The Pearl of the Andes: A Tale of Love and Adventure. Gustave AimardЧитать онлайн книгу.
But Antinahuel had fallen into a snare, from which it was impossible for him to extricate himself.
"Good!" he said, smiling; "let my sister be satisfied. I swear upon the bones of my father that I will not oppose her in anything she may please to do."
"Thank you," the Linda answered; "my brother is a great warrior."
Antinahuel had no other plausible pretext for remaining: he slowly, and, as if regretfully, rejoined his mosotones, got into his saddle, and set off, darting at the Linda a last glance, that would have congealed her with fear if she had seen it.
"Poor puling creature!" she said. "Don Tadeo, it is you I wound in torturing your leman! Shall I at length force you to restore to me my daughter?"
The Indian peons attached to her service had remained with her. In the heat of the pursuit the horses, abandoned by Curumilla and brought back by the scouts, had remained with the troop.
"Bring hither one of those horses!" she commanded.
The courtesan had the poor girl placed across one of the horses, with her face towards the sky; then she ordered that the feet and hands of her victim should be brought under the belly of the animal and solidly fastened with cords by the ankles and wrists.
"The woman is not firm upon her legs," she said, with a dry, nervous laugh.
The poor girl gave scarcely any signs of life; her countenance had an earthy, cadaverous hue, and the blood flowed copiously. Her body, horribly cramped by the frightful posture in which she was tied, had nervous starts, and dreadfully hurt her wrists and ankles, into which the cords began to enter. A hollow rattle escaped from her oppressed chest.
CHAPTER V.
AN INDIAN'S LOVE
The Linda rejoined Antinahuel, who, knowing what torture she was preparing to inflict on the young girl, had stopped at a short distance from the spot where he had left her.
When they reached the toldería, the horsemen dismounted and the maiden was untied and transported, half dead, into the same cuarto where, an hour before, she had, for the first time, found herself in the presence of the courtesan.
The appearance of Rosario was really frightful, and would have excited pity in anybody but the tigress whose delight it was to treat her so cruelly. Her long hair hung in loose disorder upon her half-naked shoulders, and at various spots adhered to her face through the blood which had flowed from her wound; her face, soiled with blood and dirt, wore a greenish cast, and her half-closed lips showed that her teeth were tightly clenched. Her wrists and ankles, to which still hung strips of the thick cord by which she had been fastened to the horse, were frightfully bruised and discoloured. Her delicate frame was convulsed with nervous quiverings, and her faint breathing painfully issued from her heaving chest.
"Poor girl!" the chief murmured.
"Why, chief!" said the Linda, with a sardonic smile. "I scarcely know you! Good Heavens! how love can change a man! What, you, intrepid warrior, pity the fate of this poor maudlin chit! I really believe you will weep over her like a woman, next!"
"Yes," the chief said; "my sister speaks truly, I scarcely know myself! Oh!" he added, bitterly, "is it possible that I, Antinahuel, to whom the Huincas have done so much wrong, can be so? This woman is of an accursed race; she is in my power, I could avenge myself upon her, satisfy the hatred that devours me, make her endure the must atrocious injuries! – and, I dare not! – no, I dare not!"
"Does my brother, then, love this woman so much?" the Linda asked, in a soft, insinuating tone.
Antinahuel looked at her as if she had awakened him suddenly from his sleep; he fixed his dull eyes upon her, and exclaimed —
"Do I love her? – love her! – let my sister listen. Before dying, and going to hunt in the blessed prairies with the just warriors, my father called me to him, and placing his mouth to my ear – 'My son, he said, thou art the last of our race; Don Tadeo de León is also the last of his; since the coming of the palefaces, the family of that man has been always fatally opposed to ours, everywhere and under all circumstances. Swear to kill that man whom it has never been in my power to reach!' I swore to do it. Good!' he said, Pillian loves children who obey their father; let my son mount his best horse, and go in search of his enemy. Then, with a sigh, my father bade me depart. Without replying, I saddled, as he had commanded me, my best horse, and went to the city called Santiago, resolved to kill my enemy."
"Well?" the Linda asked, seeing him stop short.
"Well!" he resumed, "I saw this woman, and my enemy still lives." The Linda cast upon him a look of disdain; but Antinahuel did not remark it – he continued —
"One day this woman found me dying, pierced with wounds; she made her peons bear me to a stone toldo, where for three months she watched over me, driving back the death which had hung over me."
"And when my brother was cured?" the Linda asked eagerly.
"When I was cured," he resumed, passionately, "I fled away like a wounded tiger, bearing in my heart an incurable wound! Two suns ago, when I was quitting my toldería, my mother, whom I loved and venerated, wished to oppose my departure; she knew that it was love that attracted me from her, that it was to see this woman I left her. Well, my mother – "
"Your mother?" the courtesan said, breathlessly.
"As she persisted in not allowing me to depart, I trampled her, without pity, beneath the hoofs of my horse!" he cried, in almost a shriek.
"Oh!" exclaimed the Linda, recoiling.
"Yes! it is horrible, is it not, to kill one's mother? Now!" he added, with a frightful mocking laugh, "will my sister ask again if I love this woman? For her sake, to see her, to hear her address to me one of those sweet words which she used to speak near me, or only to see her smile, I would joyfully sacrifice the most sacred interests. I would wade through the blood of my dearest friends – nothing should stop me!"
The Linda, as she listened to him and observed him, reflected deeply, and as soon as he ceased she said —
"I see that my brother really loves this woman. I was deceived, I must repair my fault."
"What does my sister mean?"
"I mean, that if I had known, I should not have inflicted so severe a chastisement."
"Poor girl!" he sighed.
The Linda smiled ironically to herself. "But my brother does not know what palefaced women are," she continued; "they are vipers, which you endeavour in vain to crush, and which always rise up again to sting the heel of him who places his foot upon them. It is of no use to argue with passion, were it not so I would say to my brother, 'Be thankful to me, for in killing this woman I preserve you from atrocious sorrow.'"
Antinahuel moved uneasily.
"But," she continued, "my brother loves, and I will restore this woman to him; within an hour I will give her up to him."
"Oh! if my sister does that," Antinahuel exclaimed, intoxicated with joy, "I will be her slave!"
Doña Maria smiled with an undefinable expression.
"I will do it," she said, "but time presses, we cannot stay here any longer – my brother doubtless forgets."
Antinahuel darted a suspicious glance at her.
"I forget nothing," he replied; "the friend of my sister shall be released."
"Good! my brother will succeed."
"Still, I will not depart till the blue-eyed maiden has recovered her senses."
"Let my brother hasten to give orders for our departure in ten minutes."
"It is good!" said Antinahuel; "in ten minutes I shall be here."
He left the cuarto with a hasty step. As soon as he was gone, the Linda knelt down by the young girl, removed the cords that still cut her flesh, washed her face with cold water, fastened up her hair, and carefully bandaged the wound on her forehead.
"Oh!" she thought, "through this woman I hold you, demon!"
She