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

CHAPTER XVI
THE CASA GRANDE OF MOCTECUHZOMA

At the remote period when the Aztecs, guided by the finger of God, marched forth, without knowing it, to conquer the plateau of Ahanuac, of which they eventually made the powerful kingdom of Mexico, although their eyes were constantly turned toward this unknown land, the permanent object of their greed, they frequently stopped their during migration, as if fatigue had suddenly overpowered them, and the hope of ever arriving had failed them.

In such cases, instead of simply camping on the spot where this hesitation had affected them, they installed themselves as if they never intended to go further, and built towns. After so many centuries have passed away, when their founders have eternally disappeared from the surface of the globe, the imposing ruins of these cities, scattered over a space of more than a thousand leagues, still excite the admiration, of travellers bold enough to confront countless dangers in order to contemplate them.

The most singular of these ruins is indubitably that known by the name of the Casa Grande of Moctecuhzoma, which rises about two miles from the muddy banks of the Rio Gila, in an uncultivated and uninhabited plain, on the skirt of the terrible sand desert known as the Del Norte. The site on which this house is built is flat on all sides. The ruins which once formed a city extend for more than three miles in a southern direction: and also in the other directions all the ground is covered with potsherds of every description. Many of these fragments are painted of various colours – white or blue, red or yellow – which, by the by, is an evident sign not only that this was an important city, but also that it was inhabited by Indians differing from those now prowling about this country, as the latter are completely ignorant of the art of making this pottery.

The house is a perfect square, turned to the four cardinal points. All around are walls, indicating an enceinte inclosing not only a house, but other buildings, traces of which are perfectly distinct; for a little to the rear is a building having a floor above, and divided into several parts. The edifice is built of earth, and, as far as can be seen, with mud walls; it had the stories above the ground, but the internal carpentry has long ago disappeared. The rooms, five in number on each floor, were only lighted, so far as we can judge from the remains, by the doors, and round holes made in the walls facing to the north and south. Through these openings the man Amer (el hombre Amargo, as the Indians call the Aztec sovereign) looked at the sun, on its rising and setting, to salute it.

A canal, now nearly dry, ran from the river and served to supply the city with water.

At the present day these ruins are gloomy and desolate: they are slowly crumbling away beneath the incessant efforts of the sun, whose burning rays calcine them, and they serve as a refuge to the hideous vultures and the urubus which have selected it as their domicile. The Indians carefully avoid these sinister stations, from which a superstitious terror, for which they cannot account, keeps them aloof.

Thus the Comanche, Sioux, Apache, or Pawnee warrior, whom the accidents of the chase, or any other fortuitous cause, had brought to the vicinity of this dangerous ruin on the night of the fourth or fifth day of the cherry moon —champasciasoni– that is to say, about a month after the events we described in the last chapter – would have fled at the top speed of his horse, a prey to the wildest terror, at the strange spectacle which would have presented itself to his awe-stricken gaze.

The old palace of the Aztec kings threw out its gigantic outline on the azure sky, studded with a brilliant belt of stars. From all the openings – round or square – formed by human agency or by time in its dilapidated walls poured floods of reddish light; while songs, shouts, and laughter incessantly rose from the ruined apartments, and troubled in their dens the wild beasts, surprised by these sounds, which disturbed in so unusual a manner the silence of the desert. In the ruins, beneath the pallid rays of the moon, might be distinguished the shadows of men and horses grouped round enormous braseros, while a dozen horsemen, well armed, and leaning on spears, stood motionless as bronze equestrian statues at the entrance of the house.

If within the ruins all was noise and light, outside all was shadow and silence.

The night slipped away: the moon had already traversed two thirds of her course; the badly tended braseros went out one after another; the old mansion alone continued to gleam through the darkness like an ill-omened lighthouse.

At this moment the sharp and regular sound of a horse trotting on the sand re-echoed in the distance. The sentinels stationed at the entrance of the house with difficulty raised their heads, oppressed by sleep and the vivid cold of the first morning hours, and looked in the direction whence the noise of footsteps was audible.

A horseman appeared at the corner of the road leading to the ruins. The stranger, paying but little heed to what he saw, continued to advance boldly toward the house. He passed the ruined wall, and on arriving within ten paces of the sentries, dismounted, threw the bridle on his horse's neck, and walked with a firm step toward the sentries, who awaited him silent and motionless. But when he was about two swords' lengths from the party all the lances were suddenly levelled at his breast, a hoarse voice shouted, "Halt!"

The stranger stopped without a remark.

"Who are you? What do you want?" asked a horseman.

"I am a costeño. I have taken a long journey to see your captain, with whom I wish to speak," the stranger said.

By the pale and flickering rays of the moon the sentry tried in vain to distinguish the stranger's features; but that was impossible, so carefully was he wrapped up in his cloak.

"What is your name?" he asked, in an ill-tempered tone, when he saw that all his efforts were useless.

"What need of that? Your chief does not know me, and my name will tell him nothing."

"Possibly so, but that concerns yourself. Keep your incognito if you think proper; still, you must not be angry with me if I do not let you disturb the captain. He is at this moment supping with his officers, and certainly would not put himself out in the middle of the night to speak with a stranger."

The man could not conceal a sharp movement of annoyance.

"Possibly so, I will say in my turn," he remarked an instant later. "Listen. You are an old soldier, I think?"

"I am one still," the trooper said, drawing himself up proudly.

"Although you speak Spanish magnificently, I believe I can recognise the Frenchman in you."

"I have that honour."

The stranger chuckled inwardly. He had caught his man: he had found out his weak point.

"I am alone," he went on. "You have I know not how many comrades. Allow me to speak with your captain. What do you fear?"

"Nothing; but my orders are strict – I dare not break through them."

"We are in the heart of the desert, more than a hundred leagues from every civilised abode," the stranger said, pressingly. "You can understand that very powerful reasons were requisite to make me brave the numberless dangers of the long journey I have made to speak for a few moments with the Count de Lhorailles. Would you shipwreck me in sight of port, when it only requires a little kindness on your part for me to obtain what I want?"

The trooper hesitated; the reasons urged by the stranger had half convinced him. Still, after a few minutes' reflection, he said with a toss of his head, —

"No, it is impossible; the captain is stern, and I do not care to lose my corporal's stripes. All I can do for you is to allow you to bivouac here with our men in the open air. Tomorrow it will be day; the captain will come out; you will speak to him, and arrange matters as you please, for it will not affect me."

"Hem!" the stranger said thoughtfully, "it is a long time to wait."

"Bah!" said the soldier gaily, "a night is soon passed. Besides, it is your own fault; you are so confoundedly mysterious. A man needn't be ashamed of his name."

"But I repeat that your captain never heard mine."

"What matter if he hasn't? A name is always a name."

"Ah!" the stranger suddenly said, "I believe I have found a way to settle everything."

"Let's hear it: if it is good I will avail myself of it."

"'Tis excellent."

"All the better. I am listening."

"Go and tell the captain that the man who fired a pistol at him a month back at the Rancho of Guaymas is here, and wishes to speak to him."

"Eh?"

"Do you not understand me?"

"Oh, perfectly."

"Well, in that case – "

"Between ourselves, the recommendation seems to me rather scurvy."

"You think so?"

"Parbleu! He was all but assassinated by you. What, was it you?"

"Yes, I and another."

"I compliment you on it."

"Thanks. Well, are you not going?"

"I confess to a certain amount of hesitation."

"You are wrong. The Count de Lhorailles is a brave man; no one doubts his courage. He must have retained our chance meeting in pleasant memory."

"After all, that's possible; and, besides you are a stranger. I cannot bear the thought of refusing you so slight a service. I will go. Wait here, and do not be impatient, for I do not promise you success."

"I am certain of it."

The old soldier dismounted with a shrug of his shoulders, and entered the house. The stranger did not appear to doubt the success of the corporal's embassy; for, as soon as he had disappeared, he walked up to the door. In a few moments the corporal returned.

"Well," the stranger asked, "what answer did the captain give you?"

"He began laughing and ordered me to bring you in."

"You see I was right."

"That's true; but, for all that, an attempted assassination is a droll recommendation."

"A meeting," the stranger remarked.

"I don't know if you call it by that name here; but in France we call it waylaying. Come on."

The stranger made no reply; he merely shrugged his shoulders, and followed the worthy trooper.

In an immense hall, whose dilapidated walls threatened to collapse, and to which the star-spangled sky served as roof, four men of stern features and flashing eyes were seated round a table, served with the most delicate luxury and the most sensual idea of comfort. They were the count and the officers forming his staff, namely, Lieutenants Diégo Léon and Martin Leroux, and Don Sylva's old capataz, Blas Vasquez.

The count had been encamped with his free company for the last five days in the Casa Grande of Moctecuhzoma. After the attack on the colony by the Apaches, the count, in the hope of finding again his betrothed, who had disappeared in so mysterious a way during the action, and most probably had been carried off by the Indians, immediately formed the resolution of executing the orders government had given him long previously, and which he had hitherto delayed obeying, with pretexts more or less plausible; but in reality because he did not care, brave as he was, to have a fight with the redskins, who were so resolute and difficult to overcome, especially when attacked on their own territory. The count drew one hundred and twenty Frenchmen from the colony, to whom the capataz, who burned to recover and deliver his master and young mistress, added thirty resolute peons, so that the strength of the little troop amounted to one hundred and fifty well-armed and experienced horsemen.

The count had asked the hunters, whose help had also been so precious to him, to accompany him. He would have been happy to have not only companions so intrepid, but also guides so sure as they to lead him on the trail of the Indians, whom he was determined to follow up and exterminate. But Count Louis and his two friends, without giving any further excuse than the necessity of continuing their journey at once, took leave of Lhorailles, peremptorily refusing the brilliant offers he made them.

The count was compelled to put up with the capataz and his peons. Unfortunately these men were costeños or inhabitants of the seaboard, perfectly well acquainted with the coast, but entirely ignorant of all relating to the tierra adentro or interior countries. It was, therefore, under this inexperienced guidance that the count left Guetzalli and marched into Apacheria.

The expedition began under favourable auspices: twice were the redskins surprised by the French at an interval of a few days, and mercilessly massacred. The count wished to make no prisoners, in the hope of imprinting terror on the hearts of these barbarous savages. All the Indians who fell alive into the hands of the French were shot, and then hung on the trees, head downwards.

Still, after these two encounters, so disastrous for them, the Indians appeared to have taken the hint; and, in spite of all the count's efforts, he found it impossible to catch them again. The summary justice exercised by the count appeared not only to have attained, but even outstripped the object he designed; for the Indians suddenly became invisible. For about three weeks the count sought their trail, but was unable to discover it. At length, on the eve of the day on which we take up our story again, some seven or eight hundred horses, apparently free (for according to the Indian custom, their riders lying on their flanks, were nearly invisible), entered the ruins about midday, and rushed on the Casa Grande at a frightful pace.

A discharge of musketry from behind the hastily erected barricades hurled disorder in their ranks, though it did not check the impetus of their attack, and they fell like lightning on the French. The Apaches had plucked up a spirit. Half naked, with their heads laden with plumes, their long buffalo robes fluttering in the wind, steering their horses with their knees, the Indian warriors had a warlike aspect capable of inspiring the most resolute men with terror. The French received them boldly, however, although deafened by the horrible yells their enemies uttered, and blinded by the long barbed arrows which rained around them like hail.

But the Apaches, as much as the French, wished for no mere skirmish. By a common accord they rushed on each other in a hand-to-hand fight. In the midst of the Indian warriors, the Black Bear could be easily recognised by his long plume and the eagle feathers planted in his war-tuft. The chief urged his men on to avenge their preceding defeats by seizing the Casa Grande. Then one of those fearful frontier actions began, in which no prisoners are made, and which render any description impossible through the ferocity both parties display, and the cruelties of which they are guilty. The bolas perdidas, bayonet, and lance were the only weapons employed. This fight, during which the Indians were incessantly reinforced, lasted more than two hours, and the defenders of the barricades allowed themselves to be killed sooner than yield an inch of ground.

Beginning to hope that the Indians must be wearied by so long a struggle and such an obstinate defence, the French redoubled their efforts, when suddenly the cry of "Treason! Treason!" was heard in their rear. The count and the capataz, who fought in the first ranks of the volunteers and peons, turned round. The position was critical. The French were really caught between two fires. The Little Panther, at the head of the fifty warriors, had turned the position, and taken the barricades in reverse. The Indians, mad with joy at such perfect success, cut down all they came across, uttering the wild yells of triumph.

The count took a long glance at the battlefield, and his determination was at once formed. He said a couple of words to the capataz, who returned to the head of his combatants, warned them what to do, and watched for the favourable moment to carry out his chiefs instructions. For his part the count had lost no time. Seizing a barrel of powder, he put into it a piece of lighted candle, and hurled it into the densest ranks of the Indians, where it burst almost immediately, causing irreparable injury. The terrified Apaches fell into disorder, and fled in every direction to avoid being struck by the fragments of this novel shell. Profiting cleverly by the respite produced by the barrel among the assailants, the adventurers led by the capataz turned and rushed on the Little Panther's band, which was only a few paces off by this time. The spot was not favourable for the Indians, who, collected in a narrow entry, could not manoeuvre their horses. The Little Panther and the Apaches rushed forward with yells. The French, as brave and as skillful as their adversaries, boldly awaited with levelled bayonets the shock of the tremendous avalanche, which fell upon them with blinding speed. The redskins were driven back. The rout commenced, and the Apaches began flying in every direction. The count sent several peons after them, who returned toward nightfall, stating that the Apaches, after reforming, had entered the desert.

The count, although satisfied with the victory he had gained (for the enemy's loss was tremendous), did not consider it decisive, as the Black Bear had escaped, and he had been unable to recover the person he had sworn to save. He gave orders to his cuadrilla to prepare for a forward march in the desert, and on the next day the French would definitely leave the Casa Grande.

The count fêted with his officers the victory gained on the previous day, and urged them to drink to the success of the expedition they were going to attempt on the morrow. Flushed by the numerous potations he had made, by the repeated toasts he had drunk, as well as by the hope of complete success ere long, the count was in the best possible temper to hear the singular message the old corporal delivered so much against the grain.

"And what sort of fellow is he?" he asked, when the other had performed his task.

"On my word, captain," the corporal answered, "so far as I could see, he is stout, well-built young fellow, and gifted with a sufficient stock of assurance, not to speak more strongly."

The count reflected for a moment.

"Shall I have him shot?" the soldier asked, taking this silence for a condemnation.

"Plague take it, what a hurry you are in, Boiland!" the count said laughing and looking up. "No, no; this scamp's arrival is a piece of good luck for us. On the contrary, bring him here with the utmost politeness."

The soldier bowed and retired.

"Gentlemen," the count continued, "you remember the trap to which I almost fell a victim: a certain amount of mystery, which I have never been able to fathom, has since surrounded this affair. The man who asks speech of me has come, I feel a presentiment, in order to give me the key to many things which have hitherto been incomprehensible."

"Señor conde," the capataz observed, "pray take care. You do not yet know the character of our people; this man may come to draw you into a snare."

"For what purpose?"

"¿Quién sabe?" Blas Vasquez answered, employing that phrase which in Spanish is so meaning, and which it is difficult to translate into our tongue.

"Bah, bah!" the count said. "Trust in me, Don Blas, to unmask this scamp, if he be a spy, as I do not suppose."

The capataz contented himself with an almost imperceptible shrug of his shoulders. The count was one of those men whose lofty and arrogant mind rendered any discussion impossible. The Europeans, and, before all, the French in America, display towards the natives – white, half-breed, or redskins – a contempt which breaks out in their language and actions, persuaded they stand intellectually far above the inhabitants of the country in which they happen to be, they display towards them an insulting pity, and amuse themselves with continually turning them into ridicule, by mocking either their habits or their belief, and in their hearts grant them an amount of instinct not greatly superior to that of the brute.

This opinion is not only unjust, but it is also entirely false. The American Hispanos, it is true, are very far behindhand as regards civilisation, trade, mechanical arts, &c.: progress with them is slow, because perpetually impeded by the superstitions that form the basis of their faith; but we ought not to make these people responsible for a state of things from which they are eager to emerge, and for which the Spaniards are alone culpable, owing to the system of brutalising oppression and crushing abjectness in which they kept them. The grinding tyranny which for several centuries weighed Indians down, by rendering them the utter slaves of haughty and implacable masters, has given them the characteristics of slaves – cunning and cowardice.

With a few honourable exceptions, the mass of the Indian population especially – for the whites have advanced with giant steps in the path of progress during the past few years – is scampish, cunning, cowardly, and depraved. Thus it ever happens that when a European and a half-breed come into collision, the white man, instead of the intelligence he boasts, is duped by the Indian. It is so well recognised as an article of faith in Spanish America, that the half-breeds and Indians are poor irrational creatures, gifted at the most with enough intelligence to live from hand to mouth that the whites proudly call themselves gente de razón.

We are bound to add that, after a few years' residence in America, the opinions of the Europeans with regard to the half-breeds are greatly modified, because a little acquaintance with the country enables them to take a more healthy view of the people with whom they are mixed up. But the Count de Lhorailles had not reached that stage: he only saw in the Indian or half-breed a being all but lacking reason, and dealt with him on that erroneous principle. This belief was destined, at a later date, to bear most terrible consequences.

The count had noticed the shrug of the shoulders the capataz gave, and was about to reply to him, when the corporal reappeared, followed by the stranger, on whom all eyes were at once fixed. The stranger bore without flinching the cross fire of glances, and, while remaining completely wrapped up in the folds of his large cloak, saluted the company with unparalleled ease. The appearance of this man in the banqueting hall infected the guests with a feeling of uneasiness they would have been unable to explain, but which suddenly rendered them dumb.