Instinctively the whole troop pulled up, horse and foot. It was the first time that the Spaniards had ever seen a Peruvian army so splendid in appearance and so impregnable in position, and it was a sight that might have inspired the boldest heart with both admiration and awe. While they were standing thus gazing at the splendid spectacle, half inclined to wheel about and make the best of their way back to Cuzco, if indeed the way were still open, de Molina threw up his right hand and cried—
“Ah, did I not tell you, Caballeros? There is the Inca himself if I mistake not. By the Saints, does he not look as goodly a figure as any Christian knight amongst us, and how well he sits that good steed of mine! See, he is waving a white scarf and beckoning to us. Come, let us forward, comrades. That means a truce at least.”
The apparition that had called forth this exclamation was that of the Inca himself. He was clad from head to foot in shining steel. Round his helmet was bound the scarlet llautu but without the imperial borla, and from it rose two lofty nodding feathers of the Coraquenque, which only the chief of the royal House might wear. In his right hand he carried a broad white scarf or kerchief, and with his left he guided his charger with perfect ease down the narrow, winding causeway which led from the rear of the fortress on to the plain. As he crossed this towards the brink of the river the Spaniards rode up to the other bank, each of them waving his scarf in reply to his signal. Then across the river there came, in the clear, high-pitched tone in which the Peruvians send their signal-cries from mountain to mountain, the words—
“Why have you followed me so far, my friends? Every moment your lives have been in danger. Do you not know that the City of the Sun is already beleaguered, and that you stand between two of my armies?”
“Cuerpo de Cristo! That is bad news!” growled de Candia. “It will be no light matter getting back to our quarters if that is so.”
“And if it be so it were well to learn the worst at once,” said de Molina. “I will go and speak with his Majesty.”
And before any of them could stay him the gallant young cavalier had leapt his horse into the stream and was swimming across. A half-suppressed cry of wonder broke from the Peruvian soldiers, and two or three companies of them, armed with bows and slings and spears, marched swiftly down out of the fortress which guarded the bank on which the Spaniards were, as though to cut off their retreat, while others marched out from the other fortress as though to close round the sacred person of the Inca. But he instantly waved them back and rode alone to a point on the bank which de Molina was rapidly nearing. As he reached it the dripping horse scrambled out of the water, and de Molina, holding out his hand, said with a laugh—
“A good morrow to your Majesty! This is a strong place and a gallant array that you have here.”
Manco took his hand and replied gravely—
“You and your comrades have done unwisely, my friend. If you had not forced me to leave you so suddenly last night I would have warned you that by sunrise this morning every pathway to it would have been filled by our warriors. Moreover, if I had not been in this part of the valley Ruminavi would certainly have taken you for spies, and my people are now so incensed against yours that you would have been slain if it had cost a thousand lives, and then,” he went on more gently, “how would you have kept your promise, and who would have saved Nahua from her doom? But now you have not a moment to lose. The higher the sun rises the greater will be the peril of your return. There is indeed only one means by which you can reach the city alive. Take this feather,” he said, pulling one of the sacred plumes from his turban. “There is not one of the Children of the Sun who would dare to touch the wearer of that. Put it in your helmet and go. With it I give you and your comrades your lives in payment for mine. Should we come to battle, still wear it and you will be harmless, however thick the fight. Tell your leader what you have seen here, and save Nahua and the queen as quickly as maybe, for soon there will be bitter and relent less war between us to the end. Now farewell. Go quickly if you would go safely.”