He who had commanded the shooting squad stooped over the corpses, a smoking pistol in his hand. Now he glanced up at Driscoll. “Pues, si señores,” he said, “of amnesty, yes,” and chuckling, he indicated the bodies with his pistol. “But wait––” He thought he saw a form quiver, one he had overlooked. Remedying this with a belated coup de grace through the brain, he shoved back his white gold-bordered sombrero and mopped his forehead as a laborer whose labor is done.
“Under which general amnesty, caballeros,” he went on merrily, “you have just witnessed the first act. My loyalty to the Emperor grows. His Majesty has a sense of humor.”
It was Don Tiburcio. He had deserted the Contras to waylay the rich bullion convoy of which Rodrigo Galán had told him. But the convoy never came. Rodrigo, the “sin vergüenza,” had not levied toll at all. He had swallowed it whole, a luscious morsel of several millions in silver and gold. The coup was of a humor the less appreciated by Don Tiburcio because he had figured on doing the very same thing himself. At present he was chief of scouts under Mendez, and commanded the Exploradores, audacious barbarians who were invaluable for their knowledge of the country.
From Tiburcio and Ney Driscoll finally gathered the meaning of the decree. It was the keynote to the Imperialist hopes. Its cause was the flight of Juarez across the border. Maximilian was surcharged anew with enthusiasm. Even the United States must now recognize his empire, he believed. 288And confounding flurry with activity, as usual, he fervently proclaimed the courage and constancy of Don Benito Juarez, but added that the Republican hegira finally and definitely stamped all further resistance to the Empire as useless. Then, august and Cæsar-like, he allowed amnesty for those who submitted immediately; he prescribed death for all others. Rebels taken in battle were not even to have trial. Maximilian believed that ink, thus sagaciously besmeared by a statesman’s fingers, would blot out further revolution. But it was so fatuous, so stupidly unnecessary! The court martials, or French gardens of acclimatization, as the dissidents called them, were already doing the work of the decree. The poet prince merely lifted the odium of it to his own shoulders. His amnesty became infamy, and was called the Bando Negro, a nefast Decree to blacken his gentleness and well-meaning for all time.
Driscoll left his informants, and walked up and down, up and down, alone. It did not occur to him to fill the cob pipe between his teeth. A scowl settled between his eyes, and it deepened and grew ugly. The desperado was forming in the man–desperado, as contrast to polite conventions. Desperado, as primitive man, who hews straight, cutting whom or what he might, cutting first of all through the veneered bark of civilization. For this reason, in this sense, he might be termed outlaw. And walking up and down, up and down, he hewed till he had laid bare the core of the matter. And he saw it naked, without the polish. Thereupon he knew what he was going to do.
He saddled Demijohn, and Demijohn followed at his shoulder to the jefetura. Here, at the entrance, under the brick-red portales, Driscoll left the horse, untied, and opened the door and passed within.
The jefetura, or prefecture, was at present the headquarters of the command, and in the long front room were assembled a 289number of officers, including Ney and Tiburcio, besides the jefe of the place and several town magistrates, all chatting with Colonel Mendez about the recent victory. They greeted the American cordially, and poured out tequila for him. He had done as much as any to win the fight. Michel laid a hand on his shoulder.
“Monsieur,” he said with mock formality, “to-day, when you permitted yourself to save my skin, you called me a fool. But I would have you observe, monsieur, that only my patron divinity, the god of fools, is permitted to know so much.”
Driscoll loosed himself from the affectionate grip, and turned to Mendez.
“Colonel,” he said, “I’m going to get out of this.”