One evening, just after sunset, they were standing on the shore of the lake, watching the afterglow on the mountains. The valley was already shrouded in twilight, but the distant peaks gleamed brilliant rose against the darkening blue of the eastern sky. Alone, Cristoval would have swept the prospect with a glance and turned away; but now, as his eyes followed her guidance, he grew conscious of the beauty of creeping shadows and dying light, and echoed her quiet admiration.
They turned away at length, and walked slowly toward the villa, unconscious of the evil lurking in the growing dusk. They passed up the avenue, and a dark form rose stealthily from the shadow, parting the branches and leaning forward with the tense alertness of a cat to watch their receding steps. They disappeared, and after a moment's listening the half-naked figure skulked along the terrace, crouching to avoid the overhanging boughs, reached the enclosing wall of the garden, and was over, speeding away in the darkness like an apparition.
An hour later two Cañares rose from their lair in a ravine half-way up the mountain-side to receive him. He spoke a dozen words, answered by a grunt from his companions; groped in the obscurity for his cloak, threw it over his shoulders, and the three filed out from their concealment, heading toward the lower end of the valley. Six days afterward they entered Xauxa.
Spring was now well advanced, and Xilcala grew daily more fair in fresh verdure and blossoming orchards. Stray, fragmentary rumors began to float in, borne by herdsmen on their way to pasturage in the higher Cordilleras. But the tales had reached them from mouth to mouth, and so far as they concerned the Spaniards, were tangled and over-colored. One day, however, there came news of a different order, brought by a chasqui, the first to enter the valley in many weeks. The first item was the death at Xauxa of the young Inca Toparca, and the burning at the stake by Pizarro of Challicuchima, the Quitoan general, on the suspicion of having poisoned the Inca. The second item, heard with greater grief by the Xilcalans, was Pizarro's advance upon Cuzco, and the defeat of the Auqui Manco in the Pass of Vilcaconga, where he had opposed the invaders. The Spaniards, it was thought by the chasqui, were doubtless in possession of the capital. Pizarro had left Xauxa garrisoned by a small force of infantry and several hundred Cañares to serve as a base upon which to fall back if forced to retreat from Cuzco.
With the exception of Toparca's death there was nothing in the news which occasioned surprise to Cristoval. He was too familiar with Spanish prowess to doubt that Pizarro would take Cuzco. He mourned the young prince, but there was more than the intelligence itself to cause him uneasiness and depression. The seclusion of the valley seemed violated by its intrusion, and he awakened to reluctant thought of the end which must come to the half-dreamlike days, bringing uncertainties, dangers, and the parting which had grown more and more unwelcome.
The day of the arrival of the evil tidings Rava and Maytalca spent in retirement, and Cristoval was condemned to solitary wandering. His rambling did not take him far from the hemicycle, and he returned thither frequently, lingering with many a glance up the avenue; then strolled again, or lounged where he could view a certain favored seat. He often turned at fancied footfalls; a distant flutter of the garments of some maid of the Palla's household was strangely suggestive of Rava; and more than once he was deceived by a glint of bright sunlight on the foliage. Curiously, the garden seemed haunted by dim phantasms of that familiar, graceful form, and after the hundredth illusion he took himself to task: "What, Cristoval! Art a boy, to go mooning along these paths, starting at thine own conjurings? What aileth thee? Once thou wast good companion for thyself. Now thou goest about peering and stretching thy neck into the bushes like an unmated cock-pheasant. Come! Go saddle up and ride. Thou 'rt in sore need of exercise, camarada."
He started back with resolution. As he approached the hemicycle his steps slowed, and he halted in front of the seat where Rava had worked. There lay a forgotten skein of thread. He picked it up, contemplating it with an interest disproportionate to its importance or value. Useless to try to follow his thoughts. It was intrinsically feminine, that trifle, and the soldier succumbed to its femininity. He drew a small pouch from his bosom and placed the skein beside the half-dozen other precious trinkets it contained. He closed the pouch; reopened it hastily, removed the thread, and replaced it upon the seat where he had found it; then sprang to his feet and walked rapidly away. A half-hour later he was galloping along the lane toward the canyon by which they had approached Xilcala weeks ago.
Now the valley, stirred for a moment by the chasqui's tidings, sank again into its repose. The mourning for the defeat at Vilcaconga was mitigated by confidence in ultimate victory. What enemy of Tavantinsuyu had ever triumphed? Soon a call to arms would come, and the nation would respond with overwhelming potency. All in good time.
At the villa of Maytalca the days went as before. But—were they days of growing happiness, or of more rapidly growing pain? Cristoval could not have said, nor could Rava. He had learned to interpret the evanescent light in the brown eyes that so often sought his own, but the joy it gave him was for the instant, and followed at once by a deeper pang. He turned away from the gentle face whose beauty, waxing daily more alluring under the tender burning of the soul within, would have shaken the knees of the resolution of one thrice more saintly than Cristoval. But though he told himself that the parting must be only a question of weeks, though he rode hard and invoked the good San Antonio, Cristoval found little peace.
CHAPTER XX