The Free Lances: A Romance of the Mexican Valley

Saying which Luisa Valverde crossed her arms over her breast, and with eyes raised devotionally towards heaven, seemed to offer up a mute, but fervent thanksgiving.

“Still lives!” echoed the Condesa, with a look of mingled surprise and perplexity.

“Of course he does; surely you did not think he was dead!”

“Indeed I knew not what to think – so long since I saw or heard of him. Oh, I’m so glad he’s here, even though in a prison; for while there’s life there’s hope.”

By this the Condesa had recovered breath, though not composure of countenance. Its expression alone was changed from the look of trouble to one of blank astonishment. What could her friend mean? Why glad of his being in a prison? For all the while she was thinking of a him.

“Hope!” she ejaculated again as an echo, then remaining silent, and looking dazed-like.

“Yes, Ysabel; I had almost despaired of him. But are you sure they have him here in prison? I was in fear that he had been killed in battle, or died upon the march, somewhere in those great prairies of Texas – ”

“Carramba!” interrupted the young Countess, who, free of speech, was accustomed to interlarding it with her country forms of exclamation. “What’s all this about prairies and Texas? So far as I know, Ruperto was never there in his life.”

“Ruperto!” echoed the other, the joy which had so suddenly lit up her features as suddenly returning to shadow. “I thought you were speaking of Florencio.”

They understood each other now. Long since had their love secrets been mutually confessed; and Luisa Valverde needed no telling who Ruperto was. Independent of what she had lately learned from the Condesa, she knew him to be a gentleman of good family, a soldier of some reputation; but who – as once her own father – had the misfortune to belong to the party now out of power; many of them in exile, or retired upon their estates in the country – for the time taking no part in politics. As for himself, he had not been lately seen in the city of Mexico, though it was said he was still in the country; as rumour had it, hiding away somewhere among the mountains. And rumour went further, even to the defiling of his fair name. There were reports of his having become a robber, and that, under another name, he was now chief of a band of salteadores, whose deeds were oft heard of on the Acapulco Road, where this crosses the mountains near that place of many murders – the Cruzdel Marques.

Nothing of this sinister tale, however, had reached the ears of Don Ignacio’s daughter. Nor till that day – indeed that very hour – had she, more interested in him, heard aught of it. Hence much of the wild excitement under which she was labouring.

“Forgive me, Ysabel!” said her friend, opening her arms, and receiving the Countess in sympathetic embrace; “forgive me for the mistake I have made.”

“Nay, ’tis I who should ask forgiveness,” returned the other, seeing the misapprehension her words had caused, with their distressing effect. “I ought to have spoken plainer. But you know how much my thoughts have been dwelling on dear Ruperto.”

She did know, or should, judging by herself, and how hers had been dwelling on dear Florencio.

“But, Ysabel: you say they made him a prisoner! Who has done that, and why?”

“The soldiers of the State. As to why, you can easily guess. Because he belongs to the party of Liberals. That’s why, and nothing else. But they don’t say so. I’ve something more to tell you. Would you believe it, Luisita, that they accuse him of being a salteador?”

“I can believe him accused of it – some of those in power now are wicked enough for anything – but not guilty. You remember we were acquainted with Don Ruperto, before that sad time when we were compelled to leave the country. I should say he would be the last man to stain his character by becoming a robber.”

“The very last man! Robber indeed! My noble Ruperto the purest of patriots, purer than any in this degenerate land. Ay-de-mi!”

“Where did they take him, and when?”

“Somewhere near San Augustin, and I think, several days ago, though I’ve only just heard of it.”

“Strange that. As you know, I’ve been staying at San Augustin for the last week or more; and there was no word of such a thing there.”

“Not likely there would be; it was all done quietly. Don Ruperto has been living out that way up in the mountains, hiding, if you choose to call it. I know where, but no matter. Too brave to be cautious he had come down to San Augustin. Some one betrayed him, and going back he was waylaid by the soldiers, surrounded, and made prisoner. There must have been a whole host of them, else they’d never have taken him so easily. I’m sure they wouldn’t and couldn’t.”

“And where is he now, Ysabel?”

“In prison, as I’ve told you.”

“But what prison?”

“That’s just what I’m longing to know. All I’ve ye heard is that he’s in a prison under the accusation of being a highwayman. Santissima!” she added, angrily stamping her tiny foot on the tesselated flags. “They who accuse him shall rue it. He shall be revenged on them. I’ll see justice done him myself. Ah! that will I, though it costs me all I’m worth. Only to think – Ruperto a robber! My Ruperto! Valga me Dios!”

By this, the two had mounted up into the mirador – the Señorita Valverde having come down to receive her visitor. And there, the first flurry of excitement over, they talked more tranquilly, or at all events, more intelligibly of the affairs mutually affecting them. In those there was much similarity, indeed, in many respects a parallelism. Yet the feelings with which they regarded them were diametrically opposite. One knew that her lover was in prison, and grieved at it; the other hoped hers might be the same, and would have been glad of it!

A strange dissimilitude of which the reader has the key.

Beyond what she had already said, the Condesa had little more to communicate, and in her turn became the questioner.

“I can understand now, amiga mia, why you spoke of Don Florencio. The Tejano prisoners have arrived, and you are thinking he’s amongst them? That’s so, is it not?”

“Not thinking, but hoping it, Ysabel.”

“Have you taken any steps to ascertain?”

“I have.”

“In what way?”

“I’ve sent a messenger to Tacubaya, where I’m told they’ve been taken.”

“Not all. Some of them have been sent elsewhere. One party, I believe, is shut up in the Acordada.”

“What! in that fearful place? among those horrid wretches – the worst criminals we have! The Tejans are soldiers – prisoners of war. Surely they do not deserve such treatment?”

“Deserve it or not, some of them are receiving it. That grand gentleman, Colonel Carlos Santander – your friend by the way – told me so.”

The mention of Santander’s name, but more a connection with the subject spoken of, produced a visible effect on Luisa Valverde. Her cheek seemed to pale and suddenly flashed red again. Well she remembered, and vividly recalled, the old enmity between him and Don Florencio. Too well, and a circumstance of most sinister recollection as matters stood now. She had thought of it before; was thinking of it all the time, and therefore the words of the Condesa started no new train of reflection. They but intensified the fear she had already felt, for a time holding her speechless.

Not noticing this, and without waiting a rejoinder, the other ran on, still interrogating:

“Whom have you trusted with this delicate mission, may I ask?”

“Only José?”

“Well; José, from what I’ve seen of him, is worthy of the trust. That is so far as honesty is concerned, and possibly cleverness. But, amiga mia, he’s only a humble servitor, and out there in Tacubaya, among the garrison soldiers, or if it be in any of the prisons, he may experience a little difficulty in obtaining the information you seek. Did you give him any money to make matters easy?”

“He has my purse with him, with permission to use it as he may see best.”

“Ah! then you may safely expect his bringing back a good account, or at all events one that will settle the question you wish to have settled. Your purse should be a key to Don Florencio’s prison – if he be inside one anywhere in Mexico.”

“Oh! I hope he is.”

“Wishing your amanti in a prison! That would sound strange enough, if one didn’t understand it.”

“I’d give anything to know him there – all I have to be assured he still lives.”

“Likely enough you’ll soon hear. When do you expect your messenger to be back?”

“At any moment. He’s been gone many hours ago. I was watching for him when you came up – yonder on the Tacubaya Road. I see nothing of him yet, but he may have passed while we’ve been talking.”