The Quest of the Four: A Story of the Comanches and Buena Vista

But even the nearest states were separated from Mexicoby a vast wilderness, and, as time passed and nothingcame, belief settled into certainty. The force of Taylorhad been destroyed. Then the messenger arrived literallyfrom the black depths with the news of the unbelievablevictory. Taylor was not destroyed. He had beatenan army that outnumbered him five to one. The littleAmerican force held the Pass of Angostura, and SantaAnna, with his shattered army, was flying southward. Atfirst it was not believed. It was incredible, but othermessengers came with the same news, and then one coulddoubt no longer. The victory struck so powerfully uponthe imagination of the American people that it carriedTaylor into the White House.

Meanwhile, Phil, in the Pass of Angostura, sitting bya great fire on the second night after the battle, wasthinking little of his native land. After the tremendousinterruption of Buena Vista, his mind turned again tothe object of his search. He read and reread his letter.He thought often of the lava that had cut his brother'sfeet and his own. John was sure that they had gonethrough a pass, and he knew that a woman at a well hadgiven him water. The belief that they were on the trailof those forlorn prisoners was strong within him. AndBill Breakstone and Arenberg believed it, too.

"Our army, I understand, will go into quarters in thisregion," he said, "and will make no further advance byland into Mexico. We enlisted only for this campaign, and I am free to depart. I mean to go at once, boys."

"We go with you, of course," said Bill Breakstone."Good old Hans and I here have already talked it over.There will be no more campaigning in Northern Mexico, and we've done our duty. Besides, we've got questsof our own that do not lead toward the valley of Mexico."

Phil grasped a hand of each and gave it a strongsqueeze.

"I knew that you would go with me, as I'll go withyou when the time comes," he said.

They received their discharge the next morning, andwere thanked by General Taylor himself for bravery inbattle. Old Rough and Ready put his hand affectionatelyon Phil's shoulder.

"May good fortune follow you wherever you may begoing," he said. "It was such boys as you who wonthis battle."

He also caused them to be furnished with largesupplies of ammunition. Middleton could go no farther.He and some other officers were to hurry to Tampico andjoin Scott for the invasion of Mexico by the way of VeraCruz.

"But boys," he said, "we may meet again. We'vebeen good comrades, I think, and circumstances maybring us together a second time when this war is over."

"It rests upon the knees of the gods," said Arenberg.

"I know it will come true," said the more sanguineBreakstone.

"So do I," said Phil.

Middleton rode away with his brother officers and asmall body of regulars, and Phil, Arenberg, andBreakstone rode southward to Agua Neva. When they hadgone some distance they stopped and looked back at theplateau and the pass.

"How did we ever do it?" said Phil.

"By refusing to stay whipped," replied Arenberg.

"By making up our minds to die rather than giveup," replied Bill Breakstone.

They rode on to the little Mexican town, where Philhad an errand to do. He had talked it over with theother two, and the three had agreed that it was of theutmost importance. All the time a sentence from the letterwas running in Phil's head. Some one murmuring wordsof pity in Mexican had given him water to drink, and thevoice was that of a woman.

"It must have been from a well," said Phil, "this isa dry country with water mostly from wells, and aroundthese wells villages usually grow. Bill, we must be onthe right track. I can't believe that we're going wrong."

"The signs certainly point the way we're thinking,"said Bill Breakstone. "The lava, the dust, and thewater. We've passed the lava and the dust, and we knowthat the water is before us."

They came presently to Agua Neva, a somber littletown, now reoccupied by a detachment from Taylor'sarmy. The people were singularly quiet and subdued.The defeat of Santa Anna by so small a force and hisprecipitate flight made an immense impression upon them, and, as they suffered no ill treatment from the conquerors, they did not seek to make trouble. There was nosharpshooting in the dark, no waylaying of a few horsemen byguerillas, and the three could pursue without hesitationthe inquiry upon which they were bent.

Wells! Wells! Of course there were wells in AguaNeva. Several of them, and the water was very fine.Would the señors taste it? They would, and they passedfrom one well to another until they drank from them all.Breakstone could speak Spanish, and its Mexican variations, and he began to ask questions-chance ones at first, something about the town and its age, and the things thathe had seen. Doubtless in the long guerilla war betweenTexas and Mexico, captives, the fierce Texans, had passedthrough there on their way to strong prisons in the south.Such men had passed more than once, but the people ofAgua Neva did not remember any particular one amongthem. They spent a day thus in vain, and Phil, gloomyand discouraged, rode back to the quarters of theAmerican detachment.

"Don't be downhearted, Phil," said Breakstone."In a little place like this one must soon pick up thetrail. It will not be hard to get at the gossip. We'll tryagain to-morrow."

They did not go horseback the next morning, not wishingto attract too much attention, but strolled about thewells again, Breakstone talking to the women in the mostingratiating manner. He was a handsome fellow, thisBreakstone, and he had a smile that women liked. Theydid not frown upon him at Agua Neva because hebelonged to the enemy, but exchanged a gay word or twowith him, Spanish or Mexican banter as he passed on.

They came to a well at which three women were drawingwater for the large jars that they carried on theirheads, and these were somewhat unlike the others. Theywere undoubtedly of Indian blood, Aztec perhaps, or morelikely Toltec. They were tall for Mexican women, and itseemed to Phil that they bore themselves with a certainerectness and pride. Their faces were noble and good.

Phil and his comrades drew near. He saw the womenglance at them, and he saw the youngest of them look athim several times. She stared with a vague sort ofwonder in her eyes, and Phil's heart suddenly began to poundso hard that he grew dizzy. Since the letter, coming outof the unknown and traveling such a vast distance, hadfound him in the little town of Paris, Kentucky, he hadfelt at times the power of intuition. Truths burstsuddenly upon him, and for the moment he had theconviction that this was the woman. Moreover, she was stilllooking at him.

"Speak to her, Bill! Speak to her!" he exclaimed."Don't let her go until you ask her."

But Breakstone had already noticed the curiousglances the woman was casting at Phil, and in theSpanish patois of the region he bade them a light andcourteous good morning. Here all the charm of Breakstone'smanner showed at its very best. No one could takeoffense at it, and the three women, smiling, replied in asimilar vein. Breakstone understood Phil's agitation.The boy might be right, but he did not intend to be tooheadlong. He must fence and approach the subjectgradually. So he spoke of the little things that makeconversation, but presently he said to the youngest of thewomen:

"I see that you notice my comrade, the one who isnot yet a man in years, though a man in size. Does itchance that you have seen some one like him?"

"I do not know," replied the woman. "I am lookinginto my memory that I may see."

"Perhaps," said Breakstone smoothly, "it was one ofthe Texan prisoners whom they brought through here twoor three years ago. A boy, tall and fair like this boy, but dusty with the march, bent with weariness, his feetcut and bleeding by the lava over which he had beenforced to march, stood here at this well. He wasblindfolded that he might not see which way he had come, butyou, the Holy Virgin filling your heart with pity, tookthe cup of cool water and gave it to him to drink."

Comprehension filled the eyes of the woman, and shegazed at Breakstone with growing wonder.

"It is so!" she exclaimed. "I remember now. Itwas three years ago. There was a band of prisoners, twelve or fifteen, maybe, but he was the youngest of themall, and so worn, so weak! I could not see his eyes, buthe had the figure and manner of the youth who standsthere! It was why I looked, and then looked again, theresemblance that I could not remember."

"It is his brother who is with me," said Breakstone."Can you tell where these prisoners were taken?"

"I do not know, but I have heard that they were carriedinto the mountains to the south and west, where theywere to be held until Texas was brought back to Mexico,or to be put to death as outlaws."

"What prisons lie in these mountains to the southand west?"

"I do not know how many, but we have heard most ofthe Castle of Montevideo. Some of our own people havegone there, never to come back."

She and her companions shuddered at the name of theCastle of Montevideo. It seemed to have some vague, mysterious terror for them. It was now Bill Breakstonewho had the intuition. The Castle of Montevideo wasthe place. It was there that they had taken John Bedford.He translated clearly for Phil, who became very pale.

"It is the place, Phil," he said. "We must go tothe Castle of Montevideo to find him."

He drew from his pocket a large octagonal gold piece, worth fifty dollars, then coined by the United States.

"Give this to her, Bill," he said, "and tell her it isfor the drink of water that she gave to the blindfoldedboy three years ago."

Bill Breakstone translated literally, and he added:

"You must take it. It comes from his heart. It isnot only worth much money, but it will be a bringer ofluck to you."

She took it, hesitated a moment, then hid it underher red reboso, and, the jars being filled, she and hertwo companions walked away, balancing the great weightsbeautifully on their heads.

"To-night," said Phil, "we ride for the Castle of Montevideo."

CHAPTER XVI

THE CASTLE OF MONTEVIDEO

The Castle of Montevideo, as its name indicates, commanded a magnificent view. Set in a nicheof a mountain which towered far above, it lookeddown upon and commanded one of the great roads thatled to the heart of Mexico, the city that stood in the valeof Tenochtitlan, the capital, in turn, of the Toltecs, theAztecs, the Spaniards, and the Mexicans, and, for all thatmen yet knew, of races older than the Toltecs. But theSpaniards had built it, completing it nearly a hundredand fifty years ago, when their hold upon the greater partof the New World seemed secure, and the name of Spainwas filled with the suggestion of power.

It was a gloomy and tremendous fortress, standingseven thousand feet above the level of the sea, and havingabout it, despite its latitude, no indication of the tropics.

Spain had lavished here enormous sums of money dugfor her by the slaves of Mexico and Peru. It was builtof volcanic pumice stone, very hard, and of the color ofdark honey. Its main walls formed an equilateraltriangle, eight hundred feet square on the inside, and sixtyfeet from the top of the wall to the bottom of theenclosing moat. There was a bastion at each corner of the mainrampart, and the moat that enveloped the main walls andbastions was two hundred feet wide and twenty feet deep.Fifty feet beyond the outside wall of the moat rose achevaux de frise built of squared cedar logs twelve feetlong, set in the ground and fastened together by longitudinaltimbers. Beyond the chevaux de frise was anotherditch, fourteen feet wide, of which the outer bank was ahigh earthwork. The whole square enclosed by theoutermost work was twenty-six acres, and on the principalrampart were mounted eighty cannon, commanding theroad to the Valley of Tenochtitlan.

Few fortresses, even in the Old World, were morepowerful or complete. It enclosed armories, magazines, workshops, and cells; cells in rows, all of which wereduly numbered when Montevideo was completed in theeighteenth century. And, to give it the last andhappiest touch, the picture of Ferdinand VII., King of Spain,Lord of the Indies and the New World, was painted overthe doorway of every cell, and they were many.

Nor is this the full tale of Montevideo. On the innerside of each angle, broad wooden stairways ascended to thetop, the stairways themselves being enclosed at intervalsby wooden gates twelve feet high. The real fortificationsenclosed a square of nearly five hundred feet, and insidethis square were the buildings of the officers and thebarracks of the soldiers. The floor of the square was pavedwith thick cement, and deep down under the cement wereimmense water tanks, holding millions of gallons, fed bysubterranean springs of pure cold water. By means ofunderground tunnels the moats could be flooded withwater from the tanks or springs.

It has been said that the Spaniards are massivebuilders, the most massive since the Romans, and they haveleft their mark with many a huge stone structure in thesouthern part of the New World. What Montevideo costthe kings of Spain no one has ever known, and, althoughthey probably paid twice for every stick and stone in it,Peru and Mexico were still pouring forth their floods oftreasure, and there was the fortress, honey colored, lofty, undeniably majestic and powerful.

When Mexico displaced Spain, she added to thedefenses of Montevideo, and now, on this spring day in1847, it lowered, dark and sinister, over the road. It wasoccupied by a strong garrison under that alert and valiantsoldier, Captain Pedro de Armijo, raised recently to thatrank, but still stinging with the memories of Buena Vista,he was anxious that the Americans should come andattack him in Montevideo. He stood on the rampart ata point where it was seventy feet wide, and he lookedwith pride and satisfaction at the row of eighty guns.Pedro de Armijo, swelling with pride, felt that he couldhold the castle of Montevideo against twenty thousandmen. Time had made no impression upon those massivewalls, and the moat was filled with water. The castle, mediæval, but grim and formidable, sat in its narrowmountain valley with the Cofre de Montevideo (Trunk ofMontevideo) behind it on the north. This peak wasfrequently covered with snow and at all times was gloomyand forbidding. Even on bright days the sun reached itfor only a few hours.

While Pedro de Armijo walked on the parapet, lookingout at the range of mountain and valley and enjoyingthe sunlight, which would soon be gone, a young manstood at the window of cell No. 87, also looking out atthe mountain, although no sunlight reached him there.He gazed through a slit four inches wide and twelveinches high, and the solid wall of masonry through whichthis slit was cut was twelve feet thick. The young man'sankles were tied together with a chain which, althoughlong enough to allow him to walk, weighed twenty-fivepounds. Once he had been chained with another man.Formerly the prisoners who had been brought with himto the Castle of Montevideo had been chained in pairs, the chain in no case weighing less than twenty pounds, but, since only John Bedford was left, Pedro de Armijoconcluded that it was his duty to carry the chain alone.

John Bedford was white with prison pallor. Althoughas tall, he weighed many pounds less than his youngerbrother, Philip. His cheeks were sunken, and his eyeswere set in deep hollows. The careless observer wouldhave taken him for ten years more than his real age. Hehad shuffled painfully to the slit in the wall, where hewished to see the last rays of the daylight falling on themountainside. The depth of the slit made the sectionof the mountain that he could see very narrow, and heknew every inch of it. There was the big projection ofvolcanic rock, the tall, malformed cactus that put out awhite flower, the little bunch of stunted cedars or pines-hecould never tell which-in the shelter of the rock, andthe yard or two of gully down which he had seen thewater roaring after the big rains or at the melting of thesnows on the Cofre de Montevideo.

How often he had looked upon these things! What alittle slice of the world it was! Only a few yards longand fewer yards broad, but what a mighty thing it wasto him! Even with the slit closed, he could have drawnall of it upon a map to the last twig and pebble. Hewould have suffered intensely had that little view beenwithdrawn, but it tantalized him, too, with the sight ofthe freedom that was denied him. Three years, they toldhim, he had been gazing out at that narrow slit at themountainside, and he only at the beginning of life, strongof mind and body-or at least he was. Never in thattime had he been outside the inner walls or even in thecourt yard. He knew nothing of what had happened inthe world. Sometimes they told him that Texas hadbeen overrun and retaken by the Mexicans, and he fearedthat it was true.

They did not always put the chains upon him, butlately he had been refractory. He was easily caught inan attempt to escape, and a new governor of the castle, lately come, a young man extremely arrogant, haddemanded his promise that he make no other suchattempt. He had refused, and so the chains were ordered.He had worn them many times before, and now theyoppressed him far less than his loneliness. He alone ofthat expedition was left a prisoner in the castle. Howall the others had gone he did not know, but he knew thatsome had escaped. Both he and his comrade of thechains were too ill to walk when the escape was made, and there was nothing to do but leave them behind. Hiscomrade died, and he recovered after weeks, mainlythrough the efforts of old Catarina, the Indian womanwho sometimes brought him his food.

John Bedford's spirits were at the bottom of thedepths that afternoon. How could human beings be socruel as to shut up one of their kind in such a manner, one who was no criminal? It seemed to him that latelythe watch in the castle had become more vigilant thanever. More soldiers were about, and he heard vaguely ofcomings and goings. His mind ran back for thethousandth time over the capture of himself and hiscomrades.

When taken by an overwhelming force they were onehundred and seventy in number, and there were greatrejoicings in Mexico when they were brought southward.They had been blindfolded at some points, once whenhe walked for a long time on sharp volcanic rock, andonce, when, as he was fainting from heat and thirst, awoman with a kind voice had given him a cup of waterat a well. He remembered these things very vividly, andhe remembered with equal vividness how, when they werenot blindfolded, they were led in triumph through theMexican towns, exactly as prisoners were led to celebratethe glory of a general through the streets of old Rome.They, the "Terrible Texans," as they were called, hadpassed through triumphal arches decorated with the brightgarments of women. Boys and girls, brilliant handkerchiefsbound around their heads, and shaking decoratedgourds with pebbles in them, had danced before thecaptives to the great delight of the spectators. Sometimeswomen themselves in these triumphal processions haddone the zopilote or buzzard dance. At night theprisoners had been forced to sleep in foul cattle sheds.

Then had come the Day of the Beans. One hundredand fifty-three white beans and seventeen black beanswere placed in a bowl, and every prisoner, blindfolded, was forced to draw one. The seventeen who drew theblack beans were promptly shot, and the others werecompelled to march on. He remembered how lightly theyhad taken it, even when it was known who had drawn theblack beans. These men, mostly young like himself, hadjested about their bad luck, and had gone to their deathsmiling. He did not know how they could do it, but itwas so, because he had seen it with his own eyes.

Then they had marched on until they came to theCastle of Montevideo. There the world ended. Therewas nothing but time, divided into alternations of nightand day. He had seen nobody but soldiers, except theold woman Catarina, who seemed to be a sort of scullion.After he recovered from the prison fever of which hiscomrade of the chains died, the old woman had shown asort of pity for him; perhaps she liked him as one oftenlikes those upon whom one has conferred benefits. Sheyielded to his entreaties for a pencil for an hour or so, and some paper, just a sheet or two. She smuggledthem to him, and she smuggled away the letter that hewrote. She did not know what would happen, but shewould give it to her son Porfirio, who was a vaquero.Porfirio would give it to his friend Antonio Vaquez, whowas leading a burro train north to Monterey. After thatwas the unknown, but who could tell? Antonio Vaquezwas a kind man, and the Holy Virgin sometimes workedmiracles for the good. As for the poor lad, the prisoner,he must rest now. He had been muy malo (very sick),and it was not good to worry.

John tried not to worry. It was such easy advice togive and so very hard for one to take who had beenburied alive through a time that seemed eternity, andwho had been forgotten by all the world, except hisjailers. That letter had gone more than a year ago, and,of course, it had not reached its destination. He oughtnever to have thought such a thing possible. Very likelyit had been destroyed by Porfirio, the vaquero, oldCatarina's son. He had not seen old Catarina herself in along time. Doubtless they had sent her away becauseshe had been kind to him, or they may have found outabout the letter. He was very sorry. She was far fromyoung, and she was far from beautiful, but her briefpresence at intervals had been cheering.

He watched the last rays of the sun fade on the volcanicslope. A single beam, livid and splendid, lingeredfor a moment, and then was gone. After it came thedark, with all the chilling power of great elevation. Thecold even penetrated the deep slit that led through twelvefeet of solid masonry, and John Bedford shivered. Itwas partly the dark that made him shiver. He rose fromthe stool and made his way slowly and painfully to hiscot against the wall, his chains rattling heavily over thefloor.

He heard a key turning in the lock and the dooropening, but he did not look around. They usually camewith his food at this hour, and the food was always thesame. There was no cause for curiosity. But when heheard the steps of two men instead of one he did lookaround. There was the same soldier bringing his supperof frijoles and tortillas on a tin plate, and a cup of verybad coffee, but he was accompanied by the new governorof the castle, Captain Pedro de Armijo, whom John didnot like at all. The soldier drew up the stool, put thefood on it, and also a candle that he carried.

John began to eat and drink, taking not the slightestnotice of de Armijo. The man from the first had givenhim the impression of cold, malignant cruelty. JohnBedford had often thought that his own spirit wascrushed, but it was far from being so. Pride was strongwithin him, and he resolved that de Armijo should speakfirst.

De Armijo stood in silence for some time, lookingdown at the prisoner. He was not in a good humor, hehad seldom been so since that fatal day when the wholearmy of Santa Anna was hurled back by the little forcefrom the North. He knew many things of which theprisoner did not dream, and he had no thought of givinghim even the slightest hint of them. In him was thevenomous disposition of the cat that likes to play withthe rat it has caught. A curious piece of mockery, orperhaps it was not wholly mockery, had occurred to him.

"Bedford," he said, speaking good English, "youhave been a prisoner here a long time, and no one lovescaptivity."

"I have not heard that any one does," replied John, taking another drink of the bad coffee.

"You cannot escape. You see the impossibility ofany such attempt."

"It does not look probable, I admit. Still, fewthings are impossible."

De Armijo smiled, showing even white teeth. Herather liked this game of playing with the rat in the trap.So much was in favor of the cat.

"It is not a possibility with which one can reckon,"he said, "and I should think that the desire to be freewould be overpowering in one so young as you."

"Have you come here to make sport of me?" saidJohn, with ominous inflection. "Because if you have Ishall not answer another question."

"Not at all," said de Armijo. "I come on business.You have been here, as I said, a long time, and in thattime many changes have occurred in the world."