CHAPTER XI.
GENERAL BUSTAMENTE.
Don Tadeo was right, when, on seeing General Bustamente pass, he said hewas on his way to visit his mistress. It was, in fact, to the residenceof the Linda the General was going. On arriving at the gate, one of hismen dismounted, and knocked. But no one answered; and at a sign fromthe General, the soldier knocked louder. But still all remained silent;there was no movement within. He began to feel uneasy. This silence wasthe more extraordinary from the General's visit having been announced,and he was, consequently, expected. "Oh! oh!" he said, "What is going onhere? Knock again, Diego, and knock in a way to make yourself heard!"
The soldier knocked with all his strength, but still uselessly. DonPancho's brow contracted; he began to fancy some misfortune must haveoccurred.
"Break open the door!" he cried.
The order was instantly obeyed; and the General, followed by his escort,entered the house. In the Patio all dismounted.
"Be prudent," said the General in a low voice to the corporal whocommanded the escort; "place sentinels everywhere, and keep a sharplook-out whilst I search the house."
After giving these orders, the General took his pistols from hisholsters, and, followed by some of his lancers, entered the house;but everywhere the silence of death prevailed. After passing throughseveral apartments, he arrived at a door, which, being a little ajar,allowed a stream of light to pass. From the other side of this doorproceeded something like stifled groans. With a kick of his foot, oneof the lancers dashed open the door; the General entered, and a strangespectacle presented itself to his astonished eyes! Dona Maria, tightlybound, and gagged, was fastened to the foot of a damask bed, saturatedwith blood. The furniture was broken and disordered, whilst two deadbodies, lying in a pool of blood, made it evident that the room had beenthe scene of a desperate conflict.
The general ordered the dead bodies to be removed, and then desired tobe left alone with the lady. As soon as the lancers had departed he shutthe door, and approaching the Linda, he hastened to release her from herbonds. She was senseless.
On turning round to place the pistols he had retained in his hands onthe table, he drew back with astonishment, and almost with terror, ashe perceived the dagger standing erect in the middle of it. But thisinstinctive feeling lasted only a moment. He went quickly up to thetable, seized the dagger, which he carefully drew out, and eagerly tookup the paper it had pinned down.
"_The tyrant Don Pancho Bustamente is cited at the expiration ofninety-three days!
_"THE DARK-HEARTS."_
he read in a loud, harsh tone, and then crushed the paper violently inhis hand. "Sangre de Dios! Will these demons always make a mock of me?Oh! they know that I show no mercy, and that those who fall into myhands----"
"Escape!" said a hollow voice, which made him start involuntarily.
He turned sharply round, and beheld the Linda, with her vicious eyefixed upon him with a demoniacal expression. He sprang towards her.
"Thank God!" he cried warmly, "you are again restored to your senses.Are you sufficiently recovered to explain the scene that has taken placehere?"
"A terrible scene, Don Pancho!" she replied, in a tremulous voice; "ascene, the bare remembrance of which still freezes me with terror."
"Are you strong enough to describe it to me?"
"I hope so," she replied. "Listen to me attentively, Don Pancho, forwhat I have to tell concerns you, perhaps, more than me."
"You mean this insolent summons, I suppose?" he remarked, showing it.
She glanced over it, and replied--
"I did not even know that such a paper had been addressed to you. Butlisten to me attentively."
"In the first place, have the goodness to explain to me what you justnow said."
"Everything in its turn, General; I will not fail to explain everything,for the vengeance I thirst for must be complete."
"Oh!" he said, a flash of hatred gleaming from his eye, "set your heartat ease on that head,--whilst avenging myself, I will avenge you."
The Linda related to the General what had passed between her and DonTadeo in the fullest details--how the Dark-Hearts had snatched him fromher hands, and the threats they had addressed to her on leaving her.But, with that talent which all women possess, of making themselvesappear innocent in everything, she represented as a miraculous piece ofawkwardness on the part of the soldiers charged to shoot him, the factof Don Tadeo being alive after his execution. She said that, attractedby the hope of avenging himself upon her, whom he suspected of being nostranger to his condemnation, he had introduced himself unseen into herhouse, where by a strange chance she happened to be alone, having thatevening permitted her servants to be present at a _romeria_ (a fete),from which they were not to return before three o'clock.
The General had not for an instant the idea of doubting the veracity ofhis mistress. The situation in which he had found her,--the incrediblenews of the resurrection of his most implacable enemy, altogether soconfused his thoughts, that suspicion had no time to enter his mind.He strode about the room with hasty steps, revolving in his head themost extravagant projects for seizing Don Tadeo, and, above all, forannihilating the Dark-Hearts,--those never-to-be-caught Proteuses, whoso incessantly crossed his path, thwarted all his plans, and alwaysescaped him. He plainly saw what additional strength the escape of DonTadeo would give to the patriots, and how much it would complicate hispolitical embarrassments, by placing at their head a resolute man whocould have no longer any considerations to preserve, but would wage warto the knife with him. His perplexity was extreme; he instinctivelyfelt that the ground beneath him was mined, that he was walking overa volcano, but he had no power to denounce to public opprobrium theenemies who conspired his ruin. The recital made by his mistress hadproduced the effect of a thunderclap upon him; he knew not what measuresto employ in order to counteract the numerous plots in action againsthim on all sides, and simultaneously. The Linda did not take her eyesoff him for a moment, but watched upon his countenance the variousfeelings aroused by what she told him.
We will, in a few words, introduce to the reader this personage, whowill play so important a part in the course of the following history.[1]General Don Pancho Bustamente, who has left in Chili a reputation forcruelty so terrible that he is generally called _El Verdugo_, or theexecutioner, was a man of from thirty-five to thirty-six years of age,although he looked near fifty, a little above the middle height, wellmade, and of good carriage, announcing altogether great corporealstrength. His features were tolerably regular, but his prominentforehead, his grey eyes deeply set beneath the brows, and close to hishook nose, his large mouth and high cheek bones, gave him something ofa resemblance to a bird of prey. His chin was square, an indicationof obstinacy; his hair and moustache, beginning to be streaked withgrey, were trained and cut in military fashion. He wore the magnificentuniform, covered at every seam with gold embroidery, of a generalofficer.
Don Bustamente was the son of his own works, which was in his favour.At first a simple soldier, he had, by exemplary conduct and more thancommon talents, raised himself, step by step, to the highest rank of thearmy, and had in the last instance been named minister-at-war. Then thejealousy which had been silent whilst he was confounded with the crowd,was unchained against him. The General, instead of despising calumnieswhich might have died out of themselves, gave them some degree offoundation, by inaugurating a system of severity and cruelty. Devouredby an ambition which nothing could satisfy, all means were deemed goodby him for the attainment of an object he secretly aimed at, which wasthe overthrow of the republic and government of Chili, and the formationof Bolivia and Araucania into one state, of which he would causehimself to be proclaimed Protector--an object which, besides the almostinsurmountable difficulties it presented, ever appeared--owing to theuniversal hatred which the General had aroused against himself--to slipfurther from his grasp each time he thought he was about grasping it.
At the mom
ent we bring him on the scene, he found himself in one of themost critical circumstances of his political career. He had in vainshot the patriots _en masse_--conspiracies, as always happens in suchcases, succeeded each other without interruption, and the system ofterror which he had inaugurated, far from intimidating the population,appeared, on the contrary, to urge them on to revolt. Secret societieswere formed; and one of these, the most powerful and the most terrible,that of the Dark-Hearts, enveloped him in invisible nets in which hestruggled in vain. He foresaw that if he did not hasten on the _coupd'etat_ he meditated, he should be lost beyond redemption. After arather long silence, the General placed himself by the side of the Linda.
"We will be avenged!" he said, in a deep tone; "be but patient."
"Oh!" she replied, bitterly, "my vengeance has commenced!"
"What do you mean by that?"
"I have caused Dona Rosario del Valle, the woman Don Tadeo de Leon lovesso passionately, to be carried off."
"You have _done_ that?" said the General.
"Yes, and in ten minutes she will be here."
"Oh! oh!" he exclaimed; "and do you mean to keep her with you?"
"With me!" she cried; "No, I thank you, General. I hear that thePehuenches are very fond of white women; I will make them a present ofher."
"Oh!" Don Pancho muttered, "women will be always our masters! they aloneknow how to revenge themselves! But," he added aloud, "have you no fearlest the man to whom you have confided this mission should betray you?"
She smiled with terrible irony,
"No," she said; "that man hates Don Tadeo more than I do, if that bepossible; he is working out his own vengeance."
At the same instant steps were heard in the chamber preceding the room.
"You will see, General--here is my emissary. Come in!" the Linda cried.
A man appeared; his face was pale and haggard; and his clothes, torn anddisordered, were stained in various places with blood.
"Well!" she exclaimed, in a tone of intense anxiety.
"All has failed," answered the man, breathless with haste and terror.
"What!" the Linda shouted, with a cry like that of a wild beast.
"There were five of us," the man continued, quite unmoved, "and wecarried off the _senorita_. All went on well till within a shortdistance from this house, when we were attacked by four demons, who cameI know not whence."
"And you did not defend yourselves, miserable cowards!" interrupted theGeneral violently.
The bandit gave him a cold look, and continued impassively--
"Three of our number are dead, and the leader and myself wounded."
"And the girl?" the Linda asked passionately.
"The girl was recaptured by our opponents. The Englishman has sent me toyou to learn if you still wish him to carry off Dona Rosario?"
"Would he attempt it again?"
"Yes. And this time, he says, he is certain to succeed if the conditionsare the same."
A smile of contempt played round the lips of the courtezan.
"Repeat to him this," she replied; "not only shall he receive thehundred ounces if he succeeds, but, still further, he shall have ahundred more; and that he may be in no doubt of my promise," she added,rising and taking from a drawer a rather heavy bag which she handed tothe bandit, "give him this; there is the half of the sum, but bid himdespatch!"
The man bowed.
"As to you, Juanito," she continued, "as soon as you have acquittedyourself of this mission, return, for I shall, perhaps, want you here.Begone!"
The bandit disappeared instantly.
"Who is that man?" the General asked.
"A poor devil whom I saved some years ago from certain death. He isdevoted to me, body and soul."
"Hum!" said the general, "he has rather too cunning an eye not to be arogue."
The Linda shrugged her shoulders.
"You are mistrustful of everybody," she said.
"That is the way not to be deceived."
"Or to be deceived the more easily."
"Perhaps so. Well, you see this abduction, so admirably planned, and thesuccess of which was certain, has failed."
"I can only repeat what you yourself said to me just now."
"What is that?"
"Patience! But, pray, what are your present plans?" The General rose.
"Whilst you are carrying on against our enemies," he said, in a low,stern tone, "a guerilla warfare of ambuscades and treacheries, I, on mypart, will wage an open war against them--a war in the face of the sun,but as merciless as yours. Their blood shall flow in streams over allthe territories of the Republic. The Dark-Hearts have summoned me inninety-three days. Well, I take up the gauntlet they have thrown to me."
"That is well!" the Linda replied. "And now let us so arrange our plansthat they may not fail like their predecessors. We must come to an endwith these miserable plotters, and in doing so, take a revenge that willmake an impression on others."
"It shall be a vengeance! I will stake my head on the game. Oh," headded, "I hold them! I have found the means I sought to make them allfall into my hands; let them sleep for a while in deceitful security,but their awakening shall be terrible!"
And, having saluted the Linda with the greatest courtesy, the Generalretired.
"I leave you a few soldiers to watch over your safety till the return ofyour servants," he said, as he went out.
"Thank you, thank you!" she replied, with a bland smile.
The Linda, when left alone, instead of seeking the repose so necessaryafter the excitement of the night, remained plunged in deep thought.At sunrise she was still in the same place, in the same position. Shewas still reflecting, but her features became animated; a sinistersmile curled her pale lips; and her eyes, though apparently fixed uponvacancy, emitted portentous flashes. Suddenly she sprang up, and passingher hand rapidly over her brow, as if to efface its wrinkles, she cried,in a tone of triumph--
"And I, too, will succeed!"
[1] Reasons of the highest consideration oblige us to change the namesand the portraits of the personages of this history, as the majoritystill exist. But we vouch for the correctness of the facts we relate.