CHAPTER XXXVI.
THE LION AT BAY.
"My God!" said the General, "am I the dupe of an hallucination?"
"Ah! ah!" the King of Darkness exclaimed, with an ironical smile, "yourecognize me then, General?"
"Don Tadeo de Leon!" Don Pancho cried, in horror. "Do the dead thenarise from the tomb? Oh! I hoped that what I heard was false. It is you!"
"Yes," Don Tadeo replied, in a stern voice, "you are not mistaken, DonPancho; I am Don Tadeo de Leon, whom you caused to be shot upon thePlaza Mayor of Santiago. Your spies have informed you correctly."
"Man or demon," the General shouted, half choking with rage, "I will notyield to you! I will fight you as a man, and send you back again to thehell from which you have escaped!"
His enemy smiled disdainfully.
"Your hour has arrived, Don Pancho," he said; "you are due to thejustice of the Dark-Hearts."
"You do not hold me yet, wretched traitor! If I cannot conquer, I candie, weapon in hand, like a soldier."
"No, your hour has struck, I tell you; you are ours, you shall die, butnot the death of a soldier; you shall be executed by our justice!"
"If that be the case," the General yelled, brandishing his sword, "comeand take me!"
Don Tadeo did not deign a reply; he gave a signal, and a lasso whizzedthrough the air, launched by an invisible hand, and fell round theGeneral's shoulders. Astonished by this unexpected attack, before hecould make the least possible resistance, he received a terrific shock,lost his stirrups, was pulled from his horse, and dragged amongstthe insurgents. The astounded General, half mad with rage and shame,exhausted himself in vain efforts; nearly strangled by the lasso whichflayed his neck, his face assumed a purple tint; his eyes, injected withblood, seemed starting from their sockets, and a white foam flowed fromthe corners of his discoloured lips. Don Tadeo contemplated him for amoment with a mixture of pity and triumph.
"Free him from that slipknot," he said. "Secure his person, but treathim with respect."
The soldiers, terrified at this prompt capture, which they had not atall expected, stood downcast and silent; in their stupor forgetting eventhe use of their arms. Don Tadeo turned towards them:
"Surrender," he shouted, "surrender! the man who misled you is in ourpower; your lives shall be spared."
The soldiers consulted each other for an instant with their eyes; andthen, as if by a spontaneous movement, they threw down their muskets,crying aloud:
"Chili! Chili! liberty! liberty!"
"That is well!" said Don Tadeo; "leave the city, encamp at the distanceof a mile, and await the orders which shall soon be transmitted to you."
The conquered soldiers, with downcast looks, followed the road they hadtraversed an hour before; they passed through the silent ranks of theinsurgents, which opened to give them passage. Without loss of time,Don Tadeo, followed by a crowd of his partisans, directed his coursetowards the Plaza Mayor, where the battle still raged. The soldiers,solidly intrenched in the Plaza, and masters of the cabildo, foughtvaliantly, hoping still for the assistance of General Bustamente, ofwhose fate they were ignorant. Although reduced to a small number, thesetroops occupied a formidable position, in which it was almost impossibleto force them, without resolving to suffer great loss. Persuaded thatthey only required to gain time, the soldiers fought with the energy ofdespair, defending inch by inch the barricade behind which they weresheltered.
But the day was passing away, their ammunition was growing exhausted, agreat number of their comrades were stretched dead at their feet, andnothing could support them but the hope that the succour so impatientlyexpected was at hand. In the heat of their own contest they had notheard the noise of the battle fought by Don Pancho at the city gates, inwhich but few shots had been fired, as it had been principally decidedby cold steel. Discouragement, however, began to affect the bravest,the general who commanded even felt his energy diminish, and he lookedaround him with great anxiety.
Dejected, and with downcast eyes, the senator, who had been the bearerof the fatal proclamation, trembled in all his limbs; he regretted,but too late, having thrown himself into this hornet's nest; and heoffered up the most magnificent vows to the innumerable saints of thegolden Spanish legend, if they would bring him safe and sound throughthe perils which surrounded him. The worthy man had not any warlikeinstincts; and we can safely affirm, without fear of contradiction, thatif he had had the slightest suspicion that things would have taken theturn they did, he would have remained quiet in his charming quinta ofCorro-Azul, in the environs of Santiago, where his life glided away sosoftly, so happily, and, above all, so free from care. Unfortunately,as it sometimes happens in this nether world, where, whatever Candidemay say, everything is not for the best, in the best of worlds, DonRamon Sandias--so the worthy senator was named--had not been able dulyto appreciate the charms of that calm life; ambition had gnawed at hisheart, though he had nothing to wish for; and he had, as we have seen,plunged up to the neck in a hornet's nest, from which he did not knowhow to emerge.
At every shot he heard, the poor senator jumped like a Guanaco, withstartled eyes; and when, now and then, in spite of the precautions hehad taken, the sinister hissing of a bullet resounded in his ear, hethrew himself flat on his face, murmuring all the prayers that histroubled memory could recall.
At first, the contortions and cries of Don Ramon had very much amusedthe officers and soldiers among whom accident had placed him; they hadeven taken delight in augmenting his terrors; but, at length, as happensmore frequently in such cases than people fancy, the pleasantries hadceased; Don Ramon's terrors had communicated themselves to the laughers,who saw, with fright, that their position was becoming every minute moredesperate.
"The devil take the poltroon!" the General at length cried, angrily;"cannot you keep your trembling limbs still? Caspita! console yourself,they won't kill you more than once."
"Ah! that is very easy for you to say," the senator replied, in a brokenvoice; "I am no soldier; it is your trade to be killed, it is all one toyou."
"Hum!" said the General, "not quite so much so as you may think; butcomfort yourself; if this goes on a little longer, we shall all gotogether."
"What is that you say?" the poor man muttered, with redoubled fear.
"Caramba! it is clear as day, if Don Pancho does not make haste andcome, all of us here will die."
"But I do not wish to die!" said the senator, bursting into tears; "Iam no soldier. Oh! I implore you, my good, my inestimable Don TiburcioCornejo, let me go away!"
The General shrugged his shoulders.
"What consequence can it be to you?" the senator continued, in asupplicating tone; "do save my life! show me which way I can get out ofthis cursed confusion."
"Eh! how the devil do I know?"' the General said, impatiently.
"Well, now, look here," said the senator; "you owe me two thousandpiastres, which I won of you at Monte, do you not?"
"What then?" the General, vexed at this ill-timed remark, said, sharply.
"Get me away from here, and I will cry quits."
"You are a fool, Don Ramon; do you think if I could get safely away fromhere, that I would remain?"
"I see what you are," said the senator, despondingly; "you are but afalse friend, you desire my death, you thirst for my blood."
In short, the poor man was almost mad; he knew not what he said,terror had deprived him of the little sense he ever possessed. But, inreality, the position became every instant more critical; the carnagewas horrible, the soldiers fell one after another beneath the bulletsof the insurgents, who were sheltered by every corner of the plaza. Twoor three sorties attempted by the troops had been vigorously repulsed;and hence, decimated as they were, all they could possibly do now was toprevent their intrenchments from being carried.
All at once the senator bounded forward like a chamois; he made directlyto the General, and seized his arm.
"We are saved!" he cried; "thanks be to God! we are saved!"
"Hilloh! what's the matter now, Don Ramon? What bee has stung you? areyou really mad?"
"I have not been stung," the senator replied, as fast as he could speak,"nor am I mad; we are saved; I tell you, we are saved!"
"Well, how? what is it? Is Don Pancho coming at last?"
"Don Pancho, indeed! I wish he were at the devil!" "Well, what is it,then?"
"Why, do you not see, yonder? look, behind the barricade which blocksthe entrance of the Calle de la Merced."
"What is there to see?"
"Why, a flag of truce! a white flag!"
"Ah!" said the General, eagerly, "let us look! let us look!"
And he did look.
"True!" he said, at the expiration of a minute. "Success to all cowards,say I, for having good eyes; I did not see it."
"Ay, but I did," said Don Ramon, rubbing his hands, quite revived, andmarching off with great glee. But, at that moment, a nearly spent ballcame ricocheting and whizzing close to his ear.
"Lord, have mercy upon me!" he cried, falling flat on his face, andso remaining, as motionless as if he were dead, although he had notreceived a scratch.
In the meantime, the General had likewise caused a flag of truce to behoisted on his intrenchments, and had given orders for the firing tocease. The noise of the combat being hushed, the senator, like a rabbitrelieved from alarm, raised his head a little; reassured by the silencewhich prevailed, he sat up, looking on all sides with the greatestanxiety, and, at length, convinced that the peril was over, he contrivedto get upon his legs, which, however, trembled so frightfully under him,that they could scarcely support him.