Gustave Aimard
The Tiger-Slayer: A Tale of the Indian Desert

CHAPTER II
DON SYLVA DE TORRÉS

Guaymas is quite a new town, built somewhat from day to day according to the fancy of the emigrants, and hence no regular lines of streets have been maintained. However, we had better mention here that, with the exception of a few houses to which that name may be fairly given, all the rest are frightful dens, built of mud, and deplorably dirty.

In the Calle de la Merced, the principal, or to speak more truthfully, the only street in the town (for the others are only alleys), stood a one-storied house, ornamented with a balcony, and a peristyle supported by four pillars. The front was covered by a coating of lime of dazzling whiteness, and the roof was flat.

The proprietor of this house was one of the richest mineros in Sonora, and possessor of a dozen mines, all in work; he also devoted himself to cattle breeding, and owned several haciendas scattered over the province, the smallest of which was equal in size to an English county.

I am certain that, if Don Sylva de Torrés had wished to liquidate his fortune, and discover what he was really worth, it would have realised several millions.

Don Sylva had come to live in Guaymas some months back, where he ordinarily only paid flying visits, and those at lengthened intervals. This time, contrary to his usual custom, he had brought his daughter Anita with him. Hence the entire population of Guaymas was a prey to the greatest curiosity, and all eyes were fixed on Don Sylva's house, so extraordinary did the conduct of the hacendero appear.

Shut up in his house, the doors of which only opened to a few privileged persons, Don Sylva did not seem to trouble himself the least in the world about the gossips; for he was engaged in realising certain projects, whose importance prevented him noticing what was said or thought of him.

Though the Mexicans are excessively rich, and like to do honour to their wealth, they have no idea of comfort. The utmost carelessness prevails among them. Their luxury, if I may be allowed to employ the term, is brutal, without any discernment or real value.

These men, principally accustomed to the rude life of the American deserts, to struggle continually against the changes of a climate which is frequently deadly, and the unceasing aggressions of the Indians, who surround them on all sides, camp rather than live in the towns, fancying they have done everything when they have squandered gold and diamonds.

The Mexican houses are in evidence to prove the correctness of our opinion. With the exception of the inevitable European piano, which swaggers in the corner of every drawing room, you only see a few clumsy butacas, rickety tables, bad engravings hanging on the whitewashed walls, and that is all.

Don Sylva's house differed in no respect from the others; and the master's horses on returning to the stable from the watering place, had to cross the salón, all dripping as they were, and leaving manifest traces of their passage.

At the moment when we introduce the reader into Don Sylva's house, two persons, male and female, were sitting in the saloon talking, or at least exchanging a few words at long intervals.

They were Don Sylva and his daughter Anita. The crossing of the Spanish and Indian races has produced the most perfect plastic type to be found anywhere. Don Sylva, although nearly fifty years of age, did not appear to be forty. He was tall, upright, and his face, though stern, had great gentleness imprinted upon it. He wore the Mexican dress in its most rigorous exactness; but his clothes were so rich, that few of his countrymen could have equalled it, much less surpassed it.

Anita who reclined on a sofa, half buried in masses of silk and gauze, like a hummingbird concealed in the moss, was a charming girl of eighteen at the most, whose black eyes, modestly shaded by long velvety lashes, were full of voluptuous promise, which was not gainsaid by the undulating and serpentine outlines of her exquisitely modelled body. Her slightest gestures had grace and majesty completed by the ravishing smile of her coral lips. Her complexion, slightly gilded by the American sun, imparted to her face an expression impossible to render; and lastly her whole person exhaled a delicious perfume of innocence and candour which attracted sympathy and inspired love.

Like all Mexican women when at home, she merely wore a light robe of embroidered muslin; her rebozo was thrown negligently over her shoulders, and a profusion of jasmine flowers was intertwined in her bluish-black tresses. Anita seemed in deep thought. At one moment the arch of her eyebrows was contracted by some thought that annoyed her, her bosom heaved and her dainty foot, cased in a slipper lined with swan's down, impatiently tapped on the ground.

Don Sylva also appeared to be dissatisfied. After directing a severe glance at his daughter, he rose, and drawing near her, said, —

"You are mad, Anita: your behaviour is extravagant. A young, well-born girl ought not, in any case to act as you have just done."

The young Mexican girl only answered by a significant pout, and an almost imperceptible shrug of the shoulders.

Her father continued, —

"Especially," he said, laying a stress on each word, "in your position as regards the Count de Lhorailles."

The girl started as if a serpent had stung her, and fixing an interrogatory glance on the hacendero's immovable face, she replied, —

"I do not understand you, my father."

"You do not understand me, Anita? I cannot believe it. Have I not formally promised your hand to the count?"

"What matter, if I do not love him? Do you wish to condemn me to lifelong misery?"

"On the contrary, I regarded your happiness in this union. I have only you, Anita, to console me for the mournful loss of your beloved mother. Poor child! You are still, thank Heaven, at that happy age when the heart does not know itself, and when the words 'happiness, unhappiness,' have no meaning. You do not love the count, you say. All the better – your heart is free. When, at a later date, you have had occasion to appreciate the noble qualities of the man I give you as husband, you will then thank me for having insisted on a marriage, which today causes you so much vexation."

"Stay, father," the girl said with an air of vexation. "My heart is not free, and you are well aware of the fact."

"I know, Doña Anita de Torrés," the hacendero answered severely, "that a love unworthy yourself and me cannot enter your heart. Through my ancestors I am a Christiano Viejo; and if a few drops of Indian blood be mingled in my veins, what I owe to the memory of my ancestors is only the more deeply engraved on my mind. The first of our family, Antonia de Sylva, lieutenant to Hernando Cortez, married, it is true, a Mexican princess of the family of Moctecuhzoma, but all the other branches are Spanish."

"Are we not Mexicans then, my father?"

"Alas! My poor child, who can say who we are and what are we? Our unhappy country, since it shook off the Spanish yoke, has been struggling convulsively, and is exhausted by the incessant efforts of those ambitious men, who in a few years will have robbed it even of that nationality which we had so much difficulty in achieving. These disgraceful contests render us the laughing stocks of other people, and above all, cause the joy of our greedy neighbours, who with their eyes invariably fixed upon us, are preparing to enrich themselves with our spoils, of which they have pilfered some fragments already by robbing us of several of our rich provinces."

"But, father, I am a woman, and therefore unaffected by politics. I have nothing to do with the gringos."

"More than you can imagine, my child. I do not wish that at a given day the immense property my ancestors and myself have acquired by our toil should become the prey of these accursed heretics. In order to save it, I have resolved on marrying you to the Count de Lhorailles. He is a Frenchman, and belongs to one of the noblest families of that country. Besides he is a handsome and brave gentleman, scarcely thirty years of age, who combines the most precious moral qualifications with the physical qualities. He is a member of a powerful and respected nation which knows how to protect its subjects, in whatever corner of the world they may be. By marrying him your fortune is sheltered from every political reverse."

"But I do not love him, father."

"Nonsense, my dear babe. Do not talk longer of that. I am willing to forget the folly of which you were guilty a few moments back, but on condition that you forget that man, Martial."

"Never!" she exclaimed resolutely.

"Never! That is a long time, daughter. You will reflect, I am convinced. Besides, who is this man? What is his family? Do you know? He is called Martial el Tigrero. Voto a Dios, that is not a name! That man saved your life by stopping your horse when it ran away. Well, is that a reason for him to fall in love with you, and you with him? I offered him a magnificent reward, which he refused with the most supreme disdain. There is an end of it, then; let him leave me at peace. I have, and wish for, nothing more to do with him."

"I love him, father," the young girl repeated.

"Listen, Anita. You would make me angry, if I did not put a restraint on myself. Enough on that head. Prepare to receive the Count de Lhorailles in a proper manner. I have sworn that you shall be his wife, and, Cristo! It shall be so, if I have to drag you by force to the altar!"

The hacendero pronounced these words with such resolution in his voice, and with such a fierce accent, that the girl saw it would be better for her to appear to yield, and put a stop to a discussion which would only grow more embittered, and perhaps have grave consequences. She let her head fall, and was silent, while her father walked up and down the room with a very dissatisfied air.

The door was partly opened, and a peon thrust his head discreetly through the crevice.

"What do you want?" Don Sylva asked as he stopped.

"Excellency," the man replied, "a caballero, followed by four others bearing a table covered with pieces of gold, requests an audience of the señorita."

The hacendero shot a glance at his daughter full of expressiveness. Doña Anita let her head sink in confusion. Don Sylva reflected for a moment, and then his countenance cleared.

"Let him come in," he said.

The peon withdrew; but he returned in a few seconds, preceding an old acquaintance, Cucharés, still enwrapped in his ragged zarapé, and directing the four leperos who carried the table. On entering the saloon, Cucharés uncovered respectfully, courteously saluted the hacendero and his daughter, and with a sign ordered the porters to deposit the table in the centre of the apartment.

"Señorita," he said in a honied voice, "the Señor Don Martial, faithful to the pledge he had made you, humbly supplicates you to accept his gains at monte, as a feeble testimony of his devotion and admiration."

"You rascal!" Don Sylva angrily exclaimed as he took a step toward him "Do you know in whose presence you are?"

"In that of Doña Anita and her highly-respected parent," the scamp replied imperturbably, as he wrapped himself majestically in his tatters. "I have not, to my knowledge, failed in the respect I owe to both."

"Withdraw at once, and take with you this gold, which does not concern my daughter."

"Excuse me, excellency, I received orders to bring the gold here, and with your permission I will leave it. Don Martial would not forgive me if I acted otherwise."

"I do not know Don Martial, as it pleases you to style the man who sent you. I wish to have nothing in common with him."

"That is possible, excellency; but it is no affair of mine. You can have an explanation with him if you think proper. For my part, as my mission is accomplished, I kiss your hands."

And, after bowing once more to the two, the lepero went off majestically, followed by his four acolytes, with measured steps.

"See there," exclaimed Don Sylva violently, "see there, my daughter, to what insults your folly exposes me!"

"An insult, father?" she replied timidly. "On the contrary, I think that Don Martial has acted like a true caballero, and that he gives me a great proof of his love. That sum is enormous."

"Ah!" Don Sylva said wrathfully, "that is the way you take it. Well, I will act as a caballero also, voto a brios! As you shall see. Come here, someone!"

Several peons came in.

"Open the windows!"

The servants obeyed. The crowd was not yet dispersed, and a large number of persons was still collected round the house. The hacendero leant out and by a wave of his hand requested silence. The crowd was instinctively silent, and drew nearer, guessing that something in which it was interested was about to happen.

"Señores caballeros y amigos," the hacendero said in a powerful voice, "a man whom I do not know has dared to offer to my daughter the money he has won at monte. Doña Anita spurns such presents, especially when they come from a person with whom she does not wish to have any connection, friendly or otherwise. She begs me to distribute this gold among you, as she will not touch it in any way: she desires thus to prove, in the presence of you all, the contempt she feels for a man who has dared to offer her such an insult."

The speech improvised by the hacendero was drowned by the frenzied applause of the leperos and other assembled beggars, whose eyes sparkled with greed. Anita felt the burning tears swelling her eyelids. In spite of all her efforts to remain undisturbed, her heart was almost broken.

Troubling himself not at all about his daughter, Don Sylva ordered his servants to cast the ounces into the street. A shower of gold then literally began falling on the wretches, who rushed with incredible ardour on this new species of manna. The Calle de la Merced offered, at that moment, the most singular sight imaginable. The gold poured and poured on; it seemed to be inexhaustible. The beggars leaped like coyotes on the precious metal, overthrowing and trampling underfoot the weaker.

At the height of the shower a horseman came galloping up. Astonished, confounded by what he saw, he stopped for a moment to look around him; then he drove his spurs into his horse, and by dealing blows of his chicote liberally all around, he succeeded in clearing the dense crowd, and reached the hacendero's house, which he entered.

"Here is the count," Don Sylva said laconically to his daughter.

In fact, within a minute that gentleman entered the saloon.

"Halloh!" he said, stopping at the doorway, "What strange notion is this of yours, Don Sylva? On my soul, you are amusing yourself by throwing millions out of the window, to the still greater amusement of the leperos and other rogues of the same genus!"

"Ah, 'tis you, señor Conde," the hacendero replied calmly; "you are welcome. I shall be with you in an instant. Only these few handfuls, and it will be finished."

"Don't hurry yourself," the count said with a laugh. "I confess that the fancy is original;" and drawing near the young lady, whom he saluted with exquisite politeness, he continued, —

"Would you deign, Señorita, to give me the word of this enigma, which, I confess, interests me in the highest degree?"

"Ask my father, Señor," she answered with a certain dryness, which rendered conversation impossible.

The count feigned not to notice this rebuff; he bowed with a smile, and falling into a butaca, said coolly, —

"I will wait; I am in no hurry."

The hacendero, in telling his daughter that the gentleman he intended for her husband was a handsome man, had in no respect flattered him. Count Maxime Gaëtan de Lhorailles was a man of thirty at the most, well built and active, and slightly above the middle height. His light hair allowed him to be recognised as a son of the north; his features were fine, his glance expressive, and his hands and feet denoted race. Everything about him indicated the gentleman of an old stock; and if Don Sylva was not more deceived about the moral qualities than he had been about the physical, Count de Lhorailles was really a perfect gentleman.

At length the hacendero exhausted all the gold Cucharés had brought: he then hurled the table into the street, ordered the windows to be closed, and came back to take a seat by the side of the count, rubbing his hands.

"There," he said with a joyous air, "that's finished. Now I am quite at your service."

"First one word."

"Say it."

"Excuse me. You are aware that I am a stranger, and such as thirsting for instruction."

"I am listening to you."

"Since I have lived in Mexico I have seen many extraordinary customs. I ought to be blasé about novelties; still, I must confess that what I have just seen surpasses anything I have hitherto witnessed. I should like to be certain whether this is a custom of which I was hitherto ignorant."

"What are you talking about?"

"Why, what you were doing when I arrived – that gold you were dropping like a beneficent dew on the bandits of every description collected before your house; ill weeds, between ourselves, to be thus bedewed."

Don Sylva burst into a laugh.

"No, that is not a custom of ours," he replied.

"Very good. Then, you were indulging in the regal pastime of throwing a million to the scum. Plague! Don Sylva, a man must be as rich as yourself to allow such a gratification."

"Things are not as you fancy."

"Still I saw it raining ounces."

"True, but they did not belong to me."

"Better and better still. That renders the affair more complicated; you heighten my curiosity immensely."

"I will satisfy it."

"I am all attention, for the affair is growing as interesting to me as a story in the 'Arabian Nights.'"

"H'm!" the hacendero said, tossing his head, "It interests you more than you perhaps suspect."

"How so?"

"You shall judge."

Doña Anita was in torture; she knew not what to do. Seeing that her father was about to divulge all to the count, she did not feel in herself the courage to be present at such a revelation, and rose tottering.

"Gentlemen," she said in a feeble voice, "I feel indisposed; be kind enough to allow me to retire."

"Really," the count said, as he hurried towards her, and offered her his arm to support her, "you are pale, Doña Anita. Allow me to accompany you to your apartment."

"I thank you, caballero, but I am strong enough to proceed there alone, and, while duly grateful for your offer, pray permit me to decline it."

"As you please, señorita," the count replied, inwardly piqued by this refusal.

Don Sylva entertained for a moment the idea of ordering his daughter to remain; but the poor girl turned towards him so despairing a glance that he did not feel the courage to impose on her a longer torture.

"Go my child," he said to her.

Anita hastened to take advantage of the permission; she left the salón, and sought refuge in her bedroom, where she sank into a chair, and burst into tears.

"What is the matter with Doña Anita?" the count asked with sympathy, so soon as she had gone.

"Vapours – headache – what do I know?" the hacendero replied, shrugging his shoulders. "All young girls are like that. In a few minutes she will have forgotten it."

"All the better. I confess to you that I was alarmed."

"But now that we are alone, would you not like me to give you the explanation of the enigma which appeared to interest you so much?"

"On the contrary, speak without further delay: for, on my part, I have several important matters to impart to you."

CHAPTER III
THE TWO HUNTERS

About five miles from the town is the village of San José de Guaymas, commonly known as the Rancho.

This miserable pueblo is merely composed of a square of moderate size, intersected at right angles by tumbledown cabins, which are inhabited by Hiaqui Indians (a large number of whom hire themselves out annually at Guaymas to work as porters, carpenters, masons, &c), and all those nameless adventurers who have thronged to the shores of the Pacific since the discovery of the Californian plains.

The road from Guaymas to San José runs through a parched and sandy plain, on which only a few nopales and stunted cactuses grow, whose withered branches are covered with dust, and produce the effect of white phantoms at night.

The evening of the day on which our story commences, a horseman, folded to the eyes in a zarapé, was following this road, and proceeding in a gallop to the Rancho.

The sky, of a dark azure, was studded with glistening stars; the moon, which had traversed one-third of her course, illumined the silent plain, and indefinitely prolonged the tall shadows of the trees on the naked earth.

The horseman, doubtlessly anxious to reach the end of a journey which was not without peril at this advanced hour, incessantly urged on with spur and voice his horse, which did not, however, appear to need this constantly-renewed encouragement.

He had all but crossed the immense uncultivated plains, and was just entering the woods which surround the Rancho, when his horse suddenly leaped on one side, and pricked up its ears in alarm. A sharp sound announced that the horseman had cocked his pistols; and, when this precaution had been taken against all risk, he turned an inquiring glance around.

"Fear nothing, caballero," a frank and sympathetic voice exclaimed; "but have the kindness to go a little farther to the right, if it makes no difference to you."

The stranger looked, and saw a man kneeling under his steed's feet, and holding in his hands the head of a horse, which was lying nearly across the road.

"What on earth are you doing there?" he asked.

"You can see," the other replied sorrowfully, "I am bidding good-by to my poor companion. A man must have lived a long time in the desert to appreciate the value of such a friend as he was."

"That is true," the stranger remarked, and immediately dismounting, added, "Is he dead then?"

"No, not yet; but, unfortunately, he is as bad as if he were."

With these words he sighed.

The stranger bent over the animal, whose body was agitated by a nervous quivering, opened its eyelids, and regarded it attentively.

"Your horse has had a stroke," he said a moment later. "Let me act."

"Oh!" the other exclaimed, "do you think you can save him?"

"I hope so," the first speaker laconically observed.

"Caray! If you do that, we shall be friends for life. Poor Negro! My old comrade!"

The horseman bathed the animal's temples and nostrils with rum and water. At the end of a few moments, the horse appeared slightly recovered, his faded eyes began to sparkle again, and he tried to rise.

"Hold him tight," the improvised surgeon said.

"Be quiet, then, my good beast. Come, Negro, my boy, quieto, quieto; it is for your good," he said soothingly.

The intelligent animal seemed to understand. It turned its head towards its master, and answered him with a plaintive neigh. The horseman, during this period, had been feeling in his girdle; and bending again over the horse, —

"Mind and hold him tightly," he again recommended.

"What are you going to do?"

"Bleed him."

"Yes, that is it. I knew it; but unfortunately I did not dare risk doing it myself, through fear of killing the horse."

"All right?"

"Go on."

The horse made a hasty move, caused by the coldness of the wound; but its master held it down and checked its struggles. The two men suffered a moment of anxiety: the blood did not issue. At last a black drop appeared in the wound, then a second, speedily followed by a long jet of black and foaming blood.

"He is saved," the stranger said, as he wiped his lancet and returned it to his fob.

"I will repay you this, on the word of Belhumeur!" the owner of the horse said with much emotion. "You have rendered me one of those services which are never forgotten."

And, by an irresistible impulse, he held out his hand to the man who had so providentially crossed his path. The latter warmly returned the vigorous pressure. Henceforth all was arranged between them. These two men who a few moments previously were ignorant of each other's existence, were friends, attached by one of those services which in American countries possess an immense value.

The blood gradually lost its black tinge; it became vermillion, and flowed abundantly. The breathing of the panting steed had grown easy and regular. The first stranger made a copious bleeding, and when he considered the horse in a fair way of recovery he stopped the effusion.

"And now," he said, "what do you propose doing?"

"My faith, I don't know. Your help has been so useful to me that I should like to follow your advice."

"Where were you going when this accident occurred?"

"To the Rancho."

"I am going there too. We are only a few yards from it. You will get up behind me. We will lead your horse, and start when you please."

"I ask nothing better. You believe that my horse cannot carry me?"

"Perhaps he could do so, for he is a noble animal; but it would be imprudent, and you would run a risk of killing him. It would be better, believe me, to act as I suggested."

"Yes; but I am afraid – "

"What of?" the other sharply interrupted him. "Are we not friends?"

"That is true. I accept."

The horse sprang up somewhat actively, and the two men who had met so strangely started at once, mounted on one horse. Twenty minutes later they reached the first buildings of the Rancho. At the entrance of the village the owner of the horse stopped, and turning to his companion, said, —

"Where will you get down?"

"That is all the same to me; let us go first where you are going."

"Ah!" the horseman said, scratching his head, "the fact is, I am going nowhere in particular."

"What do you mean?"

"Oh! You will understand me in two words. I landed today at Guaymas; the Rancho is only the first station of a journey I meditate in the desert, and which will probably last a long time."

By the moonlight, a ray of which now played on the stranger's face, his companion attentively regarded his noble and pensive countenance, on which grief had already cut deep furrows.

"So that," he at length said, "any lodging will suit you?"

"A night is soon spent. I only ask a shelter for horse and self."

"Well, if you will permit me to act in my turn as guide, you shall have that within ten minutes."

"Agreed."

"I do not promise you a palace, but I will take you to a pulquería, where I am accustomed to put up when accident brings me to these parts. You will find the society rather mixed, but what would you have? And, as you said yourself, a night is soon spent."

"In Heaven's name, then, proceed."

Then, passing his arm through that of his comrade, the new guide seized the horse's reins, and steered to a house standing about two-thirds of the way down the street where they were, whose badly fitting windows gleamed in the night like the stoke holes of a furnace, while cries, laughter, songs, and the shrill sound of the jarabes, indicated that, if the rest of the pueblo were plunged in sleep, there, at least, people were awake.

The two strangers stopped before the door of this pothouse.

"Have you quite made up your mind?" the first said.

"Perfectly," the other answered.

The guide then rapped furiously at the worm-eaten door. It was long ere anyone answered. At length a hoarse voice shouted from inside, while the greatest silence succeeded, as if by enchantment, the noise that had hitherto prevailed.

"¿Quíen vive?"

"Gente de paz," the stranger replied.

"Hum!" the voice went on, "That is not a name. What sort of weather is it?"

"One for all – all for one. The cormuel is strong enough to blow the horns off the oxen on the top of the Cerro del Huérfano."

The door was immediately opened, and the strangers entered. At first they could distinguish nothing through the thick and smoky atmosphere of the room, and walked hap-hazard. The companion of the first horseman was well known in this den; for the master of the house and several other persons eagerly collected round him.

"Caballeros," he said, pointing to the person who followed him, "this señor is my friend, and I must request your kindness for him."

"He shall be treated like yourself, Belhumeur," the host replied. "Your horses have been led to the corral, where a truss of alfalfa has been put before them. As for yourselves, the house belongs to you, and you can dispose of it as you please."

During this exchange of compliments the strangers had contrived to find their way through the crowd. They crossed the room, and sat down in a corner before a table on which the host himself placed pulque, mezcal, chinguirito, Catalonian refino, and sherry.

"Caramba, Señor Huesped!" the man whom we had heard called frequently Belhumeur, said with a laugh, "You are generous today."

"Do you not see that I have an angelito?" the other answered gravely.

"What, your son Pedrito – ?"

"Is dead. I am trying to give my friends a cordial welcome, in order the better to feast the entrance into heaven of my poor boy, who, having never sinned, is an angel by the side of God."

"That's very proper," Belhumeur said, hobnobbing with the rather stoical parent.

The latter emptied his glass of refino at a draught, and withdrew. The strangers, by this time accustomed to the atmosphere in which they found themselves, began to look around them. The room of the pulquería offered them a most singular sight.

In the centre some ten individuals, with faces enough to hang them, covered with rags, and armed to the teeth, were furiously playing at monte. It was a strange fact, but one which did not appear to astonish any of the honourable gamblers that a long dagger was stuck in the table to the right of the banker, and two pistols lay on his left. A few steps further on, men and women, more than half intoxicated, were dancing and singing, with lubricious gestures and mad shouts, to the shrill sounds of two or three vihuelas and jarabes. In a corner of the room thirty people were assembled round a table, on which a child, four years of age at the most, was seated in a wicker chair. This child presided over the meeting. He was dressed in his best clothes, had a crown of flowers on his head, and a profusion of nosegays was piled up on the table all round him.