"Meanwhile the gathering clouds obscure the skies,
From pole to pole the forky lightning flies,
The rattling thunders roll, and Juno pours
A wintry deluge down and sounding showers;
The company dispersed to coverts ride,
And seek the homely cots or mountain side."
Ãneis iv.
From this long and dreamless sleep Quentin Kennedy started and awoke next morning, but not betimes, as the sun's altitude, when shining on the whitewashed walls of the posada, informed him. He sprang up and proceeded to make a hasty toilet.
"Breakfast, a guide, and then to be gone!" thought he, joyfully.
On issuing from his scantily-furnished chamber into the large room of the posada, or rather what was once the posada, he found a number of the guerillas busy making up ball-cartridges. Heaps of loose powder lay on the oak table, and the nonchalant makers were smoking their cigars over it as coolly as if it were only brickdust or oatmeal.
The guitar that hung by its broad scarlet riband from a peg on the wall, brought to memory all the episodes of last night, and Quentin sighed when reflecting that a girl so lovely as its owner should be lost among such society, for to him, those patriot volunteers of his Majesty Ferdinand VII. had very much the air and aspect of banditti.
He looked forth from the open windows into the street of the puebla; the morning was a lovely one. The unclouded sun shone joyously on the bright green mountain sides, while a pleasant breeze shook the autumnal foliage of the woods, and tossed the large and now yellow leaves of the ancient vines that covered all the walls of the old posada, growing in at each door and opening; but Quentin could not repress a shudder when he saw the four large graves at the foot of the archway, for the faces and forms of the poor victims came before his eye in fancy with painful distinctness—the rigid figure of the grey-haired captain, the other officer who wept for his wife and children, the conscript whom they named Louis—the manly and unflinching courage of all!
Baltasar de Saldos twisted up his enormous whiskerando-like moustaches, and smiled grimly as only a taciturn Spaniard can smile, when he perceived this, as he conceived it to be, childish emotion of his guest.
"The ladies await us, senor," said Baltasar; and Quentin, on turning, found the dark and deeply-lashed eyes of Isidora bent on his, as she smilingly presented her plump little hand to be kissed, and then the same party who had met last night again seated themselves at table, and a slight breakfast of thick chocolate, eggs, and white bread, was rapidly discussed. As soon as it was over, the brilliant young donna and the withered old one withdrew, bidding Quentin farewell, and adding that as he was to depart so soon, they should see him no more.
Quentin, with a heart full of pleasure, belted on his sabre and assumed his forage cap; he also drew the charges of his pistols and loaded them anew.
"And now, Don Baltasar, with a thousand thanks for your kindness, I shall take my departure," said he. "But how about a guide to avoid the main road, and escape the enemy's patrols?"
"As we are so soon to leave this, and commence active and desperate operations, the end or extent of which none of us can foresee, the Padre Trevino, who is the very model and mirror of sons, has decided on sending that excellent lady his mother (a slight smile spread over the Spaniard's sombre visage as he spoke) across the frontier for safety. She goes to the convent of Engracia, at Portalegre; and, as she knows the whole country hereabouts as if it were her own inheritance, she shall be your guide."
"She—Donna Trevino?" exclaimed Quentin, who was by no means enchanted by the offer of such an encumbrance.
"Si, senor. You will be sure to take great care of her."
"But—but, Don Baltasar, that old dame! (devil he had nearly said)—why not send one of your band?"
"I cannot spare a single man. Spain will need them all. The senora is very deaf and old, you need scarcely ever address her, and, as she is taciturn, she will not incommode you. Besides our Spanish mistrust of strangers, she has—excuse me, senor—a horror of all who are beyond the pale of the Church."
"But, senor," urged poor Quentin, "to travel for two or three days with a deaf old lady!"
"What are you speaking of, senor? We are only a little more than thirty miles from Portalegre as a bird flies. You lost your way, and rambled sadly in coming here; but I shall mount her on a mule, and you on a horse, and you may easily be there, even though proceeding by the most steep and devious route, before the sun sets."
"To-night!"
"Exactly. There is, as you are aware, a vast difference in travelling on horseback with a guide, and a-foot, in a strange country, without one."
"I thank you, senor," said Quentin, considerably relieved, "and shall commit myself to the guidance of the old lady, though I fear that she views me with no favourable eye."
"Here come your cattle."
"A noble horse, by Jove!"
"I have filled your canteen with aguardiente."
"Thanks, senor."
"I know that you Inglesos can neither march nor fight, as we Spaniards do, on mere cold water, with the whiff of a cigar."
They were now at the door of the posada, where a group of dark, idle, slouching, and somewhat villanous-looking guerillas were loitering, to witness the departure.
"Ah, if these fellows only knew that my pockets were so well lined with moidores!" thought Quentin.
Lazarillo held the horse (which had evidently been a French cavalry charger) and the mule by their bridles. The former had a fine switch tail, which was now tied or doubled up in the Spanish fashion, as he had to perform a journey. The latter was a tall, sleek, and handsome animal, whose figure indicated great speed and strength.
The saddles were Moorish (the fashion still in Spain), made with high peak and croup behind; the stirrup-irons were triangular boxes, and the bridles, bridoons, and cruppers, with their brass bosses, scarlet fringes, tassels, and trumpery ornaments, closely resembled the harness of the circus.
At the pommel of the horse's saddle, hung a leather bottle of wine, and behind was a handsome alforja, or travelling bag, ornamented with an infinity of tassels, and containing bread, sausages, a boiled fowl, and other edibles to be consumed on the journey. Nothing was forgotten, and as Quentin mounted his horse, the old lady was led forth by Trevino, who, with Baltasar's assistance, lifted her into the mule's saddle.
The venerable donna was muffled up in a large loose garment of striped stuff, purple and white; it covered her from head to foot, and but for her thick veil, which entirely concealed her withered visage, she might have passed for an old Bedouin in a burnous.
"Senor, this lady is one in whom I am so deeply interested," said Trevino, with the keen, fierce, and impressive glance peculiar to him, and with a hand, by force of habit, perhaps, on his knife; "I say, one in whom I am so deeply interested, that I trust to your care and honour in seeing her, without hindrance or delay, safe to Portalegre."
"I shall see her safe to the gate of the Engracia convent," said Quentin; "and how about returning the cattle, Don Baltasar?"
"Leave them there, too—my free gift to the convent. And now, adios," said he, with a low bow; "doubtless we shall meet again when the army is in motion."
"I hope not," muttered Quentin. "Adios, senores."
A few minutes more and they had left the puebla, with its lawless garrison, its cannon, and earthen bastions, on which the scarlet and yellow ensign of Castile and Leon was waving, far behind them, and were riding at a rapid trot down the green mountain path which Quentin had travelled alone last night.
Soon he saw the place where the road branched off to Valencia, and where he had parted from Ribeaupierre; and, ere long, he passed the dead horse, already torn and disembowelled by the wolves or the wandering dogs which infested all the wild parts of Estremadura.
How changed were the scene, the circumstances, and the companionship since he had last been in the saddle, cantering along the road to Maybole, escorting Flora Warrender!
Leaving this path, and striking off to the left, Donna Ximena, to whose guidance he silently and implicitly committed himself, and who rode a little way in front, managing her mule with ease, and, considering her years, with undoubted grace, conducted him up a steep and narrow track that led into the wildest part of the mountains, where the summits of slaty granite were already beginning to be powdered by frost and snow in the early hours of morning, and where the valleys, which the industry of the Moors made gardens that teemed with fertility and beauty, are now desert wastes, abounding only in rank pasturage.
Their cattle soon became blown, and, as the pleasant breeze that fanned the foliage in the forenoon, had already died away, and been succeeded by an oppressive and sultry closeness, they proceeded slowly, and now Quentin thought he might venture to converse a little with his silent companion, for the monotony of travelling thus became tiresome in the extreme.
"Donna Ximena," said he, as their nags walked slowly up the mountain path. "Donna Ximena!" he repeated, in a louder key, before she said, without turning her head—
"Well, senor?"
"It surprises me much that Don Baltasar permits a girl so lovely as his sister to reside among those dangerous guerillas."
To this remark the haughty old lady made no response, so, raising his voice, he added—
"He may now be without a home to leave her in; but, certainly, Isidora is, without exception, the most beautiful and winning girl I ever saw—in her own style, at least," he concluded, as he thought of Flora Warrender.
He had to shout this remark at the utmost pitch of his voice before the old lady replied, with a gloved hand at her right ear,—
"Yes, senor—she put a large and beautiful sausage into the alforja."
"Bother the old frump!" said Quentin; then shouting louder still, he added, "Your head, senora, is so muffled in that mantle and veil, that it is quite impossible you can hear me."
"Were you speaking, senor?"
"The devil! I should think so—yes!"
"Speak louder."
"I cannot possibly speak louder, senora; but I was remarking the danger that might accrue to a girl of such wonderful beauty as Donna Isidora among the companions of her brother."
"It is Valdepenas, senor."
"What is Valdepenas?"
"The wine in the bota—taste it if you wish—I filled it for you."
Quentin relinquished in despair any further attempt to make himself heard or understood, and for some miles they proceeded, as before, in total silence, while the gathering of the clouds betokened a storm, and Quentin was certain he heard thunder at a distance; but a few minutes after, the sound proved to be that of a brass drum reverberating between the mountain slopes! As these drums were then used by the French alone, he instinctively reined up, and his silent guide, to whom he did not deem it worth while to communicate his alarm, did so too.
"Ah—you heard that, my venerable friend," said he aloud.
The sound now became continuous and steady, and his horse, an old trooper we have said, snorted and pricked up his ears intelligently. It was the regular but monotonous beating of a single drummer, who was timing the quickstep for the troops in the old fashion still retained by the French, when on the line of march, as it proves an excellent method, in lieu of other music, for getting soldiers rapidly on.
Desirous of reconnoitring, Quentin somewhat unceremoniously pushed his horse past the mule of his fair, but exceedingly tiresome companion, and dismounting, led it forward by the bridle.
The path, rugged and narrow, here went right over the steep crest of a hill between some volcanic rocks that were covered with dark-green clumps of the Portuguese laurel and wild olive tree; and from thence it dipped abruptly down into a little green valley where stood a farm house in ruins.
There by the wayside was a human skull, white and bleached, stuck upon the summit of a pole, the grim memorial of some act of retributive justice for murder and robbery.
Proceeding slowly and listening intently as he went, for the sound of the drum was coming every moment nearer, Quentin peeped over the eminence and found himself almost face to face with the first section of the advanced guard of a French regiment of infantry; they were scarcely a hundred yards distant, and were toiling up the steep ascent.
In heavy marching order, with their blankets and blue great-coats rolled, they were clad in long white tunics of coarse linen, with large red epaulettes, high bearskin caps, each with a scarlet plume on the left side; the legs of their scarlet trousers were rolled up above the ankles; all had their muskets slung, and they were chatting, laughing, smoking, and marching, some with their hands in their pockets, and others arm-in-arm, in that slouching and free manner peculiar to all troops when "marching at ease," but more especially to the French.
On seeing the alarming sight, Quentin leaped on his horse, and cried—
"Away, Donna Ximena for your life—here are a body of the enemy—we shall be either shot or taken prisoners!"
And very ungallantly caring little whether his venerable friend, the mother of the worthy Trevino, fell into the hands of the French, provided that he escaped them, Quentin goaded the sides of his horse with his Spanish stirrup-irons, and lashed its flanks with a switch which he had torn from an olive tree.
It sprung off with a wild bound; the lady's mule also struck out, and away they went headlong down the mountain side together at a break-neck pace, followed by shouts from the French, the first section of whom were now on the crest of the eminence, and who unslung their muskets and opened a fire upon them.
Every shot rung with a hundred reverberations between the mountain peaks; Quentin, however, never looked back, but rode recklessly and breathlessly on, thinking as the old lady scoured after him on her mule, and as he lashed his horse without mercy, that he somewhat resembled Tam o' Shanter pursued by Cuttie Sark.
There was no contingency of war of which he had a greater horror than that of becoming a prisoner. If taken by the enemy, years might pass on and still find him in their hands, and when released or exchanged, he would be little better than a private soldier—not so good, in fact. His time for promotion would be irrevocably past, and all the stories he had heard of the sufferings to which the French Republican and Imperial officers subjected our troops when prisoners in the impregnable citadel of Bitche, the fortress of Verdun, and elsewhere, crowded on his mind, with a consciousness of the beggared and hopeless life to which the event might ultimately consign him, even if he survived the captivity, which, in his restless and irritable horror of all restraint, he very much doubted.
Fortunately for him the long-barrelled muskets of the French infantry were very dissimilar to Enfield rifles in the precision of their fire; thus, he and his companion were soon beyond all range, and an opaque vapour, alternating between purple and brown in its tint, that descended on the mountains, while a storm of blinding rain and bellowing wind broke forth, put an end to all chance of pursuit; but they rode on fully ten miles without knowing in what direction, when the fury of the storm compelled them to take refuge in a thicket.
Dismounting, Quentin was too breathless and blown to attempt to outbellow the wind in making excuses to old Donna Ximena; he simply lifted that good lady off her mule, and conducted her under the stately chestnut trees, which gave them shelter. He then unslung the bota and the alforja from his crusader-like demipique, and was proceeding to secure the bridles of their nags to a branch, when there burst a shriek from his companion, with the exclamation—
"Madre divina! O Madre de Dios!"
At that instant there shot forth a terrific glare which seemed to envelop them, and to fill the whole thicket with dazzling light, showing every knot and twisted branch, and every gnarled stem.
Then there was a tremendous crash, as a thunderbolt ground a giant chestnut to pieces, literally splitting its solid trunk from top to bottom; next rang the roar of the thunder peal as it rolled away over the vapour-hidden mountain peaks, leaving the dense and murky air full of sulphurous heat and odour.
Stunned by the torrent of sound, and half blinded by the lurid glare, more than a minute elapsed before Quentin discovered that, startled alike by the flash and the thunder-clap, the horse and mule had torn their bridles from his hands and galloped madly away, he knew not whither.
Even the faintest sound of their hoofs could no longer be heard amid the ceaseless hiss of the descending rain, every drop of which was nearly the size of a walnut; so now, there were he and old Donna Ximena (who crept closer to him than he cared for) left a-foot he knew not where, in that gloomy thicket, evening coming on and night to follow, a storm raging, and the French in motion in the neighbourhood!
"Here's a devil of a mess!" sighed poor Quentin.