The Rover of the Andes: A Tale of Adventure on South America

“Yes, yes, I know,” said Manuela, drawing her mantilla a little more closely over her now fair face. “You shall hear. Listen. You know that my father loves you?”

Pedro smiled assent, and nodded.

“His is a loving and loveable nature,” resumed our heroine.

(“So is his daughter’s,” thought Pedro, but he did not say so.)

“And he never forgets a friend,” continued Manuela. “He has often, often spoken to me about you, and your dear ones, and many a time in his military wanderings has he made inquiries about the dear child who was stolen so long ago—ten years now, is it not?”

“Ay, not far short of eleven. She was just turned five when last I beheld her angel face—no, not last, thank God.”

“Well, Pedro, you may easily believe that we had many raisings of our hopes, like yourself, and many, many disappointments, but these last arose from our looking chiefly in wrong directions. It somehow never occurred to us that her lot might have fallen among people of rank and wealth. Yet so it was. One day when out on the Pampas not far from Buenos Ayres, visiting a friend, and never thinking of dear Mariquita, we saw a young girl coming towards us down the garden walk.

“As she came near, my father stopped short, and laid his hand on my shoulder with such a grasp that I nearly cried out. I looked up in surprise, and never before saw such an expression of eager inquiry on his face.

“‘Manuela!’ he said, in a low, tremulous voice, ‘if Mariquita is alive I see her now. I see our friend Pedro in every line of her pretty face.’

“I looked, but could not see the likeness. You know how differently people seem to be affected by the same face. I failed to see in the sweet countenance framed in curling fair hair, and in the slight girlish figure of surpassing grace, my swarthy friend Pedro. She seemed startled at first by my father’s abrupt manner. He questioned her. What was her name—‘Mariquita,’ she said. ‘I was sure of it,’ rejoined my father. ‘Your surname, my girl?’

“‘Arnold, senhor,’ she replied, with surprise.

“My dear father is very impulsive. His hopes sank as fast as they had risen. ‘Of course,’ he said afterwards, ‘Mariquita is a common name, and should not have raised my expectations so quickly, but the likeness, you see, staggered me.’

“Dear father!” continued Manuela, casting down her eyes, and speaking in a pensive tone, “I do love him so, because of his little imperfections. They set off his good points to so much greater advantage. I should not like to have a perfect father. Would you, Pedro?”

She raised her eyes to the guide’s face with an arch look—and those eyes had become wonderfully lustrous since the skin had lost its brown hue.

“Really, Manuela,” returned the impatient guide, “I have not yet considered what degree of perfection I should like in my father—but how about—”

“Forgive me, yes—Mariquita. Well, finding that we were going to the house where she dwelt, Mariquita walked with us, and told us that she had lived with our English friends, Mr and Mrs Daulton, since she was a little child. Did she remember her parents? we asked. Yes, she remembered them perfectly, and tried to describe them, but we could make nothing of that for evidently she thought them handsomer, grander, and more beautiful than any other people in the world. She did not remember where they dwelt—except that it was in the woods and among mountains.

“‘That corresponds exactly,’ cried my father, becoming excited. ‘Forgive me, child; I am an eccentric old fellow, but—did you quit your home amid fire and smoke and yells—’

“My father was stopped at this point by our arrival at the house, and the appearance of our friends. But he was too much roused by that time to let the matter drop, so he carried Mrs Daulton off to the library, and learned from her that the child had been lent to her by a priest!

“‘Lent, my dear madam?’ said my father.

“‘Yes, lent. The priest laughed when he presented her, but said the child was the orphan daughter of a distant relation of his who had left her to his care. He did not want her, or know what to do with her, and offered to give her to us. My husband said he could not accept such a gift, but he would gladly accept her as a loan! We both disbelieved the priest, for he was a bad man; but, as we were much in want of a companion for our own little girl at the time, we accepted her, and brought her here. The priest died suddenly, and as there was no one else to claim her, we have kept her ever since, and right glad we are to have her.’

“‘You won’t have her long,’ said my sweet father, in his usual blunt and pleasant way. ‘I am convinced that I know her father. Of course Arnold is a name you gave her?’ ‘No; when she came to us she said her name was Mariquita, but she knew of no other name. It was the priest who told, us her surname was Arnold.’

“Well, Pedro, to bring my story to an end, my father told the Daultons all about you, and got them to lend Mariquita to us. That was two years ago. Since then she has dwelt with us as my very dear sister. My father knew you were in Peru at the time, and his purpose was to wait till you should return, and present Mariquita unexpectedly to you to see if you would recognise each other. Therefore he did not mention her when he wrote asking you so urgently to return here. Neither did he mention his suspicions to Mariquita herself. We just led her to understand that we found her company so pleasant that we wished her to remain with us for a long visit. Then came news of the illness of a dear relation of mine in Chili. I was sent by my father to see and nurse her. At parting he told me if I should by any chance meet with you, I was on no account to speak or even hint at this matter. Little did either of us think at the time that I was destined to make so long a journey under your care. And you know, Senhor Pedro, that I am not bad at keeping secrets. I not only obeyed my father in this matter, but I faithfully obeyed yourself when you imposed on me the necessity of keeping my disguise secret from Senhor Armstrong.”

“You did, Manuela, faithfully.”

“And it was very hard to do, let me assure you, as well as needless,” returned Manuela, in a slightly hurt tone. “Over and over again I have been on the point of betraying myself. Why did you require me to maintain such secrecy, and afflict myself with such constant care and watchfulness?”

“Because I knew full well,” replied Pedro, with a twinkle in his eye, “that if poor Senhor Armstrong knew your true character, he would infallibly fall in love with you in spite of your brown skin.”

“And pray, senhor, why should you object to Senhor Armstrong, or any one else, falling in love with me in spite of my brown skin?”

“You know very well, Manuela, that, your father being my friend, it is my duty in all circumstances to be faithful to him. You are also aware that your father entertains a strong objection to very young men, who have no money or prospects, presuming to think of marriage with his daughter, and that he would never consent to your being engaged to Senhor Armstrong in present circumstances. It was my simple duty, therefore, when I saw the danger, to warn and protect you. Indeed I saw, almost the first day after we met the youth, that I had made a great mistake in asking him to join us; but it was too late then to change, so I imposed secrecy on you, and admit that you have acted your part well; but my well-meant efforts have been utterly in vain.”

“How so!”

“Why, because the poor wretch has fallen hopelessly in love with you in spite of your disguise—ay, and in spite of his own efforts to the contrary, for I have watched him carefully, and regard him as an uncommonly fine specimen of an amiable, self-denying, and honourable man. And now, as I had feared, your father is furious at his presuming even to think of you, though I have done my best to show him that he has acted nobly all through our journey; that, after all, he may not really care for you at all, and that at all events you have given him no encouragement whatever, and do not care a straw for him.”

Manuela flushed deeply at the last words, and there was the slightest possible contraction of her fine eyebrows as she replied, somewhat loftily—

“Senhor Pedro, you are a kind friend and a faithful guide, but you pretend to a greater knowledge of these matters than you possess. You do not understand my beloved father as well as I do, and you are totally ignorant of the state of my feelings. However, I believe you have done all for the best, and my earnest request now is that, having discharged what you conceive to be your duty on this point, you will say and do nothing more.”

“Your will would be law in this matter, even if I were not under such a deep debt of gratitude to you,” returned Pedro, “and it is all the more easy to obey you now that I have handed you over to your father and am no longer responsible. Are you aware that we start immediately in pursuit of the Indians who have attacked and murdered the poor people of Rolland’s Ranch?”

“Yes, my father has told me all about it.”

“Has he told you that you and Mariquita are to accompany the force so far on the road, and that when we get beyond the disturbed district I am to carry you on with a small party to Buenos Ayres, while the main body pursues the savages?”

“Yes, he told me that too,” replied Manuela; “but,” she added, with a little hesitation, “he did not say who was to go with our small detachment.”

The slightest possible twinkle in Pedro’s eye indicated suppressed feeling as he replied that he also was ignorant on that point—the only things which he was quite sure of being, that Senhor Armstrong and Quashy were to go with the main body.

“Indeed!” exclaimed the maiden in surprise. “I had thought Senhor Armstrong objected to fighting.”

Pedro laughed. “So he does, senhorina; but when the rescue of captive women and children is in the case, he holds fighting to be a duty, as you are aware. But I must go now,” continued Pedro, becoming grave and earnest as he took the girl’s hand. “Words can never express my feelings towards you and your father, dear Manuela. Indeed I have never been in the habit of saying much—least of all when I have felt much. Mariquita and I will bless you both to the latest hour of our lives. Adieu. We meet in the morning at the house in which you are staying—Lawrence has named it the house with the rustic porch—and we start from there. You are all ready, I suppose?”

“Yes. You know I have little luggage to look after,” said Manuela, with a laugh, “and I shall continue to travel as an Indian girl—as an Inca princess!”

“Indeed. Why so?”

“That, Senhor Pedro, is a matter with which you have nothing whatever to do!”

Chapter Twenty Two.

Colonel Marchbanks proves to be not so Good a General as he gets Credit for, and Lawrence stands self-convicted

It has been stated that our hero had agreed to join Colonel Marchbanks in the pursuit of the Indians, not because the troops sought to avenge the murders which had been committed, but because several women and children had been carried off, and the rescue of these formed the main object of the expedition.

There can be no doubt, however, that the desire of Lawrence to join in such a praiseworthy adventure was not a little stimulated by the fact that Manuela was to accompany her father, at least a part of the way, and he naturally hoped to have some opportunities of speaking to her—perhaps of riding beside her, as he had so often done when he imagined her to be a daughter of the Incas.

But alas! the course of his love being true and deep—remarkably deep—was doomed to run in its proverbially rugged course.

Colonel Marchbanks, when leading his men to “glory”—or otherwise—like a true soldier, as he was, invariably moved with an advance and rear-guard. Like a cautious father, he placed Lawrence in the rear-guard, and arranged that there should be a considerable distance between it and the main body.

We may remark in passing that when the first burst of the old gentleman’s anger with Lawrence was over he had generously resolved, in consideration of what the young man had done for his daughter, to make no further allusion to the ballroom scene, but merely to hold the presumptuous youth politely at arm’s-length, and take especial care that the two young people should not again have an opportunity of meeting alone. He laid no command on either of them, but simply trusted to his own wisdom and watchfulness.

Being as it were a freelance, Lawrence, he knew, would naturally ride in the force very much where he pleased. He had therefore cleverly provided against the evil consequences that might flow from such freedom by making a little arrangement at a brief and final interview the evening before they set out.

“Now, young senhor,” he said, in his usual abrupt way, “although a volunteer in this expedition, and not versed in military matters, you must of course put yourself under my orders, and consider yourself one of my troopers.”

Oh! of course, of course, Lawrence had not the slightest objection to do so. He was quite ready to do whatever was required of him, if only he might assist in the rescue of hapless captives; and although he knew nothing of military matters, still, in the event of an engagement, he might prove himself useful as a surgeon.

“Humph! We don’t deal much in surgeons in this country. It is usually do or die with us,” replied the colonel, with a grim smile. “However, we shall see. Meanwhile, I have appointed you to the charge of some of the baggage-mules. Your late experience must have made you somewhat expert in such matters, and your duty will be with the rear-guard. One of my officers will show you your position in the morning. Good-night.”

Lawrence left with a quiet “Good-night, colonel,” and with a very unquiet feeling that somehow things might not turn out precisely as he had hoped.

Later that night Manuela appeared before her stern father dressed in the old familiar costume of an Indian girl, and with her fair skin stained dark brown. Usually the old soldier met his child with a beaming smile, that lit up his rugged visage with tenderness, as a gleam of sunshine sometimes illumines the rugged peaks of the Andes, but on this occasion he received her with a frown compounded of love and annoyance.

“How now, child? This is an unseasonable time for such foolery.”

“I want to travel in my old dress, father,” she replied, with a winning smile that almost tore the old man’s heart in twain;—and there are such smiles, reader, let us assure you, though you may not have had the good fortune to see them yet!

“You certainly shall do nothing of the sort, my dear,” returned the stern old man, as if he were laying down one of the Medo-Persic laws—for he was very tough, you know, and had great power of control over his feelings, especially the softer ones.

“Oh, I’m so sorry you don’t like it!” said the Inca princess, with a little look of humble disappointment which was infinitely more heartrending than the smile; “but do you know, father, I have ridden so long in this costume, and in the gentleman fashion, that I feel quite sure—at least, I think—I should be utterly knocked up the first day if I were to begin a long hard journey in the ladies’ position. Then, you know, I could not dare to ride so in ordinary female dress and with a white face; the thing would look ridiculous—wouldn’t it? And, of course, everybody knows that Pedro arrived here with an Indian girl in his band, so the thing will seem quite natural, and nobody will notice me, especially if I keep near to Pedro; and the soldiers will just think—if they think at all—that you have left your daughter behind.”

“Ah, well, that alters the case, Manuela,” said the colonel, with most un-Medo-Persic hesitancy, and still frowning a little at his ink-bottle—not at his daughter. “Of course, if it had been merely one of your whims, nothing would have induced me to let you go in such guise, but there is truth in what you say, and—yes—a good thought, you shall travel near Pedro. Good-night. Go to bed, love. You will need all the rest you can obtain between now and morning.”

“Good-night, darling father. I would kiss you if I had not just put on the stain.”

She retired, and soon after laid her pretty brown cheek on her pillow in placid contentment, while her grim father arranged his war plans so that Pedro should travel with the advance-guard.

There was a soft, fresh, exhilarating breeze blowing from the Pampas as the troop issued from the little town at a gallop, when the first streak of dawn became visible.

There was order, doubtless, in all the arrangements, but all seemed utter confusion to Lawrence as he assisted the young officer under whose special command he was placed to look after the mules. Some faint evidence of order, however, began to reveal itself to his uneducated mind when he observed that the confusion abated on the main body moving off and leaving him with a small band behind. His perception of order might have been still further though unpleasantly increased had he known that the advance-guard, with Manuela in its train, had started a considerable time previously. But he had not much time to think, for the command was almost immediately given to mount and ride.

Quashy was beside him, for, being his servant, Colonel Marchbanks had said he might do with him as he pleased. But Quashy was silent, for his spirit was chafed. His master observed the fact after the first half-hour’s gallop.

“What ails you, Quash?”

“I can’t abide peepil,” growled the negro, “what says ‘aw!’”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean that Aw’s agwine wid us.”

“What—the sportsman—eh?”

“Yes, massa. On’y I don’t b’lieve he ever sported nuffin but a swagger, and—and—‘aw!’ W’en I git up dis mornin’ I heerd ’im say to his friend: ‘I say, Jack, wouldn’t it—aw—be dooced good fun to go and—aw—hab a slap at de Injins?’ If de Injins send a spear troo his libber—aw—he’ll not t’ink it sitch fun!”

“That’s true, Quash, but the same may be said of ourselves.”

“Not so, massa, ’cause we nebber said it would be ‘dooced good fun.’”

“There’s something in that, Quash, but you shouldn’t let feelings of ill-will to any one get the mastery of you. Men of his stamp are often very good fellows at bottom, though they do ‘aw’ in a most ridiculous and unaccountable manner. Besides, he has done you no harm.”

“Done me no harm!” repeated the negro, indignantly, “didn’t he say you was mad or drunk?”

“Well, well,” said Lawrence, laughing, “that was a very innocent remark. It did no harm to either of us.”

“You’s wrong, massa,” returned Quashy in a magnificently hurt tone. “It dood no harm to you, but it hurt my feelin’s, an’ dat’s wuss dan hurtin’ my body.”

At this point in the conversation the troop passed over the brow of an eminence, and beheld the wide rolling sea of the illimitable South American Pampas, or plains, stretching away on all sides to the horizon. During the whole morning they had been galloping through the region of the Monte, or bush, that border-land which connects the treeless plains with the tropical forests of the north, where thorny shrubs covered the ground in more or less dense patches, where groves of the algaroba—a noble tree of the mimosa species,—and trees laden with a peach-like but poisonous fruit, as well as other trees and shrubs, diversified the landscape, and where the ground was carpeted with beautiful flowering plants, among which were the variegated blossoms of verbena, polyanthus, and others.

But now, all was changed. It seemed as if the party had reached the shores of a great, level, grassy sea, with only here and there a seeming islet, where a thicket grew, to break the sky-line of the horizon. For a few minutes the rear-guard drew up to collect the straggling baggage-mules, and then away they went with a wild shout, as if they were moved by the same glad feeling of freedom that affects the petrel when it swoops over the billows of the mighty ocean.

The scene and the sensations were absolutely new to Lawrence and Quashy. Both were mounted on very good horses, which seemed to sympathise with their riders, for they required no spur to urge them over the grassy plain. The sun was bright, and Lawrence had been too long accustomed to the leaden skies of old England to quarrel with the sunshine, however hot it might be; besides, he rather enjoyed heat, and as for Quashy, heat was his native element. A pleasant air was blowing, too. In short, everything looked beautiful, especially to our hero, who knew—at least supposed—that a certain princess of the Incas was in the band immediately in front of him. He was not aware, you see, that she was with the advance-guard!

“Das am mug-nifercent!” exclaimed Quashy, as his horse put his foot into a biscacho-hole, and only escaped a fall by making a splendid bound, where by its haunch, striking the negro’s back, sent him plunging on to its neck.

“Oh! I does like to be shook like dat, massa.”

“If you get shook much worse than that,” cried Lawrence, “I’ll have to stop to pick you up.”

“No fear, massa. Howebber much I wobbles I nebber comes off.”

An islet of bushes at this point necessitated a slight détour. On the other side of it they found that the main body of the troop had halted for rest and food.

Right glad was Lawrence to find that Colonel Marchbanks’s humour was entirely changed, that the asperity of the previous night had passed away, and that the natural urbanity of his nature had returned.

“A pleasant gallop, was it not, Senhor Armstrong?” he said, as our hero joined the group of officers around him.

“Delightful, and quite new to me,” said Lawrence. “I have often read of but never seen the Pampas till now.”

He looked furtively about as he spoke. The colonel marked the look, and with a somewhat grim smile observed that they should see more than enough of the Pampas for some days to come.

“The sea of long yellow-brown grass and thistles,” he added, “gets to be rather monotonous at last; but I never weary of the feeling of immensity and freedom which it inspires. Come, dine with us, senhor.”

Lawrence gladly accepted the invitation.

“We make but a brief halt,” said the colonel, “for time presses and distances are great. Our next shall be at the Estancia Algaroba, where we shall spend the night. Your friend Pedro will make arrangements for us. He is with the advance-guard.”

“Oh, indeed,” said Lawrence; then, feeling that he ought to say something more, “I suppose his newly-found daughter is with him?”

“Yes,” replied the colonel, curtly, as he shot a suspicious glance at the youth from under his shaggy brows.

After dining, Lawrence returned to the baggage-mules with an unaccountable depression of spirits upon him, and deeply absorbed with the question whether rear-guards ever overtook advance-guards, and what, if they did, usually became of intervening main bodies. With such puzzling military questions on his mind, the remainder of that day’s journey was not equal to the first part, and even Quashy, the sympathetic, failed to interest him!

The estancia, previously referred to by the colonel, stood on a slight eminence surrounded by the grove of algaroba-trees from which it derived its name. The fruit of this tree forms excellent food for cattle, and Lawrence found himself busily engaged during the first hour after arrival in procuring it for his mules, and otherwise looking after his charge. When this duty was done, feeling no disposition to join his comrades at supper, he sauntered into a garden in rear of the estancia, where he found a rustic seat under an algaroba-tree, and sat down to meditate.

It was a calm, peaceful, moonlight night, with an air, so he felt, of sadness about it which harmonised with his melancholy thoughts. He now believed he saw through Colonel Marchbanks’s plan, and had given up all hope of seeing Manuela again. In these circumstances, being a man of submissive spirit yet powerful will, he set himself resolutely to think of the important object in which he was engaged. Somewhat thus his meditations ran—

“I am no soldier, but I am a man, and I should be less than a man—unworthy to live—if I were not ready to help in the rescue of women and children. Some of the girls, poor things, may be like Manu— that is—. Now, although I hate war, and do not approve of settling disputes by the sword, I feel that self-defence, or the defence of the helpless, justifies war,—ay, to the knife. Of course it does. Was I not thoroughly justified in fighting the robbers when Manu—. Well, then, let me think it out. A thing is not properly thought at all until it is thought out, and found out. Talking of that, how fortunate that Pedro’s little daughter was found out. It is most interesting! I delight to think of her. And she’s so pretty, too—quite beautiful, though, of course, not so beautiful as Man—”