of God, soldiers of the Cross, and champions of our holy Church, and if gold and gems shall be the lawful reward of your labours here, shall not the eternal bliss and glory of Heaven be your reward hereafter?

“It is not only El-Dorado that lies beyond the mountains. The harvest-fields of God and our holy Church are there, and for every heathen soul that is washed clean in the waters of baptism, each one who wields the sword in a good cause shall have reward in Heaven more precious than rubies—ay, more than if all the gold of El-Dorado were his.

“What matters it though the heathen be many in number and their hearts full of guile? How shall numbers prevail against the strength that God shall give you to do His work. How shall the wiles of heathenesse overcome the wisdom of holiness? In your weakness shall be your strength, and in your simple valour your highest wisdom. Soldiers of God and the Church, go on, and God’s blessing go before you!”

It was Vincente de Valverde who spoke; not now the thin, gaunt monk who had dragged his shivering limbs and dripping garments out of the river a few days before amidst the laughter of the whole troop, nor yet the cold-blooded persecutor who had stood not long before in the plaza at Santo Domingo in Hispaniola and with unmoved eyes watched half a score of lapsed heretics writhing and screaming amidst the torture of the flames. For the moment he had risen above the man and the persecutor to be the single-hearted servant of his God and his Church, and his words rang out clear and true as words ever do ring from a heart that has a single purpose, and that a good one. The echo that they found in every heart was instant, and as the last words pealed from his lips every cavalier sprang to his feet, every sword leapt from its scabbard, and every lip was pressed with one consent to the cross-hilt.

“Even so—God speed our holy work, and may His holy Mother bless it with her prayers!” said the deep voice of Don Francisco, and then every other voice rang out in a shout of—

“Cajamarca—on to Cajamarca! There lies the road to glory and salvation!”

“And El-Dorado!” growled Carvahal, as the shout was dying away. “It were as well not to forget that in the meantime, Caballeros.”

CHAPTER IV.
ACROSS THE RAMPARTS OF EL-DORADO

The next morning, while the dew yet lay on the grass and the higher slopes and peaks of the Eastern mountains were yet cut off from the lower by a shadowy sea of mist, every cavalier and man-at-arms had already breakfasted and was out in the square of Zaran, looking to his arms or making his charger ready for the momentous march that was to begin that day.

They had gathered up and hidden away the fragments of gold and silver which the simple-minded people had brought the night before as fodder for their strange beasts, and by this means every man of them left Zaran the richer by a good many pesos’ worth of the coveted metals than he was when he came into it.

They had learnt much during their brief stay in the little frontier town that had whetted still further their already keen appetites for the wealth and the wonders of El-Dorado, and trusty guides had been given them, and when all was ready for the departure the Curaca with his chief officials came out to bid the sons of Viracocha good-speed, and these, after greetings and presents of meat and drink had been bestowed upon the parting guests, went before them down the smoothly-paved street which led to the gate of the town and out through this on to the little grassy plain which stretched for half a league or so from the walls along the river bank.

Here they saw a strange sight, yet one which they and their children and their children’s children have had good cause to remember from that day to the day of their deaths, generation after generation, even until now. Once clear of the town Pizarro, riding, as was his wont, at the head of the troop, raised his right hand, and every man stopped and every horse was reined in. Then the deep voice of the Captain rolled out—

“Halt, my brothers and companions in the Faith! Ere we go farther let us give thanks to Him who hath brought us thus far through so many and great dangers, and let us pray for that aid and countenance without which our human strength will in vain carry us farther.”

Then every man who was afoot dropped on his knees where he stood, and every cavalier swung himself from the saddle and knelt down likewise by the left fore-foot of his horse with the bridle on his arm, and crossed his hands upon his breast, the Captain kneeling by his charger in front of them all. Then there came out from the midst of the kneeling throng Vincente de Valverde followed by one Brother Joachim, a stalwart Friar of the Order of St. Francis, bearing a tall cross of black wood on which hung the white effigy of his Master, and as Valverde took his stand in front of Pizarro, he raised this in his great arms high above his head, and then the priest lifted his voice and prayed, and while his prayer, in the melodious monkish Latin, rose sweetly upon the still morning air the Curaca and the head-men of the town, with all the throng that had followed them from the gate, first looked about them in wonder, and then, as though drawn by some strange, unknown influence, all their eyes were turned upon the figure of the White Christ upon the cross, and whispers ran from lip to lip as they said wondering to each other—

“Is this, then, the god of the sons of Viracocha? Was it not said that he should come back, even as these have come to us, clad in armour of silver and armed with the lightnings? Why, then, does he hang bleeding and naked as he does yonder?”

Now when Velverde had finished his prayer he saw them looking askant at each other and gazing ever and anon at the crucifix and heard their murmurs, and, though he could not understand what they said, he read their looks of wonder truly enough and knew how to draw an omen of happy augury from them. With a swift motion he flung wide apart the hands that had been crossed upon his breast and cried in a loud voice—

“See, soldiers of the Cross, how gracious a sign hath been vouchsafed to us, even here at the gates of the land we have come to conquer for God and His holy Church! Was it not said of old: ‘If I be lifted up, I will draw all men unto Me’? Behold how the eyes of the heathen are already fixed upon the holy emblem of our Faith! Truly a day shall come when by your valour and devotion the darkness shall be taken away from this land, when its false gods shall be cast down and men’s hearts shall know and their eyes shall see no other God than Him who liveth and reigneth world without end! Laus Domine! Laus Domine! Praise Him, ye children of His and soldiers of His Cross, for in this sign shall ye conquer!”

Then with one accord every man, from the Captain to ribald old Carvahal himself, sprang from his knees to his feet, every sword leapt from its scabbard, and every pike and partisan was waved aloft, and as the hoarse, deep-toned shout, “Laus Domine! Laus Domine!” rolled forth from every warrior’s throat the first sun-burst of the morning streamed over the eastern mountains and flashed in a thousand rays on the gleaming blades and points of the weapons.

Then Pizarro, who of all men knew best how to turn a moment of enthusiasm to good account, sprang into the saddle, swung his blade above his head and, half turning towards his little army, cried—

“Ay, praise to the Lord, for in His strength we shall conquer, though of ourselves we be but few and weak. Mount and forward, gentlemen. Yonder dawns the morning of salvation for us which shall end the long night that we have passed through together. Forward, and God be with us!”

As he said this he turned his horse a little to the right and rode past where Valverde stood with the crucifix still raised above him by the strong arms of Brother Joachim. As he passed it he lowered the sword which ere long was to drink so deeply of innocent blood, and made the sign of the Cross with the hilt, and the priest blessed each man of the troop as he went by with bended head and crossing himself. When all had passed he and Brother Joachim mounted their mules and took their places in the rear, and so those whom they believed to be the sons of the god Viracocha passed from the wondering gaze of the first of the Children of the Sun who had beheld them, and went on their way to El-Dorado.

There is no room to tell here of all that befell them day by day on that first march of theirs, for this is not the story of their journeyings—of which you may learn better from the pens of those who made them—but rather of the things that they did when the end of the march had at length brought them to the scene of their triumphs and their crimes.

They passed through Caxas and Huamacucho, finding them as de Soto had said, and being entertained with the simple and yet bounteous hospitality of the kindly-hearted people who were soon to whisper their names to each other as words of more than mortal terror.

They were surrounded by sights as strange as Christian eyes had ever seen, though not yet by things as terrible as those which the soldiers of Cortes had seen a few years before far away in Mexico on the other side of the central line of the earth. Everywhere they beheld the signs of perfect peace and order, though but a few days’ marches to the eastward the earth had trembled not many weeks before beneath the tread of countless hosts rushing to the conflict out of which was to spring the doom of Atahuallpa and the Children of the Sun, and which Ullomaya the priest had spoken by the bedside of the great Huayna-Capac in far-off Quito.

Everywhere, too, throughout the valleys and towns they saw the wealth of field and mine and the triumphs won by patient labour spread about them with lavish hand. The fields were green and golden with bounteous crops. In the groves of fruit-trees the branches bent beneath the weight of their luscious harvest. Gold and silver seemed to be in as common use as brass and iron were in Spain, and the people, clad in their bright-coloured stuffs of many hues and decked with jewels such as only princes wore in Europe, seemed to be living lives as calm and cloudless as the endless summer which smiled down from the changeless skies above them.

Many another hand than old Carvahal’s closed ever and anon itchingly on sword-hilt or pike-handle at the sight of all this; and often passions less holy than the ardour of conquest, to say nothing of the service of the Church, stirred in many a grim warrior’s breast, for the daughters of this strange and childlike people were very fair and dainty to look upon with eyes which, like theirs, had starved so long for the sight of woman’s beauty.

But the orders of the Captain were very strict, and, what was more, he obeyed them himself, for the greatest honour that can be accounted to Francisco Pizarro is accorded to him by those who truthfully say that he never asked a follower of his to dare or do that which he would not do himself, or forego delights which he himself would not go without.

Only once on that long march did any man seek to break the bonds of this iron discipline, and this was done by one Pedro Navarro, a man-at-arms who, on the morning that the army left Huamacucho, was accused by one of the headmen of the town of having offered violence and insult to his daughter.

Pizarro instantly put off the march until the accusation was made good in due form. Then in the presence of the army and the townspeople he called the offender before him and said—

“Pedro Navarro, hast thou come hither to serve God and His Saints or to pander to thine own evil lusts? What need hadst thou to leave Panama if thy desire was to bear thyself as a lecher and a doer of base violence rather than as a soldier of the Cross? Till thou hast repented, thou art not worthy to bear the arms or wear the garb of a soldier of Spain.”

Then, looking round among the cavaliers, his eyes lighted on Carvahal, and some thought that the shadow of a grim smile was visible under his beard as he beckoned to him and said—

“Come hither, Carvahal. I know of no hands fitter than thine to punish one who hath demeaned himself as this man hath. Let two of his fellows strip him of his arms and clothes, ay, even to his shoes, and do thou tie him to thy stirrup till thy mercy shall see fit to let him loose, and should he give signs of lagging on the march doubtless thou wilt find means at hand to bring him back to good marching order.”

To this Carvahal consented readily enough, for sinners punish sinners with as much gusto as thieves chase thieves, and all that day he dragged the naked, limping wretch by his side, stumbling over the steep stony road with swollen and bleeding feet, his bare back blistered by the scorching sun and his tongue, unslaked by a single drop of water, hanging out black and baked between his parted teeth, and when he was like to faint he roused him with his spurred heel to hear a homily on St. Anthony or a sermon that it would have done the Devil good to listen to.

It was a sore punishment enough, and Pedro Navarro was more dead than alive when the evening halt was called. And yet, not long after, this same man threw himself in the way of a spear that was aimed at his Captain’s throat, so well did Francisco Pizarro know how to lead men like dogs and yet, like dogs, make them love him the better for his chastening of them.

Huamacucho was passed on the fourth day from Zaran, and on the night that the penance of Pedro Navarro was ended the sun set, as it seemed to these voyagers in a strange land, over the confines of two worlds. All day the narrow path, winding round hillspurs and threading mountain-sides midway between Heaven and the depth of unmeasured valleys and gorges, had led upward and ever upward.

At some of the turnings they had looked back and seen valley after valley, divided by their parting ridges, sloping and falling away down into illimitable distances until their eyes lost themselves in a dim, far-off haze beyond which, as they well knew, lay the desert coast and the blue Sea of the South. At others, looking upward, they saw ridge after ridge and range after range, each one barer and bleaker than the one below it, towering ever up and up like the steps of some titanic stairway which seemed to reach from earth to Heaven, and ever and anon from some ’vantage point of better view they saw far, beyond and above the highest of these, twinkling points of gleaming white, whiter than the cloud-sprays drifting in the mid-most heaven, so high and far away that it seemed as though they had as little kinship with the earth as the clouds themselves.

There was not a faint heart in all the company, for none such would have come thus far; but, as day after day they mounted higher and higher, and as hour after hour the awful solitude of those lonely wildernesses encompassed them more and more closely about, there was not a heart among them that did not feel the weight of the Unknown pressing in upon him.

“By the faith of a soldier and a Christian,” said Carvahal as he rounded one of the hillspurs on the forenoon of the seventh day, riding beside Alonso de Molina, “methinks much more of this would pass human endurance. Look at yonder line of snow and ice sharp-edged against the sky! Hast thou ever seen the purity of such whiteness as that on earth? Doth it not seem as though this ever upward mountain road would take us rather to the gates of Heaven than to those of El-Dorado? Santiago! it would need but little faith to see the gleam of the Gates of Pearl amidst yon peaks of snow and ice—may my good St. Francis pardon me for naming things earthly and heavenly in one breath!”

The young cavalier looked at him with a grave face, but with the twinkle of a smile in his eyes, and said—

“In good truth, Carvahal, this is a land of strange and mighty marvels that we are coming into, and the best proof of that is that I have never heard thee speak with such reverence of anything in any other land. Even now I feel as though I were hanging ’twixt Heaven and earth, and yet Filipillo had it from the guides this morning that, ere we descend into the valley in which Cajamarca lies, we must even pass between those same shining peaks and pyramids, and, from all they tell, nothing that we have yet seen or done will compare with the labour or the soreness of it.”

“The holy Saints forfend!” said Carvahal, making a show of crossing himself, “for even El-Dorado might be too dearly won or even Heaven itself—may the Saints again forgive me—what blasphemy am I talking! Surely the strange air of this heathen land hath set my old wits a-wandering. Yet well might such a journey daunt the firmest mind.”

He was right; for they, first of all Europeans, were beginning to experience that strange disorder of mind and body which is only known to those who have travelled long at great elevations, and as they went ever higher and higher their sufferings increased even as their wonder and their fear did. Men who would have charged a host single-handed at the call of faith or duty reined up their trembling steeds on the brink of frightful precipices with hands that shook as though they had never held lance or sword, and their eyes gazed blankly down into the awful voids and their hearts fluttered in their labouring breasts like the hearts of little children left alone in the darkness.

Then, at length, they passed through the region of burning sun and piercing wind which lay above the soft summer of the valleys into the eternal winter that reigns unbroken through the centuries on its everlasting thrones of ice and snow.

There indeed they thought themselves wanderers beyond the limits that God had set to human life. Before and behind and around them towered the vast white shapes that seemed like the guardians of the portals of some other world into which no human foot had ever ventured. The icy blasts smote them with the keenness of sword-edges, and they and their labouring, shivering beasts gasped agonisingly for breath in the thin, frozen air.

At night cavalier and charger, man and brute, huddled together for warmth, for those awful wastes held neither tree nor shrub to furnish fuel for a fire. Their commonest duties seemed to them like the labour of slaves, and once a man-at-arms who sought to warm himself by running down a hill-slope fell prone ere he had gone fifty paces, with the blood gushing from his nose and mouth and ears, and his eyes starting out of his head. When they went to take him up he was already dead and the blood that had come from him frozen hard.

Still through all they pressed on, for their Captain, ever the last to rest and the first to move, had but one word on his lips, and that was “onward,” and there was not a man among them who would have dared the shame of retreat or the bitterness of the reproach with which Pizarro would have bade him go back.

And so, as old Carvahal and the great Pedro de Candia had often used the little breath they had to spare in saying, since there is no staircase, however high, but must have a top step, they came at length to a curved ridge of grey-brown grass that sloped between two ice-crowned pinnacles of rock, and here, standing, as it seemed, upon the very roof-tree of the world, they saw before and behind them only downward slopes.

Here Pizarro called a halt that was right welcome to every man and beast in the troop, and, calling Filipillo and the guides to him, he held a short conference with them. And when this was over he faced his pinched and starving, shivering followers, who had gathered in little huddled groups about him, and said in a voice that sounded strangely unlike his own in the thin, dry, cold air—

“Comrades, by the grace of God and with the help of His Holy Mother and the blessed Saints, we have won our way through the terrors of this wilderness to the threshold of the new land which shall be ours. The labours of the upward way are over. Henceforth our steps trend downwards from these fearsome solitudes, forsaken of man, if not of God since His arm has protected us even here, once more into the haunts of men and the home of warmth and sunshine. Did yonder snow-cloud break ye would see through it your first glimpse of the Land of Promise!”

As he said this he pointed with his right hand downward towards a tumbling sea of frozen mist which rolled in ghostly, silent billows along the mountain-side, and even as he spoke a storm-gust swept down from the upper ridges and rent asunder the heavy snow-laden clouds above them. Through this the sun, already beginning to sink towards the west, shone with a sudden stream of warmth and radiance. The mists at their feet parted, and through the changing rifts their longing eyes caught distant glimpses of tree-clad slopes and level, verdant plains cut by shining streams far, far away below them, and in the midst, for one brief instant, they saw a city so far away that it looked like a home of pigmies, yet with a gleam as of gold on its domes and roofs.

“Cajamarca! Cajamarca! Yonder is the Inca’s city!” piped Filipillo in his thin, shrill voice, starting forward and pointing down towards it.

“El-Dorado! El-Dorado!” shouted Carvahal in a hoarse, cracked voice, scrambling back into his saddle. “Santiago! we have won our way through this frozen hell. Now let us get down to Paradise, since in this heathen country God’s order is changed and Hell stands above Heaven.”

“El-Dorado! El-Dorado!” ran like an echo from lip to lip—and, as the whole troop moved forward and downward, the rifts in the snow-mist closed again and shut out the vision from their eyes.

CHAPTER V.
THE OPEN GATE

It was a good hour or more, so steep and difficult is that downward road, before the zone of frozen mist was passed through, and the vanguard of the little army halted, transfixed with wonder and admiration by the glorious scene which spread out—looking, in good truth, like a vision of Paradise after the hideous regions they had just passed through—some five thousand feet below them.

To the north-westward the slanting beams of the descending sun streamed under the edge of the cloud and mist and spread in a flood of glory over a broad valley walled in by terraced hills on every side. The whole of the level floor of the valley was covered with fields and plantations, separated by long green and red flowering hedges, groves of trees and shining streams, and straight paved roads, bordered by over-hanging trees.

At the very foot, as it seemed from that elevation, of the steep, sloping mountain-wall they had just crossed lay the city of Cajamarca, and scattered all over the valley were scores of villages gleaming white amidst the green of the fields and leafy groves about them.

On the lower slopes of the hills rose countless terraces, formed by the patient labour of many generations, the lowest of them golden with ripened maize, and step by step the gold passed shade by shade into the brilliant green of the unripened crops of the highest terraces. It was a vast oasis in the midst of a still vaster chaos of bleak and desert mountains, the home, as it seemed to these wayworn travellers, of industrious peace and bounteous plenty, and the gentler soul of Alonso de Molina whispered to him as his gaze first fell upon its glories that it was a paradise into which he and his gold-hungering companions were about to bring the poison of treachery and the storms of ruthless violence.

And yet another moment’s thought reminded him that not even this fair-seeming Eden was free from the curse that had blasted the first Paradise of earth, for he knew well that in the midst of it lay encamped a vast and conquering host, led by one who, beguiled by the fleeting dream of empire, had drawn his sword against his brother and brought down upon the ancient empire of the Incas that doom pronounced of old against the kingdom divided against itself—the doom which by the mailed hand of the invader was so soon to fall upon himself.

“A goodly land, comrade, and one that it were a pity to leave too long in the possession of the heathen and the enemies of Holy Church and His Most Catholic Majesty,” said Pedro de Candia, who was guiding his stumbling beast alongside of him. “Malediction! what roads! This is the fortieth time at least in the last hour that nothing but the help of the Saints hath kept this poor beast off his knees, and it were an ill place this even for a dumb brute to kneel down in, to say nothing of pitching a good Christian on to his head.”

“A goodly land as thou sayest, Pedro,” replied Molina, somewhat sadly, “and well worth the stealing, as old Carvahal would say, and yet—well, if I were not a good Catholic I should think that those who could make such a paradise in the midst of such a wilderness, heathens though they be, were well deserving of a better embassy than we bring them, coming as we do with the Cross of God before us, lies on our lips, and the lust of plunder in our hearts.”

“From which speech it would seem that the work before us is not much to your liking, Caballero,” said the deep, stern voice of the Captain-General on the other side of him.

He turned quickly in his saddle and saw Pizarro’s dark, grave eyes looking half inquiringly, half reproachfully at him, and before he could find any words to reply Pizarro went on in a kinder tone—

“Did I not know that there is no stouter heart or stronger arm under our banners than thine, Molina, I should say that thou has brought too gentle a mind to such work as ours is and has to be. They who would hew out empires for their masters in the strange and new-found lands of the earth must do it with hands cased in gauntlets of steel. The silken glove is for the court and the palace. Ends, not means, must be the care of those who stake honour, fortune, and life itself on such hazards as ours.

“And look you,” he went on, speaking quicker and louder, as though he wished those about him to hear as well, “let us make no mistake as to that which now lies before us. Yonder valley looks a paradise, but it is the armed camp of a conquering tyrant to boot. If the envoys have not lied to us, Atahuallpa is yonder at the head of a host of eighty thousand men, full-flushed with the pride of victory, and we are a hundred and sixty soldiers and gentlemen of Spain, cut off from all succour and with but one road to take—and that road lies forward!”

“And thou shalt find none readier to follow thee along that road, Señor, than he who will strike none the less hard for God and king because he would win the land by other means if he could,” replied Molina, bending his head in deference to his Captain’s reproof.

“Spoken like as gentle a knight and as brave a cavalier as Spain herself can boast of!” said Pizarro, smiling one of his rare smiles. “I did not mean to reproach thee, only to show thee how great a difference there may be between that which a man would do and that which he must. Thou knowest well that I could think no evil of one of those who came with me across that line on the sands of Gallo.”

Then, without waiting for any reply, he pulled his horse aside and joined his brother Hernando, who was riding a little way behind him.

“A strange man!” said Candia, in a low voice. “One of those instruments that God fashions sometimes out of vile material to hew out the rough shapes of His mysterious purposes—a base-born bastard, whose first work in life was tending swine, and now raised by the strength of the great heart that God gave him to be a hidalgo of Spain and, as I for one truly believe, ere long to be conqueror of realms wider than Spain itself. Fear not, Molina, put thy scruples in thy pouch, since thou presently hast but little else to put there. God makes great men only to great ends. Leave the means to destiny, and believe thou art not marching under the banner of such a man as Francisco Pizarro for nothing.”

“That I well believe,” answered Molina. “We here are but instruments. Thou art right. It is not for the tool to question the intent of the hand that uses it. Thinkest thou we shall reach the city to-night?”

As though in answer to him the trumpet at that moment sounded a halt. While they were talking a turn in the downward road had brought them in sight of a ridge of rocks out-cropping from the grass-grown mountain-side to the right hand, and looking from a little distance like the fragments of some Titan-built fortress. To the left rose a steep, scarped hill, ringed with rocks. It was a position that a hundred men, resolute and well armed, could have held against ten thousand. Even a few score of naked savages could have poured such a rain of great stones down upon the little company passing between the two fastnesses as would have left neither man nor horse unmaimed, even if alive, and the Captain-General was not a man to lead his followers into such a place without due caution.

So the halt was called while they were yet above what might have been a death-trap for them all, and scouts were sent out on either hand to feel the way, and these, after a diligent search, came back and said that they could find not so much as a mouse among the rocks. So the trumpets sounded again, and the troop, with eyes and ears alert and weapons ready, marched through the defile which, if he had had the knowledge or the will to do so, the master of the hosts encamped below might have infallibly made the end of their journey.

“El-Dorado is ours!” laughed Carvahal to Hernando de Soto, as they came out of the pass and emerged on a green, sloping plain below. “Those who left such a place as that unguarded will make but small fight for the best they have. Carramba! with the men we have here I would hold that pass against all the armies of His Catholic Majesty while my powder and shot and the stones on the hillside held out. It is but child’s play taking a castle whose defenders leave the portcullis up and forget to raise the drawbridge. Cuerpo de Cristo! who would have thought to find the gate of the Inca’s treasure-house left open like that?”

De Soto laughed a trifle bitterly, and said—

“If thou wert anything better than a blaspheming eater of fire with never a thought beyond throat-cutting and gold-getting, Carvahal, thou wouldst have seen by this that we have been welcomed into this land as friends, as envoys of a king whom these poor people look on as a god. Nay, have they not hailed us as sons ourselves of one of their gods? Did not Titu Atauchi, brother of Atahuallpa himself, greet the Captain-General down in Huamacucho yonder as Inca Viracocha, and place on his left arm the golden bracelet which none but those of Divine descent, as they think, may wear? Thou mayest believe me when I tell thee that if they had taken us for what we are we should never have come thus far alive through such a land as this, and it is thought——”

“Which makes thee ever and anon feel and speak more like a monk than a stout adventurer. Is that not so, de Soto?” growled Carvahal in reply. “Santiago! though I am not so fine a gentleman or as soft-hearted a splitter of skulls as thou or Molina yonder, who hath conversed with me more than once in such a strain, yet, in good sooth, I believe I’m the better Christian, for, on my faith as a good Catholic, I believe that the Saints who watch over our enterprise have thus blinded the eyes of these heathens so that we can do our good work the easier. How else could we few prevail against so many? It is faith thou wantest, de Soto—faith. Thou art overmuch given to reasoning, which was ever a bad thing for those whose business is rather with hard knocks than soft, smooth-sounding words.”

“Ha!” exclaimed de Soto, suddenly rising in his stirrups and looking on ahead. “What have we yonder? By my faith, a pair of forts, seemingly as well placed and as skilfully built as the best engineer could wish for. See how they command the way down to the valley from all sides! There, too, a handful of men could hold the road against a host. How much the easier, then, could the hosts of the Inca hold it against such a handful as we are! And look you—Santiago! what madness!—they are coming out from the chief one on the right hand yonder to meet us as though we were friends.”

De Soto laid a bitter emphasis on his last words, but Carvahal only slapped his thigh, and chuckled—

“Cuerpo de Cristo! Did good soldiers of the Cross ever have such luck as that! Verily the Lord hath delivered the heathen into the hands of His servants.”

The little army now moved down in good order on to a level space before the principal fort, and there, at the command of the Captain, halted drawn up in battle array. Pizarro and his brother Hernando went forward with the guides and interpreters, amongst whom was the lad Filipillo, who was soon to play so important a part in the great tragedy about to be enacted, and met the party that had come out from the fort. It was led by an Inca noble, the Curaca of Cajamarca, and he, after the first courtesies had been exchanged, told the Captain-General that his lord and master Atahuallpa, in whose name he welcomed him, had bidden him offer the hospitality of the fort to him and his followers for that evening and night, as it was already too late to make the rest of the descent into the valley. The next morning he would himself conduct them into the city, and lodge them in the more suitable quarters that the Inca had already set apart for them.

He told them also that Atahuallpa himself was encamped with his army at one of his palaces on the other side of the valley, where he was performing the observances of a fast which must be completed before he could give the strangers audience. But until then they would be lodged and well cared for as his guests in the city.

The Captain-General accepted the invitation with many courtesies and assurances of friendship, and that night the Spaniards slept softer and fared better than they had done for many a weary day and night, albeit the prudence of Pizarro found excuses for planting sentries and making sufficient provision against surprise, for he was a man who never of his own free will gave odds to Fate.

The next morning with the first glimmer of light the trumpet sounded, and, horse and foot, the little army marched out and mustered on the slope beyond the fort, watched with wondering and admiring eyes by their simple hosts. Then the Fray Valverde prayed before them, and pointed his prayer with a sermon which, as Carvahal said after, was both long and strong for the stomachs of breakfastless men shivering in a keen wind on a bleak hillside. Then came breakfast, and after that the ranks were formed for the march to the city.

Before the trumpet sounded Pizarro spoke a few brief, weighty words to them, telling of the dangers that possibly awaited them, of the risk of treachery, and the enormous advantage of numbers that the Inca could use against them if once he took them for enemies. He gave them three watchwords—silence, watchfulness, and obedience, and then he rode to the head of the column and the downward march began.

With every mile the beauties of the valley opened out in ever-increasing splendour before them, but the weight and magnitude of the enterprise whose crucial hour was now so near seemed to press heavily upon their hearts and dim their eyes to the wonders that were multiplying about them. The valley that they were entering seemed a very paradise on earth, and yet, for all that they knew, it might for them be the end of their earthly journeying and the grave of all their hopes of El-Dorado.

As the column wound round the base of a green wooded hill whose summit was crowned with a building, half fort, half palace, constructed of the wonderful Inca masonry, they came in sight of the gate by which they were to enter the city. Then Pizarro waved his hand, the trumpets rang out brazen and jubilant, and, with banners waving and the bright morning sun gleaming on plate and mail and shining weapons and harness, this little handful of invaders of a mighty empire marched forward towards the gate.

They reached it and passed through it into a broad, paved street, but here there were no welcoming throngs to greet them as at Caxas and Huamacucho. As they rode through the town, and street after street opened up, they looked in vain for some sign of life. In all the city there seemed neither man, woman, nor child left. Not a sound answered the blare of their trumpets, the jingling of their accoutrements, or the clang of the iron hoofs on the stones of the silent streets. Cajamarca was, for the time being, a city of the dead, and if any of them had possessed the gift of prophecy he might well have looked upon it as an emblem of the desolation which they were bringing into the land of the Children of the Sun.

CHAPTER VI.
IN THE CITY OF THE INCA

No reception could well have been more different from the anticipations of the adventurers than that which awaited them in the first of the cities of the Incas that they had so far seen, for the towns that they had passed through on their road up the western slopes of the mountains they had looked upon only as the outposts of an entrenched camp, a camp which to them was El-Dorado, and whose trenches and circumvallations were the gorges and heights of the mighty Andes themselves.

As has just been said, they entered the city in utter silence save for the blare of their own trumpets and the jingling of their own arms and accoutrements. They had already learnt from their guides that Cajamarca was the third city in importance in the whole Inca empire, standing as it did between Quito and Cuzco, and commanding the high-road running from north to south through the domains of Huayna-Capac.

It was in vain that they asked the Curaca or his subordinates for some explanation of their strange reception. There was not even an animal or a fowl left in the city. Only the wild birds flying to and fro amongst the trees which lined the squares of the city gave evidence of life within its borders. Not a house was tenanted, and every street and square was deserted, and yet this but a few hours before had been the home of many thousands of human beings. What had become of them? To all inquiries the Curaca and his officers answered in the same words—

“It is the will of our Lord, and in this land there is no other will but his. That which the Son of the Sun says is already done. The city is the home of his guests. It is ours to do our Lord’s will; it is his only to know the reason. He is the brain; we are the hands.”

And so, amidst an utter silence that at length even swallowed up the voices of their own trumpets, Pizarro and his men entered Cajamarca and took possession of the spacious quarters allotted to them by this mysterious master of men whose officers obeyed him with the unquestioning servility of dogs.

The quarters assigned to the Spaniards were at the north-western end of the irregular square which occupied the centre of the city. They were formed of low, one-storeyed buildings, massively built and containing rooms large enough for the accommodation of a score of men each, and, as there were far too many of them for the little force to occupy, some of them were for the time being turned into stables for the lodging of the eighty-five horses and eight mules which had survived the hardships of the journey.

But though the strangers had been, as it were, welcomed into an empty house, there was no lack of entertainment, and that, too, of a sort which awoke more appetites than one, for there was an abundance of roasted meats, baked cakes of maize-meal, boiled roots and vegetables and varied fruits which, once strange to them, they had now become accustomed to, all of which were brought to them in dishes and vessels of silver, and to Pizarro and his captains there was brought also the golden-yellow chicha, the royal drink of the Inca himself, in great goblets of chasened gold so massive and splendid that when they sat down to their first meal that midday Carvahal, after taking up a great golden bowl in both hands and quaffing a mighty draught of the pleasant liquor that it contained, set it down again on the table and brushed the clinging drops from his beard, and said with one of his big, chuckling laughs—

“Cuerpo de Cristo, Caballeros! what does this remind you of? Carramba! without any disrespect to your worshipful persons I should be inclined to liken the present scene to a banquet of the beggars of Seville enjoying the best hospitality served in the most sumptuous fashion that the Chamberlains of His Most Catholic Majesty could achieve.”

“A somewhat rude simile, Señor Carvahal,” said Hernando Pizarro in his dry, official voice, “and one that would scarce bear the test of logic. Surely thou art too stout a soldier of Spain to liken men who have the faith of God in their hearts, good plate of proof on their bodies, and good swords of Toledo steel by their sides, to beggars? Surely thou art confounding the worth of that which is to be won with the worth of that which is to win it?”

Carvahal had already opened his mouth to make some reply after his own fashion when the Captain-General, turning towards his brother, said—

“Thou hast there touched on a matter, Hernando, which should be discussed amongst us without loss of time. Carvahal, thou canst have thy jest hereafter shouldst thou find time to make it. Here and now there are other things to be talked of, for very grave matters claim our attention, and as true soldiers know no time so good as the present, it were better that we discussed them now. What say you, comrades?”

He paused and was answered by a silence in which every head was bowed in consent. Then, leaning his folded arms on the table, he went on to speak words which, as the event proved, decided the fate of an empire.

“We can speak here,” he said in his slow, grave tone, “with such confidence as we could on the beach of the island of Gallo or in the cabin of one of our own ships, for truly we are as lonely here in the midst of this strange land as we could be there. The safety of all depends upon the faith of each. Therefore, apart from all questions of loyalty to our king, the interest of each is the welfare of all. Let us, then, as behoves true men and adventurers embarked upon an enterprise as desperate as it is glorious, look the conditions of our situation fairly and fearlessly in the face so that we may at once make the best and know the worst of them.”

He paused again and looked about him and saw set faces and steadfast eyes such as he was accustomed to see when speaking on weighty matters. Then he went on again.

“We are here, a hundred and sixty strangers and adventurers, in the heart of an empire whose inhabitants, by all accounts, may be numbered by myriads. Between us and the sea over which we came and by which alone we could return whence we came is a barrier which we have crossed as guests and which we can never recross save as conquerors. Within a league or so of us Atahuallpa lies encamped, the leader of a conquering host that is numbered by thousands, while we are numbered by tens.

“So far we have been received as guests and friends, but the youngest of us here is too old a soldier to be deceived by such appearances as we have seen. In this wondrous land, where gold and silver and gems seem to have no value, our entertainment has cost so little that it is but a drop in the ocean of Atahuallpa’s wealth. Against that it behoves us as reasonable men to set the value of our destruction to him. You know through many rumours that these heathens have received us at the bidding of one of their ancient superstitions as beings somewhat more than human, as children of one of their gods, whose son they have by an unwelcome if somewhat useful flattery taken me to be.”

Here he stopped and stroked his beard, and Pedro de Candia, looking round at the Fray Valverde, said in a low tone that had a laugh running through it—

“That, methinks, would be but a poor warrant in the eyes of the Church for the canonisation even of your Excellency, and yet a very good reason for the excommunication and anathema of his imperial high and mightiness should it ever come to the holy father yonder to pronounce the ban upon him.”

Valverde smiled but said nothing, having said all he would say in his smile. Some of the others laughed aloud, guessing his meaning, and Pizarro went on—

“I see thou hast taken my meaning even before I spoke it, de Candia, and so thou hast left me but little more to say. We are few but strong against many whose only strength is in their numbers. It may be, as indeed seems most likely to me, that we have been decoyed by fair-seeming appearances into a trap, but if so this would not be the first time that the caged animal has turned and rent his captor. For us there is no escape save through the red road of battle and victory. These people, as I have said, are strong only in their numbers, and more than that, from what we have seen it is manifest that they are a huge body which moves and acts by the thought and will of a single head.

“To strike the body would be but to bury our weapons, as it were, in a mountain of flesh, which would be as vain a work as striking an elephant with a dagger. Wherefore it will be as plain to you as it is to me that if we are to reduce this vast body to our will and purposes—nay, if we are to prevent it from eating us, alive or dead, at a mouthful, we must strike swift and straight and strong at its head.

“In a word,” he went on, tapping with his forefinger on the table in front of him, “it is not upon this Inca empire with its innumerable legions that we must make war; it is upon Atahuallpa himself, and in that warfare our first weapon must be that of the weak: we must use cunning first and steel afterwards. Atahuallpa, himself a usurper who has divided the empire of his father in war with his brother, has, to my mind, led us here into a trap baited with a simulation of kindness and welcome and with the sight of gold and silver and gems such as we have here about us. It is for us, having no retreat, to take the fowler in his own snare.”

He paused again and looked about him as though expecting an answer from some one. But no answer came. Bold as they were, the quiet daring of this tremendous proposition was more than they could grasp at the first view of it. For a hundred and sixty men, less than half a troop of cavalry, isolated in a strange land, cut off from all resources save such as they could make for themselves, in the midst of a land whose extent they only dimly dreamt of, and confronted and, it might be, surrounded with armies of unknown numbers, to take captive the lord and master of uncounted thousands looked at first sight an enterprise such as only demigods could dare, and yet another moment’s thought showed them that the masterful genius of Pizarro had in those few weighty sentences pointed out the only possible way to victory and the only means of saving the little army of adventurers from destruction.

There was silence for a time, and Pizarro, folding his arms across his cuirass, closed his eyes and waited for his words to sink, as they did, deep into their minds. Then, as no one else seemed inclined to break a silence that was getting irksome to him, Carvahal took another deep drink of chicha from the golden bowl before him, and then, putting it down with a clash on the table, said—

“By the bones of St. Francis! it seems that, whether this heathen body has a head or not, at least this Christian body of ours has. There never yet was a maze that had no way out of it if but a single one, and the Captain has found not only the way but the thread that leads to it. Doubtless he will give that thread into our hands in good time. Meanwhile there is another view to be taken of our position. We are not only a little band of wanderers lost in the vastness of a strange land. For my own part I would rather call ourselves a wedge of steel driven by the hand of God into the heart of a mighty oak. Oak is strong, but steel is stronger. Carramba! let but the wedge be driven far enough and the tree will be split? What say you, Caballeros?”

“Spoken like a stout soldier, Carvahal,” laughed Pedro de Candia across the table, “and for once with as fine a point upon thy tongue as thou art wont to have upon thy sword.”

“And like a good and faithful Christian to boot!” cried Valverde, rising to his feet. “It is not we who are delivered into the hands of the heathen. It is the heathen who in his blindness hath been delivered into ours. What shall the numbers of this unbelieving tyrant avail if we are but true to ourselves and our holy cause. We here in the flesh are but few, yet if our hearts do not fail us, shall not all the hosts of Heaven come to our aid in the hour of need? Who can prevail against the Lord and His anointed? Hath not the Vicar of Christ himself blessed our holy enterprise, and shall not it therefore come to a happy issue? Let the wisdom of the serpent unite with the courage of the lion, and all the hosts of heathendom shall not avail against us!”

“If we find the valour,” growled Carvahal to Hernando de Soto, sitting next to him, “we may trust the holy father to find the cunning. Methinks that if we took this fair valley for Eden we should not have to look very far for the serpent. Holy Saints, what heresy am I talking!” and once more he buried his broad, red face in the golden bowl of chicha.

Then Pizarro opened his eyes again and said as quietly as before—

“Well, then, Caballeros, since none of you hath anything against my plan, we will take it as approved till a better one shall suggest itself, and, as there are few heads amongst us, it will be well to have the best thoughts of all. This afternoon, therefore, let every one ponder what I have said, let every man, gentle and simple, think himself in the greatest peril that he hath yet ventured into, which in truth may well be the case. Let us consider these lodgings of ours our fortress, let every means be taken to guard against surprise, and yet forget not that everything must be done in such fashion that no suspicion shall be aroused. To-night our council of war shall meet, and to-morrow, if Atahuallpa does not send an embassy to us, whether of peace or war, then we will send one to him. And now, Caballeros,” he went on, rising from his seat, “we have used our tongues enough for the present. Let us use our eyes and ears and learn what we can of the truth of this strange situation into which we have come. We have but scant time for thought and plan-making, for we know not how soon the moment for action may come.”

There was a little hum of conversation after this, each one talking with his neighbour and discussing the thoughts that were uppermost in his mind. Hernando de Soto, Pedro de Candia, and Alonso de Molina were seated together at a little distance from the Captain, his brother, and Valverde. Presently de Soto caught Pizarro’s eye and made a motion as if he would speak. He nodded to him as though to say that he was listening, and de Soto said in a tone loud enough for all the others to hear—

“We have been talking, Señor, likening ourselves to the warriors of Judah on the borders of Canaan. They sent men to spy out the strength or weakness of the land. Why should not we do the same thing? It is yet but a little past noon, and Atahuallpa is no more than a league or so away. There is no time to be lost, and that which we have to learn we cannot learn too quickly. I have been your envoy with some success twice already: once at Tumbez and once at Caxas and Huamacucho. Give me half a score of horse and let me ride across the valley and speak face to face with the Inca himself while you are making safe your position here. Before nightfall I shall be back with news that may be well worth the telling.”

A hum of admiration and approval ran round the chamber as he uttered this daring proposal, and Pizarro answered, speaking slowly and gravely, and yet with a gleam of approbation in his eyes—

“That would be a bold venture, de Soto, and one well worthy of him who would undertake it, but, bethink thee—an embassy of ten to one who cannot know the laws of Christian warfare, surrounded by countless legions amidst which ye would be but as a handful of pebbles dropped into the ocean! We could ill afford to lose thee, de Soto, and I would rather lose my right hand than thee and ten others. What think you, Hernando?”

His brother thought for a moment, and then he looked up and said—

“De Soto is right, and I for one see no danger in the venture. Rather would it show the Inca that we come as friends, suspecting nothing of such designs as he may have against us. If Atahuallpa seeks our destruction, believing us safe in his power, he will not alarm the whole of his quarry by offering violence to our embassy. If his friendship be genuine, then, too, there can be no danger. Let de Soto take a score of our best-mounted horsemen and set out forthwith. The venture may well look a bold one in heathen eyes, and its boldness can do our enterprise little harm and may do it much good. Let them go, say I.”

Pizarro looked down and stroked his beard in silence for a moment. Then he looked up and said—

“That is well and cunningly reasoned, brother. Thou wert ever a sound counsellor. Boldness is, after all, the best weapon of those who are at once stout of heart and few in number. De Soto, choose thy troop, to the number of not more than twenty. Take Filipillo to be thy mouthpiece, and God give thee a good return!”

CHAPTER VII.
HOW DE SOTO PERFORMED HIS EMBASSY

The matter of the embassy to Atahuallpa having been thus decided, but little time was wasted in carrying it into execution. While Pizarro and his captains had been debating the venture in the banqueting-hall in the quarters which the Inca had assigned to them, a fierce and sudden storm of wind and hail had swept down the valley, and this, enduring only for a short time, as storms in those regions are wont to do, was followed by a swift change of temperature which melted the hail into a warm, soft rain. Then this with equal suddenness vanished, and the parting cloud-masses rolled in great shadowy billows up the mountain-sides, and down between them the sun streamed warm and bright over the humid foliage of the valley, turning it by one of Nature’s subtle strokes of magic into an enchanted realm paved with emeralds and diamonds—dazzling and yet fleeting forecasts of the fate of those whose daring had led them thus far into the unknown land which for most of them should prove at once a treasure-house and a grave.

“A good omen, comrades!” laughed de Soto as he wheeled his horse in between the chargers of Alonso de Molina and Sebastian ben-Alcazar, a tall, spare-built, dark-faced cavalier with more Moorish than Christian blood in his veins, and who was a Christian now only because his father had abjured his faith for love of a dark-eyed, fair-haired maiden of Castille. “A good omen, forsooth! Sunshine after storm. In good truth it seems to me that we have battled through storm and darkness enough from the sands of Gallo to this pleasant vale before us to earn somewhat of sunshine after our labours.”

“Sic itur ad astra!” replied ben-Alcazar gravely. “I have heard of a proverb which says that the memory of toil which is past is the best heartening brave men can have to strengthen them for future labours.”

“That is as true as thy scrap of Latin, ben-Alcazar,” laughed de Molina more gaily than he had done; “yet surely we have climbed near enough to the stars in coming here. For my own part I wish to go no nearer till I go for good.”

“We are ready—Vamos!” cried de Soto before he could get any further with his philosophical speech.

As he spoke he drew his sword and at the same moment the trumpet sounded, and at the head of their little troop of fifteen horse, the pick and flower of the whole army so far as mounting and accoutrements went, they moved across the square towards the opening of the street which led to the roadway running from the city walls to the pleasure-house round which the army of the Inca lay encamped.

This, when they came upon it, they found to be such a roadway as they had not so far met with in Peru, and forming a most pleasant contrast to the mountain paths over which they had so lately toiled. It was broad, straight, level, and well paved with evenly set stones, upon which the hoofs of their iron-shod horses rang merrily as they trotted along it. When they had covered about half of the way and had come within full view of the splendours of the Inca camp, with its thousands of brightly-coloured tents and hundreds of waving standards covering the plain beyond and sloping up the hillside on the other side of the valley, de Soto, turning in the saddle, said to the trumpeter of the troop—

“Diego, fill thy chest and give us a good honest blast so that we may give his heathen High-and-mightiness over yonder some warning of the honour that the servants of his Most Catholic Majesty are about to do him in this visit.”

The trumpeter put the shining brazen tube to his lips and sent the shrill, piercing notes ringing down through the silence of the valley, and as the echoes of the mountain wall repeated them de Soto said again—

“Caballeros, it is long since our good beasts have stretched their limbs on such a road as this, and mine is already pulling at the bridle as though a gallop were well to his taste. Give rein, then, and forward at speed. To come in good style before His Majesty will do us no harm in the eyes of the heathen.”

With that he threw up his right hand and gave his charger the rein. The troop, riding three abreast, followed suit, and with a thunder of hoofs and a rattle and jingle of arms and harness, with the afternoon sun shining brightly on breast-plate and morion, tossing plumes and waving pennon, the Spanish cavalcade swept along the causeway, as the historian of the Conquest has well described it, “like some fearful apparition on the wings of the wind.”

Thus they came into full sight of the Peruvian camp and saw long, serried lines of gaily-dressed warriors, splendid in armour of gold and casques of silver, drawn up motionless and expectant on the farther bank of a broad, shallow stream at which the causeway ended in a bridge of such light structure that it was manifestly made for nothing heavier than foot traffic.

De Soto, with an eye at once to good generalship and the value of first impressions, threw his hand up again and reined in his charger within fifty yards or so of the water.

“That bridge was never made to carry such as we are,” he said to his two companions. “We should make as foolish a spectacle as we should an easy prey to those heathens did we trust to it and fall through. For my part I would rather trust the water. Follow me, Caballeros! God and Santiago for Spain!”

With that he set spurs to his horse, galloped to the river’s edge and plunged into the water, followed with a great splashing and snorting of steeds by the rest of the troop. They crossed the river bed and gained the opposite bank with scarcely a break in their ranks. On the far side there was a broad stretch of level meadow-land, and across this they cantered in perfect order under the wondering gaze of the silent thousands drawn up on either side of the Inca’s pleasure-house.

This was a vast, low structure, white-walled and built in the form of three sides of a square, with the open side towards the river. The interior space was filled with a brilliant array, composed of the Inca’s chief warriors and the ministers of his court, and in the midst of a great semicircle, awaiting his already expected visitors, sat Atahuallpa, the most plainly-dressed man in all the glittering assembly, and yet distinguished from all by the golden throne-chair in which he sat while all the others stood about him or crouched at his feet, and by the crimson fringe of the borla which covered his forehead and half concealed his eyes. For all the sign that the Inca gave the display of the Spanish advance had been wasted, though wondering and perhaps admiring glances were not wanting among the courtiers and the bevy of bright-eyed, long-haired princesses that was gathered about the Inca’s throne. But Atahuallpa sat like an image carved in bronze, not even raising his head as the strange and terrible apparition approached him.

De Soto halted his troop some hundred paces from the Inca’s throne, and then at a word from him Diego’s trumpet rang out and it deployed into line. Then, with Molina on his right hand and ben-Alcazar on his left, he rode forward, and the three helmed and plumed heads bowed together within ten paces of the throne. Still Atahuallpa gave no sign that he was even conscious of their presence. His body was there on the throne, but his spirit was far away in Quito, whither it had travelled back through five years to the Day of Disaster to watch the darkness stealing over the face of the sun, and to hear the words which had foretold the doom of which these fair-faced, shining strangers, mounted on their marvellous and terrible beasts, were assuredly the harbingers.

Somewhat chilled by so frigid a reception, de Soto called Filipillo to him and bade him deliver to the Inca the brief speech that he had already prepared for him, telling Atahuallpa who they were and whence they came, whose servants they were and how their lord and master, His Most Catholic Majesty of Spain, had sent them to bear his greetings across many thousand leagues of ocean to his brother, the Emperor of the West.

This oration Filipillo delivered, putting more than enough bombast into his tone as though he knew that all this splendid state which surrounded the doomed monarch was but as a thin plate of burnished gold soon to be pierced and cut asunder by a dagger of steel. There had been a time when such as he would scarce have dared to enter the presence of the Inca grovelling on his face in the dust. Now he stood before him erect, almost as an equal, and as he stood so and delivered his message his bold eyes wandered from the impassive countenance of the Inca to a slender, half-clad form seated beside the throne, and a fair face framed in long, shining hair—a face whose beauty, as it happened, was ere long to prove fatal to him at whose footstool Pillcu-Cica-Ñusta, princess of the blood-royal of Peru, lay as a slave might lie at the feet of her master.

When the speech was ended de Soto awaited some reply from the Inca, but none came. Atahuallpa still sat motionless, not showing even by a movement of his eyes that he had understood or even heard what Filipillo had said. Then a tall and splendidly-dressed old warrior who stood at the right hand of the throne, and who was none other than Challcuchima, General-in-Chief of the army of Quito, said curtly—

“It is well so far, but the ears of our Lord are not for such base voices as thine, thou slave of his servants! Let thy master speak, and it may be that our Lord will hear.” This speech Filipillo, with no very good grace, translated to de Soto, and he, having already acquired sufficient of the Peruvian tongue to achieve a few words in it, prayed the Inca to answer with his own lips. Hearing this Atahuallpa looked up for the first time and said in a clear, passionless voice—

“Go back and tell him who sent you that I am keeping a fast which will be ended this midnight. To-morrow I will come and speak with him. Till then let him remain in the lodgings that have been given him and await my pleasure with patience.”

It was no very kindly greeting, and one that gave but little encouragement to those who received it. Whatever effect the strangeness of the embassy might have had on the minds of his soldiers and courtiers, it had none upon the frigid composure of the Inca himself. But the Spanish leader in the midst of his discouragement caught a gleam of interest in Atahuallpa’s eyes as he looked upon the splendidly caparisoned war-horse that stood nodding his plumed head and pawing the ground impatiently before him. Seizing the opportunity, de Soto, who was the finest horseman and best-mounted cavalier in the army, suddenly drove his spurs into his charger’s flanks, and, wheeling him sharply round, sent him careering away at full gallop over the level plain in front of the courtyard, and then, before the wondering eyes of the assembled thousands, he galloped and cantered, wheeled and caracoled and curveted in wide circles round the flanks and rear of his own motionless troop, and then, plunging in again at full gallop, he reined his charger up and pulled him back upon his haunches so close to Atahuallpa’s throne, that the foam flying from the bit was blown by the breath of his nostrils on to the skirts of his imperial robes.

Faint screams broke from the lips of the frightened women about the throne, and some of the nobles shrank back in something like terror from the strange sight—a weakness for which, as the chronicles say, they paid that night with their lives—but not a muscle of Atahuallpa’s form moved. He had cast his eyes to the ground again, and did not even raise them as de Soto finished his show of horsemanship. He who had sat unmoved amidst the falling ruins of Quito might well look without disturbance upon such a spectacle, strange and even terrible as it might seem in other eyes.

But when de Soto, feeling somewhat foolish after his arrogant display, had retired to his place in front of the troop, Atahuallpa looked up and made a sign with his hand, and immediately refreshments of cakes and fruit and roasted meat were brought out in dishes of silver, but these de Soto, on behalf of his men, declined with the best grace he could, for his reception had not been such as to persuade him to risk the danger of dismounting in the midst of all those armed thousands about him. Still, as the historian truthfully says, they did not hesitate to quaff the sparkling chicha from golden vases of wondrous size which were presented to them by the dark-eyed beauties of the Inca’s harem.

This they took as their dismissal, and so they made their salutations and departed with heavier hearts than they brought with them, and, having crossed the river more soberly than before, they took their way back to Cajamarca along the causeway, saying little among themselves, yet thinking much of the majesty and power that they had seen, and wondering how they, but a handful of strangers in a strange land, should overcome the innumerable hosts which the next morning might see arrayed against them.

Night had fallen when they got back to their quarters, and from thence they looked across the valley and saw the countless camp-fires of Atahuallpa’s legions sprinkled over the fields and up the distant hillsides, “as thick as the very stars of heaven.”

Later on that night Challcuchima was standing with bowed head before his master’s seat in his private apartment. Atahuallpa, buried in thought, was sitting with hands clasped in his lap and chin resting on his breast. His old servant and General had been giving him such counsel as few save he would dare to give, and now he was making a last effort to save his Lord and the son of his brother from the consequences of the gloomy fatalism that had robbed the conquering ruler of his wisdom and the absolute master of many regions of his strength.

“Think once again, Lord, I beseech thee!” he said in solemn and yet impassioned tones. “This resolve of thine is a resolve of ruin and death. These strangers are no gods, or sons of gods. Do they not eat and drink like men? More, have we not heard how some of them have fallen and died amidst the snows of the upper mountains? Have not some of these strange beasts of theirs also fallen and died by the wayside? It is true that the weapons they bear are potent and terrible, yet have not tidings come to us from the North telling us how they have turned them against each other? Would the true sons of Viracocha have done that? Would they have ravaged and plundered our towns on the seaboard as these men have done who come to us with words of friendship on their lips and lies in their hearts?

“I tell thee, Lord, as I have told thee oft before, they are but plunderers who have come to rob thee of this metal by which they set such store, and for which they will endure all toils and risk all dangers. By the memory of thy father and lord, who is even now looking down upon thee from the windows of the Mansion of the Sun, I conjure thee to speak the word that shall bid me lead thy legions to Cajamarca, and take these white-face plunderers in the trap that they will lay for thee to-morrow. Have not our spies told us of their intention? To-night all may be saved. They are few and we are many, and the darkness will cover us from the aim of their lightning-bolts. Ten thousand to-night will gladly die to save thee and destroy those who would rob thee of the inheritance of thy fathers. But to-morrow, once thou hast set foot in the snare they have prepared for thee, not all thy legions could save thee, and if thou art lost, Lord, then all is lost, for thou art all we have.”

Atahuallpa heard him in silence, and when he had finished the silence continued. Minute after minute passed and the doomed Inca gave no sign that he had even heard the warning that might have saved him. Then at length Challcuchima’s broad breast heaved with a great sigh that ended in a choking sob, and then, knowing that all further argument must be in vain, he bowed himself in silent farewell, and walked with slow steps and down-bent head towards the curtained doorway. There for a moment he paused and looked back at the unmoved figure of his Lord, and then, making the silent sign of appeal to the Unnameable, he turned again and left the Last of the Incas to his thoughts and the near impending doom from which his whole army would joyfully have died to save him.

CHAPTER VIII.
THE COMING OF ATAHUALLPA

It may well be believed that there was but little sleep for the Spanish army in Cajamarca that night, for the tidings which de Soto and his embassy had brought back, and which it is easy to see would lose nothing in the telling, were sufficiently heavy and full of grave import to convince the lightest-minded of the adventurers that the task of the morning would be no child’s play even if it succeeded, and that if it failed, as it almost certainly must have done had the Inca taken the wise advice of Challcuchima, it would infallibly involve the ruin of every man’s hopes, and most likely the loss of his life to boot.

It were idle to say that no man thought of sleep, since old Carvahal said with truth that he never closed his eyes for a wink without opening them in fear of seeing the Peruvian legions swarming round the town. There were, indeed, some who talked almost openly of a retreat to the hills while there was yet time to escape from the city which to them seemed no better than a death-trap, and among these was Alonzo Riquelme, the king’s treasurer himself, who, strangely enough, was that same “fat man” from whom, together with the one-eyed Almagro, who had not yet come upon the scene, Atahuallpa was hereafter to pray to Pizarro for deliverance.

News of this possible defection was speedily carried to the Captain, and no sooner did he hear of it, having already made the arrangements which, according to his resolve, nothing less than a convulsion of Nature should alter, he sent for all the chief men of the little force, together with the officials of the Church and the empire, who were with him to attend to other interests than those of the mere adventurer, and when these had gathered in the banqueting-hall he stood up in his place and said to them with that grave, simple eloquence which such men as he are accustomed to use at such moments when life or death, fortune or failure, honour or infamy, all hang trembling in the balance of a brief decision—

“Gentlemen and soldiers of Spain, champions of the holy Faith and comrades who have followed me thus far through storm and calm, hunger and plenty, cold and heat, I have called you here to speak to you with such plainness as the occasion demands. To my sorrow I have heard that there are some in the army who have talked of going back.”

As he said this he fixed his eyes on Riquelme, whose official assurance quailed visibly under his cold, steady gaze. Then, after a little pause, he went on—

“Let me deal with them first. They are, few as we all are, but a few among many. You all know with what difficulty we came here, even with the friendship and assistance of the servants of Atahuallpa, false though that may have been. How much harder would it be for us all to go back even if we went united? But for a few it would be impossible, for they would not only have the hosts of the Inca to fight their way through over those long and weary leagues that we have traversed, but—in the name of God and Santiago, in the cause of his Most Catholic Majesty and our own high enterprise—I swear on the faith of a true man that one Christian sword at least, held by one Christian hand, will bar their way should they seek to tread the path of the recreant and the coward—so help me God and His holy Saints, I swear it!”

As he said this he brought his mailed glove down with a crash upon the table, and then in the silence that followed he looked from face to face awaiting an answer.

“And by all the host of Heaven thy sword shall not be the only one, Señor Capitan!” cried Carvahal. “My blade, however unworthy, shall go with thine on such a mission.”

“And mine! and mine! and mine!” went the cry down each side of the long tables as one by one the captains of the troops sprang to their feet, hand on hilt.

“As I expected, comrades,” said Pizarro quietly. “That is enough. Now let us go to business. There are none of us here who are not aware of the bold stratagem with which the most admirable Captain Cortez made himself master of the person of Montezuma of Mexico, and, through him, of his whole empire; but there is this difference between our situations. Cortez was lodged in a palace in Tenochtitlan, which was to Mexico as Cuzco is to Peru. He had with him some four hundred Spanish swords and some five thousand allies of Tlasclalan. We are here but a hundred and sixty fighting men all told. We have no allies, and this deserted city into which we have been invited savours to me far rather of the trap than the guest-chamber, wherefore it follows that we must act with the greater boldness and the more instant decision. My plans are already known to you all. I have no more to say save to bid every man who carries the fear of God and the honour of Spain in his heart to do the best that in him lies to carry this our holy enterprise to a good and happy end.”

“And the blessing of God and the benediction of His holy Church—absolution in this world and beatitude in the next—be on all who worthily fulfil that most worthy behest!” rolled in solemn tones through the vast chamber as the lean, ascetic form of Vincente de Valverde raised itself erect at the other end of the table. His hand went up with three fingers pointing to the roof. Every head was bowed in silence as he spoke. “And the curse of God and the ban of holy Church on each and all whose heart shall faint or whose hand shall fail when the time comes to strike for the glory of God and the honour of Spain. Amen!”

“Amen! Amen!” came from every bowed head at once, and so the wound, which with other treatment might speedily have proved fatal, was healed, and Pizarro, seeing that the danger was past, stood up in his place again and said—

“That is well, comrades. We have had talk enough. Let us now to prayer and watchfulness that we may be the better ready for the work that lies before us.”

With that he took up his sword, which he had laid on the table in front of him, and strode out of the hall, followed by the rest of the Council of War.

The next morning, which was the morning of the 16th of November, 1532, the sun rose up in a cloudless sky to look down upon the pleasant vale of Cajamarca, and to behold as base and bloody a deed as all the red-written history of Spain can tell of.

The houses which had been allotted to Pizarro and his troops consisted of a range of low buildings along the eastern side of the great square. Their interior was composed of spacious chambers opening by wide and lofty doorways on to the square, and within these all the troops, horse and foot, were disposed. The footmen, armed from head to foot, with sword and halbert ready to hand; the horsemen, standing by their ready-saddled steeds; and the arquebusiers with weapons loaded and matches alight. The two falconets which composed the artillery of the force, were loaded and trained, placed out of sight, one in the little fort above the town and the other in one of the houses, and yet so that their discharge would sweep the square in a diagonal direction.

Very early in the morning a man-at-arms and a trumpeter had scaled the walls of the little fort overlooking the town, and stationed themselves there to give timely warning of the Inca’s approach. The last act of the night, or, as it might better be said, the first of the morning, was the solemn celebration of the Mass, and with his own hands the Fray Valverde carried the Host from troop to troop, giving absolution for all that might be done to each man as he partook of it, and when this was over he raised the solemn chant: “Exsurge, Domine, et judica causam Tuam!” in which all most fervently joined, as though, as the historian puts it, “they had been a company of martyrs about to lay down their lives in defence of their faith instead of a licentious band of adventurers meditating one of the most atrocious acts of perfidy on the record of history.”

Yet, though all was ready soon after sunrise, it was nearly noon before the sentinel on the fort announced the approach of the Peruvian army along the causeway. As it advanced legion after legion deployed in orderly array over the fields on either side, covering them, as the Spanish chronicler says, as far as the eye could reach. Within the city all was anxiety and expectation, though, in obedience to the last injunctions of the Captain, no sound was made, nor did any soldier show himself outside of the guard of honour that Pizarro had appointed to receive the Inca.

Then suddenly the sentinel gave the news that the army and the escort had halted a little distance outside the city walls, and presently there came runners from Atahuallpa to inform Pizarro that it was his intention to camp in the open that night and enter the city at daybreak the following morning.

Pizarro saw in an instant that such a delay meant ruin. He knew that his soldiers were already overstrung with suspense, and that another night must prove intolerable to them, knowing that they were closely surrounded by the innumerable hosts of the Inca, even if under cover of the night the armed legions did not close in upon them and overwhelm them with a resistless flood of numbers. In this moment’s thought he had penetrated the true design of Atahuallpa. Challcuchima had renewed his entreaties in the morning, and had so far prevailed upon his master to cause the halt, which even at that last hour might have saved the Land of the Four Regions from the grasp of the invader.

Pizarro instantly called his brother Hernando to him, and sent him with de Soto and Molina to bid the Inca welcome in his name, and entreat him to come forthwith into the city, as he had prepared an entertainment for him, and had many weighty matters to discuss with him which would ill brook delay.

“Tell him that I hope to sup with him to-night,” he said as Hernando mounted his horse.

And so, as will be seen, it came to pass.

It has been well said that whom the gods would undo they first make mad, and so it must have been with the Last of the Incas, for a writer of romance would be laughed at as an outrager of all the possibilities were he to relate what followed as his own story. Yet it is but sober fact that Atahuallpa, impelled by what impulse none may know, listened with open ears to the persuasions of the treacherous embassy, and not only left the protecting shelter of his army, but set out for the city attended by an unarmed escort.

Hernando and his companions rode swiftly back to tell of their good fortune.

“It is not the least of thy services to our master that thou hast done to-day, Hernando,” said Pizarro as his brother told him of the result of his embassy, “for now truly hath the Lord delivered the heathen into our hand.”

It was nearly an hour later that their expectant eyes caught sight of the head of the Inca’s cavalcade advancing up the broad street into the square. First came a body of some two or three hundred slaves carrying brooms of feathers, with which they removed every particle of dust and dirt from the path. These were followed by a band of gaily-dressed girls, crowned with garlands and carrying baskets of flowers, which they strewed in the way, chanting songs of strange and yet sweet harmony, which the pious chronicler tells us sounded “like songs of hell” in the ears of the faithful.

Then came the advance guard, brilliant in gorgeous liveries and plumed head-dresses, and after these rank upon rank of nobles with plumed casques of burnished silver on their heads and their bodies covered with armour of golden scales from shoulder to thigh. Then a body of priests, bare-headed and robed in flowing garments of snowy whiteness. Then followed a brilliant and orderly throng of nobles and warriors blazing with gold and silver and bright-hued uniforms shining with gems, and, borne aloft in the midst of these was the open litter, gorgeous with bright and many-tinted feather work, in which Atahuallpa sat in his golden chair, blazing with gold and gems, and motionless as a statue hewn out of pale bronze.

Not a Spaniard was to be seen as the splendid pageant reached the entrance to the square. Those who came in front separated into two long lines, and between them the Inca’s bearers advanced into the great open space. As they reached the middle of it the Spanish trumpets rang out, and the guard of honour sallied forth in all the bravery of polished steel and gay caparisons to meet it.

The first salutations were exchanged with a gravity befitting the occasion, and, these being over, Vincente de Valverde, Bible in hand, and attended by Brother Joachim bearing the great crucifix on his right hand, and the interpreter Filipillo, carrying the recollection of the fair face and bright eyes of the Princess Pillcu-Cica in his heart, on his left, advanced with slow steps towards the side of the Inca’s litter.

Atahuallpa now for the first time turned his head and stared in cold surprise at this strange apparition, and Valverde, giving him little time for wonder, plunged forthwith into an exhortation long enough to have wearied out anything more sensitive than the stony indifference of the Inca. In fervent heedlessness of the fact that every word had to pass through the mind and the lips of Filipillo before it could be understood, he expounded the whole Christian faith from the Fall of Man to the mystery of Pentecost, and from thence he deduced the descent of the Pope as the successor of the Apostles, and, passing from this to the Divine right of kings under the sanction of the Vicar of Christ, he proved to the satisfaction of any good Catholic that His Majesty of Spain was the true lord and rightful owner of all the lands of the West, including Atahuallpa’s empire, since he who sat in the chair of St. Peter had given them to him. Finally, seeing at length some signs of impatience on the frowning countenance of the Inca, he held up the Bible, proclaiming it as the Word of the Most High which he and those with him were commissioned to preach in every land under the sun.

When he had at length come to an end Atahuallpa turned his eyes on to Filipillo and said—

“Speak, slave, and if thou understandest the speech of this strange creature tell me what he says that I may answer.”

Filipillo bowed himself almost to the earth, and then, standing erect again, replied—

“Son of the Sun and Lord of the Four Regions—the man who has spoken is a priest of the Strangers and the servant of a strange God whose name hath never been honoured by coming to thine ears. This God is one and three, so far as my poor senses can understand, and that makes four. Further, this God has given the whole earth to a man who reigns in a place called Rome, and he, so the priest here says, has given them that part of the earth which is illuminated by thy presence and blest by thy rule. How this may be I know not, but he says that the black thing which he holds in his hand there is the Word of his God with which He speaks His will to men.”

“Bid him give me the thing and let me hear it!” said Atahuallpa curtly.

“The Inca would fain take the holy book into his hands, Father. Doubtless the touch of it will soften his heart and open his ears,” said Filipillo in Spanish to Valverde.

The priest gladly held it out with both hands towards the litter. The Inca took it and held it to his ear for a moment or two. Then his black, heavy brows came together in an angry frown over his gleaming eyes. With a contemptuous gesture he flung the book to the ground and said to Filipillo—

“Tell the false priest that he is a liar. The thing is dumb. My land is mine, and none can give it away. If the strangers have come only to tell me such children’s tales as that let them go back whence they came while my mercy leaves them alive. I want no god but the god of my fathers, and he is yonder!”

As he said this the Inca turned his face towards the sun, now, as though for a fatal omen, as the chroniclers put it, sinking on its downward path towards the western mountains, and bowed his head, moving his lips as though in unspoken prayer.

CHAPTER IX.
“FOR GOD AND SPAIN!”

“Anathema! Anathema! Shall the word of God be trodden under-foot of the heathen?” cried Valverde, his voice rising almost to a scream as he plunged forward with both hands outstretched to rescue the sacred volume from the feet of the Inca’s bearers and escort, who, as though fearing that some violence was about to be done to their Lord, were beginning to crowd round the litter. He seized it in his right hand, and then, drawing himself up to the full height of his meagre stature, and spreading his arms out wide above his head, he turned his face up to the heavens and cried in a voice that rang loud and shrill through the silent square—

“Fall on! Fall on! Strike for God and for Spain! The Church absolves you. Strike, strike, and spare not, for the hour has come!”

Then, turning towards the Spaniard’s quarters, he ran with his hands still above his head to Pizarro, who, at the head of the troop that had been called the guard of honour, was slowly advancing towards the Inca’s litter and cried again—

“Son of the Church, fall on! Do you not see how the fields on both sides are filling with the host of the heathen? Strike now, straight and swift, ere it is too late.”

Even at this supreme moment it seemed as though the soldier-soul of Pizarro made a last revolt against the treachery which he himself had planned. He knew that the splendidly arrayed guards of the Inca and the people who were now crowding fast into the square were unarmed, that they had not even taken the precaution of bringing those simple weapons which, however effective in their own warfare, would be but as children’s playthings if pitted against the shot and steel of his own troops. As Valverde reached his horse’s head he drew rein, and threw up his right hand to stop those behind him, saying, in a low, husky voice—

“Is there no other way, Father? These poor people have no arms. There are many of them, but they would only be as a crowd of children before our charge——”

“There is but one way with the enemies of the Lord!” cried Valverde, raising his voice again to a shrill scream. “Fall on, I say, fall on! By my lips the Church absolves you! God Himself, whom this heathen hath insulted by casting His holy Word into the dust with contumely, will see whose hand is first raised to wipe the shame away, and ere long the king must know whether to-day an empire has been won or lost for him. Fall on! Fall on! for God and Santiago!”

The words, impassioned as they were, were skilfully spoken, and they left Pizarro with but one course open to him. A scarf of white silk, the colour of peace and truce between honourable enemies, was lying across his saddle-bow. With a hand that trembled as it had never done in battle, he took it up and waved it once aloft. Pedro de Candia, who had mounted one of his guns on the little fort above the square, was standing beside it with the lighted match in his hand, and as he saw the scarf wave he raised the smouldering match to his lips, blew on it and laid it on the priming.

The next instant the ears of the thronging thousands who had followed the Inca into the city were for the first time thunderstricken by the hoarse roar of cannon. For the first time their eyes saw leaping from the throat of a gun the flash which foretold the coming of the iron messenger of death.

Candia had trained his piece with all too deadly certainty. The little ball struck a golden-armoured, gaily plumed Peruvian who stood at the head of a column of guards within a few paces of the Inca’s litter. He happened at the moment to be looking up towards the fortress. The shot struck him full in the face, burst his head asunder as though it had been a rotten orange, and ploughed its way through the files behind him, leaving a long row of bloody and mangled corpses to mark its path.

To the soldier of to-day such a thing would seem but a trifling and common-place incident of warfare, but to the Peruvians it was the revelation of a new power of destruction so strange and terrible, that its effect upon their minds was as great as would be that of a bolt falling from heaven upon a modern battlefield and annihilating a whole regiment.

But de Candia’s cannon-shot was but the prelude to the dreadful tragedy that was to come. Almost at the same moment the other falconet, which had been mounted in the banqueting hall, belched forth its spurt of flame and cloud of smoke through one of the windows, and sent its ball into the midst of another dense mass of people that had rushed together at the sound of the first shot, impelled by that strange instinct which is common to both sheep and men when faced with some new and therefore more appalling danger.

Then, a moment later, from every window and doorway in the Spanish quarters jets of flame and waves of smoke gushed forth, and a storm of bullets from the arquebuses swept across the square and plunged into the crowded masses of the unarmed and helpless Peruvians. The thick and stifling smoke made by the crude and imperfect powder rolled across the square, blown by an easterly wind into the faces of the panic-stricken people, blinding and choking them. Then the roar of the cannon and the rattle of the musketry was followed by the hoarse, roaring battle-cry of the Spaniards.

“Santiago! Santiago! At them for God and Spain! Ohé! Ohé! At them! At them! Cristo y Santiago!”

Now rang out the clattering thunder of hoofs and the swift, orderly tramp of mailed feet on the stone pavement of the plaza, as the Spanish horse and foot rushed forth from their concealment, and flung themselves with murderous fury and resistless impetus upon the struggling, screaming swarms, which scattered before them in a vain attempt to escape from the crowded square. The cavaliers leapt their iron-shod horses into the shrinking masses of men and women, swords rose and fell every moment, gleaming ever redder and redder in the light of the afternoon sun. Pikes and halberds and axes thrust and hacked their way with pitiless swiftness through the unresisting crowds, and high above the screams of terror and agony that came from the helpless victims still rose the hoarse and murderous cry—

“Dios y Santiago! Ohé! Ohé! Strike for Spain and El-Dorado!”

And still the horses reared and plunged, leaping hither and thither as the spurs of their riders drove them on, stamping the gaily-dressed throngs down and crushing them out of all human shape against the stones till they were more than fetlock deep in blood. And still the cruel steel did its murderous work, wielded by hands that knew no mercy, and ever and anon the cannon boomed out again, and the arquebusiers, reloading their cumbrous pieces, sent their bullets wherever they could aim them without hurting their comrades.

On the western side of the plaza there was a high wall of mud and stone stretching between two buildings some two hundred paces apart, and against this was pressed a vast throng of panting, struggling wretches, hemmed in on all sides by the Spanish horse and foot. The bullets tore their way through the dense mass, the stamping horse-hoofs struck them down by dozens, and the sweeping, thrusting steel mowed them down by scores. At length the vast throng surged outwards for a moment, and then, like a wave beaten back by the rocks, recoiled upon the wall. For one awful moment it remained motionless, pent in between the closing ring of steel and the wall. Then the wall swayed and tottered, and with a rumbling crash fell outwards, and over its ruins and through the cloud of dust that rose over them the wave of human agony and terror surged forward and scattered into broken and flying units over the open field beyond.

Some of the cavalry, foremost among whom was old Carvahal, his broad face purple-red with the lust of slaughter, rolling to and fro in his saddle, shouting hoarse battle-cries and invoking every saint in the calendar as he laid about him to right and left with his long sword, spurred forward over the ruins of the wall and spread out over the plain, careering hither and thither, and trampling and cutting their screaming victims down; but the greater part turned back to take their share in the still more bloody work that was going on round the gorgeous litter of the Inca.

This was now tossing to and fro above the human flood like a boat labouring in the sea, and in it Atahuallpa sat clinging to his golden chair, staring with dazed eyes at the hideous scene about him, thinking, it may be, of that other scene in far-off Quito, and remembering those last words of Mama-Lupa as she stood above the prostrate body of Zaïma, his mother, on the terrace—

“Sacrifice! Sacrifice! The Divine Ones are wroth, and only sacrifice can appease them!”

And sacrifice it truly was, such sacrifice as human ruthlessness has seldom exacted or human loyalty and devotion paid. The nobles and princes of the doomed empire, their trappings of gold and silver and gems splashed and spattered with the noblest blood in the Land of the Four Regions, crowded round the litter of their Lord, opposing their bare hands to the steel of the Spaniards, and making a wall of their bodies to protect him from the plunging, trampling chargers. They clung with despairing heroism to manes and bridles, they strove to drag the riders from their saddles, and even flung their arms round the horses’ legs, as though with their puny strength they would wrestle with these strange and terrible war-beasts and overthrow them. No sooner did one go down trampled to death or cloven to the chin than another sprang forward to take his place and meet his doom.

So the bloody, ruthless work went on, and ever the devoted throng round the Inca’s litter grew less and less, and the Spaniards forced their way nearer and nearer towards the sacred and hitherto inviolate person of the Son of the Sun. At length one of the men-at-arms, Michael Asterre by name, a soldier of huge frame and giant strength, burst through the last ring, struck down one of the bearers with a blow of his iron mace and, standing on his body, reached up and grasped Atahuallpa by the left arm. The litter rocked and swayed more violently than before, and just as Asterre was dragging him down a horse was driven close up, so close that the foam from its bit dripped upon the splendid feather work, and the deep voice of the Captain shouted—

“On thy life harm him not! Let go, I tell thee, or, by our Lady, I will cut thee down myself!”

As Pizarro said this he stretched out his hand to save the falling Inca. At this moment Atahuallpa’s stupor vanished, and the flame of the old warrior spirit seemed to blaze out again at such an insult as no Inca had ever before suffered—the touch of a hostile hand. He snatched a dagger of polished copper from his girdle and struck at Pizarro with it, but before his hand fell a sword blade, whose hilt was in de Soto’s hand, leapt across the litter and struck the dagger from his hand. Yet the forceful stroke of the Inca’s arm beat the sword-blade down and drove the point into Pizarro’s wrist.

“Well meant, de Soto, and I thank thee!” laughed Pizarro, as he saw the blood flow. “Yet I never thought that blood of mine would be shed by Spanish steel.”^[13]

Years afterwards he thought of this when the crime of that moment of his greatest triumph had been assessed at the bar of Eternal Justice, and the penalty of the ancient law, blood for blood, was about to be duly exacted.

At the same moment de Soto’s horse, forced forward by the press behind it, stumbled against the litter and overturned it. Pizarro gripped the falling Inca and pulled him across his horse’s neck and, as he fell, Michael Asterre put out his hand and snatched the imperial borla from his brow. And thus was the Last of the Inca’s, the son of the great Huayna-Capac, and lord and master of many millions, discrowned by the hand of a common soldier who had embarked upon this wondrous enterprise for no better reason than to save himself from a debtors’ cell at Panama.