CHAPTER V.
THE OPEN GATE
It was a good hour or more, so steep and difficult is that downward road, before the zone of frozen mist was passed through, and the vanguard of the little army halted, transfixed with wonder and admiration by the glorious scene which spread out--looking, in good truth, like a vision of Paradise after the hideous regions they had just passed through--some five thousand feet below them.
To the north-westward the slanting beams of the descending sun streamed under the edge of the cloud and mist and spread in a flood of glory over a broad valley walled in by terraced hills on every side. The whole of the level floor of the valley was covered with fields and plantations, separated by long green and red flowering hedges, groves of trees and shining streams, and straight paved roads, bordered by over-hanging trees.
At the very foot, as it seemed from that elevation, of the steep, sloping mountain-wall they had just crossed lay the city of Cajamarca, and scattered all over the valley were scores of villages gleaming white amidst the green of the fields and leafy groves about them.
On the lower slopes of the hills rose countless terraces, formed by the patient labour of many generations, the lowest of them golden with ripened maize, and step by step the gold passed shade by shade into the brilliant green of the unripened crops of the highest terraces. It was a vast oasis in the midst of a still vaster chaos of bleak and desert mountains, the home, as it seemed to these wayworn travellers, of industrious peace and bounteous plenty, and the gentler soul of Alonso de Molina whispered to him as his gaze first fell upon its glories that it was a paradise into which he and his gold-hungering companions were about to bring the poison of treachery and the storms of ruthless violence.
And yet another moment’s thought reminded him that not even this fair-seeming Eden was free from the curse that had blasted the first Paradise of earth, for he knew well that in the midst of it lay encamped a vast and conquering host, led by one who, beguiled by the fleeting dream of empire, had drawn his sword against his brother and brought down upon the ancient empire of the Incas that doom pronounced of old against the kingdom divided against itself--the doom which by the mailed hand of the invader was so soon to fall upon himself.
“A goodly land, comrade, and one that it were a pity to leave too long in the possession of the heathen and the enemies of Holy Church and His Most Catholic Majesty,” said Pedro de Candia, who was guiding his stumbling beast alongside of him. “Malediction! what roads! This is the fortieth time at least in the last hour that nothing but the help of the Saints hath kept this poor beast off his knees, and it were an ill place this even for a dumb brute to kneel down in, to say nothing of pitching a good Christian on to his head.”
“A goodly land as thou sayest, Pedro,” replied Molina, somewhat sadly, “and well worth the stealing, as old Carvahal would say, and yet--well, if I were not a good Catholic I should think that those who could make such a paradise in the midst of such a wilderness, heathens though they be, were well deserving of a better embassy than we bring them, coming as we do with the Cross of God before us, lies on our lips, and the lust of plunder in our hearts.”
“From which speech it would seem that the work before us is not much to your liking, Caballero,” said the deep, stern voice of the Captain-General on the other side of him.
He turned quickly in his saddle and saw Pizarro’s dark, grave eyes looking half inquiringly, half reproachfully at him, and before he could find any words to reply Pizarro went on in a kinder tone--
“Did I not know that there is no stouter heart or stronger arm under our banners than thine, Molina, I should say that thou has brought too gentle a mind to such work as ours is and has to be. They who would hew out empires for their masters in the strange and new-found lands of the earth must do it with hands cased in gauntlets of steel. The silken glove is for the court and the palace. Ends, not means, must be the care of those who stake honour, fortune, and life itself on such hazards as ours.
“And look you,” he went on, speaking quicker and louder, as though he wished those about him to hear as well, “let us make no mistake as to that which now lies before us. Yonder valley looks a paradise, but it is the armed camp of a conquering tyrant to boot. If the envoys have not lied to us, Atahuallpa is yonder at the head of a host of eighty thousand men, full-flushed with the pride of victory, and we are a hundred and sixty soldiers and gentlemen of Spain, cut off from all succour and with but one road to take--and that road lies forward!”
“And thou shalt find none readier to follow thee along that road, Señor, than he who will strike none the less hard for God and king because he would win the land by other means if he could,” replied Molina, bending his head in deference to his Captain’s reproof.
“Spoken like as gentle a knight and as brave a cavalier as Spain herself can boast of!” said Pizarro, smiling one of his rare smiles. “I did not mean to reproach thee, only to show thee how great a difference there may be between that which a man would do and that which he must. Thou knowest well that I could think no evil of one of those who came with me across that line on the sands of Gallo.”
Then, without waiting for any reply, he pulled his horse aside and joined his brother Hernando, who was riding a little way behind him.
“A strange man!” said Candia, in a low voice. “One of those instruments that God fashions sometimes out of vile material to hew out the rough shapes of His mysterious purposes--a base-born bastard, whose first work in life was tending swine, and now raised by the strength of the great heart that God gave him to be a hidalgo of Spain and, as I for one truly believe, ere long to be conqueror of realms wider than Spain itself. Fear not, Molina, put thy scruples in thy pouch, since thou presently hast but little else to put there. God makes great men only to great ends. Leave the means to destiny, and believe thou art not marching under the banner of such a man as Francisco Pizarro for nothing.”
“That I well believe,” answered Molina. “We here are but instruments. Thou art right. It is not for the tool to question the intent of the hand that uses it. Thinkest thou we shall reach the city to-night?”
As though in answer to him the trumpet at that moment sounded a halt. While they were talking a turn in the downward road had brought them in sight of a ridge of rocks out-cropping from the grass-grown mountain-side to the right hand, and looking from a little distance like the fragments of some Titan-built fortress. To the left rose a steep, scarped hill, ringed with rocks. It was a position that a hundred men, resolute and well armed, could have held against ten thousand. Even a few score of naked savages could have poured such a rain of great stones down upon the little company passing between the two fastnesses as would have left neither man nor horse unmaimed, even if alive, and the Captain-General was not a man to lead his followers into such a place without due caution.
So the halt was called while they were yet above what might have been a death-trap for them all, and scouts were sent out on either hand to feel the way, and these, after a diligent search, came back and said that they could find not so much as a mouse among the rocks. So the trumpets sounded again, and the troop, with eyes and ears alert and weapons ready, marched through the defile which, if he had had the knowledge or the will to do so, the master of the hosts encamped below might have infallibly made the end of their journey.
“El-Dorado is ours!” laughed Carvahal to Hernando de Soto, as they came out of the pass and emerged on a green, sloping plain below. “Those who left such a place as that unguarded will make but small fight for the best they have. Carramba! with the men we have here I would hold that pass against all the armies of His Catholic Majesty while my powder and shot and the stones on the hillside held out. It is but child’s play taking a castle whose defenders leave the portcullis up and forget to raise the drawbridge. Cuerpo de Cristo! who would have thought to find the gate of the Inca’s treasure-house left open like that?”
De Soto laughed a trifle bitterly, and said--
“If thou wert anything better than a blaspheming eater of fire with never a thought beyond throat-cutting and gold-getting, Carvahal, thou wouldst have seen by this that we have been welcomed into this land as friends, as envoys of a king whom these poor people look on as a god. Nay, have they not hailed us as sons ourselves of one of their gods? Did not Titu Atauchi, brother of Atahuallpa himself, greet the Captain-General down in Huamacucho yonder as Inca Viracocha, and place on his left arm the golden bracelet which none but those of Divine descent, as they think, may wear? Thou mayest believe me when I tell thee that if they had taken us for what we are we should never have come thus far alive through such a land as this, and it is thought----”
“Which makes thee ever and anon feel and speak more like a monk than a stout adventurer. Is that not so, de Soto?” growled Carvahal in reply. “Santiago! though I am not so fine a gentleman or as soft-hearted a splitter of skulls as thou or Molina yonder, who hath conversed with me more than once in such a strain, yet, in good sooth, I believe I’m the better Christian, for, on my faith as a good Catholic, I believe that the Saints who watch over our enterprise have thus blinded the eyes of these heathens so that we can do our good work the easier. How else could we few prevail against so many? It is faith thou wantest, de Soto--faith. Thou art overmuch given to reasoning, which was ever a bad thing for those whose business is rather with hard knocks than soft, smooth-sounding words.”
“Ha!” exclaimed de Soto, suddenly rising in his stirrups and looking on ahead. “What have we yonder? By my faith, a pair of forts, seemingly as well placed and as skilfully built as the best engineer could wish for. See how they command the way down to the valley from all sides! There, too, a handful of men could hold the road against a host. How much the easier, then, could the hosts of the Inca hold it against such a handful as we are! And look you--Santiago! what madness!--they are coming out from the chief one on the right hand yonder to meet us as though we were friends.”
De Soto laid a bitter emphasis on his last words, but Carvahal only slapped his thigh, and chuckled--
“Cuerpo de Cristo! Did good soldiers of the Cross ever have such luck as that! Verily the Lord hath delivered the heathen into the hands of His servants.”
The little army now moved down in good order on to a level space before the principal fort, and there, at the command of the Captain, halted drawn up in battle array. Pizarro and his brother Hernando went forward with the guides and interpreters, amongst whom was the lad Filipillo, who was soon to play so important a part in the great tragedy about to be enacted, and met the party that had come out from the fort. It was led by an Inca noble, the Curaca of Cajamarca, and he, after the first courtesies had been exchanged, told the Captain-General that his lord and master Atahuallpa, in whose name he welcomed him, had bidden him offer the hospitality of the fort to him and his followers for that evening and night, as it was already too late to make the rest of the descent into the valley. The next morning he would himself conduct them into the city, and lodge them in the more suitable quarters that the Inca had already set apart for them.
He told them also that Atahuallpa himself was encamped with his army at one of his palaces on the other side of the valley, where he was performing the observances of a fast which must be completed before he could give the strangers audience. But until then they would be lodged and well cared for as his guests in the city.
The Captain-General accepted the invitation with many courtesies and assurances of friendship, and that night the Spaniards slept softer and fared better than they had done for many a weary day and night, albeit the prudence of Pizarro found excuses for planting sentries and making sufficient provision against surprise, for he was a man who never of his own free will gave odds to Fate.
The next morning with the first glimmer of light the trumpet sounded, and, horse and foot, the little army marched out and mustered on the slope beyond the fort, watched with wondering and admiring eyes by their simple hosts. Then the Fray Valverde prayed before them, and pointed his prayer with a sermon which, as Carvahal said after, was both long and strong for the stomachs of breakfastless men shivering in a keen wind on a bleak hillside. Then came breakfast, and after that the ranks were formed for the march to the city.
Before the trumpet sounded Pizarro spoke a few brief, weighty words to them, telling of the dangers that possibly awaited them, of the risk of treachery, and the enormous advantage of numbers that the Inca could use against them if once he took them for enemies. He gave them three watchwords--silence, watchfulness, and obedience, and then he rode to the head of the column and the downward march began.
With every mile the beauties of the valley opened out in ever-increasing splendour before them, but the weight and magnitude of the enterprise whose crucial hour was now so near seemed to press heavily upon their hearts and dim their eyes to the wonders that were multiplying about them. The valley that they were entering seemed a very paradise on earth, and yet, for all that they knew, it might for them be the end of their earthly journeying and the grave of all their hopes of El-Dorado.
As the column wound round the base of a green wooded hill whose summit was crowned with a building, half fort, half palace, constructed of the wonderful Inca masonry, they came in sight of the gate by which they were to enter the city. Then Pizarro waved his hand, the trumpets rang out brazen and jubilant, and, with banners waving and the bright morning sun gleaming on plate and mail and shining weapons and harness, this little handful of invaders of a mighty empire marched forward towards the gate.
They reached it and passed through it into a broad, paved street, but here there were no welcoming throngs to greet them as at Caxas and Huamacucho. As they rode through the town, and street after street opened up, they looked in vain for some sign of life. In all the city there seemed neither man, woman, nor child left. Not a sound answered the blare of their trumpets, the jingling of their accoutrements, or the clang of the iron hoofs on the stones of the silent streets. Cajamarca was, for the time being, a city of the dead, and if any of them had possessed the gift of prophecy he might well have looked upon it as an emblem of the desolation which they were bringing into the land of the Children of the Sun.