He was thinking of that ill-starred Darien expedition, with its plague and famine and ruthless slaughterings, which had been the grave of so many golden hopes; of the gallant high-hearted Vasco Nuñez de Balboa whom he had watched toilfully climbing the hills from whose summit he, first of all the men of the Old World, was to behold this Sea of the South over which he was now looking, hoping against despair for Almagro’s ship to come and end the weary weeks of waiting; and then he thought of his own black treachery which had sent Vasco to his death in obedience to his own unspoken resolve to strike all men from his path who bade fair to get to the Golden South before him.
Then his thoughts shifted on to his first expedition southward from Panama, and he reviewed one by one with unsparing exactness the long succession of labours and disasters that had daunted well nigh every heart but his. He thought of his little, crazy, overloaded ships struggling against storms and contrary currents; of the pestilential swamps and fever-haunted forests through which he had led his ever-dwindling little band of followers, and of the twenty-seven men who, one by one, had starved to death under his eyes in Hunger Bay—just as those companions of his down yonder must soon starve if help did not come.
Then at length his thoughts took a brighter hue as they turned back to the day on which that young naked savage lad, son of the cacique Commogre on the mountains above Darien, had laughed at the Spaniards for quarrelling about a few pounds’ weight of gold and, pointing to the southward, had told them of the unknown sea and the lands that lay along its borders where gold was as common as the stones by the wayside and silver as the wood in the forests; and lastly he remembered how he himself had had that brief glimpse of El-Dorado at Tacamez which had lured him on to this, his second, journey which had ended here on the desert shores of Gallo and in the pitiless clutches of famine and despair.
Surely thoughts like these were enough to shake the heart and turn back the steps of many a man who might well yield to such ill-fortune and yet still be accounted brave; but it was not such a man who stood beside the flagstaff-cairn on Gallo and stared out in defiance of Fate itself over that dreary sea and into those all-circling glooms. If he had been he would never have written the name of Francisco Pizarro in letters of blood and flame across the Western World beside that of Hernando Cortes, and, though he knew it not, ere that day’s gloom had deepened into the darker gloom of night, he was to show by a few brief words and one all-decisive act what manner of man he truly was.
The diggers on the beach had ended their task and were roasting the wretched fruits of their labours over a few smoky fires of mouldering sticks in the driest places among the rocks. But Pizarro, still seemingly lost in his thoughts, made no motion to join them at their meal, and presently a man whose short, sturdy, strong-built frame seemed to have defied so far both famine and sickness, came with short, active steps up on to the platform, carrying a drinking-can in one hand and a wooden platter in the other.
“Since you did not come to your breakfast, Señor Capitan, I have brought it to you,” he said in a cheery voice, as Pizarro saw him and came to meet him. “ ’Tis poor fare enough, but as good as this God-forgotten wilderness affords. This is almost the last of the wine, but the fish is passable, though the biscuit would be better if there were more bread and less mould.”
Pizarro took the platter but put back the proffered can, saying with a smile that was strangely soft and kind for such a man as he—
“Nay, nay, good Ruiz. I thank you for your care of me, but I have no need of the wine, I who am still the strongest here, saving perchance yourself. Take it back and let the sick have it. Water is good enough for me. Nay, nay, man, I tell you I will not have it. Take it away and bring me a stoup of your best water instead.”
“Ever the same, Señor,” said the Pilot—for it was he, Bartolomeo Ruiz, first Pilot of the Southern Seas, who had brought the future Conqueror his breakfast in such homely fashion—“ever the same, caring more for the meanest wretch that has scurvy in his bones than for the life that is now everything to us. Still I do your bidding for its kindness’ sake, praying, as I ever do, that Our Lady of Mercies may wait no longer to reward your goodness with the fortune it deserves. Ha! by the Saints, what was that?—the sound of a gun from the sea! Now, glory to God and Our Lady—there Almagro comes at last! Said I not ever that he would never leave us in our need?”
As Pizarro’s longing ears caught the thrice-welcome sound that came booming out of the mist to seaward, a bright flush leapt into his thin, sallow cheeks, and he stretched out his hand and said in a voice that had a clear, strong ring of joy in it—