A DMM OFAMONE 
 
 BY CHARLES F. EMBREE 
 
A Dream of a Throne 
 
, O Holy Mother, I cannot. 
 
A Dream of a Throne 
 
 The Story of a Mexican Revolt 
 
 BY 
 
 CHARLES FLEMING EMBREE 
 
 Boston 
 
 Little, Brown, and Company 
 1904 
 
1900, 
 BY LITTLE, BROWN, AND COMPANY 
 
 All right* reserved 
 
 ONIVIK8TTY PRESS JOHN WILtON 
 AND ION CAMBRIDGE, U.S.A. 
 
s-3 f 
 
 TO MY WIFE 
 
 M578458 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 PART FIRST 
 
 PAGE 
 
 THE MONASTERY i 
 
 PART SECOND 
 TIZAPAN - 7 6 
 
 PART THIRD 
 THE ISLAND . . ........ 283 
 
A Dream of a Throne 
 
 PART FIRST 
 
 THE MONASTERY 
 
 CHAPTER I 
 
 AT nightfall of a day in May, 1833, there was 
 lamentation in a fisher s hut on the banks of 
 the Mexican lake, Chapala. The shadows of St. 
 Michael s hill, which rises high and rocky out of 
 the town s centre, had long since fallen across the 
 Chapala plaza. The sun had set in red and gold, 
 and the waves, as the darkness came on, were ris 
 ing slowly. The hut was of adobe with steep, 
 thatched roof. Its rooms were two and its floors 
 earthen. There were many other huts like this in a 
 long line to the east, and between them and the 
 water stretched smooth brown sand where white 
 nets, for two hundred yards, were extended on poles 
 to dry. The nets should be taken down at this 
 hour or earlier, and rolled into a ball, and the tiny 
 black boat that should carry them into the lake a 
 little later on rode restless and empty at the shore. 
 The larger canoa, too, its one sail furled, tossed 
 yonder on the waves, unused for days, and the nets 
 remained extended with the wind fluttering them. 
 
i A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 A boy of fourteen years came out of the hut with 
 a little bundle of rockets in his hand, and sat down 
 near a tree. He was much whiter of face than the 
 majority of the inhabitants of this fishing village. 
 His features were clearer cut and more intelligent. 
 His eyes were deep and, at present, sad, for there 
 were tears in them. The lake breeze dried the 
 tears. He untied the rockets in absorption, the 
 absorption of a man who has seen or dreamed much, 
 and with none of the air of a child. He was dressed 
 in loose white, the common clothing of this simple 
 people of the high tropics. He wore sandals on his 
 feet. 
 
 He lit the rockets one by one with wax matches, 
 and they shot into the air hissing, and burst with 
 sudden reports on the night s stillness. It some 
 how seemed a very solemn thing. There was no 
 play in this. The last of them left him in grief, as 
 plainly written on his face as though he had added 
 twenty years to his few. The crack, crack of the 
 explosives in the air had aroused no one along the 
 shore. The boats still rode uneasily and empty, 
 and the nets fluttered untouched, like ghosts. In 
 the hut, however, there was heard the loud wailing 
 of a man, a hysterical wailing rather than a grief- 
 stricken one, such that a philosophic listener would 
 not have pitied long, for surely the mourner would 
 soon recover and be as boisterous in another direc 
 tion. A little girl of four years, in cotton dress 
 oddly long, crept out, awe-struck, went to the boy 
 where he still sat, and silently hugged him. Then 
 she whispered : 
 
 "What is he crying about, Vicente? What is 
 the matter with her? Is she is she dead, brother 
 Vicente? " 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 3 
 
 "Clarita," he said, holding to her, "she is dying, 
 and the rockets have gone before her, and we shall 
 have no mother nobody, nobody." 
 
 Whereat the little girl sobbed and crept back 
 into the hut, among banana and castor trees that 
 stood about it. The boy did not move. When the 
 wailing of the man permitted, Vicente could hear 
 the low voice of a priest within ; the same who had 
 sent him out with the rockets to fire, according to 
 custom, as the soul departed. 
 
 It was at length quite dark, save for the stars, 
 brilliant enough. Only a little candle-light fell 
 three feet outside the door. A gendarme came 
 round the corner not far away, where the two white 
 church towers stood high, past some lime-kilns, 
 and along the row of fishers huts. He arrived at 
 the candle-lit doorway and stood in the light with 
 his hat off. 
 
 " Is she dead, Francisco? " he asked. 
 
 "Oh, my God! Dios! Dios!" wailed the man 
 within. "She is gone the life of my life!" 
 
 The priest was quiet enough and the girl again 
 awe-struck. The gendarme handed a paper to the 
 priest, who read it. 
 
 "This is an order," said the latter, "that she is to 
 be buried at once. Why, there is no contagion here. " 
 
 The gendarme shrugged his shoulders. 
 
 "People are afraid of small-pox," he said. 
 
 The dead woman lay on matting and blankets on 
 the dirt floor, with candles at her head and feet, her 
 face covered. The little girl came silently to her 
 and sat down at her head. 
 
 " What ! " shrieked Francisco, a fisherman not 
 yet forty. "To-night! Animals! Beasts! Will 
 you tear my heart from my body?" 
 
4 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 "They are afraid, sefior, all the town, for there 
 has been the disease this year in Jocotepec, and 
 some women who have looked at Dona Julia have 
 said it was like it." 
 
 "This is blasphemy! Holy Mary protect us! In 
 the night and to take her away now! Oh, Dios! 
 Dios ! " And he wailed afresh and more hysteri 
 cally. 
 
 The priest knew that there was no small-pox here, 
 but it was as well now as another time. Fran 
 cisco s grief was not very deep. The order was 
 given, let it be executed. The town had indeed, 
 foolishly, been afraid of the hut. It seemed there 
 would be difficulty in securing men to carry the 
 coffin. The gendarme went out. He would find 
 them, said he. He went no further than two huts 
 away, and after parley returned with two fishermen. 
 They passed Vicente sitting, without motion, on the 
 sand, and entered the hut. The two were named, 
 respectively, Anastasio and Fortino. The one was 
 long and lean, and the other massive. They, as 
 Francisco, wore the white clothing and the sandals. 
 There were, too, colored sashes round their waists. 
 
 There was little else said. Anastasio brought a 
 rude wooden coffin that seemed to have been await 
 ing the mcment under the banana-trees. Fortino 
 remained outside, while his companion carried it 
 in. Presently the latter and the gendarme came 
 out again, bearing it awkwardly. Coffins were 
 sometimes carried to the grave on a table, the table 
 being hoisted to the single bearer s back. They 
 had no table here, and no one would lend, for fear 
 of the disease. So the great Fortino, strong as a 
 bull, lifted it lightly to his shoulder, and went 
 tramping away. Anastasio, the gendarme, and the 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 5 
 
 priest followed in silence. Francisco threw him 
 self down in the hut and beat his skull with fierce 
 ness. The burial party was nigh swallowed up in 
 gloom, yonder a little way across the beach, when 
 the girl ran out laboriously through the sand, fasci 
 nated. She was at their heels, reaching up her 
 little hands to the coffin, and stumbling. She did 
 not sob or cry, but they heard her quick breath and 
 turned in surprise, whereat she clung to Fortino, 
 looking up at the coffin piteously. Only the gen 
 darme was moved and loosed her grip. 
 
 At that moment, Vicente, who had but just per 
 ceived the child, came running, seized her in his 
 arms, and bore her back. She struggled, and at 
 length sobbed bitterly; but he held her, and sat 
 down with her where he had been before. She 
 clung to him then with her head buried on his 
 shoulder, while he watched the retreating shadows 
 of the burial party. They were barely seen yonder 
 where the white nets ended. They were turning 
 into a lane now, between two huts. They were 
 gone. Dry-eyed, he stared at the scarcely-seen 
 corner for many minutes. He did not know it; but 
 he did not feel like a boy, nor was his face a boyish 
 face. 
 
 He knew she had been good to them both, and 
 that to have a mother was, somehow, to have that 
 which is most necessary. When they had eaten 
 the frijoles and the tortillas there in the hut with 
 her, it had always been she who had prepared them. 
 She had done it as though she loved to do it. She 
 had not been like that woman four huts away, who 
 beat her children. Yes, it was plain she had loved 
 them. When they had played together, he and 
 Clarita, here on the sand so many, many evenings 
 
6 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 after the moon was up, while the nets were drawing 
 fish, and the waves lapped the shore gently, she 
 had always been watching over them. She had 
 been the true, the real part of all living, though he 
 had not known it till now. Francisco had been 
 only another person who came and went and fished 
 and was boisterous. When they had awakened in 
 the morning, and Clarita had hugged him, it was 
 the mother they saw first. When they lay down on 
 the matting to sleep at night, she had watched 
 them and made them warm. He began to realize 
 in some larger way that she had been above the life 
 that she lived; at least, she had been more faithful 
 than her race. So he held the child tightly, there 
 in the dark, and did not want to move, and a dor 
 mant loneliness that had long belonged to him took 
 shape. 
 
 An hour passed, and she was asleep in his arms, 
 contented. Francisco had become silent By 
 faint distant whistles and the sound of an oar com 
 ing across the water, Vicente knew there was fish 
 ing farther away at other parts of the shore. But 
 Francisco s nets, which Fortino and Anastasio had 
 been wont to draw with him, hung idly as before, 
 and there was no fishing here. He grew stiff, but 
 not sleepy. After a long time he was surprised 
 that the priest returned and entered the hut. A 
 grunt from within told of the awaking of Francisco. 
 The latter s grief had not kept him from sleep. 
 
 " Has he come? " said the priest. 
 
 "No," said Francisco. 
 
 The boy heard no more, and there seemed to be 
 no more said. His attention was suddenly attracted 
 by the faint plashing of oars a little way out on the 
 waves. He strained his eyes, and at length saw a 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE ^ 
 
 shadow, which became, indistinctly, a boat. It was 
 strange, thought he, that a boat and a little boat 
 should be coming here in the night, for to-night 
 there was no fishing. The plash came nearer, and 
 the boat touched the bank. He could just see that 
 a form stepped out of it. There seemed to be no 
 anchoring or tying of the vessel, and there was no 
 more noise. 
 
 The figure came over the sand. He would have 
 thought it a woman had it not been so tall. It 
 moved slowly, and passed within a few yards of him 
 and the sleeping child without seeing them. Vicente 
 noted then what he had not seen before, that a 
 candle had been placed in the little yard of his own 
 home, under the banana-trees. The figure moved 
 to this candle and stood at the door, and he saw it 
 more plainly. It was a man, but robed. He would 
 have been very tall had he not been bent. The 
 light barely showed to the staring boy eyes of ter 
 rible lustre, and a face white. This last was the 
 more wonderful to Vicente. He had never seen a 
 really white face before. Even the priest of 
 Chapala was almost as dark as his neighbors. The 
 new-comer went in as noiselessly and mysteriously 
 as he had come, and the scarce-seen shadow of his 
 boat rose and fell beside that other little fishing 
 craft. 
 
 For another hour there were the murmurings of 
 conversation within, sometimes only whispers. 
 Once or twice Francisco s voice broke out in pas 
 sion, and once in a broad jest. Vicente thought of 
 creeping closer and listening. But his sorrow and 
 his loneliness, the great night and the child, put 
 the idea out of his head; he only sat still. In spite 
 of the continuous sound of voices, sometimes eager, 
 
8 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 sometimes arguing, often urging, and at last even 
 threatening, the boy nearly forgot the new-comer. 
 He grew tired, and would have wakened his sister 
 and gone in. But there was stirring, then, and the 
 priest and the boatman came out. The latter went 
 to the beach slowly, as he had come, but the boat 
 did not depart. The priest came to Vicente. 
 
 "He who has just come," said he to the boy 
 kindly, " is a man greater than are we. For many 
 years he has been a friend of mine, of Francisco, 
 and of Julia. You are left alone now, Vicente. 
 He has come to take you with him, not so far away 
 but that you can return, and he will show you new 
 things." 
 
 The boy stood up, wakening the girl, who still 
 clung to him. His eyes were very wide open and 
 black, and he stared a moment in silence and 
 wonder at the priest. 
 
 "Why," he said simply and resolutely, "I do not 
 want to see new things." 
 
 "Listen, boy. As yet you know nothing, even 
 of yourself. You have lived here in this hut since 
 your earliest memory. Will you not believe that 
 there is a wide world beyond this, with strange 
 deeds and strange gains in it ? You will go to-night 
 because I, your priest, tell you to. You will learn 
 many things you did not know. And you will learn 
 more of yourself of yourself, do you understand? 
 And to-morrow you may return if you wish." 
 
 "Oh! what is the hitch now?" cried Francisco, 
 bursting, in irritation, out of the hut. "Bring him 
 in!" 
 
 Vicente was led in, bewildered. He put the girl 
 down, and she sat beside him on the floor. 
 
 "What are you hanging back for?" said Fran- 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 9 
 
 cisco. "Haven t I raised you and taken care of 
 you? And when I tell you it s all right, it is, isn t 
 it? Origins!" And he struck his palm with his 
 fist. "It s to be explored. Can t you show any 
 interest in the origin ? " 
 
 "The origin of what? " asked the boy. "I don t 
 know what you mean. " 
 
 "Then go with him and learn. It 11 pay." 
 
 "And leave Clarita?" 
 
 " You may return to-morrow night if you wish," 
 said the priest. 
 
 Vicente was unconvinced. The priest led him, 
 then, to the water s edge. 
 
 "We shall speak to the other," he said. 
 
 They found the boat, and, a little way from it, 
 the tall man standing on the shore. The latter 
 approached and laid a gentle hand on Vicente s 
 shoulder. Then he stooped and talked to him. 
 His voice was low and sibilant, but kind. It 
 seemed to hold a magic in it for the boy, who knew 
 not why, but half wanted to follow him. 
 
 "Come with me, my son," said the speaker. "It 
 is necessary. I will teach you, to-night, many 
 things you have wanted to know. I am your 
 mother s, your father s, the priest s friend. They 
 and I say it is best." 
 
 In spite of the magic a sudden panic seized 
 Vicente. He broke away and ran to the hut. He 
 caught Clarita in his arms and cried : 
 
 " Oh ! they are going to take me away from you ! 
 I can t leave Clarita!" 
 
 Passion swept over Francisco s face. He waited 
 no more, but tore the girl away from him, seized 
 him in a grip of iron, and carried him back to the 
 shore. Clarita, terrified, seeing her best-beloved 
 
io A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 dragged away, cried aloud in that frightful dread 
 and wretchedness known only to a child. At the 
 shore Vicente heard her calling his name and weep 
 ing. She was following him, in the second bereave 
 ment of the night, toward the water. Francisco 
 ran back and stopped her, and they two were again 
 in the hut. The priest held the boy by the 
 shoulder. Another shadow was seen then, running 
 out from the banana-trees across the beach to the 
 shore, a small shadow. It came boldly up to the 
 boat s side, and a girl s voice called out: 
 
 "What are you going to do with him? " 
 
 It was a very young voice. This girl could not 
 have been more than ten years of age. Her face 
 could not be plainly seen, but she was tall for her 
 age. Her dress was shorter than Clarita s, and her 
 head and feet were bare. 
 
 "Who is this?" said the boatman kindly, at the 
 same time reassuring Vicente by the pressure of his 
 hand. 
 
 "This is Pepa," said the trembling Vicente. 
 "Her mother keeps the restaurant." 
 
 "I am Vicente s sweetheart," spoke up Pepa 
 without hesitation, and frankly. "Vicente is going 
 to marry me when he grows up. Do you think I 
 would stay at home when his mother died? No. I 
 am not afraid of the small-pox; and I ran away and 
 came. I have been hid under the banana-trees 
 since dark. What are you going to do with him ? " 
 
 The tall stranger slowly took a wax match from a 
 box, lighted it, and held it to her face. It lit a 
 keen interest in his own eyes. He smiled. There 
 was one gray lock falling down on his white check, 
 wherein were wrinkles. 
 
 "Ah, she is beautiful. You will marry him 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE n 
 
 when he grows up ? " he said, as the match went out. 
 " Good. And you want him now to go with me and 
 see some of the world you will conquer together." 
 
 "Oh! is that what you are taking him for? " said 
 she, as though she understood it. She meditated, 
 while Vicente wavered between the fascination 
 which the scene and the man were exercising on 
 him and his fears. She seemed altogether too old 
 for her age. 
 
 "She is a strange child," muttered the priest. 
 
 "Yes, Vicente, you ought to go," said she. 
 
 The boy was lifted bodily into the boat. He 
 struggled much, but it was of no avail. Within, 
 he sank down, trembling more. The robed form of 
 the stranger entered after him and cut off escape. 
 He was startled at the rising of a rower at the 
 boat s farther end. He had thought there were 
 only the two of them in the vessel. The rower 
 said nothing, but took up his oars, and the boat was 
 pushed off. Even yet Vicente heard the sobs of 
 Clarita in the hut as she cried his name, the hut 
 that had been his home, and from which the woman 
 who had loved him had been carried away on a 
 fisherman s shoulders. 
 
 " Good-by ! good -by !" cried Pepa from the 
 shore. " And you will marry me when you come 
 back ! " 
 
 It was all a dream to him. He was bewildered, 
 and could not think. Crouched on the boat s bot 
 tom as it glided away into the darkness, the last he 
 heard from the shore was little Clarita s voice. 
 She was weeping and calling his name. 
 
CHAPTER II 
 
 THEY were out of sight of the shore almost at once, 
 save for the faint candle-light at the hut. That 
 too disappeared when they sank into a deep trough 
 of the waves, and when they arose again Vicente 
 could see it no more. He was on the floor of the 
 boat with the oarsman behind him and the old man 
 in the stern before him, and there was no sound but 
 that of the oars and the waves. He gained assurance 
 sufficient to look about. The oarsman was not to be 
 distinctly descried. He wore a sombrero that made a 
 pointed shadow against the sky as he swayed back 
 and forth. His silence alone was remarkable, and as 
 he pulled he sometimes sighed deeply. There was a 
 slim little mast with a sail furled on it, unused because 
 they were going against the wind. They appeared to 
 him to be aiming straight out across the lake, a thing 
 he had heard called madness in such a frail bark as 
 this and in the night. For the worst storms come at 
 night and the nearest shore straight across is twenty 
 miles away. He was not a child to be long cowed. 
 He gained self-command. That black figure in the 
 boat s stern must know its course. A kind of pride 
 or haughtiness came to the child and he sat still, 
 scorning to be afraid. 
 
 It seemed hours during which nothing happened, 
 and there was no word spoken. The ceaseless rise 
 and fall of the waves, their lapping on the boat s sides, 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 13 
 
 and the stroke and the sigh of the oarsman, these 
 were all. He longed to see the face whose eyes had 
 fascinated him. The form was always there in the 
 same position, but the face unseen. He believed it 
 must be midnight or later, and in spite of the strain 
 he was growing sleepy, when the wind changed. He 
 saw the old man s arm make a slow motion in the air, 
 and the oarsman ceased rowing, hoisted the little sail, 
 and crawled to the stern, sitting down beside the other. 
 Dread and doubt swept over the boy in turn as he 
 watched them. 
 
 The boat sped on now, striking the waves boldly, 
 and the sail was full. That great loneliness came over 
 Vicente again. It was the loneliness of the lake thus 
 dark and unknown, the loneliness of the night, and 
 the loneliness of his heart. He was tired and he lay 
 on the boat s bottom. He was thinking of Clarita 
 when he fell asleep. 
 
 He was awakened by the striking of the boat upon 
 a rock gently. He started up and the rower was 
 leaping out to a shore dimly seen. The sail was 
 down and the boulders of a high and rugged ascent 
 loomed about. Half the night sky was shut away by 
 a mass of land whose rugged edge above him cut a 
 zigzag line along the stars. He had never been, since 
 he could remember, five miles from the village of 
 Chapala. Nor were any coasts opposite the village 
 known to him. Familiar names of certain Indian 
 towns on the lake s border were in his mind, but 
 here was no town. Nor did he know how many 
 hours the journey had occupied. He had come 
 long over black waves. He had arrived in the night 
 at an unknown and seemingly deserted coast. He 
 knew no more. 
 
 His companion, following the oarsman, lifted the 
 
i 4 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 boy out to the rocks. The oarsman was again com 
 municated with by signs. He was apparently deaf 
 and executed his orders like a slave. The boat was 
 tied in a little cove, the chain rattling startlingly on 
 the otherwise complete silence. The oarsman went 
 on up the ascent, picking the tortuous path among 
 rocks. Vicente preceded the old man and struggled 
 up. He was at length lifted into the latter s arms and 
 borne, as though his weight were nothing. A wild 
 goat and kids started from the rocks and bleated, 
 leaped away, and were gone in the gloom. The 
 climbers were a hundred feet above the water when 
 they came to a wall. The servant scrambled over it 
 and took the boy. The wall was in ruins with rough 
 stones fallen at its base. There was tangled vegeta 
 tion here and cacti lifted their myriad flat leaves 
 against the sky, for the summit of the ascent was 
 reached. The oarsman put the boy down and be 
 tween the two men Vicente walked on. There was 
 no further sign of life, and he imagined he could see 
 the faint gray of the dawn. Before them rose huge 
 irregular piles, formless. A little nearer and the 
 piles were ruins too, ruins of buildings vaster than 
 any he had ever seen. They entered in between two 
 walls that broke off aimlessly at the entrance. All 
 seemed stone, heavy, irregular, silent. All was de 
 serted. They climbed over heaps of rocks fallen 
 from heights that loomed broken overhead. They 
 were at length under a high-arched roof which, with 
 its walls, formed a black tunnel whose end he could 
 not see. At its beginning the arch too had fallen, 
 and indistinctly he could descry another arched roof 
 that joined it. The tunnel was double. 
 
 Within they walked over soft mold and the place 
 was damp. When they had penetrated some distance 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 15 
 
 into this passage the leader paused and struck a light. 
 There were sheer walls surrounding them, rising to 
 the shadowy arch. A door in the masonry here 
 blocked the path. This the servant opened and led 
 the way, holding the match, down stone steps, and 
 the boy was pushed after him. They arrived thus 
 at a chamber where the servant lit a candle. He 
 was bade by a sign from his master to withdraw, and 
 he did so, there being only time for Vicente to see as 
 he turned to the door that his hair was straggling and 
 long and his face disfigured by a great scar stretch 
 ing from the corner of his mouth across his cheek. 
 
 There were heavy benches and a seat made of the 
 fallen stones. The floor was of stones also, as were 
 the walls and the roof. There were shelves built up 
 irregularly of pieces of the ruins, and a bottle of wine 
 and some bread were on one of them. A couch 
 covered with blankets stood opposite the one door, 
 and stones formed a table whereon were books and 
 candles. 
 
 " Sit down," said the old man. 
 
 The boy sat and looked at his companion. He had 
 not seen the latter s face plainly till now. It was a 
 face that he never forgot. It seemed half smiling and 
 half grim. It might be fascinating or terrible its 
 white forehead, its wrinkled cheeks, the strong mouth 
 defying age with the lines about it that might mean 
 grief, or power, or crime, the eyes that alone showed 
 a hidden fire which must have burned in vain for 
 years, the gray hair falling round it. The man came 
 nearer and laid on the boy s shoulder a hand that was 
 long, of large joints, and heavy. His voice was oddly 
 gentle. 
 
 " You have never heard of a hermit," he said. 
 
 " No," said the boy. 
 
1 6 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 " Nor do you know why men leave the world and 
 bury themselves away like animals in the depths of 
 the earth." 
 
 He stood long, musing over the child, scrutinizing 
 his features. He sighed then, like one stricken, and 
 turned away and sat down on a bench by the table. 
 
 " I will tell you why," he said at last. 
 
 He turned fully to Vicente again and never ceased, 
 till he ceased speaking, to hold him with his eyes. 
 He knew the power of that gaze. He knew and felt 
 the weight of his purposes. Under circumstances 
 the most simple how impressionable is a child ! Spell 
 bound, half terrified, how could this one escape the 
 singular influence of his unknown companion? Vi 
 cente s lips were drawn and his eyes were wide. 
 Clarita s voice had died from his ears. Pepa was 
 no more in his thoughts. Francisco, even she they 
 had borne away, were forgotten. Only the unthought 
 loneliness was there, and he listened. 
 
 " You live," continued the hermit, seating himself 
 by the table, his voice low and distinct, " in the most 
 unfortunate country on the face of the globe. She 
 was conquered in blood, she was ridden in selfishness 
 and brutality, she is exploited by adventurers and 
 torn by revolutions. She is no country. And who 
 owns her? Whose is the land and the right? There 
 was, here on these plains and in these mountains, in 
 the times gone by, a proud and noble race, your 
 race. And the land was free and the government an 
 empire. Your mother s fathers built cities under this 
 same Mexican sun, and reared a state strong and 
 beautiful. They were masters of the soil for centur 
 ies. They were proud, true, silent. They were bent 
 on a civilization on whose very threshold they stood, 
 when one fatal year, in the midst of their security, 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 17 
 
 came the sound of the Spanish gun. You have heard 
 tales of the conquest. You do not know its ferocity, 
 its bloodiness. Your own fathers were cut down like 
 the corn in the field. Your fathers cities were swept 
 away in ruin. Your fathers wives and daughters were 
 seized and held for the basest purposes, and cast 
 away. But for one all-merciful hand every individ 
 ual of your race would have fallen in blood or pined 
 in slavery, and your great-grandfathers, your mother, 
 you yourself, would never have existed. That one 
 merciful hand was the hand of the church. It could 
 not restore to you your ancient lands ; it could only 
 save you from butchery or slavery and keep you 
 alive, holding you in its bosom, warming and nourish 
 ing you, till you should have learned to be your mas 
 ters. This it did. For many years you were slaves 
 and it freed you and taught you religion. It has 
 been your race s protector, your race s only hope." 
 
 The speaker s face was lit almost with the light that 
 lights the face of the fanatic. He leaned farther over 
 the rude table, stretched out a long finger at the awed 
 listener, and continued : 
 
 " Child, to save a lost and fallen race is the noblest 
 calling that a man can have. If that race be your 
 own, and its blood leap in you, and you be fighting 
 the battle of your butchered fathers and winning that 
 which is by God s right yours, the task is infinitely 
 great. Do you know, child, whose is that task? " 
 
 The boy could not have escaped from his com 
 panion s eye had he wished. He did not wish. He 
 gazed at him and slowly shook his head. He was 
 moved and thinking, and a flash of satisfaction came 
 into the hermit s face. 
 
 " Boy," he said solemnly, " that task is yours." 
 
 There was silence for some seconds. 
 
1 8 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 " How how," said the youth, hesitatingly, " can 
 it be mine?" 
 
 " You have seen the poverty of your own people. 
 You have lived among them and you know their ig 
 norance. Your priest tells me he has begun to teach 
 you to read. The great light of written words will 
 soon shine on you. Already, young as you are, I 
 know you have begun to realize the difference be 
 tween your people as they are and your people as 
 they ought to be. Your enemies cry, Give them 
 time ! They will rise ! My son, they have had 
 three hundred years, and they have not risen. Why? 
 Because they are cheated of their own, and their 
 conquerors alone have knowledge and civilization. 
 They need one strong hand held out to help them 
 up. They shall then attain that freedom and that 
 greatness for which the church has held them and 
 has waited." 
 
 "Why," said the boy, "the country is free. Hi 
 dalgo freed it." 
 
 A low, bitter laugh broke from the other. 
 
 " Free to what? To a hundred successive bon 
 dages. Child, where there is no stability, no govern 
 ment, there can be no freedom. Hidalgo, like his 
 many followers, though his cry was liberty and his 
 banner the Virgin, was an adventurer. How soon 
 after his death did Iturbide s empire prove his weak 
 ness? That empire should have lived. There should 
 be no republic here. This country s factions are too 
 wild. She is too unsettled. Govern herself ? Mad 
 ness ! She can no more govern herself than a wind 
 can govern the sea it has lashed to fury. She needs 
 one powerful, never-failing hand. Iturbidc lacked 
 the strength. He fled, returned, and died. Your 
 land and your people have, since then, been given 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 19 
 
 over to a mob of madmen. Revolution has followed 
 revolution. Government there is none. Lies, treach 
 ery, murder, self-aggrandizement, are the politics and 
 the aim of these successive devastating flames. Your 
 people are like starved sheep, driven bleating here 
 and there, fleeing the forest fire to be caught in the 
 barren rocks, and leaping the rocks only to fall into 
 the sea. So-called governments hold you as the 
 despairing player holds the dice and cast their for 
 tunes with you. Each new blusterer lets you fall as 
 you will, only that it be luck for him. Allende, 
 Guerrero, Morelos my son, what were they? 
 Criminals with their fingers on your throat. And 
 most blasphemous " 
 
 Here he leaned farther forward and there was a 
 singular smile on his face that drew the lines about 
 his mouth into unpleasing prominence. 
 
 " The church itself, the vessel of God s spirit, your 
 only friend and protector, is exploited with you." 
 
 There was a long silence after this, and the speaker 
 sat watching the boy. The expression of the old 
 man s face sank into sadness. He raised his hand 
 and stroked the long gray locks. 
 
 " My son," said he at last, " you are coming to the 
 rescue, and I shall tell you why. You were not born 
 to fish or to plant corn on the shores of this lake. 
 You were born to learn and to do. Your country 
 and your people have waited long for one strong 
 spirit. For the ancient empire lives yet, trodden 
 though it is, in the depths of your national character. 
 The time is coming when every bitter wrong you 
 have suffered will bear its fruit at last, and the fire 
 burst out. I have heard its warning. These last 
 petty brawlers will light the match, for you and your 
 race will endure no more. If I prove to you the 
 
20 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 right is yours and the time has come, and give you 
 the means and show you the way, will you follow and 
 grow to be your people s liberator?" 
 
 The boy, wrought to a high pitch, threw his head 
 down on his arms to the table and cried with a fervor 
 that sounded strange in a boy s voice : 
 
 " I would Holy Mary help me ! I would do it if 
 I could ! " 
 
 " You can and you will. The woman who died 
 to-night was not your mother." 
 
 The boy started up as though he had been struck. 
 The other s face calmed him, and he sat down, hold 
 ing his breath. 
 
 41 Will you believe me? Have you faith that I am 
 telling you the truth? " 
 
 " Yes," gasped the boy. 
 
 " Your mother died fourteen years ago. She came 
 to the monastery one night in Guadalajara bringing 
 you. Ah, I remember the night." He stopped and 
 dreamed. Of all the many emotions that the face 
 had shown, the sorrow on it then seemed the deepest. 
 " I remember the night. She was nearly dead when 
 she came. She died there. We took charge of you. 
 Your eyes ah, yes your eyes were like hers, 
 when the monk brought the candle and held it over 
 you, and your hair was already black and thick." 
 He paused again, dreaming. " Some of the monks 
 knew her and her history, and they decided together 
 that you should be kept and cared for. I will tell 
 you who she was. 
 
 " Montezuma s was not the only so-called empire 
 in the Mexican valley. There were two others on the 
 banks of the Texcocan lake. There was another 
 city, too, almost as beautiful as his, the city of Tex- 
 coco. These three empires formed a league and 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 21 
 
 were, when your enemies conquered them, virtually 
 equal. The kings of Texcoco were as royal as Mon- 
 tezuma himself, though the latter held the predomi 
 nance in the councils and the wars. The three ruled 
 all this land, farther to the north than this, and farther 
 south than Yucatan. Before the conquest Texcoco 
 was torn with wars of the succession. One branch 
 of the royal family was driven away, a cousin of the 
 king seizing the throne. A brother of that king was 
 one of those driven out. In the event of there being 
 no heir from him who held the throne or him who 
 claimed it, this brother s descendants would be the 
 rightful kings. After so many years, that has come 
 to pass. That wronged Texcocan, after using all his 
 powers in vain to win Montezuma to his cause, wan 
 dered in the mountains for many months. His 
 brother at last came into his own through the inter 
 vention of Cortes, and he expected again to be taken 
 into favor. In this treachery disappointed him. He 
 who then took the throne feared this wandering 
 brother would attempt a usurpation. The latter was 
 hunted down just previous to the conquest and would 
 have been killed. Absolutely alone he fled far to the 
 west, over many mountains and plains, being days 
 with scarcely any food. One evening near sunset he 
 arrived at the summit of a ridge, and looked down 
 into the bosom of this lake, then called Chapalac. 
 The beauty of its circling mountains, the limpidness 
 of its waters, soothed him. At his feet lay a little 
 fishing village, the same they call to this day Tizapan. 
 He descended, found shelter among these simple 
 folk, kept the knowledge of his identity to himself, 
 and spent his days and died there. But he had mar 
 ried one of the maidens of the village. To her alone 
 he confided the secret and laid on her the solemn io- 
 
22 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 junction that the knowledge of his royalty should go 
 down, a sacred secret in the line, till some future date 
 should restore it to its own. Just before his death he 
 made her swear it. He died in ignorance of the fall 
 of Mexico, and the fact that the kingdom whose se 
 cret his wife held was swept away. She had two sons, 
 and they, too, were intrusted with the truth and cer 
 tain written proofs of it. So the line descended. It 
 branched away from the lake, and I have studied it 
 elsewhere. Some of its branches are lost ; there is 
 only one that is clear to the present day. One of its 
 members was a bishop in Guadalajara one hundred 
 and fifty years ago ; another died fighting a corn in 
 surrection in the city of Zacatecas near the end of the 
 last century. As the line descended, the written se 
 cret, with its gradual accumulation of added proof, 
 descended with it, cherished fondly to the death of its 
 every member. Fourteen years ago the only living 
 representative was a woman of twenty years. She 
 was beautiful. Her blood was pure as the blood of 
 the old emperors. Not one taint of the Spaniard had 
 entered the line. She had the bearing, the untouched 
 strength of mind, and the will of royalty." 
 
 The speaker sighed, shaded his face with his hand, 
 and paused. 
 
 " Well, she bore a son," he continued, " and died." 
 
 The boy was trembling from head to foot. He 
 arose and seized the other s hand, half in a curious 
 frankness, half in agitation. 
 
 "Am I the boy?" he cried. 
 
 " You are the boy." 
 
 The weight of it fell on Vicente then, and he could 
 say no more. His face was gray-brown, and he again 
 sat down. 
 
 " Her secret was intrusted to me," said the hermit. 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 23 
 
 " She knew the church to be against the folly of Hi 
 dalgo. She knew the Dominican monastery at Gua 
 dalajara to be in favor of royalty. She had no grown 
 member of the family to whom to intrust the secret, 
 and you were too young. And I had been a 
 friend to her. So she died, leaving it to me. Two 
 of my brother monks were told, and it was decided 
 that if the time came to help you to your own, your 
 old rights and the old rights of the church at once 
 might be restored. It was agreed that, to a certain 
 age, you should be raised among the common people, 
 that you might know them. I was leaving then the 
 monastery, even that little of the world I was putting 
 behind me. I carried you to this lake and thence to 
 Chapala, and gave you to Francisco and to Julia. 
 Yesterday word came to me from the Chapala priest 
 and the monastery that Julia was dying. Then, too, 
 the time is coming. So I went and brought you. I 
 had paid Francisco much to keep you. I had to pay 
 him more to get you away without disturbance, for he 
 wanted you to help him with his fishing boats. Ha ! 
 ha ! " The laugh was grim. " Fishing boats ! As 
 the Christ said on the borders of a lake like this : 
 Come, I will make you a fisher of men ! 
 
 There was another long pause, and the boy, scarcely 
 able to sit, tingling in every nerve, waited. 
 
 " The least touch of the match," continued his 
 companion slowly, " is sufficient to raise a revolution 
 in this inflammable land. It needs the strong hand of 
 a rightful king to hold it in its proper course. I say 
 again, the people are ready for you. You are to say 
 whether or not you will make yourself ready for 
 them. If you tell me yes, you shall be taken to-mor 
 row night rather to-night, for it must be already 
 day to the monastery at Guadalajara. You will 
 
24 .-/ DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 be cared for, educated, trained there by careful hands. 
 And you will be taught the world you are to con 
 quer. I brought you here, first because this is half 
 the distance to the spot on the shore where a horse 
 man will meet you to carry you thither ; second, be 
 cause here my purposes as to your destinies took 
 unchangeable shape ; third, because here, locked in 
 the ground, I keep the proofs, and I am going to in 
 trust them to you. I wanted you to carry through 
 all your life the memory of this night, the picture of 
 this place, and the face of this lonely old man, that 
 you may know the life and the secrecy that guards 
 your destiny. For child, child," and his voice was 
 unsteady, " your destiny is mine." 
 
 The hand that had again shaded his face was taken 
 away. 
 
 " Tell me if you are ready. Your people were 
 driven from their Eden and made to toil and sweat 
 three hundred years in bondage. Come. I will lead 
 you back that you may see again the cherubim and 
 the flaming sword that turneth every way and know 
 again where is your race s tree of life." 
 
 The boy arose impassioned, fell on his knees 
 beside the hermit, and clasped him as he would have 
 clasped a father. 
 
 " I will do it. Help me, oh Holy Mary! " 
 
 To this the hermit replied nothing, nor did he 
 touch the youth with his hands. A look that was a 
 mixture of daring and of fear, and, too, of some 
 stronger passion, flooded his face as he stared at the 
 kneeling figure. When the boy arose he said : 
 
 "You will think of it long and deeply." 
 
 He too was on his feet, going in scarcely concealed 
 agitation to the entrance. 
 
 "Sleep there," he said, pointing to the couch, 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 25 
 
 and went out of the low door and closed it behind 
 him. 
 
 To Vicente, wrought to the highest strain qf emo 
 tion, it seemed for a moment that with the thud of 
 the closing door he must awake from his dream. He 
 sat down on the cot and watched the wavering halo 
 round the candle s flame. His gaze followed the rays 
 and rested on the shelf with the bread and the bottle, 
 on the table with the books, and on the unspeaking 
 stones of the walls. He lay down at full length, his 
 eyes again on the halo. He had hardly done so 
 when he fell asleep. He slept profoundly, dream- 
 lessly, for twelve hours. 
 
CHAPTER III 
 
 IT was the opening of the door that awoke him. 
 He started up with a cry and saw the old man 
 standing at the bedside, a fresh candle in his hand. 
 Of the white light of the hermit s face, there was no 
 abatement. The latter then talked to the youth again 
 for an hour, in that same low, convincing, compelling 
 tone, now standing before him fastening on him his 
 eyes, now walking with long strides to and fro the 
 length of the little cell. His form seemed taller, as 
 though it straightened with the inspiration of his 
 words. There was nothing left unsaid. The pitiable 
 plight of the nation, the duty of a king, the future 
 these were the themes, rendered solemn, sweet, 
 glorious by a measured eloquence calculated to 
 impress even an older and a less emotional heart 
 than Vicente s. He stopped at last in the middle of 
 his walking and turned abruptly on the boy. 
 
 " Are you ready?" he cried. 
 
 The listener had wakened with every nerve on the 
 alert. He had drunk every word. He now stood up 
 with every drop of his blood bounding in his veins. 
 
 " I am ready," said he. 
 
 The hermit went to the shelves, took away the 
 stones at their back, and drew out two small 
 packages. 
 
 " These are the proofs," he told the boy, putting 
 one into his hand. " You will keep them forever, 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 27 
 
 and learn to read them. And this," giving him the 
 other, " is a little money. You will need but little 
 now. In the time to come you will not forget the 
 tomb from which you are to receive the rest." 
 
 " Why is it a tomb at all?" suddenly asked the 
 boy, half daring, half childishly frank. " And why 
 did you leave the monastery instead of staying to 
 teach me yourself, and why are you buried here? " 
 
 " Asked like a king of his subject," mused the 
 hermit. 
 
 Saying no more, he went to the door and, opening 
 it, stood for a moment looking up and out. No light 
 of day penetrated to the cell. The boy reasoned as 
 to the hour. It must be night again. Presently the 
 servant came down the steps and in. He bore a 
 basket which he put upon the floor. The boy was 
 again struck with his peculiar appearance. The scar 
 gave to his face an expression partly devilish, partly 
 foolish. His eyes and forehead bespoke intelligence. 
 His manner was that of the defeated, even the cowed. 
 He went out. 
 
 " Eat," said the hermit. 
 
 The youth found wine, bread, beans, and fruit in 
 the basket. He ate heartily, drank some wine, and 
 stood up again looking his benefactor fearlessly in 
 the eye. 
 
 " I am ready to go now," he said briefly. 
 
 The hermit again opened the door; the servant 
 came nearly to the entrance and stood waiting on the 
 steps in the shadows outside. 
 
 Vicente approached those shadows. His bene 
 factor took his hand and pressed it so that it ached, 
 saying : 
 
 " Boy, your soul is your mother s soul, and your 
 destiny is beyond even a hermit s dreams." 
 
28 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 The speaker wheeled away, plainly agitated. He 
 went to the farthest side of the cell, crying strangely, 
 with his back to the youth : 
 
 " Go ! Leave me ! Leave me ! " 
 
 In the doorway Vicente turned. 
 
 " I only want to be sure of one thing," said he, " if 
 you will promise it to me." 
 
 The old man wheeled again and waited. 
 
 " I want the priest in Chapala to teach Clarita to 
 read," said the boy. 
 
 " It shall be done," was the reply, " and in return 
 I shall exact this promise of you. You are never to 
 seek this spot again till it seeks you. You are never 
 to inquire its location. No curiosity, no motives 
 good or bad, are to lead you to search for me till I 
 have called you. If you never so much as hear of 
 me till your throne be established you are not to 
 think it strange. Simply in silence trust me, believe 
 that I have reason and know my course, and seek not 
 to unearth this tomb, lest its power to help you fail. 
 Will you promise me this?" 
 
 " I promise it," said the boy, and went out. 
 
 He was just outside the door. His gray-brown 
 face, lit with determination, a face so much lighter 
 than that of the slavish figure behind him, seemed to 
 stand out of the gloom. With a sudden sound like a 
 sob the hermit strode across the cell and seized him 
 violently in his arms. 
 
 "The face," cried he, " the face too ! " 
 
 And he kissed the face with passion, pushed the 
 boy away, and turned into the cell again, shutting the 
 door behind. The last impression Vicente had of 
 his features was the impression of suddenly increased 
 wrinkled age. 
 
 The servant and the boy went out together, the 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 29 
 
 servant leading. They passed over the soft mold 
 and under the long arched roof. They came out of 
 the tunnel s broken end and climbed the piles of 
 fallen stones. The sound of small waves, dashing on 
 the rocks, came suddenly up and the night wind struck 
 them. Over the stony way they had come they 
 descended to the water and the boat was rocking at 
 the shore. The night was much as the previous one 
 had been, starlit ; and the waves were no higher than 
 before. They entered the boat; it was pushed off, 
 rowed round some points of rock, and headed away 
 into the dim lake. After a little time the sail was 
 hoisted, the boatman sat in the stern with the sail s 
 ropes, and the boy sat at the prow. What dreams, 
 what slow unrolling scenes, what fears and hopes and 
 dazzling promises, were in the brain, then, of him 
 whose disposition since his earliest childhood had 
 been the dreamer s, him to whom the waves breaking 
 on the beach, the sunset with its myriad clouds of 
 intensely colored light and its circle of flaming 
 mountains, the nets and the children tumbled to 
 gether on the sand, the care of the only mother he 
 had known, all had held a cause of visions and of 
 loneliness, a meaning, a promise? In a sense the 
 boy died as he crossed the waters on that night, and 
 the man was born, young as he was. But the man 
 knew nothing and must learn. 
 
 An hour passed as silently as had been the iourney 
 on the night before. He began to wonder who could 
 be the figure that sat so motionless in the stern. 
 From wondering this, he pictured his face. The 
 youth s imagination cast that visage constantly up, 
 exaggerated and distorted it. For many minutes it 
 refused to be put down. It seemed to speak pain, 
 agony, crime ; or it was mocking all these. The boy 
 
30 A DREAAf OF A THRONE 
 
 grew intensely nervous and the first fear that he had 
 felt since he left the Chapala beach came on him, 
 now that the strong influence of the hermit was re 
 moved. He could not bear the silence. He found 
 perspiration starting from his forehead. 
 
 "Who are you?" he suddenly cried aloud. 
 
 There was no answer. The waves lapped the 
 boat s sides, and the wind swayed the sail and blew 
 his hair round his face. There seemed no doubt 
 the man was a mute. His imagined features hung 
 before the boy for many minutes yet. The latter 
 heard, then, the dashing of waves behind him to the 
 right. He had not watched their course, nor looked 
 ahead during the last hour. He turned, and another 
 shore and other rocks rose behind him. Another 
 moment the sail was down ; a little longer and the 
 boat was run skilfully aground on a space of beach, 
 three yards in length, left by an opening amidst 
 boulders. 
 
 Only vaguely had Vicente till now realized his ab 
 solute ignorance of that spot of shore to which the 
 hermit had led him. Now as he leaped out it broke 
 on him with full force. In all the lake s one hundred 
 miles of length, two hundred and fifty miles of cir 
 cuit, where was the cell? And this spot, too, where 
 was it? They could not have crossed the lake in two 
 hours. They must have crossed, thought he, merely 
 a bay, sailing from one rocky point to the arm oppo 
 site. He knew of no such bay. They might be at 
 the extreme western end of the lake where it narrows. 
 He had but a moment to puzzle over this, for two 
 horsemen and a third riderless horse came along the 
 beach over a stony trail. One of them brought a 
 basket and gave it to the mute, who, putting it and 
 himself in the boat, lay down there, doubtless waiting 
 
A DREAM OF- A THRONE 31 
 
 for a turn of the wind before retracing his course. 
 The other horseman dismounted and gave the third 
 animal to the boy. 
 
 " The hermit has intrusted you to us," he said, 
 without preface. " To the monastery. Come ! " 
 
 Vicente mustered his courage. A new, half-savage 
 delight, such as the boy feels in reading of strange 
 adventures, took possession of him. But the reality 
 of it, and the weight and purpose of it never left him. 
 He mounted, and they rode away. The rocks clinked 
 under them. They ascended a low knoll, and came 
 by a single path to an opening between peaks where 
 they rose higher and higher to the connecting ridge, 
 and then descended again to a valley. They struck 
 a wider road after a time, and spurred on. For hours 
 the horses were urged to an almost incredible speed. 
 The boy was strong and tough as his Indian fathers, 
 and he rode well. Mountains loomed to the ris^ht 
 
 o 
 
 and the left, were passed and sunk into the shadows. 
 Others rose to the front, and were passed too. Here 
 a heavy gate was opened and closed in silence, and a 
 tiny earthen hut stood alone in the wide stretch. 
 Mesquit bordered the way for miles, and dried 
 streams, waiting thirsty for the summer rains, made 
 ruts that the horses leaped. The men spoke but 
 little, and only of the way, the hour, and the speed 
 of the journey. Vicente, with all his youthful vigor, 
 was at last sore and weary when, there being still no 
 light of dawn visible in the sky, they came to the 
 outlying huts of the city of Guadalajara, passed them, 
 and entered its streets of cobblestone. 
 
 They did not pass through the city s centre, but 
 merely made a circuit in some of the outskirts. They 
 were in the regions where the streets become roads 
 into the dusty country, when they stopped at the 
 
32 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 monastery walls. One of his companions dismounted 
 at a double door that was twelve or fifteen feet in 
 height and a good ten broad. The wall itself rose 
 high and massive, and extended seemingly a long 
 distance. It inclosed unseen grounds and the build 
 ings. The dismounted man knocked with vigor by 
 an iron knocker. A porter pushed back the grating 
 of a little window, and there was some conversation. 
 The door swung open and the three entered and 
 were closed in, the ponderous timbers giving out a 
 deep thud. The porter lay down on the ground, and 
 the riders and their horses, finding themselves in a 
 wide, bare court that surrounded edifices, crossed it, 
 and, under these second walls, circled the monastery. 
 
 The boy had nearly lost his sense of direction, when 
 they were halted again at another door. They were 
 all dismounted now, and after another knocking a 
 monk came out and led the horses away, saying 
 nothing. One of Vicente s companions left him, the 
 other led him in. The passages were stone and cold, 
 and they came into an inner patio, square-columned, 
 open to the starlit sky, save where trees made the 
 gloom deeper. Another passage and another patio ; 
 and yet a third passage and a third patio. Every 
 where were silence and darkness. At length in the 
 fourth court, larger than the others, where a fountain 
 played, there was a ray of light. It issued from a 
 cell under the roof of a columned corn-dor. To the 
 partly open door of this they went and knocked. 
 1 lie prior came out, and with him the boy was left. 
 
 The prior brought a candle, whose light fell softly 
 over his black robes and over the sunken, colorless 
 skin of his face. He led the way to a fifth court, and 
 aa they passed the fountain the candle-light fell on an 
 iron stand which held a book of unwieldy size chained 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 33 
 
 to it by an iron chain. Vicente followed. The place 
 took the bounding life out of his veins. As they ap 
 proached the cell that should be his, home-sickness 
 swept over him like pain, and the hut on the Chapala 
 sands was before his eyes. In the cell, bare and rude 
 enough, yet with a bed on which he could sleep him 
 self into enthusiasm again, the prior put down the 
 candle. To this monk there was subject of profound 
 interest in the slight, lost figure before him. He 
 looked into the boy s face, scrutinizing it. Then he 
 blessed him, with his hand on his head. 
 
 " All will be well," said he. 
 
 He went away and shut the child in. 
 
 The outer walls that inclosed the monastery grounds 
 extended four hundred yards in each direction ; they 
 were twenty feet high. In the hundreds of years of 
 Spanish rule in Mexico the church acquired vast 
 tracts of land and built vast edifices. A later policy 
 has swung back the secret doors and made public the 
 cloister, and in many cities walls like these still stand, 
 but inclose barracks, hospitals, prisons. In former 
 days these squares held the great strength of the land, 
 and out of their secrecy and their silence issued who 
 knows what arms of power? 
 
 When that outer door shut the boy in, it was not 
 to open again for him, nor was he so much as to see 
 the world, for six long months. Indeed he never be 
 came wholly free from the influence of the place, and 
 the day when he finally left it for the last time was 
 to be a day of much meaning. 
 
 It shall not be the purpose of this narrative to 
 relate the workings of that power by which the 
 church, in so many countries and so many ages, has 
 molded its agents and brought about its ends. In 
 finite patience seems to have been its watchword. 
 
 3 
 
34 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 Let months and years count for nothing. Do not 
 act till the time is ripe. If the long, long care and 
 building of one set of the church s servants do not 
 finish the task, this is nothing. These being dead 
 the next shall take it up. Be there born in the heart 
 of Rome, or in that of a dependency of Rome, a 
 purpose, it shall be deathless. Rome shall bury 
 haste, she shall hug the secret, she shall cover the 
 egg for years, for centuries if she must, till it hatch. 
 
 Weight and gloom oppressed the boy for two 
 months. He scarcely left his cell. The depth of the 
 purpose should be given time to sink, slowly, deeply, 
 into his very soul. Who, inexperienced, can depict 
 the effect of the cloister on the spirit of a boy? 
 His, and they saw it plainly and joyed in it, was too 
 strong to break. It took in seriousness. He fasted 
 and saw few of the monks. The prior s sunken 
 features and eyes of keen life were much with him. 
 He was led slowly, coldly, in the way of his future. 
 He walked, on rare occasions, like a small, silent 
 ghost, through the corridors and the many patios, 
 where the trees reflected the sun and the fruit hung 
 yellow. He talked a little with the figures about 
 him. He learned, at first, almost nothing concern 
 ing them. They had their cells, their refectory, 
 their chapel. There seemed to be unlimited num 
 bers of them, but the place was so large there were 
 seldom more than a few together, yonder at the 
 fountain, here in the court, passing there under the 
 shadows of the columns, or chanting at the altar. 
 The patios, he learned, were twenty-three. The 
 chapel was exactly in the centre. And wherever he 
 turned, were walls, walls, walls. The prior taught 
 him many things, solemnly. There were many con 
 ferences over his welfare of which he knew nothing. 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 35 
 
 It was gradually explained to him how, to know the 
 world and to realize the meaning of his destiny, it 
 was best first to drink the dregs of bitterness here. 
 Later, said they, he should not be bound by the 
 ceremonies as were they. He should be taught, and 
 should learn to be freer than they. But now 
 
 So he fasted, he prayed, he walked in gloom. No 
 element of the boy was allowed to show itself. He 
 was, for the time, a monk, young as he was. If he 
 did not understand it he did not, at first, question. 
 He was dumb. Many a sick hour his brain revolted 
 and would show him nothing but Clarita, the lake, 
 the woman who had been faithful as his mother. But 
 his outdoor, vigorous spirit, though dormant, was 
 unable to be crushed. Other days his dreams of 
 old came back, and the mystic in him roused and 
 responded to these gloomy walls, these stone pas 
 sages, these trees and fountains. Toward the two 
 months end he grew unendurably weary of this 
 cloister life. The Aztec blood in him was too pure. 
 They found him one day, when they had left him in 
 the deepest gloom, leaping the stones of the fountain 
 with a wild freedom like a panther. They took 
 counsel together. The meaning of his own future 
 had not sufficiently sunk into his understanding. 
 So a monk, one he had learned to hate (though 
 there were many he respected and a few he loved) 
 came to his cell, whither he had slunk away abashed. 
 
 " You must scourge yourself," said he solemnly, 
 and held up the scourge. 
 
 There was a deep vein in his own nature, of the ex 
 istence of which the boy had till then been ignorant. 
 His blood boiled. He was like an enraged king. 
 He scarcely knew what he did. Scourge himself 
 like the lowest? They had done much with him. 
 
36 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 \\c had submitted for weeks. He had desired to 
 submit and had put the boy s spirit down and tried 
 to learn. He had suffered, feared, wept. He had 
 grown thin and weak. The eyes that glared sud 
 denly on the priest were sunken eyes. He knew in 
 that moment who he was. 
 
 " I am no monk ! " he shrieked, and, springing 
 toward his visitor, seized the scourge from his hand 
 and brought it hissing through the air, straight across 
 the other s face. The monk beat a precipitate and 
 scandalized retreat, his cheek bleeding. He cried 
 blasphemy for many a day. The boy shrank trem 
 bling into a corner, rage and remorse combating in 
 him. 
 
 It was a question for the prior to settle, and the 
 prior was old and worldly-wise, despite the cloister. 
 He chuckled to himself over the matter, which he 
 seemed to weigh with solemnity. It proved to him 
 that the boy s nature was a nature to be feared. It 
 was time, said he, that a little more liberty should 
 be granted, and his education should be begun and 
 vigorously pursued. So Vicente was reprimanded 
 only. Then he was led out to the big book chained 
 in the patio. 
 
 " This is the Bible," said the prior. " The com 
 mon people should not read it, but you, you are to be 
 taught to read, not only this, but many other things." 
 
 The monks took him in hand, and the lessons of 
 all kinds began. They found him apt. The monk 
 he had scourged did not approach him, but frowned 
 from a distance with bandaged cheek. Even yet 
 they fed the boy but little. But he wanted little. 
 And many hardships were put upon him. He was 
 cnven, after his studies, heavy labor; but he pre 
 ferred it to idleness. 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 37 
 
 At the end of the half year they sent him out on 
 certain days, like Luther of old, to beg in the streets. 
 They wanted him, too, to learn the city and the 
 customs of its people. So he scudded through the 
 narrow ways, begging his bread, dressed in the habit 
 of the cloister. He prowled into every nook and 
 corner of the town. He was many a time lonely and 
 sad and wandered on, even in the night, to drown 
 his restlessness. The people of some streets grew to 
 know the face of the boy, a face thin but strong, 
 gray-white, unlike the more ordinary Mexican face. 
 The main plaza in the town s centre was haunted 
 by him. The deep cathedral bells seemed to him 
 to find echo in the emotions of his heart, in its mem 
 ories, its capacity for love, its loneliness and its 
 hopes. He wandered under the plaza s trees and 
 among its flowers. He went under the cathedral s 
 pointed towers and into its doors. The mass was 
 solemn to him ; but there was one thing strange in 
 his conduct. He would not kneel. They had 
 noticed this long and with pain in the monastery 
 chapel. They had prayed with him, exhorted him, 
 threatened him, punished him. He had listened to 
 it all. He had not defied them ; he had not seemed 
 rebellious. He had meditated on it and made no 
 reply. They had watched his eyes and pale face, 
 and, puzzled, left him. He would not kneel. 
 
 He learned, in the time that then passed, to read. 
 He had learned a little of the Chapala priest. The 
 prior brought him such books as were calculated to 
 inspire him, histories of his people and their wrongs, 
 works relating to kings and their rights, treatises on 
 the divine origin of the church and its legitimate 
 power. In his sixteenth and seventeenth year in 
 particular, these books and many more absorbed 
 
38 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 him. Also, he went much to the chained volume by 
 the fountain. The Old Testament was his favorite. 
 He read it as another boy reads a fairy-tale. He 
 dreamed over it, lay awake thinking of it, arose with 
 his nerves in tension in the middle of the night and 
 carried his candle to it and read. The books seemed 
 to have changed him more than all else. He 
 became more silent, meditative, self-contained, as 
 though he felt a power grown in him. He had the 
 look and the manner of one much older than he. 
 One night he found in the chained book a pas 
 sage that had failed to strike him before. He re 
 called that the hermit had quoted it. He carried it, 
 after that, till the day of his death, in his heart. 
 
 " And he placed at the east of the Garden of Eden 
 cherubim, and a flaming sword which turned every 
 way, to keep the way of the tree of life." 
 
 Needless to say, long since had he devoured the 
 contents of those proofs of his lineage which the her 
 mit had submitted to him. He read them over and 
 over. He kept them locked away in safety save 
 when he took them out to pore over them yet again. 
 The proof was there, clear and indisputable back to 
 the old time, and every letter of it he learned by 
 heart his mother s epistle written in a fine, peculiar 
 hand and ending with a passionate appeal to her child, 
 then unborn the preceding documents extending 
 back, older and yellower; among them that of him 
 who had been killed in Zacatecas and whose involved 
 sentences embodied a curiously quaint dream of the 
 imperial future the crisp statement of facts written 
 one hundred and fifty years before by the Guadala 
 jara bishop, who trusted his cause to the Virgin 
 finally, the irregular piece of sheepskin, doubtless 
 from some flock of Chapalac s shore, whereon were 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 39 
 
 the unfading hieroglyphics of the old prince, relat 
 ing his wanderings. This last the boy carried 
 always with him. It was like a talisman that brought 
 to him the help of those warrior spirits who had 
 been as royal as Montezuma s self. 
 
 The time was approaching when the monks in 
 tended sending him back, for a year, to his people, 
 to study them more thoroughly, to be in touch with 
 their interests, to wander all the lake region over and 
 be a part of it; then again to return for the final 
 training and the final wait till the opportune moment 
 for the blow. 
 
CHAPTER IV 
 
 CLARITA had not forgotten him. If the fishers 
 knew where he was they did not tell her. She 
 was too little at first to know how to question. After 
 months, during which she rarely heard his name, she 
 lost all disposition to question. But her life was not 
 what it should have been. She still lived in the 
 hut with Francisco ; and Anastasio, his tall, lean 
 fellow-fisherman, had come to live with them. What 
 care she received was little more than to be hastily 
 fed, and, for the rest, to take care of herself. She 
 played with the children on the sand, or went wan 
 dering with the enterprising Pepa up St. Michael s 
 sides over the town. She had in her an unexpressed 
 longing for better care, and she remembered Vicente 
 and held him in her heart. 
 
 She grew pretty as she grew older not a beauty 
 like Pepa s. Pepa s eyes learned to flash at eight 
 years of age. There was freedom, grace, daring, 
 in Pepa s very carriage. She did naughty things, 
 too, and all the village knew her. If she was 
 punished by her mother at the inn she cried out that 
 when Vicente came to marry her, he would punish 
 her mother too and the whole fishing town. She also 
 remembered the boy, but she had so many other 
 things in her lively, scintillant brain, that the mem 
 ory gradually grew vague. With Clarita it was dif 
 ferent. She was quieter ; her prettincss was modest, 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 41 
 
 subdued. Her hair was oddly auburn, and when she 
 washed it in the lake on Saturdays and dried it in 
 the sunny breeze, it glistened like gold ; which gold 
 Pepita mingled with her black tresses, let the wind 
 wrap the two of them in the combined mesh, and 
 ran off laughing with Clarita held round her slim body 
 by Pepita s strong young arm, both girls barefoot. 
 
 Francisco was cruel at times, and loud and boister 
 ous always. He did not understand the child and 
 little cared. So she did not love him. She loved 
 nobody there, unless it were Pepita, whose spirit was 
 too wild for her. She sat on the sand under a huge 
 salati tree that stood by the shore, and, though she 
 did not think it, her little heart was crying for some 
 thing beyond. She thought at those times under 
 the wild fig s great branches of the brother she had 
 romped with, the brother who had carried her on 
 his shoulders, tumbled her in the sand, eaten and 
 slept with her, and disappeared across the lake in the 
 night. When she was eight the priest came and 
 arranged that he should teach her. He explained to 
 her that Vicente had exacted the promise. She had 
 not heard the name for months. Her blood leaped 
 up and her face, not a very dark one, flushed with an 
 eager blush, and the growing dimples in her cheeks 
 were suddenly deep. 
 
 " Where is he ?" she said, half afraid to ask. 
 
 " He has gone away to learn, too, but he will 
 come back." 
 
 She was only bewildered at this. But she asked no 
 more. His memory was the only thing of reality 
 and happiness in her life; he had wanted her to 
 learn, and she would learn. That one past wish of 
 the boy s was enough for all her heart and its affec 
 tions to tie to. 
 
42 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 She was nine years old when she went once with 
 the fishermen to the city market with the fish. Some 
 of the men went early every Thursday morning, that 
 Guadalajara s market might be full of fish for Friday. 
 The fishers clubbed together for this and took turns 
 in going, two making the journey for all. Pcpa had 
 already gone more than once. She had run off ,to 
 go. She used to own a burro of her own, and if the 
 men would not permit her to ride between the 
 baskets on theirs, she rode hers. Alas ! the grow 
 ing, high-spirited, reckless Pepita cost her wrinkled- 
 faced mother at the wesoii many a night s sleep. 
 Clarita would not do as she. When it came Fran 
 cisco s turn she begged to go. It was rarely he let 
 her do anything like that; but he let her now. 
 
 Francisco, Anastasio, and Fortino the big, circled 
 out on the lake in the little boat all night, dropping 
 the meshes of the long net. They drew its two ends 
 then to the beach, and pulled in the net s circle, using 
 both hands and feet, till the white fish wriggled on 
 the sand. This was repeated till three o clock of 
 Thursday morning. Then they piled the fish in tall 
 cylindrical baskets among wet banana leaves with wet 
 banana leaves over the top to keep them cool. The 
 burros were driven out of a lot behind the hut, and 
 came stupidly. The baskets were roped to them, 
 one on either side of each burro. Then Clarita was 
 awakened, arose from the earthen floor, put on her 
 little long dress of pink cotton and heV blue rebozo, 
 and came rubbing her eyes. By lantern light on the 
 beach Anastasio s long arm hoisted her to a burro s 
 back, and she sat high up perched between the two 
 guarding baskets, with her feet out on the burro s 
 neck. Then the journey began, and Fortino he 
 who had carried her mother s coffin away on his 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 43 
 
 shoulder was left with the nets. Francisco and 
 Anastasio walked behind the burros (there were five 
 of them), beating them with sticks, and making the 
 journey, so nearly as possible, a lively one. 
 
 They went for hours thus over stony ways, and were 
 climbing the ridge that stretched between mountains 
 when the sun came up. They stopped on the ridge s 
 summit, with all the great lake spread out like a silver 
 jewel in its porphyry boundary of peaks behind, the 
 sun reflected in it, and the valley and its trail t<? 
 Guadalajara to the front. The girl leaped down, and 
 they made a fire of brush on the ground and warmed 
 beans and ate tortillas. Then they were away again, 
 and noon found them half the distance to the city. 
 Dinner at one was like the breakfast, and the stream 
 they ate it by was tiny and poor, for it was in March, 
 a season warm enough here, but dry. Clarita 
 mounted again in silence, dust on her dress and on 
 her auburn hair, and the animals were beaten on. 
 
 " What would you do, Anastasio," cried Francisco, 
 in a speculative vein, " if you had a thousand dollars ? " 
 
 Anastasio, the chief characteristic of whose attenu 
 ated body was laziness, whistled slowly as though the 
 sum were not comprehensible. 
 
 " I d just sit down on the shore," drawled he, " and 
 let them bring me tequila from the first day of Janu 
 ary round to the last day of December, leaving out 
 Guadalupe day, and San Francisco day, and a few 
 more fiestas, when they could make \\. pulque " 
 
 " Ha ! ha ! " shouted Francisco, as though it were 
 a joke of great refreshing qualities. " But after a day 
 you would n t be in a condition to drink it ! " 
 
 " Then they could just set it around on the sand 
 till I came to," drawled Anastasio. 
 
 " I never saw the amount," mused the other, 
 
44 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 dreamily. "The most I ever had well, you know 
 when it was when they paid me," with a wink at 
 the girl, who was on the second burro to the front, 
 " to keep him, you know." 
 
 " And you spent it infernally regularly. Yours 
 was a great deal. Pay you for taking him, pay you 
 for keeping him, and you made them pay you for 
 taking him away. Francisco," continued the drawl 
 ing fisherman, swinging himself all the while lazily 
 along, and towering far over six feet in lank height, 
 "Francisco, the mother of God will reward you." 
 
 " If I could only sell him again," sighed Francisco, 
 breaking into a roar after the sigh, " the reward would 
 be greater ! " 
 
 Clarita s burro chancing to lag at that moment, 
 they came to her side. There were tears in the 
 child s eyes, and when Francisco uttered a harsh ex 
 clamation at the sight, she sobbed. They whipped 
 the burro up, and she was trotted on, her little bare 
 feet sticking out on the animal s neck, her body 
 perched straight between the two great baskets, and 
 the tears running slowly down her cheeks. 
 
 It was eight o clock at night and dark when they 
 came to the city. They entered an inn, or meson, for 
 the poorer classes. It was low and large and square, 
 built about an open, stone-paved court where many 
 burros waited. The fish being at once disposed of to 
 market-men in tall sombreros and red blankets, the 
 fishermen and the girl went into a dirty dining-room 
 where some were eating round a rude table and some 
 were squatted on the floor. A cook brought them 
 eggs, and the inevitable tortillas, and some fried 
 pork from charcoal fires that burned in pot-like 
 brascros. 
 
 A half hour later the child, lonely, unhappy, was 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 45 
 
 put to bed with some women in a bare room with a 
 blank white wall, brick floor, and matting for a bed. 
 She fell asleep. The next morning the sound of 
 rockets awakened her. She started up in dread. 
 The sound brought over her the misery of that night 
 long ago when her mother died. She thought she 
 was to be torn again from Vicente. She found 
 instead that it was a feast day, and all the city 
 was in a giddy mood. Francisco was calling her. 
 There were to be bands in the plaza, a saint carried 
 with great procession and pomp through all the 
 streets, illimitable amounts of tequila drunk, and, at 
 night, " castles " and wheels in fireworks. In the res 
 taurant were crowds of men and women. The men s 
 white clothing was all spotlessly clean, and the women 
 were in bright colors. Their shouting and laughing 
 bewildered the child, and gorditas and chicharrones 
 and many another fried and sputtering thing sizzled 
 on the charcoal fires. She could not eat. Francisco 
 and Anastasio had already taken some liquor, and 
 they were as happy as was possible for Mexicans to 
 be on a gala day. They had the money for the 
 fish. 
 
 " More tequila ! " whined Anastasio. " I am so 
 long, brothers. It takes so much to get to the bot 
 tom of me. Friends, I can always feel it drying up 
 on the road down, and my stomach is left whistling." 
 
 " Then it will have whistled music enough for a 
 cock-fight before night. Ha ! ha ! " cried Francisco. 
 " Come on ! " 
 
 They were out and away to the plaza, Clarita, her 
 blue rebozo over her head, following them dumbly, 
 forgotten. The narrow streets were full of gay colors 
 and the shops were crowded. The cantinas were 
 fullest of all. Round the plaza were the low-arched 
 
46 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 portalcs under whose continuous shade the people 
 promenaded. The trees swung golden fruit in the 
 morning breeze, the flowers spoke all colors, and the 
 pointed cathedral towers rose high against the deep 
 blue of the Mexican heavens. There was a band 
 playing, and the girl, lost in its melodies, wandered 
 nearer and nearer it. 
 
 It was all strange to her, half awing, half fascinating 
 her. She had watched the crowds for an hour, mov 
 ing slowly here and there, and a great yellow flower 
 that had swung over her head was just falling to the 
 ground at her feet, plucked by the wind, when she 
 remembered that she had not heard the loud jests of 
 her father and his companion for some time. She 
 was alone and grew terrified. She ran from the 
 plaza to the arches of the portales, not knowing why 
 nor whither. As she ran she caught sight of a figure 
 in black, passing among the many brilliant colors of 
 the thronged street. She paused, she stopped. She 
 knew not whether her terror increased or abated. 
 The face of the figure had been toward her but a 
 moment; the figure itself was passing on. She would 
 have cried out, but could not. She was in one 
 instant back in the days of her infancy. She would 
 have run after the black figure, but this too she could 
 not do. She was fixed to the spot. She saw it going 
 away, turning the corner by the cathedral, walking 
 slowly as though in a rcvery and it was gone. 
 
 After many minutes she was able to decide which 
 was the street by which they had come from the 
 meson. She entered it and trudged on, her rcbozo 
 fallen to her shoulders. She was sick and full of 
 wi-ariness. She entered the meson unseen, crept into 
 the room where the matting was, and crouched in a 
 corner on it She was trembling. She stayed there 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 47 
 
 all day, the music, the rockets, the noise of the pro 
 cession when they carried the gaudy saint along the 
 street, failing to draw her out. As for Francisco and 
 Anastasio, they were happy enough, without thought 
 of her, without intention of returning home till the 
 festivities should be done. Tequila is a good thing 
 with which to silence care. They did not return to 
 the meson till nearly night. They entered at last in 
 mood half maudlin, half boisterous. 
 
 " A little more tequila, mother," muttered Anas 
 tasio to the woman in the restaurant. " It has it 
 has got nigh to the bottom." 
 
 Francisco, suddenly remembering, went to look 
 for the child. She was not there. 
 
 The day s gloom and loneliness had produced their 
 fruit. She was not all timidity and she had had time 
 to think and feel. She felt sure she had seen the 
 only human being she loved, the only one that loved 
 her. She had been neglected all her life, neglected 
 and cruelly treated to-day. She wanted him she 
 could bear it no more without him. Toward evening 
 she crept out of the meson again and ran swiftly, 
 recklessly to the plaza, covering her face with her 
 blue rebozo, and arrived breathless at the cathedral. 
 She hung about its great iron gates for an hour, 
 hardly daring to hope. Many figures came out and 
 went in, some of them in black. None was he. At 
 last, when the red sunset was in the sky and over the 
 street, the biggest of the bells boomed out over her 
 head. 
 
 Then she saw him, slighter than the other black 
 figures, graceful, to her beautiful. He was coming 
 out, though the rest were now going in, and she saw 
 his face plainly. She had been a tiny thing when 
 they took him away, and years had passed. But she 
 
48 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 would have known him anywhere in all the world. 
 She saw his face more plainly still. It had never 
 been so white as this in days gone by. It had never 
 been so thin nor the eyes so deep. She was terrified 
 anew at the change in him, terror mixed with ecstasy. 
 She did not run to him. She stood holding to the 
 iron of the gate, staring at his eyes. He was a yard 
 from her, looking at the ground and not seeing her, 
 when she uttered a wild, harsh cry: 
 
 " Vicente ! Vicente ! " 
 
 He turned, surprised, looked, caught her up, and 
 held her sobbing against his breast. 
 
 He was alarmed yet delighted to have her. He 
 walked with her, at first in silence, into one of the 
 narrow streets where the seclusion was more marked. 
 There he put her down. 
 
 " Oh, Clarita ! " he cried, " where did you come 
 from why are you here? " 
 
 She was here to find him, and she told him so, and 
 she never wanted to go back, clinging to his hand 
 with all her dimples out and the blushes there too, 
 the auburn hair blowing about her face and the 
 happiness returned. 
 
 Where did he go? Where did they take him? 
 Where was he now? She would go too oh! 
 mightn t she, mightn t she stay with him? 
 
 "Have they treated you ill?" asked he, looking 
 down at her pityingly. She felt again that his face 
 was changed. It was more serious, the eyes larger 
 and darker. 
 
 She told him they had left her here in the streets 
 and she had run back to the inn and crouched on the 
 floor all day. Could n t she stay with him please, 
 oh ! could n t she stay with him ? 
 
 He bit his lips and there was red blood in his very 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 49 
 
 forehead. His anger at Francisco was boiling in 
 him. Had they begun to teach her to read ? 
 
 " Oh yes, the padre teaches me, and I came yester 
 day with the fish. Oh ! can t I stay with you ? " 
 
 " No, Clarita," he replied, and was lost in a sudden 
 revery. Then he continued as though the decision 
 had but then swept over him. " But I am coming, 
 little sister, and soon. Look at me. I promise to 
 come back." 
 
 He seemed wrapped in the meditation of his 
 purpose after that, and walked on, holding the child s 
 hand. She gripped his as though never to loosen it, 
 and trudged with him. She was terribly afraid he 
 would send her back. His black clothing and his 
 silent manner filled her with something like rever 
 ence. For the mere idea of Vicente had ever been to 
 her an idea of all that was beyond her poor little life. 
 
 He walked faster and faster, dreaming and holding 
 her hand. He came to the monastery walls and 
 suddenly stopped. 
 
 " Clarita," he said, " I promise to come back to 
 you. And when I come I will explain all, why I 
 went away, and the thing that I am going to do. 
 You are going on, and must study as I wanted you to. 
 You will be able, by and by, to understand me. And, 
 under the salati tree I am coming to talk it over with 
 you, there by the lake where we played. Francisco 
 does not know v^hat he does. I shall teach him to 
 treat you better. And now, because it is not per 
 mitted that you enter here, you must go back with 
 him." 
 
 She could make no reply to this. She simply 
 raised her rebozo to her head and wrapped herself in 
 it, humbly obeying. To stay was all her thought 
 but he said to go. It was nearing dusk and the hour 
 
 4 
 
50 A IW.AM OF A THRONE 
 
 had arrived \vlicn the gendarmes of the day on the 
 street corners were being changed for those of the 
 night. One of the latter, ready for his watch, passed 
 them under the monastery walls, with his lantern. He 
 took his station at a corner, and the other, whom he 
 relieved, came walking by. 
 
 Vicente had observed this latter gendarme before, 
 had even addressed him at times. He was a very 
 young man, probably not yet twenty-one. He was 
 a little over medium height with broad shoulders, 
 graceful and athletic figure. The uniform sat well 
 on him. 
 
 " Senor ! " called Vicente. 
 
 The other came up. Vicente explained to him 
 that the child, his sister, had come with the fishers 
 from the lake, that she had lost her way and that he 
 wanted the officer to take her back to the inn. The 
 gendarme had won a secret confidence in him long 
 since by his quiet, firm doing of his duty. Clarita 
 was given into his charge and Vicente offered him a 
 piece of money. The other looked at it, shrugged 
 his shoulders, and smiled. 
 
 " No," said he. " I dare say the child will pay 
 enough in herself. Pay for a pleasure a happiness 
 in the gloom? Ah, not so, my friend. Come, little 
 one, we 11 have you back." 
 
 She turned to Vicente, who caught her up again. 
 
 " Clarita, I promise to come. Go back to the lake 
 and wait for me." 
 
 So, with her hand in the gendarme s and her head 
 turned round to her brother s retreating figure, she 
 left him. 
 
 " And what is the lake like?" asked the gendarme. 
 
 She had said nothing and not seemed to know he 
 was there. She looked up suddenly. She had not 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 51 
 
 / 
 
 noticed before that he was different from other men. 
 His face was white, at least white to her, though it 
 was doubtless tanned. But she always remembered 
 it as white. His hair, too, where it could be seen 
 under his gendarme s cap, was not black and straight. 
 It was dark brown and waving. His eyes were dark, 
 though, like hers, nearly as dark as Vicente s. He 
 spoke her language a little oddly too. She did not 
 know what it meant when one pronounced his words 
 in that manner. She forgot to reply thinking again 
 of Vicente. Vicente would come; Vicente would 
 come ! 
 
 " Is the lake beautiful? Are there mountains there 
 and are the towns big? " 
 
 " Not big like this," said she. 
 
 " Mountains? " 
 
 Yes, there were mountains. 
 
 " Tell me about it. What do you do? What kind 
 of a place? What do they call your town? " 
 
 " Chapala. It is a little place!" 
 
 " Are the people all like you? Ah tell me they 
 are like you ! " He was looking at her auburn hair. 
 
 She did not understand this. 
 
 " Oh no. They are mostly bigger," said she. 
 " Fortino is very big. " 
 
 "Are there any of them white?" he asked with 
 much sudden intensity. 
 
 She threw a quick look at his face. There was 
 some mystery about whiteness to her. No, said she, 
 Vicente was the whitest she knew. 
 
 " And what do you do there? " 
 
 " They fish there." 
 
 " Are the nets big and white, and are there boats ? " 
 
 " Oh yes ; they are very, very long, and they 
 stretch them out on the sand to dry and we play 
 
52 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 out there." She was growing interested and he won 
 confidence. 
 
 " What do you play? " 
 
 " Well, if it is moonlight, while they fish we play 
 on the sand." 
 
 " And who are we? " 
 
 " Pepa and I. It used to be Vicente, but they " 
 
 She could not speak of that, and stopped. 
 
 "Who is Pepa?" 
 
 " She is another girl." 
 
 " Is her hair like yours? " 
 
 " No, it is black. We wash it in the lake on Satur 
 days, and we climb the mountain and can see right 
 down into the patios of the houses." 
 
 " Is the lake very big and beautiful? " 
 
 " Oh yes." 
 
 He sighed deeply and walked on in silence. 
 
 " Are there gendarmes there? " said he. 
 
 " Oh there is a jefe politico there and some of his 
 men." 
 
 Silence again, then : 
 
 " Why," he muttered, " God knows it would suit 
 me. The farther away the better. If it is like you, 
 little girl, it ought to be balm indeed. I think I can 
 feel the breeze and see the sunset already. Heigh- 
 ho ! to be where all is fresh, new, untouched and 
 to forget. Little girl, you are so eloquent a pleader 
 of your native shores that I fain would go ! " 
 
 They came to the inn. 
 
 " This is it," said she subdued, and started in, leav 
 ing him with no ceremony, afraid of Francisco. 
 
 " Good-by ! " he called. 
 
 She turned, startled, remembered the Mexican po 
 liteness, and came and shook hands with him gravely. 
 His face was full of real regret at leaving her. 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 53 
 
 " Good-by. May be I shall come to your lake 
 sometime and see you there and how much better 
 were there none but you and I ! Heigh-ho ! Good- 
 by and back to the shadows." 
 
 She remembered him long. 
 
 Francisco came in soon, raving, and would have 
 whipped her had not liquor rendered his purposes dif 
 fused. She ate/r//<?/.?and tortillas for supper, as always, 
 and went to bed on the matting. " Vicente will come," 
 said she. The castles and wheels of fireworks were 
 duly witnessed by her long since unsteady father and 
 by Anastasio, to the bottom of whom the liquor had 
 now quite descended, much to his satisfaction. They 
 woke her up very early in the morning and the jour 
 ney was made back to the lake as it had been made 
 to the city. And all the way, jogging along perched 
 between the empty baskets on the burro s back, she 
 said, " Vicente is coming." They arrived at Chapala at 
 night and she was tired and sleepy and went to sleep 
 on the earthen floor. Francisco, Anastasio, and the 
 other fishermen counted the money by candle light. 
 There was not much more than half of it left. But 
 then, yesterday was a feast day; and the half was re 
 ceived sympathetically. 
 
 As for Vicente, his purpose was formed. He 
 stated his case plainly to the prior, and, partly 
 because of the imperiousness of his demand, partly 
 because it accorded with the prior s intentions, won 
 the necessary consent. He was nineteen years of age. 
 He had received what was considered, at that time 
 and in that region, a good education. He had read 
 much. He had thought more. He had grown in 
 more ways than one. 
 
 The next morning, with the very money in his 
 pocket the hermit had given him (for he had spent 
 
54 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 almost none of it) with the understanding that his 
 connection with the monastery continued through 
 the Chapala priest, and that through that circuit 
 more money could be drawn, Vicente, dressed in the 
 clothes of the middle classes and not of the monk, 
 rode out of the city and took the stony way to the 
 mountain lake. 
 
CHAPTER V 
 
 OUT of the rocky hills that lie back of Tizapan 
 on the lake s southern side, used to come in 
 those days, to Chapala, a young man of a cold, pierc 
 ing eye, pointed moustaches, and quick, silent tread 
 like the tread of a cat. He was no peon. He had 
 a widowed mother in Tizapan who might have been 
 called not far from wealthy. She gave him some 
 fruit groves in the hills and tried to tame and make 
 something out of him by letting him manage them., 
 The biggest market on the lake in those days was 
 the Chapala market on the northern shore. So she 
 bought him two canoas, and every Saturday afternoon 
 his peons loaded them with fruit and, if he chose 
 (and he generally did, for he loved the water), he 
 came with them, an all night s sail across the lake, 
 to sell on Sunday morning. 
 
 Being of a wild turn he had known the whole lake 
 and the mountains that surrounded it since he was 
 able to row and stick to a horse. He knew too much 
 of it. He had a passion for gambling and came 
 home many a time in his youth without his horse, 
 and not infrequently with two or three. He ran off 
 at eighteen years of age to Guadalajara with several 
 hundred dollars he had scraped together. He learned 
 all the games there, and though he lost nearly all his 
 money learning them, he was a sufficiently apt pupil 
 to win it back again. He went to Mexico City too. 
 What times he had had there nobody knew. After 
 
56 A DREAM OF A TlfRONE 
 
 some months Doroteo Quiroz came wandering home 
 without anything. But he had acquired that cat-like 
 tread, his ever ready manner, and a new daring. He 
 took great pride in having the gambler s honor. But 
 he said, with a sigh, that gambling was a ruinous 
 business and he was going to raise fruit. He did 
 raise fruit; but he set up a roulette table in Tizapan, 
 too, and taught other people to play. His eyes, at 
 twenty-two, had that cold, strained, yet often attrac 
 tive lustre that comes into the eyes of the gamester 
 who has seen wild times. He was grown to be dis 
 tinctly handsome. 
 
 On a certain Sunday morning in summer Doroteo s 
 two flat-bottomed craft, with single square sails 
 spread to a bulging breeze, came sailing across the 
 lake. They had weathered a storm all night, such 
 a storm as only the Chapala rainy season can 
 evolve. The winds and the rain had beaten them, 
 and the waves had cast them about, while streaks 
 of lightning tore the sky. Doroteo had been in it 
 all, save when the rain was hardest, high up on the 
 stern, and had sung a falsetto air to the thunders. 
 The sun was out radiant now, the sails glistened dry 
 ing, steam rose from the wet planks and the piles of 
 yellow fruit on the bottom, and the waves rocked 
 gently. Chapala s white, twin church towers rose 
 glistening before, under St. Michael s stony head, 
 and Tizapan was not even a speck away across the 
 water to the rear. 
 
 " Down with the sails, boys, and up with the 
 poles ! " cried Quiroz ; and then he sang softly : 
 
 " The game was sweet, the game was swift, 
 And deft that black-eyed Spanish girl. 
 She staked her love upon the red 
 I won it fair at every whirl. 
 She would not give it me 1 " 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 57 
 
 He was leaning on the bow of the larger vessel, 
 and the larger vessel s name was the " Goddess 
 Venus," painted in black letters across the sail. He 
 wore one of those rich sombreros that characterize 
 the Mexican gentleman of the country districts. Its 
 silver bands glistened and its wide brim was em 
 broidered in golden threads. He wore, too, tight 
 trousers of a fine, soft leather, with silver buttons 
 linked with silver chains down the sides to his feet, 
 and above, a short brown jacket of the same material. 
 
 The sails came flapping down, and the sailors, with 
 their white cotton drawers rolled to their hips, and 
 their brown legs glistening, walked slowly back ari% 
 forth on the boats upper ledges, poling the awkward 
 vessels to the shore. The smaller of the two, called 
 " The Delirium," was brought thus quite to the 
 sandy beach, stern first. The other was too heavily 
 laden and was halted some yards out. 
 
 " Now, out with you, boys," cried the owner, " and 
 carry me." 
 
 Two peons leaped overboard, and the water rose 
 to their hips. One of them took the rope of the 
 boat; the other received Doroteo s form on broad 
 shoulders and waded with him to the stretch of sand, 
 where he put him down. The stern of the " God 
 dess " was drawn, by means of the rope, to the prow 
 of the " Delirium," and a means thus formed of un 
 loading her cargo, using the smaller canoa as a 
 bridge. There were other canoas tossing about, 
 some at the shore, some anchored far out, some sail 
 ing in or sailing away, each with its one square can 
 vas glistening. These boats are from twenty-five to 
 sixty feet in length, part of each being covered with 
 a thatched roof. There is one mast. Up and down 
 the rugged path that led past the satati-tree into the 
 
58 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 street, and thence to the market-place, workmen and 
 strollers passed and repassed, and the fruits of a 
 hundred kinds of trees and the vegetables of many 
 strange plants, the charcoal of distant fires and the 
 wood and stone of distant mountains, went labori 
 ously thither. 
 
 " Good morning! Good morning, Don Doroteo ! " 
 cried a voice. 
 
 He had scarcely been set down. He turned to 
 find at his elbow a slender girl of fifteen years of age. 
 
 "Pepa! " he cried, letting his gaze wander slowly 
 over her body, a body coming to maturity with re 
 markable swiftness. " Why, she s a woman. Eyes 
 of me she s grown ! Dios ! let her grow an hour 
 more and she s Venus herself. How in beauty s 
 name did you do it so quickly? 
 
 " She staked her love upon the red 
 I Ml win it straight at every whirl 1 " 
 
 "No; it is promised," she said, demurely. She 
 wore a red dress. She clapped her hands in a spon 
 taneous exuberance of spirits and cried it repeatedly. 
 " It is promised it is promised ! " 
 
 "Promised? Faith, you begin early. Promise at 
 fifteen, break it at sixteen. To whom?" 
 
 His men were unloading the fruit. They had piled 
 bags of oranges on the sand. She sat down on them, 
 and talked teasingly: 
 
 " To a man. To the handsomest man. To one 
 who has seen everything that there is." 
 
 Quiroz s eyes were shinir.g and his moustaches were 
 sticking out with extreme pointedness, his whole 
 handsome face showing a scarcely tamed interest 
 in her. 
 
 " He has been, too, to strange places," she con- 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 59 
 
 tinued, her black eyes dancing. " He is going to 
 wake up the world." 
 
 " Good ! " said Doroteo. " And neither the world 
 nor he will sleep again, I 11 wager them on that, if 
 Pepa Aranja is a part of the play." 
 
 There was something half mocking in his tone, and 
 he smiled at her with his lips shut, and then made a 
 dash at her, and would have had her hand, but she 
 leaped up and stood on top of the farthest bag of 
 oranges. The workmen were surrounding her with 
 mangos and tunas. 
 
 " Touch me if you dare," cried she triumphantly, 
 straightening herself up, " and I shall jump into your 
 tunas." The morning breeze was blowing her hair 
 and her skirts about her. There was red blood in 
 her dark face. She was all life, all motion. She an 
 swered his smile then with a dazzling one of her own, 
 a smile such as one might travel a thousand miles 
 and never see again ; and she followed it with a ring 
 ing laugh, and tossed her head. " Oh when we 
 get it awake, we can keep it awake ! " she cried. 
 
 " Jump into the tunas if you wish," said he, step 
 ping slowly nearer her and speaking low, " but tell 
 me about him. Holy Mary ! I may want you my 
 self! You are so alive. Who is he? " 
 
 " Don t you know? He went away five years ago, 
 in the night. He came back last spring. He s been 
 all over and all round the lake since then. You know 
 him ! " 
 
 " Ah," said Quiroz, with much satisfaction. " Vi 
 cente. And fortune goes with him." His eyes 
 dilated, and he came close and whispered. " Are 
 you in this big game, too? By the mass, I believe 
 you re capable of secrets and schemes, and the Lord 
 knows what, young as you are. Come. Maybe I m 
 
60 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 in it too. What do you know that he is going to 
 be what? " 
 
 She grew suddenly long faced. 
 
 " I am not that kind to go telling it," she said, 
 solemnly. 
 
 " Pooh ! I know it all and more. He has been 
 in every town since his return, on all the lake s shores, 
 and beyond. Do you fancy I have n t seen him, 
 talked to him, and offered my humble services? And 
 when he begins oh, Pepa knows it all, eh? Pepa 
 only ! And when he begins, and the wheel spins, 
 Doroteo s future will be staked as well ! " 
 
 She was wide-eyed at this. 
 
 " So," said she, " you know it, too ! " 
 
 " Why, I can hold my tongue. He told me of you. 
 Doroteo is reckless. Doroteo is bold. He has seen 
 the world ha ! ha ! And the game goes on mer 
 rily when he spins the wheel. These things Vicente 
 knows, and Doroteo s knowledge of the people and 
 the lake, si t and his boldness, senorita ! Compared 
 to Vicente and your servant, all other men are 
 cows ! " 
 
 He whispered it full of scorn. 
 
 " And maybe," continued he, " Doroteo, too, is 
 promised to be in at the waking of the world ! " 
 
 His face held a secretive, half fierce expression. 
 He twirled his moustaches. 
 
 " Dios ! " he cried, " to think a girl of fifteen should 
 be a woman and an oriental beauty ! " 
 
 Anyone but Pepa would have hated his gaze. She 
 laughed at him bewitchingly. 
 
 " He will be coming back to Chapala to-day," she 
 cried. "And when he comes ah," looking the 
 while into Doroteo s eyes mischievously, " compared 
 to him all oilier men are cows ! " She laughed 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 61 
 
 again in ringing glee, and clapped her hands, and 
 skipped on the orange bags. He sprang toward 
 her. 
 
 " Little witch ! " cried he, his eyes flaming, " I 11 
 have a kiss out of those red lips for that ! " 
 
 She was too quick for him. She leaped from the 
 orange bags to one of mangos, and skipped a little 
 again, flushed and with flashing eyes. He was after 
 her there, too, and she sprang up to the low bow of 
 the " Delirium," and laughed at him and stuck out her 
 lips. He was up in an instant, making the single 
 high leap from the ground, strong and swift. But 
 her black hair, flying free, disappeared within under 
 the thatched roof, and her feet made a thud on the 
 boat s flat bottom. She was scrambling over the 
 piles of yellow and red fruit, shouting to him to come 
 on, nigh knocking the peons against the vessel s sides ; 
 and he was after her in hot pursuit. She emerged 
 from under the thatch near the boat s pointed prow, 
 and climbed to the boarded space across the front. 
 On this elevated stage over the water she had a mo 
 ment to turn and laugh at him. Then she jumped 
 across the open between the vessels, and was high up 
 on the lofty stern of the " Goddess Venus." 
 
 le I won it fair at every whirl. 
 She would not give it me ! " 
 
 she sang breathless. 
 
 He was there too, and they scrambled under the 
 second thatched roof. She stood at last higher yet 
 on the slanting prow of the " Goddess." The waters 
 rose and fell, sun-lit, under her, and there was no 
 retreat. She was flushed to her forehead, and put 
 out her lips to him temptingly again, as he came on. 
 He thought he had her then, but he did not know 
 
67 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 her. He was jumping up to her exalted perch, when 
 she disappeared over the side. There was a little 
 shriek and a splash, and he saw a red flash swimming 
 away to the shore. She was out on the sand, laugh 
 ing and shouting defiance to him and running away, 
 dripping with her soiled garments clinging round 
 lithe limbs. She was gone in the upper street, and 
 he lacked his kiss. 
 
 Vicente was indeed, at that very time, riding out of 
 Ajicjic, a village on the shore to the west. An hour 
 later he appeared in Chapala, and, shut with Quiroz 
 in a room of the meson, held a conference with that 
 active gamester, whom he had long known as daring 
 and intelligent, and whom he had chosen for those 
 qualities, believing the gaming instinct would be no 
 detriment in the day of hazardous deeds. It was 
 then revealed to Quiroz, not altogether to his satis 
 faction, that the time was not at hand. It was Vi 
 cente s decision that some years must yet go by 
 before the blow should be struck. So the two sep 
 arated, carrying with them certain differing images 
 of the yet distant future. 
 
 As for Clarita, Vicente had done all in his power 
 to better her lonely condition. He had been with 
 her as much as possible, but this was little. He had 
 expostulated with and threatened Francisco in behalf 
 of a kinder treatment, and had finally accomplished 
 something by combining these means with money. 
 He had, too, found a woman who would look a little 
 after the child, for the interest of Pepa s mother had 
 been enlisted more strongly in Clarita s favor. But 
 the child was not happy unless Vicente were there. 
 The veil of sadness that nature and circumstances had 
 cast over her from birth, would not lift, save in his 
 presence, and even then it was not so much a lifting 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 63 
 
 of it as a rendering it sweet. Vicente had come, and 
 she was more nearly happy ; she dreaded thinking 
 of the time when he should again leave her for a long 
 period. She studied diligently these days, and when 
 Vicente was there she doubled her lessons, being 
 taught by the priest and her brother too. She never 
 considered him other than her brother. 
 
 And the day must come when he would indeed 
 leave her again for long. He passed all these 
 months in a careful study of the people, the country 
 of the lake region, the towns, the mountains. He 
 was, for weeks, unheard of, being yonder on the 
 southern border, or in the western hills, or high up 
 among the mountain planters. He learned the 
 people s thoughts, their ways, and the gauge of their 
 intelligence. He carried with him a manner and a 
 mind serious, thoughtful, full of the time to come. 
 He was received everywhere by the clergy, and 
 taught and encouraged must it be said ? even 
 blinded by them. They helped him calculate the 
 power of the springs that would move the people. 
 They showed him the effects of past revolutions, the 
 failure of them, the lack of a deep movement which 
 the church alone could arouse. He grew sad at the 
 spectacle of his unhappy land. He fed on dreams of 
 the dead ages when his own blood made an empire 
 here, on hopes of the future when he should establish 
 a thing true and strong in the instability of this 
 national falsehood. 
 
 His thoughts and feelings deepened and his char 
 acter expanded. The one defect lay in the very 
 basis of his enthusiasm. The church that called 
 him, as it were, into being, inevitably cast over his 
 mind that shade of the dreamer, the ascetic, even the 
 fanatic, which the intense reality of a deed such as 
 
64 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 he contemplated could not brook. That the cloister 
 is not the best propagator of strong practical deeds 
 history plainly shows. Where the church has won 
 in politics she has done so by abandoning the influ 
 ence of the cloister. On this young soul, filled with 
 a towering earnestness, the effect of his surroundings 
 and the power that backed him was not conducive 
 to the highest strength. His enthusiasm took the 
 color of his dreams, his hopes became visions. 
 
 His brain held, burned into it, the picture of the 
 cell to which, so many years ago, he had been taken, 
 of its occupant, and of the stony coast whose waves 
 and rocks were always, in his mind, associated with 
 night. But he made no inquiries. He recalled his 
 promise and the hermit s anxiety in exacting it. He 
 respected that anxiety. Yet he could not be blind. 
 The existence of such a spot as that to which he had 
 been led could not be altogether unknown to all people. 
 Thus, whether he would or not, he was brought 
 to a half knowledge of its location. Time going on, 
 though he would not search or inquire, he believed 
 he knew where the hermit buried himself. 
 
 The year rolled round, the seed was springing up 
 indeed. There were seemingly great forces at work 
 in silence for him. But he must acquire more 
 knowledge and more power and the time must ripen. 
 There came a day in another spring when the mon 
 astery walls once more shut him in. 
 
 It would be difficult to exaggerate any account of 
 the disturbances of this young land, which, in the 
 first half of this century and later, seemed to have 
 gone mad. No historian has done full justice, if 
 indeed any has tried, to the throes and paroxysms 
 she passed through in that short term of years 
 between the victories of Hidalgo and the fall of 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 65 
 
 the French. In 1836 Spain finally acknowledged the 
 independence of her embroiled and bitter whilom 
 colony after a virtual independence of no inconsider 
 able age. But to a casual observer in those times it 
 must have seemed that such success served only to 
 add to the unhappy state. 
 
 In 1838 France bombarded Vera Cruz in the inter 
 est of the celebrated Pie Claim. The noise of 
 that bombardment found discordant sounds enough 
 throughout the land to answer it. During those days 
 a new constitution was being forced on the people ; 
 and a new constitution meant revolution after revo 
 lution. When the matter with the French was set 
 tled the noise was found to continue from within 
 more deafening than it had been round the walls of 
 Ulua. To follow the changes and unravel the skein 
 of events were useless, if not impossible. In 1839 
 General Mejia fell into the power of that formidable 
 Santa Anna. About the same time other sections of 
 the land rose up, crying for a new republic, unsatis 
 fied with the one that as yet had had scarce time to 
 breathe. " A new republic," cried they, " called no 
 more Mexico ; let it be named Sierra Madre." 
 Sierra Madre went down, a wreck. In 1840 Gutierrez 
 de Estrada wrote pointing out the alleged impossi 
 bility of a republic at all. He despaired ; he called 
 for and urged the plan of an empire. He was ban 
 ished and his exile paid for the hazardous views he 
 held. Bustamente was. president then ; he was so 
 till 1841. In that year that rugged-souled old fighter, 
 Santa Anna, in a revolution founded on the plan of 
 Tacubaya, deposed him. Europe was Bustamente s 
 asylum. Echeverria was president for a few crazy 
 days. He could hold the seat no longer, for Santa 
 Anna, with arms to back him, took it for himself. 
 
 5 
 
66 A DREAM OF A THROW 
 
 In 1843 Bravo s Junta de Notables decreed yet 
 another new constitution, and the trouble grew worse. 
 By that constitution Santa Anna was made far more 
 absolute than is compatible with the name of pres 
 ident. Rebellion was rampant; it seemed every 
 corner of the land would rise up in its own half- 
 organized revolt. In 1 844 the city of Guadalajara pre 
 sented a formidable array of armed denial. The 
 waves of that disturbance spread in all directions. 
 Even the regions of the lake felt the heavings of pop 
 ular indignation ; and some out of those quiet fishing 
 huts went forth to skirmish and to die in the city s 
 streets. Santa Anna came in person and the Jalisco 
 revolt was with trouble crushed. The time was fast 
 coming when that old despot would see his powers 
 on the wane. Returning to his capital he found the 
 nation, that had seemed to shudder at his gorgon 
 gaze, in arms against him. After his fall Herrera, 
 for one short year, held his seat. But it was many 
 years yet before the tenacious Santa Anna, bandied 
 about by innumerable events, and rising and falling 
 with them, had at last to acknowledge in his crippled 
 age that his power was grown as rotten as his body. 
 During Herrera s regime the war-clouds of another 
 country, a great and formidable country to the 
 north, began to blow black over the Rio Grande. 
 
 Of those from the lake who participated in the 
 Guadalajara insurrection in 1844, was the chief of 
 police of the Chapala canton, an officer called in 
 Mexico jcfe politico, head of the gendarmes of one 
 of the sections into which the states are divided. He 
 was a hard -boned, gray-headed old man. When the 
 trouble grew hottest the governor had called him and 
 his men to aid the state troops, such as there were. 
 He had gone with fire in his eye, riding out hotly 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 67 
 
 one night at dusk toward the city. He had got the 
 worst of it, and three weeks later, when the revolt 
 was crushed, they came carrying him home to the 
 lake on a canvas cot, whereon he raved and tore 
 his hair in a delirium. He died while they were 
 crossing the stony market square of his town of 
 Chapala. 
 
 He who came to take the place of the fallen chief 
 was that same gendarme who had long before led 
 Clarita back to the inn. He rode into the town at 
 night. He appeared the very next morning striding 
 along the beach surveying his ground, an athletic 
 figure whose step was the step of youth and alacrity. 
 Pistols hung at his belt and a spur clinked on his heel. 
 It was then he found Clarita sitting in the hut s door 
 reading a book. In spite of the years the recognition 
 was immediate. 
 
 " I have found you at last ! " cried he in frank de 
 light. " And all the way I wondered, is the little one 
 still here ! " 
 
 She was fifteen years of age, and yet a child. She 
 arose with modest blushes and held out her hand. 
 She saw again the color of his face, unusual to her. 
 She noticed, too, that if his speech had had in it be 
 fore a foreign accent, it had lost it now. 
 
 " Thank you, senor, for taking me," she replied. 
 " It was very good of you." 
 
 " Books ! " said he. " I come and find you reading 
 a book, and here among fishing boats. What fairy 
 land am I to be master of?" 
 
 " It is a book Vicente sent me," said she. " It is 
 about Rome and Hannibal, and how he crossed the 
 Alps, and the battle of Cannae. So many things, * 
 she sighed, absently smoothing the mesh of her shin 
 ing hair, " seem to have happened in the world." 
 
68 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 " Many more than you dream, little one, and many 
 that it were well you dream not." 
 
 There were suddenly heard the thuds of a horse s 
 feet and a high-spirited steed burst on the new 
 comer s view, scattering sand from its hoofs. It 
 pranced along the beach to Clarita s hut, bearing 
 Pepa on its back Pepa grown older, more beauti 
 ful, resplendent now in many colors, her blue skirt 
 scarcely hiding the black-stockinged ankle at the 
 side-saddle s stirrup. She flashed a laughing eye at 
 Clarita and called to her and checked her steed. 
 
 " Another of my subjects," said the new-comer to 
 himself. " Perhaps, after all, it may not be quiet 
 enough here for a recluse like you, Don Rodrigo. 
 A fine horse," he added aloud. " A remarkably 
 fine horse. But tell me, my never-forgotten little 
 friend," turning to Clarita, "how it has been with 
 you since I saw you so long ago and you told me of 
 your land so that I fain would have come to it with 
 you? " 
 
 " And why, senor, have you come at last? " 
 
 " Did I not tell you your pleading for your native 
 shore must draw me away?" 
 
 " Oh, senor, I am sure it was another reason." 
 
 Pepa, unnoticed, restless on that account, colored 
 high at this neglect. She would not seem to care or 
 listen, not she. Yet she knew she strained her cars lest 
 the sound of the light morning waves drown the words 
 of him who had dared to see only her horse! She 
 knew that white man was somehow different from her 
 race. She felt, the first time in her life, that here was 
 one with whom she would not dare to romp and 
 flirt. 
 
 " The reason was chiefly that, I give you my honor 
 on it," said Rodrigo. "I remembered you always; 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 69 
 
 and I wanted to get away, being a roving sort of 
 youth and not liking it there, nor anywhere else very 
 much. And I could smell these waters and see the 
 mountains, my honor on it, little one, from the very 
 eloquence of your speech. And I said it would suit 
 me. Then we had wars and troubles in Guadalajara 
 though not like Hannibal and Rome, Heaven save 
 us ! And I m afraid I killed somebody at one time. 
 At least I, with others, shot at a mob, and some of 
 them died. It happened that the life of the governor, 
 who was a friend of mine, was saved by that shooting. 
 He would insist that I had done a good thing, though 
 it had been only to kill people, and, heigh-ho ! little 
 girl, killing people is n t a good thing. Well, in spite 
 of me he would reward me ; and then it chanced that 
 your jefe politico here was killed." 
 
 " Ah, I know about that," said Clarita gravely. 
 
 " Well, remembering your eloquence, I said to the 
 governor, Make me \hzjefe politico of Chapala. And 
 he did it." 
 
 " Oh ! " cried she in delight, suppressed with timid 
 ity, being ignorant of the times to come as was he, 
 " you are the new /<?/<?/ I am so glad ! I know you 
 will take good care of us, senor." 
 
 " Good-by, Clarita ! " Pepa was calling, tossing her 
 head and dancing two middle fingers at the girl on 
 the ground, and letting her impatient steed move 
 away. " I had something to tell never mind 
 another day ! " 
 
 "I too am going in that direction," said Rodrigo. 
 " Good-by, little one ; I will see you many times." 
 
 Pepa did not make her horse go very swiftly ; 
 neither did she look at the jefe, who overtook her and 
 walked at her side along the beach. 
 
 " Yes," said he, never looking higher than the 
 
7 o A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 beast s neck, " a remarkable horse. Now how much 
 would you say that horse is worth ? " 
 
 "Enough," said she shortly. " But I got it." 
 
 Her family was not of the common classes. Her 
 widowed mother at the meson had been the wife of 
 no peon and the inn itself was no common, dirty fonda. 
 There was money in the family, as there is to this day 
 in many a secluded Mexican family which gives no 
 outer demonstration of it. Pepa had wanted the 
 horse. Alas ! she would have created trouble for 
 some one had she failed to secure it. 
 
 " Oh, it is yours? " said he. 
 
 " Of course," haughtily piqued at the exclusiveness 
 of his interest. 
 
 " Then I should like to buy him. I have to buy 
 several in fact. Now what would you take for your 
 horse? I nearly killed my best one coming here so 
 fast." 
 
 " And why, seiior, did you, a foreigner, come 
 here?" 
 
 " Call me not that," he replied, plucking a fig from 
 the salati to which they had arrived. "My soul is 
 your country s soul, seiiorita. Well," musingly, " you 
 see how the waves come beating in and kill them 
 selves in that foolish way. They commit suicide thus. 
 It chances that in the land from which I came men 
 sometimes want to do likewise. And if they arc not 
 bold enough they like to come to places where it 
 is lonely." 
 
 She made no reply. She only looked at him. The 
 life of Josefa Aranja had this day come to a new path. 
 After a moment she turned her horse s head abruptly 
 and rode slowly away toward the street. 
 
 " Adios, senor," said she. 
 
 " And you will not sell your horse? " 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 71 
 
 Had he, then, seen nothing, nothing but the horse? 
 She went on into the town. Pepita was dreamy till 
 nightfall. 
 
 There came other days, and many of them, wherein 
 he saw her plainly enough, and made no secret 
 of it; wherein, too, he grew to know her as did no 
 other. 
 
 Clarita also he saw, and in time learned the great 
 difference between her of the high spirit and this 
 quieter one. 
 
 The two had scarcely left the latter when a mozo 
 from the church came bringing her a letter. All her 
 communication with Vicente was through the priest. 
 She eagerly seized it. There was no other thing in 
 her life that brought her a pleasure such as came 
 with these letters, save the coming of Vicente him 
 self; and, since that year he had spent about the 
 lake, he had come but once, eight months before the 
 writing of this epistle. He had stayed three weeks 
 then and returned. It was a serious letter, couched 
 in the terms of his own mood. Wrapped in a sweet 
 delight, she read as follows : 
 
 LITTLE SISTER, I ought to write happily to you, re 
 membering that you are a child. The letter should be 
 bright. But you have never, Clarita, seemed quite a child 
 to me. Whether it is that I, weighted as I am with the 
 purpose you know, have oppressed you, no, I am sure 
 you will not say this is it. It is because your spirit is older 
 than your body. So I never feel that I must write myself 
 to you other than I am. And for one with that before him 
 that I have before me, to call himself happy were folly. 
 Yet I am not repining. My hopes are high. But you will 
 understand how the lightness of boyhood must now long 
 since have passed from me. 
 
 Clarita, it is a strange thing, this that I have to do, and 
 
72 A DREAM O2 A THRONE 
 
 a very great one. The unhappy state of our people works 
 unhappiness in me. I am overcome, at times, contemplat 
 ing the little that they have, the very much that they need. 
 Since I last wrote to you I have been away. I went to 
 Mexico City that I might see the heart of the country. It 
 is a troubled heart. Even its own beatings it knows not. 
 It is war and tyranny and selfishness selfishness always. 
 The land has no time to turn to those pursuits by which it 
 should live. It seems dying in paroxysms. 
 
 I found there a class unlike any that you know, though 
 there are some of them here, too ; a class of aristocrats, 
 people educated, versed in the world. There are wonder 
 ful women there, little girl, and men whose intelligence, 
 were it not blind, should bring about better things. I saw 
 with bitterness that these, a small minority of my people as 
 they are, had lost sight, in their wrangling, of the masses of 
 us who live away, who crowd the little towns and make the 
 country. These masses alone can I claim for my people. 
 And the enlightenment and the power that the others have 
 must one day be to them. 
 
 But how very far are these our people from ability to 
 reach enlightenment ! Can there be, anywhere on the 
 globe, a race that needs more? And this in particular 
 brings sadness to me : the thing they do most need is 
 character. Truth, honesty, faithfulness, these our people 
 have not, these they dream not. In my readings of other 
 peoples, Clarita, I always felt heir histories started with 
 some quality we do not have. They were stable. I won 
 dered, then, is it because my nation is young that it knows 
 not truth? I think it is not so. Our ancient ancestors, 
 the Aztecs, kept faith, and they were newer than we. 
 Heart rottenness, faithlessness, deceit, these I have found 
 to be qualities of old nations, nations run out, living in tra 
 dition. And as my heart is true and as I am writing to 
 her I love as my own blood, I swear I believe that the dis 
 honesty of my race comes from Spain. It is the tainted 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 73 
 
 blood. We were not highly civilized before the Spaniards 
 came. I will not claim even that which others have claimed. 
 But had Spain not wronged us we should have reached a 
 development which this broken Spanish offspring knows not. 
 Clarita, longing for something true, something firm and 
 strong, I have looked about me in vain. Somewhere under 
 the current it may be but invisible. Let me say it with 
 shame, veracity is gone from the whole scheme of the 
 Mexican character. I have wept and cursed and called us 
 no more than a nation of liars and thieves. The seller in 
 the market cheats his neighbor a score of times every day 
 that he breathes the air. The child at its mother s skirts 
 learns first of all, greatest and chiefest lesson, to lie for gain. 
 Everywhere that I go my heart bleeds. What can I do 
 with these ; what can I hope from a nation from whose 
 whole moral life truth has been taken away, to whom dis 
 honesty is virtue theft, success? This to me, in the 
 masses of the people, who are under the current of the 
 political storms, is sadder than the embroiled condition of 
 the government that shifts and fights over their heads. 
 
 But I must not, I will not despair. How I long to do it 
 all, to lift them ! But it will take generations. If I can 
 be but the beginning of something stable, let me not say 
 that I have lived in vain. Somewhere under the current 
 must lie the truth, and I know in other things my people 
 have traits that have, many times, made nations of the 
 greatest power before whom the world has trembled. They 
 have all else. Let them only be taught in this night that 
 truth, truth alone, will bring the day. I see but one way. 
 There must come, and there will come, as surely as the sun 
 rises, some man of strength, some iron soul that can grasp 
 the nation and hold it in the way of progress. There must 
 be a heart that never flinches ; an eye that sees into every 
 nook and corner of the land ; a mind that grasps all, di 
 gests all ; a soul that loves and is true. That man will 
 come. Might it be I ! But despair not; if not I, then 
 
74 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 another. Let failure stalk on ; I can nevertheless prophesy, 
 the century shall not die till he come. 
 
 In these thoughts, what comfort to turn to you, little girl 
 by the lake ! You alone are true. I read your last letter 
 with delight. Your writing improves, and you can think. 
 That you love the books I have found for you is much hap 
 piness to me. Pepa too has written. How secretly she 
 learned long ago, and how she surprised us, when last I 
 came, by writing in the sand ! May the time come when 
 there shall not be a canton where schools are not, and 
 scarcely a peon s child that cannot read. Pepa has won 
 my heart. How deeply I had grown to love her I did not 
 know till I saw her last. Already is she a woman. Tell 
 her that my promises to her, when last I saw her, are locked 
 in my breast. She is not absent from me. Let me not be 
 abs ent from her. I shall write to her soon, and let love 
 hold us as one. 
 
 And so, good-by, my sister. I shall come sometimes to 
 Chapala for a short while only, before I come at last for the 
 great deed and then, Heaven be my guide ! And turn 
 not from your sweet, pure walking in the world. Be truth, 
 Clarita, in this darkness of untruth. Let the world lie, let 
 faith die away, I know you will carry in your heart the 
 virtue that was your mother s, the faithfulness that is your 
 own. Go you with God. 
 
 VICENTE. 
 
 He did come one other time before the great time 
 came. And after that the waiting began drawing to 
 an end. What power he had was gathered close in 
 him, ripening fast. Meanwhile the waves of revolu 
 tion ceased not to sweep the land. The people saw 
 little chance for safety. Comfort and peace failed 
 together. Dissatisfaction was abroad. In this un 
 stable state the very means of living must grow more 
 scant. Corn, that chief factor of the food of the com- 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 75 
 
 mons, had scarce time to grow, till the hot blasts 
 withered it. Famine occurred from time to time in 
 many parts. It came at length to Jalisco and the 
 lake region. There was a dearth of corn. The same 
 old cause that has stirred the masses since the days 
 of Rome, ay, and long before, served to raise them 
 here. 
 
 But even in this, fish could still be drawn from the 
 lake. The great majority of these people were not 
 really hungry. A leader who was more a man of the 
 world, who had fewer visions and was more practical, 
 would not have mistaken the sporadic uprising of a 
 few for a profound movement, nor the results of his 
 own magnetism, and the church s under-working, for 
 the evidences of a permanent change. He would 
 have feared the current was shallow. 
 
PART SECOND 
 
 TIZAPAN 
 
 CHAPTER I 
 
 THE nucleus of the army was born during the 
 summer of 1846. Vicente left the monastery 
 early in July, and, without going to his former 
 home, proceeded to Ocotlan, a town on the lake 
 some distance to the east of Chapala. The clergy 
 had been, in all this region, diligently at work. 
 The priest of Ocotlan received him. The last of 
 his plans were there matured. He began a slow 
 journey round the lake s borders, not for the pur 
 pose of raising any considerable number of troops, 
 rather to prepare, in conjunction with the priest 
 hood, for the uprising on a second circuit which he 
 should undertake at the completion of the first. He 
 wished, on this primary journey, merely to gather 
 up a small body of some two hundred men whom he 
 knew personally, and understood to be even now 
 ready for him. He would drill that body, and make 
 it the beginning whereto subsequent rebels might 
 cling. 
 
 By the end of July he was on the lake s southern 
 side at Tizapan. Quiroz here joined him. They 
 proceeded to Tuxcueco and San Luis. When they 
 arrived at the latter place they were at the head of 
 more than one hundred men. They made no demon- 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 77 
 
 stration. They interfered with nothing, produced 
 nothing of a revolution. They held their men in 
 check and drilled them. They found the clergy 
 working as silently and quickly as they. They 
 knew just what number of soldiers they might 
 expect from each town when they should come 
 again. Months before there had arrived, little by 
 little, in certain of the larger places, arms and 
 ammunition purchased by the church. These should 
 be at Vicente s disposal. Some of his troop came 
 already armed. Those who did not were quietly 
 provided for. By late August he was in Jocotepec, 
 at the lake s western end, with his expected band 
 of two hundred. He camped them a mile from the 
 town. 
 
 He, with Doroteo, spent an additional month in 
 that spot. He received secret word, almost every 
 day, from the priesthood relative to the depositories 
 of arms, the well mapped-out course of his coming 
 triumphal march with its prearranged details con 
 cerning camps and provision for the army. As yet 
 his force was infantry, save ten. He drilled them 
 thus for lack of horses. But there were negotia 
 tions on foot for more animals. It was his determi 
 nation to mount every man possible and as quickly 
 as he could. This, too, was the church s purpose. 
 It was hoped and believed that by the completion of 
 half the second circuit he might see his entire force, 
 grown as it should be, mounted. With a formidable 
 array of cavalry, composed of these hardy riders, he 
 would be safe against immediate attack to organize 
 more infantry, or, should the time seem ready, 
 make a quick dash and carry consternation imme 
 diately to Guadalajara itself. 
 
 Whatever may be said as to the rawness of the 
 
7 8 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 rest of his troops (from the very speed of his subse 
 quent movements not well organized) it is certain 
 that his nucleus of two hundred became, under his 
 hand, like a fine machine. He spent day and night 
 in labor over them. He won their hearts. He 
 learned to wield them with the accuracy and pre 
 cision of a single tool. 
 
 All this time, though occasionally menaced, he 
 was not disturbed. He had produced absolutely no 
 confusion, and the public mind was not roused. 
 The State was impoverished as to troops. Every 
 canton had been sucked of its blood for many wars. 
 There were no State troops whatever in the lake 
 region, few enough anywhere else. The only 
 defenders of these districts were the jcfcs politico* 
 of the cantons and their few gendarmes. Even 
 these police had been diminished in number for 
 distant combats. At Chapala there was but the 
 ridiculous number of eleven. The cantons were 
 small. If Vicente found himself exciting hostility 
 in one, he had but to flit with his troop into another, 
 where a different, weakened, and unrouscdjrfe held 
 sway. 
 
 On a day of September, the summer rains having 
 about ceased, and the long dry season being on the 
 point of beginning, he suddenly, without warning, 
 crossed the boundary of Rodrigo s dominion at 
 Ajicjic, entered the Chapala canton, and appeared 
 late in the evening with his two hundred in Chapala 
 itself. They marched in quietly, meeting no oppo 
 sition, wheeled down the main street, issued on the 
 beach, and camped there for the night. 
 
 The town was profoundly stirred, but without 
 tumult. Rodrigo (who, as shall be seen, had not 
 been altogether inactive), calling together his 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 79 
 
 eleven men (they were all mounted), shut himself 
 up in the patio of the jefatura politico,, cursed his 
 fortune for dividing the State as it was, and leaving 
 him in one division of it with eleven men, laid the 
 matter before his confederates, and speedily decided 
 his course. 
 
 The revolutionary band was provided for and left 
 in the hands of lieutenants. Quiroz, night ap 
 proaching, went with his quick tread for a secret 
 conference with the priest. Vicente first found 
 Clarita alone in the fishing hut, and, having spent 
 with her a half hour, which to that lonely girl was 
 a space of intense delight, left her, and proceeded 
 to the inn. The night had come, and the waves 
 were rising on the lake. The last pink glow of the 
 sunset lingered in the zenith. The wind came 
 fresh and strong out of the watery west, and blew 
 over camp and town. He entered the meson> whose 
 wide, inner corredores and patio with plants were 
 silent and dark. He proceeded straight to a room 
 reserved for him. He wondered where was Pepa. 
 
 Having left ajar the door leading into the wide 
 veranda, he lit a candle. He stood there a moment, 
 its light over his features, displaying the high fore 
 head, the sensitive mouth, the strong chin, above 
 all, the peculiar whiteness of his complexion. He 
 stared out into the shades of the silent patio. The 
 guests at this time of year were few. Supper was 
 not served till two hours later. The corredores were 
 unlighted. Where was Pepa? She had been in 
 formed of his coming. He waited yet a half hour. 
 She had not come. 
 
 He had just turned with knitted brow to the 
 candle, when she suddenly appeared, framed in the 
 shadowed doorway. She had grown taller. She 
 
8o A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 was never more beautiful. She gave a little cry, 
 but advanced slowly. He met her half-way, held 
 her, and gazed into her eyes. Something in them 
 produced in him a sudden gloom. She seemed 
 changed. There was an unwonted touch of sadness 
 in her face. 
 
 "Pepa!" he cried. "What is it? You do not 
 seem like the old Pepa. Tell me ! " 
 
 "The old one? Ah, Vicente, you do not want 
 the old one." She looked dreamily at the light. 
 " No, no a new one, one that knows you and 
 understands the greatness of all you will do. 
 Vicente, I am turned into a half wild girl these 
 times. Oh! I am restless! I want to do something 
 to act, like you." She pressed closer to him. 
 "Tell me," she whispered, "when is the first blow 
 to be struck. When can we fight? " 
 
 He laughed gently at her. 
 
 "You, the woman," cried he, "calling for blood! 
 Pepa, you have been to me the soul of this great 
 hope. I have carried you with me wherever I went. 
 That I may come to her, I said, before the real war 
 begins, and let her be the final inspiration of it, - 
 her love the beginning and the power of it this 
 will be my happiness. You have lifted this dream 
 above dreams, that march above the acts of adven 
 turers. I have lain down every night with your 
 face before me, arisen every morning with Pepa for 
 the spring of the day s deeds. You are restless; 
 your blood bounds with the uncrushed spirit of the 
 old days as does mine. Then may you indeed begin 
 the action. Pepa, the time of quiet marches and 
 drilling is this night passed. Tell me are you 
 ready with your own hands to begin for me the new 
 course ? " 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 81 
 
 "What is it?" she whispered eagerly. There 
 was a depth to that eagerness that even he did not 
 comprehend. She grew suddenly solemn, hanging 
 on his words. He believed her face slightly 
 darkened. 
 
 "It is this," said he. "The first overt act shall 
 be committed to-night. The time is ripe. I need 
 now at last to make the one irrevocable leap. 
 Hitherto I have done nothing distinctly hostile. I 
 will show my intentions plainly to-night, that all 
 the world may see. The provocation must come 
 from me. I can no longer go on increasing my 
 numbers without opposition. So let it be plainly 
 war. Three hundred men await me at Mescala, 
 whither I go to-morrow. Ocotlan has others. By 
 to-morrow night, so ready is the machinery of the 
 church, I shall march into the latter place with 
 eight hundred. The progress henceforth is swift, 
 open. I am from this night in war. To break 
 into it boldly, so that there may be no retreat 
 either for me or for my men, I shall take possession 
 of the canton building here before midnight." 
 
 She turned suddenly pale. But she conquered 
 the thought that caused the pallor, and smiled that 
 dazzling smile of hers. She grasped his hand in a 
 tight grip, and whispered : 
 
 "Will there be a battle?" 
 
 "There may be resistance, but I doubt it." 
 
 She was silent. She withdrew from him and 
 paced the room. She broke out, presently, into a 
 ringing laugh of keen and reckless merriment. 
 She came back to him where he stood by the candle 
 watching her. She put her hands upon his shoulders, 
 and brought her raised face close to his. 
 
 "What am I to do? " she asked. 
 6 
 
82 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 " I will tell you. The people need some striking 
 beginning to appeal to their imaginations. The 
 match must flare in a way that the populace will 
 see. The moment of the break ought to have in it 
 something that can be told and spread in all direc 
 tions. Hidalgo, when he raised the people long 
 since, recognized the advantage of the tocsin. He 
 knew that among all the untutored masses that 
 sound would ring out and produce an effect that a 
 hundred proclamations would not cause. I have 
 thought of this long. Pepa, you shall ring the 
 tocsin and start the revolt. My men shall be ready. 
 A quick and orderly march will be made to the 
 jefatura politico, and the place taken. The flame will 
 then be lit. None can turn back. My reign will 
 begin when you touch the bells of the church." 
 
 Her blood was bounding; yet it did not produce 
 that burst of enthusiasm he had expected. 
 
 "If they resist," she whispered, "and you seize 
 them, will they will they be killed, even the 
 leader?" 
 
 "Untamed, indeed!" cried he. "What, then, is 
 the beautiful barbarian s idea of war! They shall 
 only be held, unless they die fighting. What is 
 it? Have I dreamed this poor little dream in 
 vain ? " 
 
 She threw her arms around him with a feverish- 
 ness that he may have thought he understood. 
 
 " I will do it ! " she cried. " What is the hour ? " 
 
 "Twelve o clock," said he. 
 
 She broke away from him and ran to the door. 
 She turned, and her eyes were blazing with the 
 light he thought he loved and understood. What 
 man s mind could have been prism enough to sepa 
 rate and count the rays that made that light? The 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 83 
 
 fever in her grew. She threw a quick kiss at him 
 from her finger tips and was gone. 
 
 A mozo was lighting lamps over dining-tables 
 which stood in the corredor. She could hear her 
 mother s voice in the far kitchen. She went out 
 into the dark passage that led into the street, passed 
 a shadow standing there, and was startled that it 
 slightly moved. She came into the street, and 
 went wandering restless, bareheaded, toward the 
 lake. She stood at last under the salati tree, the 
 water beating up on the sand before her. She sud 
 denly started and turned. The shadow that had 
 been in the passage had followed her with lithe, 
 silent tread. She could see his pointed sombrero, 
 and the points of his moustaches were barely visible. 
 
 "Josefa Aranja," whispered he, half mockingly, 
 "the heroine ah, she of the bells. Does she 
 dream of the long future wherein the tocsin shall 
 still ring Pepa s fame and memory! The days and 
 the years will go by and die. The king will reign; 
 and pupils in schools will learn of her, of her who 
 rang the bells. And after many years there will be 
 a high bronze statue in a beautiful park in the city s 
 centre, and the statue will be the slender figure of 
 Josefa Aranja. And on this day school children 
 shall sing and bands shall play, and there shall be 
 wreaths on her head and wreaths at her feet, 
 though Pepa shall know it not, for that she lies 
 yonder, where the sun falls yellow on the sod ! 
 Ah ! picture of beauty ! she who rang the tocsin, 
 and is called her country s liberator!" 
 
 She turned angrily on him, her very forehead 
 burning. 
 
 "And Doroteo Quiroz," she cried, "may be 
 called a traitor on that day ! " 
 
84 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 She ran away and disappeared in the darkness. 
 She came at length under the two slender white- 
 spires. The church was dark and deserted, and in 
 the empty walled court before it she spent the next 
 few hours alone, seated in the darkness at a tower s 
 base. Those hours were unhappy ones. When 
 the clock over her head struck half-past nine, she 
 could sit still no longer. She sighed and arose. 
 
 "He will be fleeing," murmured she, feeling the 
 heat on her face. 
 
 The clock struck yet other quarters. The struggle 
 in her that made the hours unhappy grew fiercer as 
 the night advanced. It was at last intolerable, and 
 she could wait no more. It was half-past ten when 
 she went slowly up the deserted street past her 
 home, and came, with something like stealth, to the 
 open market square. The tiny shops were closed 
 and the stone-flagged space was bare, save for a few 
 lime and orange trees. She crossed it with a quick 
 impulsive burst of speed, the struggle in her hav 
 ing ended. 
 
 She came at length to that long, low, white build 
 ing over whose door the words "Jefatura Politica" 
 were painted in yellow letters. She flitted to the 
 iron-barred window in the shadow. The window s 
 doorlike inner shutters were closed, though she- 
 could detect little gleams of light coming through 
 the cracks. She held to the bars, her untamed 
 heart beating swiftly. She put her face to them 
 after a time and called, scarcely above a whisper: 
 
 " Don Rodrigo ! " 
 
 There was no sound from within. She shivered 
 a little. She could just hear the clock striking a 
 quarter to eleven, the tones wavering up from the 
 lake on the uncertain wind. She became a little 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 85 
 
 piqued and then half angry. She laughed with 
 scorn of herself, but nervously. She slipped on, 
 then, to the door, some yards distant. It was very 
 large, and double, to permit of the passage of 
 horses. It was made of heavy, thick wood, set in 
 something of a recess. She was at it, silently 
 extending her hand toward the iron knocker, when 
 a guard stepped from the recess s shadow. 
 
 " What do you want? " asked he. 
 
 She was too daring not to go on now in the course 
 begun. 
 
 "To speak to theyV/V she whispered, shrinking 
 as much as possible into the darkness. 
 
 "Oh!" he said, recognizing her. "He is busy. " 
 
 "I will speak to him," she said imperiously. 
 "Go and tell him to let me in." 
 
 The man entered, and presently returned and 
 admitted her, closing the door after her. She went 
 through the stone-paved passage that led to the 
 patio. That inner court was very large. On two 
 sides, approached by wide-roofed corredores, were 
 offices, a court, and living rooms for Rodrigo, and 
 certain other officials. Opposite the door, barely 
 distinguishable in the gloom on the far side, were 
 many stables. There was a door there, too, leading 
 out to the rear at St. Michael s foot, where there 
 was no beaten path among the boulders and over 
 the rocky mountain side, but where it was possible 
 for a horse to go, reaching thus, by a circuit, the 
 Guadalajara road. 
 
 She heard some confusion in the darkness of that 
 distant side where the stables stood. One towering 
 and spreading mamey tree in the patio s centre 
 swayed and sighed with the wind. She tiptoed 
 along the bricks and gently knocked where a beam 
 
86 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 of light came through a keyhole. Rodrigo himself 
 opened the door. She had shrunk away and hidden 
 herself in the shadow. He saw only the night, and 
 heard only the confusion at the stables. She some 
 how felt or feigned fear. He stepped out and 
 caught sight of her dress as the wind fluttered it. 
 His face became suddenly serious, seen in the light 
 from the office. 
 
 "What is it? " said he, in a voice hardly audible. 
 
 "You do not ask me to come in," she replied. 
 She was sulking in the shadow. He presently suc 
 ceeded in drawing her out of it. 
 
 She went in and sat down by a large square table 
 whereon were papers and a pistol with its cartridge 
 belt. He sat down opposite and gazed at her. 
 She had heard his spur clink as he entered. She 
 arose boldly, closed the door, and returned to her 
 seat. Her face showed the extreme high tension of 
 her nerves. It was with her a peculiar moment, 
 wherein a native, reckless daring combated with 
 fear, even with shame. She spread out her fingers 
 on the table, and did not look at Rodrigo or say 
 anything. She merely sat there. Then the blood 
 rushed to her face. 
 
 "You have come," said he at last, slowly, "be 
 cause the troubles and the wars are beginning. I 
 was never blind to the fact, Pepa, that you had a 
 lover. So the friendship that sprang up and lived 
 and grew to be well, it was not a cold one 
 between us, you feel must give way. We are sooner 
 or later to go different paths. You would be an 
 enemy, should it fall to my lot to fight, that would 
 lend more meaning to fighting. Knowing you as I 
 have known you, I fancied many times that when 
 the silent little army reached this place you would 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 87 
 
 desert us and turn Amazon. You have come to say 
 good-by; is it not so?" 
 
 She threw back her head and let her eyes rest on 
 him. They were burning, and the red blush was in 
 her very temples. 
 
 "I can say it if you wish," said she, half petu 
 lantly, half solemnly. 
 
 "It is not I, it is the troubles that wish," he 
 replied. "You have made the days pass with an 
 added light in them, the sad old days. I shall 
 ever be glad I knew you. May you never, in these 
 bad times that are coming, do such great deeds as to 
 be no longer the girl you are. Pepa, I shall remem 
 ber you always as you were in the days when we 
 knew each other." 
 
 " Remember me ! " cried the impetuous girl, aris 
 ing with anger and pain in her face. " No crush 
 me out of your memory. I will ask but that one 
 favor. If, when I come, as I came to-night, with a 
 thing on my tongue to say, which I trembled think 
 ing of, that would have been, perchance, more nearly 
 like ruin to me than great deeds, and I dare not say 
 it, rather fling it away from me if, when I am 
 thus, you call up some old days coldly, and all but 
 tell me to say the last farewell and be gone then 
 I pray you, Don Rodrigo, in the name of unspoken 
 faith, do not strain your foreign ideas of kindness 
 to keep me in your memory ! " 
 
 Many a time he had feared the possibilities in this 
 girl. He had vainly tried to hold her back. He 
 was struck now by a positive grief that stood out for 
 one second on her face. 
 
 " You hate me you despise me ! " she cried 
 suddenly. " Let the bird break its wings ! " 
 
 She was leaving him, hurrying to the door. He 
 
88 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 sprang forward and reached it before her. He flung 
 it open and pointed out. She looked, and the light 
 from the room fell in a wide streak across the patio. 
 She beheld horses there saddled, and men in secret 
 haste saddling others. She heard his spur again 
 clink on the bricks. She realized the purposed 
 flight. 
 
 "Go!" whispered he. "You must not stay. 
 Whether you will it or not I shall remember you. 
 You see the horses you understand. You need 
 not say the thing you were afraid to say. Never 
 never ! " 
 
 She moved away. 
 
 "And thank you!" he called after her, thinking 
 of days she had brightened for him, himself struck 
 with a sudden sadness. 
 
 She was surprised, her heart brought back, by 
 those last words. She turned from the shadow one 
 instant, and smiled on him a quick smile which he 
 never forgot. She ran out, then, to the street, and 
 was gone. 
 
 He knew at once that she had misinterpreted his 
 thanks. He knew that was the thing above all else 
 he should not have said. He muttered self-accusa 
 tions and turned back into the room. 
 
 Her mood was changed. She was become eager, 
 full of intense excitement, happy with a happiness 
 that made her heart sing. She drowned all other 
 thoughts, recalling his last words and look, crushing 
 all other visions. This was enough, like liquor that 
 in itself suffices though it bring unheeded pain 
 afterward. She would not return to the meson ; nor 
 would she speak to or see any other human being 
 till midnight should come. She crossed the plaza 
 and went to the east. She turned then into the 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 89 
 
 darkness of a street that leads to the lake behind 
 the church. She wandered on down toward the 
 water, her happiness becoming, as she came, mingled 
 with a certain pensiveness which seemed ever a part 
 of her nature, which was, indeed, the trait most 
 fascinating in her. 
 
 She was as still as the night. Behind the church 
 there were lime-kilns, huge and smoking. They 
 stood at the beginning of the open beach. She 
 came to them. The burner suddenly threw open 
 the door of one of the blazing furnaces in order to 
 heave in more wood. A shaft of intense red light 
 shot out across the beach and the lake, so that the 
 sand and the water seemed burning with it, and a 
 tunnel was cut into the heart of the night. She 
 stopped near the kiln in the shadows. The burner 
 heaved in a stick, and then suddenly saw her appear 
 in the brightest of the light, staring into the fierce 
 mass of white fire. He was startled. She looked, 
 bathed in that brilliancy, like the fire s very spirit. 
 He gaped at her and turned to his work. 
 
 "Pretty hot," volunteered he. 
 
 She went away toward the water. 
 
 "No no, "said she, slowly. "That is n t hot." 
 
 The door of the furnace was shut, and the night 
 buried in darkness the shaft the light had cut. She 
 came to the water s very edge, where the night 
 waves rolled on the sand, running frantic races all 
 along the shore, out of blackness into blackness, 
 white demons that they were. 
 
 When the clock struck three-quarters past eleven, 
 she entered the walled front court of the church, and 
 came to the side of the right-hand tower. In its 
 base was an open door leading to stairs and the 
 belfry. It was never closed, and the bell-ringers 
 
9 o A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 lived in huts by the lime-kilns. She went in and 
 groped in the narrow space of blackness for the 
 steps. Then she began to ascend. As in many 
 Mexican churches of to-day the stairs to the bells 
 were stone and spiral. They were very old and 
 worn, by much use, into deep hollows. She circled 
 round and round and up, in the darkness, her hands 
 following the stone wall and the central stone shaft. 
 She could see absolutely nothing. She came at last 
 to the spiral s summit, traversed a short passage, 
 went under a low doorway, and issued in the belfry. 
 It was open to the free air on all sides. At its 
 corners many slender white pillars supported the 
 spires above. Their lightness and grace were pure 
 beauty even in the night. The cool west wind 
 swept through under the bells which hung their 
 great weights and iron tongues over her head. She 
 felt for the rope of the largest, a bell of deep voice. 
 The cord was tied to the clapper. Having assured 
 herself of its position, she went to the belfry s side 
 and leaned over the stone railing, waiting. She 
 grew again feverish, and could scarcely be still. 
 The wind cast her black hair all about her face and 
 fluttered her skirts. She sang an odd and melan 
 choly song: 
 
 " Oh thou Fair God ! when wilt thou come again, 
 
 That all the barren land may laugh with flowers ? 
 Fulfil thy sacred promises to men, 
 
 Bring us the fruits of thy mysterious powers ! 
 We die forsake us not. 
 Hast thou thy sons forgot ? 
 Thou wast our fathers God Be ours ! Be ours ! " 
 
 She waited yet another silent minute. Then the 
 silver voice under her began proclaiming the hour of 
 midnight. She turned and seized the rope, and 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 91 
 
 counted. At the last stroke she put out all her 
 energy, and the great clapper crashed against the 
 bell. The tocsin pealed out, not once nor twice, 
 but many times. She swung the iron tongue to 
 and fro with mighty clangor. All the silent night 
 seemed suddenly shattered by that battering hail of 
 sound. The town was up and the cry raised. The 
 days of primitive peace were done. 
 
 The two hundred had been drawn up in the plaza 
 a moment before the hour. They had marched 
 quietly and stood in quiet. There was no marked 
 demonstration. When the tocsin sounded and the 
 townspeople began gathering in wonder, the troops 
 were brought in order to ti\z jefatur a politico,. The 
 bell having ceased, Doroteo Quiroz s lithe form 
 went noiselessly to the wooden door. He knocked 
 resoundingly, and demanded the surrender of the 
 place in the name of the new government. There 
 was no reply. He knocked again, and again de 
 manded in a loud voice. No answer. The next 
 step was already decided upon. With one hundred 
 men Vicente had now disapppeared up the street, 
 wheeled the corner and ascended to St. Michael s 
 side, from which he could reach the building over a 
 tortuous course at its rear. All was done quietly 
 and in order. There was no wish to cause fighting 
 or bloodshed. 
 
 Quiroz, in front with the other hundred, quietly 
 awaited a signal. The townspeople still came 
 flocking, and huddled about in silent groups in the 
 darkness of the plaza. In the midst of that silence 
 an unexpected thing occurred. The great Fortino 
 (long since, in the recesses of his crude heart, a 
 deep admirer of Vicente) had secretly wished to 
 join the new movement. Not appreciating the full 
 
92 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 value of order and a quiet declaration of war, he 
 now, in the crowd s middle, seeing the ice broken 
 and the revolution begun, became inspired to deeds. 
 He felt his vast muscles tingle. He was exasperated 
 that the door opened not, and that Vicente s forces 
 stood thus balked. An unreasoning enthusiasm 
 entered him. In silence he trod up the street after 
 the one hundred who had disappeared. He was in 
 that street now alone, bending over something. 
 The most prominent constituent of the ceilings in 
 many Mexican houses is the enormous beams that 
 are left visible, sometimes beautifully carved. 
 These are frequently of such size and weight as to 
 astonish the beholder. One of them lay, on this 
 night, in the street before an unfinished house. It 
 was over twenty feet long and exceedingly thick. 
 It was thought six men would be needed to put it in 
 place. Over this bent the enthusiastic giant. He 
 had begun to chuckle a deep, inward chuckle. He 
 kneeled and seized the timber at its middle. Some 
 from the crowd had now lit torches of a resinous 
 wood called ocotc, and came running hither. 
 
 " Away ! away ! " growled the big one. " Leave 
 me to it!" 
 
 He heaved and groaned. Great folds of skin, 
 bristling with hair, bulging on his neck, were 
 visible in the flickering light. The width of his 
 back seemed suddenly doubled. He put out his 
 tremendous strength, swelled and strained, sweat 
 dripping from his flaming countenance. Those 
 watching were amazed to see the timber slowly rise, 
 till it rested on his shoulder, a position unusual 
 for the burden of a Mexican carrier. Then he came 
 erect, his legs straightening inch by inch. He was 
 facing the plaza, and balanced himself with that 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 93 
 
 great weight, looking ahead. He chuckled still, 
 rumblingly. He was absorbed, seeing no one. 
 
 "Out of the way!" thundered he. "Give me 
 room. Give me room ! " 
 
 He had begun his astonishing course, and the 
 spectators held their breath. That mass of wood 
 that scarcely one of them could have lifted went 
 heavily on, a mammoth battering ram. The chuckle 
 of the bearer grew louder. The perspiration became 
 streams. He went his ponderous way down the 
 street, his speed increasing. He broke from a walk 
 to a trot, and the trot grew faster. He gathered 
 momentum and charged on, being like a locomotive 
 let loose. Every step he took added to his irre- 
 sistibleness. His tread seemed to shake the ground. 
 They saw him coming, looming out of the shadows, 
 and spread to right and left. His chuckle grew 
 louder and burst into a low roar. He was running 
 now, fearfully. He could no more have stopped 
 himself than if he had been some cyclone sweeping 
 down on the lodgings of the jefe. He neared the 
 plaza, swerved through a great arc to the right, and 
 made the quarter circle, the timber wheeling with 
 him. His roar burst into a shout and the end of 
 that ram crashed straight through the wood of the 
 door, went crunching on full half of its twenty feet 
 of length, cut a square hole for itself, as though it 
 had been cast from a cannon, and stuck, fastened 
 there, horizontal, its hither half protruding into the 
 street. The shock had hurled Fortino back, but 
 not discomfited him. He let the chuckle sink slowly 
 into silence, and sat down On the opposite side of 
 the street, satisfied. Thus unexpectedly and un 
 called-for, in the matter of revolution had Fortino 
 declared himself. 
 
94 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 The soldiers and some of the crowd seized the 
 protruding end and swayed on it. The door was 
 speedily demolished and an entrance thus effected 
 at the same time that Vicente found the rear door 
 wide open, and marched in at the head of his men. 
 The two parties met. The crowd surged in after 
 them, and filled the patio. Torches flared from 
 many hands, and the deserted condition of the place 
 was apparent. 
 
 The first who pushed in after Doroteo s soldiers 
 was Pepa, her face full of excitement. 
 
 "They have gone! " said she in Doroteo s ear. 
 
 He turned a piercing eye on her and smiled a 
 gallant but half mocking smile. 
 
 "And how does the fair one know?" whispered 
 he, drawing out the point of his moustache. 
 
 She flashed a keen look of defiance at him, and, 
 going to Vicente, flung her hand up wildly in air 
 and hailed him as victor. The crowd rallied round 
 her, instinctively making her a leader, and shouted 
 with her. Having satisfied their curiosity they 
 surged out. Excitement was growing and they 
 seized Fortino, had him up on shoulders (a task 
 fraught with difficulty), and bore him triumphantly 
 to and fro amidst tumult. 
 
 " Anastasio, " said Francisco, looking on dubiously, 
 "this triumph of Fortino s is treason to us." 
 
 " He will come to a bad end," drawled Anastasio. 
 
 There were to be a few hours sleep for the 
 soldiers before the march to Ocotlan. Vicente at 
 length returned to the meson. He found Clarita 
 there waiting for him and trembling. It was there 
 he bade her good-by, lingering long with her. She 
 was very sad when she finally turned away. He 
 had but left her when Pcpa, excitement still high in 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 95 
 
 her, met him in the barely lit corrector. She threw 
 her arms round his neck. 
 
 "Vicente!" she cried, "I am going with the 
 army ! " 
 
 He grew pale. 
 
 "My horse is the best of them all," cried she, the 
 feverish burning of the eyes and temples visible 
 again. " And I cannot stay ! I am made for this. 
 Call it wild they may but I am wild. Already 
 the soldiers rallied round me. I can be the spirit 
 of it ! " 
 
 " Pepa Pepita ! What mad dream is this ! " 
 
 She broke away and ran to her room, laughing 
 over her shoulder at him. 
 
 "I am going!" cried she, and disappeared. 
 
 He knew too well that the thing on which she set 
 her heart she did. 
 
CHAPTER II 
 
 THERE was no sign of dawn over the eastern 
 waters, and the crowd had dispersed and left 
 silence, when a candle was lit in Fortino s hut. 
 Fortino s hut was on the beach, like those of the 
 other fishers; and it was so small and so frail, 
 being made of reeds, that it trembled to its founda 
 tions at the very approach of the monster who lived 
 in it. It seemed there need be no surprise should 
 his head burst through the thatch, or an arm or a 
 great leg be heard crashing in the walls. He was 
 again chuckling, smotheredly, and the very bristling 
 folds on the back of his neck were damp with per 
 spiration. Some new things in the way of possible 
 deeds and honor had come into the brain of Fortino, 
 and the vistas of war were opened up to him. 
 
 A rollicking song came unsteadily along the 
 beach, interrupted by an occasional hiccough. It 
 echoed crazily in the night, and came nearer. It 
 quite entered Fortino s hut, and, with it, the singer 
 came too. Francisco s eyes were observed staring 
 at the light, and Francisco s broad grin became a 
 prominent furnishing of the bare hovel. Some 
 distance over his head Anastasio s became visible, 
 blinking, sleepy. Fortino sat down heavily on the 
 floor. 
 
 "A traitor shall not repose!" cried Francisco. 
 "Anyhow, not while there are things like this! 
 Sh ! Look. What do you think of this for spoils? " 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 97 
 
 He whispered it with husky intensity, and held 
 out something that glittered in his hand. 
 
 "Don t take the spoils, now, Fortino," whined 
 Anastasio. "They are his. To him be the reward." 
 And he came in and lay down with his feet out of 
 the door and his head against the opposite wall. 
 He had left a blanket and a roll of nets outside. 
 
 Fortino looked more closely. The thing was an 
 inkstand with a little silver on it. The significance 
 of this possession broke on Fortino. He stared 
 long at it, growing red. 
 
 "St. Francis!" muttered he. 
 
 "Sh!" said Francisco. "It is out of thejefe s 
 office. Ha! ha! All things are to be made pub- 
 lie! Spoils to him that can get them," lowering 
 his voice. "Corn? Why, corn isn t going to 
 count ! " 
 
 "Do you curs mean to say," said Fortino, "that 
 what we can find we get? " 
 
 "Why, curse me," cried Francisco, injured, 
 "isn t it war?" 
 
 "Si, and peace and a blessing go with it," said 
 Anastasio, eying the silver. " Let peace be with 
 the war." 
 
 "Men," said Fortino, meditating, "you are given 
 over to unworthy thoughts. Besides, what is the 
 thing worth? " 
 
 Francisco became knowing, shrewd. 
 
 "I don t know what this one will be worth. This 
 war maybe worth millions; it may be only thous 
 ands. But I do know, si, senor, I know exceedingly 
 well that wars there have been that would dazzle a 
 fellow s eyes, that there have. Men, there were 
 wars in Rome." 
 
 And he elevated his nose. 
 
 7 
 
9 8 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 "Where is that?" inquired Anastasio with in 
 terest. 
 
 " Rome is a country of kings," said Francisco. 
 
 "To the north?" said Anastasio, politely. 
 
 " It is it is an island," said Francisco. 
 
 "A fishing country," put in Fortino with author 
 ity. " It is among the Triquis. I was in that 
 direction once. It is south." 
 
 "Oh, ignorance!" groaned Francisco. "This is 
 not that Rome. This one is farther off. Well, 
 there was a fellow came down on Rome. He came 
 up over the mountains, which were of considerable 
 heights. And a battle was fought, called the 
 battle was called Hannibal was the battle called." 
 
 "Si, scnor ! It is the name of the place," broke 
 in Fortino with anger, and beating the soil with his 
 fist. "And it is among the Triquis. I have been 
 nigh to it. A fair sized village is Hannibal for an 
 Indian village. The houses there are round, made 
 of cane. I am some travelled, senor. I am well 
 posted on Rome, having been, I tell you again, in that 
 direction once on a burro." And Fortino growled 
 and grumbled away over his Rome in high dudgeon. 
 
 "You won t be convinced? This, I tell you, is 
 another Rome further off ! And do you know what 
 spoils they gathered up after the battle?" 
 
 "The Triquis are an ordinary set. They are a 
 measly tribe, the Triquis," said Fortino. "I 
 wouldn t build much on any spoils out of the 
 Triquis." 
 
 "Triquis!" burst out Francisco in hot wrath. 
 " This is Rome ! Rome is no Triqui ! " 
 
 " I know, I know," said Fortino, nodding his head 
 and speaking with calm assurance. " I tell you I 
 was there, and their houses are round." 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 99 
 
 "Oh, come to the spoils, Francisco," complained 
 Anastasio, sitting painfully erect and waiting. 
 
 " I defy you to make an estimate," cried Francisco. 
 " Guess now." 
 
 " Was it silver pesos, or was it gold ? " inquired 
 Anastasio. 
 
 "The Triquis have no gold, "put in Fortino, stub 
 bornly. " It s rare they get silver even. They are 
 too far west in the wild parts. They do their trad 
 ing in corn, the Triquis." 
 
 "These, I tell you," said Francisco, "were an 
 island of kings farther off." 
 
 " Si," said Fortino, "there is a fishing island west 
 of the Triquis." 
 
 "Oh, come to the spoils!" cried Anastasio, in 
 exasperation, getting up. "Was \kpesos?" 
 
 "Friends," replied Francisco, his face lit with 
 calm, triumphant happiness, "they gathered up, 
 after the battle of Hannibal in Rome, one bushel of 
 gold rings ! " 
 
 There was some silence, Anastasio staring with 
 shining eyes. 
 
 " Hm ! " said Fortino at length, "nose rings. 
 Don t build on any Indian nose rings. I don t call 
 to mind that the Triquis wore nose rings. But I 11 
 wager you on this : if a bushel of nose rings was 
 ever gathered up out of that measly tribe of Indians 
 they were brass." 
 
 "These were not brass," contradicted Francisco. 
 "And what is more, they were finger rings." 
 
 "Francisco," said Anastasio, with some plaintive- 
 ness, " is this a true thing? " 
 
 " It is a part of history, " said Francisco. " Clarita 
 read it to me out of a book." 
 
 Fortino was greatly taken aback. 
 
TOO A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 V 
 
 "Oh," said he, "if it came out of a book." He 
 began to look on Francisco with more interest. " Is 
 that a fact? In the books, eh? Well, maybe it is. 
 I won t go against the books. I never heard of any 
 such thing out of the Triquis. Well if she read 
 it out of a book." 
 
 Anastasio was at the door. 
 
 "There is no doubt about their being gold, Fran 
 cisco? " queried he. 
 
 "They were pure gold," said Francisco with 
 importance. 
 
 Anastasio sighed heavily, and went out and gath 
 ered his nets in his arms. He came to the door. 
 
 " It was a whole bushel of them, now, Francisco ? " 
 he asked, dreamily. "You wouldn t lie to me, 
 amigo ? " 
 
 "A full bushel of pure gold rings and this was 
 only a small part of the spoils." 
 
 Fortino was still sitting staring up at the narrator. 
 Anastasio sighed again, and went with the roll of 
 nets to the far corner. 
 
 "Let them stay here, Fortino, till the day when 
 I return," said he. 
 
 "Where in the name of the devil are you going?" 
 grumbled Fortino, like a man irritably convinced. 
 
 "To the wars," said Anastasio, with sentiment. 
 
 "Are you two fellows going to the wars?" 
 inquired Fortino, eying them both. 
 
 They made no direct reply. 
 
 "They gathered them up right off of the ground," 
 said Francisco at length, like one seeing the vision 
 of it, "just gathered them up. No trouble at 
 all filling the bushel, just gathered them right 
 up." 
 
 Anastasio dropped the net in the corner. 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 101 
 
 "Ah," sighed he, "it is more lucrative than 
 fishing." 
 
 They all pondered on it for an hour, chiefly in 
 silence, and the first streaks of the dawn found them 
 pondering on it. 
 
 "I don t count on or want the spoils," said 
 Fortino, "but I want to know when he is going to 
 start out for Ocotlan." 
 
 " Before sun-up. " 
 
 "Well, come on," said Anastasio, leading the 
 way, swinging himself out and over the sandy beach 
 toward the plaza. The others followed, the green, 
 blue, and magenta of their respective sashes begin 
 ning to glimmer a trifle in the pale dawn. 
 
 "Patriotism is a fine thing," said Francisco, 
 sententiously. 
 
 "Wars are a ripe good thing," observed Anastasio; 
 and he added, going lankly on before: "St. Mary 
 rewards him that makes sacrifices." 
 
 Before sunrise the little force marched out of 
 Chapala, taking the lake read to the east, in which 
 direction lay Mescala and Ocotlan. It had slightly 
 grown both as to infantry and horse, the latter num 
 bering thirteen. It was in good spirits, to which 
 the cool, exhilarating air of the. morning added. 
 In the east, over the water, hung the red of the 
 coming sun, and the lake lay still and glassy, wait 
 ing, mountains reflected in its clear crystal. A 
 quick, steady progress was maintained till nearly 
 noon. Quiroz rode before the little force of cavalry, 
 keen-eyed, watchful, reserved. Vicente, likewise 
 mounted, followed the horse at the head of his foot 
 soldiers. He was eager to be on, now that the 
 plunge was made. If Rodrigo s departure had been 
 for the purpose of making a stand, that stand could 
 
102 ./ DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 not be of effect against this force, small as it was, 
 unless in some way thtjefe should have much in 
 creased his own. At the earliest, therefore, Vicente 
 expected no formidable opposition till he should have 
 reached Ocotlan and gathered up the forces await 
 ing him. 
 
 The band that had joined him from Chapala num 
 bered less than fifty. They were undisciplined, 
 and, in the main, unmounted. He had called them 
 together in the early dawn, effected some sort of 
 organization, and made of them a company. He 
 had cast about for a leader. Fortino had long been 
 known to him as a man of great power and dogged 
 clinging to his purpose. The sudden bold, though 
 unauthorized act of the stubborn, hard-headed mon 
 ster, had appealed to him. He believed him the 
 sort of man from which to make a good soldier. 
 He came to a quick decision, mounted Fortino on 
 one of the few horses obtained in Chapala, and put 
 him at the head of the new force. Anastasio and 
 Francisco were thus under the leadership of their 
 old comrade. 
 
 But the horse farthest in the lead of all this 
 motley band did not bear Quiroz. There was yet 
 another before him, a free, independent member 
 of that army; one to whom no military discipline 
 could or would extend. It was the girl, Josefa 
 Aranja. With many emotions warring in her she 
 had kept her laughing threat, suddenly appearing 
 when the march was ordered, mounted on her in 
 comparable steed, waving her hand at the army, 
 dashing on in front of it. She wore a red dress, 
 a color she much preferred. She had donned a 
 black rebozo that, falling to her shoulders, did not 
 conceal her shining hair. She gave Vicente no 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 103 
 
 opportunity to expostulate. She galloped away to 
 the front as the troops started, the ends of her 
 rebozo fluttering in the wind of her speed. She 
 was followed by the glistening eyes of Doroteo 
 Quiroz. 
 
 At first she was joyous, exultant in a sort of bar 
 barous freedom. She turned her head and flashed 
 her smile at all the line and waved them on. She 
 fell back and called to them, saying she would lead 
 them into battle. She was like a fascinating child, 
 full of a restless, consuming spirit. When Vicente, 
 for the last time, pleaded with her not to go on this 
 perilous course, she only laughed, and said she 
 would win his victories for him. 
 
 The soldiers, in particular the two hundred trained 
 men of Vicente s own, caught the fair leader s 
 spirit. The novelty of it and her daring roused 
 enthusiasm. They seized upon her as upon some 
 element of luck, an embodiment of fortune. She 
 appealed to their gaming instinct as she did to that 
 of Quiroz. She was the thing to stake it on. She 
 took the place of a banner to rally round. They 
 began at length to cheer her. They threw up caps 
 and called her " La Capitana; " whereat she waved 
 at them again, and kindled fresh enthusiasm with 
 her brilliant smile and her contagious laugh. An 
 army needs something to idolize. She had the 
 nature to draw out its emotion. She could soon 
 become, thus, the idol, the centre of attraction, 
 finally a symbol even vital to it. 
 
 After a few hours the dancing of her eyes ceased, 
 and the buoyancy departed from her. The excite 
 ment had fed on other things than the exhilaration 
 of thus riding on before. It had been born of a 
 dangerous fire, and had burnt itself out. She was 
 
i o 4 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 far in the lead, and a gloom fell on her. She rode 
 slowly, one steady course, looking ahead. The sun 
 had lifted its yellow ball out of the water, and was 
 half way to the zenith. She stared into its reflected 
 image. Her face had grown dark. The men behind 
 her inspired her no more, indeed, they had never 
 done so. Other dreams were hers as she rode thus, 
 and she knew that the thing that had led her out on 
 this unwonted course was not merely her wild nature, 
 her longing for action. It was another and a 
 deeper thing, a recollection of days that had not 
 held Vicente in them, of a parting that rankled in 
 her memory. She could be the spirit of battles 
 yes, she had that unusual nature that has marked 
 some few women out of the long course of history. 
 But had he who was the leader of the troops behind 
 her been another, would the enthusiasm have gone 
 out and the gloom come? She laughed a mirthless 
 scorn of herself. She heard, then, Quiroz s voice 
 behind her. Unconsciously she had let his horse 
 men come nearer her, and he had reached her side 
 unawares. 
 
 "Why did the spirit of the strange one suddenly 
 die?" said he, glittering on her. "What is it that 
 lives hidden in you? Pepa, there is no man in the 
 wide world can read you. But, believe it, there is 
 one that knows your powers. Quiroz, if it please 
 you to hear, is that one. What need the army fear? 
 Ha! listen." He came closer and whispered it, 
 fastening his eyes on her. "Even though the 
 centre of it were killed, the scheme could live on. 
 Though the leader died what were even that ? 
 Pepa and one servant of hers, who knows her, could 
 yet do all things." 
 
 She turned her face to him, flashed a contempt of 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 105 
 
 that daring speech, and, saying nothing, rode away 
 from him. 
 
 Shortly before noon they arrived at Mescala. It 
 was but a collection of mud huts about an irregular 
 and gaunt square, wherein a few lean pigs squealed 
 for the food they were not likely to receive. The 
 lack of corn had fallen heavily on this region. 
 Behind the town were many fields in the mountains 
 which had been wont to sustain a scattered popula 
 tion of whom Mescala represented only the centre. 
 The hand of want had drawn out such military 
 powers as the district possessed. Vicente had not 
 been mistaken in the number of soldiers there to 
 be obtained. There were three hundred armed 
 men, including seven horsemen, awaiting him in 
 the square, under the leadership of a gray-headed 
 old fighter called Pancho. The two bodies shouted 
 greeting to one another and coalesced. Dinner was 
 eaten at that place. Vicente, who had been watch 
 ing Fortino s manoeuvring of his small band, and 
 who was always on the look-out for a leader of merit, 
 had been pleased with the conduct of the giant. 
 He gave him, in addition, a minority of Pancho s 
 men. 
 
 The march was speedily renewed. The long 
 hours of the sunny afternoon, coloring the lake 
 white, then yellow, then pink, saw the advancing 
 column ever on the lake s shore, and ever nearer 
 Ocotlan. Evening came on, and the low walls of 
 that town appeared, lit with the light of sunset. 
 
 Round about this village the mountains somewhat 
 give way, leaving a plain. Through the plain s 
 middle and by the town runs a small stream that, 
 issuing from the lake, makes away on its long 
 course to the Pacific. The army entered this plain 
 
106 A J^KKAM Of .1 THRONE 
 
 when the sun was near the western horizon. It 
 marched for a mile over a wide road, cut straight 
 through unfenced fields of green corn. The stalks 
 stood dense on either side, but were of a sickly 
 growth, the rains of the past summer having been 
 light. The mile being nearly traversed, the column 
 issued into a bare space of some one hundred yards 
 width, crossed that and came to the stream. The 
 banks were not steep. The bed was some thirty 
 yards in width, but the water occupied only some 
 four of the thirty at the farther shore. All the rest 
 of the space between the two low and sandy banks 
 was level, dry, and gravel-covered. The column 
 descended into this bed, crossed it, waded the 
 shallow stream, climbed the other bank, and pro 
 ceeded toward Ocotlan s adobe houses, which stood 
 immediately at hand. The town made no defence; 
 it could not. Indeed it was already occupied by 
 Vicente s allies. The head of the troops coming to 
 the first street, was met by a hasty messenger from 
 the presidcntc of the town council, who, fearful and 
 with no troops, made haste to surrender. The sur 
 render was no more than received when there came 
 dashing along the Mescala road a boy on foot. He 
 was Pancho s son. He brought the news, pantingly, 
 that a body of cavalry had eaten dinner in Mescala 
 and were pursuing him; they would arrive at once. 
 The youth had slipped away, and, believing himself 
 the especial object of that cavalry s hate, had run 
 the whole distance with all his speed, so marvellous 
 is the endurance of many an Indian lad. He was 
 too excited to have gained any idea of the number 
 of the enemy. All efforts failed to elicit even the 
 most unsatisfactory estimate. Pepa had ridden to 
 him while he delivered his message. 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 107 
 
 " Was the leader white ? " she asked. 
 
 "Si! Si!" was the reply. 
 
 She turned her horse away and rode alone to the 
 river. 
 
 Preparation was speedily made for battle. It was 
 determined to hold the bank of the stream next the 
 town. The Ocotlan troops, gathered to join Vicente, 
 were immediately sent for. They came out of the 
 street on the double quick. There were some two 
 hundred and sixty of them, including but six horse. 
 The secret organization effected by the church s 
 powers had so far been thorough. Vicente saw 
 himself at once at the head of more than eight hun 
 dred men, the expected number. They were undis 
 ciplined save for his original two hundred, but he 
 mustered his skill in their disposition. His cavalry 
 now numbered twenty-six. With Quiroz at their 
 head he placed them to the fore at the stream, 
 extended in a single line. Behind them, on the 
 flat between stream and town, he drew up his foot. 
 He ordered earthworks to be thrown up; but the 
 work of so doing was scarcely begun when the 
 enemy came. 
 
 When Don Rodrigo, with his eleven men, rode 
 out of Chapala the night before, it was not his pur 
 pose permanently to abandon the field. True, he 
 did not wish for war; yet he had followed Vicente s 
 movements with deep interest. He had early seen 
 that the uprising should be crushed at once, and, 
 being republican to his heart s core, had at times 
 felt some glow of desire to crush it. He was a 
 personal friend of the governor, and possessed, he 
 knew, the confidence and good-will of that somewhat 
 weak executive as did none other of the police of 
 the lake region. Perceiving the danger to grow 
 
io$ A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 more threatening, and the sapped and tottering State 
 to remain impotent, he had, a week earlier, addressed 
 a long and appealing letter to the governor. He 
 had laid the whole situation before him, urged the 
 need of immediate action, reminded him of the 
 powerlessness of the few country police, and finally, 
 with what eloquence he could master, called for a 
 body of troops, however small, to be at once de 
 spatched, that the revolt might die in its infancy. 
 He freely offered his own services to lead the attack 
 should no better leader be at hand, at the same 
 time declaring himself not eager for the duty. 
 
 The governor was a man of nearly shattered 
 nerves. He was drawn this way and that, buffeted 
 by many waves of the national turbulency. He 
 lacked decision and promptness. There were many 
 other calls for troops, seeming as urgent as Rodrigo s 
 own. The State was poor to penury. Already the 
 panic-stricken executive had been called upon to 
 create soldiers where no soldiers were. He was at 
 his wits end. There had come no reply to Rod 
 rigo s letter. 
 
 The jefe had written again, and, when Vicente 
 reached Chapala, he determined to wait no longer. 
 He would go straight to Guadalajara, urge his cause 
 in person, secure what troops he could, and return. 
 He did not wish the leadership. But he would take 
 it should the State furnish no other for the place. 
 
 In the middle of the morning, therefore, he was 
 riding with his eleven on the Guadalajara road. 
 He perceived before him a cloud of dust, which, 
 somewhat dissolving, displayed a little band of 
 horsemen approaching him. He halted, and the 
 leader of that band, meeting him, gave him a paper 
 with the governor s seal thereon. 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 109 
 
 "My one friend in many troubles," it read in 
 formally, "you have saved me in this sea before; 
 you will do it now. You talk of leaders and troops 
 as though I could raise them from the dust. I am 
 driven to insanity with the distracting calls on the 
 resourceless State. You are leader enough; there 
 is no other. Kill the Chapala revolt for me and my 
 gratitude is eternal. I send you thirty horsemen. 
 You want more, but they are not to be had. Why ? 
 Because of mobs we have plenty, of armies none. 
 The government has gotten itself mixed in a war 
 with the United States. I, as every other State of 
 the Republic, am sapped of troops. I create you 
 captain of this band. Add what gendarmes you 
 can. Strike quick, and I trust you." 
 
 Thirty men! Rodrigo scanned them with some 
 thing like humor in his eyes. If he must be 
 launched into a small war of his own heigh-ho! 
 let us at it! His army was infinitesimal, but he 
 recalled that Vicente s two hundred were nearly all 
 foot. Forty-two horsemen, he believed, did they 
 strike at once, fearlessly, would effectually paralyze 
 the revolt; for they were well armed with sabres 
 and short guns. He ordered a return to the lake. 
 The men cheered him, and the gallop to Mescala 
 was begun. 
 
 He who had been the leader of the thirty assumed, 
 henceforth, a position somewhat like that of first 
 lieutenant to Rodrigo. He was named Bonavidas. 
 He was a large man, with very broad shoulders, but 
 a frame exceedingly bony. His legs and arms were 
 very long. The most striking detail of his appear 
 ance was a peculiar sickliness, even haggardness of 
 countenance. He was at times frightfully pale, and 
 breathed like one in exhaustion. His expression 
 
no A DREAir OF A THRONE 
 
 was uncanny. These characteristics were all the 
 more curious when it was seen that a good humor 
 (somewhat infernal), expressed by a haggard smile, 
 was his usual mood; and that he seemed ever power 
 ful, more so, indeed, the more sickly was his face. 
 Rodrigo studied this anomaly of a man as they 
 rode. He believed he had here an ally such as he 
 needed. 
 
 " Bonavidas," said he at last, "you do not look 
 like a man to hunt fighting." 
 
 "If every other," said Bonavidas, smiling his 
 ghostly smile, and expressing his eagerness by a 
 flapping of his lank knees against the saddle, his 
 mind characteristically lingering over the unclean 
 thought, " if every other be as lively a corpse as 
 I, we shall soon be digging graves for the living." 
 
 They arrived, at some time between the hours of 
 ten and eleven, at the ridge overlooking the lake. 
 That beautiful expanse of water lay shimmering in 
 the white light. 
 
 "A pretty place to spoil with trouble," said 
 Bonavidas. "The shores are as handsome as the 
 water. And what is that spot that lies out there 
 in the middle?" 
 
 " An island," said Rodrigo. " And a spot haunted. 
 There is never a Mexican thinks of the beauty of 
 that ; he dreams only of its ghosts and steers in the 
 other direction. They say it is long since cursed, 
 and the devil has it." 
 
 "An attractive idea," said Bonavidas. "What is 
 on it?" 
 
 "Ruins of a Spanish prison," returned Rodrigo. 
 
 They had descended from the ridge s summit, 
 and, for a time, the lake disappeared. They issued 
 at last on its borders and made a short halt at 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE in 
 
 Mescala, where, the town being nearly deserted, it 
 was found impossible to learn the number of those 
 who had passed before; for the populace of the 
 country districts are often found to be in total 
 ignorance of numbers. A steady trot was then 
 entered upon, which brought that small body of 
 cavalry to the corn-covered plain about Ocotlan 
 shortly before the sun, a red and fiery ball, touched 
 the horizon s line. 
 
 Emerging into the wide road between the fields 
 of grain, more than one eye detected the line of 
 battle yonder under the walls of the town with the 
 river before it. Rodrigo halted his men. The corn 
 was not high, and the horsemen could see over its 
 mile of extent. A sudden silence fell on them. 
 They sat and scanned that opposing force for one 
 short minute; then they looked at each other. Its 
 extraordinary one day s growth astounded even 
 Rodrigo. His face grew white, but he shut his 
 jaws and flinched not. He saw a band of cavalry 
 which seemed not greatly inferior to his own. 
 Behind it, deployed in a single compact line, he 
 perceived nearly eight hundred foot. He believed 
 he detected Vicente s form, mounted, in front of 
 the division of the left. The leader of the centre 
 he did not recognize. On his enemy s right he saw 
 a division headed by an enormous man whom he 
 believed, yet could scarcely believe, to be the fisher 
 man Fortino. He looked more closely, and decided 
 it was he. He knew Fortino to be unskilled as a 
 leader. That right division appeared, too, a trifle 
 weaker than the others. Lastly, it was nearest the 
 street s end leading into the town. Rodrigo swept 
 the front with quick eyes, seized upon these facts, 
 steeled his nerves, and made his plans at once. 
 
ii2 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 He turned to his men, calmly, leisurely. He smiled 
 a cool, humorous smile at them. 
 
 " Are you afraid ? " said he. 
 
 Their awe at the superior force fled at once. 
 They declared for the dash. He knew his dangers 
 and his powers, but did not hesitate. 
 
 "We will meet the cavalry with a shock it will 
 never forget," he commanded. "Ride, brothers, 
 every one of you a demon. We will crush the 
 horse. We then plunge through their right wing 
 of infantry, cut it in two, and gain the street. We 
 will then, with the protection of its narrowness, 
 hold it against the entrance of the infantry, whose 
 lines in a street can be no wider than are ours. 
 Come; your lives and victory depend on crushing 
 the horse, and one blow will do it." 
 
 He saw a wavering smile play over Bonavidas 
 pale face, and the relish that odd person had for 
 this deed of danger was unmistakable. One minute 
 only had been occupied in the survey. In one more 
 the forty-two were deployed in corn-fields, the line s 
 middle resting on the road. 
 
 The word of command was on Rodrigo s lips, but 
 he did not utter it. He saw, in that moment, issu 
 ing from his enemy s ranks, a horse at whose saddle 
 fluttered a crimson dress. It was Pepa, and he sud 
 denly knew her. She dashed down into the stream 
 and came on. 
 
 That unexpected movement had taken Vicente 
 completely by surprise. He had tried to induce 
 her to retire into the town. She had persisted in 
 remaining on the field, though to the rear and out 
 of the probable range of shots. Vicente, now 
 absorbed in the concentration of his powers, was 
 suddenly amazed to perceive that she had already 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 113 
 
 burst through the line of infantry at a point distant 
 from him, and crossed the stream. She was a hun 
 dred yards to the front before he realized it. He 
 called after her. He commanded her. He started 
 away, spurring his horse, to force her back. He 
 heard Quiroz s voice behind him cry: 
 
 " Let her alone ! She will walk barefoot over 
 burning hell before she die let her!" 
 
 Vicente perceived that his enemy was waiting. 
 He knew that only brute force and a disgraceful 
 scene could make her return, even should he over 
 take her and her horse was superior to his. He 
 heard the army behind him burst into enthusiasm 
 for her daring; knew that to hamper this their 
 inspiration would be a military mistake. He realized 
 that the fight was waiting on her; that his men had 
 come to trust that this untamable woman carried 
 with her her own safety. Chagrined, he was forced 
 back. He, as Rodrigo, held his men and waited. 
 His troops were shouting: 
 
 "Viva la Capitana ! Viva la Capitana!" 
 
 The girl did not heed. Seeing she was not pur 
 sued, she suddenly slackened speed. She rode 
 slowly on, her horse stepping proudly, majestically. 
 She came in between the two fields of corn and 
 halted not. Her black rebozo s ends waved behind 
 her in the rising evening breeze. The last of the 
 sunlight, piercing the field of grain, cast its hori 
 zontal beams on the red of her dress and barred it 
 with lines of shadow, so that the crimson, as she 
 went, flickered and flashed with a thousand inter 
 mittent rays of light. The tasselled stalks whis 
 pered and waved in air. She held the two forces 
 motionless. Her eyes, deep burning, were bent 
 before her. Blood suffused her face, and the ex- 
 
 8 
 
ii 4 A DREAM OF A THROXK 
 
 citcmcnt, repressed, showed itself only in eyes and 
 lips. 
 
 In the universal silence she came thus to a point 
 half way between the two troops. She halted her 
 horse and turned a little sidewise. She could see 
 Rodrigo before her. She looked and saw Vicente 
 behind her. Her face became suddenly bloodless, 
 and the corn-fields seemed swaying and circling 
 round her. She recovered herself, gathering her 
 strength, and looked at the two ways. Their lengths 
 were equal. Their widths and smoothness were the 
 same. It was as far to Vicente as to Rodrigo the 
 one was to her right, the other to her left. The wide 
 path through the fields led straight to either. She 
 would not turn her horse east or west. He was 
 champing his bit. She loosed the reins and let 
 him have his will, her hand trembling as she did 
 so. Even in her the spirit of gaming lived. She 
 watched her steed with fear concentrated in her 
 great eyes. He turned and went on in the direction 
 she had been going. A delirium of haste seized 
 her. She spurred him and dashed toward the horse 
 men of Rodrigo. She bent over, her face a face of 
 flame, and urged him on. She drew up with a 
 quick and reckless wheeling of her steed before the 
 leader. He had advanced some ten paces to meet 
 her. She looked at him haughtily, but her eyes spoke 
 her spirit. She bent them on him and said, low: 
 
 "What is it you have for me? " 
 
 "Nothing," said he, his face still whiter. 
 
 A wave of anger and shame burst on hei. She 
 shot a look of hate at him, wheeled, and dashed 
 back so quickly that the troops who idolized her 
 could not have known even that she had come so 
 near the chief of their enemies. 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 115 
 
 She galloped toward the river, hearing the jefe s 
 sharp cry of charge. She let her powerful horse 
 put out all his speed and flew down toward Vicente s 
 forces, the sound of the galloping cavalry behind 
 ringing in her ears. She neared the stream and 
 raised her hand high in air, crying: 
 
 " Follow me! " 
 
 She had one instant to knot her flying rebozo round 
 her waist, leaving her head bare. Then she wheeled 
 once more toward Rodrigo s advancing line. 
 
 It would have been well could Quiroz have held 
 his horsemen on the stream s east bank, thus taking 
 his enemy at a disadvantage when that enemy should 
 cross and be forced to mount it. But Vicente saw 
 the space between river and town to be too narrow; 
 the cavalry was too close to the foot. Did it so 
 remain the foot would be hampered by its presence. 
 So, immediately on the charging of Rodrigo s men, 
 he ordered a counter-charge of Quiroz s twenty-six. 
 
 They saw the girl, having come to the stream s 
 opposite bank, turn to iead that charge. Doroteo 
 and his horsemen dashed into the stream, across the 
 gravel bed, up the other side, and followed her. 
 Rodrigo s line had cut straight through the trampled 
 grain. He held it compact and steady. He swung 
 down toward the river with mighty force. He knew 
 the value of one quick, projectile-like charge at a 
 given point. Instinctively he adopted the tactics 
 of Napoleon, of Greene, of Forrest. He swept out 
 into the open plain between corn and stream with 
 bursting speed. 
 
 The girl had fallen in with Ouiroz s men. She 
 was at Doroteo s side, wild as an animal, leading 
 them on. The two bands fired volleys and then 
 crashed together with terrific shock. It was hence- 
 
n6 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 forth a fight of sabres, knives, or pistols. The 
 indiscriminate mass swayed for an instant to and 
 fro. Horses and men went down. She was in the 
 middle of it, fighting on, blindly, enraged. She 
 scarce knew what she did. She believed she aimed 
 her weapon more than once straight at that white 
 leader who had cast her back. But he bore down 
 untouched. His force pushed on irresistibly, cut 
 ting or crushing as it went. The inferior line of 
 Quiroz slowly gave way, ground, as it were, over the 
 course it had traversed. It fought with unabated 
 fury. Quiroz s shrill cry, "Down with them! 
 Down with the sons of Hell ! " rang ever clear and 
 high over the noise of battle. His men were hurled 
 to the river s bank and down. Reduced in number 
 they still fought on. Rodrigo s line crushed its 
 slow way into the gravel bed and over it. He was 
 losing men; he bore on, cutting his way with 
 demoniacal desperation. 
 
 He tried to centre his powers on Quiroz, to slay 
 that fierce fighter. But enchantment went with 
 Quiroz. He seemed to feel, in the tempest s 
 middle, a joy, a delight that was devilish. He held 
 a long macJiete. His every blow was delivered with 
 a coolness as great as were its power and speed. 
 His eyes glittered like coals. He was yet pressed 
 back. His line floundered for one instant in the 
 waters of the stream, turned and dashed up the 
 other bank. The girl was with it. Rodrigo s men, 
 suffering here most severely, staggered up after, 
 concentrated their power and still pressed on. It 
 seemed they were cutting through solid iron, so 
 marvellously did Quiroz hold his force together. 
 But that force was crushed at last straight into the 
 line of Fortino s ri^ht. There its leader made an 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 117 
 
 ultimate desperate effort. He held Rodrigo in 
 check yet another minute. Thejefe was gathering 
 his strength for the final wheel to the left and a 
 leap through the ranks of infantry. 
 
 That minute was enough. In it Vicente showed 
 his cool head and the discipline he had ground into 
 his two hundred. He was with that band on his 
 line s left, whereas the fight of the cavalry was on 
 the right. Rodrigo being for an instant checked 
 by horse and foot, Vicente swung his two hundred 
 round, like the spoke of a wheel on the hub of the 
 centre. The machine-like precision of his men was 
 proved. Rodrigo was caught, as it were, in the 
 trap of an angle. Vicente s left poured a sudden 
 deadly hail on his flank. The whole line was at 
 once engaged. Pancho s centre, raw as they were, 
 broke on the imprisoned/^. The State s horsemen 
 went down like grain in the field. Rodrigo, driven 
 to his last madness, huddled the remnant of his 
 torn force, called out the power of every nerve, gave 
 the cry for the great burst, plunged like a maniac 
 through horse and foot, knocked the charging Fortino 
 half senseless with a blow from his empty weapon, 
 cut through the panic-stricken right, as though his 
 line had been a line of steel, dealt death about, 
 left a bloody track behind, tore himself loose from 
 his last antagonist, and galloped away into the 
 town s street. 
 
 The battle, small as it was, had been inconceiv 
 ably fierce and deadly. Vicente had shown, once 
 for all, his coolness, his deep thought, his power 
 over men, though he had so fearfully outnumbered 
 his antagonist. The flank fire of his two hundred 
 had done terrible execution, a fire and a movement 
 directed with masterful genius. He had ridden up 
 
n8 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 and down his ranks, calm. He had no more heeded 
 the storm of bullets than though it had been a storm 
 of dust. He saw Fortino, after a brave dash, 
 stagger back dazed. He saw the gray-bearded 
 Pancho with a long wound opened on his cheek, and 
 the blood trickling down the beard, drip, drip, with 
 the flood that needs no haste. He perceived Bona- 
 vidas ghastly countenance, haggard as death, but 
 living with a cruel joy as he felled his antagonists 
 with powerful arm. He poured in his fire, cut his 
 enemy down, then saw that last charge of Rodrigo s 
 remnant, the bursting asunder of Fortino s right, 
 and the escape. 
 
 Quiroz s decimated cavalry gathered itself together 
 and dashed at the town in hot pursuit. The girl 
 was already far in the lead, disappearing. The red 
 ball of the sun had gone down. The lake had 
 burned with its last fire and grown leaden. The 
 night was coming quickly on. Rodrigo had not 
 sufficient men remaining to make a stand, even in 
 the street. He fled. That memorable battle was 
 fought and won. 
 
 The gray-bearded Pancho, as the tumult ceased, 
 fell dead from his steed. The stream and tin- 
 stretch beyond and the space before the town were 
 strewn with slain. Vicente had lost eighty-seven 
 men, the scarcely conceivable, deadly effect of that 
 infuriated band of penned-up cavalry. Out of the 
 forty-one that had followed the bold dash of Rodrigo, 
 but a dozen cut their final gash of blood through the 
 crushed right and escaped. Such was the Battle of 
 Ocotlan, told yet with bated breath in many a 
 fisher s hut, remembered as a fight such as, for 
 fierceness, the lake had never seen will never see 
 again. 
 
CHAPTER III 
 
 WITH the setting sun rose clouds in the east and 
 south, and lightning over the southern moun 
 tains was answered by other lightning over the east 
 ern. The rumblings of distant thunder told of the 
 coming of one of those swift storms of rain and wind 
 that at times follow the rainy seasons some weeks 
 after the daily summer storms have ceased. The 
 stony road from Mescala to Ocotlan, with the moun 
 tains to its one side and the darkening water to the 
 other, was overcast with gloom, when there came 
 along it toward the latter town a single traveller on 
 foot. 
 
 The gloom was of that dull, weird kind that heavy 
 clouds and a lingering bit of sunlight conspire to 
 produce. It could not be many minutes till the way 
 would be dark save for the lightning flashing on the 
 road s rocks and the pedestrian moving among them. 
 A wind came out of the south and crinkled all the 
 lake, and heavy blue waves began to beat upon the 
 shore. The wind caught the skirt of the traveller s 
 dress and whipped it, a flash of pink when the light 
 ning lit it, round young limbs. 
 
 She had seen the sun s red ball going down. She 
 had heard, too, firing in the distance before her, 
 whereat she had shuddered at the great burnt scar 
 of red the sun made across the water s face. On a 
 lonely spot of the shore near Mescala she had been 
 frightened by the sudden apparition of a man loom- 
 
120 A DREAAf OF A THRONE 
 
 ing from behind boulders, and had heard a boat 
 grating on the sand. Naturally timid, she had 
 scudded away in the light from that very path of 
 red across the water, casting one glance behind her. 
 That glance had revealed to her the man s face, lonely 
 against a background of southern sky and clouds, a 
 face about which the rising breeze blew strands of 
 tangled hair, on whose forehead sat care or some 
 thing worse, and across whose cheek a scar wrenched 
 the features into an expression that seemed to her 
 infernal. The sun s scar on the water was nothing to 
 that. She ran. She came to a rocky angle of the 
 road; turning to look again, the figure had disap 
 peared. But she carried its effect with her. 
 
 The firing before her had not ceased. The sun s 
 red was nearly gone before she heard it no more. 
 She was afraid of the sound, and longed to know. 
 Almost she would have preferred the presence of the 
 bullets and the sight of the battle to this fearing un 
 certainty. She must hasten lest the night should lose 
 her. The big empty world was a strange thing to her. 
 What were all its vastness and its loneliness ; its peo 
 ple, its lands, its battles? Only let her reach Ocot- 
 lan and find him living what were all these things? 
 It had been dark like this, and she had felt this sud 
 den lostness once before, when they had carried away 
 a body from her hut, and there had been no unrolling 
 of the nets. 
 
 It was black night when she came to the river s 
 bed, save for the flashes that lifted Ocotlan out of the 
 blackness for her, and burnt its adobe walls. The 
 clouds were over all the sky, and the measureless 
 curtain of the coming rain, had it been day, would 
 have been seen to hang, thick with torrents, over all 
 the south-eastern lake, rolling nearer. 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 121 
 
 She could dimly see lights and people beyond the 
 stream, and, to the right of the town, still farther, 
 fires as of a camp. She found herself trembling, and 
 went down into the bed of the stream. She fell 
 against a great bulk lying on the pebbles. She 
 groped to the right and the left, and fell against 
 others. Despairing, she wanted to weep, but could 
 not, and the lightning came and showed her that the 
 bulks were horses lying dead. As the lightning went 
 out, a white spot caught her eye. Whether it were a 
 face she did not know, but she cried out smotheredly, 
 and ran on by a way the light had shown her, straight 
 through the narrow strip of water, and climbed up 
 the other bank. 
 
 A little way further there were some torches of 
 ocote flaring yellow, being carried slowly here and 
 there. She came to them, and the bearers, speechless 
 women from Ocotlan, saw her figure suddenly in their 
 midst, the wind wrapping round her the skirts the 
 stream had wet, and the flames showing the gold of 
 her hair. 
 
 One of the women wailed and turned away, and 
 there came another, searching, weeping, turning over 
 bodies on the ground, and crying : 
 
 " Oh my Juan ! My Juanito ! My nino ! " 
 
 The girl knew she was in the midst of the slain. 
 She seized the arm of the crying woman and 
 said : 
 
 " Where is the leader?" 
 
 " Heaven knows ! " was the distracted reply. 
 
 Terrified at this, the girl ran on, dark shapes still 
 about her, a groan there or a curse here. A ribald 
 young female came staggering over the field with a 
 torch and a rag of a flag. She was drunk and 
 singing. 
 
122 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 " Dead ! all dead ! " and she laughed and sang 
 again. "My Cenobio left me! He s dead !" she 
 cried, seizing the traveller s slim shoulder and leering 
 horribly on her. " He went down here ! " And 
 she thrust out a thin arm tragically and pointed to 
 the field. 
 
 " Where is the leader, Vicente ? " gasped the other. 
 
 11 Vicente? Ha ! " shrieked the first. " Oh, God 
 help him ! " She went staggering on among the 
 fallen. 
 
 Shaking in every limb the traveller went toward 
 the fires. She passed figures coming and going, and 
 bodies carried. A part of the army was burying the 
 dead. She came at length like a quick shadow or a 
 leaf blown by the wind, to the long line of open air 
 camps, where the rest of the troops, exhausted, 
 cooked, or lay on blankets, or gambled with tossed 
 pennies. She scanned the line. He was not there. 
 She ran along it, her throat dry. She came at length 
 to a row of adobe walls some yards in front of the 
 camp. There was one fire here, and two men were 
 seated on the ground leaning against the wall. They 
 were Anastasio and Fortino. The relief at sight of 
 them was so intense that, when she cried to them, it 
 was half a cry, half a dry sob. She flung herself 
 down beside them. 
 
 " Is Vicente dead?" she cried. 
 
 11 No," said Anastasio, without emotion, straighten 
 ing a long leg flat on the ground. " Why," he 
 drawled, suddenly, a little surprised, " how did you 
 get here?" 
 
 " I followed. Take me to Vicente." 
 
 " I think I can do that," muttered Fortino, in grim 
 humor. " I can do something, if I can t hold a line 
 of horse." 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 123 
 
 He arose and led the girl away remorsefully. 
 
 " Is my father killed? " she had asked of Anastasio. 
 
 " Oh Lord, no," drawled Anastasio. 
 
 Fortino took her into the town. He muttered all 
 the way, deeply, subterraneously. They went some 
 blocks in silence, she wrapping her rebozo closely 
 round her head and shoulders. 
 
 " No," broke out Fortino, suddenly. " No, they re 
 not dead. But it is n t any virtue of mine. I was 
 knocked, I was. I am no man, girl. I am a burro." 
 
 His bitterness was great. Parties of hastening sol 
 diers were scouring the streets and once or twice 
 they saw where doors were being burst open. 
 
 " They re looking for the jefe" grunted Fortino, 
 " the jefe it was my business to stop. He and his 
 men broke through me and my drivelling right. 
 They Ve found two of his men, and that s all they 
 will find." 
 
 She said nothing to this. They came to a long, 
 low house with eaves projecting on the street. The 
 front was flush with the sidewalk, and the windows 
 were barred with iron. A street-lamp showed carved 
 lions heads on the massive door. They show the 
 place to this day as the house that lodged Vicente 
 after the battle, number fifteen of the Calle del Rio ; 
 weather-beaten it is, with its many-colored plaster- 
 ings falling off. 
 
 Fortino beat on the door with a noise that the 
 thunder answered, for the stoTm was over the town. 
 It was opened and she was let in, and Fortino, 
 mumbling, went away. The first drops of the tor 
 rent fell on her blue rcboso before she entered. 
 
 Vicente was with the clergy on that night. The 
 battle was called a victory, though the leader was 
 chagrined that the jefe had escaped him. The 
 
i 24 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 meaning of the fight and the plans of the next move 
 ments were to be discussed in a parley in this, the 
 house of a priest, over whose low, flat roof loomed 
 the towers of a church. They were waiting, too, in 
 vain, for news of the capture of the fugitives. It was 
 the priest himself who had cautiously opened the 
 door to the girl. When he learned who she was he 
 admitted her and closed it. His full face suggested 
 a deep but suppressed glee, and in his long sotana 
 he led her, rubbing his hands nervously together as 
 he went, along corridors, round a patio, to a large 
 rear room. Vicente was there alone. They had 
 brought into that room one of those pot-like port 
 able brascros, that he might dry his garments by it; 
 for in the manceuvering of the fight he had dashed 
 more than once through the stream. The brasier sat 
 now in a corner on the brick floor, its bed of live 
 coals casting out a red glare. There was a candle 
 on the ledge of a deep window whereof the inner 
 wooden shutters were closed and barred. 
 
 She arrived at the room s door and the priest left 
 her. A delight that was agitation filled her as she 
 came timidly in. Her face was beautiful in that mo 
 ment, and wonderfully lit. The suspense was done. 
 
 "Vicente! " she cried, and sank forward, shaking 
 and sobbing. 
 
 " My faithful one ! " said he, when his first aston 
 ishment was over, holding her and making her dry 
 her dress over the coals, " if only the whole cause 
 had your spirit in it! But why did you come? I 
 left you safe. Pepita s mother promised me only 
 this morning that you should be cared for. War is 
 not for you." 
 
 " I was lonely," said she ; " and, Vicente, I am a 
 woman now." 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 125 
 
 He looked her over. She was, indeed, at seventeen 
 a woman. Her form had grown slightly fuller than 
 it was in the old days. Her face, too, was a woman s 
 face, for all its youth and its dimples and the glistening 
 hair about it. It held in it a dreaminess that made it 
 almost sad. He told her so with a pang in his heart. 
 
 " No, no ! " she cried, smiling at him. " Not with 
 you. I was always happy with you. Vicente, I 
 could n t stay I could n t be away when you were 
 here. There is n t anything there any more ; and 
 the very sight of the nets and the house made me 
 unhappy." 
 
 " But what can this bloody war, child, have to do 
 with you ? " 
 
 " I can follow you let me ! Oh, I am so lonely ! 
 And if you are if it goes wrong with you I can 
 take care of you then ! " 
 
 He caught her to his arms where she came will 
 ingly, and the candle-light lit moisture in his eye. 
 He sat down on a chair still holding her. 
 
 " Little girl," said he, looking into the bed of coals, 
 " do you not know how, in all the struggle and the 
 fear, I remember and keep you as the bright spot 
 behind, whither I shall return? Where all is fierce 
 ness I remember you as gentleness. Look," stretch 
 ing out his hand and pointing to the fire, " I can 
 see it all, merely looking at the coals. There is your 
 face, luminous. Some love will come to you some 
 day, now that you are a woman, and it will light 
 your face like that. There is the beach, too, and the 
 hut with its poor little thatch. Why, Clarita, if I 
 were in the blackest dungeon I could still see the 
 waves that we played by, and feel the spray, and 
 the west wind, and my sister s hair tangled by it 
 and blown like dull gold damply over my face." 
 
126 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 She could not answer him. After a pause he 
 continued : 
 
 " And this is why I do not want you to follow me, 
 that I may run no risk of losing you. Your poor 
 feet have come a long way." 
 
 She put one of them out and looked at it and 
 laughed at him a little. 
 
 " They are very well," said she. 
 
 They were small, encased in the rough shoes that 
 the Chapala cobbler made. The shoes were worn, 
 damp, and discolored with the journey. 
 
 " Surely those little things," said he, " will not bear 
 much. You should be at home. It is better than 
 this ; and I know you have, under your gentleness, 
 a strength." He smiled. " We used to call you stub 
 born. You would so persist in doing that which you 
 wanted to do. You can care for yourself till a better 
 time. Your old stubbornness will not make you 
 follow me. And if the day comes when these dreams 
 are realities, what will you have me do for you 
 then?" 
 
 " Only so have it," said she, " that you shall not 
 have to go away any more. It is very great, Vicente, 
 to be as you are. You are not like other men." 
 
 "No, it is not great; would that I could make it 
 so. If I should die now, Clarita, I should be called 
 only an adventurer. Scarcely a star, girl, shines on a 
 path like mine. One victory cannot blind me to the 
 dark days to come. I may die like the others, for 
 having lifted up my voice and desired something 
 different. The world seems ever to hate him who 
 disturbs its repose." 
 
 She clasped her fingers together over the charcoal 
 and bent down till its red glare made her face like 
 flame. 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 127 
 
 " Oh ! " she cried, " that I too might stay with 
 you ! " 
 
 " Why," said he, laughing gently, " you are the 
 calm over it all. And you will go back and wait 
 till the waves are still." 
 
 She thought in silence. 
 
 " Yes," she sighed after a time, " I will go back. 
 But it is with sorrow, and only because you wish it. 
 I shall not be happy. And I do not like it there 
 any more," she added with odd simplicity. " And I 
 do not like Pepa s mother. And Pepa where is 
 she? Vicente, I want to say something to you." 
 
 " Say on," said he. 
 
 " I I am afraid of Pepa." 
 
 His face darkened. 
 
 "Why? "asked he. 
 
 Not for myself. She is good to me but I 
 am afraid of her for you." 
 
 " She did a brave thing to-day," said he. " She 
 rode out between the two ranks, straight into the 
 enemy. She is like a dream in the night. She stirs 
 my heart strangely, yet I cannot truly know her. 
 She rode slowly, daring them. She made them halt, 
 and gave us every opportunity to take in their 
 number and more fully to prepare ; and afterward 
 she turned and galloped back and led the charge." 
 
 His face grew much darker as he spoke. She was 
 interested but little. 
 
 " Yes," she said gloomily ; " yes, that is like Pepa." 
 
 " But you are afraid of her?" 
 
 She clasped his arm and repeated it. 
 
 " I am afraid of Pepa. I do not know; there is 
 something that makes me afraid." 
 
 " Well," he said after a long pause, " maybe there 
 is, child." 
 
i 2 8 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 They spoke yet a little while of other things. The 
 storm had broken and was warring outside. The 
 terror of the battle and the gloom of the field she 
 had passed through were over her, and she shuddered. 
 
 " Early in the morning," said he, " there departs a 
 canoa from here for Chapala. It is a boat of a friend 
 of the priest. He will carry letters to Chapala, and 
 you shall go with him. You will be safe and the 
 journey will be easy. The army is not for you." 
 
 He gave her his bed, which stood in the room s 
 corner, kissed her good-night, and left her. She sat 
 long looking into the dying fire, hearing thunder and 
 rain in torrents without, and afterward dropped her 
 head to her hands on her knees and the tears ran 
 down on the pink of the dress. Then she went to 
 bed and slept. 
 
 Fortino had returned slowly to the point where she 
 had found him. He had taken no interest in the 
 silent seekers after fugitives, the occasional flashing 
 of a torch round a dark corner He believed the 
 remnant of the enemy had galloped away out of the 
 tov/n ; indeed it was known that some had so done. 
 
 " They ve caught two ! " cried a friend, running 
 past him. 
 
 "Eh?" said Fortino; "two;" and went on ill- 
 humoredly. " And the rest may be in Heaven or 
 Hell. They are n t here, oh Saint Gregory ! " 
 
 He came to the outskirts and thence to the wall 
 where his two companions were, and the isolated 
 camp fire flickered and smoked. The rain was com 
 ing on with more violence, and sputtered and hissed 
 on the coals. Anastasio was seated under the shel 
 ter of thatched eaves that hung out from the wall. 
 He had his sombrero down over his eyes, his lank- 
 knees close to his face, his lanker arms wrapped 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 129 
 
 round them. His red blanket, for further protection, 
 was wound all about his body, his neck, and his chin. 
 He was the picture of indolence. Off to the left were 
 the other camps, surprised by the rain, the fires dying 
 out, the men huddled together. To the right were 
 still the torches flaring over dead bodies. 
 
 Fortino, too, sat down by the fire in the shelter of 
 the eaves. The rain, coming from behind them, left 
 this spot comparatively dry. When the full torrent 
 broke, Francisco came dashing from the field of the 
 slain, his blanket fluttering in the wind and his 
 sandals clapping out sharp slaps on the wet earth. 
 He leaped in under the eaves. 
 
 " What, you old figure-head ! " cried he in an im 
 pertinent bantering to Fortino. " You who lead and 
 fight like a lame cock ! Oh your battle ! Ha ! ha ! 
 Ha ! ha ! " and he slapped his leg with vigor. " Villain, 
 you were chaff in the wind. The first big wave went 
 right over your head as though your bristles were 
 grass on a sandy marsh. Take a lesso-n from me. I 
 would inspire a rock with recklessness, I would. 
 Men, did you see me? I was the stiffest feather in 
 your right wing, was I ! " 
 
 " And you beat more air than all the rest of them," 
 observed Anastasio, slowly crossing his legs another 
 way, " I 11 wager you that, and were easily first when 
 the wing flew." 
 
 u Let remorse have its own way in me, fellow," put 
 in Fortino gloomily. " I am no soldier, eh? Nor 
 a bellows either." 
 
 Anastasio cast a pensive eye out into the rain and 
 the night, toward the field of the slain. 
 
 "Where are they, Francisco?" said he. "Where 
 are the spoils? " 
 
 " They are out there," replied the other, shaking 
 9 
 
i 3 o A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 his head and staring, too, into the rain. " St. Fran 
 cis, .it is creepy, this spoils. Now if it were day 
 Friends, there is a bad atmosphere hangs over the 
 spoils. I moved a little in that direction. Amigos 
 mios, it seems to me doubtful that spoils are made 
 for the night. Spoils are a creature of the day-time. 
 Now I tell you I would do it I came near doing it 
 - 1 could bring myself round to it, if Fellows, I 
 am a man of deep sympathies and stirrings of the 
 bosom." 
 
 " You would rather take your spoils from a live 
 man," suggested Anastasio. " Yet if I did not know 
 the stirrings of your bosom made it flabby in the 
 matter of courage, I should say you had some dead 
 fellow s coins under your blanket." 
 
 " I am afraid of nothing," cried the hot Francisco, 
 " under the whole course of the sun. Yet even a 
 vigorous coward were something to have faith in, and 
 better than a cow of a man who chews his cud during 
 battle. What did Anastasio do? By my soul s sal 
 vation, he sat the ground cross-legged during the 
 fight. When the enemy was coming on I heard a 
 wheezing sigh some feet over my head. I turned 
 and it was this tall animal commencing to bend him 
 self down and arranging his legs. He sat himself 
 on the hard ground, he did, in the midst of us, cross- 
 legged. And he turned loose his weapon in that 
 condition. And when they came rushing on us and 
 had us fighting them like bees round our heads, there 
 was this long strip of human flesh, lazy as a woman, 
 by my soul, in the midst of them, shooting straight 
 up." 
 
 " This was on account of my coolness, brother," 
 said Anastasio. " I was remarkably cool during the 
 fight. I distinctly recall stopping a moment to put 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 131 
 
 my blanket over my mouth to keep out the poi 
 son of the coming night air. For I sometimes have 
 a cough. Besides, that is my way of going into 
 battle. I go into it sitting down, and my theory of 
 the fight is that the rest ought to do likewise. You 
 call your line up in a long row and you make them 
 sit down, cross-legged for them to whom it is more 
 comfortable. And when the enemy comes charging 
 on you, forbid a rise, but have the firing done as they 
 are. Thus is there no danger of a rout. No soldier, 
 lest he disobey orders, can run away, for he cannot 
 run sitting and to get up is to disobey orders, where 
 after he knows he will be shot. These are my the 
 ories of a battle." 
 
 Anastasio s vocabulary was frequently a matter of 
 awe to his companions. There was much silence and 
 consideration after this speech. 
 
 " No doubt," said Francisco, venturing a straining 
 of his own vocabulary and speaking weightily, " it is 
 a way to gain momentum." 
 
 " You," replied Anastasio taking him up, " you 
 don t know what momentum is." 
 
 To which Francisco warmly retorted : 
 
 " I know the Castilian tongue, senor, andite mean 
 ings. There are some who know nothing but the 
 tongue. There are some who are all tongue. Mo 
 mentum is this : A bull in a field is made mad by an 
 agitation of the blanket, so. He comes at you, his 
 tail whizzing and his eyes shut. You leap behind 
 a very large rock, thus, the rock happening to be 
 in the field where the bull is. The bull, having got 
 force as he came on, finds himself unable to stop the 
 movement of his body and he smashes as though he 
 were glass, on the rock, horns first. Si, senor, and 
 what was it smashed him? " Here Francisco empha- 
 
i 3 2 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 sized matters with a sweep of his hand. " It was the 
 momentum in the rock! " 
 
 " It is a very hard metal," said Fortino, who had 
 not listened to much of the discourse. " There arc 
 veins of it among the Triquis. The Triquis mine it 
 and carry it to the west coast, and it is shipped 
 north, where they tell me there is a nation of mad 
 men." 
 
 "There is that," said Francisco, "a nation that 
 speaks foolishly a language that nobody can under 
 stand. They are white and their country is as big as 
 all Mexico or bigger, so I am told. They have large 
 cities, too, of madmen. And those that chance to be 
 born of a sane mind are made crazy by the rest be 
 fore they come of a good age, that harmony may be 
 preserved." 
 
 " A good national policy," said Fortino ; " a wis 
 dom worthy even of a right-minded people." 
 
 They had sat for some time in silence when Doro- 
 teo came round the corner and entered banteringly 
 into conversation with them. Pursuing a course of 
 clever flattery which he knew too well how to use, 
 he presently drew Fortino aside, and, with his fingers 
 on the giant s arm, whispered to him of Pepa. She 
 had not been seen since the fight. Fortino could 
 furnish no information of her. It was then that 
 Quiroz unburdened himself to his big listener. He 
 told him plainly of his passion for the girl, his love 
 of the bloody game they were playing, a love trebled 
 by the stake he had set before him in the person of 
 Josefa Aranja. When he finally left Fortino, not 
 only had he soothed that remorseful man s heart by 
 praise of his fighting he had done another thing. 
 He had secured a promise that, did it ever chance in 
 battle that Pepa were cut down and in danger, For- 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 133 
 
 tino would seize the young tigress by brute force and 
 carry her off the field to await the coming of Quiroz. 
 This agreed, the adroit Doroteo moved noiselessly 
 away, Fortino turned to his companions. They 
 prepared for the night. 
 
 " Where is la capitana? " inquired Francisco, com 
 pletely burying himself in his blanket. 
 
 " She is doubtless," said Anastasio slowly, " in a 
 church somewhere, praying." 
 
 And he stretched himself at a marvellous length 
 on the ground. The storm was only beginning to 
 abate, and e*re long the three of them were answering 
 its thunders with their snores. 
 
 Early in the morning the priest in the house that 
 lodged Vicente and his sister, came to Clarita s door 
 and awakened her. She could not see Vicente ; he 
 was already out with his troops. She dressed herself 
 and was given into the charge of the man in whose 
 canoa she was to be a passenger. She left the priest 
 still rubbing his hands most heartily, and went away 
 to the lake. The storm had gone by and the sun 
 rose clear ; all the world was fresh and glistening with 
 the clinging drops of rain, and the morning breeze 
 came cool out of the mountains. They found the 
 canoa riding at anchor some distance out. She was 
 lifted to a sailor s back and carried through sparkling 
 water. When all was ready a sail was hoisted. 
 
 She stood in the bow looking back at the town. 
 The soldiers were far to her right, seemingly pre 
 paring to move. Vicente she could not distinguish. 
 A white-clothed, bare-legged sailor sat in the stern 
 at the wooden rudder. Another sprawled under the 
 boat s thatch on the floor. Still a third lay high up 
 at the prow over the water and sang a lazy, melan- 
 
i 3 4 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 choly tune to himself, a song of the Senora, the 
 Senorita, the love that was not love but hate, the 
 happiness that was not joy, but death. Before night 
 the mountains back of Chapala and the two white 
 towers under them rose high over the boat s bow. 
 
CHAPTER IV 
 
 AS Don Rodrigo and his men dashed through the 
 right wing and into the town, a last shot fol 
 lowing them wounded ihejefe s horse. Thejefe him 
 self was unhurt. There were twelve of his band left. 
 White with rage he spurred his animal on with what 
 vigor he could muster. Quiroz s cavalry not having 
 been, in the last of the fight, very well consolidated, 
 and not expecting this dash for the town, was not so 
 rapid at following as it might otherwise have been. 
 Smothering his chagrin as best he could, though 
 taking a fierce delight in the memory of that scythe- 
 like sweep through opposing ranks, Rodrigo hud 
 dled his flying band as close together as possible, 
 decided on a tortuous gallop through the narrow 
 streets, an exit on the far side of Ocotlan, and a dash 
 for the mountains thence escape if not pursued ; if 
 pursued, it could be but by the enemy s little cavalry, 
 and he only prayed it might follow him. With what 
 keen delight would he burn in cutting down that no 
 more than equal foe ! Once away, he swore he 
 would yet raise an army that would down this rebel 
 lion. The crooked, lane-like quality of the town s 
 streets, the fast-coming night whose shadows were 
 already thick between the rows of low adobe build 
 ings, aided the flight. 
 
 This was all well enough thus mapped out. Un 
 fortunately there was a bullet in his horse. They 
 were in the midst of the town, circling in deep alleys, 
 
ij6 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 cutting a secret, swift path out of the coming night, 
 when he felt his beast waver, quiver under him. He 
 spurred the poor animal on, and it dashed with the 
 rest yet another crooked block. Then it suddenly 
 reeled and fell flat, giving its dexterous rider barely 
 time to leap in safety to the ground. And that rider 
 knew his enemy was pursuing him, misled by the 
 darkness and unreadiness and by the irregular lanes 
 of the town, but not distant. 
 
 This spot where his horse fell was in a little side 
 cut across half vacant lots, where thatched huts stood 
 placed at random. The way was lined with a long 
 double hedge of some thickly growing tropical plant, 
 and by the deep foliage of rows of mango trees. The 
 lane was a narrow shaft of dense green. The wavering 
 of his steed had made him, ere this, last of his band. 
 The rest, save Bonavidas and two others, were far 
 gone when the beast came down and died. 
 
 " Up behind me ! Quick ! Quick ! " cried Bona 
 vidas, breathing heavily and wheeling his horse to 
 Rodrigo s side. The two others, weapons out, waited 
 with impatience. 
 
 " Go on never mind me ! " cried thejeft. " That 
 would be but to give both of us up. Go on, I tell 
 you ! " 
 
 " We won t leave the captain," said they surlily. 
 
 "Go on, I tell you I command you! Bonavi 
 das, the rest need you more than I. In the name of 
 God, fellows, go on ! I know a sure refuge. I will 
 join you on the Guadalajara road ! " 
 
 Bonavidas, being somewhat of a grim philosopher, 
 dashed off and was gone. The others lingered yet a 
 moment, which moment cost them dearly. They 
 were ordered, pleaded with by the/</>, and finally left 
 him. They failed to overtake their comrades. They 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 137 
 
 were halted some distance beyond the plaza, cor 
 nered and captured by Doroteo and some others. 
 Their comrades were off, galloping across fields, 
 thence into a rocky road, thence to safety. 
 
 Of the pursuers, the most ready and the leader had 
 been the girl. She had turned her horse loose after 
 them, and he was the best animal in Vicente s forces. 
 She heard behind her Doroteo s curses and order of 
 pursuit, and her comrades coming. She was far in 
 advance of them, and wheeled the corner of adobe 
 walls into the first street but little behind Rodrigo 
 and his men. She leaned far forward, urging on her 
 steed. Her enemy did not gain ground before her, 
 nor, though she might have done so, did she gain on 
 him. Those quick turns and circuits that the pur 
 sued made in the dusk, she too made in following. 
 Her eyes were bent always to the front that she 
 might not lose him in the shades. She lost her rebozo 
 in that wild gallop. The long, soft cloth floated away 
 behind her on a breeze and fell over the head of a 
 naked and terrified boy, who, with other townspeople, 
 was scampering away to the safety of a hut. That 
 rebozo hangs to this day in a church at Ocotlan, won 
 derful prodigy from the heavens, miracle dropped by 
 the Holy Virgin into the streets. It is framed in gold ; 
 and the priest of the church, an old man, is he who 
 was the naked boy, and on whom Blessed Mary let 
 fall this not-to-be-mistaken or disregarded summons 
 out of the clear sky. 
 
 When the jefe s men came to those groves of 
 mango trees, and wheeled into the little lane whose 
 shadows were already night and whose shaft of nar 
 row green, like a tunnel, was a shaft of black, Pepa 
 wheeled after them. What was that wavering of 
 beast before her? Her heart bounded and seemed 
 
138 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 to stop. She drew her own horse to a quick halt, 
 close under the overhanging arms of the trees. She 
 could barely see the tottering shadow some yards to 
 the fore. She heard the thud when the carcass fell, 
 and a quick, smothered exclamation in a voice she 
 knew. She was on the ground at once, silent, leading 
 her steed with the caution of her Indian ancestors, 
 closer, closer. She kept well under the thick foliage 
 of the mangos. She could not have been seen. A 
 Few moments more, and those before her, in less of 
 the shadow, were but scarcely distinguished forms. 
 She stopped twenty yards from them, heard the little 
 colloquy, and perceived that he was left there alone. 
 While she assimilated all this, Doroteo and his men 
 were passing in eager haste by the opening of the 
 lane. They did not even see that opening, the trees 
 at that point nearly meeting over the narrow path 
 between. The pursuers had gone by with a sweep 
 of wind and dust, and the lane was left in the deep, 
 living silence of a summer night. 
 
 Rodrigo had crept through the foliage at the 
 path s side, and lain flat on the ground ; the girl 
 stood motionless, straining every nerve that she 
 might know what he did. When silence came again, 
 he crept back slowly, cautiously. She could hear 
 twigs crackle, and finally, when he reached the path 
 and stood up, she could barely see his form. He 
 thought himself alone. The blood rushed to her 
 head. She found herself trembling to think how 
 easily she could kill him. Something savage in her 
 leaped up, and she pictured his death. But she 
 laughed inwardly at herself, and put the vision 
 away. 
 
 " Pepa, thou fool," she said, " it must go beyond 
 this to despair, before thou canst do that." 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 139 
 
 She let him go on till he was yet farther away. 
 
 Then she tied her horse to the trees and went after 
 him, as silent as he. Before he reached the end of 
 the lane, he crept through the foliage again to the 
 opposite side. She was fearful of losing sight of him, 
 and crept through quickly where she was. She found 
 herself in one of those marvellous, yet common groves 
 of unnumbered Mexican fruits ; where the deep black 
 shadow of the mango still reared itself; where the 
 orange and the toronja, the cidra, and the lemon, 
 hung their unseen globes ; where the papaya lifted 
 its long stem and its picture-book clusters of leaves 
 against the sky ; where the huele-de-noche loaded and 
 sickened the air with that ravishing scent too sacred 
 for the day. 
 
 There was a hut on the far side and a candle burn 
 ing in its doorway. Beyond the hut was another lane 
 leading into a more prominent street, and the plaza 
 was not far distant. A certain Mexican boy of seven 
 teen years was considerably astonished before eight 
 o clock of that night, in this very grove. He was 
 emptying charcoal from a basket to the ground at 
 the hut s door. He was wrapped in a blanket and 
 wore a common straw sombrero. He saw no shad 
 ows out under the trees but the trees shadows. But 
 another that fell from no tree came stealthily up be 
 hind him. The charcoal was falling rattlingly, dustily 
 to the earth, when the boy felt a blow that seemed to 
 burst every blood-vessel in his head, on the side of 
 that member. After reeling and half sitting, half fall 
 ing down, he gained his senses. His blanket and his 
 hat were gone. 
 
 At night, and particularly if there be dampness or 
 the suggestions of rain in air or sky, the Mexican 
 peon covers all of his face but his eyes with his blanket 
 
1 40 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 He wraps the whole upper half of him in that gar 
 ment, fie has an idea, inherited with solemn belief 
 from many generations, that there is poison in ni^ht 
 air. He will sleep by dozens in one room piled thick 
 with snoring human bodies, with all doors and win 
 dows tightly shut to keep out the foul poison of a 
 pure night breeze, nowhere purer and sweeter than 
 on the Mexican tableland, and breathe as he sleeps 
 the nauseous exhalations of his slumbering family 
 and their cousins and their mistresses and friends. 
 And he will arise refreshed, let the heavy chemicals 
 of his night s lodgings like a fog of disease out into 
 a clear morning, and congratulate himself on his san 
 itary circumspection. This night was cooled by a 
 damp breeze from the lake. Lightning and thunder 
 bespoke coming rain. Hence when the scurrying, 
 frightened, questioning inhabitants of the surrendered 
 town of Ocotlan beheld a man wrapped to his eyes in 
 a blanket and shaded to his nose with a straw som 
 brero, walking with calm, majestic tread through the 
 street s shadows as any Mexican walks, they recog 
 nized only the customary precautions of their race. 
 A girl some distance behind him attracted more at 
 tention ; and some even knew who she was. 
 
 That walk was short. Two blocks from the plaza 
 was the house of \hz prcsidcutc, he who had sur 
 rendered the town much against his will. He was 
 not unknown to Don Rodrigo. The house was sub 
 sequently torn down. There is a meson standing 
 there now. It was built round the usual inner court, 
 but had a long, narrow strip of garden, with fruit 
 trees, extending from this court through the block 
 to a rear street. This garden was lined along both 
 sides with stalls for horses. 
 
 The muffled man came to the rear street and the 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 141 
 
 entrance of the garden. He was cautious again, but 
 this street was very shadowed. At a corner some 
 distance away an oil lamp hung from the middle of a 
 wire stretched from one side of the thoroughfare to 
 the other, which lamp gave a little light. The man 
 wheeled suddenly through a wooden door that gave 
 passage to the inner side of a wall which closed this 
 end of the president s garden. He had been within 
 four seconds when the girl slid through after him, 
 scarcely seeming to open the door at all. She found 
 a way of barring it after her. As she entered, there 
 was a hubbub of voices in another street, coming 
 toward the lamp, and the resinous torches of a hurry 
 ing party of armed seekers flared round the corner. 
 She heard them come nearer, and stood holding her 
 breath. They were her friends, her adorers. She 
 crouched down and hid, and they passed on, bent 
 on some other destination. 
 
 She arose, and went on up the narrow garden and 
 knelt again and crawled. She was among cabbages 
 and chayotes. She crept closer, closer between the 
 lines of stables, and came to another high wooden 
 door which, through another adobe wall, led into the 
 patio of the president s house. She had seen it 
 open (letting through a faint light and a glimpse of 
 trees, wide verandas, and a room door) and close 
 again as Rodrigo passed stealthily on. She came to 
 it, but did not dare to enter. She lay down with her 
 eye at a crack of some breadth that was beneath the 
 door. 
 
 Rodrigo, still swathed, crossed under trees, and by 
 a tinkling fountain in the patio, and entered under 
 the low, tiled roof of a broad corrector, brick floored. 
 To his right and behind were a kitchen, cooks mov 
 ing about over charcoal fires, and a mozo cleaning 
 
i4- A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 pots. Before him was a half-opened door leading 
 into a room where a light burned. 
 
 He knocked, and the presidente came to the door. 
 The presidente was a fat, bustling, nervous little man. 
 He was sore perplexed and exasperated. He peered 
 up at Rodrigo, and Rodrigo removed the blanket and 
 the hat and smiled a curious smile on the presidente, 
 whereat the latter started back with an exclamation. 
 
 " What ! " cried he, with many colors and suffo 
 cated. " You ! You ! Oh, Dios ! My Lady of the 
 Remedies! Come in! Nay, nay stay out go 
 away ! Hide yourself here. I will hide you ! I will 
 not hide you ! Madness ! Enriqueta ! My wife ! 
 My wife ! " 
 
 Enriqueta, with a candle and a low dress that 
 showed an ample neck, came running out. She was 
 quizzical, critical. 
 
 " Who is it ? Who is this man ? " gasped Enriqueta. 
 
 " Your husband knows me," said Rodrigo, little 
 able to brook this delay in the hiding, but amused in 
 spite of it, " and that I need protection. God grant 
 I be worthy of it. My friend " and he turned in a 
 most confiding way to the prisiitt ntc "a few hours 
 of concealment, a horse in the early dawn ah 
 I see your heart warms to it. Heaven be thanked, I 
 have fallen among friends ! 
 
 With incoherency, dashing sentences, shattered ex 
 clamations, the presidente , stepping about all the time 
 as though every spot on the floor burnt his feet, ex 
 plained to his wife. 
 
 " Sir," said she, with infinite and severe, though 
 agitated propriety, " this house has daughters, inno 
 cent young things, brought up in the customs of 
 Spain. You cannot be in the company of my daugh 
 ters. Oh, Jose", my husband ! What will we do with 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 143 
 
 our girls? They are kept most carefully from men. 
 Oh, skies of the morning ! A man in the same 
 house ! Help me, oh, my faith ! in this matter. Sir, 
 this has never happened before. In this land men 
 see not young ladies in their own house. Never has 
 a male youth so much as passed the door. And I 
 will declare, sir, that only one of my daughters has 
 so much as a novio, and him she has had but three 
 weeks, and whether he means it or not the Lord 
 knows, though he has honored my daughter by 
 standing every night of the three weeks under her 
 balcony ; and I have seen him sigh in a way that an 
 old lady like me cannot misinterpret. But it shall 
 be months before we let him in, and then only when 
 he has given us every assurance of honorable in 
 tentions, and it shall be in the presence of her 
 mother. I am sure I do not know what I shall do. 
 Oh, my girls ! Oh, my guarded offspring ; guarded 
 like jewels ! My husband, I cannot solve this unless 
 you put him in Juan, the mozo s room, yonder by 
 the garden door. And, Jose ! Jose ! have a care for 
 the ancient Castilian sanctity, and you can lock 
 him in ! " 
 
 " We can lock in the sanctity, Enriqueta, better. 
 Let it be the sanctity that is locked in ! " 
 
 Enriqueta gave a slight shriek as the two crossed 
 the patio in stealthy haste, and dived in to guard her 
 brood. One of the latter was peering out of the door, 
 and was speedily bustled away. 
 
 " Look not on him ! " cried she. " In the very 
 house ! Oh a most beautiful young man a most 
 handsome one ! Cobita, my love, come away ! I am 
 all trembling. There will something come of this ! " 
 
 The rain was beginning to drop in a desultory way 
 when Don Rodrigo entered his room. Outside the 
 
r-,4 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 garden gate still lay the girl. She watched through the 
 crack till some minutes after there was anything to 
 see. The nervous presidente had returned to the front 
 part of his house and shut himself and his family 
 in. She arose then, and, assuring herself that there 
 was no lock on this door, only a wooden bar with its 
 peg running through to the side toward the garden, 
 she went back among the vegetables to the street. 
 This street door had a lock with a monstrous iron 
 key sticking in it. She stole the key. She went, 
 then, out of the garden and retraced her course to 
 the lane of mangos. She secured her horse and led 
 him to a meson. She next proceeded to a store and 
 bought a rcbozo. It was a half-hour later, and in a 
 rain now somewhat disagreeable, that, having skil 
 fully avoided the eyes of the townspeople, she 
 returned to the garden. The thunder was hammer 
 ing viciously at the night. A little while more, she 
 knew, and torrents would be upon her. She put 
 damp fingers on the garden door and pushed it. It 
 was not fastened. 
 
 The terrified presidente was too careful of his own 
 safety to do else than remain in the house. He 
 would fasten nothing. If it became proved that the 
 refugee was there, why, it would be plain the presi 
 dente had done nothing to hide him the jefe had 
 slipped in unawares to the presidente. The presidente 
 had not so much as taken the care to lock the door. 
 Hence, innocent would the presidente be. " Further 
 more, Enriqueta, my love," had the fearful soul 
 explained, snugly enough tucked in bed as he was, 
 " let the way of escape be open ; Mary be with me 
 and rid me of this burden, the sooner the better. 
 Lock him in these my grounds?" The virtuous 
 Enriqueta had suggested some such thing, with the 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 145 
 
 seeming desire of keeping this jeopardizer of the 
 safety of her daughters in more unquestionable 
 security. " No, Enriqueta; give him every opportu 
 nity to take his compromising presence away at any 
 moment. He knows where my horses are, in the 
 stalls by the cabbages. If he steals one and runs 
 away (and so, Enriqueta, I have explained to him), 
 it is no business or fault of mine ; it is an unfortunate 
 theft, God help us ! " 
 
 The good official had retired immediately after the 
 harrowing event of the fugitive s arrival. He had 
 completely undressed and been wrapped with care 
 in blankets. It was part of the worthy man s plot 
 to be snoring with innocent violence whatever else 
 happened in the rear of his premises. 
 
 Pepa, perceiving there was no one else in the 
 street, entered the door, closed and locked it after 
 her, and put the key under her rebozo. It was quite 
 dark here save for the occasional lightning. She 
 crept again among the stalls to \he patio door. She 
 listened at the stables and heard the munching of 
 horses in the dark. At the patio door she lay down 
 again and peered under. She was somewhat sur 
 prised at what she saw. The. patio was dark, as was all 
 of the house but the kitchen. Out of a door of that 
 last apartment she perceived \h.e president^ s virtuous 
 wife stealthily creeping with a candle in her hand. 
 The servants seemed to have departed. Dona 
 Enriqueta s face, full of a terrified, secret eagerness, 
 was lit white by the light ; her ample and bare neck 
 exposed itself to the wanton air of night ; her dress 
 skirt, having been removed, left her underskirt (of a 
 very startling stripe it was) free to display fat ankles 
 not stockinged. In the lady s other hand she carried 
 a covered dish. 
 
 10 
 
146 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 This apparition cautiously crossed the court. It 
 stopped in the middle of it as though hearing a noise. 
 It went on more cautiously. The good seiiora was 
 like a thief in her own house. The door of the moztfs 
 room, whereto the fugitive had been led, was on the 
 patio s opposite side under the wide low roof of the 
 corrcdor, and not far from the spot where lay Pepa, 
 haughtily amused, ill sheltered from the rain, look 
 ing through the crack. The apparition came in 
 under the corrector s roof, tiptoe. The lady arrived, 
 scared and trembling, with her face drawn into an 
 expression of guilty trepidation, at the door of Don 
 Rodrigo s room. She kneeled down, whereupon the 
 lack of stockings became to Pepa the most evident 
 testimony of her presence, and she placed the dish 
 on the floor by the door; whereon, the dish rattling 
 a trifle, she became much agitated and knocked with 
 no composure. 
 
 " Who s there ! " said a voice within, a voice 
 disguised. 
 
 " I, senor, I ! " faltered she. " Here is food ; and 
 oh ! for God s sake tell not my husband, nor come 
 near my daughters ! " 
 
 At this she was up, candle in hand, dashing in a 
 panic along the corredor to the door that led to her 
 lord and master, and her white ankles twinkled 
 plumply away. That door was closed and the open 
 court with its tinkling fountain and the wide tiled 
 corredorcs were deserted. At that moment there 
 was a burst of thunder and the torrent, long prom 
 ised, came tumbling down. The girl arose and 
 wrapped herself more closely in the rcboso . 
 
 " Well," said she, " I do not have to stand this." 
 
 So she slipped into the patio and under the shelter 
 of the tiled roof by Rodrigo s door. She had just 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 147 
 
 arrived when he slowly opened it, and, not seeing 
 her, took up the dish in silence. 
 
 " Buenas noches ! " said she, appearing suddenly 
 before him with the bright smile of a pleasant call. 
 "I shall come in if you please ! " 
 
 His muscles from his head to his feet stiffened, and 
 he all but dropped the dish. He stood speechless 
 for a moment, then he knew he must face it out. So 
 he put back a wave of brown hair off his forehead 
 and smiled in mock cordiality. 
 
 " No one more welcome," said he. 
 
 They went in and he shut the door. 
 
 " Is there a lock to it? " said she, carelessly, turn 
 ing about and looking with polite interest at the iron 
 fasteners. 
 
 " Ah, no," he replied, himself looking all over the 
 door. "It seems I am not not rude enough to 
 have a lock. Sit down. My house, as the saying is, 
 is your house." 
 
 There was only one chair in the room, and nothing 
 else but a piece of matting on which the mozo had 
 been accustomed to sleep, and a candle on the brick 
 floor. Rodrigo set the dish on the floor likewise, 
 bowed her to the chair, and she sat down in great 
 comfort. Then she took out the big key to the 
 garden gate and played with it on her lap. They 
 looked at each other for fully a minute in silence, 
 he standing. He believed he knew something of the 
 possibilities of this girl s nature. She was with his 
 enemy; she had fought against him to kill him. 
 She had discovered his hiding-place ; she had a key. 
 He did not know that key, but she played with it in 
 such an insinuating way that he guessed at once 
 what it was. The situation for him was sufficiently 
 tragic. But he expressed no such knowledge in his 
 
i 4 3 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 face, waiting for her to say something; and there 
 she sat, looking up at him with a most meaning 
 composure. She suddenly laughed at him a little 
 girlish laugh. 
 
 11 The senorita sees fit to be amused," said he, 
 leaning against the wall. 
 
 " It was great sport," said she. " Oh, I love to 
 fight! " 
 
 " You did well," said he. 
 
 " And you," she replied with politeness. 
 
 There was a pause. 
 
 "Your charge into Fortino s ranks," she continued, 
 " I liked that very much." 
 
 " And I too," was his reply, a little coldly. Such 
 conversation annoyed and angered him. His spirit 
 was too sincere to carry this on very long, and his 
 nerves were strained to a great tension. Who else 
 knew his whereabouts? How soon might this beau 
 tiful devil take it into her head to call. her soldiers? 
 after which, prisons or death. 
 
 " Yes," said he, " I, too, was pleased with all 
 that." 
 
 How bitterly it rankled in his free heart he did not 
 say; nor his grief over every one of his comrades 
 that fell. 
 
 11 If I had thought of it at all," she replied, " I 
 should certainly have expected to be shot." She 
 considered this some time. " The fire was so fierce 
 and I in the front of it. It is, after all, strange that 
 I came out unhurt." 
 
 " That is simple enough," said he. 
 
 She turned quickly and looked at him. 
 
 "So?" said she, and kicked out her little foot. 
 Her face was fascinating. 
 
 " Simple enough," he repeated, looking at the 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 149 
 
 candle-light that was growing dimmer for want of 
 attention. 
 
 " How is that? How is it so simple? " asked she. 
 
 " Because I ordered," he replied, and paused, 
 stooped down, and snuffed the candle with his bare 
 fingers, which were burnt painfully by the operation. 
 "I ordered," continued he in that position, " that 
 they should not shoot at you." 
 
 Her face lost its calmness and its roguishness and 
 much of its color. She stared at him long, her eyes 
 unfathomable. She arose suddenly with much 
 hauteur. There was no doubt of the sincerity of 
 what she now uttered. 
 
 " Yes," she said, " that is it. I am a girl I am a 
 weak woman. Call me, then, a lunatic, and have it 
 done ; for to be wild and foolish as I am, and yet 
 weak, that is to be mad. If I am to prove only that 
 I can do nothing Don Rodrigo, I prefer to have 
 your cursed bullets in me." 
 
 The emotion that was rarely, rarely absent from 
 this girl, was beating up higher and plain. 
 
 " It was not because I underestimate your daring 
 or your purposes, or fail to value the nature that 
 makes you the unusual woman that you are," said 
 he, " that I gave the order. It was well, let me 
 say, for old times." 
 
 "And this reward," she said, bitterly, " only wounds 
 me. I have amused you, is it so, in certain days 
 gone by? A girl comes into battle and you chance 
 to recall the fact. You will be affable. There is 
 nothing in it but that. You come from another 
 nation, a superior nation, a nation, no doubt, whose 
 soul is as white as the faces of its people, a nation 
 cold, steely. And I am weak, out of a passionate 
 nation, one that, having seen fire, must leap in. 
 
1 5 o A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 And me and mine you hate. It is nothing that we 
 can follow one thought into the grave, one purpose 
 into the mouth of hell. This to the nation that 
 coldly moves to material ends is nothing. I would 
 have given you a thousand times greater thanks, 
 had you told your men to tear me, me first, to the 
 earth and let every horse crush me as he passed." 
 
 " And this, to you," he said, " would have been 
 the highest way to answer you when you asked me 
 what I had for you? This would have been no 
 answer. Do you think I do not know that you play 
 with fire as a child with sand are capable of any 
 deed that your body is strong enough to carry out? 
 You come to me here to-night and prove it, which 
 proof I do not like. Are war and death and this 
 infernal torture of my defeat only things to be 
 chatted about as people chat while the band plays 
 in the plaza that you come and talk it over as 
 though it had been a bull-fight or a game of ball 
 wherein we had chanced to be antagonists?" 
 
 "And this is the way you take it?" said she, 
 standing looking at him fairly. " I am cold and 
 heartless ; I can speak of battles like bull-fights. 
 My blood never leaps my heart never burns or 
 aches I cannot understand the meaning of death. 
 No; I am come of a savage ancestry that slew 
 human sacrifices to stone gods. And even now, 
 doubtless, to you the wildcat is degrading herself. 
 She is piqued, she pleads for old days; she would 
 call up promises. I am not such," she said sadly. 
 " Promise there is none. You never said, I love you 
 neither did I. I have hated you oftener. I have 
 come merely to see, to have it burnt into me, how 
 you look on me because I am capricious, not to 
 be trusted, liking to do odd things and have power, 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 151 
 
 liking to look here on the key that locks the garden- 
 gate and to remember that the adobe wall is fifteen 
 feet in height." 
 
 " And you lose sight of the most prominent fact, 
 that you are in the ranks of my enemies. An hour 
 hence, when you are tired of playing with me or 
 when I have unwittingly piqued you some other way, 
 you may give me over to those who seek me." 
 
 " Unless you kill me first," said she. " No other 
 knows of your presence here. If they come and 
 break down the door, it is of their own finding." 
 
 " If they came," was his response, " I wonder how 
 you would fight." 
 
 " I wonder also," said she simply. " I have 
 brought no weapon." 
 
 He began to understand her mood. 
 
 " Half wild you are," he said. " I shall not dis 
 grace you by calling you anything else. Feel myself 
 and my civilization above you ? Heaven forbid ! I 
 accuse you of pleading nothing, of calling up no 
 promises nor caring to. I know you are as unfettered 
 as though there were no body encasing your impetuous 
 soul." 
 
 " And for being here," she asked, her face burning, 
 and her hand on his arm, " I am a traitor, is it not 
 so?" 
 
 He said nothing for a moment, a moment in which, 
 not knowing it, he held her soul, as it were, in his 
 hand. 
 
 " You are not a traitor," he said slowly. "You 
 are a free spirit." 
 
 He had no more than said it when he blamed him 
 self for the words. Many a time, months, years after 
 that night, the blame returned, and remorse lived 
 with him. It would not be possible to say with com- 
 
1 5 2 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 plete fulness just why he answered her thus. It was 
 not haste; he had time to think. Doubtless it was 
 the desperation of his circumstances. That he was 
 hiding within a few hundred yards of many enemies ; 
 that they were searching for him to kill him ; that 
 she was, or had been, one of them, and could give 
 him over to his fate at any moment ; these were not 
 the half of the thoughts that flashed over him. The 
 rest were : Kings shall not, cannot succeed in 
 America. This was a ground principle of his most 
 sacred belief. Fate had cast him to crush this 
 dreamer who would be king. The part might seem 
 small enough in a nation s history but it might, too, 
 be infinitely great. Seldom had a revolution a better 
 set of circumstances. The situation seemed to him 
 almost desperate. In all this, what was the duty of 
 him, the leader of the opposition and a republican to 
 the core of his being? Let no hasty judgment con 
 demn him if he decided that any sacrifice should be 
 made. So he told her that she was no traitor, and 
 called her a free spirit. And considering her nature, 
 her ancestry, the philosophy that civilization advances 
 and that barbarism cannot know who can say he 
 lied ? She was at least true to her poor, torn heart. 
 The die once cast with him, he must play the game 
 out. 
 
 " I have believed in you," he said, " as I have be 
 lieved in few women. I am sorry you are my enemy. 
 With an ally such as you anything might be possible." 
 
 " Anything," said she, with a pathos as natural as 
 was the beating of her heart, " but a return to the old 
 days. That is not possible." 
 
 He stood taller and looked at her. There had 
 been, there may now have been, deep emotion in him 
 raised by this girl. He had been fascinated, moved 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 153 
 
 to his heart s bottom, wrapped in her life as a lake is 
 wrapped in the light of the summer sun. The 
 passion had been sudden, hot. He had held it with 
 a grip of iron, but it had showed itself. He had felt 
 it unreal, not lasting. Even in the height of it he 
 had doubted her. In the strain of his situation and 
 its desperation, looking at her now when she said 
 that, the old fire came somehow into his face. He 
 was handsome then and every feature was lit with the 
 fire. He made no reply in words ; he only (con 
 sciously or unconsciously, let a higher truth be his 
 judge) let his eyes speak and she was broken. 
 
 She stepped to him quickly, the blood leaping to 
 her face, took his hand with a sudden convulsive sob, 
 and cried : 
 
 " Trust me trust me when the time comes ! " 
 She was immediately pale to her very lips, turned 
 and ran out, and was gone; out of the patio door 
 on through the black garden on to the dim lit 
 street away away. When she turned, the mean 
 ing of her words came on him, and the remorse. 
 What had his face encouraged her to do? What 
 great sin was he, in that one silent moment, guilty 
 of ? He ran after her. He called her name. He 
 must reach her. He must call her back. He must 
 tell her it cannot, shall not be, that if he cannot win 
 it alone without this sin from her, then let him rather 
 die, there, now, with defeat branded on him. Pepa ! 
 Pepa ! Perhaps she heard him and feared to lose that 
 silent promise. She was gone in the garden s black 
 ness. He went stumbling on after her, seeing nothing. 
 The rain was beating down in torrents and the thun 
 ders were rolling their battles of the sky. He came 
 toward the street door and a flash of lightning lit all 
 the rain-drenched walls and stables and the dripping 
 
154 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 plants at his feet. It showed him, too, the door in 
 the high adobe wall closed after her. He ran and 
 opened it and the street was empty. He turned back, 
 in the blackness of the drenched night. And at some 
 time before midnight, aided by the storm and by the 
 fact that Vicente s little force was too small and unor 
 ganized effectually to guard every avenue of the town, 
 he made his escape on the presidentes horse, gallop 
 ing through mud and water, wet to the skin, away to 
 the mountains and the stony Guadalajara road, his 
 steed struggling and slipping, his blood burning hot. 
 Thus on this night did Pepa Aranja fall, and did 
 Don Rodrigo commit a sin. 
 
CHAPTER V 
 
 WHEN the first glimpse of dawn came in the 
 east, the wet soldiers were up and drying. 
 A light breeze blew from the rising sun, the lake 
 glistened and danced, and there were naked backs 
 and naked legs, white clothing spread in the sun to 
 dry, laughter and song. There was cooking, too, 
 by men and women; and, before seven o clock, 
 there was an hilarious feast. Death lost its terrors. 
 Shadows went away with the night. Fighting was 
 the sport of men, the red blood of existence. And 
 with victory and a crushed antagonist behind, hope 
 and little resistance before, high was the spirit of 
 the army. 
 
 Of the eight hundred of the fight, more than seven 
 hundred were ready for the march. To these, dur 
 ing the night, had come recruits. The first victory 
 inspired many in the town with the desire to be 
 part of the next. The news spread to the surround 
 ing country, and at daybreak came still others 
 sowers, charcoal burners, ox-cart drivers, fishers 
 all dissatisfied with a plodding, barren existence, 
 ready for a change and the wine of excitement. At 
 breakfast there were more than eight hundred. The 
 new recruits were given largely to Fortino, whose 
 ranks had suffered most heavily. When Doroteo 
 brought him Vicente s order to that effect the great 
 burly fisherman was much moved. 
 
156 A DREAM OF A TJIKONE 
 
 " I swear I am not worth it," growled he. " I am 
 more fit to carry the corn." 
 
 "I take it," said Anastasio, "that you will carry 
 enough as it is. I have sat here dazed at the 
 amount of it, my appetite gone like a shirt in a 
 high wind. If I can figure, you have stowed inside 
 of your carrion corn to the amount of three almudas. " 
 
 "Sixty cents worth!" cried Francisco, putting 
 his naked legs into white trousers not absolutely 
 dry. "Nigh five reales has this traitor eaten up in 
 pure silver and in the days of famine ! " 
 
 Fortino replied nothing. Still depressed, still 
 honestly self-accusing, he turned blackly to his 
 horse. 
 
 A vital change in the condition of the troops was 
 being effected as rapidly as energy and money could 
 accomplish it. All those who joined were urged to 
 come mounted if horses could possibly be obtained. 
 Runners were that morning sent out in the direction 
 the army was to take to call the people to arms, 
 and, above all else, to secure horses. Some good 
 animals were obtained in Ocotlan, two of which 
 were turned over to Francisco and Anastasio. The 
 cavalry numbered fifty-three when the army left 
 that place. 
 
 Before the start Vicente rode among the men, 
 crying out words of encouragement and greeting. 
 They were beginning to feel that respect and sym 
 pathy which victory and a silent mien will many a 
 time inspire in an army for its leader which con 
 tinued success deepens into love. They cheered 
 him, standing up and waving sombreros. He took 
 off his own to them and rode on. Then, riding 
 slowly out of the town, her steed seemingly proud 
 of its burden, her red dress dry again, and her beauty 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 157 
 
 fresh as the morning air she rode in, came Pepa. 
 They had been watching for her. The cheer began 
 and rose and spread, till it became deafening. She 
 rode slowly along all the line, bowing and smiling at 
 them. The enthusiasm doubled and was wild. She 
 was now, irrevocably, the genius of the army. Emo 
 tion, playing free here in these troops, had enthroned 
 her as the spirit of victory. She carried her part 
 proudly, and the cheer continued when she had 
 passed. 
 
 Thus, they being flushed with triumph, the march 
 to the east in the early morning began. The 
 marshes near the shining lake, the reeds, the corn 
 fields and the meadows about Ocotlan, were passed. 
 Bright they were in the light of an autumn day; 
 and even the lessening adobe walls shone golden in 
 the sun. The townspeople, still stupefied at these 
 strange and quick running events, came to the 
 town s edge and watched the column go. T\\& presi- 
 dente came too, early as it was. And behind him 
 came Enriqueta. Enriqueta stopped at the end of 
 the last street, held her hand to shade her eyes, and 
 stared eagerly out across the fields to the departing 
 troops. 
 
 "Oh! they have not got him, my husband," mur 
 mured she. " They have not caught that beautiful 
 young man ! " 
 
 And she turned back to her barred-in daughters 
 who knows with what sighs in her virtuous Castilian 
 bosom over the quick riddance of that menace to her 
 household ? 
 
 Thenceforward, for six shining days, only triumph 
 met the advancing troops. News of the victory, of 
 the coming successes, changes, golden times, spread 
 speedily in all directions. The army arrived at no 
 
, 5 S A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 point to which the fame of its march had not come 
 before it. All along the way the poverty-stricken 
 people of the country, the ragged children and the 
 sullen men, crowded to see. They looked with awe 
 on that strange woman who rode before, and with 
 wonder and admiration on the man who should 
 come to be a king. On the whole, they were not 
 displeased with the idea. Many villages received 
 the victorious band with open arms, such opposition 
 as they contained fleeing as the band came. Even 
 some of the officials and police, disgusted with a 
 government that had bandied them about like 
 straws, paid them when it could and let them starve 
 when it could not, joined the new cause. 
 
 Round all the lake s eastern end there was no 
 power of resistance sufficient to organize itself and 
 strike a blow. The little army grew at every step 
 it took. Ragged, gaunt prospectors and hungry 
 sowers of corn threw away tools and came down out 
 of mountains to be a part of this unhampered prog 
 ress. The loose population of many towns joined 
 in and swelled the cheers for Vicente and la 
 capitana. Wherever the army halted there was 
 plenty for it to eat, arranged for secretly between 
 clergy and messengers sent before. And in every 
 town the priest was Vicente s friend and helper. It 
 was the priest who made him familiar with every 
 resource of the place; who did more than any other 
 ten men to the success of the expedition; who per 
 suaded the holders of corn, reluctant to sell on 
 credit when the cash was wanting, that the specula 
 tion was safe. Thus was the good-will of the people 
 always maintained. Pillaging was instantly pun 
 ished. Order was improved and made a necessity. 
 The undercurrent of power which came always from 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 159 
 
 the church did not make itself outwardly noticeable. 
 But it was a never-failing force such as Vicente 
 alone could rightly measure, bearing him and his 
 hopes on to the end. He knew, too, who it was 
 that most nearly personified that force. Many a 
 time he burned to break his long silence regarding 
 his unknown hermit benefactor. But he held his 
 peace. 
 
 From eight hundred his forces grew to a thousand, 
 to twelve hundred, to fifteen hundred, to two thou 
 sand. The vigilance in search of horses was not 
 abated. In those days, as now, the country was 
 dotted with mammoth haciendas or ranches. Some 
 of them are many leagues square, containing hun 
 dreds of all sorts of domestic animals and raising 
 enormous crops of every grain and fruit known to 
 the semi-tropical climate. Near the easternmost 
 point of the lake lay one of these. It was called 
 the Hacienda of the Good Faith. Its owner, a 
 Spaniard, long since disgusted at the throwing off 
 of the Spanish yoke, hating the half-governments 
 that had staggered successively and broken under 
 the burden since the end of Spanish reign, took it 
 into his heart to belie his place s name and play bad 
 faith with existing circumstances. Spain being 
 an impossibility, he hailed a king, any king, with 
 delight. He received word, before the arrival of 
 Vicente, of the need of horses. He burst into glee, 
 swore he would lose his soul for such a cause, and, 
 forgetting how his ancestors had trampled with an 
 equal enthusiasm the very government from which 
 Vicente was descended, scoured the adjacent country, 
 drained it and his own lands of what horseflesh 
 there was to be found, and, on the coming of 
 Vicente, clapped him on the back with an oath, put 
 
160 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 himself on familiar terms with the leader most 
 odiously, and turned over scarcely less than seven 
 hundred horses to the little army. 
 
 The gift was not to be despised. It was a god 
 send. The cavalry had already been increased to 
 nearly three hundred; they numbered now a thou 
 sand. Few, indeed, were the recruits from this half 
 wild people who could not ride, and ride well. If 
 there were no saddle, then they could ride without 
 saddle. The high spirits of the men, having in 
 creased steadily since Ocotlan, burst out. The 
 Spaniard was carried on shoulders, dropped, left on 
 his hacienda, and, possibly, forgotten. And the 
 army went on. 
 
 It rounded the irregular points and bays that 
 make the lake s eastern end, and gradually turning 
 westward again proceeded straight along the southern 
 coast. When they should have traversed more than 
 half that coast they should arrive at the town of 
 Tizapan, Doroteo s native place. Doroteo had 
 promised the army a royal reception there. 
 
 Pepa, during this triumphal passage, was the 
 same unreadable Pepa. There were times when she 
 was gay and her laugh rang out like a bird s note. 
 She would be the embodiment of a wild joy for 
 hours. She would gallop along the lake s edge, 
 singing as she went. She would thread her way 
 among the towering rocks that narrowed the path, 
 in untamed mood. But her good spirits seemed not 
 altogether natural. During these days the eyes 
 that watched her most constantly, like the eyes of a 
 cat, were Doroteo s. 
 
 "There is mental fever in that happiness," said 
 Doroteo to himself. 
 
 The majority of the time, however, she was 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 161 
 
 gloomy. This, too, was unnatural to her. She 
 rode at times all the day slowly in advance of the 
 troops, wrapped in melancholy. She would speak 
 to no one. She did not laugh or sing. She would 
 not even turn to look at them. If any rode up and 
 saw her face, it was clouded, and she grew angry 
 and ordered them not to speak to her. She arose on 
 certain mornings from such beds as Vicente had 
 been able to secure for her or as she had secured for 
 herself, with the strained look of the eyes that 
 marks one who has not slept. Then on those days 
 the presence of others irritated her. A change had 
 come over Pepa. Those near her saw it, wondered 
 at it. She was inscrutable. Most of all she was 
 restless. Nothing, nothing satisfied her now. 
 
 The column was one day advancing round an arm 
 of the lake at its southeastern shore. The moun 
 tains here descended almost to the water, their 
 peaks towering, rocky, overhead. The path at their 
 feet was narrow. The girl was in front, Vicente 
 following her closely. Doroteo and Fortino, lead 
 ing the cavalry, were behind them, and the horse 
 and foot wound a tortuous way at the lake s edge. 
 Pepa had been silent all the day. Vicente spurred 
 to her side. There was barely room for the two 
 horses, his being next the water. 
 
 "Your love for me," he said gently, "is deep and 
 true; is it not so? " 
 
 She turned her head and looked at him. This 
 riding in sun and wind, and this continued hardship 
 of an army s life, seemed only to have increased her 
 beauty. It was her true sphere. 
 
 " You have never doubted it ? " she said, speaking 
 unusually low. 
 
 " No. Yet true love turns first to the one it loves, 
 ii 
 
162 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 brings every burden, tells every thought and feel 
 ing. Then why are you changed, Pepa? What is 
 it that has come over you ? I have watched it hour 
 after hour. You are not the same. We are bound 
 together in so deep a destiny, and every step we are 
 taking now means so much, that there should be 
 knowledge, harmony between us. From a dream it 
 takes on some little of the form of reality, though it 
 be only begun. And I can let my mind go on and 
 find you a queen. Then it is vital to me that some 
 thing is changing you. What is it? " 
 
 She went on in silence, pale. After a time she 
 looked up at him again. 
 
 "I think," she said, "it is because I have of late 
 finished the changing from being a girl." 
 
 "Then thank the waters and the mountains," said 
 he, with some relief, "for they made you as you are 
 a daughter of them." 
 
 They had come to the end of the narrow passage 
 and the road was wider. She suddenly gave him 
 that old dazzling smile and galloped away far ahead 
 of him, spurring ever more swiftly; and she sang: 
 
 " Slender and strange that vessel was, and bright, 
 
 Bright with the sacred serpent s glittering scale. 
 A thousand skins their million points of light 
 
 Flashed from its sides all crystal clear and frail, 
 That its unearthly ray. 
 Lighting the fog-drowned day, 
 Left o er the leaden sea a shining trail." 
 
 He followed her with eyes in which there was 
 coming a sadness. Much as he hated doubt, scorned 
 suspicion, loved faith, Clarita s words would come 
 to him. Clarita had been afraid of her. 
 
 Quiroz too was watching her. It chanced after a 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 163 
 
 time that, having gradually advanced some distance 
 in the army s lead, he overtook her. 
 
 "There is fever in the gazelle s eyes," said he, 
 coming close. "She rides madly. She spurs and 
 halts and spurs again. Ah, it is weighing on her, 
 a burden in the breast. Pepa, a hundred thousand 
 moods, each more beautiful than the last, I swear 
 to God have I counted in you in the last four 
 days ! " 
 
 She did not repel him as she often had done. 
 She smiled at him, too, the dazzling smile. 
 
 " Heartburns ! " she cried mockingly, and laughed 
 a light laugh. 
 
 He wheeled his horse against hers. 
 
 "Yours are not the first or the last," said he, 
 his eyes gleaming on her, "or the only heartburns. 
 You can move heaven and earth. I have told you 
 so a dozen times before. It is not the right nor the 
 dreams it is blood like yours that does, and dar 
 ing like well, I have been said to dare. Remem 
 ber; there are other heartburns than yours." 
 
 High rocks at a turn in the road here hiding 
 them, he was dazzled then by the expression of her 
 face and her unusual action. She put out a quick, 
 hot hand and placed it half roguishly on his as it 
 lay on the saddle s horn. Whether it was his fancy 
 or not, he believed she pressed his fingers with 
 hers; and she dashed away feverishly, throwing a 
 flash of the eyes over her shoulder. She left his 
 blood leaping like fire in his veins. 
 
 At noon of the fifth day they arrived thus, having 
 increased still more, at a town called Jiquilpan. 
 There was a little body of recruits promised from 
 the mountains here. There was a messenger to 
 arrive from the monastery. There were more horses 
 
1 64 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 to be secured and a more thorough organization of 
 the forces to be accomplished. For Vicente believed 
 that before many days his enemy would have returned. 
 He decided to remain in Jiquilpan, drilling his 
 troops, the rest of that day and all of the next, mak 
 ing straight for Tizapan on the day after the mor 
 row. Tizapan, he had told Doroteo, seemed always 
 to hang in his mind as an objective point, a place of 
 meaning. 
 
 " Why ? " asked Doroteo. 
 
 " I do not know. That place, its very name, has 
 weighed on me from the first. Who knows ? Rodrigo 
 may meet us there. I want to enter it in better 
 condition." 
 
 "He will have to ride like the son of the devil if 
 he does," said Doroteo. 
 
CHAPTER VI 
 
 TO travel by night those rockbound ways over 
 the mountain ridge that separates the lake 
 from the leveler regions about Guadalajara, is to 
 make a lonely journey, let the night be beautiful as 
 it may. By starlight the way is uncertain and full of 
 gloom ; the peaks are vast shadows against the sky, 
 the ravines are hollows of unknown depths and mys 
 tery. If there be a moon, the scene is an enchanted 
 one. Crags rise misty white at every turn ; shrubbery 
 stands a formless mass melted into gray continuity ; 
 from the summit of a ridge distance unmeasured 
 stretches out before one, limitless, moonlit, drowned 
 at last in the white silence leagues upon leagues away. 
 But if there be one of those swift night storms hurling 
 himself across the mountains, the way is, in spite of 
 that diabolic company, more solitary still. The peaks 
 are sheds to pour the water in torrents down upon 
 the path. The thunders roar and crash, fighting the 
 crags and bursting in fury over the answering ravine. 
 The evil spirit of the lightning rips the blackness with 
 a sudden blinding glare of its unholy passion. 
 
 Beating his lonely way through a night like this 
 rode a horseman. He had his teeth ground together, 
 his sombrero low over his face, his hair, unkempt and 
 wild, wet with rain. His horse, apparently accus 
 tomed to such journeys, cared not at all for the light 
 ning or the thunders. It went steadily, desperately 
 on, cutting its way into the thick of the storm, stum- 
 
i66 A /MY-.. . :/ OF A THRONE 
 
 bling now and then, but making sure progress. And 
 to the rider the storm mattered little. Was the way 
 solitary ? He and his soul were more solitary still. Was 
 the blackness like that which succeeds a burnt-out pas 
 sion of the heart, the death of hope? He had carried 
 that blackness in him, was carrying it still, had walked 
 with it through the course of years. Was there no 
 cessation of the lightning s blinding tyranny, devilish 
 glee, over his unanswering spirit? Likewise had his 
 heart grown callous to tyranny. 
 
 The hours of riding thus had little measurement, 
 little meaning to him. It may have been midnight, 
 or earlier or later, when, having passed the ruggedest 
 portion of the way and issued out of those mountain 
 jaws, he turned at length into the more open road 
 that leads over plain and through valleys to the dis 
 tant city. Hardly had he done so when he heard 
 upon that road footsteps out of the -deep night be 
 hind him. He did not turn, only instinctively shrank 
 into himself and went on. The sound at length was 
 nearer, the approach of a horse that followed. The 
 lightning flashed out and he heard the animal behind 
 him suddenly shy, it having caught sight of the rider 
 before. Then the darkness was there again and the 
 rider before and the rider behind kept on in their 
 uncongenial course. 
 
 He before, from long habit unmoving, expression 
 less, and from long necessity cowed with a kind of 
 buried desperation before men, involuntarily urged 
 his horse on the faster. He lost at length the sound 
 behind him. Then another flash lit all the wide, 
 irregular valley and the peaks cut clear against the 
 glare. And the horse behind came nearer, trotting 
 a quick trot. The first rider, suddenly thrilled with 
 a sensation like unreasoning fear, spurred on and 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 167 
 
 trotted likewise. There was a half-hour of this, the 
 one unchangeably following the other, the first shrink 
 ing like a criminal as he rode. 
 
 o 
 
 The last rider, fugitive as he was, did not shrink, 
 nor was there in him any of the feeling of the cowed 
 or the hunted. He had been startled to see the other 
 suddenly before him, where previously there had been 
 no one. The lightning had shown him the rugged 
 path opening into his smoother one out of the moun 
 tains, along which the other must have come. That 
 other path, he knew, could lead only to Chapala or 
 to some portion of the more easterly shore. Some 
 thing in the mysterious apparition s manner suggested 
 stealth to the follower and his coming thus in the 
 night s middle from that region roused all the fol 
 lower s alertness. This might be some messenger of 
 his enemies. Hence he spurred up as an experi 
 ment. The other, seeming, by the intermittent glares, 
 to crouch upon his horse, spurred up also. So the 
 trot before and the following trot were continued, the 
 first with some unknown habitual dread, the last with 
 relentless purpose. The storm was passing and the 
 rain was lighter. The flashes, too, were less frequent. 
 The road being now more secure, he in front dug 
 spurs into his steed and galloped. The muscles of 
 his face were drawn like cords, and his ears strained 
 to catch the sound behind. The dreaded change 
 was not wanting ; the horse behind broke also into a 
 gallop. The dread of the first rider changed into a 
 burdening fear. He was no longer capable of sharp 
 terror. Into his strange mind came the query, why 
 should he fear? what was there in all the earth to 
 cause dread to him? No matter. Dread had grown 
 to be a part of his daily life. It was the first habit 
 of his mind. So, needlessly, as a matter of course, 
 
1 68 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 he fled, and the relentless beat of hoofs followed him. 
 He ground his teeth still more, leaned over his horse s 
 neck, and spurred on faster. His pursuer spurred to 
 equal speed. An hour of this and the horses were 
 panting. Fancying the other s pursuing pace slack 
 ened, the first rider drew sullenly in and his horse 
 trotted slowly. The clouds were passing and there 
 was the faint light of a more ordinary night. The 
 second rider drew in also, and the slow trot of the 
 one kept pace with that of the other. 
 
 The first animal regained his wind and its rider, 
 listening always to that remorseless beat, beat of the 
 hoofs behind, regained his causeless dread. There 
 was no inconsiderable portion of the journey still be 
 fore him. To listen to that following tread thus 
 calmly all the way! He spurred on again into a 
 gallop and the other followed. The gallop grew 
 faster and faster. Out from the flying clouds sud 
 denly broke the morning star in the east, brilliant as 
 it is in these semi-tropical altitudes only, a mammoth 
 jewel, a crystalline moon. The speed of the first 
 rider had increased still more. It was now a mad 
 course. And he who followed kept the distance 
 between always the same. Nearing the city after an 
 hour of this strange race, the course was like a flight 
 of panic. It was on a run, as though life itself were 
 the stake, that the outlying huts were passed. 
 
 When the city s streets were reached, the first, as 
 though struck with reason or shame, drew up to a 
 more moderate pace. The other did likewise. The 
 gray of dawn was beginning to appear in the east. 
 The first rider made a circuit round the outskirts. 
 Under other circumstances the follower would not 
 have pursued that course. He would have made 
 straight for the town s centre. But he pursued it 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 169 
 
 now. The first light of day was coming faintly into 
 the narrow streets when the two arrived thus at the 
 great walls of the monastery. At their beginning the 
 first rider spurred up yet a little more. He flung 
 himself to the ground and beat loudly on the massive 
 knocker at the gates, the other seeing faintly his 
 tangled hair. While the door was being opened he 
 who had dismounted, hearing the following horse 
 close at hand, could not resist the temptation to 
 throw a hasty glance over his shoulder it was the 
 fascination induced by his dread. Then he went in 
 and the door was closed, went in carrying his gloom 
 and his solitude with him to be still under the 
 weight that made him more like a fleeing beast than 
 a man. 
 
 In the moment of that backward glance, the fol 
 lowing rider had perceived, by the faint coming day 
 light, the face of him he followed. He rode on, 
 wondering at its monstrous hideousness. 
 
 " At least," said he at last, shaking himself free of 
 his thoughts, " that little chase has brought me here 
 an hour or so in advance of my calculations. A good 
 honest storm this was, and I am much misled if the 
 most covered part of my shivering skin is not the 
 wettest." 
 
 An hour later the sun came up, the city began to 
 stir, and all the streets, sprinkled by hand and swept 
 in small sections by bunches of broom-straw, awoke 
 yellow and clean into another day. The rider, having 
 found accommodations for his horse and himself, dry 
 clothing and a breakfast, strode away at seven o clock 
 to the main plaza. He had made himself sure of the 
 arrival of his escaped companions. He knew the 
 empty barracks they would be likely to occupy. He 
 had found them there, every man sound asleep, 
 
1 7 o A DREAM OF A Til ROM: 
 
 exhausted. They had arrived three hours before 
 him. 
 
 In the plaza was a freshness not even rivalled in the 
 mountains, a glistening of glossy leaves, a swaying 
 of fruit, the beauties of masses of flowers. The two 
 pointed towers of the great cathedral pierced a sky 
 than which yEgean s own could not be bluer, and 
 wherein were no traces of the storm that was. The 
 bells of the clock on the long white government 
 palace were multifariously proclaiming the hour 
 when the visitor entered the wide doors beneath 
 them. He knew the governor had a habit rather 
 an astonishing habit in this land of the late beginning 
 of business of coming to his office and laboring 
 alone very early in the morning. A peon sweeping 
 the stone hall let him in and knocked for him at the 
 governor s door. The governor opened it. 
 
 " Don Rodrigo ! " he cried with a thrill of anxiety, 
 and led the visitor in and closed the door a weary, 
 stiff visitor, needing rest and sleep, but determined 
 and alert still. 
 
 At the period at which this history has arrived, the 
 accomplishment of desirable political facts, whatever 
 their nature, was impeded by hindrances to which it 
 is difficult to do full justice, the labyrinths of which 
 it is not always possible to comprehend. That evil 
 genius that presided over the series of fatalities at 
 tacking the many Mexican governments, nothing 
 appeared to satisfy. It did not suffice that the Re 
 public had passed through, was passing through, gave 
 every evidence of a continuation in passing through, 
 every kind of political disease, exhausting throe, fatal 
 paroxysm. These have been hinted at before. In 
 the midst of these must come menaces, attacks, 
 defeats, from without, to supplement ambition, un- 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 171 
 
 dermining, and treason within. A huge and over 
 shadowing country to the north, inspired by unworthy 
 motives, answering the pressure brought upon her by 
 a party desirous of increasing the party power and 
 the territory wherein that power should be dominant, 
 had declared war on its puny neighbor. The slave 
 principles, being then dominant, launched the army. 
 A slave-holder led it. After fifty years it is not easy 
 to find a historian who does not condemn that war 
 for the slave power is dead. In the late spring of the 
 year of this narrative, namely, eighteen hundred and 
 forty-six, General Taylor crossed the Rio Grande 
 and invaded Mexican territory. In September, 
 shortly before the events described in the preceding 
 chapters of this book, the city of Monterey, garri 
 soned by an army of nine thousand Mexicans, was 
 besieged by the American general with an army of 
 seven thousand. For several days the place held 
 out, giving to Worth his opportunity for that gallant 
 capture of the Episcopal palace on the hill. The 
 nine thousand gave up to the seven thousand. 
 General Ampudia retreated to San Luis Potosi. The 
 Americans were coming on to the capital. Further 
 more they were sending another and a greater force 
 to Vera Cruz. It was vital that Taylor be crushed at 
 once before Scott should sweep up from the Gulf. 
 This was the news which had arrived at Guadalajara 
 not long before Rodrigo s return. And in that city, 
 as in every other city of the Republic to which the 
 news had come, there was agitation. 
 
 With these tidings came summons from Santa 
 Anna. He was to leave his government at Mexico 
 in the hands of Farias, his vice-president. He was 
 to march at once in person, at the head of the Mexi 
 can army, against Taylor. He needed and would 
 
1 72 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 have, imperial old despot as he was, every soldier that 
 could possibly reach him on his march. Guadalajara, 
 the largest city save his own, should do her utmost. 
 She had been drained drain her again. She was 
 threatened with disaster at home the disaster from 
 abroad was more threatening. Santa Anna set out 
 from his capital boldly, little knowing it was only for 
 a worse than useless march, to culminate in the 
 bloody defeat of Angostura leaving behind him 
 dissent, insurrection, the " Polko " attack on his un 
 supported government, having before him the com 
 ing disastrous winter, Scott, Churubusco, humiliating 
 amputation of that great north limb of his country. 
 
 So when Don Rodrigo put in his strong plea for 
 men and showed that growing danger on the lake, there 
 were other calls for the soldiers he so much needed. 
 Were there any soldiers? The governor, foreseeing 
 this need long, and pressed at last to superhuman 
 effort by the news of the Monterey disaster, was 
 raising a force. How large? He shook his head : a 
 pitiable two hundred. Cavalry? Ay, cavalry not 
 all raised yet, promised partly from other towns, to 
 be sent off as soon as possible to join Santa Anna. 
 The good, but not altogether statesmanlike, executive 
 was in his usual torn state of mind. He found him 
 self now between two dire necessities. Rodrigo de 
 clared his was the better cause, brought in all his 
 verbal artillery, grew warm and desperate, swore the 
 men by every right that danger created should be 
 his. The exasperated governor, forgetting for once 
 his friendship for the other, lost his temper. He 
 cursed Rodrigo, Santa Anna, the United States, life-, 
 and Heaven. Rodrigo considered this excusable, but 
 declared again for the men. It were better, said he, 
 to strike an enemy at the door than to run away to a 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 173 
 
 distant one. The governor accused him of partiality 
 to the northern invaders. 
 
 " Your blood will be boiling up in their support," 
 said he. " This whirlwind will carry you, too, Rod- 
 rigo, my friend in distress, away to fight against 
 your adopted country." 
 
 " Impossible absurd ! " broke in Rodrigo. " The 
 United States can take care of itself; at all events, 
 it needs not me. That war, thank my luck and some 
 purple dashes in the landscape of the past, is none of 
 mine. I would not be a part of it so long as there 
 are corners of this untamed land to bury myself in. 
 I am occupied with a little war of my own, and I tell 
 you plainly it is not so little as it seems. If you 
 value your State and your safety, in the name of rea 
 son give me whatever weapon you have, to strike 
 again, and give it to me now. Your two hundred 
 men cannot vitally influence the fate of Santa Anna ; 
 hasn t he enough of your fighting blood already? 
 They may do vital work here. I honestly believe two 
 hundred good fighters can crush this uprising now." 
 
 " Why, you young hothead," said the governor, 
 " you are advising the executive of a State to disobey 
 the order of his superior ; to refuse to respond to the 
 call of his country ! " 
 
 " Very good," said Rodrigo, innocently unconscious 
 of his inferior position ; " that is the way patriotic 
 speeches put matters. I put it thus : I am advising 
 you to send what force you have to crush a danger, a 
 real, live, immediate danger at your door, and to 
 think, then, of the more distant one whose progress 
 your little band of cavalry can neither aid nor retard. 
 Besides, you know enough of this country to under 
 stand that in any wind you totter and the govern 
 ment that seats you. Defeat or victory for Taylor, 
 
174 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 Santa Anna s government will go down with the next 
 revolution, and you with it. Santa Anna will not 
 come to upbraid you with laxity ; he will be engaged 
 in catching the ruins of his power as they fall. Polit 
 ically, you die shortly ; so does every other officer in 
 this swift-moving kaleidoscope of governments. At 
 least while you live do the good deed of defending 
 first your own State." 
 
 Thus did the argument continue ; and, much to 
 the chagrin and nigh unbearable nervousness of Rod- 
 rigo, it continued not merely through that day, but 
 through several days. Meanwhile, the governor 
 neared prostration, Santa Anna was marching to de 
 feat, and Vicente s victorious progress was going on. 
 Several causes contributed to this exasperating delay. 
 The little troop of two hundred, small as it was, was 
 not yet gathered ; though, in the eternal Mexican 
 spirit of delay, it was promised. There is an unalter 
 able, to a pessimistic philosopher a fatal, inertia in 
 this nation. To do a thing promptly seems out of 
 the province of its activities. Furthermore, the gov 
 ernor s very doubt made matters slower, for a man 
 sure of his purpose goes more quickly at it than one 
 in doubt. 
 
 Bonavidas on the second day, renewed in strength 
 and appearing refreshingly emaciated (for that ap 
 pearance did truly seem a necessary accompaniment 
 and indication of good health in him, he, when ex 
 hausted, assuming a puffiness about the large eyes 
 and in the grayish cheeks that might have been taken 
 as indicative of a bettered condition) Bonavid.is, 
 praised and recommended by Rodrigo, added his 
 persuasions to i\\cjefes. He also went hard to work, 
 as did some of his companions, hastening the gather 
 ing of the force. He even rode to towns at a shorl 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 175 
 
 distance. On the evening of the third day he aston 
 ished the governor by bringing in a detachment of 
 ten unexpected and unpromised recruits. He had 
 raised them up from the dead, said Bonavidas with 
 an uncanny grin. 
 
 According to a calculation afterward proved erro 
 neous, it seemed fast nearing the time when all aid 
 would be useless to Santa Anna. This Rodrigo saw. 
 His exertions at persuasion suddenly ceased. The 
 governor had fallen of late into a species of politi 
 cal trance. Word was one day passed to Rodrigo s 
 men to lie quiet till the next. This was done. The 
 governor, at length positively ill, did nothing that 
 night. The following morning Rodrigo brought him 
 a map of what he believed to be Santa Anna s route, 
 a map of the route a force from Guadalajara must 
 take to join him, with the days marked. 
 
 " It is impossible," said Rodrigo, with a pleasant 
 sparkle of the eye. " They can t reach him now if 
 the Americans blow him some leagues nearer." 
 
 The governor ran all his fingers madly through his 
 hair, and Rodrigo s cause was won. Owing to the 
 accumulation of delay after delay, the force was not 
 ready to start till the morning of the sixth day. That 
 day dawned bright and dry. Rodrigo and his little 
 band of escaped warriors had come to be like 
 brothers. The twelve others were as eager to be at 
 the fight as was Rodrigo himself. They regarded 
 the war as personal property, a fine little private 
 trouble of their own wherein glory and victory awaited 
 them on the margins of the lake and revenge, too, 
 fascinating goddess as she was. Two hundred and 
 twenty-nine horsemen, including Rodrigo, Bonavidas, 
 and some lieutenants, started away in spirits tuned 
 high to the harmony that there may be even in war. 
 
CHAPTER VII 
 
 THE,jeft s men did not direct their course at 
 once to Chapala. After crossing the divide 
 they made a slight angle to the west. Rodrigo was 
 ignorant as to the present whereabouts of Vicente. 
 He conversed with Bonavidas and others on the 
 journey, hearing their opinions. He himself be 
 lieved the revolutionist must have arrived by this 
 time at some spot on the lake s opposite shore. He 
 did not believe it would be so far west as Tizapan. 
 
 "With a good gait," he said, speaking to a 
 soldier familiar with the lake, "how much time do 
 we need to overtake him at a point some twenty or 
 thirty miles east of Tizapan? " 
 
 " If we wanted to be in condition to fight after it," 
 was the reply, " I should say we could do it in three 
 days. And that would mean heavy riding." 
 
 Rodrigo shut his jaws and rode on meditating. 
 It was then that he wheeled off to a path that leads 
 to the lake a little west of Chapala. 
 
 "Are you going to circle it in the opposite direc 
 tion ?" asked Bonavidas. " Not bad ! The distance, 
 I should say, is the same either way. We will 
 meet him." 
 
 " Bonavidas," said thcjcfe, " I am making straight 
 for Ajicjic. That is six miles west of Chapala. On 
 this road I can reach it almost as soon as I could 
 reach Chapala, perhaps a half hour later. It is 
 already past noon. We shall reach the lake by 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 177 
 
 three o clock. In Ajicjic I can learn something of 
 Vicente as well there as another place. The 
 news of his army will have spread. Well, there are 
 two ways of reaching the opposite side of a lake. 
 You can go round it or you can " 
 
 " Cross it ! " broke in Bonavidas with an amaze 
 ment that had a chuckle in it. " But, save your 
 soul, man, cross it with two hundred animals ! In 
 the name of the saints, did you ever hear of an 
 attempt like that on Chapala? canoas low roofs 
 miserable vessels. Why, they would n t hold six 
 horses apiece. Dead, that is where the Repub 
 lic s honorable army would be, in the lake s oozy 
 bottom." 
 
 Bonavidas smiled at his conceit, and his gaunt 
 face expressed no such objections as did his words. 
 
 " I can put more than six in some of those vessels," 
 said Rodrigo, determined, "if I have to pile them 
 one on the other. Suppose he had come as far as 
 Tuxcueco. We could cross, at the slowest, in ten 
 hours. This is better than three days." 
 
 Bonavidas whistled long and low, and went on 
 in dazed mood. Then he suddenly clapped his leg 
 with his hand and broke out : 
 
 " We will ! " cried he. " This is Sunday ! " 
 
 "Which I have remembered," said Rodrigo, "and 
 on Sunday Chapala s beach is crowded with canoas 
 for market day. I am going first to Ajicjic that, if 
 the news be right, I may begin at that point gather 
 ing up ships, thence gather them all the way back 
 to Chapala. Hence, a sail on the foam. Poetical 
 outlook ! " 
 
 An eager delight lit the unhealthiness of Bona 
 vidas countenance. They were riding over a rough 
 trail with cacti and stones about, and here and 
 
 12 
 
178 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 there a flock of goats. To the right was a seemingly 
 endless chain of mountains, to the left, more dis 
 tant, rose St. Michael, low and round (behind whose 
 bulk lay Chapala and the water), and the larger 
 head, called Angostura, lying between that town 
 and Ajicjic on the lake s edge. Between Angostura 
 and the opposite mountain chain the road led, 
 rising to a hill, to whose summit the little army 
 came. They looked down on the lake and, nearer, 
 small irregular fields, scores of them, checkering a 
 level stretch from mountains to water. Out of 
 these, Ajicjic s church thrust up a single gleaming 
 tower of white. Three o clock found the troop 
 sweeping into the barren plaza of that fishing 
 village. 
 
 To this day Ajicjic can claim no more than some 
 two thousand souls. It has, even yet, no railroad, 
 no stage; rarely has a vehicle been seen in that 
 primitive place other than the awkward ox-cart. 
 Its low, unplastered adobe walls stand close to 
 gether. The streets are alleys of extreme narrow 
 ness wherein there is mud when it rains, dust when 
 it is dry, rocks and swine forever. Nigh every alley 
 twists and turns, is for a block no more than a 
 gutter, for another block a public stable for burros. 
 Yet one may find some better quarters. The plaza, 
 though it is only a bare, brown waste, is wide. The 
 open court before the church, though it too is bare 
 and dirty, with lonely, crumbling walls and pillars 
 about it, yet has in its centre a weather-beaten cross 
 that speaks of service to the Lord. 
 
 The troop filled the plaza. It was halted, and 
 the inhabitants of the town, struck with amazement, 
 either shut themselves up or gathered in silence 
 round about. Groups of brown children, absolutely 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 179 
 
 naked, sat down in the dirt, thumbs in mouth, to 
 wonder in comfort. Rodrigo and Bonavidas began 
 the inquiries, prefacing them with jocularly expressed 
 friendship to certain storekeepers and a toss of 
 tequila here and there down a willing throat. Boats ? 
 There hadn t come but one boat to Ajicjic the 
 blessed day. Ajicjic was losing importance in 
 these times. On market days everybody went to 
 the bigger market at Chapala, where the news was 
 dispersed. And this one boat? It had come from 
 Tizapan with a load of wood for the lime burners. 
 Its captain, an ancient and withered Indian, was 
 sought out and refreshed with drink. Si, he knew 
 of Vicente. It was said the day before in Tizapan 
 that Vicente and his army had arrived at Jiquilpan 
 and were coming. This was made very clear. How 
 big was the army ? Oh Lord ! it was large. But 
 hozv large? The bewildered old barbarian had no 
 idea of numbers. "Very many," said he, satisfied 
 with his information. But how many? "Oh, a 
 hundred thousand!" cried he, much put to it; "and 
 I don t care what be the government so it lets me 
 alone Mother of the Lord ! let it leave me alone ; 
 * this is all I want of the government ! " 
 
 The government did not leave him alone. His 
 canoa was taken. Rodrigo treated him kindly and 
 promised him no harm should come to his vessel ; it 
 should be turned over to him on the morrow. The 
 old owner wailed over this ; he would go wherever 
 his ship went. Rodrigo agreed. He could cross 
 with them, but the vessel should be taken and at 
 once. So two of his soldiers were detailed to help 
 pole it to Chapala; for as yet there was no wind. 
 
 The rest rode out of the town and made away 
 toward the latter place, scanning the shore. The 
 
i So A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 lake was as still as the rocks. Its glassy surface 
 threw up the beams of the lowering sun like a 
 mammoth mirror. Every mountain peak hung his 
 shadow, clear and blue as himself, in its depths; 
 and below those hanging summits lay a mock sky as 
 fathomless as its counterpart above. 
 
 "This is damnation for a wind," said Bonavidas. 
 
 "Out of that stillness a wind will come at dusk 
 from the west," replied Rodrigo, "or, at most, a 
 little later. Till we are ready it cannot remain too 
 still." 
 
 The road led round a wide bay. A far point, ex 
 tending yonder into the water, marked a division 
 from which both Chapala and Ajicjic could be 
 plainly seen. There are a few huts on this point, 
 and the place is called San Antonio. There are 
 brick-kilns there, and this was the first spot since 
 leaving Ajicjic where canoas were found. There 
 were five of them lying on the many -tinted waters, 
 their masts wrapped tightly with the sails. They 
 had come to be loaded with brick. But Sunday is 
 not a day to work nay, it is a day to loll in the 
 nearest market town, particularly if there be news. 
 Here in this peaceful, primitive, fishing region, 
 people feared not thieves. The vessels were de 
 serted ; the brick-kilns smoked, attended by one 
 boy only. Soldiers were detailed for these canoas, 
 and the five were brought on (pushed with long 
 poles always provided for these craft), along the 
 edge of that next broad curve across whose shining 
 surface, three miles away, Chapala s walls crouched 
 under St. Michael. 
 
 Somewhat disappointed at having found, thus far, 
 but six vessels, Rodrigo proceeded with all speed to 
 Chapala. The loading hazardous, quixotic, un- 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 181 
 
 heard-of plan as it was must be done before the 
 wind came. The stillness so common to the afternoon 
 during the dry season usually became roughness at 
 nightfall. His men, apprised of the bold intention 
 of their leader, liked the novelty of it. This is the 
 spirit, said they, that wins. They cheered the 
 news. The very difficulties and dangers of the pro 
 ject recommended it to Rodrigo. To gain two days 
 and a half by that quick, unexpected stroke, was to 
 him to do a deed the idea of which filled him with 
 delight. He pictured to himself the queer fleet 
 lumbering into Tizapan ahead of his enemies. He 
 vowed in his heart he would beat Vicente at Tizapan 
 or go down in the attempt. He knew one or two 
 animals had sometimes been brought across the lake 
 in these vessels. If one could be brought, why, let 
 the thing expand go to, let us do an oddity. 
 Originality gains much. We will sail with two 
 hundred and twenty-nine ! He laughed within him 
 self exultantly. 
 
 "I am a boy again," said he, "sailing wooden 
 butter-dishes on the pond!" 
 
 Now, at the century s end, navigation by modern 
 means is just beginning to appear on Chapalac. 
 There is one old steamer full of vermin and rickety, 
 exceedingly small. She fell over once in the water 
 and drowned many passengers. There is a new 
 
 steamer talked of. The Hon. S C , Her 
 
 British Majesty s ex-consul general to Sweden, has 
 a little yacht that skims these waters. Otherwise 
 the shipping is the same that has conducted the 
 primitive lake commerce for hundreds of years. At 
 the time of Rodrigo s daring deed (talked of yet in 
 all that section of the State) the only vessels were 
 the canoas. One can see them there to-day exactly 
 
182 A DREAHf OF A THRONE 
 
 as they were in the old times. The largest may be 
 sixty feet in length by fifteen broad. They are flat 
 bottomed, seldom measuring six feet from water to 
 thatch. They are pitched black without. Over 
 nearly one half of the vessel there is a pointed 
 thatched roof. Some of them to-day have roofs of 
 boards; there were none of that sort then. From 
 the floor s middle stands the single mast with a 
 pulley in its top. One long yard is hoisted to the 
 mast s summit by rope and the pulley. To the 
 yard is attached the single square sail. This can 
 vas is often phenomenally large. It extends, when 
 spread, far out beyond the sides of the boat, a mam 
 moth expanse of glittering white, lacking the beauty 
 of the more graceful sails of a yacht, employing the 
 one plain principle of more surface, more progress, 
 but sometimes adorned with the vessel s fantastic 
 name painted in black across all the shining extent. 
 The speed of these craft is of course not high. 
 Never, since the lake came into being, has there 
 been cause for haste here. The wind must be 
 pretty well behind ; there is little of the science of 
 tacking; there is never such a thing dreamed of as 
 sailing against the wind. The rudder is a large 
 wooden one, operated by a horizontal handle extend 
 ing over the boat s stern. Three sailors are ample 
 allowance. Two can manage a vessel if the weather 
 is fair and there is no third. There are known 
 some heroic cases in which one person has sailed a 
 canoa alone. When Cortes built his vessels in 
 Tlaxcala, carried them across the mountains, and 
 launched them, to the Aztecs consternation, on the 
 lake where the Aztec capital stood, he did what is 
 agreed to have been an astounding thing. It is 
 only an instance of the fickleness of history that 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 183 
 
 Rodrigo s less astonishing but similarly original 
 deed should be in no record. It lives only in the 
 minds of the lake people, who alone know the 
 capacity of their boats and the difficulty of manag 
 ing a fleet of them. 
 
 Chapala was in her gayest colors on this day. 
 Her market place, even at four of the afternoon, 
 was crowded. There had gone a thrill along all the 
 lake s borders at the news of the Battle of Ocotlan. 
 This being the first market day since the fight, 
 Chapala, then the commercial capital (and suffi 
 ciently removed from the present seat of war) was 
 crowded with eager gossipers. Hence, when Don 
 Rodrigo and his cavalry suddenly rode in on the 
 scene, there was intense excitement. Before that 
 force the town was at its leader s mercy. He soon 
 received confirmation of the news regarding Vicente. 
 He even received better information of the number 
 he must fight. It seemed there were between one 
 and two thousand horse now in Jiquilpan. A 
 seriousness settled over his men when this became 
 known. Rodrigo sat his horse in silence and looked 
 them over, slowly. They read his mind, rallied 
 round him, threw up caps with cheers, and swore to 
 follow him into the jaws of death. 
 
 He rode then to the beach. His expectations 
 were riot unfounded. This busiest of all commercial 
 days brought thither many vessels. They stood in 
 a long line, sterns to the shore, on the glassy water. 
 Some lay anchored farther out. The western sun, 
 casting his yellow glare over all the motionless 
 lake, threw shadows of masts, black lines in the 
 yellow. 
 
 They were speedily counted. 
 
 "Nineteen," said Bonavidas. 
 
184 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 "And six from Ajicjic and San Antonio," replied 
 Rodrigo. "Twenty-five. Not enough. We must 
 have thirty at the least. Bonavidas, go, you and 
 thirty men. Ride east for not a minute longer than 
 half an hour. Chapala is on a right angle that juts 
 into the lake. Ride yonder and you will strike 
 water again. There are sometimes boats there. 
 Seize every vessel you find and pole it to the bluff 
 at the foot of St. Michael. You can return before 
 I have succeeded in packing these poor fish into 
 those boxes." 
 
 Bonavidas and his thirty men rode away. 
 
 Where the rocky hill that stands over Chapala 
 laves its foot in the water there was, and still is, a 
 iedge of rocks. The road led over this rise, and 
 the ledge, immediately at the shore, was a little 
 cliff six feet in height, rising perpendicularly out of 
 deep water. The place is now much altered by 
 blasting and civilized improvement. On the very 
 spot where Rodrigo loaded his vessels (a spot some 
 hundreds of yards west of the stretch of beach and 
 the famous old salati] there now stands a beautiful 
 modern villa. Times, even here in inert Mexico, 
 have changed ! 
 
 A proclamation was speedily issued to the people. 
 Every canoa capable of crossing the lake with a 
 horse was to be temporarily confiscated to the use of 
 the government. Care should be taken of them. 
 They should be at the owner s disposal the follow 
 ing morning. Those owners who so desired might 
 send one man each or themselves go, to accompany 
 the boats. Such cargo as the vessels contained 
 would better be at once unloaded. There was amaze 
 ment at this beyond all saying. The crowd was 
 thunder-struck. What impossible deed did this 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 185 
 
 portend? There was some grumbling. There was 
 more curiosity. Rodrigo s ever-ready manner and 
 diplomacy won some favor. There was a scramble 
 for the boats, and a hasty pitching out upon the 
 sand of such fruits or vegetables or rude furniture 
 as they contained. Hence, willingly or unwil 
 lingly, whether they cursed or laughed, with two 
 hundred armed cavalrymen looking complacently on, 
 the shippers gave up their property. 
 
 Rodrigo despatched his men to the vessels, the 
 horses being herded on the beach. There was a 
 hilarious removal of sandals and shoes and a rolling 
 up of trousers, shouts, jests, boisterous fun, and a 
 splashing of water and climbing to boats. 
 
 "Now," cried Rodrigo, "all hands to poles 
 and may the Virgin give us two more hours of 
 calm ! " 
 
 Rude little row-boats went scudding out to such 
 canoas as lay at a distance. Brawny arms and backs 
 were strained at the poles. Brown legs moving 
 along the upper side ledges of the vessels swelled 
 with exertion as the great hulls glided slowly over 
 the mirror of the lake. In half an hour they were 
 halted in line at the bluff, where the ledge of rock, 
 high as the boats sides or a trifle higher, was only 
 so wide as to permit the loading of three vessels at 
 once. The town was scoured for timbers. Heavy 
 planks fifteen feet in length were thrown from the 
 rock to the sterns, and the bridges were made. 
 The work was done with feverish energy and in 
 what order the haste and the novelty permitted. 
 
 "They can cross the bridge easily enough," said 
 a soldier. "But they cannot get under the roofs." 
 
 "Then tear the roofs away," said Rodrigo. 
 
 Hammers and timbers for levers were speedily at 
 
186 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 work. One by one the thatches were torn off and 
 thrown aside. A groan went up from the crowd of 
 townspeople at this. It was not to be helped. 
 Rodrigo grimly directed the work. He had the 
 power in his hands; he had entered on this course. 
 It would have taken a bloody protest to make him 
 abandon it. The horses meanwhile had been fed. 
 They were now watered at the lake s edge. 
 
 Out of the meson Clarita had come. She had 
 seen all and knew the purpose of it. With only the 
 light of her eyes, the slight pink flush of her face, 
 and the absence of her dimples hinting what she 
 felt, she crossed the plaza toward St. Michael. In 
 a crowd of townspeople, going in that direction also, 
 she was but an unnoticed unit. She made no 
 haste. She was joined, as she entered the street 
 leading to the ledge of rocks, by Pepa s mother, 
 who came running after her. Pepa s mother was 
 worn to thinness with worry over her daughter. 
 
 " My girl will be brought home to me dead," mur 
 mured she, gloomily. "Clarita, I have seen it in 
 twenty dreams." 
 
 Clarita did not seem to hear. Neither did it 
 appear that she saw Pepa s mother or any of the 
 crowd. She was quiet and dignified, where others 
 ran and were turbulent. She left the crowd before 
 she reached the ledge of rocks where Rodrigo was, 
 and to which the horses were now being led by 
 threes and fours. That wonder of an insane deed 
 made others crowd about the spot her it kept at a 
 distance. She went through an open patio of a 
 house she knew that stood at the base of the little 
 mountain. The walled court was empty, and its 
 many pomegranate trees were as still as painted 
 She sighed heavily and (Missed to the rear, 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 187 
 
 feeling as deserted as this lonely court. She came 
 out of the rear wooden door and found herself at the 
 mountain s lower rocks. Then she began to climb. 
 The mountain side was steep and strewn with 
 boulders. It was covered, too, with shrubs and 
 flowering plants. She rose gradually, and was 
 above the roofs of the houses, so that all the town 
 was like an irregular floor of flat red tiles, the lake 
 half surrounding it. It was as though she stood on 
 an island. She saw Bonavidas and his men riding 
 to the northeast a mile away. She saw a few canoas 
 in that direction too, round the far side of the cape 
 on which Chapala stands. 
 
 It was not at these she cared to look. She climbed 
 still a little higher, and then went round on the 
 mountain side till she stood just over the ledge of 
 rocks and the crowd of people. Then she watched 
 it all. From ihzjefe and his men, the scrambling 
 horses and the distrustful crowd, she turned her 
 eyes many times across the lake to the southeast. 
 Tizapan, Jiquilpan, lay there where those distant, 
 hazy peaks rose out of the water. Oh ! that it were 
 not so many miles across that shining mirror, that 
 she might, at least, see! 
 
 The loading of the first canoa began with vigor 
 and haste. Looking back from this distance on 
 that time, and remembering the slow movements of 
 Mexicans, the strangest feature of the day is the 
 rapidity with which the man concluded his unusual 
 task. The horses were left saddled and bridled. 
 There was to be no extra space for saddles in these 
 boats. The bridge of planks being laid from rock 
 to stern, the first horse was led across. He stopped 
 in the middle, terrified, and pulled back. He was 
 cajoled, and finally dashed at the boat snorting, men 
 
1 88 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 before him pulling and men behind him pushing. 
 Other shorter boards were slanted within the vessel 
 from the high stern to the floor. The inclination 
 was necessarily extreme to leave the boat s naked 
 bottom unencumbered. The animal, dashing in as 
 he did, instead of running down this last decline, 
 slid. He arrived at his destination with some of 
 the skin removed from his hind legs, so that his 
 owner cursed viciously. The beast, trembling and 
 flinching, was led as far fore as possible. Across 
 the bows and some distance toward the vessels 
 middles are heavy staying timbers, too low for a 
 horse to pass under. Hence all the snorting cargoes 
 must be crowded in the spaces aft of these timbers, 
 spaces comprising three fourths of the boats. 
 The horses were placed sidewise. It was found 
 their heads, in some instances, were high enough to 
 permit their looking over into the water. As so 
 unusual a sight may terrify an animal naturally 
 sensitive as a good horse is, in many cases it was 
 found necessary to replace the halves of the thatches, 
 fastening them perpendicularly instead of inclined, 
 to the boats sides. The horses thus blinded were 
 more quiet. 
 
 That effect of skinned legs was repeated with 
 exasperating frequency. It made no difference to 
 Rodrigo. The wounds were slight. He urged the 
 loading on with an indomitable energy and good 
 will that inspired similar qualities in his men. 
 There was frequently much trouble. One horse, 
 having started across the planks, broke suddenly 
 back through the crowd with something like a 
 scream, jerked him who held the bridle into the 
 water, and dashed away not to be caught. Others 
 struggled and kicked. But two hundred men ready 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 189 
 
 at hand can accomplish much. Certain beasts were 
 literally carried across the bridge. 
 
 Thus the work went on, three vessels at a time. 
 The three being filled, each was manned and poled 
 into the lake, and others were brought up. Beasts 
 were packed in some like cattle in cars in some, 
 tighter. There was occasionally a scuffle of loaded 
 animals within and the noise of an equine dispute. 
 Still the bare-armed men pulled and pushed, yelled 
 and beat and persuaded, till each unwieldy bulk slid 
 with a thud to the boat s flat bottom. Nearly every 
 minute Rodrigo looked away to the west and scanned 
 the regions of the setting sun. That sun came 
 down huge and red, and little clouds along its 
 course lit a score of colors. The air was yet as 
 silent as the peaks. 
 
 "It will come," cried he, "and it comes quickly. 
 On with it ! Ah, Bonavidas what luck ? " 
 
 "Found five," said Bonavidas; "they are coming. 
 I have found, too," continued he, "another thing." 
 
 He leaped from his horse. At that moment, 
 pushing their way through the crowd up the little 
 ascent, came some of Bonavidas companions bring 
 ing a man in their midst. 
 
 "I found this fellow under suspicious circum 
 stances," said Bonavidas, pointing at the prisoner. 
 " We were wading through a marsh at the lake s 
 edge, something over two miles from here round the 
 point. There was a canoa pulled up there in the 
 mud, looking as though it had n t been used for 
 months. There were three big rocks there, too, 
 that made a corner. By St. Thomas, there was a 
 saddled horse standing hid in those rocks! The 
 place is wild, and there is n t a soul living for miles. 
 So it was queer. We got the horse, waded out, 
 
i 9 o A DREA.V OF A THRONE 
 
 and went into the boat. When we jumped in this 
 person leaped up out of a sound sleep. Well, I was 
 taken aback at his face. I can take a plain grave 
 or a dead body or a good honest murder and never 
 flinch. But this man s countenance having the 
 looks of all three, and yet living I was taken 
 aback. So, after glaring at me like a goblin, he 
 suddenly jumped over into the water and made at 
 the rocks. He was after his horse. The horse 
 was n t there and I ordered a chase, and we took 
 him. He acted like a caught rat. Said I, He may 
 be a messenger of the enemy hiding till dark. So 
 I took him. There was a little boat that I think 
 was his, tied at the rocks, oars and sail and provi 
 sions. When I questioned this man he acted deaf. 
 He acted crazy, too. He fell flat down and grovelled 
 like a slave ; then he got up and that hellish face of 
 his looked damned troubled, and he kept pointing 
 out over the water. I said, Come on, Senor In 
 ferno, we 11 to the captain. I am somewhat of a 
 skeleton myself Ha ! ha ! So here he is, and the 
 horse and the provisions." 
 
 The creature thus described shrank like a slave 
 indeed in the midst of his captors. He might 
 formerly have been a man of good size. He now 
 looked withered, crouching. His manner was like 
 that of one come out of the dark, one having been 
 buried away for many years, who sees day and hears 
 voices and has nature and humanity about him for 
 the first time, and is dumb and afraid. They urged 
 him on to the jefe and he came, cowed and sullen. 
 He was so still that, in that evident dumb dread, one 
 expecting him to tremble would have observed with 
 wonder the stillness. He pushed back his sombrero, 
 showing long matted black hair, and raised his face 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 191 
 
 to Rodrigo. The brow and the eyes were those of 
 a man of superior intelligence, but in the latter there 
 was no light. The chin, too, would have been strong 
 and firm, but that a distortion extended even to it. 
 From the right corner of the mouth almost to the 
 ear stretched a great scar drawing all the skin of the 
 face s right side into revolting ugliness. Rodrigo 
 was somehow made silent by the vision. He knew 
 he had seen that face, and where. He remembered 
 the long night of his escape and the figure he had 
 followed, the glimpse of the face at the monastery. 
 To have seen it once was never to forget it. Long 
 since he had been assured that there was some vital 
 connection between that very monastery where 
 Vicente had been educated and the revolution. 
 His suspicions of the man were at once deepened. 
 He must hold him prisoner. But he was softened in 
 his presence, like one who hears the hollow ravings 
 of the insane and feels, settling over him, a con 
 sciousness of the insane s blackened life. After a 
 moment s silence the jefe said : 
 
 " Tell me who you are, friend. You shall not be 
 hurt. If you cannot speak, can you at least hear?" 
 
 The figure suddenly stooped down to the sand of 
 the road and wrote in it with his finger : 
 
 " I am nothing. Let me go. He will starve." 
 
 "Who will starve?" 
 
 He arose, and pointed across the water to the east. 
 
 " Crazy," said Bonavidas. 
 
 At this the dull eyes of the stranger grew lurid. 
 He turned to Rodrigo and went down on the ground 
 again, raising his hands and distorting his face still 
 more. Then he went through in a kind of panic the 
 most indescribable movements of pleading. 
 
 There was no time to lose ; and it were better to 
 
i 9 2 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 keep this prisoner. He might be some clever actor, 
 an enemy, and a messenger. But where to keep 
 him? Chapala s friendship was uncertain, and the 
 jail was broken open, some prisoners having escaped 
 with the aid of friends since the withdrawal of the 
 jefes men. There was but one thing to do, and the 
 decision was quickly made. 
 
 44 Search him and two of you guard him. I will 
 take him with me across the lake," said Rodrigo. 
 
 Feeling as though he had come out of a bad 
 dream he turned away to his work. The man was 
 searched and nothing found. He was led to the foot 
 of the mountain and kept there. 
 
 Meanwhile, the loading had gone steadily on and 
 the noise of it was the noise of scrambling beasts and 
 shouting men and laughing spectators. The sun 
 neared the horizon and all the west was ablaze. The 
 vessels from San Antonio arrived at five o clock, 
 poled slowly along the shore, their pointed prows 
 cutting the motionless lake like steel and their drip 
 ping poles gleaming. At that hour the work was 
 not half done. The five additional vessels Bonavidas 
 had discovered in his two mile journey came in at 
 half-past five. 
 
 " Bonavidas, you are my friend in need," said the 
 jefe. " We are thirty sail now, if my old Indian 
 from Ajicjic arrives before the wind knocks this 
 rickety loading scheme into impossibility. Hurry, 
 boys ! Pray for yet another hour of calm." 
 
 As he spoke, round Angostura point nearly two 
 miles from the west came floating the black hull and 
 slim mast of the only vessel that lacked. Then- wai 
 a cheer at sight of it. It seemed now nothing could 
 prevent a happy outcome. 
 
 "Unless," said Bonavidas, "the wind comes not, 
 
i 
 A DREAM OF A THRONE 193 
 
 and we are left hanging out, boxed up with a lot of 
 horses in a dead calm. Pleasant night would that 
 be." 
 
 The two boats now being poled to the ledge 
 Rodrigo knew. They were the " Delirium " and the 
 " Goddess Venus." As usual Doroteo s men had 
 brought their cargoes of fruit. The jefe smiled a 
 grim smile at those vessels, remembering their owner, 
 his feline manner, his pointed moustaches, his animal 
 ferocity in the fight. 
 
 " I can confiscate these," said he, " with a good 
 conscience." 
 
 Ten horses were crammed into the " Goddess " 
 and eight into the little " Delirium," which could 
 with difficulty hold even that number. 
 
 The girl, high up on the mountain side, still 
 watched it all. They had brought that crouching 
 prisoner thus ; would there be another prisoner on 
 the morrow brought so before his captor? If such 
 should be, thought she sadly, he will hold his head 
 more erect than this. Two hundred and twenty-nine 
 horsemen she counted two hundred and twenty- 
 nine. How happy they were ! How eager they 
 were ! Strange, strange world it is ; over that which 
 is laughter to some, others, alas, must weep ! She 
 had never felt so lonely ; she had never seen all the 
 earth so homeless. At least the lake, the lake that 
 was the mother of them all, might be her friend. 
 Perhaps it would bring no wind. She looked again 
 and again across the miles of water. It was to her 
 as though she were at fault for not piercing that 
 distance and seeing under those peaks. She grew 
 restless. To see them preparing; to see them go ; 
 to watch them long, long lessening sails, darkening 
 sky, rising waves; to lose them at last yonder in 
 
 3 
 
i 9 4 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 the distance where her brother was ; to find herself 
 alone in the midst of night, the army gone to seek 
 him, the darkness and the silence only for her, and 
 the bitter dreams of the things that would happen 
 there under the southern peaks. To watch one s 
 own army with one s own blood in it march away, 
 this many a woman knows to be a bitter thing. To 
 sit thus in calm and see your blood s enemy prepare 
 his forces, laugh over the future that hangs so heavily 
 over you, and to be unable even to go to the scene 
 of the fight, this, too, is a bitter thing. 
 
 " Oh Holy Mary ! " said she, clasping her hands on 
 her knees, " how am I to sit thus and see them go ! " 
 
 She, too, watched the west. She prayed, almost 
 holding her breath, that there where the mountains 
 lowered and rounded the narrow western end with 
 blue, she might see no white mist. She was fearful 
 when she looked. It became pain to look. But her 
 fears were of no avail. 
 
 Few are the spots where the sunsets are such as 
 these. The red ball came to the mountain s summit 
 and seemed to rest a moment as balancing himself on 
 that jagged line of porphyry, glaring, a monstrous eye 
 of fire that poured light over all the lake till the 
 thirty vessels, outraging the region s majestic peace, 
 were thirty burning coals in the red flood. The 
 great circuit of peaks round all the two hundred and 
 fifty miles of the water s circumference lit a thousand 
 fires. That porphyry gleamed with every shade of 
 color from dazzling white, to emerald, to blue, to 
 purple, to the red of red blood. Fleecy clouds glis 
 tened with the tints of shells : vapor banks in the 
 west towered dark with blazing edges. Streamers of 
 flame lay stretched over the zenith. Even the east 
 answered with fleeting fires. 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 195 
 
 The red ball was gone and the fires were fading. 
 She put her hand for the twentieth time over her 
 eyes and looked away to the west. And the white 
 mist was there the mist she knew far away, 
 fleecy, beautiful ; but to her it was another and a 
 heavier grief. She knew the wind was coming. 
 
 Rodrigo saw it too. Nearly every evening from 
 September to June, while the dry season lasts, the 
 wind comes up from the west. It usually arrives at 
 sunset or a little after or a little before. It is some 
 times much later, and rarely it comes not at all. He 
 had counted on something near a certainty. His 
 heart bounded when he saw that mist. There were 
 six boats left to load and the one from Ajicjic was 
 near at hand. He spurred his men on to double 
 efforts. The knowledge of a quickly coming wind 
 was like wine to them. The first three of the six 
 canoas were brought up. The white mist was a little 
 larger and a little whiter. There came, out of the 
 midst of the sunset s beauties, a little breeze. It 
 struck the cheek with a sudden coolness. And as 
 suddenly as a pebble might have stirred it the water 
 crinkled like crepe. The breeze continued dallying, 
 wonderfully light. The mist came a little closer and 
 then suddenly dispersed. Then the wind was there, 
 blowing black hair about sweating faces, cotton skirts 
 about the limbs of women, dust from the road. The 
 crinkled water rose of a sudden in small waves, and 
 the vessels were lifted a little and sank. 
 
 The one from Ajicjic arrived and the loading of 
 the last three was entered upon. The waves from 
 this time increased gradually and not slowly. This 
 last loading was very difficult. The planks rose and 
 sank irregularly, the vessels heaved, the horses made 
 trouble. But a stern determination entered the men. 
 
1 96 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 Twenty or thirty soldiers seized each ship and liter 
 ally by main force kept it from demolishing its bridge 
 or dashing itself against a rock. The beasts were 
 hauled, pushed, carried, half thrown into the canoas. 
 With a final ringing shout the thing was done. 
 
 The girl on the mountain could no longer sit where 
 she had been. She must stand. There was in her 
 now a restlessness such as she had never known. 
 The wind was there ; a little more and it would take 
 them all away. She mechanically counted the vessels 
 loaded. Not all had been necessary for the horses. 
 The rest were for the men. By systematic and dar 
 ing packing Rodrigo had made those clumsy barks 
 average a capacity of ten animals each. He had 
 thus used twenty-three canoas for the horses. Each 
 of these carried three soldiers besides, in many cases, 
 the owner or owner s agent. This left one hun 
 dred and sixty-one men, including Rodrigo and his 
 prisoner, for the remaining seven vessels, in itself a 
 somewhat reckless proportion. Yet these seven were 
 thus less burdened than were those that carried the 
 horses. Clarita saw the seven brought, rolling some 
 what, near the beach or the cliff, and the men rushing 
 for them. She saw, too, Rodrigo in the last light of 
 the day, standing on the rocks directing them. 
 
 She had known him long. This misguided man, 
 thought she, has been my friend. He is my enemy 
 now, but he has a kind nature. She stood a moment 
 more, wretched, her heart throbbing. The peaks 
 were the same the unknown morrow. Could she 
 stay and see it, remembering Vicente s wishes, her 
 promise, the danger? To her the question was not 
 would she stay rather could she? Was it possible 
 to crush her heart like that? The waves were rising, 
 the men were climbing in. She saw it again, the 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 197 
 
 vision of them going, the lessening sails, the disap 
 pearance, and the blank blackness left to her. She 
 prayed then a little to the Virgin Mary, caught her 
 skirts, and went as fast as boulders would let her 
 down the mountain. She came running breathless 
 to a boat at the rock. The men were all in save 
 those who held it from beating on the little preci 
 pice, and thejefe himself. He was preparing to enter 
 this one that rose and fell on the waves. The spray 
 dashed over her dress. They had put the long planks 
 to the stern. The bridge was fearfully unsteady. She 
 passed Rodrigo like a quick flying shadow, ran across 
 the heaving timbers and was within. 
 
 Rodrigo was astounded. He ran in after her, call 
 ing her. She would not reply because she could 
 not, and dared not even turn. She went on the 
 boat s bottom away to the bow, as though she felt he 
 was pursuing her. He came, too, calling to her 
 gently. She was shaking, then, from head to foot 
 and went down on her knees in the bow and sobbed. 
 The last of the soldiers speedily embarked. There 
 were more than twenty men on board. Rodrigo 
 strode ahead of them and came to her. Whereat she 
 turned suddenly with her face up to him. 
 
 " Will you, then," she cried, " kill me, too? " 
 
 That cut him to the quick. He was a man meek be 
 fore her from then on. It had never come to him thus, 
 that he, Don Rodrigo, was cruel to this pure woman. 
 
 "What is it you wish, Clarita, little one?" said he 
 tenderly. " There is great danger here." 
 
 " But then, you will let me go ! I know you will 
 let me ! " said she. 
 
 " What shall I do ? " cried he helplessly. 
 
 Then she caught his hand and pleaded with an earn 
 estness that would have moved a stone. 
 
198 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 " You are my brother s enemy," she said at last. 
 11 You are going to kill him and this is why I can 
 not bear to stay. You were always kind you are 
 kind enough to be good to me. This would kill me, 
 not to go." 
 
 Don Rodrigo had never been moved thus before. 
 There came suddenly to him an unreasoning desire 
 that she should indeed go. At all events she would 
 not return. Hence, somewhat bewildered, he ordered 
 the sail hoisted and the journey begun and he let 
 her stay. 
 
 The ship was first poled some distance out, as were 
 the rest. They were scattered, then, as widely as 
 could be. Sail after sail went up, spread its great 
 square extent to the wind, bulged round with it; and 
 the journey was begun. The wind came from the 
 west. Tizapan lay southeast. The course was easy. 
 A good speed will bring these craft to Tizapan before 
 dawn. The perilous plan was in full operation. Rod 
 rigo heaved a heavy sigh. He left the girl and sat 
 high up in the bow and looked away to Tizapan. 
 
 " The loads of men," said he dreamily to himself, 
 hearing her as she came and leaned over the boat s 
 side behind him, " the loads of men are somewhat 
 safe. But if there should come a storm, heaven have 
 mercy on the loads of horses ! " 
 
CHAPTER VIII 
 
 THE town of Tizapan lies at a short distance 
 from the lake. The shore in that region is no 
 such distinctly marked line of beach and rock as it 
 is at Chapala. It is not even always easy to tell 
 where the shore is. Between water and land there 
 is a stretch of marsh for several hundred yards, 
 watery, pierced by the spears of a million reeds that 
 rise thick and green to a height of some feet. Here 
 flock ducks in great numbers. The marsh is flat, 
 bewildering, and dreary. Through its middle a 
 stream, called the Tizapan River, cuts out more 
 than one course, having formed a delta. The main 
 course of this river, not over twenty yards at its 
 widest part, usually much narrower, is navigable for 
 canoas for half a mile to a point where the land is 
 dry and from which the town lies yet another mile 
 distant. The stream being crooked and the curves 
 sharp, the progress from the open lake to the inner 
 landing is usually made by poles. The lake ap 
 proach to the town could be easily blocked by 
 blocking the river. Only the one course is navi 
 gable. Nobody could cross the marshes. This fact 
 was recognized more than a century ago. 
 
 The town itself is like the greater part of Mexican 
 towns, narrow and crooked streets with the low 
 houses (joined together) shutting those streets in 
 and making them seem even narrower, and the cen 
 tral plaza of considerable size left vacant. That plaza 
 
200 ./ DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 is to-day filled with flowers and fruit and contains a 
 band-stand. In former times it was bare. The 
 mountains rise only a little way behind the town, 
 jagged and huge. Before them is a stretch of rolling 
 green fields. The river, coming from the peaks, 
 dashes down through this pastoral scene with a 
 vivacity that has laid bare a rough and rocky bed 
 whereon the water boils till it passes through the 
 town. At the time when the two small armies were 
 approaching Tizapan, much of the summer green 
 was still on field and mountain. The unclouded sun 
 poured his light over an emerald gem of the lake s 
 border. 
 
 Nearly a week of peace and triumph, and no sight 
 of the enemy, had begun to give to Vicente some 
 thing more of a feeling of freedom. With constant 
 outlook on all the roads before and behind him, and 
 across the lake, he believed he should have ample 
 notification of the approach of an enemy. For this 
 reason he consented to the departure of Quiroz from 
 Jiquilpan. The latter desired that he himself and 
 such companions as he should choose should con 
 stitute the advance party to be sent forward to Tiza 
 pan. Such a party, which should communicate with 
 the clergy concerning quarters and food for the 
 troops, was desirable to open the way. Wherever 
 possible, messengers had thus ridden ahead. 
 
 Tizapan, being Doroteo s native place, was natur 
 ally intimately known to him. It was the largest 
 town on the southern half of the circuit. It was a 
 centre of the priesthood. It had been the intention 
 from the first to make of it a temporary source of 
 supplies. It held in secret large stores of weapons 
 and ammunition. Add to these considerations the 
 fact that it was intended, should it be found the 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 201 
 
 enemy was approaching, to fortify this town and 
 make it the scene of the next struggle (for it could 
 be rendered almost impregnable) and it will be 
 readily seen that he who should now advance to that 
 spot must be one capable of acting with intelligence 
 and authority. Quiroz was that man. 
 
 When he was sent, with assistants, Pepa Aranja, 
 headstrong as always, appeared suddenly, ready 
 mounted also, and galloped out of Jiquilpan after 
 him. 
 
 It was thus that on a brilliant morning a party of 
 four left the last considerable town east of Tizapan 
 and rode at a good gait between peak and water 
 toward the latter place. They were Fortino and 
 Anastasio, Quiroz and the girl. The two former 
 rode in unsociable silence, and, spurring up irregu 
 larly, found themselves at length some distance in 
 advance of their companions. Pepa was on this day 
 dressed in dark blue. She never lost sight of the 
 value of the appearance of her clothes. She carried 
 behind her saddle a pack wherein was bound up 
 such wardrobe as she considered most effective. 
 Her dark blue skirt was not a long riding skirt. It 
 was a dress of ordinary length. She wore high leather 
 boots under it, and the toes of these, small, were 
 visible at the stirrup and the saddle s side. Her hair, 
 that shining black hair, was braided in a thick braid 
 down her back. It was remarkably long. Her head 
 was covered by a small, light, man s sombrero of 
 straw tied about by a dark blue ribbon. The effect 
 of this odd and unconventional costume was to in 
 crease her beauty by changing its details. 
 
 " Never the same," said the gleaming-eyed Doroteo 
 riding at her side. " By my soul, you are a thousand 
 women, and strange ones." 
 
202 A DKKAM OF A THROM, 
 
 She had tossed the night away, restless, on a hard 
 bed in the house of a friend of Quiroz in Jiquilpan. 
 She had not so much as closed her eyes. They 
 seemed, therefore, larger than usual, inclined to 
 hollowness, looking out at him with the fire of her 
 deep struggle in them. Her face, too, grown a little 
 thinner, had that strained, tense expression of the 
 nervous and the extremely alert. It was, in the 
 light of this day, a face that would have held 
 the attention of the dullest boor. 
 
 "The senorita has not slept," said Quiroz, wrap 
 ping the reins about his slender fingers and his 
 slender fingers about the reins. " What is it that 
 sits so heavy on the heart, the light, light heart? " 
 
 " It is that the world is wrong," said she. " As for 
 sleep I cannot think when I am asleep." 
 
 " Hence you toss the night long and rise looking 
 as though your soul, half tiger s, half woman s soul, 
 were just behind your eyes. Ha ! a good thing, no 
 doubt. The rose buds and the rose blows, and even 
 that, alas, is not the end of the rose ! " 
 
 He said this meditatively, looking away at the 
 dancing waters, that cold look never absent from his 
 eyes. There were, too, on his firm chin and shut 
 jaws and about the cheeks and temples, marks of 
 the wild life he had led. There was a kind of a long- 
 strained repose in him, even in movement, that was 
 like the silence of a steel blade. 
 
 " Doroteo," said she, turning her own solemn eyes 
 on him, "you can read me somewhat. I am restless 
 these days, that is plain to you. I do not know 
 I grow lonely also." She made an impatient move 
 ment of the head. " The world did wrong by me, 
 putting me in a woman s body. No, I do not sleep 
 I grow unhappy." 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 203 
 
 She permitted her eyes to remain on his face even 
 long after he had turned again to her. 
 
 " It springs up," said he, smiling a flickering smile, 
 " out of rocky ground. It flourishes and sways in 
 the suns of many weeks, and blooms. Well, drop 
 the figure. The woman is suddenly there. She 
 flaunts red, red colors like the rose, and runs riot 
 with life. And she droops and the red fades. Alas ! 
 even in the desert the canker came." He fastened 
 his eyes full on her. " Pepa, there are other spots 
 than the desert. Is there, then, nowhere, no way, a 
 satisfaction for the life of the rose? " 
 
 That old burning in her temples was visible again. 
 She looked dissatisfied. 
 
 " I have looked," said she, giving him always her 
 full gaze, " and I have not seen it." 
 
 That steeliness of Quiroz somewhat lessened, 
 warmed. He let his horse come nearer to hers. 
 
 " Quiroz is a gambler," said he, with a quietness in 
 which a cynical tone was barely heard. " He is a 
 rake. I am not that man that my mother and the 
 other good women would have had me. This is be 
 cause I was born a little too wild. I know the surface of 
 the earth, having wandered over it ; and the bodies of 
 men, having wounded some of them. I am hard, full 
 of a cold blood that they would say came out of hell, 
 only that they have the idea hell is hot. Therefore I can 
 not understand anything that anybody feels. A rake 
 never feels. A gambler never knows the value of a 
 blush, the truth of shame, the canker of disappointment. 
 No, I am outside the pale. Do not fancy I cannot 
 see the difference between myself and honest folk." 
 
 " Ah, Doroteo," she said, with a little impulsive 
 movement of the hand, " not every one, not every one 
 thinks of you so." 
 
204 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 He was singularly stimulated by her tone. He 
 would not take his eyes from her. Her face seemed 
 to him luminous. 
 
 " If there were one that did not," said he, with an 
 intensity half sad, half fierce, " one only. A gambler 
 takes his luck; he smiles, however the play goes. 
 But he is not altogether incapable of a longing. I 
 am no fit companion for women ; but I was born 
 with the ability to distinguish them. I should like to 
 say that to the world and let the world once know 
 that an adventurer may possess a virtue that is all 
 too rare among the sleek." 
 
 What was she thinking? Why did her face grow 
 bright with a kind of solemn brightness, and the 
 color come to her cheeks? She looked away, over 
 the lake. The small waves danced and glittered. 
 The blue peaks opposite looked mistily dreamy. 
 Somewhere beyond them, she guessed, Don Rodrigo 
 was coming. She brought her eyes back and smiled 
 on Quiroz her brilliant smile, but it was tenderer now, 
 with something in it suggestive of sorrow. 
 
 " Doroteo," said she, " not every one is bound up 
 in the set beliefs. There are some, may be, bound 
 to nothing, wilder than the adventurer. I, at least, 
 know there is a heart in you." 
 
 He seized her hand ; which she drew away, but 
 gently, still smiling at him. 
 
 " Oh! " she cried, "you are brave you are wild 
 as I am wild ! You dare the world ! " 
 
 " Listen," said he, half whispering it and gleaming on 
 her. " You too have doubted the outcome of all this." 
 
 She did not reply. Whether or not she encourage! 
 him he could not know, but with the gambler s 
 instinct, and still carrying the winelike effect of her 
 words, he risked it. 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 205 
 
 "Vicente is no common man," said he. "None 
 can appreciate him more justly than can I. But 
 there is needed something else than battles. There 
 is needed a constructive ability. Then, too, the 
 battles themselves will grow more fierce, and soon. 
 Pepita, I am afraid and I say it with sincerity 
 that the cause needs more daring, more strength than 
 his." 
 
 Still she made no reply. She looked like one in 
 fever. She kept her eyes on him and they led him 
 more surely than could have any words from her. 
 
 "Pepa," he said, "you too have the player s 
 instincts. Where the stake is highest and action 
 fiercest, I see you there always. Whose is the 
 dominant force in this march? Yours. Whose is the 
 spirit that has entered the army? Yours. Let me 
 say nothing of myself. Let me shift to the other 
 view of me and say only this " he grew fervent, 
 passionate " say the thing I have longed and burnt 
 to say. Pepa Aranja, I would follow you and you 
 only into the bottom of Hell. I would perjure my 
 soul for you. I could curse Heaven, such is my 
 madness. Give me one word no your heart, 
 your heart I must and will have. Pepa " 
 
 They were riding between boulders and the lake 
 over a sandy path. A turn round a foothill to the 
 front had taken their companions from sight. He 
 seized her hand again as it lay on the saddle s horn. 
 He deftly stopped both horses side by side. He 
 would not let her tear her fingers away. The pierc 
 ing light of his eyes had never before held such 
 intensity. 
 
 Her struggle to loose herself was not real. She 
 ceased struggling, sat up straighter and taller, and 
 smiled at him again. 
 
206 A DREAM OF A THRONP: 
 
 "What?" said she, with something like mocking 
 girlishness that did not cover a certain solemnity ; 
 " I am not fit to love, I am fit only to run wild 
 like an animal." 
 
 She turned her head away, blushing, and seemed 
 to try to withdraw her hand. But he held it. 
 
 " Then let me run wild with you ! " he cried. 
 " And in that wildness we will accomplish, with the 
 love of armies, things that others, without us, must 
 fail to accomplish ! Pepa, do you understand me ? 
 What is birth? What is blood? Nothing! Power is 
 the law." 
 
 She looked slowly behind and before her, then again 
 across the lake. She was for a moment unreadable, 
 in which moment, too, she looked worn and thin. 
 Then the blushes came back and the smiles, and she 
 turned to him. He saw a thing, when she turned, 
 that lashed his passion into a fury. There were tears 
 suddenly shining in her dark eyes. 
 
 " Promise me," she said, he still holding her hand, 
 " promise me that, whatever I will, that you will do. 
 Him who speaks thus to me and loves me, I make 
 prove himself. Ay tie mi!" She laughed a little 
 rippling laugh, brought the long, shining braid of 
 her hair over her shoulder, and passed it lightly 
 across his hand; whereat a thrill ran through him. 
 " Ay de mi! This touch of the braid is the magician s 
 touch. See how imperious I have grown, hearing 
 your love for me! Is it thus you love me? Then 
 - promise me ! " 
 
 " On your woman s soul," he said, with something 
 like reverence, " I swear it." 
 
 She suddenly tore her hand from his and spurred 
 away, laughing blushingly over her shoulder. 
 
 They came round the rocky corner that hid them 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 207 
 
 from their companions. . They perceived, a hundred 
 yards ahead, the great Fortino wheeling his horse 
 close to that of Anastasio and beating Anastasio 
 roundly with a small stick. There seemed to be a 
 quarrel on hand which the lank recipient of the beat 
 ing took with much calm. 
 
 " What is the matter with you two clowns ? " cried 
 Quiroz ill-humoredly, riding up with the girl. "What 
 kind of a discord is this in the army ! " 
 
 " There is no discord whatever," whined Anastasio 
 as the beating ceased and Fortino, red and perspir 
 ing, went on in fumes of wrath. " This big lime-kiln 
 of a man is the only one doing anything; and his 
 vile deeds are in full harmony with his character, I ll 
 swear Heaven." 
 
 " He cavils at me," grumbled Fortino, " and has 
 no veneration for the most sacred feelings of a man. 
 I was swearing that I would follow Vicente and his 
 fortunes faithfully into the deep sea. I would prove 
 constancy, following doggedly, which I will, too, with 
 the faith of a dog; and I will try to prove this 
 statement." 
 
 " And I say," said Anastasio, " that he does n t 
 appear to know the nature of faith. It is not in dogs 
 that you find faith. I have seen many a fine dog 
 follow his master about with his soul and his faith 
 apparently in his eye, for a day. Whereas they were 
 in his stomach ; for when he was fed he lay down 
 and slept and his master might, for all of him, walk 
 straight to the tail of the devil. It is this honest view 
 of mine over which Fortino makes trouble," continued 
 Anastasio, in a tone of discouragement. 
 
 " Then you tell us, old Solomon," grunted For 
 tino, " what faith is ; you who know." 
 
 " Well," said Anastasio speculatively, removing his 
 
208 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 hat and scratching his head, " I should say faith is a 
 sticking to a thing till it is eat up, regardless of the 
 wants of others." 
 
 The girl had seemed not to listen. She stared 
 away, pale, across the lake. 
 
 " In your ideas of faith," said Fortino with con 
 tempt, " where does the advantage to anybody else 
 come in? " 
 
 " Faith," replied the other, " I should say is dis 
 tinctly a personal matter. Others may derive benefit 
 from the example, and thus be enabled to stick to 
 the next thing till it, too, is eat up. This, friends, is 
 world philosophy." 
 
 " I will yet teach you another kind," muttered the 
 gloomy giant. " I am a poor old tanned leather 
 hide, I am. Well, may be so, may be so. I failed 
 in the first battle. I have been ridden down by 
 remorse for it. But there will be another enemy and 
 other days and other examples of faith that can go 
 into the sea." 
 
 He sank into a silence from which he could not be 
 drawn during the whole of the day. The girl was as 
 silent as he. She said scarcely a word throughout 
 the long journey. She remained pale, overcast with 
 meditation, seeming unhappy. There was a little of 
 the burning still about her temples when they entered 
 Tizapan. 
 
CHAPTER IX 
 
 EVENING was coming down on the town when 
 Doroteo and his three companions rode into it. 
 The fruit orchards cast long shadows over the fields 
 and the rocky bed of the stream was cut, by adobe 
 walls, into yellow bars of light and darker bars of 
 shade. Half way between the town and the water the 
 road that leads round the lake cuts at right angles the 
 road from the river landing to the plaza. Hence a 
 party coming from either direction along the lake s 
 shore would enter Tizapan by the same way, the 
 mile-long road from the river. Into this last Doroteo 
 and his companions turned after crossing the stream 
 by the only bridge. Looking to the right, the north, 
 down this narrow way, the river landing with a few 
 huts about it could be seen some hundreds of yards 
 distant at the beginnings of the marsh. The huts 
 were dilapidated and dirty. The marsh was green 
 and flat and waste. The lake beyond lay many- 
 colored in the sunset. The entire scene was a silent, 
 deserted one. Both to east and west the lake-circling 
 road was deserted likewise. To the left, the south, 
 toward which point they turned, the short river road 
 was, for less than half a mile, flanked by high, thick, 
 irregular stone walls beyond which lay waste land, 
 sandy and brown, cut by mountain spurs. The four 
 traversed this distance between the walls approach 
 ing the town, the river landing behind them. When 
 the walls ceased it was to give place to adobe houses 
 
 14 
 
2 TO A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 whose continuous extent abruptly began the street at 
 a point yet another half-mile from the central plaza. 
 
 " What kind of a town, in the name of the saints, 
 do you have here? " said Fortino in a bass growl of 
 wonder. He had never been at this spot before, in 
 spite of having lived many years on the opposite 
 side of the lake. " I will swear we have ridden nigh 
 the sixth of a league in this tunnel of a street and 
 there has been never another street crossing it, nor 
 a break in the joined walls of the houses. This way 
 might be a canon of rocks for any outlet I see to it. 
 What kind of a trap were your people making out of 
 their town ? An unbroken shaft from the lake to the 
 centre, is it? Why arc there no streets crossing 
 this street? " 
 
 Doroteo laughed a little smothered laugh and his 
 eyes glittered. 
 
 " Because," said he, " behind this left-hand wall of 
 houses runs the river, and there is no bridge yet for 
 another mile. What would be the use, friend, of run 
 ning a street across this one, through these walls, into 
 the rocks of the river? As for the right well, who 
 knows? Why do we Mexicans do many odd things? 
 Why do we build our houses with nine windows and 
 then brick up five of them as regularly as the clock 
 strikes?" 
 
 " As for that part of the town to the right," said 
 Anastasio, " it is not worth getting into, and no 
 body gets into it that can keep out; and a man 
 once in has no occasion for coming away for he is so 
 drunk with the stench of the foul quarter that he 
 can only sit down and smell himself into his grave. 
 So old fat cock, what do you want with a street 
 into it?" 
 
 "Does it continue thus to the plaza? "said For- 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 211 
 
 tino, stopping his horse, looking up and down, and 
 whistling long and slowly. 
 
 " Entirely to the plaza," said Quiroz, " save for 
 one street which you shall see leading into it." 
 
 " How easily can the enemy reach the plaza from 
 some other way? " 
 
 " From the east, whence we came, he cannot reach 
 it at all with horses, because of the river. For there is 
 but one other bridge besides that which we have 
 used. It is beyond the plaza ; or it was. A flood 
 came down in the middle of a clear day last summer 
 and washed it away. It is not yet repaired. There 
 is one narrow spot between rocks that can be crossed 
 on foot by a board ; that is all. They are working 
 on the bridge. From the other direction " 
 
 " Yes, come at the other direction. If I have any 
 head for strategy, it is from the west Don Rodrigo 
 will ride." 
 
 " From the west he might, if he did not mind 
 winding his horses, make a cut out of the lake road, 
 come round the outskirts of Anastasio s stenches, and 
 get into the plaza, from the west also. But the spurs 
 of the foothills come down there, making a jagged 
 difficulty. There is no regular path cut. He would 
 lead a bad chase, and after it all have to enter the 
 town s centre by almost such another tunnel of a 
 street as this, though at right angles to it." 
 
 " Si" said Anastasio, " they have taken great pains 
 to wall away the smells of this quarter." 
 
 As he rode on a heavy chuckle began to play about 
 within Fortino like a subterranean noise suppressed 
 by the surface of the earth. And as he proceeded 
 the chuckle continued, accompanied at every internal 
 ebullition by a puffing and swelling of the bristled 
 folds on his neck s back. He grew red, too, with 
 
212 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 cogitation. They came, still between the walls and 
 amidst some agitated comment from the towns 
 people, near the plaza ; and still he chuckled, at 
 last breaking out: 
 
 " A beautifully fortified trap ! Oh, let the enemy 
 meet me here ! " 
 
 At a point some hundred yards from the open 
 plaza the narrow street suddenly turned to the right 
 at right angles to its original line, still keeping its 
 walls intact It proceeded in this new course for 
 some fifteen yards only, when it abruptly returned to 
 its first direction by making another right angle to 
 left. At this second angle was the only break in 
 the continuous walls of the shaft, a break caused 
 by the fact that those fifteen yards between the two 
 corners were but a prolongation of another street 
 leading from the quarter of bad smells. So that one 
 having come up the river road, turned the first cor 
 ner to the right, and traversed the stretch to the sec 
 ond corner, might then continue, without a second 
 turn, straight on into the bad-smelling section, or 
 wheel to the left and proceed along the shaft to the 
 plaza, a straight course of between eighty and 
 ninety yards. Hence it was that the tunnel-like way 
 led south from the lake and the lake road a mile to 
 the first right angle, turned abruptly west for fifteen 
 yards, then turned again abruptly south to the plaza. 
 In all its course, save at the second turn, so peculiar 
 is the construction of many of these Mexican towns, 
 there was not a crossing alley or path or a break in 
 the bounding walls. A person standing at any point 
 of the stretch of fifteen yards between the two angles 
 could see neither the plaza nor the street leading to 
 the lake. 
 
 Immediately at the first angle, standing indeed on 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 213 
 
 the corner, and on the right of the four as they ad 
 vanced, was a large, low dwelling of considerable 
 dignity in the town. It was roofed with red tiles and 
 plastered neatly over all its two external sides. The 
 plaster was then colored in fantastic and brilliant 
 manner with swirls of red and streaks of green, possi 
 bly representing some fearful species of marble as yet 
 undiscovered save in the fruitful imagination of the 
 Mexican. The effect is a common one here ; in 
 the duller-hued north it would be only grotesque ; in 
 Mexico, where colors are born in a million variations 
 from the very qualities of the atmosphere, it is not 
 altogether displeasing. 
 
 " My ancestral walls," said Doroteo as they rode 
 by, waving his nand at them with courtesy. " I was 
 born there crucifixion of my soul ! it was on this 
 spot I felt the growth of my wings, and learned vir 
 tue. There is a lady in this house now Heaven 
 waste all its blessing on her ! who has wept over 
 me till what fire I had was near being quenched. 
 Friends, on to the plaza that you may see the lay 
 of the town ; then you are to be lodged here." 
 
 The girl scanned the gaudy walls and the low, 
 barred windows without pleasure or interest They 
 turned the house s angle, traversed the few yards of 
 dusty street to the next angle, turned that, and ad 
 vanced to the central open square. It was now dusk. 
 Shadows of evening lay over walls and bare earth. 
 
 There used to be, indeed until recently there still 
 was, in the plaza s centre, a curious relic of the last 
 century. It was a massive chain thirty yards in 
 length, coiled into a heap upon the ground. It had 
 lain coiled there, the town s property, for some scores 
 of years. Its links were each five inches in length 
 and half as many broad. The whole must have 
 
2i 4 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 weighed several hundred pounds. Years and rain 
 and sun and rust affected it not. When Fortino rode 
 up and looked at it on that October night it was as 
 mighty and as strong as it was in its long gone youth. 
 It seemed not to have been moved for many years. 
 It was a little sunken in the soil. It was brown, 
 scaling, and covered with dust. He leaped down, 
 lifted a link, and let it drop, and the link clanked with 
 a heavy iron voice. The girl was riding slowly, 
 thoughtfully, round the empty plaza, followed by 
 the town s eyes, but not seeing them. Doroteo and 
 Anastasio had halted, and were looking about at the 
 four rows of sleepy shops and houses that shut in the 
 square, the tiled sheds in their front, the dim lamps 
 and candles within, the openings of two other narrow 
 streets from the mountains. 
 
 " More wonders ! " said the great Fortino from the 
 ground, where he stooped over the chain. " Quiroz, 
 what in God s name is this? " 
 
 " A thing with a fine use," said Quiroz. " In vice 
 regal days we were as fine a fortified town as ever 
 Europe held. You observed the only approach by 
 land. Good. There is only one by water, and that 
 is not a pathway of flowers, brothers. It is up the 
 river. Well," and he seemed to gloat over the idea, 
 " in old times if trouble was smelled, they stretched 
 that chain across the river at the marshes. But our 
 enemy will come on land if he comes. Cavalry 
 gallops not over the lake." 
 
 A meaning grunt was Fortino s response, as he 
 lifted the link again and listened, swelling and ab 
 sorbed, to its voice when it clanked rustily back to its 
 fellows. His chuckle was gone. He seemed hence 
 forth wrapped in a dream, a dream which, to judge 
 from his features, must have been hot and stifling. 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 215 
 
 Meditation in this giant was ever like the moving of 
 ponderous machinery. He heaved himself into his 
 saddle again, unseeing. He followed the others 
 through the fast thickening shade over the course 
 they had come. He seemed unaware of their pres 
 ence. The chuckle, very much buried, began again 
 as he proceeded. They came at length to Quiroz s 
 birthplace. The gaudy walls were now shadowed. 
 There was no sign of life. In the front nearest the 
 plaza, facing the short stretch of street between the 
 two angles, there was no door, only iron-barred win 
 dows. The door was round the corner on the straight 
 way to the lake. They turned both angles and came 
 to it. They were dismounting, when a noise burst 
 from Fortino. 
 
 " Damn me ! " cried the giant, sweating, " with a 
 strength like mine, damn me ! it can be stretched 
 across a street as well as across a river. Let my 
 enemy come ! " 
 
 It was like a heavy roar, this speech, as it came 
 out. He leaped, infinite mass that he was and heavy 
 as a falling wall, to the ground ; and (Doroteo having 
 knocked with an iron knocker and the door to the 
 patio being opened by a mozo) he followed the others, 
 leading his horse and fuming. The four and their 
 steeds were within. 
 
 The patio, bricked save for circular, stone-lined 
 spaces about many a tree, was as clean as much 
 labor and good feminine supervision could make it. 
 The house with its wide, low, inner, tiled verandas, 
 shut in but two sides, the sides next the street. The 
 two others were closed by high adobe walls plastered 
 white and brilliant. The brick floors of the verandas, 
 were swept to a perennial redness, and the walls at 
 their backs were as marvellously colored as were 
 
216 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 those without. There reigned everywhere thrift, 
 cleanliness, a thousand evidences of supervision and 
 labor. In the house of Doroteo Quiroz there was no 
 Mexican slovenliness. Even the mozo wore clothing 
 of unimpeachable whiteness, and was glistening of 
 countenance. He was fat and sleek, too, and re 
 ceived his master with chattering joy. He led the 
 horses through a rear door in the high white wall, 
 to the stables. The four crossed the patio to the 
 corrector. 
 
 At this there was a cry of agitation from the voice 
 of a woman, and an apparition of sky-blue, loosely 
 composed and fluttering in the breeze of its own 
 speed, came running out of a door, across the bricks 
 of the corrector, and fell into the arms of Quiroz. 
 
 " Doroteo ! My little son ! " cried she breath 
 less. 
 
 She was fully fifty years of age. She had a keen, 
 somewhat bony, white face, out of which eyes of an 
 anxious black brilliancy scanned Quiroz. 
 
 " This mother of mine," said Quiroz, holding her 
 at arm s length and looking her over with a kind of 
 gallantry that seemed not suitable to the occasion, 
 " remains the same charming one, let the years thrash 
 away as they like. Friends, here is the lady who had 
 the honor of giving me birth. Mamacita, these are 
 friends of mine, precious as gold. You are going to 
 take them into your heart." 
 
 11 Doroteo," cried she, with piercing anxiety and 
 looking thin and shivering in the loose folds of the 
 sky-blue, "you are come now at last to settle down ! 
 Your old mother knows this is the last of your wan 
 derings. They tell me you have done strange things 
 and not been very quiet ; and say, Doroteo, they 
 try to make me believe you are still wild. But does n t 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 217 
 
 a mother know her own son ? Gentlemen, you are 
 friends of his and the lady who is the Oh ! I 
 had neglected. Who is the lady, Doroteo?" 
 
 " The Senorita Josefa Aranja," said Quiroz with a 
 bow. " She is a traveller. She is a friend of mine. 
 You are to give her the softest bed." 
 
 Pepa came forward in silence, and greeted the lady 
 after the Mexican fashion. She did it solemnly. 
 
 " Ah well," murmured the Senora Quiroz, pon- 
 deringly interested in the girl, " this will help him to 
 settle down. This is a good sign. A girl may be 
 may be Come in, gentlemen, and the senorita." 
 
 She led the way in. 
 
 " A girl may be necessary to a reform," she added 
 to herself. " She seems a quiet one." 
 
 Within, the bricks of the floors were glazed and 
 polished highly. There were high brass candlesticks 
 with lit candles on a table in the centre of the first 
 room. The table held, too, some extraordinary orna 
 ments in the way of paper flowers and artificial fruits 
 of marvellous coloring; a melon whose pottery slices 
 were ever luscious, a mango of a red and yellow such 
 as paint and paint only could induce, a chirimoya 
 cracked across its crystal top, and many more. There 
 was a high glass cylinder that protected within it some 
 gaudy thing, whose beauties were altogether without 
 name or precedent. There was a long cane-bottomed 
 and cane-backed sofa against the wall, in front of which, 
 facing each other and placed, in relation to the sofa, 
 at non-convivial angles, were two cane rockers of no 
 common pattern. About one half the rest of the 
 wall other straight-backed chairs, of cane likewise, 
 stood stern as soldiers. Like the parlors of many a 
 Mexican home to-day, it was well kept and clean and 
 proper, but the pointlessness of its ornaments and 
 
218 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 the severity of its arrangements, left no possible room 
 for a homelike appearance. It was as cheerless as 
 the glazing of the bricks. Seldom sat any one on the 
 chairs; few visitors came to use the sofa; the fruit 
 and the flowers and the unnamed beauties wasted a 
 perennial sweetness on a desert air. The widowed 
 mistress was more familiar with the kitchen, where 
 servants even now could be heard preparing supper; 
 or with her own bedroom, where there was a crucifix 
 of large size, and where she spent the hours waiting 
 for the time when Doroteo s wild days should have 
 passed. 
 
 " Bring us a light, Maria ! " cried she, bustling 
 about in a not-to-be-allayed agitation ; " come, light 
 this lady to the room beyond my own. No, I will 
 go myself. Follow me, senorita. Ah he has come 
 back," she continued, leading the way along the cor 
 rector, entering the room before the girl. " He has 
 come, and the bad days are over. Nobody knows a 
 son like a mother. It is a little waywardness. Why, 
 Doroteo was always a good boy ; oh, a love of a boy, 
 Senorita Josefa ! He was as plump as the turkeys 
 till he grew tall. Come ; " she set the girl s candle 
 on the small wooden dresser; " it worries you too. 
 I have never seen you before, but I have intuition. 
 I judge you at once. You are sad. It worries you 
 too, and a woman longs for his quieting down, you 
 as well as I. I will acknowledge I feel quite a 
 mother to you Ah! what am I saying! Mary 
 guard an old woman s tongue. It is a it is a sister 
 that I feel to you ; and already ! But nobody ever 
 knew a boy s nature as does his mother. And I, old 
 Manuela Quiroz, know he has come to the point of 
 settling down." 
 
 " Yes, Dona Manuela." said Pepa, " doubtless he 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 219 
 
 will," and sighed and turned to the bed. So the old 
 lady left her and went hastily back. 
 
 " A good sort of girl," she murmured feverishly. 
 " If this could only come out so ! Doroteo, my love, 
 
 my boy, my good boy ! I can scarcely credit my 
 eyes in seeing you. The fruit orchards are in excel 
 lent condition, Doroteo. Senor What is his name, 
 Doroteo?" 
 
 " The biggest one is Fortino. That is name 
 enough. Can you take that vast man into your 
 heart, mother? These are both lovable fellows. 
 Anastasio is as fine a boy to be cuddled as he is 
 long, I 11 swear it before God s throne ; blasphemous 
 devil that I am ! " 
 
 " O son ! this is harsh talk ; must I return to a 
 washing out of your mouth with soap ? Ha! ha!" 
 laughing tearfully and much moved with the tender 
 recollection. " It was thus I punished him in the 
 old days. Don Anastasio, I assure you " (she had 
 scarcely looked at Anastasio) " he was so plump, 
 he and his little legs, when he was a boy, that he 
 gave every promise of being as plump a man as 
 yourself." 
 
 " Senora," said the extremely lank Anastasio, dur 
 ing a grunt from Fortino, " the slenderer I am the 
 bitterer is your remark. There is nothing plump 
 about me but my admiration of ladies." 
 
 " Oh," replied she absently, " I thought Anastasio 
 was the big one. Come, supper is called. We eat 
 on the corrector. It is less lonely for a widow ; and 
 
 1 am then nearer the door if he if any one should 
 come." 
 
 By Doroteo s attention the men were given means 
 of washing face and hands in a pottery bowl by the 
 kitchen, a courtesy the agitated Dona Manuela had 
 
220 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 neglected. Under the low tiles of the wide corrcdor, 
 with the night-shadows of trees just beyond and the 
 sighing of the night wind audible about, the table 
 was spread, white, inviting, candle-lit. 
 
 " Doroteo," said his mother, drawing him aside, 
 " they are dressed like the servants. These friends 
 of yours look like peons to me. It is I suppose 
 whatever you do is all right now I would believe 
 you always, Doroteo ; I always had the utmost faith 
 in you. I never sat down with peons in my life, 
 Doroteo And and the girl?" 
 
 " These fellows are to do great services. Excep 
 tions are good things. Do you forget I am in war?" 
 
 " Holy Mary ! I thought you were abandoning 
 the war ! Oh ! Doroteo, have you not come home 
 to stay?" 
 
 " By and by, Mamacita" said he, stretching his 
 lips across the teeth. 
 
 " Am I, then," she faltered, " encouraging the war? 
 I do not believe in war. And the girl, is she Sh ! 
 tell your old mother. I always had your full con 
 fidence ; oh, yes ! you always told me everything. 
 Is she is it " 
 
 She paused, her white bony face lit with her 
 anxiety. He smiled finely on her, and chucked 
 her with a great but elegant gallantry, wherein the 
 cat-like quality of movement was not entirely lacking, 
 under the chin. 
 
 " Who knows whither blows the wind ! " said he. 
 
 The girl, being called by a servant, came then out 
 of her room, deep-eyed, silent. She still wore her 
 hair in the braid. The fishermen, urged, approached, 
 and the five sat down. Waited on by a bright-eyed 
 little Mexican girl and the sleek moso, they ate a 
 supper that satisfied even Fortino. It chanced that 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 221 
 
 Quiroz finished before the others. He arose, and, 
 appeasing his questioning mother by the announce 
 ment that he was off to the priests (which holy pur 
 pose comforted the lady), did indeed abruptly depart. 
 The churchmen, he had assured Anastasio and For- 
 tino, would send a servant who, in conjunction with 
 those two warriors, was to spend the night gathering 
 together provision for the army. 
 
 " God be praised," murmured Dona Manuela, when 
 the heavy door had clanged to after him (she was eat 
 ing nothing but staring at the girl), " if he has come to 
 a need of the priests ! A man s heart cannot be always 
 hard. He will come to the church before he dies. 
 Senorita, you too cannot eat. Ah I understand ; 
 you could tell it all to me, me who understand ! 
 Women s bosoms beat the same in all the world." 
 
 The senorita did not reply. Having eaten little, 
 she too arose abruptly and went to her room. Her 
 door closed after her; Dona Manuela and the fisher 
 men were the only feasters left. 
 
 " A good, quiet girl," murmured Dona Manuela 
 dreamily. " Sefiores, she seems like a nice, well- 
 mannered young lady. Oh, if it could be brought 
 about ! Surely you can say things to her in his 
 favor you who know his good qualities. There is 
 nothing so good as a good woman to settle a man 
 down." 
 
 " Marriage," sighed Anastasio, by way of saying 
 something encouraging, " is a pleasant thing." 
 
 " Nobody knows him as I do," she went on. "These 
 wanderings are not to his inclination. Oh, I know 
 him. It is because he grew so rapidly this made 
 him restless. But these are not his true inclinations. 
 He is cut out for a quiet life, is Doroteo. Mothers 
 know. Mothers know." 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 11 Si" grunted Fortino positively, between mouth- 
 fuls, " mothers do know. I knew a mother among 
 the Yaquis that had her son hanged. She knew him, 
 she did, as few knew him." 
 
 "This was terrible, Don Fortino," she replied in 
 awe. " But Doroteo was good from his birth. He 
 used to run and pick up the oranges. He was a 
 beautiful child. And when he ran away and was so 
 long gone, it was his restlessness ; and he has told 
 me himself that he was not happy. You gentlemen 
 are kind and are friends of his. What is there we 
 three can do together to settle him down? Come," 
 and she settled herself down in fictitious comfort and 
 coziness, making of them, as it were, a harmonious 
 group of three with a common purpose and a com 
 mon care ; " come, we three together can work it 
 out!" 
 
 During this conversation one subject of it remained 
 shut in her room. At the corrector s shadowed end 
 the heavy wooden door of that room was visible with 
 a point of light issuing from the keyhole, an aper 
 ture corresponding in size to the enormous key now 
 in the possession of the girl. No sound issued from 
 that room. The other person thus discussed was in 
 the streets. He had stood a moment outside the 
 patio s entrance after the clanging of the door. The 
 night was very windy, and gusts swept up the narrow 
 canon of the street. 
 
 " The lake must be getting high with a wind like 
 this," said he musingly. 
 
 He began to hum that same old tune about the red 
 which he had hummed in another day long ago, the 
 day Pepa had jumped into the water. He turned the 
 corner and came into that little fifteen-yard stretch of 
 the street before the second turn. He paused there 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 223 
 
 a moment at the window of the room he knew was 
 hers. As he did so he heard its door open and shut. 
 He knew the tread of the person who entered, came 
 to a point near the window, and lit a candle. He did 
 not know the meaning of the absolute silence that 
 reigned thereafter or her thoughts. The window 
 was shut. It was of solid, wooden, door-like parts, 
 with no glass. It was barred by a wooden bar within 
 and by the customary bulging iron ones without, like 
 a prison. He went away toward the plaza swiftly. 
 
 " Bah ! " said he ; " give thanks to whatever Cath 
 olic deity did it. I am no novio that must stand out 
 side a window. 
 
 " * I won it straight at every whirl. 
 She would not give it me ! " 
 
 The streets of that odd old town were nearly de 
 serted. They were dark, too. The place lay wrapped 
 in a primitive silence. It had grown some and 
 changed in many ways since that long-gone day 
 when the Texcocan prince saw it lying here under 
 the peaks whereon he stood. And, while a descend 
 ant, such as he may have held in his half barbaric 
 dreams, was coming to fight, if need be, over his un 
 known grave, and hearts beat and intrigues went on, 
 and there were signs of a fire of battle in the sky, 
 doubtless he knew it not, nor cared that the old Tex 
 cocan power was dead, died with him, could rise up only 
 like a ghost that flits about and is gone. Quaint 
 old Tizapan, strangest village of your time; where 
 mediaeval Europe and ancient Mexico came and 
 lay down together, a lion and a lamb, and slept in 
 peace ! 
 
 Into the shadows of the bare plaza went Quiroz. 
 Some of the little shops were still open, but he did 
 
224 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 not pause at them. He crossed by the iron coil in 
 the centre and went into another street that leads 
 toward the mountains. He came presently to the 
 river, dashing down between high, rocky walls, with 
 the backs of houses shutting it in. He paused and 
 made an examination. The bridge was indeed gone. 
 They had been working at its repair ; but, so slow is 
 Mexican labor, it would be long before a horseman 
 could enter the town by that means. A long timber 
 gave a footpath to a rock in the centre, and another 
 long timber led to the opposite side. Doroteo did 
 not cross. He sang yet a little softly, and came back 
 to the plaza. Besides this street to the broken bridge 
 and the one from the river, only one other entered 
 the plaza. It came in on the western side. This 
 was the street he had said an enemy from the west 
 might reach by a tortuous circuit. He turned into 
 it. It was as dark and shaft-like as the other, save 
 that some streets led out of it toward the southern 
 peaks, in which direction lay the more ancient por 
 tions of the town. He came to a church and went in. 
 There were a few candles and many images in mys 
 terious shadows, and some women kneeling on the 
 bare floor, wrapped in rebozos, and wailing out 
 prayers. A priest was coming out of a door near 
 the altar. Doroteo went to him. There was a mo 
 ment s conversation, and the priest led him through 
 another side door out of the church, across an open 
 court, and into a building that joined the sacred edi 
 fice. The doors of that building were closed after 
 them. For some hours Quiroz was shut in with the 
 man of the church ; as he or Vicente had been in 
 many other villages. When he came out at last it 
 was after midnight; and certain later plans of the 
 clergy were clear to him. 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 225 
 
 In the plaza, now dark save for the starlight and 
 one smoky lamp, he found Fortino and Anastasio. 
 
 " These rumors keep knocking my head," grumbled 
 Fortino. " How the devil can they tell he is coming? " 
 
 "What? Who?" cried Quiroz. 
 
 " Why, they say the jefe is coming. Here, boy ! " 
 
 A boy from a small group that was gathering in 
 the darkness came up. 
 
 "What is it they say?" 
 
 " They say Don Rodrigo is coming," said he, ex 
 citedly. " Everybody says so." 
 
 "How is he coming?" inquired Quiroz, without 
 excitement ; " what do they say ? " 
 
 " Quien sabe ! They say he is coming." 
 
 The boy ran away. 
 
 "This is the run of them," broke in Anastasio. 
 "They say they say. Nobody knows. I brand 
 these things as lies." 
 
 " Go back to the house, you two," said Quiroz. 
 " I shall join you at once. I, too, believe no such 
 rumors. But I shall soon know." 
 
 The two fishermen disappeared down the street 
 toward Quiroz s home, where the white Dona Manuela 
 sat up waiting for the return of her son. 
 
 Quiroz s queries were exhaustive. He wandered 
 into many parts of the town. The rumor was cer 
 tainly persistent, but nowhere could he find founda 
 tion for it. He could not even discover any rider 
 who had entered the place since dark, and who might 
 have brought the news. 
 
 " Why," said one, " they say he is coming by the 
 lake." 
 
 " Ha ! " laughed Quiroz, in scorn. " He brings 
 only infantry if he does, what is that to us ? " 
 
 He went back to his home, alert, swift. He was 
 15 
 
226 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 puzzled by these rumors. He came to the patio door 
 at one o clock and went in. 
 
 "You have seen the priest, Doroteo, my son?" 
 said Dona Manucla, coming out with a candle, still 
 dressed in the light blue dress and looking wan. 
 
 " A jolly good old dog he was, too," said Quiroz, 
 under his breath, paying little attention to her. 
 
 " Will you not go to bed now, Doroteo, my son?" 
 asked she, anxiously. 
 
 " Presently, mother, presently. Is the lady still in 
 her room ; has she gone to bed? " 
 
 " I can see her light by the cracks," said Dona 
 Manuela, with some eagerness. " Ah, Doroteo, she 
 is a beautiful creature, and a good, quiet one." 
 
 41 Put me down for a hearty second to that, so much 
 so that I cannot wait. I go to pay court, mother, to 
 this quiet one, now, in the middle of the night." 
 
 " Oh, my son ! " cried she in consternation. " This 
 is improper ! " 
 
 " You know Doroteo too well to accuse him of 
 impropriety," cried he, glistening of eye and smiling 
 on her. " Nobody knows a son as does his little 
 mother. Now, say I. Love and war wait for noth 
 ing." 
 
 11 Oh, my son ! " cried she, plaintively, as though 
 feeling the awfulness of it, but giving in because he 
 took decision away from her. " Oh, my son ! A 
 happy outcome oh, a happy outcome ! This is a 
 strange world." 
 
 Fortino and Anastasio were crouched with their 
 blankets in the middle of the patio. Quiroz assured 
 them he had been unable to verify the rumors. 
 Then he went to Pepa s door. The night was as still 
 there in the corredor by her room as it could have 
 been on the highest peaks. 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 227 
 
 He knocked lightly. She opened to him at once. 
 He went in boldly, recklessly, and closed the door. 
 The patio was left in its nightly peace. Dona Man- 
 uela, somewhat horrified, stood stooped and trem 
 bling, with the candle in her hand, staring at the 
 door. Fortino and Anastasio at length stretched out 
 on the bricks and slept. 
 
 There was then a great struggle in the bosom of 
 Dona Manuela. 
 
 "The keyhole is so very large," said she plain 
 tively. 
 
 She went a little closer. A mother s anxiety drew 
 her on, yet held her back. Five fearful minutes she 
 spent with her will in the balance. 
 
 " Ah, God forgive me ! " cried she. " At least it is 
 a little sin. And Doroteo never keeps anything from 
 me. Nay, nay, he tells me all ; when he comes 
 out he would tell me all that passed, anyway. How 
 good it is that a mother has thus the confidence of 
 Oh Doroteo, Doroteo ! could you keep aught from 
 me me who long to know ! " 
 
 She crept up to the keyhole. It really was very 
 large. They are so to-day in all the smaller places 
 of Mexico, and the keys are of great size. The girl 
 was seated by the table whereon the candle stood. 
 She was plainly in view, with her face toward the 
 door. Her eyes were large and black and her face 
 thin. She was staring at a part of the room the 
 mother could not see, but in which she felt her son 
 to be. Indeed Doroteo s voice was heard. 
 
 " It is merely," said he, " that they say he is coming. 
 Only rumors, it may be, but we are to be ready. 
 Pepa, let us come at last to open speech." 
 
 The old lady was so agitated by the mystery of 
 these words she could not hear the reply. There 
 
228 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 was other conversation within. At length she dis 
 tinguished this from the girl : 
 
 " Doroteo Quiroz will keep to me his promise 
 more surely than to the God he no more than half 
 believes." 
 
 Full of wretchedness Dona Manuela awaited the 
 answer to this slander ; would fain have defended her 
 son from so blasphemous and unexpected a remark. 
 She saw a strange and dazzling smile on the nervous 
 face of the girl within. She heard her son step 
 nearer the table. She still could not see him. 
 
 " But is the promise, then, to be mine only ? " cried 
 he. " You give me smiles you give me no other 
 proof. I follow you like the lost one that I am, 
 caring for nothing so that I be under your eyes. 
 You are a gambler, in your soul, as much as I. How 
 do I know I am to have, for my promise and its ful 
 filment, one caress from the lips that can smile so? 
 I will have it I will have it now ! Muerte de Dios ! 
 if I have held you once I can wade through fire. 
 Come, words are nothing to Quiroz." 
 
 He came very near her. She was suddenly on her 
 feet. At first, like a panther and looking majesti 
 cally beautiful, she held him off by the very look. 
 But in that moment she Learned more of the man 
 with whom she had to deal and of his desperation 
 than she had learned in all her previous acquaintance 
 with him. Her face was like white flame; but it 
 gradually softened. It was no less white, but there 
 was a change in the light of the eyes. She looked 
 as though she would smile, but she did not. At 
 least he sprang to her. For one second she was in 
 his arms. Then she pushed him away. 
 
 " Now go ! " she cried. 
 
 The scene had thrilled the older woman at the key- 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 229 
 
 hole with many emotions. She had barely time to 
 run hysterically away to the corrector s far end, the 
 candle tottering in her hand, her face alternately burn 
 ing and turning haggard, when Doroteo came sud 
 denly out and closed the door. He was the same 
 swift, feline Quiroz ; but he was hot about the fore 
 head. He carried with him a picture of the girl 
 throwing herself down on a chair by the table, bury 
 ing her face in her arms. 
 
 " Oh my son ! " cried the shaking Dona Manuela, 
 running unsteadily to him. " Be careful; be careful 
 what you do. Passion is a wild thing ! " 
 
 Passing her he patted her once on the cheek, 
 lightly, delicately; with less desire to keep alive her 
 pitiable faith in him she would have called it coldly. 
 
 "Never fear go to bed, Mamacita" 
 
 He went to Fortino and awoke him. Anastasio 
 slumbered on. 
 
 " Fortino," he said, speaking with hard pointed- 
 ness, " I was mistaken about the other bridge, I went 
 there to-night. They have completed it. Vicente 
 could cross there and beat the enemy to the plaza i! 
 the enemy came. I am going out now to hunt the 
 rumor down. Sleep on ; you will need your strength. 
 If I find reasons I shall send this long slumberer on 
 a gallop to Vicente before dawn. By the new bridge 
 an army can reach the plaza and fortify itself and an 
 enemy not know it is there. Adios ! " 
 
 " Give me a swing, then," growled Fortino, " at the 
 chain. The scheme begins to grow on me. I know 
 I shall win back my repute." 
 
 Doroteo was gone and Fortino sat up long ponder 
 ing with the mien of a Jove or a Saturn. 
 
 The broken Dona Manuela, full of doubts and 
 terrors but straining her faith still, poor woman, 
 
230 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 grasping in her lonely soul at every straw, went 
 slowly and bent into the glazed, homeless parlor and 
 sat down stiffly on one of the straight chairs. She 
 seemed to have no idea of retiring. She sat there 
 for a long time. 
 
 " He will tell me all," she sighed. " He knows the 
 love of his mother. If anything goes wrong I fear 
 the girl will be the cause of it. Oh yes, he always 
 tells me everything, does Doroteo." 
 
CHAPTER X 
 
 TO this day the trip between Chapala and Tiza- 
 pan is often made between dusk and dawn in 
 those same flat-bottomed canoas. To be afloat in the 
 lake s middle on a moonless night is to have no sign 
 of shore on any hand. Many times the waves out 
 there rise to great heights and those frail barks are 
 tossed about like chips. Shipwrecks and loss of life 
 are far from unknown. 
 
 The same wind that had swirled about Quiroz in 
 Tizapan s narrow streets was filling thirty square sails 
 on the darkening waters. They flew over the waves 
 like so many night-birds, silent. The west grew dark ; 
 even the highest edge of the highest cloud put out 
 its light. The strangely freighted vessels spread out 
 for a distance of some two miles. As they are not 
 the easiest craft to manage it was well not to let them 
 come too near one another. Chapala s few lights 
 gradually disappeared ; only the stars remained. 
 There was, at nine o clock, no shore ; there were no 
 mountains; only each little ship to itself plunging 
 into the night, a ghostly company of white wings on 
 every hand, and rising waves beating against pitched 
 sides and flinging spray over man and beast. In the 
 main the horses had become as quiet as could have 
 been hoped, though an unusual lurch sometimes 
 caused a scramble of hoofs and some equine expres 
 sion of distress. 
 
232 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 " Did you know there is iron on the prow of this 
 thing?" called a soldier from the black depths of 
 the canoa which Bonavidas commanded, a canoa 
 loaded with men only. " What did they put iron on 
 it for? This is the biggest and the fastest, too. If 
 anybody should get in front of this prow, holy 
 fathers ! we would cut into him ! " 
 
 Bonavidas, like some lean prowler of the night, 
 moved always from one end of the vessel to the other, 
 bending that bony visage of his over the water and 
 watching the other sails. Some of his companions 
 under the unremoved thatch at length sang low and 
 melancholy songs in that peculiar, restrained falsetto 
 of the Mexican peon. 
 
 The next boat, some rods to Bonavidas right, was 
 the little " Delirium," wherein were three soldiers, a 
 servant of Doroteo, and eight horses. Beyond this, 
 a full black quarter of a mile, flew the sail of the 
 jcfe. Thejefe, with his invigorated mood of youth 
 gone, sat high on the prow of his vessel looking 
 away to the fathomless southeast. The majority of 
 his companions had congregated at the stern with 
 the man at the rudder. The prisoner was there too, 
 crouching in their midst. Others lay asleep, unseen, 
 under the thatch. 
 
 " Clarita," said the jcfe, turning about and seeing 
 her indistinctly, " if I would let myself think, I would 
 come to believe you have made a criminal of me." 
 
 She was standing again at the boat s side on a coil 
 of rope which made her high enough that she could 
 look over into the water. He could barely make out 
 the outline of her body ; the shapely head with the 
 rebozo over it was more plainly seen. Now and then 
 the wind caught a strand of her hair and blew it 
 about her face. She had spoken no more. 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 233 
 
 " I knew you before this, Don Rodrigo," she said, 
 " and you were kind. You believe you are doing 
 right and crime is not the word." 
 
 " Gentle judge," said he, half to himself. " But I 
 am mistaken then misguided wrong." 
 
 " Yes," said she with simplicity. 
 
 He whistled a little to himself, softly. 
 
 " Heigh-ho ! " he replied. " Let us not talk of 
 this. Let us talk of the first day I saw you. Why 
 had you run away from the meson?" 
 
 " I was lonely," said she. " I wanted Vicente." 
 
 "And you had not seen him since you were how 
 old?" 
 
 " Four." 
 
 " This is a faith," he mused, " that ought to move 
 mountains. To carry his face in your mind so long, 
 and to go straight to the place where he was. There 
 is something supernatural in a child." 
 
 The boat was rolling a little more and the spray 
 came over them. 
 
 " Let me make you a bed under the thatch. You 
 are not used to this," said he. 
 
 " Not yet," she replied. " I have been to Tizapan 
 before, and in the night." 
 
 " Where will you go there ? " he inquired anxiously. 
 " I am sick thinking of it. You you, in the heart 
 of the trouble! " 
 
 " I will go to Doroteo s house. His mother is very 
 good." 
 
 "And Doroteo?" 
 
 " No. He is not good." 
 
 " This, at least," muttered Rodrigo, " is a satis 
 faction." 
 
 "Why?" asked she. 
 
 He was confused at this. 
 
234 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 " Because because it leaves you more admiration 
 for the rest of us poor wanderers." 
 
 " I have seen this prisoner," she said thoughtlessly, 
 " before." 
 
 " I would n t listen to a secret from her," said the 
 jffe t " if m y life depended on it. Don t tell me any 
 thing, little girl, I prefer to find it out myself." 
 
 " Oh, this is nothing. I merely saw him on the 
 shore when I was going to Ocotlan." 
 
 " When were you at Ocotlan? " 
 
 " The night of the battle. I was very glad you 
 were whipped. But," she added quickly, as though 
 afraid she had offended him, " I was also very glad 
 they had not hurt you." 
 
 " You would have liked them to take me prisoner." 
 
 " Yes," said she. 
 
 "Ah, now we understand each other," he replied. 
 " Why did you go to Ocotlan? " 
 
 " To find brother Vicente. I tried very hard, but 
 I could not stay." 
 
 " Again. You went again ! And how did you 
 go?" 
 
 " I walked. It took all the day and into the night." 
 
 " This might be a fairy story," said he dreamily, 
 " and you the good princess. Is there then one, one 
 in all the world, that can keep faith? And here you 
 are a third time going to him, and these last were 
 after many years. And you are a fisherman s daughter 
 from the lake where civilization lives not Yet the 
 greatest thing in earth shines from you." 
 
 He could see that she turned her face to him. If 
 she had been on the point of replying she checked 
 herself. In a silence somewhat prolonged he be 
 lieved her eyes were still on him. Then she sur 
 prised him by saying suddenly: 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 235 
 
 " I have seen something not very happy in you 
 many a time, Don Rodrigo." 
 
 He made no response. The fear that she had 
 been rude still hung in her mind, and she found her 
 self wishing he would speak, but he did not. They 
 chanced to be looking toward the southeast. 
 
 " You know the island that lies out there," she said 
 after a time, in order that the silence might be broken. 
 " They say it is haunted. Did you not go there once, 
 Don Rodrigo; and what was it that you found?" 
 
 " I was but just now thinking of it," said he. " I 
 sailed there from the other end of the lake. That, 
 too, is a matter I would rather put out of my mind, 
 because of a thing I may have to do. I would 
 rather speak of you, you who wander your little 
 world over after Vicente like a lost soul. You are 
 no smaller than the greatest wanderers nor your 
 wanderings any less than theirs. A hundred thou 
 sand souls have been cast adrift on this same sea 
 whereon you are alone. Oh, pitiful creation ! Yet 
 I think there was never another so pure as you." 
 
 " What is there in a little barbarian like me," she 
 said, " that keeps you thinking of me, and seemingly 
 full of interest, when it is only that I am lonely and 
 go to find my brother." 
 
 " Heaven record that simple remark ! and I will 
 answer it saying, What is there in God to interest 
 a man, when it was simply that God was lonely and 
 came to earth to find his brother. I tell you again 
 you carry in you the greatest thing that lives." 
 
 " You think too much of me," said she, looking 
 away over the waves toward Tizapan. 
 
 "If I saw much of you I think it might be so in 
 deed. I should need some angels to watch over the 
 wrecked pieces of my heart, lest it get together again 
 
236 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 in spite of itself. Why do I think too much of you, 
 and why do I keep speaking of you? It is because 
 I think we are in the same way of life, if it be that 
 at all ; and that these waves we are cutting through 
 on this reckless project have their counterparts in 
 something deeper. I am going on to find something 
 too ; though there is less hope of my success than 
 of yours, seeing that I do not know what I am hunt 
 ing. Hence, if facts in the scheme of the universe 
 make tones in a harmony, by such faith as I have 
 we are listening to the same music and it has sad 
 dened us both alike." 
 
 There was a new throbbing in her gentle bosom. 
 She was so pure, so true, so open to emotion. She 
 looked at his form again, black against the sky, and 
 at the silent sails dim about her; and the wind she 
 had hated came and blew gently on her cheek. She 
 thought of Vicente, of all the past. She remembered 
 the pressure of Rodrigo s hand when he had first led 
 her, years ago, back to the meson. She could not 
 help it her heart was very full and a tear came 
 to her eye and rolled in the darkness down her 
 cheek. 
 
 " I wish that you were not his enemy," she said in 
 a voice that made him silent. " We would be friends, 
 the three of us." 
 
 Who can blame him if, for a moment, he felt little 
 and guilty, and would have given some years of 
 his life to fulfil her wish? 
 
 Meanwhile the vessel had come gradually nearer 
 that of Bonavidas, between which and Rodrigo s 
 sailed the " Delirium." Rodrigo came down to the 
 flat bottom, steadied the girl s arm with his hand, 
 and led her under the thatch, for the ship was now 
 rolling greatly and the waves were growing too high 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 237 
 
 for her to stay where she was. He had them strike 
 a light and light a candle under the thatch ; and the 
 best spot was chosen for her. There were many of 
 those rude soldiers who were glad enough to lend 
 their blankets for her bed. With several of these he 
 made her a place to sleep and she lay down. The 
 last thing she saw before the light was put out was 
 the eyes of that prisoner. He was crouched in the 
 stern between his keepers. His face looked ashen 
 in the faint candle-light; and it came over her with 
 a thrill that the dull reflection of the rays from his 
 eyes was like that from the eyes of her mother that 
 night long ago, just before Fortino had carried her 
 away. So it was little she slept. She lay in silence, 
 seeing nothing, hearing the wash of the waves. 
 
 In that second boat to the left there was growing 
 some agitation. Bonavidas had a thing to annoy 
 him. 
 
 " To the devil with that little Delirium ! " cried 
 Bonavidas. " What kind of a damp-headed fool has 
 hold of her rudder? Holloa! You adobe men! Do 
 you want to make corpses of us? Don t you see you 
 are getting too near? Pull away! Pull away! The 
 waves beat in this direction. You re too near, I 
 say ! " 
 
 His voice, battling with the wind, went across the 
 water to where the little " Delirium " was pitching 
 fearfully. Another voice, faintly heard, came back : 
 
 " I can t manage her. She has something wrong 
 with her rudder." 
 
 " You ve got to manage ! " cried Bonavidas. "You 
 can t transfer to anything in this lake but to the 
 bottom of it. Lord have mercy on that boat, boys ! 
 Steer us off to the left." 
 
 " I can t," came his steersman s reply out of the 
 
238 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 gloom. That official was growing desperate. " The 
 wind has changed due south and it s too high. If I 
 turn a hair s breadth more we re over; that s the 
 end of it." 
 
 " For God s sake ! " cried Bonavidas across the 
 water, " keep away or we re into you ! " 
 
 " No. We re five rods ahead of you," was the 
 reply. 
 
 The " Delirium s " sail could indeed be seen rapidly 
 coming closer. It was rising and falling in frantic 
 response to hostile wind and waves. Already the 
 vessel was out of the track of the wind. The great 
 square canvas occasionally flapped wing-like, then 
 bellied with a burst of force that made the canoa 
 stagger. The danger increased and the inability of 
 management. Bonavidas and his men, yelling warn 
 ings, beheld the other boat head straight across their 
 course. The sail loomed up like a ghost before. 
 Under it could be heard confusion of men and 
 horses. Bonavidas himself leaped to his rudder and 
 there were others with him. They strained every 
 muscle against the wooden bar to wheel round the 
 " Delirium s " right. Their sail was dropped and 
 the yard fell with a crash. It was too late. A great 
 wave beat them back. The "Delirium" staggered 
 in front. She was close at hand. Her sail was over 
 them like a dense white mist which had suddenly 
 come out of the night to bury them. There was a 
 moment s suspense and the crash came. The iron- 
 bound prow of the bigger vessel was heard grinding 
 its way into the other s side. Her force was such 
 that she wheeled her smaller antagonist half way 
 round, tore a gash like a long wound in her stern, 
 swept away her useless rudder and went on, leaving 
 the helpless hull a wreck behind. 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 239 
 
 The thing had come so suddenly that no one was 
 ready for it. It was a quick terror out of the midst 
 of a good progress. The " Delirium " had answered to 
 her name. She had suddenly gone mad. She was as 
 wild in those few desperate seconds as her owner, but 
 to less purpose. She floated now a doomed ship. 
 The water rushed in at her wounds; she drifted, 
 whirled, and beat upon the waves. Within there was 
 a mixture of animal and human insanity. The shock 
 had made the horses like so many demons. Packed 
 as they were, they struggled and fought for life in the 
 darkness. They broke halters and became a con 
 fused mass. There were four men in the vessel ; they 
 cried in frenzy. One, a soldier, was knocked among 
 the horses and trampled a score of times by iron 
 hoofs. Two leaped into the water. The fourth was 
 paralyzed with fear. He stood high up on the bow 
 as silent as death. The vessel could hold up but a 
 moment longer. The animals, in an excess of their 
 frantic struggle, burst more of the wrecked planks 
 into fragments. The stern went down as suddenly as 
 rock sinks, and the prow shot up. Its one stupefied 
 occupant clung to it with his last despair. For a 
 second it hung as though suspended. Then it sank, 
 carrying him with it amidst the scream of horses. 
 The damage was done, and the " Delirium " was no 
 more. One horse only could be seen, by the strain 
 ing eyes in Bonavidas vessel, to come to the surface. 
 It beat about pitifully for some minutes and sank. 
 The man who was trampled and he who clung to 
 the bow were not visible. The latter was Dcroteo s 
 servant who came in charge of the boat. The two 
 others swam toward Bonavidas. They were skilful 
 and of cool heads. They were at length, with much 
 difficulty, rescued by ropes and drawn into the 
 
240 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 larger vessel. That larger vessel had come off 
 unscathed. 
 
 " Thanks to the iron," muttered Bonavidas. 
 This accident chilled his crew and their com 
 panions. They had witnessed the spectacle, a spec 
 tacle horrible beyond telling thus in the midst of the 
 lake s blackness. Only one other vessel was close 
 enough so that its occupants knew of the misfortune. 
 About the others the night wind whistled and the 
 waves beat as before, and no sound that was greater 
 than that of wind and waves, came from the wreck. 
 The other vessel was Rodrigo s. He had them bring 
 him as near and as swiftly as possible. He heard 
 the news then, shouted to him by Bonavidas. He 
 said nothing at all. He sat high up on the bow 
 again and looked steadily across the waters into the 
 southeast. 
 
 The waves were highest at one in the morning. 
 Before that hour he lay down in the boat s bow, 
 directing his steersman to awake him at the first sign 
 of dawn or at the dying of the wind. Ifc had that 
 rare faculty of snatching a few hours profound sleep 
 in the midst of excitement. After some time there 
 was a little gray in the east, and such of the ghostly 
 company of sails as had been hidden by the night 
 began to appear across the waste of waters in the 
 first of the day. Rodrigo did not need to be 
 awakened. He was suddenly up, over the prow 
 again, scanning the lake. Before him the long line 
 of peaks, like an immeasurable shadow, rose out of 
 the south. One of his soldiers, who chanced to be 
 familiar with the lake, was called to him. 
 " How long before we arrive at Tizapan? " 
 " I should say not before seven or eight o clock." 
 " Then we have made poor time," said thcjffe. 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 241 
 
 He descended. The east was now turning golden, 
 and day was at hand. He went in silence under the 
 thatch on his way to the stern. The girl lay asleep 
 with a peon s common gray blanket over her. That 
 strange, rich, auburn hair of hers, shining already in 
 the early light, lay flung out on the boat s bottom. 
 Her face was beautiful but sad. It lacked its dim 
 ples and the pink flush. He could not resist the 
 temptation to pause, and stood over her looking at 
 the picture she made in sleep. The carrying out of 
 the unheard-of project was near completion. He had 
 made the bold, new stroke. He had gained much 
 time, and hoped to surprise his enemy. Perhaps 
 this very day would see war and blood for him 
 victory or defeat or death. And this girl had come 
 into the middle of it, and every stroke he made was 
 anguish to her. For a moment he was sickened. 
 But the face was sufficiently full of peace. 
 
 The northern mountains had become an insepara 
 ble, sierra-like line of distant blue. Chapala, far be 
 hind and under them, was invisible. Tizapan, only a 
 few miles away, was visible, its green marshes, its 
 indistinguishable mass of adobe walls. Before seven 
 o clock the river s mouth and the miles of reeds were 
 reached. There was many an eye strained toward 
 the land ; but the land was as free from the presence 
 of an enemy as it was when the old prince first looked 
 down on it. There was, from that distance, not a 
 living being to be seen. 
 
 Bonavidas vessel was in the lead. He sailed 
 straight into the stream, where the waves were at 
 first inconsiderable, then lacking. The river here 
 was twenty yards in width. It was deep and of still 
 appearance, though flowing swiftly. Its water was 
 yellow with clay. It was flanked, as though by walls, 
 
 16 
 
242 A DJREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 with dense green reeds among which could be caught 
 the glimmering of the watery marsh. The river 
 turned, making many sharp bends. So the sail came 
 down, and the poles were taken up. Rodrigo, to be 
 on hand for the directing of the others, anchored his 
 vessel outside the mouth. One by one, as they ar 
 rived, they plunged into the murky flood of the litde 
 stream. 
 
 A mile in, Bonavidas arrived at dry land. He 
 passed the huts, whose ragged inhabitants were 
 already congregated in wonder. It was seen, too, 
 that the fleet s approach had caused more excitement 
 in the town than had at first been visible. The path 
 thither was soon lined with hastening pedestrians 
 come to see the prodigy. The greater part of the 
 inhabitants of Tizapan, however, remained at home 
 and looked to the barring of doors and windows. 
 
 Bonavidas arrived at the last spot possible. His 
 boat could go no further. There lay just before him, 
 then, one other canoa, deserted, sail-furled. It was 
 the only vessel in the river not belonging to tiieje/Ss 
 fleet. Bonavidas was now in the midst of a dense 
 field of cane that stretched narrowly between road 
 and marsh. He cast out his cable and tied his ves 
 sel against the shore. It was speedily unloaded of 
 its cargo of men only. The second and the third 
 poled round the last bend, nosed the first, and tied 
 also. Others came. They were packed in the river 
 as tightly as the beasts were packed in them. Some 
 of them in this narrow portion of the stream, were 
 even too long to turn stern to shore ; wherefore the 
 difficulty of unloading was trebled. 
 
 Immediately on landing, Bonavidas and his men 
 dashed off in search of planks for gangways. There 
 was at that time, as indeed there still is, a place be- 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 243 
 
 low the huts on the marsh s edge where canoas were 
 built and launched. There were three in construction 
 there when the soldiers arrived. Timbers were thus 
 more easily obtained than they had been at Chapala. 
 Enough were discovered to make rough gangways 
 for ten boats at once. Slowly the clumsy craft came 
 on, one by one. The river was a thread of strange 
 beads. The crowd, congregating at the main landing, 
 had food for wonder, looking down as they were on 
 cargo after cargo of saddled beasts. 
 
 The canoas behind that of Bonavidas were imme 
 diately attacked with vim. The planks were up and 
 the work again began. The horses were brought out, 
 worse for wear, stupefied or snorting, but in the main 
 still ready for service. They became then so en 
 tranced with freedom that the herding them was no 
 simple matter: as boys will shout and leap about 
 after an unwonted confinement. 
 
 Half of the vessels were now either unloaded or 
 ready to be. Thejefe still remained a mile away at 
 the river s mouth, trusting the landing to his lieuten 
 ant and anxiously looking out for the safety of every 
 ship. It was at this time that a surprise came to 
 Bonavidas. He was dashing about at the edge of 
 the thick cane, directing and planning, when he heard 
 a call from within the field. In that moment he 
 chanced to be alone. He stopped, turned, and peered 
 in among the dense growth of sweet, green stalks. He 
 caught a glimpse of scarlet hidden some yards in. 
 The sun blinded him and he put his hand over his 
 eyes and looked again. There were other hands, 
 slender, small hands, in there, holding back the cane, 
 and there was a girl s face, eager and drawn, peering 
 at him. He went in and was hidden from view. He 
 came to her and recognized her. 
 
244 A DREAM OF A THROVE 
 
 Long since had the shrewd Bonavidas wondered 
 about this girl. Her coming to Rodrigo s lines be 
 fore the fight at Ocotlan had been more than a pass 
 ing event to him. He had noted, on that occasion, 
 every feature of her face; most of all had he marked 
 its changing expressions. That had been a queer 
 occurrence to Bonavidas. He had fancied some 
 things then. When ihejefe s remnant fled through 
 Ocotlan, Bonavidas alone perceived her following. 
 Many a time he had thought it strange that, with her 
 start and her horse, she had not made the chase a 
 more successful one for her companions. Once, 
 later, he had bantered Rodrigo in a sepulchral way 
 about that young tigress. Rodrigo s manner on that 
 occasion was food for thought. In the head of this 
 pale lieutenant there had been and were many 
 speculations. 
 
 The two were now hidden as effectually as though 
 shut in by walls. 
 
 "Do you know me? " whispered the girl. 
 
 " Si, I know you." 
 
 " If what I say seems to you worth it, will you act 
 without telling tlicjefe it was I who came? " 
 
 " If it is n t absolutely necessary." 
 
 " It shall not be necessary," said she almost an 
 grily. " He would do nothing if he knew it came 
 from me. This I shall make clear to you. Come 
 nearer." 
 
 He did so, and she fastened her great black eyes on 
 him and began whispering. She caught his hand, 
 too, after a time, and held it with a firm grip. For a 
 quarter of an hour he did not remove his gaze from 
 hers because he could not. 
 
 From his companions, laboring on the river bank, 
 Bonavidas had disappeared unnoticed and as sud 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 245 
 
 denly as though he had gone through the earth. He 
 was inquired for and called. He did not come. 
 
 " He has gone down the river looking after other 
 canoas" said they. 
 
 The work went on and the quarter of an hour 
 passed. Twenty vessels had arrived and eleven were 
 unloaded. Bonavidas suddenly appeared again, com 
 ing from the field of cane. There was even an un 
 usual pallor on his extraordinary visage. He seemed 
 in a blank dream. He stood looking dully at the 
 horses and the boats. 
 
 " Blood of the Cross ! " muttered Bonavidas ; " may 
 there be others happier over it than she. If I ever 
 saw hell in a woman s face and her hand was as 
 cold as lake water." 
 
 He climbed to one of the canoas that was still 
 thatched. He stood on the roof and looked across 
 the fields to Tizapan. There was a red spot going 
 yonder between the stone walls and disappearing into 
 the town. 
 
 A half hour later the last of the canoas, a weather- 
 beaten, faint little thing, came slowly into the river s 
 muddy mouth, and Rodrigo s vessel, poled, entered be 
 hind it. The thirty were at length drawn up and the 
 line, as close as vessels could be, was complete. The 
 last of the unloading was carried through with ex 
 treme haste. 
 
 Rodrigo s first care, when his vessel was made fast 
 a little below the huts, was his prisoner. He had him 
 brought to shore and guarded. His next was the 
 safety of the girl. She would land at once, she 
 said. 
 
 " And leave me and go to Tizapan," said he, help 
 ing her out. 
 
 " Yes," she replied, not looking at him. 
 
246 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 " They say Vicente is not there." 
 
 " He will come," said she, " and I shall wait. Or if 
 he does not, I can go where he is." 
 
 " You are sure Doroteo s mother is your friend? " 
 
 " Oh yes." 
 
 " At least I must send some one to take care of 
 you." 
 
 " No, no I do not want any one. I know the 
 way." 
 
 " Then good-by. God bless you." 
 
 There was a little of the pink in her face. She did 
 not lift her eyes to him. She shook hands hastily and 
 said " Thank you." She put her rebozo (it was a dark 
 gray one this time and her dress was gray) more care 
 fully about her with that inimitably graceful move 
 ment of the Mexican woman, and went sadly away 
 alone along the dusty road. Some of the auburn 
 hair, escaping from the rebozo, glistened like gold in 
 the sun. Thus she too, like Pepa, passed between 
 the stone walls and entered the town in the early 
 morning. 
 
 The unloading was at last accomplished and the 
 canoas abandoned, lying there in a long, ugly line, 
 ungainly things. But the ungainly things had done 
 much, and a wonder went down in the annals of the 
 lake, and among these simple folk Don Rodrigo s 
 name lives on. 
 
 Some provisions had been brought from Chapala. 
 More were bought at the huts. A breakfast by no 
 means satisfactory was made ; the troop was gotten 
 together and hastily mounted, not much worse for 
 the unusual night. As for the horses, of all the more 
 than two hundred but three were found seriously dis 
 abled. Rodrigo made diligent inquiry among the 
 people concerning his enemy. The spectators as a 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 247 
 
 whole made a crowd sufficiently gaunt and tattered. 
 He learned from them only that Vicente was hourly 
 expected. 
 
 Previous to the departure of the troop there was a 
 conversation of much purport between the jefe and 
 Bonavidas. The latter drew his chief aside. 
 
 " We are to hold the plaza, this is the scheme?" 
 said Bonavidas. 
 
 " Yes. We have there an open space seventy-five 
 yards square. An enemy can approach only in thin 
 lines." 
 
 " Good. We will go the roundabout way to the 
 plaza. We will not take this street." 
 
 " Why? " said the jefe, eying Bonavidas, whom he 
 knew to be a man of reason. " There is no trail the 
 other way. It is two miles farther and over rocks, 
 and the enemy is not here." 
 
 " I don t want to go this way," muttered Bonavidas, 
 with a half comic feigning of sulkiness. 
 
 " Come at it, Bonavidas ; quick. What do you 
 know?" 
 
 The lieutenant led the jefe further away and whis 
 pered with him for some minutes. Whatever argu 
 ments he employed, they were effective. He knew 
 how to use his tongue, and to the using of it the 
 peculiarities of his countenance never failed to add 
 force. It is enough to say that, though every other 
 point was elaborated and the next few hours mapped 
 out clearly, he was shrewd enough to make no 
 mention of Josefa Aranja. 
 
 When the little cavalry moved, they did not pro 
 ceed by the straight way from river to plaza. They 
 turned into the lake road to the right. They turned 
 again out of that to the left. They cut a new path, 
 and a difficult one, at the foothills, and came at 
 
248 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 length to the town s opposite side, where that other 
 street, the only other one save that whose bridge 
 was broken, led into the plaza from the west. They 
 had brought their cowed prisoner with them. The 
 tiny Tizapan jail faced the plaza and was empty. 
 Rodrigo took immediate possession of that prison 
 and, glad to free himself for the time of all thought 
 of his captive, put him in it. That silent person 
 slunk into its farthest corner and was locked in. 
 
CHAPTER XI 
 
 IT has been said there was one other canoa in the 
 river when Bonavidas came into it. It belonged 
 to a sharp-eyed Indian who sailed from Mescala for 
 Tizapan the previous morning. The morning wind 
 being from the east, he had drifted toward Chapala 
 that he might pick up the west wind at night and 
 thus arrive at his destination. Having been be 
 calmed during the long afternoon within sight of 
 Chapala s beach, his keen eyes had made out that 
 loading of horses. The sight inspired him with 
 haste. He was, when the wind came, far in advance 
 of Rodrigo. His vessel was a swift one. He 
 arrived at Tizapan, with news burning his tongue s 
 end, at two o clock in the morning. Running up 
 the long street, the first man he met therein was 
 Doroteo, to whom he told the news. The unheard- 
 of deed seemed at first impossible even to the reck 
 less Quiroz. But he knew the Indian, and, after 
 many questions, became assured of the truth of his 
 report. Then he suddenly burst out : 
 "Damnation! I could do it myself." 
 He stood for a second struck with wonder, turned 
 about, broke into a silent run, and left his informant 
 standing in the street. The latter went on through 
 the town, and such prowlers as were up and in 
 groups about were put in possession of that which 
 he knew. 
 
2 5 o A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 It was still not three o clock, and some time 
 before the first of dawn, when Quiroz entered the 
 door of his own patio. Fortino was again asleep in 
 the middle of it, wrapped in his blanket. Anastasio 
 had not wakened. The light had disappeared from 
 the parlor. The mother was shut in her bedroom 
 with her crucifix. Quiroz went to the girl s door 
 and knocked gently. The candle was still burning 
 inside. She opened it and came out. He whis 
 pered to her and they entered, closed the door, and 
 sat down on opposite sides of the candle, looking at 
 each other. They staid thus for a full half hour, 
 wherein they talked together constantly, usually in 
 whispers. The course that had been begun in the 
 case of Pepa Aranja, some years before when a new 
 jefe politico came to Chapala, that had arrived at a 
 precipice on the night after the fight at Ocotlan, 
 came to its bad end at the cliff s bottom during that 
 half hour. Toward the end of it she laid a still, 
 cold finger on the hand of Quiroz and said some 
 thing in a tone rather hard and unlovable. Oddly 
 enough, that very tone put the culminating touch to 
 her long fascination of Quiroz. When he came out 
 she looked haggard. He shut the door and left her 
 within. 
 
 He went to Anastasio and touched him on the 
 shoulder. The long fisherman sat up and would 
 have spoken. Doroteo flashed a lighted wax match 
 into his face and put his finger on the other s lips. 
 So, after getting up slowly and stretching his limbs 
 a formidable process Anastasio followed Quiroz 
 in silence across the patio. Fortino was not dis 
 turbed. The two went to the rear door of the court, 
 opposite that which led to the street. This they 
 opened and went through, finding themselves in a 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 251 
 
 larger, ruder, unadorned square, about which were 
 stalls. The mozo was asleep in a stall that was like 
 the others save that it was made for him instead of 
 for a horse. At Quiroz s direction the mozo was 
 not disturbed. Anastasio s horse, in a stall oppo 
 site, was, at Quiroz s direction also, led out and 
 saddled by Quiroz himself and the fisherman. All 
 was performed with silent speed and a stealth that 
 fitted well Quiroz s lithe body. 
 
 " I am not any town clock, " complained Anastasio. 
 " I want to know why I do things." 
 
 The horse being saddled, Doroteo took the com- 
 plainer by the shoulder and gave him full, pointed 
 directions in that confidential tone that is a fine 
 flattery. He told him of the fleet. He explained 
 to him the meaning of the news of \hejefes coming. 
 
 "Vicente is to leave Jiquilpan this morning at 
 dawn or earlier. You will meet him half way. 
 Rodrigo will arrive here a full hour before Vicente 
 unless you do miracles. That it be no more Anas 
 tasio will see. Make it less, boy, make it less. 
 Ride like a devil. Tell him he cannot hope, in 
 spite of all effort, to arrive here before the jefe. 
 Tell him it is the opinion of Quiroz that the jefe 
 will draw up in the plaza and hold that. Tell him 
 to ride straight up the river road. There is no 
 other. I find I was right about the other bridge. 
 It is down, and the one we crossed is the only one. 
 And this is the only approach. The street is nar 
 row and they will have us at a disadvantage; there 
 fore a heavy swift charge is the only stratagem. 
 Tell him to gallop straight into the plaza and lay to 
 it. Tell him that Fortino, the girl, and Quiroz 
 will lie in hiding till he come, but our liberty is 
 worth not one centavo after nine o clock. If I dis- 
 
252 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 cover there is some other stand made than that in 
 the plaza I shall send my mozo out to meet him and 
 give him full knowledge of the ground. If the 
 enemy be in the plaza Fortino and I shall be on the 
 look-out for Vicente. We shall be mounted here at 
 the patio door. Tell him we shall ride out and join 
 his van as he comes, and the dash at them shall be as 
 strong as horses can make it. Tell him the Indian 
 claimed there are one thousand horse. This is a 
 lie. He says, too, there were thirty sails. Tell 
 Vicente Quiroz figures that only the Almighty 
 could put more than two hundred horses and two 
 hundred men in thirty canoas. Tell him, then, they 
 will have the advantage of position but we can over 
 whelm them with numbers, and that, above all else 
 and I charge it on you, you long patriot, not to 
 omit this if I send no word that they are not 
 drawn up in the plaza," and here it was as well 
 that, for the darkness, Anastasio could not see the 
 infernal gleam of Quiroz s eyes as he finished, 
 "then the end depends on the momentum of the 
 charge." 
 
 A feeling of exhilaration came into the fisherman. 
 He sighed a long, preliminary sigh. He swung his 
 interminable leg across the saddle and spurred his 
 steed. Doroteo went before him across the rear 
 court to another door still farther to the rear. This 
 door was a full block away from the front street. 
 It, too, opened on a street, a narrow, dirty thread 
 of a street, which, to the right, led into the 
 quarter of stenches whereof Anastasio had spoken, 
 and to the left gave entrance, half a block away, 
 into that thoroughfare already mentioned as a con 
 tinuation of the little stretch of fifteen yards on the 
 south side of Quiroz s house, the fifteen yards 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 253 
 
 between the only two bends in the way from river 
 to plaza. 
 
 " Now ride ! " cried Quiroz, smotheredly, as the 
 horseman made his exit through the door. 
 
 Anastasio did so. He turned to the left into the 
 thread of a street. He came to the continuation of 
 the fifteen yard stretch, and turned to the left again 
 into that. It was still dark, and this street was 
 empty. He rode past the opening of the last eighty 
 yard course to the plaza on his right, past the south 
 side of Dona Manuela s unhappy home on his left 
 (from which side looked forth Pepa s barred window 
 with a little candle-light shining through the 
 chinks), turned to the left a third time, and was 
 in the straight way to the river landing. He had 
 thus made almost a complete circuit of the house to 
 reach this course. He went by the shut patio door 
 and its high white wall at a gallop. He put spurs 
 into his animal, and was out of the town and into 
 the course between stone fences. He came thus to 
 the lake-encircling road and wheeled into it to the 
 right. And some of the people at the cluster of 
 huts, aroused long since by the Indian messenger 
 with the news, beheld, at some time before dawn on 
 that early fall morning, a shadowy, lengthy horse 
 man flying away toward Jiquilpan. 
 
 There was a blacksmith s shop across the alley 
 opposite that rear door of the stable courtyard. 
 Doroteo stepped to that shop after the disappear 
 ance of Anastasio, and tried the smoky wooden door 
 that led into it. The door was weak, and, appar 
 ently, the place was not occupied at night. Doroteo 
 stepped back into the stable courtyard of his own 
 domains, and shut and barred the entrance. He 
 came silently to the rear door of the dwelling s patio 
 
254 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 and entered that, closing it likewise. Fortino was 
 still asleep. The girl s door was still closed, and 
 there was no sign of his mother. The wind was 
 fallen much. The breath of early morning stirred 
 the trees in the clean court, whose silence was 
 unbroken. 
 
 Quiroz kneeled by the great man wrapped in the 
 blanket on the bricks, and shook him violently. 
 Fortino awoke with a loud grunt. 
 
 "Pretty dog you are," said Quiroz, affably and 
 softly. "Oh, a good old dog. Dreaming, as a 
 slender young girl dreams, he was, over her lover, 
 while wonders go on and the enemy comes." 
 
 Fortino rolled heavily, and with excitement, into 
 a sitting posture. 
 
 " Is the brute on hand ! " roared he, with a roar 
 that Doroteo smothered. 
 
 "The brute is on hand, and Fortino will retrieve 
 his repute. Awake out of these girlish dreams, 
 graceful gazelle." 
 
 "Where is Anastasio," growled Fortino, snorting 
 like some awakened bull and staring about. "And 
 come at the news. If I fail again on this day no, if 
 Heaven is still alive and breathing I shall not fail." 
 
 "Anastasio has gone. He is more wakeful, more 
 alert. I have received word from a mozo whom I 
 once employed, and who lives in Tuxcueco (which, 
 as you know, is on this same southern shore to the 
 west), that Rodrigo is coming. This same mozo 
 came knocking at the door not half an hour ago, 
 having ridden nearly all of the night from his home 
 in a gallop. Don Rodrigo and something less than 
 one thousand cavalry are on the road. They left 
 Tuxcueco after midnight. They do not gallop. 
 They keep their horses fresh. They will arrive 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 255 
 
 here before the middle of this sweet morning, do 
 you hear? Fortino, dreamer that you are, poet in 
 soul who conceives great deeds, Fortino, your day 
 of action is at hand." 
 
 The other was up, with his form swelling. 
 
 " Give me a way that is honest and sure and 
 proves me a man of faith. What is it? Is it the 
 chain ? Oh, Son of Mary ! my muscles have this 
 night dreamt of the chain ! " 
 
 "It is the chain," said Quiroz, softly, laying four 
 slender fingers on Fortino s breast. "And give 
 thanks for your strength. There is not one other 
 giant in the whole lake region that has muscle 
 enough. Anastasio has this moment ridden off at a 
 gallop toward Jiquilpan with the news for Vicente. 
 He will meet our forces in the middle of the dis 
 tance. He carries my map of the way and my 
 plans. From the estimate of the messenger who 
 tells me the start and the speed of ihejefe, and from 
 my own estimates, Vicente can easily reach Tizapan 
 an hour before him. For this I have sent Anas 
 tasio, that he may come full speed. The messenger, 
 too, has seen the map of the town that Rodrigo is 
 using. He says it is Rodrigo s plan not to attempt 
 the perilous and almost impossible way round the 
 foothills; for he has received no word of Vicente s 
 approach and believes himself at least a day ahead 
 of us. He knows, too, of the broken bridge of 
 which I have told you. But he does not know that 
 it has been replaced. He therefore believes that 
 our forces cannot reach the plaza save by this same 
 street from the river. He intends, then, to come 
 up this street. He intends, if the way be clear, to 
 advance and fortify himself in the plaza s middle. 
 But listen " 
 
256 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 Quiroz came very near, keeping his fingers on 
 the other s breast. The perspiration was beginning 
 to come out on the giant s face. 
 
 " Rodrigo will learn, before he arrives, that his 
 enemy is ahead of him. My map to Vicente marks 
 out the way round, east of the town, to the new 
 bridge. Besides, Anastasio and others of our forces 
 know the circuit perfectly. It is through orchards ; 
 there are no roads ; but it is easy. Vicente will 
 never enter the river road. He will turn out of the 
 lake road before reaching this one. He will come 
 into the plaza by the street toward the southern 
 mountains, which street leads over the new bridge 
 which Rodrigo believes to be wanting. Do you 
 begin, you slender dreamer, to have visions of the 
 outcome? I figure Rodrigo will arrive something 
 before nine. He will learn at the river, if not 
 sooner, that we hold the plaza. He is a bold and 
 quick fighter. He will not pause. Vicente and 
 his forces will be drawn up in the central square in 
 compact, broad lines. He will have every gun 
 aimed at the narrow throat of the street. The 
 advantage will be ours. Rodrigo will sweep up 
 this street which you call a tunnel; and a tunnel it 
 is, and it shall be a tunnel leading to the glory of 
 Fortino. Mark me; no enemy can see round a 
 corner. My house s wall is at your disposal, and 
 there is a garden s wall opposite. My boy, do you 
 follow?" 
 
 That buried chuckle that seemed at times to boil 
 within the fisherman s body began to be audible. 
 It rumbled and shook him. It grew heavier and 
 louder, and his folds of flesh were agitated by it. 
 
 "Come," said Quiroz, and, cat-like, went away 
 to the street door. He paused and went to the 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 257 
 
 stables, and returned with a strong rope. Then he 
 went out. 
 
 He was followed by Fortino, who, from the house 
 to the plaza, and from the plaza back to the house, 
 never ceased to chuckle. The news of the approach 
 ing fleet was now spreading, and there were new 
 groups on the street hurrying hither and thither or 
 going to the river. They were not, however, so 
 numerous as Quiroz had feared. For his plans the 
 leading of this fisherman through the streets had 
 some peril in it and he knew it. He held Fortino s 
 arm. He hurried him with all speed, and passed 
 those who passed him in fear of the news being 
 spoken. This was the one narrow edge whereon his 
 course went. Once over this, and the giant still 
 blinded by his lies, he believed he could manage 
 the rest. There were other things that blinded 
 Fortino, his eagerness, his wounded vanity about 
 to be satisfied, his subterranean joy. It is doubtful 
 that cannon could have taken his mind from his 
 laborious cogitations as he went unseeing, unhear- 
 ing, into the central square. 
 
 The square was still dark and nearly empty. They 
 came to the coil of chain, and Fortino stooped and 
 felt it caressingly. He ran the rope round its lower 
 coils. Then he knelt with his back to it, and put 
 his hands behind him, under the chain. Quiroz 
 assisted. The rest of the rope was passed over 
 Fortino s head, placed across his broad breast, and 
 knotted again at the chain, after the manner of the 
 ropes of cargadores to this day. The giant swayed a 
 little forward. The mass came up slowly. Quiroz s 
 hands steadied it, and the lifter, holding his breath, 
 was on his feet with the iron coming up, up. He 
 was at length straight and the burden secure. 
 
 17 
 
258 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 "She weighs," muttered Fortino, "some hundred 
 and fifty kilos." 
 
 Even so great a weight is not really formidable to 
 a very strong Mexican. But as Fortino went pon 
 derously through the darkness his tread on the earth 
 was like the tread of a monster. On the return 
 there was less danger of his hearing the news, 
 for he was even more preoccupied; yet Quiroz, 
 close at his side, scarcely breathed for anxiety. 
 Certain groups and hastening couples discussed 
 the unheard-of fleet. Quiroz broke in with loud 
 remarks to his companion and drowned the voices. 
 Some came near enough to note the burdened 
 man. But the darkness permitted none to recog 
 nize the nature of the burden, and a heavily laden 
 cargador, even so early in the morning, was not a 
 sight worthy of much comment when there were 
 other greater wonders at hand. When at length 
 the two arrived at the centre of the fifteen-yard 
 stretch between the two angles of the street, and 
 at a point near Pepa s window, and some seven 
 yards from the first corner, the carrier paused, knelt 
 slowly down, and deposited the chain on the ground 
 close against the wall of Quiroz s house. 
 
 "Nobody will steal that," said he, huskily, 
 mopping his brow. "They could take the house 
 first." 
 
 There were still little beams of light coming 
 through the chinks of Pepa s window. The two 
 speedily turned the corner and entered the patio 
 door. Quiroz not only locked it, but put its only 
 key in his pocket. He led the fisherman into the 
 larger court of the stables, across that and into the 
 little lane into which Anastasio had ridden. As 
 he did so the first of the dawn was in the sky. 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 259 
 
 "Burst in that door," said he, pointing to the 
 smithy. 
 
 Fortino did it with evident pleasure. It was a 
 matter of no difficulty to his shoulder. They struck 
 a light within. Fortino seized anvil and hammers; 
 Quiroz loaded himself with bars of iron. Thus 
 burdened they retired across the lane and re-entered 
 the stable court, the door of which Quiroz locked, 
 pocketing that key also. In the court s middle the 
 stolen property was deposited. A portable brasero 
 and charcoal were brought from the kitchen. The 
 maid-servants sleeping in the next room were not 
 awakened by Doroteo s silent tread. 
 
 "It 11 be some trouble heating it with that," said 
 Fortino. "Why couldn t I have done it in the 
 smithy?" 
 
 "This is better, boy," said Quiroz, whispering. 
 " Secrecy secrecy is the word. You can heat it 
 by hard blowing of the fire. There are ocote, 
 matches, and a soplador. Now have you it clear 
 in your head what you need ? " 
 
 "Clear as glory, and here it is." 
 
 Fortino then laid out his plans to Quiroz with as 
 much fervor and as tingling a pleasure as ever 
 would-be poet displayed in reading his verse to his 
 friend. Quiroz approved. 
 
 "Make the hook first," said he. "That must be 
 on the opposite side in the wall of the garden of a 
 good neighbor of mine. The wall must be scaled 
 by a ladder, which deed you must do before it is 
 well day, that you may attract less attention. At 
 it, oh my aspiring soul ! Glory shall be yours ! " 
 
 And the giant went to work with a force and a 
 haste that made his flesh only some degrees less hot 
 than his furnace. 
 
260 A DKJ-.AM Or A Til ROM: 
 
 Before the lighting of the fire Ouiroz went across 
 the court to his sleeping mozo and awoke him. 
 
 " Come," said he. 
 
 The mozo followed him into the patio, whereupon 
 Doroteo shut and locked that door also, and pocketed 
 his third key. 
 
 "Stay here in the corrector a little," said Quiroz; 
 " I shall presently need you." 
 
 So Fortino was left alone with his chuckling and 
 his labors of glory. 
 
 Quiroz was again with the girl. It was a half 
 hour after this, and there was now a very little light 
 in the street, that Pepa, let out by Quiroz, who 
 locked the door again after her, went away toward 
 the river. While Doroteo was absent she had 
 changed her dress, and he saw, as she came out in 
 the dawn, that it was red. 
 
CHAPTER XII. 
 
 TO the man in whom there is something of the 
 dreamer it seems there is also likely to be cer 
 tain bitter compensations for the pleasure of his 
 dreams. Just so much as he is capable of rising into 
 the mood of a rarefied medium, just so much is he 
 likely to be wont to sink into moods of doubt and 
 darkness. For a time the doubt becomes that kind 
 of sickness of spirit which, like the morbidness of the 
 sleepless, sees health nowhere, and can only believe 
 in health by a kind of unimpressive hearsay. This is 
 the price of the dreamer s exaltation. What it was 
 that sunk Vicente into a bad mood when he left Ji- 
 quilpan, he himself did not know. There had come 
 into his mind at times some shadow of sorrow con 
 cerning the girl, he would not have called it doubt. 
 He was given, too, to a deep and comprehensive 
 speculation always, which may have been often too 
 far beyond the immediate task in hand. Otherwise 
 he might have doubted Quiroz, for he knew some 
 thing of Quiroz. Yet, thought he, to what cause 
 could an adventurer better cling than this? The very 
 nature of his progress and his project seemed to him 
 certain to hold Quiroz. Then, too, it is hard for a 
 man of Vicente s nature to realize perfidy of the 
 blackest kind till he sees it proved. Hence, wherein 
 he was weakest was wherein the church and its train 
 ing had given him some little of the nature of the 
 
262 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 churchly philosopher who loses sight, in bigger 
 schemes, of one small criminal in his way. 
 
 The mounting of his troops had been pushed 
 steadily on. He now had horses for a large majority, 
 a number approaching fourteen hundred. As his 
 force marched out of Jiquilpan shortly before dawn, 
 this cavalry rode in advance of the smaller infantry. 
 The sense of coming danger was heavy on Vicente as 
 they went. He was in the lead silent. Somehow 
 his thoughts would not mount over this day and go 
 on to victory. They wandered rather in the past and 
 stopped short this side of Tizapan. 
 
 " And he set cherubim and a flaming sword that 
 turneth every way," muttered he. " Ay, the strong 
 man will come before the century ends. But what 
 are you, with your old Aztec blood, that you should 
 pass those cherubim and that sword?" 
 
 He became restless with that sense of danger over 
 him, and eager to dash into it and have it done. The 
 sun came up, and the day over which his thoughts 
 could not leap was begun. It was scarcely an hour 
 later that Anastasio s thin figure and flying horse 
 burst with ungainly speed on his view. The message 
 was delivered and communicated to the troops. They 
 had been advancing some hours at a brisk gait. 
 They were somewhat stunned by the news of that 
 bold move of Rodrigo s, but when they knew Doro- 
 teo s estimate of thcjcfSs numbers they shouted and 
 laughed over it, and were eager to be on. Vicente 
 only smiled when he heard of the fleet. He knew 
 now that the greatest speed might be all too slow. 
 He abandoned the infantry, with the command that 
 it should follow as rapidly as possible. He ordered 
 the cavalry forward with such speed as was at all 
 compatible with the distance. 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 263 
 
 The line galloped on, grinding the trail into dust 
 that swirled in clouds behind. An hour, and there 
 was many a horse in a lather, but the beat of the gal 
 lop ceased not. Vicente himself, at the front with 
 Anastasio, set the pace. Anastasio s horse, because 
 of its long journey hither, began to give out. It could 
 not stand this continued charge. Anastasio fell be 
 hind. That lank rider found himself at length the 
 last of the line. Francisco, in a brotherly mood, con 
 ceived with extreme suddenness and acted upon with 
 unwonted alacrity, lagged likewise, using great and 
 highly unselfish energy to assist his comrade on with 
 his steed. A terrible passion fell on Anastasio, a 
 thing exceeding rare to that languid fisherman. 
 Whereas for years previous he had not felt anger, it 
 was as though the years heaped it all now within him. 
 Hence, raging over the prospect of dropping far be 
 hind and seeing none of the fight (a prospect by no 
 means so annoying to Francisco), he beat his animal 
 with clattering vigor, employing for this purpose 
 arms, feet, knees, spurs, even the whole of his legs. 
 Finally, when the horse would, in spite of all tor 
 ments, stop still for a siesta in the road s middle, An 
 astasio got off and threw rocks at it. Francisco s 
 excessive sympathy at this pass was worthy of a 
 more appreciative object. He paused likewise, in 
 dustriously absorbed in his condolence. He was so 
 furiously berated by Anastasio for this misplaced zeal, 
 that he at length reluctantly pursued the flying 
 troops. Hence it was that the deserted philosopher 
 entered Tizapan a half hour after the last of the cav 
 alry had disappeared in the narrow street. 
 
 By half-past eight, such was the speed of the forced 
 gallop, the troop was within less than two leagues 
 from the town. It was here that another messenger 
 
264 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 met it. He was Doroteo s MOSO, riding at a hard 
 gallop also. The line was not halted; the messenger 
 merely fell in with it. He handed a paper to Vicente, 
 who read it as he rode. It was this : 
 
 They are drawn up in the plaza, watching the streets. 
 They are a little over two hundred, all mounted. They 
 believe you are near and that they have no time to fortify. 
 Come straight up the river street, which is open. We will 
 join you. Victory is ours. But it depends on the vigor of 
 the charge, for their position is bad for us. Hence, ride 
 hard. QUIROZ. 
 
 The news was passed back and the order for a less 
 ening of speed. The last two leagues were covered 
 on a brisk trot only, that the horses might be a little 
 fresher. The town was then suddenly at hand. Be 
 fore entering it a halt was ordered. The leader 
 believed it unnecessary to attack his enemy with 
 his entire force, a force whose numbers would have 
 produced a congestion in the street and plaza embar 
 rassing if not fatal. He therefore chose less than a 
 third of his cavalry to accompany him in the first 
 charge. He formed them five abreast; commanded 
 the reserve to proceed to the town and remain in 
 waiting in the street; and gave the word to advance. 
 
 They came to the river road that cuts the lake road 
 at right angles. Vicente wheeled into it, seeing the 
 mud huts, the marsh, the rising ducks, the glistening 
 mirror of the lake, and thirty empty canoas lifting 
 slim masts from the river. The cavalry beat up be 
 tween the stone walls to the town. The order was 
 given that the charge in full gallop, boldly, should be 
 entered on at once when the first of the low adobe 
 houses that lined the street should be reached. A 
 last black doubt swept, then, over Vicente. He re- 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 265 
 
 membered afterward that even as they struck the 
 gallop there came down over him some sense of the 
 rottenness of the whole human fabric. He was filled 
 with a calm ferocity after that. He felt like a spirit 
 leaping into fire. He found himself saying again, as 
 they began the last mad charge through the shaft : 
 " And he set cherubim and a flaming sword " 
 The town had till then lain in comparative silence. 
 It had been, as it were, hugging itself in a chill an 
 ticipation. The streets were long since deserted. 
 There was indeed a band of more than two hundred 
 horsemen drawn up in the plaza, with weapons aimed 
 at the river way. The only other bridge, that had 
 led into the plaza from the other direction, was as 
 lacking as it had been when Doroteo saw the place 
 of it in the night. By the third street, from the west, 
 Rodrigo had come. As he rode into the plaza 
 Bonavidas had been unable longer to keep back the 
 source of his knowledge. Rodrigo turned white as 
 he listened. Remorse fell on him as though he had 
 been a criminal. But he was there. His men were 
 there. The enemy was at hand. 
 
 There was silence without the house of Ouiroz. 
 The iron chain was still in the street, though there 
 had been, earlier, a change in the position of it. 
 The swirls of extraordinary colors shone as gaudily 
 on the walls as though they expressed some type of 
 self-assurance and vanity. The colors had been the 
 first in the street to come out of the obscurity of the 
 night. The earliest dawn had had its first, silent 
 sport with the green and the red. Not long after 
 that earliest dawn, and when the street was still dimly 
 and grayly lit, Quiroz and the giant had come stealth 
 ily out of the patio door, closed it, and rounded the 
 corner into the fifteen-yard stretch where the chain 
 
266 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 was still coiled against the wall. They crossed the 
 street here to its opposite side. There was then 
 (and in some parts of the same town there are still 
 similar ones) a small fruit orchard of pomegranates, 
 aguacatcs, oranges, etc., mingled with a little coffee. 
 It was walled in on two sides by houses, and on the 
 side next the street by a thick adobe wall as high as 
 the houses themselves and, like them, capped with 
 tiles. Over the tiles tops were seen the tops of 
 trees stirring a little with the morning s breath. The 
 great Fortino bore a ladder, and there were iron and 
 instruments in the hands of Quiroz. This little turn 
 of the street was deserted. Its dust and stones 
 seemed to be asleep in the dim gray. 
 
 The ladder was put against the garden wall op 
 posite the house, and the two climbed up to the tiles 
 and pulled it after them. They then lowered it 
 within and descended. The trees cast a deep shade. 
 The scent of orange blossoms was strong, and the 
 slick leaves of coffee, even in the gloom, had begun 
 to shine. There was no sound save that of the men 
 themselves or the occasional falling of a purple alli 
 gator pear from some unseen height. Then the 
 sweat, which with him was ever a mental product, 
 came out on the ox-like Fortino and he seized the 
 tools and began digging in the adobe wall at a height 
 a little lower than a man s shoulder. Quiroz stood 
 over him urging him on in suave whispers. 
 
 " They will know," said Quiroz, " that Fortino, 
 the slender, conceived it, executed it, and wears his 
 glory as he wears his grace. Let other heroes be 
 like this. There will be no strutting out of Fortino. 
 It is to keep faith, to redeem pledges, to establish 
 again that repute that the sensitive mind felt gone. 
 Ah, these are the world s noblemen ! At it, my 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 267 
 
 boy ! you are a foot and a half through. I should 
 say you are more than half the distance. This wall 
 is never a nun s finger thicker than a vara. God ! 
 this place might be a nunnery and we getting into 
 it, an idea sufficiently full of poetry if I had time to 
 carry it out." 
 
 " Give me only ten minutes," growled the giant, 
 hoarsely. 
 
 Three quarters of an hour after entering, the two 
 and the ladder were again in the street, which had 
 grown lighter. They passed some excited men and 
 women who came a moment too late to see from 
 whence they had taken that means of ascent which 
 Fortino again bore on his shoulder. They rounded 
 the corner to the patio door and went in, at which 
 moment the huge one burst into a private and fear 
 ful laugh that was a kind of monstrous exultation. 
 And from the garden wall, where they had worked, 
 protruded some inches into the street a heavy iron 
 hook capable of withstanding a mighty strain, for 
 it was but the curved end of a bar that ran three feet 
 through the solid adobe and was clamped on the 
 far side. 
 
 In the house Dona Manuela was again to be seen, 
 and still in the light blue. Dona Manuela s hair, 
 turning gray, was arranged but loosely, and a curl, 
 grayer than the rest, fell down on her cheek. 
 
 " Ah, Doroteo ! " cried she, running out to the 
 corredor as the men came in. " I was driven very 
 unhappy, for you and the girl were gone ! Where 
 were you? And be very careful, my son, lest you 
 take some false step that you would regret till the 
 day of your death, which Mary grant it may be here 
 in your bed and peaceful." 
 
 " I am more careful than St. John when he wrote 
 
268 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 books and recorded visions, Mamacita" He led 
 Fortino to the rear patio, let him through, and whis 
 pered : "At it again, thou patriotic heart, and let 
 purgatory s flames be slower ! " 
 
 " This is true," said the anxious lady as he returned 
 to her; "wild and uncareful ways were ever unnat 
 ural to you, Doroteo. But I am sometimes afraid 
 you may be led astray. She is really a quiet girl, 
 Doroteo? Is she a good girl, such as your old 
 mother would want you to keep company with?" 
 
 She passed her hand over his face, looked up at 
 him, eagerly, and ran her fingers under his sombrero 
 and through his hair. 
 
 " I have never seen anything about her that any 
 Castilian or Moorish traditions could blush at," said 
 he. " She will be coming back, and as modest as 
 white violets, 1 11 swear by any kind of an image." 
 
 An hour later, during which hour there had been 
 hammering in the rear court, the street door, which 
 Doroteo had not again locked, was opened and Pepa 
 came in. She carried a set expression of the feat 
 ures during those hours, and a deep and strange 
 gaze was in her eyes, a gaze that frightened Dona 
 Manuela, true-hearted Dona Manuela, who, though 
 all she thought was mistaken, though she clung only 
 to false old beliefs concerning that handsome son 
 than whom there could have been no greater stranger 
 to her on the sad face of the earth, still held the 
 great good, the glory that will shine because it is 
 faith when the earth is dead. She had made many 
 little fluttering plans about going to Pepa, when 
 Pepa should come in, and putting her arm about 
 her and having a good, satisfying talk with the girl. 
 But when she saw Pepa, the fluttering changed and 
 she could not approach her. 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 269 
 
 Doroteo locked the patio door after the girl. She 
 said nothing to him of her success, but he knew it 
 from her face. 
 
 "Is it ready?" asked she, her eye burning, but 
 with a tone not soft or satisfied, and on hearing 
 which Dona Manuela went away slowly under the 
 corrector. 
 
 "The garden, yes a minute more and the other 
 likewise. The red again ! Passion of God ! I love 
 you in red ! I made it a rule when I was still a 
 boy that I would never play any color but the red. 
 There must be a red fire in my very soul, else I am 
 born near hell and hear the crackle of the blaze. I 
 am like a bull, that the color maddens me. I never 
 see it that something in me does not stir as though it 
 would leap. I can shut my eyes any time in the 
 night and see a red stream, like blood, flowing hot 
 through my brain. Ideas, people, deeds, associate 
 themselves to me with colors, and if the color is red, 
 the idea, the person, the deed is mine or I will die 
 getting it. Pepa, if I shut my eyes and think of you 
 Muerte de Dios ! there was never a color so deep, 
 so maddening as that. It is as though my soul were 
 suddenly a mass of flame. You have dressed thus 
 for me on the great day ! " 
 
 He went away to the door of the rear court. She 
 had not smiled at him, and when he turned, having 
 said she had dressed in red for him, there was a high 
 scorn on her face. He came back with Fortino, 
 who was absorbed in his deed to as great an extent 
 as the mass of his body was great. Fortino carried 
 more tools and more iron, and there were still noises 
 in him, and when he passed Pepa he emitted heat like 
 the lime-kiln to which Anastasio had compared him. 
 He went with Doroteo to Pepa s room and the two 
 
270 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 entered it, she following. Dona Manuela, bewildered 
 and bent at the far end of the corrector, scared at the 
 tools and the iron, came slowly up, trembling and 
 murmuring: 
 
 " Oh Doroteo ! Oh Doroteo ! " 
 
 The room Pepa had occupied was the corner room ; 
 that is to say, its east side was upon that part of the 
 street which was the straight stretch to the river, its 
 south side was on the fifteen-yard stretch between 
 the two angles. There were two windows in it, one 
 in each of the two sides named. The east win 
 dow therefore, looked out on the straight way over 
 which cavalry would pass before reaching the first 
 corner. That window was, indeed, not far from the 
 patio door, which led out into that way and faced 
 in the same direction. The south window gave view 
 across the street to the garden from whose wall pro 
 truded the iron hook. Mention has been made of 
 the bars that protected these windows. The feature 
 is a common one nearly a universal one in Mex 
 ico to-day. From the high top to the low bottom 
 near the floor, there extended over the outer sides of 
 these two apertures iron bars a few inches apart, like 
 the bars of a jail. These were bent at the ends to 
 right angles, and the ends were inserted deep in the 
 outer adobes surrounding the windows and fastened 
 securely ; so that the plane of the bars was a few 
 inches beyond the plane of the wall. On this 
 account one could stand on the broad sill and, look 
 ing up and down the street, see the whole of it, which 
 view would have been impossible had the bars been 
 flush with the wall. This, too, is the common 
 arrangement to-day. 
 
 The hook in the garden adobes was opposite a 
 spot corresponding to one nearly in the southwest 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 271 
 
 corner of the room, to the right of the south window 
 as one looked out, and some seven yards from the 
 street s angle, for the apartment was large. To this 
 corner went the giant in his labors of glory. Here, 
 too, he assaulted the plastering (tinted blue and with 
 lines and stencil-figures of red and brown) and came 
 to the adobe and assaulted that, the drops running 
 from his face, his throat giving out grunts. Doroteo 
 and the girl stood silently behind him and Dona 
 Manuela crept to the door. Then she cried out: 
 
 " Oh my son ! This will make an ill appearance. 
 Doroteo! Doroteo! what is it? What terrible thing 
 are you going to do? I have felt it all night that 
 you would do something that you would regret. 
 What is the meaning of this awful hole?" 
 
 It was at this moment that there came a knocking 
 on the iron knocker of the patio door. She did not 
 heed it, perhaps did not hear it. Pepa was as still as 
 a mute, watching the tools in Fortino s hands. It 
 would have taken a many times more ominous knock 
 ing than that to wake Fortino from the internal 
 frenzy of his dream. For indeed the knocking was 
 a little timid. Doroteo, who had stood near the east 
 window as though guarding it, gave no appearance 
 of perceiving the knock. 
 
 " The truth is, mother," said he, " that my enemies 
 are coming up this street to sack the town. Fortino, 
 this patriot here, is going to stretch the big chain 
 across for a little impediment. The idea is masterful 
 and all Fortino s." 
 
 "S/, let them come let them come! " muttered 
 Fortino from the corner. 
 
 "Oh Doroteo! " cried the old lady, throwing her 
 self upon him. " I beseech you to leave the war alone ! 
 Come, come your life shall be quieter ! " 
 
2 7 2 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 There was a second knocking on the iron knocker 
 at the door, louder but still unheeded. 
 
 " You would make a coward of me, mother," asked 
 he blandly, " when the enemy comes to sack the 
 town and carry you off ? " 
 
 " No," she answered with sadness, " they would n t 
 want a poor old soul like me." She sank into a 
 painful revery, still clinging to him, during which 
 there was a third knocking, louder and still more pro 
 longed. " Is it necessary to the war, all this, and the 
 terrible hole?" asked she. " Doroteo, I wanted you 
 to follow the natural bent of your nature and Oh 
 Holy Mary ! is that hook out there in Don Ana- 
 cleto s garden wall for the chain ? Why Doroteo ! 
 if some of the horses trip on it the riders will be 
 killed ! " 
 
 The fourth knocking, irregular, like that of one in 
 great haste and growing fearful. Doroteo moved to 
 the window and looked out, saying: 
 
 " Not likely, Mamacita. Ah, it is the auburn- 
 haired one. How in the name of miracles did that 
 little bird flutter here?" 
 
 He and Pepa exchanged glances, and Pepa went 
 out, followed quickly by Dona Manuela. 
 
 "Auburn hair, did he say?" murmured the latter. 
 Whose? was it hair he said? Ah! Clarita ! Clar- 
 ita ! Oh little lady how did you come and you 
 had n t forgotten me ! " 
 
 " I came in one of the boats," said Clarita, 
 admitted by Pepa. She was tired and wretched. 
 She had grown very much afraid at the door, think 
 ing no one would come to let her in, being alone in 
 the town without friends, and all the danger and the 
 fear of battles, and the fear for him accompanying 
 her. " I came because I I wanted to come. This 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 273 
 
 is all," said she, taking off the gray rebozo, whereat 
 the auburn hair shone. 
 
 " But you have come to a terrible place," groaned 
 Dona Manuela. " Come away ; I will give you some 
 thing to eat." 
 
 " Only a little coffee, Dona Manuela. Pepa, Pepa ! 
 I did not know you were here. Then Vicente, too, 
 has come? Pepa, I think you are not well; you do 
 not look well. There is Doroteo in the room, too 
 oh tell me, has Vicente come ! " 
 
 Doroteo had stepped to the room door and closed 
 and locked it. 
 
 " He has not come," said Pepa, " but he is coming 
 in an hour." 
 
 It was like a soft spring day in the midst of winter, 
 this coming of the gentle one. She walked across 
 the patio, clothed in her faithfulness and her inno 
 cence, and none of the crime came near her. She ate 
 a little in the kitchen, wept over and fondled by Dona 
 Manuela, whose whole heart and all its frozen fears 
 and longings melted with a rush before Clarita ; to all 
 of which Clarita smiled a little and had the dimples 
 out, and was eager, in her sadness, for the hour to 
 pass. Meanwhile Pepa stood just outside the door 
 of the room wherein Fortino was at work, and kept 
 her gaze, a hard one, on the kitchen, and guarded 
 the secret. Afterward she went to the kitchen 
 door and said abruptly: 
 
 " Did the jefe say how he would come to the 
 plaza?" 
 
 " No," said Clarita, " I did n t talk to him about 
 that." 
 
 Pepa went back to the door of her own room re 
 lieved. Then Clarita s arrival was of less moment 
 than she had thought probable. Clarita, too, would 
 
 18 
 
274 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 suppose Rodrigo s course to be up this street. Yet 
 it were best to keep her away from Fortino till the 
 work should be done. Quiroz came and spoke a 
 moment to Pepa, and returned and again closed the 
 door. 
 
 " Do you know who has come? " he was now say 
 ing to the sweating fisherman, kneeling down and 
 laying a hand on the other s shoulder as he worked. 
 " Clarita. She came by one of my own canoas from 
 Chapala. She has seen Vicente, and she, soul of 
 honesty, is our witness that Vicente has arrived. She 
 came from the plaza and he has sent her here for 
 safety. Have you kept your ears alert, my moun 
 tainous one have you listened for the tramp of 
 horses? " 
 
 " I have listened and there has been no horse pass 
 by this street," said Fortino, coming to the outer air 
 at last and completing the hole with a grunt of 
 satisfaction. 
 
 "And why? Because the scheme goes on as 
 Quiroz said. Vicente has entered the town by the 
 other bridge. At this moment his spurs are clinking 
 in the plaza. Do you know, old hungerer for deeds, 
 I long since sent my mozo to lie in wait for Rodrigo 
 at the lake road from Tuxcueco and (for my mozo is 
 unknown to that doomed /r/r) to tell him of Vicente s 
 readiness. Hence Rodrigo is no such fool as not to 
 be in full gallop when the pretty play is made. Come 
 out; and up with the chain." 
 
 " No," said Fortino. 
 
 " What is it now ! " 
 
 " I shall out and prepare, si seTwr" said Fortino. 
 " But the chain comes not up till the horses are on 
 it. Ha! ha! Give my strong arm one good last 
 chance ! " 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 275 
 
 " Fortino, Fortino, my boy, can you be sure of it 
 thus? It would take strength like that of a bull and 
 a speed straight out of Heaven ! " 
 
 " Fah ! " thundered Fortino, going to the door. 
 " I shall not risk their seeing it and pulling up. Ha ! 
 ha! Ha! ha!" 
 
 Laughing wildly he went out across the patio and 
 into the street. He turned the corner and came to 
 the hole he had made through the gaudy wall. He 
 lifted an end of the coil that lay there and passed it 
 through the aperture to Quiroz. 
 
 "What are you doing?" cried a last passer-by, 
 hurrying away to safety. 
 
 " It is not any of your damned business ! " cried 
 Fortino, and returned to the patio, and into the room, 
 still laughing. 
 
 So they clamped that chain end immovably inside 
 the room with strong iron, which, before it could 
 break through, must tear out a good fourth of the 
 wall ; and it may be as well to remind the reader 
 again that the adobe walls of a good house are of 
 great thickness and solidity. 
 
 It was approaching nine o clock when the fisher 
 man again went out on to the street, his form swelling 
 and his eyes seeing nothing. The houses might have 
 been pearl, so full of an exaltation was he, a righteous, 
 faithful exaltation, a desire to do good, strong deeds 
 in an honest cause ay, the streets might have been 
 paved with gold. 
 
 Doroteo locked the patio door after him and went 
 and locked also the door of the room wherein he had 
 worked. So that chosen apartment was left empty 
 with its clamps of iron and its chain end and its hole 
 in the wall. Quiroz handled the two heavy keys for 
 one hesitating second. Each was monstrous, that of 
 
276 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 the room especially so, being a foot in length and 
 of heavy metal. There were reasons why Quiroz 
 deemed it best that his person should not be encum 
 bered by such a weight of iron. It was in that 
 second that Pepa went out by the rear door that led 
 into the second court. She proceeded thence into 
 the alley and streets Anastasio had traversed. Quiroz 
 cast a glance at the kitchen. His mother was still 
 there with Clarita, but she would be hovering over 
 him in a minute more. 
 
 He slipped into the glassy and unhome-like parlor 
 and hid the two keys amidst the artificial fruit, the 
 cracked crystal chirimoya, the slices of melon, the 
 china mango buried them in that uninviting heap 
 of painted lusciousness. Then he came stealthily out 
 and, as silently as the girl had gone, went through 
 the back court and into the alley by the smithy. He 
 did not lock those two rear doors but closed them, 
 leaving a quicker retreat if it should be needed. At 
 the smithy he turned to the left in the lane and came, 
 after a few yards, to that prolongation of the fifteen- 
 yard stretch by which Anastasio had entered the 
 latter when he rode past the house and away. 
 Quiroz, just before coming to the first of the fifteen 
 yards, found Pepa, like a red statue, standing at the 
 corner of the street that led into the plaza. She was 
 waiting there, hid from the view of any one in the 
 plaza itself, but being so near the corner that merely 
 a step would be sufficient to bring the gleam of a red 
 dress to the eyes of those waiting. Quiroz passed 
 her, singing softly: 
 
 " She staked her love upon the red " 
 
 He passed by the opening of the street that led 
 into the plaza and, looking thither, saw cavalry stand- 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 277 
 
 ing. He went on and entered the fifteen-yard stretch, 
 in the middle of which was Fortino. Fortino s laugh 
 ter had sunk into the subterranean chuckle. The 
 chain of massive links was stretched across the road, 
 but lying on the ground. It was almost twice as 
 long as was necessary. So he (standing against the 
 garden wall and by the hook) held it near its middle, 
 the useless portion being coiled at the wall s foot. 
 But even so much of that unbreakable line of iron 
 was of great weight, and the hook was nearly as high 
 as his shoulder. 
 
 " Can you do it? " said Quiroz. 
 
 " Si, lo hare" was the untroubled response. 
 
 The street was so narrow that the distance of seven 
 yards to the first corner would prevent Fortino s being 
 seen by the approachers till they were near rounding 
 the turn. Fortino was cogitating on this point. 
 
 " Si but they must be nearer than that nearer 
 than that," muttered he. 
 
 " No ! " cried Quiroz with passion. " In the name 
 of all that is holy, up with it before they make the 
 turn ! " 
 
 " Not so ! " grunted the preoccupied Fortino. 
 
 " I tell you yes," whispered Doroteo. " At least 
 leave it to me. Give your attention, man, to the 
 chain. I will tell you when to swing it up. Wait 
 not too long! " 
 
 " Vamos a ver" responded Fortino. 
 
 When Quiroz had left the house he had for a mo 
 ment forgotten the properties of a mother s eyes and 
 ears. Dona Manuela, in the kitchen, had seen his 
 stealthy entrance into the parlor and had heard the 
 slight rattle of the crystal fruit. When he went out, 
 she ran after him, calling him : 
 
 " I want you with me, Doroteo ! " 
 
278 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 But he had not heard and was gone. She came 
 back and, Clarita having drunk her coffee, Doiia 
 Manuela, followed by the girl (who was beginning 
 to be frightened by the lady s manner), ran to the 
 parlor and, knocking the crystal cJiiriinoya to the 
 glazed brick floor where it burst into a score of pieces, 
 discovered the keys. 
 
 " Clarita ! " cried she, " they are leading him into a 
 secrecy that is as unnatural to him as it is painful to 
 his mother. Come, I feel that I must open the door 
 of the room." 
 
 And she went to it, the sky blue dress fluttering. 
 In her fulness of heart and desire to talk of the 
 nature of Doroteo, she had not at all explained to 
 Clarita the matter of the chain. She had chattered 
 on as though the other knew of it, and Clarita was 
 by now quite bewildered. The door was unlocked 
 and the two went in, and the old lady with fear and 
 trembling pointed at the end of the chain clamped 
 against the wall in the corner. 
 
 " These are the awful things he is led into. Oh, 
 Clarita, my little friend ! my little friend ! " 
 
 Clarita stared at it. Then she came a step nearer 
 the south window and looked out and saw Fortino, 
 the huge, the ugly, standing against the opposite wall, 
 his loose white trousers flapping in a little breeze, his 
 blue sash brilliant, his head bare, his eyes staring in a 
 trance at the corner, the chain in his hand. Quiroz 
 was near him. The street was as silent as though the 
 town were dead. The sun came into it and was yellow 
 on the stones, the earth, and the adobes ; the breath 
 from the lake lifted the dust aimlessly and swirled it 
 about in little funnels. She was horrified. She felt 
 all the blood in her veins as though it stood sud 
 denly still. 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 279 
 
 "What are they going to do, Dona Manuela?" 
 asked she, whispering it. 
 
 " Why, they say their enemy is coming and they 
 will stop him," cried the other. " Oh ! I cannot look 
 yet, yet I will have to ! I cannot yet I can 
 not refrain. Nay, nay, I will not look ! " 
 
 Clarita s face turned suddenly gray. She had been 
 too young, too sincere and innocent, to dream of it 
 before but had she had time to think she would 
 now have known the great, new thing that was born 
 in her heart. Don Rodrigo and his men were to 
 plunge into that trap. She went to the east win 
 dow, the window that gave view toward the river, and 
 stepped up on its ledge and looked down. Far away 
 there were horses galloping here at a fearful speed. 
 She was sick and clung to the iron. " At least," said 
 she, " it will save my brother. Oh Vicente ! Vicente ! 
 the chain will save you ! " So she stood, fascinated, 
 unable to move, and prayed to Mother Mary, while 
 Dona Manuela, seeing by the girl s face that the mo 
 ment was come, crouched in the room and covered 
 her ears and her eyes with her hands. 
 
 The galloping troop came on and its speed seemed 
 increased. They were within two hundred yards of 
 her when she recognized him. The knowledge came 
 to her like the stab of a knife, but it gave her thought 
 and swiftness. She leaped from the window with a 
 cry, ran from the room and to the patio door, the one 
 idea, to stop him, crystallized in her brain. She 
 pushed and beat upon the door. It was locked and 
 the terrified Dona Manuela had the key. 
 
 "The key! The key!" cried the girl, rushing 
 frantically upon her. The old woman could not 
 realize it or obey. It was too late. The horses 
 gallop was heard close to the spot. Clarita ran again 
 
2 8o A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 with a wild despair to the east window and seized the 
 iron and called. It was he indeed. He was close to 
 her. He was passing her. Madly she shrieked his 
 name the gallop drowned it and he had gone by, 
 pulling up slightly to wheel the corner, wheeling it 
 out of her sight. She was not one to bury her face. 
 Her terror was too vast. She was at once at the 
 south window, springing to its sill, seeing the chain, 
 crying to him piteously. 
 
 Outside there had come to Fortino too the sound 
 of the hoofs. He gave one more fierce laugh and 
 steeled his mighty muscles. The cavalry came burst 
 ing round the corner upon him. He waited till the 
 last second. He heard Quiroz s shrill scream, " Up 
 with it ! Up with it ! " and felt Quiroz s fists beating 
 his great back. He put out all his monstrous strength 
 and the line of iron links swung up. He saw, then, 
 Vicente s face, a fine, set, white face, and the eyes 
 bent ahead. He recognized it, yet he did not rec 
 ognize it. The time was too short. The great deed 
 was too strong on him bewilderment could not stop 
 it; and Quiroz was screaming in his ears. Confused, 
 he saw Clarita in the window beating the bars she 
 could not break, pale as death and screaming. His 
 neck swelled in bristling folds and his muscles were 
 steel. The chain swung up and a link of it fell over 
 the hook, and the cavalry, which in that second had 
 rushed on to its doom, crashed against the unyielding 
 iron barrier. Vicente in front, was thrown forward, 
 over his horse s head, over the chain, falling stunned 
 in the street beyond. His steed, with those beside it, 
 was hurled back on haunches and the riders were cast 
 to earth. The next beasts were upon them, and the 
 next and the next dashed into the struggling heap. 
 Men shrieked and went down amidst trampling hoofs 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 281 
 
 The whole distance to the corner and beyond it be 
 came one fearful mass of indiscriminate ruin; till, 
 owing to the fact that there was necessarily some 
 little distance between each successive five and the fol 
 lowing five, the onward charge was at length stopped 
 with all but less than one hundred pulled short in the 
 river road, safe but panic-stricken, turning, fleeing. 
 
 At the moment of the shock the red dress had ap 
 peared suddenly in the street that led to the plaza. 
 A moment more and ihejefis troop was down on the 
 ruin. There was scarcely a shot fired, for there was 
 scarce need of it. In the main, Rodrigo s men 
 leaped from their horses and secured their prisoners. 
 Those at whom they would have shot were round a 
 corner, and there was no wading through that mass 
 of man and beast. Vicente was picked up and car 
 ried into safety as were many more, and guarded. 
 The work of extrication went on, and the mass was 
 untangled. Rodrigo found himself trembling as he 
 worked, as though from fear; and, looking up once 
 through the bars of the window, he perceived the 
 form of a girl lying there as though dead, and he saw 
 that her hair was auburn. 
 
 On Fortino the terrible mistake, for mistake as yet 
 he believed it, broke with a force beyond bitterness. 
 The giant was rendered mad. He cast his eyes 
 about like a dying ox. He saw the red dress of Pepa 
 among his enemies. He grasped at the last straw to 
 save his honor. He remembered, in the midst of 
 that infernal confusion, that he had once promised to 
 carry that girl out of danger, if danger should arise. 
 He believed her beset by enemies. With a hideous 
 sound that was more of a roar than a cry, and seem 
 ing crazy as the craziest lunatic, he burst through the 
 enemy, man and horse, with a force like the force of 
 a warship. He swung his arms and broke limbs as 
 
282 A DREAM OF A III RONE 
 
 he went. He came to the girl, and seized her from 
 the ground, lifting her with a grip it would have 
 taken ten men to loose. He plunged then with her, 
 through the last obstruction, crying out something in 
 a strange Indian tongue, and went striding away. 
 She called to him and pleaded with him, and all but 
 cursed him. She writhed and tore at his hair and 
 face. It had no more effect on that striding giant 
 than would have had a swarm of flies. 
 
 " Fortino can do something ! O my Lord ! He 
 can take care of ladies ! This is the field for the 
 cursed ladies ladies ! " 
 
 He strode on, turned the corner into the little lane, 
 and came to the smithy, still crying out, still heeding 
 not the writhings and the protestations of the girl. 
 He opened the rear door and bore her through. He 
 crossed that court where he had forged the iron, and 
 came to the patio door. He mistakenly thought it 
 was locked. With his last fury he dashed at it with 
 his shoulder. It was not a strong door, and it burst 
 like glass, and he tramped through. He went under 
 the patio s waving trees and over its brick pavement. 
 Dona Manucla was running to him, tottering. He 
 heeded her not. He clung to the girl. He bore her 
 under the tiled roof of the corredor, and all but flung 
 her into the room where Clarita lay. Then, himself 
 remaining outside, he banged the door to, locked it, 
 and hurled the key into the air a hundred yards away. 
 He sat down, after that, with his back to the wall, and 
 blubbered. 
 
 " There, O woman ! " cried he to the haggard lady. 
 " There is your prize ! I promised I would marry 
 her. So help me, pinnacles of Heaven, I will marry 
 her to the Archangel Gabriel, if you but speak the 
 word. Damn me ! Damn me ! " 
 
PART THIRD 
 
 THE ISLAND 
 
 CHAPTER I 
 
 SECRETS the church had in those old days, 
 unfathomable, dark, buried ones. The cloister, 
 in its holiness, fostered, perchance, some unholy 
 things. Here, as in the open world, doubtless some 
 who rose did it by crushing some who fell; at times 
 he who rose even crushed himself. 
 
 At Tizapan one may see the marsh, the river, the 
 lake and river roads. He may behold, even in the 
 midst of change, the street, the house, the spot. 
 These are not all; there is a less important thing, 
 a jail wherein a speechless prisoner was confined 
 on that same day ; in which, though it was no dun 
 geon, he was as buried as certain old monastery 
 secrets, clerical hopes, crimes of the cloister. 
 
 The prisons of these small towns were usually of 
 primitive sort. That in Chapala even now is of but 
 one room. The Tizapan jail was, at the time of the 
 disaster to Vicente s troops, of a similar simplicity. 
 It was located in the centre of the town, on the 
 main plaza, being behind Rodrigo as he waited 
 there with his horsemen. Its floor was a space of 
 hardened earth not more than fifteen feet square. 
 There were no windows, only the large door of iron 
 bars that led into the plaza. It was to this place, as 
 
284 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 the only security immediately available, that the 
 man captured at Chapala by Bonavidas had been 
 brought. He had entered with the same oppressed, 
 slavish manner, doggedly, not looking at his captors. 
 Had Rodrigo then found a half hour to question 
 him, he might have decided there was no point in 
 his being held, and let him go. But, with no clear 
 purpose, for he had no clear idea of him, the jcfe 
 locked him up till more important matters should 
 be done with. 
 
 On entering, the creature had crept to the far 
 corner, and sat down on the floor, after which, till 
 four o clock of the afternoon, he glared at the door. 
 When Rodrigo s men had drawn themselves up in 
 the plaza with clicking hoof and clinking spur, he 
 had not moved, being like the insane who sit in a 
 strained silence. When there had come the sound 
 of a disaster and a panic somewhat distant, and 
 when Rodrigo s horsemen had galloped away, he 
 still had not moved, only glared with something 
 more nearly like fire in his dull eyes. After that 
 there were many sounds from many directions. 
 Hours went by and the noon came, and no one 
 approached the cell. Its inmate was buried away 
 from all that action, and the things going on in the 
 world were only a distant din to him. Wherefore 
 the jail was like the material form of certain mental 
 influences which had made the world only a distant 
 din these long years. For a man s mind may be his 
 surest prison. 
 
 At four o clock in the afternoon he slowly removed 
 his sombrero from his head and laid it on the floor. 
 The hat was the color of jet. His hair was black 
 and tangled, as always, and long enough to reach 
 his shoulders. After a time he put his hand into 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 285 
 
 the pocket of his tight black trousers and drew it 
 out empty; then he sat motionless for another 
 space ; after which he put his hand in the bosom of 
 his shirt, also black, drew out a handkerchief and 
 untied its knotted end, displaying a few coins and 
 a white pocket-knife. He tied the coins in the 
 cloth again, and put the little bundle back in his 
 bosom, retaining the knife with purposeless manner. 
 Later, having opened the blade, he marked with its 
 point on the dirt floor. The afternoon light came 
 abundantly in at the iron door and the marks showed 
 clear in the earth. He made, slowly, the figures 
 1819, and sat and looked at them. Then he made 
 them again in another place, and smaller: 1819. 
 He made them a fourth and a fifth time. He did it 
 laboriously, completely absorbed. He covered, at 
 last, all the space within his reach with those 
 figures. They were repeated behind and before 
 him, to his right and left. When there was no 
 more room without moving, he ceased for a time, 
 and went over the rude display carefully, lingering, 
 glazed of eye, at every number. After this he 
 slowly arose and began working on the walls, and a 
 space of a yard square became pretty well covered 
 with the same figures. He was still marking 1819 
 in the adobes when some one came to the iron 
 door. 
 
 He did not so much as turn. He stopped mak 
 ing the figures, and stood still with his hand lifted 
 against the wall. The door was opened, the new 
 comer entered, and the door was closed. The mute 
 still stood in an incomprehensible immovability, as 
 though stunned, and the figure behind stopped and 
 gazed at the numbers on the wall and the floor. 
 Then the mute began again, marking, still not hav- 
 
286 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 ing turned, and cut 1819 once more with jagged 
 irregularity. 
 
 "Has all this that you mark a meaning, friend, 
 and is it this that makes you dumb, or are you only 
 amusing yourself? " said the man behind. 
 
 The mute turned and beheld Rodrigo standing in 
 the last light of the day. There was no reply. 
 
 "Come, man," said ihejefe, throwing off a certain 
 sombreness that he had worn, becoming easier of 
 manner and advancing; "whether it is that you fear 
 me, or that you have for some reason come to fear 
 all men, or that you are acting with a genius that I 
 could wish to transfer to a land where there are good 
 stages I do not know. Frankly, you do not look 
 like a spy to me, nor have I expected to gather 
 much out of you. I have to dispose of you some 
 how. I am come to see if I can gratify myself by 
 letting you go. I have brought ink and paper and 
 pen that you may write, and time is limited. Now 
 pen it out, plainly, and give me your deeds and 
 intentions." 
 
 The mute s eyes held a slumberous fire as he took 
 the paper, which fire did not render the distorted 
 countenance less hideous. He made, not without 
 difficulty, the words: 
 
 "Take me back across the lake." 
 
 "But I cannot be so free with you," said thejefe, 
 "for I have other matters. Write me something of 
 yourself." 
 
 The mute, crouching to the floor in an attitude of 
 fear, penned out : 
 
 " He will starve. He was ill." 
 
 "This same thing twice," said Rodrigo. "Who 
 is he?" 
 
 The mute thought long and stupidly, and then 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 287 
 
 sighed, that kind of sigh that seems beyond all 
 anguish, to which a groan would be but as the 
 expression of relief. Then he wrote, very slowly: 
 
 "The worse than God. The stronger than Hell." 
 
 "Thou poor fool," muttered Rodrigo, stooping, 
 too, and fastening his eyes on the other s, concen 
 trating all his mind to read him. "There is no 
 God nor any hell that will starve. It is you, 
 wrecked heart, and I, chip in the sea, that starve. 
 Come, friend, what is this to you? What will it 
 matter to you if he starve? " 
 
 Something startling swept over the other s face. 
 He wrote again : 
 
 "Then I would follow her. I would do it then 
 do it. I would walk into the sky. I am a slave. 
 Let me go. Take me back across the lake." 
 
 "If it is your hallucination that some one binds 
 you, why not let him starve, if this be his tendency? 
 This will free you." 
 
 The other sank into the dull unreadableness again. 
 He began after a time to rewrite the sentence, 
 "Take me back." He did not finish the last word, 
 becoming abstracted, and presently returned once 
 more to his slow, rapt marking of figures. They 
 stood out on the paper once, twice, thrice 1819. 
 
 There came another person to the door. Dusk 
 was coming on. The plaza was shadowed and the 
 jail was growing dark. 
 
 "Don Rodrigo," said a suave voice without, "this 
 is a secluded spot for a little conference. Let me 
 in." 
 
 Rodrigo stood up. He saw that the man outside 
 was Doroteo Quiroz, his handsome figure having 
 approached noiselessly. His lips were pressed 
 tightly together, and his moustaches were visible in 
 
288 A DREAM OP A THRONE 
 
 the half light as black points. The two looked full 
 at one another for a moment ; then Rodrigo walked 
 gravely to the door, which he had locked after enter 
 ing, and let the visitor in. Quiroz s manner was 
 full of the Mexican superficial politeness and 
 elegance. 
 
 "Do me the favor, then, senor," said he, bowing 
 with his fingers on his breast, "to extend me the 
 hand of a brave caballero and a victorious one." 
 
 He stretched out his own, and with scarcely per 
 ceptible hesitation Rodrigo took it, somewhat 
 coldly. 
 
 "We are of different races," began Quiroz. 
 " Good. We could thus combine what is fair and 
 amiable out of north and south. You know me for 
 a Mexican. You are expecting fair words and no 
 deeds. Quiroz is a gambler. This freely. But I 
 am going to give you a proof that he can go to a 
 point without wavering. Hence, listen to me: for 
 whatever folly there is in me, if ever in my life 
 I meant what I said, may Mary die and the church 
 be proved a harlot if I am not in earnest now. I 
 will speak in the presence of this idiot here, for I 
 know him. He has been a crazy shadow on the 
 lake for many a month. They say he is the- ghost 
 who haunts Prison Island. You will learn nothing 
 from him but you do not need to." 
 
 Rodrigo stood up tall and still, his customary 
 whiteness of face slightly more marked. He kept a 
 somewhat cold gaze on Quiroz, and at times there 
 was the bare suggestion of a sneer on his lips, but, 
 withal, his manner had in it a certain proper defer 
 ence and attention. 
 
 " Go on," said he. 
 
 "Don Rodrigo, you are a fighter. The man whc 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 289 
 
 created a new idea and carried it out as you did, is 
 one to whom I am pleased to doff my hat. You are 
 no dreamer. You are a man of action. So much 
 for my views of your ability. Pardon me if I say 
 that you as yet have no knowledge of Doroteo 
 Quiroz. Do you fancy I put myself on a plane 
 above my deserts? Far from it. There is no 
 veriest prop of virtue who knows more surely than 
 do I that the word to be applied to me is traitor 
 unblushingly. I plead guilty; yet I would have you 
 recall that there are more kinds of traitors than one, 
 and a treason may be built on an honest foundation. 
 Why did I enter Vicente s scheme? Because I am 
 a gambler. I pretend to be nothing else. My one 
 unalterable ambition has ever been to gain for my 
 self, strictly for myself, the greatest power and the 
 richest success possible to me. Vicente s was the 
 biggest game at hand. I had no more than entered 
 it when I saw his weakness. For he dreams too 
 much. This I know. I am as honest as truth when 
 I say that I believed success impossible to him. 
 That kind of nature will come to the day of ruin 
 sooner or later. Well, am I to be blamed for cold 
 judgment? No; for judgment with me is as spon 
 taneous as an emotion. You can call a man mis 
 taken for his judgment you cannot call him 
 criminal. We praise constancy; we talk much of 
 faith. In God s name, is it constancy to wreck a 
 previous and constant course by clinging to that 
 which will wreck it ? Half the condemned treachery 
 in the world is constancy to an idea that was domi 
 nant before the thing betrayed was born, an idea 
 that thus had the precedence. My previous ambi 
 tions would brook no continuance with Vicente. To 
 wreck him a few weeks or months before his in- 
 
 J9 
 
290 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 evitable wrecking of himself was but to make less 
 his ruin. In this, do me the favor to observe, I 
 was true to myself, which is called the first virtue. 
 
 "Ay, Quiroz is a gambler, but the gambler is tell 
 ing you simply a mathematical fact when he says that 
 the man who knows me thus, who docs not consider 
 me honest, and yet perceives whereto I am indomita 
 bly constant, can steer his course with mine with the 
 safety of faith. Don Rodrigo, a revolt like this is 
 not the measure of my ambition. Mexico is totter 
 ing. Santa Anna has left the capital sapped of its 
 powers and is marching to Taylor and a sure defeat. 
 Meanwhile I am here with more than a thousand 
 horsemen at my back. For what have you done? 
 You captured the leader and some forty others, dead 
 and living. The rest fled. When a path could be 
 cut through the street, your lieutenants pursued the 
 fugitives. They captured scarcely a dozen. The 
 rest are scattered. But you know as well as I that 
 I have means of gathering them up. They will 
 come when I call. You, Don Rodrigo, are at the 
 head of two hundred. Listen. I have no desire to 
 try issues with a man like you. I would rather we 
 try them together. We are here on the lake s 
 southern side. Mexico City is not so very far to 
 the southeast. It is left without an army. It is 
 ever in a weakened state of discord. Come; the 
 time is ripe. We gather recruits on the way; for I 
 know the people. He who marches into the capital 
 now with two thousand men is its master. I tell 
 you again Taylor will defeat Santa Anna. The 
 Americans will come on. We cannot fight them ; 
 we shall not try. They must then deal with him 
 who holds the government. The United States 
 will not dare annex the country. She has too many 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 291 
 
 troubles of her own. I have studied this matter 
 long since. She will likely rob us of some of our 
 northern provinces. Well, who remains with the 
 rest ? " 
 
 He paused; he lifted a steady hand and drew out 
 the point of his moustache. Then an audacious 
 smile played on his features. Rodrigo said noth 
 ing. He held his eyes unmoved and stared straight 
 into those of Quiroz. The shadow of disdain was 
 still on his lips, and his face wore something of 
 hauteur. 
 
 " Don Rodrigo, you are a man of deeds, and you 
 love power. That leader who marches in while the 
 army is away to him shall the power be." 
 
 Rodrigo was silent for some moments. 
 
 "Quiroz," said he, coldly, "for what you have 
 done the government thanks you. I myself cannot 
 be insincere enough to do so, nor to agree with you, 
 nor to act with you; for I find you most eminent in 
 ability to do that thing which the Greeks called 
 making the worse appear the better reason." 
 
 With this Rodrigo turned somewhat stiffly away, 
 as though to continue his conversation with the 
 mute, who had not moved. If there was any resent 
 ment in Doroteo the gloom did not permit that it 
 be visible on his face. He was too much Quiroz to 
 show it in words. 
 
 "This is final?" said he. 
 
 "This is final," replied Rodrigo. 
 
 "Then do me the favor," said Quiroz, with his 
 teeth shut and a smile glittering on his face, "to 
 offer me, in parting, the hand of a gentleman." 
 
 Rodrigo offered it. 
 
 "Excellent to be frank," said Quiroz. "Well 
 to go straight to all points. And in leaving (in 
 
292 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 which," and he gripped the other s hand with 
 extreme force, " my purpose is to gather up my 
 troops), in leaving, allow me to express rather a 
 strengthened than a diminished faith in your abili 
 ties, senor. Adios. Hasta la vista! I am sorry 
 that I can make no use of the esteemed gratitude of 
 the government." 
 
 "Adios" said the/*/*. 
 
 This stilted conversation being finished, Doroteo 
 went out. If there had been, in his reference to 
 his troops, any hint of a threat, he was not the man 
 to have let it appear in his tone or his face. What 
 ever gall was in him as he departed, the elegant 
 Quiroz, the deceiver, would not speak it out, even 
 by a word, even in the midst of his bitterest resent 
 ment. There can be no doubt that the highest 
 lustre of his scheme faded with this failure. But 
 he bowed himself out with grace and went his feline 
 way. Outside, however, could one have seen his 
 face he would have noted keen hate and steely 
 desperation in it. He was resolved that, despite 
 all obstacles, the scattered force that had been 
 Vicente s should at once be his. 
 
 Referring once more to the threat that the refer 
 ence to troops might have contained that reference 
 hung in Rodrigo s mind when Quiroz was gone. 
 He stood in the almost dark jail, staring into the 
 darkness. He meditated thus for some minutes, 
 with something of a turmoil under the calm that sat 
 on his face. He must not risk losing his advan 
 tage. He had that instinctive tenacity which is a 
 characteristic of his people; this, added to a natural 
 determination, completely to fulfil the task intrusted 
 to him. 
 
 " There is no prison in Guadalajara that is suffi- 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 293 
 
 ciently safe," he mused. "The strongest was 
 wrecked in the last revolution. The other is yet 
 unfinished. That nest of troubles is no place for 
 him. Even the journey thither might be disastrous, 
 for it would be through a country of his allies." 
 
 He gazed yet other minutes into the darkness. 
 He went out then, procured a candle and matches, 
 and returned. He entered, locked the door, and lit 
 the candle. The mute was still crouched in the 
 darkest corner, his sombrero again on his head, 
 pulled down far over his face. Only the chin and 
 the scar were visible when the match was touched 
 to the candle. He held the paper in his hand as 
 though he had been staring at it in the dark. 
 Rodrigo came and kneeled down before him, putting 
 the candle on the earthen floor. He saw, too, that 
 the pen and the ink were at hand. 
 
 " You wish to be free," said Rodrigo, in a low tone. 
 
 There was no reply, but the man lifted his face 
 and looked at him. 
 
 " You wish to be free, is it not so ? " said Rodrigo. 
 
 The mute took the pen and wrote as before : 
 
 "Take me across the lake." 
 
 " Listen," was the reply. " I will take you across 
 the lake. I will do it to-night. We will start at 
 once, and when we arrive at the opposite shore you 
 shall be free. All this if you can do one thing for 
 me." 
 
 The figure before him distorted the scar into 
 something that might have been a smile, horrifying 
 as it was. 
 
 " Do you know an island between here and Mescala 
 which they call Prison Island?" 
 
 The mute was as still as stone, with a dead color 
 on fris face. 
 
294 A DREAM OF A TIfKONE 
 
 "An island," continued Rodrigo, "whereon there 
 are ruins of great buildings and nothing else. Come 
 you are a kind of bat on the lake; do you know 
 it?" 
 
 "Yes," wrote the mute, his hand shaking. 
 
 " Have you been there ? " 
 
 There was no reply, only glassy eyes and the 
 scar. 
 
 "Man," said Rodrigo, whispering, and with 
 sternness, "do you want to be locked in a blacker 
 prison than this and to stay there? You know this 
 island; I have heard that you do. Answer me 
 quickly and plainly if you want freedom or mercy." 
 
 "I know it," wrote the other in mute fear. "I 
 have been there." 
 
 " Do you know its coasts and whether there is a 
 cove that might serve as a harbor? Could you steer 
 a canoa into safety at that island, avoiding the 
 rocks, landing us without danger, even in the night 
 and with waves?" 
 
 With that rock-like silence again his only expres 
 sion of emotion, the other, after a long time of dull 
 pondering, wrote: 
 
 "I know it." 
 
 "You could do it in safety?" 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 "Friend," said the jefe, "let me give you full 
 warning. I am your comrade if you treat me well. 
 Do as I wish and I shall send you on to the opposite 
 shore, and you shall be free. If you fail me or 
 deceive me, I am more likely to kill you than to let 
 you live. Mark me. I, too, know the location of 
 the island. Any attempt to steer us away is use 
 less. I, too, have been there, but I approached 
 from the other side, and I have no knowledge of 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 295 
 
 the rocks and the shore. So I take you for the 
 landing. Get me safe on that island and you are 
 free. If you wreck me well, I can swim and 
 shall have as good a chance as you. Now I am 
 going to trust you. I do not believe you will play 
 me false. Freedom it is, my man. Will you go? " 
 
 "When?" wrote the other, his hand shaking 
 again. 
 
 "Now." 
 
 The distortion of the mute s visage was then 
 unintelligible. It may have meant mad delight it 
 may have meant abject terror. He was able to 
 write, "Yes," and Rodrigo arose and left him with 
 the candle; and the slow waving flame with its 
 blue rings round it cast light on the creature s face 
 and over his body, and displayed an agitation such 
 that it must have struck awe in any that saw it. 
 
 Scarcely half an hour went by before there came 
 steps again at the door. It was unlocked, and 
 Bonavidas and another entered. 
 
 "Come on," said Bonavidas, taking the mute s 
 arm and compelling him to arise. " Save us ! he is 
 stiff as a corpse. Brace up this is no march to 
 the grave, though we are both good candidates for 
 it. I dare say the worm that has you at last, my 
 stiff prisoner, will have feasted on me first; but he 
 will still be far from fat ha ! ha ! Bitter will have 
 been his first disappointment, and, if I am a judge 
 of fowl, as bitter will be the next for the arm of 
 this skeleton is thin." 
 
 His companion shuddered a little and wrapped a 
 purple blanket round him, covering the half of his 
 face. The three went out. There was not much 
 stir, and few people were in the plaza. The 
 wounded and the excitement were farther back in 
 
296 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 that quarter of the town nearest the mountains. 
 Kyed by only a few passers-by the three entered the 
 street to the river. Farther ahead in its gloom, 
 faintly lit by an oil street lamp, could be seen a 
 squad of soldiers with a prisoner in their midst, 
 moving in the same direction. Whereas the mute 
 went crouchingly, with face buried under his hat, 
 that other prisoner walked with something of state- 
 liness. Those who saw his face on that march said 
 it was not like the dark faces of Mexico one would 
 have thought he came from some other land that 
 his carriage was marked by a gentle pride, and his 
 eyes were so deep and so strangely sad that a child, 
 looking on them, wept and ran away. There was a 
 wound, too, on one temple, and his left shoulder 
 and arm were bandaged and carried stiffly. 
 
 It was thus it chanced that Rodrigo, Vicente, the 
 mute, Bonavidas, and some twenty soldiers, met 
 that night on the river s bank, where the marshes 
 stretched out into darkness and the waves could be 
 faintly heard. The wind was from a little west of 
 south ; not the best for the journey, but, if it should 
 last sufficiently long, serviceable. Some of the 
 canoas owners had sailed away; but haste is not a 
 characteristic of the land, and there were novel 
 things in Tizapan to see. More than half of the 
 craft that had threaded their way to the landing in 
 the early morning were still there. The party that 
 now arrived selected two of the best. 
 
 The huts were deserted. The town lay yonder, 
 black and silent; the night was a starry one. Cer 
 tain townspeople, few in number, came stealthily 
 after the party of soldiers to see, and stood in the 
 gloom at a little distance from the river. With 
 something more nearly like reverence than author- 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 297 
 
 ity, for he could not control his sentiments nor the 
 moving of his heart which a certain majesty of 
 bearing in his prisoner had caused, Rodrigo ordered 
 Vicente into the second of the two boats and 
 manned that vessel with half his twenty men. Some 
 weapons and ammunition were put therein also. He 
 himself went to the canoa in front. He was silent, 
 chilled. He could not go in the same vessel with 
 his captive ; it would take, said he, a vaster strength 
 than he had. Bonavidas was left in control of that 
 rear ship. 
 
 The mute and certain other weapons and ammuni 
 tions, together with stores of provisions, were put 
 in the forward boat, which was manned by the other 
 soldiers. All being aboard, the poling was silently 
 begun, and the dark, winding course down the river 
 between the walls of reeds was entered upon. 
 
 The few townspeople turned back to the things of 
 unhappy interest in the town, where the rest of the 
 jefe s men, under a trusted soldier chosen for that 
 place, guarded some less important prisoners in a 
 great adobe hall once used as a storehouse for golden 
 fruit, product of summer suns and mountain torrents 
 and the free air and the free soil of a land of curious 
 liberty. The destination of the vessels was known 
 only to those in them and to some of the soldiers be 
 hind. The secret was locked and the guide was 
 mute. There were adequate instructions left, also, 
 concerning immediate notification of any new events, 
 and bonfire signals explained and well remembered. 
 In the stern of his ship the jefe stood, not rejoicing 
 over victory, not happy with success. There was 
 the picture in ihzjefes mind of a small woman with 
 strange hair and a face sorrowful as he had last seen 
 it in the improvised hospital, where they revived 
 
298 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 her brother, bandaged his wounds, and let her 
 come in. 
 
 It was well that, the last vessel being some twenty 
 yards down stream, the jcfcs vision was only a 
 vision and not the woman herself. There had crept 
 down to the bank, after those other townspeople, a 
 slight figure unseen by the others. The others 
 were gone when she ran silently to the landing and 
 saw the two vessels, indistinguishable bulks of 
 gloom, going away yonder in the reeds, and heard 
 the soft, soft plash of the poles in muddy water. 
 She wanted to cry out, but could not. She sank 
 down, not burying her face, but gazing out over the 
 flat marsh and the unseen lake. She sat there some 
 long hours after every sound had ceased, and the 
 silence was like death. 
 
CHAPTER II 
 
 IF, at the bottom of the long scale of human im- 
 happiness, there be an absolute misery like the 
 theoretical absolute zero of the thermometer, the 
 great Fortino was at that degree, a point of dead, 
 cold despair, where there is no motion, which motion 
 would be heat, heat of anger, or hope, or thrilling 
 recollection, a point whereat the unimaginable de 
 pression is like the frigidity that cannot be felt, 
 that would freeze the very nucleus of the first cell 
 that should begin to stir into thought or emotion, 
 a point, however, from which reaction is not alto 
 gether impossible. 
 
 Toward noon of the day of the disaster, he had 
 trod across the brick pavement of the patio t where 
 the round ball of his great shadow mingled with the 
 flecking shadows of trees. He had entered the rear 
 court through the remnant of the door he had shat 
 tered, and being in that barer and drearier space, 
 with the anvil and white ashes of a charcoal fire not 
 far distant, he had sat himself down on the ground 
 by the stables and had stayed there. When Doroteo 
 had come and begged that the silent monster volun 
 teer some information as to the key of the room 
 wherein the girls were locked, he had not appeared 
 to respond even in thought. His face assumed the 
 beginnings of a look of scorn that he should be 
 assaulted with details at a time like this. The 
 scorn became frozen and went out, and there was 
 
300 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 nothing more to be drawn from him. As the key 
 had been hurled in some unknown direction through 
 the high clear air of that memorable morning, the 
 door to which it had belonged was at length broken 
 open by Doroteo and his mozo, during which act 
 Fortino was not present, being still sitting by the 
 stables; nor did he know or care when the good 
 Dona Manuela, trembling like a reed in a wind, 
 expended her motherly care on her of the auburn 
 locks and brought the girl to. 
 
 There was little of any sort of movement during 
 that day in the rear court of stables. Doroteo 
 passed through it several times, quick, absorbed. 
 The mozo came and fed some animals and said some 
 thing to Fortino, whom he eyed with curiosity. But 
 F*ortino did not reply. Then, for hours, there was 
 nothing but the horses, the adobes, the bare earth, 
 the anvil and the brasero over which the sun poured 
 its yellow autumn flood. There, too, was directed 
 the great man s gaze. The anvil s shadow grew 
 longer as the hours went by, the light about it be 
 came yellower, and at length the shadows of western 
 objects beyond came and took away the yellow. 
 The dusk came on. But Fortino did not cease to 
 stare at that mass of iron and the chalky pile of 
 ashes, which last an evening breeze lifted and made 
 white dust. They came and begged him to eat; 
 but he would not. Dona Manuela came likewise, 
 at length having the servants bring dishes and set 
 them before him. They remained untouched. So 
 the lady sighed, and, with her head turned looking 
 at Fortino, she and the sky-blue dress and the gray 
 hair went back into the front patio. 
 
 It grew dark, and the night wind swirled among 
 the stables. The early stars gave way to later ones. 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 301 
 
 Odd birds, common in these parts, flew silently 
 overhead and hissed short, quick, startling hisses at 
 him out of the night, as though to warn him or to 
 awaken him or to make uncanny jests at him. At 
 some time after midnight he rolled over heavily and 
 sunk into a sleep that, for its broken snorings and 
 its nightmares, was a thing dreadful to hear. When, 
 in the early morning, the mozo came to feed the 
 horses, Fortino was again sitting erect. Later there 
 was a second attempt to get him to eat, as fruitless 
 as the first. In this Dona Manuela again partici 
 pated, full of anxiety for the poor man s mind, 
 though not well comprehending what was the matter 
 with him. 
 
 "Alas! alas!" cried she at length, in despair, 
 "this good, large man will starve!" 
 
 Anastasio was one of those who heard this remark. 
 Neither he nor Fortino had been sought after by 
 Vicente s captors, Quiroz having left the impression 
 that the fishermen were a part of the treason. The 
 philosopher had but just now entered by the rear 
 alley, and the early morning beams fell on his long 
 body and showed his languid calmness. He had not 
 been seen here till now since he rode away so 
 swiftly, more than a full day previous. He came 
 sauntering in much as he sauntered anywhere else. 
 He stood and gazed at the inert Fortino in thought 
 ful mood. 
 
 "No, senora," said Anastasio. "He will not 
 starve. I should say two months from to-day, if he 
 be still here, there may be call for alarm." 
 
 "Oh! but senor!" cried the anxious lady with 
 much earnestness, " he has eaten nothing for twenty- 
 four hours ! " 
 
 " Senora, have you, then, not heard of the camels? 
 
3 o2 A DREAM OF A TJ1KOM: 
 
 They say a camel will live many days off his humps. 
 And whereas he does well on two, Fortino has an 
 infinite number; and better yet, the other beast 
 contends with the drawback that the space between 
 the two is vacant. Fortino has this advantage, that 
 all the spaces between his many are filled up, so 
 that his figure presents a smooth and reassuring 
 surface. I should say there is nutriment enough in 
 Fortino to last two moons." 
 
 The lady finally withdrew, she and the servants 
 carrying the untouched dishes, and Anastasio sat 
 down in front of the giant. 
 
 "Bravery is a good thing," said he, and paused, 
 calmly meeting Fortino s lurid gaze with his own. 
 He made his remarks at a considerable distance 
 from each other, and in the nature of speculations. 
 " Faith, too, works what I should call wonders. 
 To wade into the sea, I will be sworn, is more 
 glorious than it is wet, which is saying much. 
 Fortino, if you do not take something you will be 
 eating your bodily ability. Hut if he who works not 
 shall not eat, he who eats not need not work, where 
 in there is comfort. I have thought many a time, 
 which is best, glory or idleness? But I didn t 
 know anything about the former, so I stuck to the 
 other, being aware of its good points. Yesterday 
 was a fine day. You should have seen the lake on 
 yesterday and heard the note of the dove. The 
 lake sparkled, and the dove, she sang." 
 
 Fortino rolled heavily into a slightly different 
 position, gazing at the anvil, and something like a 
 smothered groan was in him. 
 
 " Our comrade in bravery," said Anastasio, " where 
 is he? Francisco is " 
 
 There was a cautious creaking at the rear door 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 303 
 
 that led into the alley, and the door was slightly 
 opened. A head came through, showing a gaunt 
 face of stealth and terror, and eyes like dollars. 
 
 "Come in," drawled Anastasio with whining im 
 patience, " come in, brother; there is no cavalry 
 here." 
 
 Francisco cautiously closed the door behind him, 
 and, looking ever to all sides, as though in fear of 
 treachery, crept up and sat down. 
 
 "I am afraid of no cavalry," said he, with a faint 
 attempt at bluster. " I I oh, friends ! where is 
 the enemy ! " 
 
 " Can it, then, be that you were out of the fight ? 
 This accounts for the misfortune." 
 
 "If every man had had my discretion, friend," 
 cried Francisco, "there would have been no misfor 
 tune. I know when to make a retreat with dignity. 
 There is one thing about me, if I am a fisherman 
 I learn the art of war rapidly." 
 
 "At a gallop," said the long one. "Fortino, 
 awake, till I give you the history of this man of 
 valor. When we came on to the town, I having 
 delivered my message (with a faith, Fortino, speak 
 ing of faith, that classed me immediately with 
 angels), I having delivered it, had trouble with my 
 horse. Francisco was riding near the front. It was 
 convenient, when he had learned of the enemy 
 ahead, for Francisco suddenly to conceive and bear 
 a prodigy of brotherly love, which led him to drop 
 behind to assist me. And the farther behind we 
 lagged, beating my steed, the kindlier was Fran 
 cisco. When at last my horse stopped I was un 
 gentle enough to curse this brother, and he went 
 on. He was the last member of the cavalry when 
 it entered the street. From a long distance away 
 
304 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 on the lake road I saw him lumbering in last, and 
 his speed was not high. He was out of my sight in 
 the town something less than one minute. Ah he 
 learned the art of war in that space of time. Fran 
 cisco is peculiarly quick at learning. I saw him 
 issue, having learned the art, like a rocket from a 
 newly blessed house, and there was a blue vapor 
 arising from him as he came on. The rapidity of 
 his learning increased as he advanced; his horse s 
 nose pierced air like the point of a bullet. He 
 wheeled into the lake road a full half mile ahead of 
 the next fugitive, and bore down on me so that I 
 had barely time to pull a little to one side. I heard 
 him crying out to me before he came near: Fly! 
 Fly! Then he swept by with a wind that raised 
 my sombrero and blew my hair across my cheek, 
 shrieking: I will save my honor! I per 
 ceived then that the rest were coming, and, Fran 
 cisco having become a little smoke in the distance, 
 and the others having likewise fled past me in con 
 fusion, I said to myself, sitting meditating on my 
 steed, There is agitation in the town. Finding at 
 length that the horse would no longer balk, but 
 would go on at a slow gait, Si, said I to myself, 
 I will go in where the agitation is. When I was 
 on the point of entering the town I saw that sickly 
 man that is with \.\\zjcfe dashing out with troops in 
 pursuit. I was feeling tired at that time, and in 
 need of quiet. So I drew up at the roadside and 
 sat with both my pistols aimed at the comers and 
 resting easily on the saddle s pommel; and they 
 dared not touch me, I did fill them so with dread. 
 Said the sickly one as he went by on a gallop, Put 
 up your guns, child, there are bigger birds than 
 you! Si, said I, but they fly high. Francisco, 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 305 
 
 for one, flies exceeding high. When they were 
 gone, and I came on in and saw the scene of the 
 trouble, and thought again of the fugitives, there was 
 one point that was a great comfort to me. There is 
 one thing they will never get, said I, pleased. 
 They will never catch Francisco s honor. 
 
 " I tell you, idiot, it was my discretion that saved 
 me. Fly? Did not they all fly? That there was 
 some terrible thing ahead I knew, and I saved my 
 abilities for another time. I was cool, I was calcu 
 lating. There are times, fool, when it is best to be 
 wise !" 
 
 Francisco was recovering himself, and he uttered 
 this principle with a great gesture. 
 
 " And wherein did I next show wisdom ? " he con 
 tinued. " Listen, you who were two miles from the 
 fight. As soon as I was round the first point of 
 rocks toward Jiquilpan, my horse stumbled and 
 threw me. The rest caught up with me and passed 
 and scattered into the mountains, or went on. 
 Then I heard the enemy coming. So I beat my 
 horse away, and he went off crazy toward Jiquilpan 
 to distract attention from me who remained behind. 
 This is a science called in war, strategy. It is by 
 strategy that great things are done in war, and by 
 strategy that great men occupy their minds. And 
 not everybody, let me tell you, senores, has mind 
 enough so that strategy can occupy it ; no, senores. 
 It was by strategy that the big fight at Hannibal 
 was won, with the rings. I have read history and 
 I know how to employ principles. So the horse 
 went galloping off to distract attention. The dis 
 tracting attention is one of the leading things in 
 strategy. Next I leap straight into the lake, and 
 dive. There were rocks there, and I dived to the 
 
 20 
 
306 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 other side of them. This again was good strategy. 
 If I had stayed this side of the rocks I might have 
 had to come up for breath at the wrong time. Many 
 great strategies have been thus ruined. When the 
 enemy was gone I came out on the bank. I confess I 
 was sore from scraping myself on a boulder. Hence, 
 I limped into the mountains, and lay down and hid, 
 and I saw the enemy come back. And, owing to 
 my strategy, he did not have me. I am not any fool, 
 brothers. At night I decided that the heroic thing 
 was to come back. And I have limped some three 
 miles during the night. I was hungry. I slept a 
 little outside the town and have limped in here. I 
 did it boldly I was not terrified. I walked in like 
 a lion, senores." 
 
 " You appeared so, indeed," said Anastasio. 
 
 Fortino had no more than barely heard, if indeed 
 he had done so much. He was dumb. 
 
 " There are some ideas about yesterday," said 
 Anastasio, " that confuse me." 
 
 No one replied and the three were as though 
 thinking. 
 
 " St" continued the long one, " there are things 
 that mix me." 
 
 "You did not mix in the things, ha! ha! " broke 
 out Francisco with the knowledge of a fine bit of 
 humor. 
 
 " My horse had not learned the art of war," was 
 the chilly response. " He kept my discretion to the 
 rear, instead of whizzing there with it afterward. Si, 
 there are matters of directions, messages, and deeds, 
 that are not clear. If this great body here could 
 speak he might tell me why he blocked the way. But 
 never mind, we will lay it on to the Holy Virgin." 
 
 The great body revolved slightly, but ponderously, 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 307 
 
 and Fortino s eyes, inflamed and swelled, looked out 
 of Fortino s unshaven face at Anastasio like the eyes 
 of a gorgon. 
 
 " When Doroteo gave me my message," said Anas 
 tasio meditatively, " he made no mention of anything 
 wrong with Fortino. Was it, Fortino, that you had 
 slept in the night air? I left you slumbering like 
 a babe. Were you dreaming, even then, of that 
 treason? " 
 
 A rage like a burning furnace was suddenly born 
 in the giant. He grew inconceivably hot. He arose 
 with an awful majesty. He stamped the ground and 
 strode to and fro before his wondering comrades. 
 
 " Treason ! Treason ! " he growled like some wild 
 beast. " Who talks of treason ! Who dares call me 
 traitor ! What message did you carry, blot on 
 earth?" He strode nearer and shook his huge fist 
 in the face of his unmoved torturer. " Stand up and 
 give me your own perfidy. What message, worm ! 
 worm ! did you, then, carry away when you left me 
 asleep in my untouched honesty ! " 
 
 " Make it plain plain say I," broke in Francisco. 
 " It has puzzled me too. But I have not learned 
 even what happened. Come at it, friends; his de 
 mand, Anastasio, is just. Was it some strategy? " 
 
 "What was it?" repeated Anastasio, on whose 
 acute mind much of the true situation had long 
 since dawned. He spoke with a labored innocence. 
 "It was the message Quiroz gave me what else? 
 And I, too, carried it away in my untouched honesty. 
 I have already said that I showed a faith that was 
 pleasing to the Lord." 
 
 " But what was it, worm ! " roared Fortino. 
 
 " What, then, did he tell you, lime-kiln? " was the 
 response. 
 
3 o8 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 "Just, too," put in Francisco. 
 
 " He told me, damn you, that you had gone to 
 warn him of the enemy s coming." 
 
 " This is white truth," said Anastasio. " This is 
 pure innocence. He was right. Doroteo s honesty, 
 too, was untouched. We were a good honest trio, 
 and this also, I dare say, pleased the Lord." 
 
 " He told me, too," continued Fortino, bending 
 over and holding his fist always before the other, 
 speaking in growls and roars, " that Vicente was to 
 come over the other bridge, the bridge toward the 
 mountains and take his stand in the plaza." 
 
 "Ah, brother, but the other bridge is gone. I 
 went yesterday, when the dew fell, and looked at the 
 place. Brother," he repeated with infinite gentle 
 ness, " there is no other bridge." 
 
 " But he told me," cried Fortino with a great gasp 
 and burning to the roots of his hair, " that the bridge 
 was rebuilt ! " 
 
 " I wonder if this, too," whined the long one, 
 "pleased the Lord." 
 
 " He said he said that the enemy was coming 
 up the river road ! Tell me, then, what your mes 
 sage was, and tell me quick I can stand no 
 more!" 
 
 " While you lay slumbering like a babe, brother, 
 he told me that the enemy should be in the plaza 
 and I should direct Vicente up the river road." 
 
 " I can swear," said Francisco excitedly, " that this 
 same message Anastasio delivered with speed and 
 honesty." 
 
 The full realization of the treachery broke slowly 
 over the giant s ponderously moving mind. He 
 turned about in his smothered rage and stared like a 
 crazy one at the house of Quiroz. Then his eyes 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 309 
 
 went wild and swept over the unmoved Anastasio 
 and the excited Francisco. The perspiration sud 
 denly poured in streams from his face and he strode 
 away heavily, like a mighty mechanism, toward the 
 rear door that led into the alley. He came to the 
 anvil and seized it up. He turned and lifted the mass 
 of iron in both hands high over his head. For 
 a second he held it there, a statue of some enraged 
 Hercules ready to crush the world. Then he hurled 
 it with the force of a field-gun straight through the 
 clear morning air, over the heads of his comrades, till 
 it crashed into the wall that divided the stable court 
 from the house s patio. It tore a hole in that wall 
 big enough for a child to hide himself in, and sent 
 the adobes flying shattered. The hurler turned 
 majestically about and proceeded toward the alley. 
 He came to the door, turned again, and shook his 
 fist at the house and stamped the dust of the accursed 
 place from his feet, crying hoarsely : 
 
 " Let me see you no more ! " 
 
 He went out and banged the door so that one of 
 its planks split from top to bottom, and they heard 
 him going away crying: 
 
 "Son of hell! Son of hell !" 
 
 He trod thus out of the town and to the borders 
 of the lake, and there where there was loneliness and 
 the morning sun and breeze and the plaintive note of 
 the dove, he sat himself down by the marsh. 
 
 His two companions remained for some time where 
 they were. 
 
 " I had foreseen," said Francisco at last, " that it 
 was some strategy." 
 
CHAPTER III 
 
 THAT some one else on the premises of Quiroz 
 had passed as bad a night as had Fortino, the 
 giant could not know. The day before, during all 
 the hours that succeeded the catastrophe, Pepa had 
 not left the house. She had stayed chiefly in her 
 room ; when she had come out it was in silence. 
 Clarita perceived a great change in her erstwhile vi 
 vacious friend. Pepa, during that day and the night 
 that followed it, was a haunted woman. Somehow 
 the horror of the deed had been too great, too mon 
 strous, for one so young as she. 
 
 She was not incapable of remorse. It was not so 
 much that she was faithless or irresistibly wicked. It 
 was rather to be considered entirely from the opposite 
 view-point, she loved overpoweringly, and in her 
 love was a passion really mad ; her nature was not 
 trained either by heredity or environment to collect 
 the scattered elements of good in her character and 
 make a chain to resist the evil course of her love. 
 During that day she did not venture out to find him 
 whom she loved, and who, she believed in her unso 
 phisticated mind, had encouraged her to the deed, 
 had even silently offered her the reward. She did 
 not venture out simply because, long to as she might, 
 she could not. She found herself powerless, dread 
 ing seeing him as much as she desired it. For now 
 that the deed was done, and she had seen it, its hide- 
 ousness was visible to her. There crept into her un- 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 311 
 
 tutored heart some instinctive fear that that white 
 man he who awed her and won her, and whose 
 race and its civilization were mysteries to her 
 might be revolted by this treachery. She dared not 
 think that out she only felt it. So she was afraid 
 and wretched all that day, full of her love and her 
 hopes, recalling over and over the night at Ocotlan 
 and his face when it held out promises to her. Hence, 
 for the time, the treachery and the wildness were 
 gone, as though she had been two women. 
 
 All that day she found herself perversely and per 
 sistently trying to hear nothing of that which went 
 on in the town. In her revulsion of feeling she would 
 listen to nothing. Dona Manuela and Clarita, after a 
 few attempts at drawing her out (they were in igno 
 rance of her part in the drama, though Clarita feared 
 her as always), held instinctively aloof. Quiroz 
 found he could make nothing of her, and went away 
 pondering on this new mood, realizing that he might 
 never get to the bottom of this strange woman, and, 
 for that very reason, fascinated the more. She shut 
 herself up before it was dark, and was not again seen 
 till morning. She lay dressed, realizing every min 
 ute that she might be losing the last chance to see 
 Rodrigo, but nevertheless, because of that silent, in 
 stinctive fear, unable to move. For something like 
 twenty hours out of her life she lost her daring. 
 Hence the night was one of an emotion that it is 
 hardly too extravagant to call agony. 
 
 When dawn came, she having slept but little, it 
 seemed that the light of a new day brought her 
 somewhat back to herself. She arose, and that very 
 action revived her. She felt her old daring and 
 spirit somewhat returned. She made her toilet with 
 her mind full of half-formed purposes and her blood 
 
3 i2 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 high. She was less of a woman, doubtless, than she 
 had been in her sullen silence of the day before ; but 
 she was Pepa once more. She was sorry she had let 
 all the day and night go by in inaction. Then, it 
 being still early, about the time, indeed, when For- 
 tino was shaking the dust of the place from his feet, 
 Quiroz knocked, was admitted, and told her of the 
 departure of thejefc with his prisoner. 
 
 " I tried, incomprehensible and ever-maddening 
 woman, to let you know of this last night, but you 
 would not respond to the tapping of a lover s fingers 
 on your door. The fair one is asleep, said I ; and 
 after all, what matter? The thing is done; why 
 trouble one s brains about the destiny of th isjefe? 
 Let the fair one sleep. Which I did, though I longed 
 to read your dreams." 
 
 There was but little change of expression on Pepa s 
 face, for she was again nearly mistress of herself; but 
 that little Quiroz perceived. And with her subse 
 quent questions and actions there came to him the 
 first vague suspicion of a possible truth but it did 
 not form itself into a positive doubt. 
 
 "Where have they gone?" asked she, quietly. 
 
 "Where else but to the city?" responded he. 
 "But theyV/i- is sometimes original. It would be, so 
 it seems to me, folly to go to Guadalajara. Yet I 
 believe there he has gone. On the other hand, it 
 would be like him to stop on the island. He could 
 hold that against many canoas, and the rocks and 
 waves would help him; but the project is a little 
 reckless. What matters it? He and Vicente are 
 gone ; and permit me, in the last bottom of my heart, 
 to curse tiizkjefe politico" 
 
 She came and laid her hand on his shoulder. 
 
 "Then you have failed," she said, fastening on his 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 313 
 
 the eyes that began to dance with light. " He would 
 not join in the great scheme. You are bitter over 
 this, Doroteo. It has disappointed you more than 
 you will say. The canker of it is still in you." 
 
 " There was some tameness in him," said he. " It 
 seemed to me like an omen. I used to quit the game 
 when I felt like this. But since it is so, I am glad he 
 did not stay. I should have been tempted, when I 
 gather up the army, to whip him for a kind of devil 
 ish delight I should take in it. Now, what do I care ; 
 what does Josefa Aranja care ? She trusts me ; she 
 knows I can pick up this scattered force. Pepa, I 
 will do all that I have sworn to do or die." 
 
 "Then at it," she said firmly, and dazzling him 
 with the smile he had not seen for many hours. " Go. 
 If I am inspiration to you, remember now how I 
 send you away. I call you a hero. I put my hands 
 on your shoulders, so. I look into your eyes, so. 
 I give you all hope, all promise. Go now; do not 
 delay one hour. For you carry with you my love." 
 
 She half whispered the last with an odd pensive- 
 ness. He was glittering of eye and full of bounding 
 blood. He would have seized her and kissed her, 
 but she broke suddenly away, and, with a touch of 
 coldness, bade him leave her. 
 
 " Then, pretty tigress, I am to have no pledge? " 
 
 " Tigress is a good word, in books ; you have used 
 it before; but it is not I. Pledge? Rapacious Qui- 
 roz ! Look ; when I arise a few mornings hence and 
 step to this window and see you riding up the street 
 with an army at your back, then you may have it 
 never, never, never till then ! " 
 
 So he left her, fired with his enthusiasm, the canker 
 and the omen no more in his mind, reckless and 
 stealthy Ouiroz. The mozo saddled a horse for him 
 
3 i4 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 and Doroteo, not so much as taking leave of his 
 fluttering mother, mounted it in the patio and rode 
 away. 
 
 It was not long after that that Pepa found Clarita 
 alone under the trees of the patio. The sad Clarita 
 sat on a bench there, deep in her troubled thoughts, 
 a silent girl, almost a hopeless one. The flecks of 
 sunlight coming through the mass of leaves, made 
 shining spots of gold on her hair. Pepa came up 
 quietly. She was again the old lovable Pepa. She 
 put her arm tenderly round Clarita * waist. 
 
 " What are you dreaming about so sadly? " asked 
 she. 
 
 " Vicente," said Clarita. 
 
 " You knew that they took him away last night? " 
 
 " I saw him go," was the reply. 
 
 " No one knows where he has gone unless it be 
 you, Clarita. Do you know?" 
 
 " I do not know. But I know where it may be." 
 
 Pepa smoothed the other s hair. 
 
 " Where? " asked she. " To Guadalajara? " 
 
 " No, I do not believe they would take him there." 
 
 "Then where?" 
 
 "To Prison Island." 
 
 "Why?" 
 
 " From something Don Rodrigo said when we were 
 coming," said Clarita. 
 
 Then she told her what it was. There was a long 
 and earnest conversation after that between the two. 
 There was suddenly born a purpose in Pepa s mind, 
 but before she could speak it, Clarita herself had 
 urged the deed; for in the latter s feminine heart 
 there was bravery of its kind, and, least expected of 
 all perhaps, an ingenuity and creative talent, not ex 
 ceedingly prominent but, in the one great subject, 
 
X DREAM OF A THRONE 315 
 
 capable of conceiving and doing. There were plans 
 laid, and a course was determined on. A half hour 
 later Clarita arose with new light and hope in her 
 face. She went alone into the rear patio. 
 
 " Where is Fortino? " she asked. 
 
 " He went out of that door," replied Anastasio, 
 " and I heard him making the river road shake with 
 his walking on it." 
 
 She returned, went into the Street by the patio 
 door, and proceeded toward the river. She asked 
 several whom she passed for news of him. One had 
 seen a very large man yonder by the shore. Thither 
 she came, finding him sitting in a small bare space 
 between the lake road and the marsh, his eyes fixed 
 on the dark water that lay silent among the reeds. 
 The flat marsh was green and shining in the morn 
 ing sun, with the river winding through it a glistening 
 band. There was little wind. Doves in the trees 
 were still making their sad sounds, of all in nature 
 fittest music to the scene. 
 
 The fisherman did not hear her approach. She 
 came where he sat, and laid her small hand on his 
 shoulder. He turned his head slowly, and looked at 
 her, without much evidence of recognition. 
 
 " Fortino," she said gently, " you are very wretched 
 over yesterday. At least I, Fortino, do not believe 
 that it is you who are to blame. I think I even know 
 who is, and, except that I was so weak from grief 
 and did not know where to turn, and Dona Manuela 
 was kind, I could not have stayed in his house. I can 
 not return thither. Fortino, do not despair. There 
 is always a way for the faithful one, and you are Vi 
 cente s friend. Listen to me ; I will tell you how we 
 might do something, at least come where he is, so 
 that you can let him know you did not mean it 
 
3 i6 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 I, too, will tell him that, and we will not feel hard 
 against you. Do you hear, Fortino?" 
 
 He looked into her tender eyes. The animal-like 
 man melted before her, and that odd old Fortino 
 actually wept, of a sudden, like a child. Then she 
 continued, putting her hand on his, being very sorry 
 for him : 
 
 " Don Rodrigo and some soldiers and two vessels 
 went away across the lake last night at dark, taking 
 Vicente. I saw them. Nobody knows where they 
 went, but I have good reasons for thinking it was to 
 the island that lies out there seven leagues distant. 
 And this is why. When we were coming, Don Rod 
 rigo and I talked of the island, and he said he had 
 been there. He said, too, he did not like to speak 
 of it, for, if the course of the war took a certain turn, 
 he might have to do what he should not like to do. 
 I did not understand him, but I think now he was 
 thinking of the capture of Vicente, and it came over 
 him that there might be the safest spot; for they 
 say much of the old prison remains. Fortino, you 
 do not believe it is haunted, and are not afraid of 
 ghosts ? " 
 
 " Not I," muttered he heavily, beginning to think. 
 
 " You have never been there?" 
 
 " No." 
 
 " Would you go, Fortino, if I wanted you to, and 
 take me me and Pepita? " 
 
 Pepa had so managed the affair of the day before 
 that none of the directions to him or any other save 
 Quiroz had come from her. She had been the un 
 seen power. Hence Fortino had not definitely con 
 nected her with the treachery. But he did not like her. 
 
 " I don t want to take the other one," said he. 
 
 "Why?" 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 317 
 
 " Nothing. I don t like the other one." 
 
 " Well, but she wants to go. I do not know any 
 reason why I should not want her to. You know 
 you know, Fortino, she and Vicente are were 
 lovers. It would be only right that she go." 
 
 She was smothering her own suspicions, trying to 
 be good to Pepa in her own sorrow. 
 
 " Yes, I want you to take us both. You can 
 get two other sailors. You can take my father and 
 Anastasio." 
 
 " No," groaned he ; " they taunted me." 
 
 " This was very wrong of them," she said thought 
 fully. " Well, there are others. And we shall take 
 food for three days, for we may not find him at once. 
 I was once out five days, going from place to place 
 with my father, and sleeping in the canoa ; it was a 
 good journey, and I liked it. We will go first to the 
 island. If he is not there, we will go on across the 
 lake, and learn where he is. Then, if they have 
 taken him too far away, at least," and her voice 
 broke, " we can go to Chapala and be at home. 
 There is nothing to be done, Fortino, by staying here. 
 You want to tell him that you are still faithful ; that 
 it was no fault of yours, only your faith. We will 
 find him ; even there may be some chance to rescue 
 him, for you are very strong." 
 
 " I would break down the gates of Heaven to do 
 that, Clarita," said he. 
 
 " Then you will come?" 
 
 " Si" he replied, arising with a mournful dignity, 
 and seeming to the small girl very large indeed, 
 " I will go. But the wind is wrong. I think we 
 shall have to wait till night for a wind. It has 
 changed since I sat here. The sky, the clouds, the 
 very air are against me, wreck that I am." 
 
3 i8 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 " Then," said she, " we will go when the wind 
 comes." 
 
 She thanked him fervently, and gave him her hand, 
 and then, wrapping the gray rcbozo about her head 
 and shoulders, went on into the town. She went to 
 Quiroz s house only to report to Pepa. She would 
 not stay there. She went to an inn at the plaza, and 
 remained in it all day. 
 
 Thus it chanced that, when a southern breeze 
 sprang up toward six o clock that evening, and the 
 sun had lit his flames in the west, another canoa was 
 poled down the river and sent out into the lake, 
 where the white square of canvas caught the wind, 
 and a journey was begun toward a barely visible 
 speck of black in the distant middle of the great 
 basin. 
 
CHAPTER IV 
 
 THERE is but a vague idea among the inhabi 
 tants of the lake borders concerning the 
 origin and the age of the ruins that are still 
 to be seen on Prison Island, ruins which, by their 
 massiveness, by their evidences of a complete and 
 elaborate system, form a startling contrast to the 
 simplicity of the life of the surrounding shores. One 
 need only chance on that deserted spot in the middle 
 of the lake to know that a powerful and civilized 
 nation came and pushed its institutions into a primi 
 tive one. 
 
 The island is three-quarters of a mile long and less 
 than a quarter of a mile wide in its widest part. At 
 some parts the width is less than an eighth. It is 
 curved round a small bay on the western side, the 
 side toward Chapala and from which Chapala s towers 
 are barely visible. It is a rocky and rugged piece of 
 land, stern, unpromising. It rises more than one 
 hundred feet above the water and its summit is 
 somewhat flat. Its sides are steep and strewn with 
 boulders. In places at the shore lie vast quanti 
 ties of broken rocks heaped or strewn in chaos. 
 The place has repelled men for many years. The 
 prison is too gloomy, too stern. They thought it 
 haunted. 
 
 There are a few large trees on the summit, but 
 the most prevalent plant is the great, zigzag bush 
 of the flat-leaved cactus that bears the juicy tuna. 
 
320 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 These plants stand in thorny clusters that rise high 
 in air and cover spaces of many square yards, defy 
 ing penetration. They cling, too, down on the steep 
 sides and drop red fruit into the waves. But they 
 leave much of the summit bare. There are some 
 wild goats leaping among the stones. Many a car 
 rion-eating black bird of great size, being a kind of 
 vulture, hovers about ruined wall or empty moat, 
 or flaps a sluggish wing over the roofless cells. 
 
 Toward the northern end stand the ruins of a stone 
 Catholic chapel. The roof lies broken on the floor. 
 The naves are empty. The walls are discolored by 
 time and let in the sunlight through yawning gaps. 
 There is no altar, nor any pulpit, nor a vestige of 
 priesthood, nor any memory of those that came in 
 at the high arched door and knelt. There is a large 
 open square near by whose surrounding walls, fifty 
 yards in each direction, are mouldering and covered 
 with herbage. 
 
 A full half mile away, at the southern end, the end 
 toward Tizapan, are the remains of an edifice much 
 larger and curious of construction. It was like two 
 tunnels built above instead of under the ground, of 
 stone, rising fifty feet in height, the tunnels parallel, 
 divided only by a single wall that was common to 
 both. There was no communication between them. 
 There were no partitions. The tiny windows were 
 thirty feet above the ground and the arched roofs 
 let in no light. Each long passage measured twenty 
 yards from end to end. Each might have held many 
 prisoners and, thus occupied, even beneath the 
 ground there could scarcely have been a more 
 loathsome dungeon. The appearance of this build 
 ing from without, is strange in the extreme. Its 
 position, too, arrests attention. It is high on the 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 321 
 
 bluff over the water. The island at that end narrows 
 and that section of it whereon the building stands 
 is cut off from the rest by a deep moat that extends 
 entirely across the land. The moat is now dry ; the 
 drawbridge is wanting. In one of the two high 
 pillars that stand at the place of the bridge is an 
 inscription stone. The inscription is chiselled away. 
 
 Between the church occupying the island s one 
 end and the vaulted building occupying the other, 
 and situated in the centre of the widest portion of 
 the island, stands the largest edifice. It is nearer the 
 vaulted one than the church. A space of some one 
 hundred yards separates this prison from that of the 
 tunnels. It is exceedingly large and square, being 
 made of long rows of cells extending successively 
 round the four sides of an inner open court. None 
 of the cells has doors opening out to the unwalled 
 island. Some of them have doors opening into the 
 court. Others have not even these, nor any win 
 dows, only one narrow door leading into a second 
 cell which, windowless, leads into a third, thence to 
 a fourth. The fourth may open into the court. 
 Thus there are series with but one entrance for each. 
 The last of a series, with its door locked, must have 
 been a. hole of horrors to him who occupied it. 
 
 Nearly all the walls stand firm and strong, though 
 blackened. The greater portion of the roofs has 
 fallen in and lies in ruins. There is a reason for the 
 intact condition of the walls. There is a place where 
 it seems a prisoner has tried to dig his way out, 
 which place shows the composition. He began with 
 the plaster coating and came to a layer of brick. 
 Doubtless he was overjoyed that it was brick instead 
 of stone. After concealing his labor for some time, 
 in peril of being shot, he came to a wall of solid 
 
 21 
 
322 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 rock. The stones of it arc exceedingly large. They 
 are square cut, fitted with nicety. He failed to go 
 further. If one starts boring in from outside he will 
 come to brick also. So the real wall of stone is 
 buried between walls of brick. The whole is two 
 yards thick. 
 
 The court in the centre is forty yards square. It 
 is wild looking, deserted. From without one low 
 passage leads into it between cells. To reach that 
 passage a deep moat must be crossed, a moat which 
 surrounds the entire prison. It is now dry and the 
 bridge is gone. In two corners of this edifice nar 
 row spiral staircases rise to the summit of it, issuing 
 in towers. These corners, time-stained, give the last 
 touches to the mediaeval air that is over the whole of 
 the island. But the mediaeval power is gone. 
 
 Farther toward the eastern shore there are ruins 
 that are more completely ruins. Here must have 
 been a building as large as that just described. But 
 it was much older. Its walls are all down, rounded 
 heaps like earthworks. Out of the summits of the 
 heaps grow large trees. Again, between the square 
 prison and the prison of tunnels, stands a lone 
 tower, high and square, with stairs in it. Past this 
 a paved road, doubtless convict made, leads from the 
 one prison to the moat that cuts the island in two 
 at the other, and continues beyond. 
 
 On the western side, the side of the bay, the side 
 toward Chapala, the ascent, though steep, was such 
 as to allow of the building of a winding roadway up. 
 It is broad and well paved, the slow, slow work of 
 many hands. One cannot see it without picturing 
 to himself the lines of wretches that toiled in bond 
 age up the long incline. At its foot by the bay are 
 the remnants of a stone landing-place. Here is a spot 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 323 
 
 more nearly like a harbor than is any other of the 
 shore. Here the canoas the same in those old 
 times that they are to-day discharged their un 
 happy cargoes. At the landing, with its base beaten 
 by the waves, is another lonely tower. It is Roman 
 in appearance. It is massive, lifting a heavy dome. 
 
 To him who, in that olden time of tyranny, brought 
 his enslaved Aztec body and his crushed Aztec soul 
 to this spot, hope must have perished, and the day, 
 though it were the fairest that the fair lake knew, 
 been black. For, though he should penetrate the 
 rock and cross the moat, though he should evade the 
 sentries on wall and in tower, freedom yet would not 
 be his till he should swim ten miles to Mescala on 
 the north, or twenty to the south, there where Tiza- 
 pan lies unseen under her peaks. 
 
 Before dawn of the day last spoken of there was 
 the unwonted presence of two canoas in the little bay, 
 sailing in lonely, disturbing the old solitude, being 
 poled at length, sails down, to the ruins of the dock 
 beside the tower. The wind was falling and the waves 
 were gentle. The morning star was up in the east. 
 The guide had done his duty, though with the lessen 
 ing breeze there was no such need of him as the 
 jefe had anticipated. Besides the anchors at the 
 bows, ropes were run out of the sterns and tied at 
 the tower s base. The tower itself rose gloomy, its 
 dome cutting a half circle out of the sky. The rocky 
 promontories of the island, too, shut out half the 
 starry expanse. Men disembarked and stood about 
 on the rocks, chilled by the place. It was new to 
 them all save to the guide and the leader. The 
 prisoner was brought to land, guarded. He, too, 
 stood looking at the tower. He had said not a word 
 since he entered the canoa with Bonavidas. He said 
 
324 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 nothing now. He stood aloof, silent, the night hiding 
 the expression of his face. When the men, the 
 weapons, the ammunition, and the provisions were at 
 length safely landed on the remnants of pier, the 
 prisoner was heard to sigh heavily. 
 
 The guide, whose scarred face had been seen at 
 times during the voyage by the light of a candle and 
 had been observed to show signs of excitement, was 
 on the point of landing. Rodrigo s voice sounded 
 odd and loud, breaking on the silence: 
 
 " Keep to your vessel, friend," said he. " I shall 
 not pay you by leaving you in this solitude. I 
 promised to see you over. So I will. Bonavidas, 
 have you chosen your men?" 
 
 " They are ready enough," was the reply. 
 
 " Take, then, this vessel. It is the fastest. The 
 wind will not last you many hours more. So make 
 for the nearest coast. Take this silent friend with 
 you and give him his liberty when you arrive. Then 
 you and your three companions get you to the gov 
 ernor as fast as any beasts you can steal or buy or bor 
 row can travel thither. Give him first the letter, and 
 in the name of haste get an answer from him at once 
 and bring it, that I may know my next step. And 
 remember this, as I have told you : If there is to be 
 any delay, if I am to hold this desert spot so much 
 as a day after your return, he is to send me a cannon 
 or two to do it with. Go on and make haste." 
 
 The mute was crouched on the stern of the vessel. 
 He hesitated. He felt Rodrigo s hand on his 
 shoulder and suddenly flashed eyes at the jcfc that 
 were luminous in the darkness. 
 
 "Thank you friend," said thcjefe, " and farewell." 
 
 The mute descended within, went creeping to the 
 bow, and lay down there, where it was black, on the 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 325 
 
 boat s bottom under an unused sail. Bonavidas and 
 three others entered likewise. The boat glided out 
 impelled by poles. It lay for a moment rocking 
 yonder on the waves. Then the canvas went up and 
 caught the breeze. With the four soldiers in the 
 stern and the mute in the bow, the vessel began its 
 journey in the first of the dawn. 
 
 None of those left behind spoke. The march up 
 the old winding roadway of cobblestones began, 
 Vicente, strong and elastic of step, leading the way. 
 He seemed to hasten to this new condition as though 
 it were part of his own necessary course. The steep 
 way led between walls of rock and clusters of cacti. 
 They issued at length on the island s top under 
 certain trees, and the lake and the round tower were 
 far below. Under these trees, they halted him and, 
 a guard being left, Rodrigo and some others went 
 away and disappeared. They were gone an hour, 
 during which it grew lighter, during which, also, the 
 prisoner stood, seemingly unseeing, and looked at 
 the east where the sun would rise out of the water. 
 When at last the jefe returned there was red in the 
 sky and the clear freshness of a new day in the air. 
 Rodrigo had examined the island from end to end. 
 He knew his course. He was, too, sick at heart. 
 
 " Come," said he to Vicente, constrainedly. " I 
 must plunge into it as into cold water, and have it 
 done. If you knew half the bitterness this business 
 causes me, we might yet be friends." 
 
 Vicente turned his eyes on the speaker. 
 
 " Why, we are sufficiently so," said he. " We 
 follow different laws, that is all. At least you are a 
 man. There be some that are not men." 
 
 The jefe was startled to see the other s one un- 
 bandaged hand held out to him. He took it in 
 
326 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 silence and turned, and Vicente followed. They 
 went to that great square prison, across whose moat at 
 the only opening the soldiers had dragged the trunk 
 of a tree. When the prisoner finally entered and 
 felt the presence of the walls about him, the sun was 
 rising and burnishing the lake and a track of yellow 
 gold led across the water straight into its great eye. 
 
 He was taken through the stone passage and into 
 the open court. Its floor was covered with weeds, 
 shrubs, and cacti. Among these the party went, 
 crossing to the western wall. On this side there was 
 one of those series of cells already mentioned, where 
 of a single cell only gave exit into the court. The 
 second opened only into the first. It had a small, 
 deep-barred window. The third led into the second 
 and the fourth into the third. These two last had 
 no other doors nor any windows. They had been 
 dungeons. 
 
 The innermost of the four, that one most dungeon- 
 like, was still roofed. It was situated in the far south 
 east corner of the ruins. To pass from it through the 
 three others, and thence to the only exit, one must tra 
 verse a distance of some thirty yards, for the cells were 
 long. The partition between it and the third was 
 intact and the open doorway very narrow. Between 
 the third and the second were the rotten remnants of 
 a heavy wooden door strengthened by iron bands. 
 The second cell was roofless and the partition between 
 it and the first was partially down. The exit into the 
 court was another narrow doorway with no door. 
 Guards at this passage were thus in command of the 
 four cells. 
 
 They put him in that series, and some soldiers 
 took their stand at the entrance. Rodrigo, eager to 
 be away from a spot that was loathsome to him, took 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 327 
 
 the rest of his men to the shore again, whence the 
 provisions were to be carried to the sufnmit. Those 
 provisions were, for the most part, of that very store 
 that Fortino and Anastasio had seen to the gathering 
 of in Tizapan. They were, in the main, taken to the 
 ruins of the church. It was there Rodrigo made his 
 quarters. He would not stay longer than need be in 
 the prison. The church was cleaned, fuel was col 
 lected, duties were assigned, and the wait for the 
 governor s orders was begun, a wait that, to him 
 who was master of the spot, who loved freedom and 
 deeds and action, was nevertheless a wait of unalloyed 
 misery, the hours of which were depressing weeks. 
 
 " Pray God I may receive orders to-morrow," said 
 he, " and that I be not forced to the worst." 
 
 Vicente had walked into his prison with his never- 
 absent, unmoved calmness, whatever else his face 
 bespoke. They asked him where he wished his bed. 
 He traversed the first and second cells, looking at 
 their desolation. He pushed open the rotten door to 
 the third, and the hinges grated echoingly. He 
 traversed the third and the fourth. The last was 
 darkest and most depressing, but its floor was intact. 
 He desired, said he, to sleep there. So the place 
 was cleaned as well as could be. It was paved with 
 large square stones. Blankets were brought and put 
 in the farthest corner, according to his directions, and 
 a candle was placed beside them. He was left alone. 
 
 He strode slowly back and forth for hours from the 
 southern end of the innermost cell to the northern 
 end of that which gave exit to the court where the 
 guards sat. At one o clock they brought him some 
 thing to eat, as they had done at nine. All the 
 afternoon he stood in the second cell at the barred 
 window, looking out over the weed-choked patio. At 
 
3 2S A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 night, having eaten, he shut himself up in the rear 
 cells. 
 
 He did not sleep. The hours went by, passed by 
 him in unhappy thought. And it was characteristic 
 of his unsullied nature and the strong and faithful 
 clinging to his one purpose, that not his failure or his 
 danger was the cause of bitterest grief to him, but 
 rather the sorrowful fact of the treachery that had 
 brought them about. He tried to put the memory 
 of that away. He wished, finally, that his wounded 
 head and shoulder might pain him more poignantly, 
 that he might thus be unable to think. But the 
 treachery was yet uppermost. There was one subject 
 of thought, however, that finally banished even that. 
 
 As he had neared the island a burst of light had 
 come over his brain. He had watched the course of 
 the vessel with unseen intensity of interest. There 
 were other things meant by that heavy sigh which 
 escaped him on the pier than mere sadness. It meant, 
 too, relief of what had been nearly excitement. When 
 he had risen to the island s summit he had scanned 
 every rock, though he had seemed to see nothing. 
 Arrived at that summit it was not the coming day 
 alone that he saw. Entering his prison he had 
 strained his powers of recollection. He had not, 
 however, been gratified. He had seen nothing that 
 he remembered. But his situation, he felt, was never 
 theless strange and incongruous. The possibilities of 
 it filled him with an unreasoning anticipation. When 
 the sun at length rose, therefore, and he came, after a 
 sleepless night, and looked, hollow-eyed, through the 
 bars into the desolate court, it was not on a day alto 
 gether without hope that he gazed, nor on walls that 
 meant nothing but imprisonment. Yet having gazed 
 thus at certain black wings that drooped over a turret 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 329 
 
 opposite, he sighed again, a sigh of pain, and turned 
 and paced among the ruins. 
 
 "Fool," said he; "fool you are and have ever 
 been. Now that your dream is wrecked, you would 
 look for miracles to spring from the ruins of a prison." 
 
 That day also passed without incident. And the 
 second night, to be nearly as sleepless as the first, 
 closed in. 
 
 Meanwhile the vessel in which Bonavidas was has 
 tening his message to Guadalajara and on which 
 Vicente s destiny hung, had rounded, in that first 
 dawn, the rocks that mark the bay s eastern arm, and 
 made for Mescala. It was still nearly dark when the 
 last of the island s coasts was left behind. Just after 
 passing that last headland, a spot where bold rocks 
 stood out of the water and the land was broken 
 with stony confusion, the four soldiers being at that 
 time in the boat s stern and the sail somewhat hiding 
 the bow, one of the four believed that he heard a 
 splash in the water to the front. 
 
 "What was that?" said he, leaning over the side. 
 " There was a noise in the water." 
 
 The others leaned and looked also. It was too dark 
 to see. 
 
 " I did n t hear anything, nor you either," said 
 Bonavidas, coughing dryly and spitting up something, 
 which result of the cough he did not make manifest 
 to his comrades. He turned, then, deathly pale, but 
 smiling his same uncanny smile. 
 
 " I, too, heard it," said the third soldier, who was 
 at the rudder. 
 
 " And I," said the fourth, " but it was only a fish. 
 They say the vagres jump out of the water so, and I 
 have seen a vagre five feet long." 
 
 " It is not so, ; answered the first. " Vagres never 
 jump out of the water." 
 
330 A DREAM OF A THROXK 
 
 " Vagrcs, I tell you, jump most astonishingly high." 
 
 " Children," said Bonavidas, " the argument is pur 
 poseless. Jump or no jump, what odds? Call it a 
 mermaid ; mermaids are prettier than vagrcs." 
 
 The discussion was dropped. The breeze contin 
 ued light. There was fear lest it should die before 
 bringing them to shore. The high blue saw of the 
 mountains seemed to grow higher and nearer with 
 exasperating slowness. Day came and the yellow 
 sun ; the lake was a mass of flashing ripples. When 
 the vessel stood half-way between the tiny and distant 
 island and the vast and distant mountains of the shore, 
 one of the soldiers left the stern, where he had been 
 playing cards with a companion, and, stooping under 
 the thatch, went to the bow. 
 
 " How is our freight, the mute ? " called one from 
 the stern. 
 
 " I don t see him," said the other. 
 
 " He is under the sail." 
 
 " He is not under the sail." 
 
 " I tell you he hid himself under the sail." 
 
 " If you can see fish where there arc none, you may 
 see him under it, then. I tell you, friend, there is 
 nothing under the sail." 
 
 The two who were not at the rudder followed to 
 the bow. The sail was thrown aside and lay flat on 
 the floor. There was no possible place in a vessel 
 like this to hide. The bow was empty. The soldiers 
 gazed at one another. 
 
 " Well, may Moses comfort me ! " ejaculated Bona 
 vidas. 
 
 " He has slid over the side in the dark and dived 
 yonder by the island," said the fourth soldier. 
 
 " Si, senor" said the first. " That was your vagre" 
 
CHAPTER V 
 
 RODRIGO determined that the night watches 
 should not be left entirely to inferiors. Un 
 congenial as the whole task had grown to be, he 
 would yet watch all points himself. He inaugurated 
 the custom of making in person at least three slow 
 circuits of the entire island each night. Thus would 
 there be less possibility of a fleet s surprising him. 
 
 It was still dark on the morning of that second day, 
 and he had but just returned to the church from his 
 last inspection of his guards, when one of the latter 
 came to him. A canoa, said the soldier, had anchored 
 off the southern point. Thejefe arose and, following 
 the guard, went and looked at the ghost-like vessel, 
 which could scarcely be seen lying on the waves. 
 Some intuition, born of a new interest in his life, or 
 perhaps his knowledge of her nature, turned his 
 thoughts at once to Clarita. Moody, dark of mind, 
 he gave orders that the vessel be watched, and re 
 turned to the church. He lay down and passed 
 sleepless hours till day. 
 
 "The little one/ " he muttered. " She would go 
 into the great abyss to find him." 
 
 At daylight, the waves being smaller, the mysteri 
 ous canoa was poled into the bay. Rodrigo had dog 
 gedly refrained from watching its arrival. He had 
 remained at the church, receiving word of its move 
 ments. He mastered his own perversity at length 
 and came to the island s upper edge. The vessel 
 
332 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 lay there at the ruins of pier with the ripples lapping 
 its sides. There was a sailor sitting on its stern eat 
 ing a tortilla. There was another doing something 
 with a sail. If there was any one under the thatch, 
 the thatch of course hid him. 
 
 Rodrigo observed these things at a glance ; but 
 they took none of his attention. His eyes were nearer. 
 She was there, the little one, toiling slowly up the 
 long ascent of old cobblestone roadway, a cactus or 
 a boulder now hiding her, for she was very small, so far 
 down there. The gray rebozo was over her head and 
 shoulders, and the hair was hid from the light of the 
 morning. Strange as her coming was, perhaps her 
 companion seemed stranger yet, merely that so great 
 and rough a man should be her companion. Fur 
 Fortino was climbing up, too, by her side, Fortino the 
 huge, with a demeanor of deep seriousness, of depres 
 sion. His sombrero seemed exceedingly high. His 
 white peon shirt and his loose white trousers were a trifle 
 soiled and his sandals a trifle worn. Round his waist 
 was the blue sash, still brilliant. He was assisting her, 
 holding her arm in a stiff and unwonted gallantry. 
 
 The^V/i sighed and turned back. He entered the 
 church and sat down on a heap of the fallen roof with 
 his back to the door. After a time the new-comers 
 had reached the summit, for he heard her high voice 
 asking for him. 
 
 "We will go, if you please, senor, to Don Rodrigo." 
 
 A soldier came into the church. 
 
 " Shall I bring them in here? " 
 
 " Yes," said thcje/e. 
 
 The ruins seemed stern to her, inspiring her with 
 awe ; and she shuddered at the birds, though she was 
 not conscious of seeing them. The doorway of the 
 church was large and she and Fortino turned to it. 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 333 
 
 The giant stood stolidly staring at the back of Rod- 
 rigo, who had arisen yonder at the altar place. 
 
 "Don Rodrigo," said she timidly. 
 
 He turned and looked at them. Her first impres 
 sion, and it was a startling one, was that Rodrigo 
 looked older than she had thought him. He forced 
 himself into a strained cordiality, white and serious of 
 face. He came across the floor among bricks, stone, 
 and mortar. He held out his hand. 
 
 " Come in at least we can be equal in a church. 
 Fortino, my friend, you have brought this girl to a 
 dreary place." 
 
 " Senor," said Fortino, standing glaring at Rodrigo 
 with bloodshot eyes and speaking with despair, you 
 may be a brave man, but I am no friend of yours. I 
 am not anybody s friend. Damn me, he who takes 
 Fortino for a friend is cursed." 
 
 " At least come in," said Rodrigo, and they followed 
 him toward the place of the altar, a movement rather 
 of nervousness than of purpose for the sky was the 
 roof wherever they went. 
 
 " Don Rodrigo," said Clarita, turning her eyes on 
 him and letting the rebozo fall to her shoulders as she 
 stood, like a figure in some gray stone, before him, 
 "is Vicente here?" 
 
 " He is here, little one," said he. " He is in the 
 prison over there." 
 
 Whereat her eyes filled with tears, though she did 
 not hesitate, but spoke as before. 
 
 " I have brought Fortino, senor, because we thought 
 he might be here, and if he had not been, we should 
 have gone home. Don Rodrigo, it was Fortino who 
 put up the chain. But Fortino is not a traitor ; he 
 did not mean it. Fortino is loyal and very good. 
 He was told that it was you he was to stop. You 
 
334 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 will not think less of Fortino because he would have 
 injured you, for you know he was on the other side. 
 And when he found they had deceived him, he was 
 very ill, and it weighs on him very much. And I 
 was I was sorry for him, for it weighed on him 
 so. I saw he was he was not what Vicente might 
 think him ; and I said I said I would bring him " 
 she faltered and looked at the big Fortino "I would 
 bring him here, and, if Vicente were here, I knew you 
 would let him talk to him, so that he can tell Vicente 
 that he did not mean it. This will be a great happi 
 ness to Fortino. This is this is why I brought him, 
 Don Rodrigo." 
 
 Rodrigo was awed into silence by the simplicity of 
 that wonderful statement; nor did it strike him as in 
 congruous, this small girl s bringing of this giant over 
 the water. He stood and looked at her as she gazed 
 anxiously up at him. She seemed to him beautiful. 
 
 " Little girl," sighed he at last, " if any man could 
 refuse you this alas! he would be no more a man. 
 I think I read that you came, too, because, as at 
 other times, you could not stay away. You too wish 
 to see him? " 
 
 " Is he comfortable, senior, and is he where he can 
 have a little room and light and food, and where he 
 can sleep? " 
 
 " It is the best I could do, Clarita. He has all 
 these things." 
 
 She stood in strained silence for a time. 
 
 " Can I stay here in the church? " asked she. 
 
 "Why it is a dreary and a hard place." 
 
 " It will do. Fortino can bring food from the 
 boat and watch at the door." 
 
 " God pity me ! " cried Rodrigo. " You too, then, 
 wish to stay ! " 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 335 
 
 " I do not want to go away, senor," said she. 
 
 " But how will you sleep how will you live? " 
 
 He knew there was a quick fire born in him and 
 that his heart was not all eagerness that she should 
 go away. 
 
 " Have you forgotten, senor, that we are very poor 
 here by the lake and the houses are little, and that 
 I have slept all my life on the ground? I will stay. 
 I cannot go away. I could sleep, senor, if I must, 
 on the rocks outside." 
 
 " You may have the church, Clarita," said he, 
 sadly; "and I think the Virgin will forget that it is 
 ruins and come." 
 
 " I knew if you were here," said she, " you would 
 be good to me. I am not afraid." 
 
 " I shall take this friend now," said the jefe t " to 
 Vicente. And you though I dread it you too 
 will come?" 
 
 " No. I will not come. And I believe I do not 
 want him to know that I am here. You will tell 
 your men that Vicente is not to know. Fortino, you 
 are not to tell him that I am with you. For if he 
 needs me, Don Rodrigo, I know you will come and 
 tell me. I do not want him to know, for it would 
 add to his unhappiness. He would be afraid for me." 
 
 The two went out, Rodrigo leading, and Fortino 
 following silently in a perspiration but without any 
 of the customary flames in his face. She came to 
 the door, wrapping the rebozo round her head, and 
 sat down on a stone and watched them go, her eyes 
 full of her love and her wretchedness. She had 
 made a sacrifice that one should not try to measure 
 when she decided she should not go also. When 
 she saw the two arrive at the prison she cried in her 
 heart : 
 
336 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 11 I, too, wish much to see him ! " 
 
 They felt it necessary at the prison to search 
 Fortino. They found nothing. Rodrigo ordered 
 one of the guards to "accompany the fisherman and 
 be present at the interview. He himself returned to 
 the church. The girl had gone inside. She was 
 standing by the far wall, wrapped in thought, and 
 he came near her. 
 
 " Senor," she said with emotion, and put out her 
 hand with a little impulsive movement that was new 
 to him, " I wish to tell you again that I know that in 
 your heart you are not any enemy to us, only that 
 you were on the side that you thought right. I say 
 this because I can see that you are oppressed and are 
 sorry for me, and because I must thank you again for 
 being as kind to him as you can be and to me." 
 
 He took the hand a moment. 
 
 "Have I been kind to you, Clarita? It seems to 
 me I have been only cruel." 
 
 " You are kind, indeed you are kind ! " she said, 
 eagerly, frankly, with the tenderness that made her 
 greatly fear to hurt any one. 
 
 He had her sit down on a smooth stone where of 
 old priests had chanted. He himself sat down a 
 little way from her. 
 
 " You could not stay away," he said, turning his 
 brown eyes and knitted brow toward her, speaking 
 musingly. 
 
 " No." 
 
 " You would have come had it been the sea in 
 stead of the lake." 
 
 " I do not know," said she, " for the sea is very 
 wide. I should have wanted to try." 
 
 He was silent a long while. He was borne away 
 on a stream of strong deep thought and emotion. 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 337 
 
 " Clarita," he said, after a time, " I am lost again 
 in wonder at your faithfulness. You do not know 
 how different you are you never saw the world. 
 If it had half of your steadfastness it would be the 
 world no longer. There are books in my country 
 that are full of stories of Mexican faithlessness. It 
 is a habit, and a bad and constant one, to call your 
 people faithless. The opinion is prated much, and 
 believed much. I even had it myself. Well, I have 
 seen Mexican treachery. There are villains here 
 there are villains everywhere. But there are true 
 ones too. I have seen a faith, a strength of soul, 
 on the lake s border such as I never knew in any 
 other part of the wide world. Let my nation plume 
 itself no more on honesty. I think there are many 
 at its very head who could learn the art of life from 
 you." 
 
 " Senor, you rate me very much too high. I do 
 not want you to think thus of me. Tell me some 
 thing about your life before you came here. It must 
 have been sad." 
 
 She said it with so much tenderness that he was 
 drawn out of himself. He had come to that time 
 when a man would throw himself away to empty his 
 heart. 
 
 " A part of it was bitter, little one. How could 
 you understand that another woman was untrue?" 
 
 " I have seen women," said she, thinking of Pepa, 
 " of whom I was afraid." 
 
 She arose and came and sat nearer, a very natural 
 movement. 
 
 " Tell me," said she. 
 
 He waited some minutes. 
 
 " I lived in a city," he began, " in the east, and 
 my father was a man of wealth. I was a little wild 
 
 22 
 
338 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 of spirit, Clarita, and I went away from home and 
 travelled over the west. In a western city I met 
 a girl with whom I thought I fell in love. Well 
 it is like so many other stories. There is no need 
 to tell it all. She was beautiful or I thought she 
 was. I think it was her eyes that won me large 
 gray eyes. I gave her everything, my heart and my 
 faith. I believed in her as though she were myself. 
 All my life I had seen the worship of money and 
 hated it. Because I had some wealth I had seen the 
 falseness of many friends. Well, at the deepest 
 moment I saw hers also. That is all, little girl. 
 There is no romance in this, just dull bitterness. 
 She may have thought she cared for me. It was 
 really the money; for she went away and married 
 some one else who had more of it. This turned me 
 against everything. I was always extreme in my 
 acts and feelings. I thought for a time that every 
 one was false. So I wanted to go away and bury 
 myself. I came down here, for I knew it was a 
 country different and full of solitudes as well as of 
 turmoil. That was eight years ago. I was sad nearly 
 all of the time ; I could not forget her. I was glad 
 to be with another race and learn another language. 
 At last I knew she was unworthy of so much sorrow, 
 and I became more careless. I have led a pointless, 
 purposeless life. I had come to Guadalajara in a 
 sudden new spirit of action. I wanted to fight. I 
 joined the little army there and in some troubles 
 some of the city s gendarmes were killed. So they 
 policed many of the streets for a long time with 
 soldiers. This is how I chanced to be a gendarme 
 for a time. Then one day there came into my life 
 a strange little Mexican child with a blue rebozo over 
 her head." 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 339 
 
 She said nothing for a long time, looking at the 
 ruins scattered on the floor ; there was the flush of 
 pink slightly in her face, but the dimples were no 
 more there, for in these days she did not smile. 
 
 " I am sorry," said she at last, haltingly, and paused 
 for another silence. She added after a time : 
 
 " Was she very beautiful, this other woman?" 
 
 " She seemed so once." 
 
 " Was she was she very white? " 
 
 " Yes, she was very white." 
 
 Clarita drew the rebozo more closely about her and 
 sighed. 
 
 " And she was tall, too," she said after a time ; 
 " tall and white and different. Ah, no wonder you 
 loved her ! " 
 
 " Clarita ! " cried he, " to be tall and white is noth 
 ing ! I could love these things no more. Don t you 
 know, don t you know, strange dream-child that you 
 are, what alone it is that I could come to love? " 
 
 " Then," said she, turning a little away, " if it was 
 not right for you to care for the other, perhaps God 
 had a purpose in all of it." 
 
 " I have denied it many times," said he. " There 
 was no purpose for me, no thread to follow out. I 
 seemed drifting. I said to myself, there was under 
 my life none of that power of fate that is the source 
 of the deeds of other men. But I was wrong. Alas ! 
 I might have known it, seven years ago, for even then, 
 once, I felt the stream that was bearing me. And 
 now now I am blind no longer." 
 
 " I too," she said falteringly, trembling, not daring 
 to look at him, " have felt thus. Tell me more of 
 that other girl you love. I know you are very sorry 
 she was not good, and I I too am sorry." 
 
 " Clarita ! " he said arising, " I am sorry no more. 
 
340 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 I wanted to tell you what it is that I could love 
 faith, truth. The peace that I wished to find in the 
 world when I came away, did not satisfy me. It must 
 be in a person, in a woman. And at last I came 
 here ; and I found that the beauty of this place had 
 embodied itself in a girl ; and the fact came over me 
 with such depth of knowledge and such sweetness of 
 emotion that at first it was as though it had been 
 with me always. Clarita, by this very confession I 
 am lost. My miserable state is this: That I have 
 found my first love was not love but shallowness, 
 that, having grown older, love, the true, the living, 
 has come to me. In this I am haunted and crushed 
 by the knowledge that I am bound to a course that 
 is anguish to her I love, may be worse than anguish." 
 
 She had arisen in deep emotion, and had walked 
 away toward the church s far corner, whither he fol 
 lowed her. There were hewn stones, broken, lying 
 at her feet, and the wall was damp and black. She 
 put her arms up on it, and leaned her face against 
 them, burying it, and stood, her breast heaving. 
 
 " I have not dared to ask before," she said, her 
 voice coming unsteadily, " but you must tell me. 
 What are you going what will be done with 
 him?" 
 
 He sat down on a stone and held his head in his 
 hands. 
 
 " You would not demand of me that I free him, 
 after after all that happened and be called a 
 traitor." 
 
 She lifted her face from the rebozo and looked at 
 him, and a great burst of pity came from her, so that 
 she started to him, but turned back and buried her 
 face again against the wall as though she were a very 
 little child. 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 341 
 
 " Oh, it is not mine to demand ! " she said. " I am 
 not anything I cannot I cannot ! " 
 
 " Clarita," he replied, " it is yours, and yours only. 
 For I am powerless. You think yourself weak. You 
 have in you the power that is greatest and strongest of 
 all earth s powers. And because I trust you because 
 I love you I would believe that whatever you did 
 or said was right. I do honestly think that if you 
 told me I did wrong to keep your brother, and asked 
 me to let him free, I should walk now to the prison 
 and open the door, though I ruined my life by doing 
 it. Speak, little one the moment is yours." 
 
 She looked at him fearfully. He had not raised 
 his head. She was holding her breath. Her rebozo 
 had fallen again to her shoulders, and the flood of 
 hair was unbound. Her face seemed almost pure 
 white in the light from the gaping roof; every drop 
 of blood forsook it. There was absolute silence for 
 many seconds. Her brain began to burn with mad 
 thoughts. She closed her eyes. She raised her 
 small hand above her head, and grasped at the damp 
 stones. There came, then, from the walls of the 
 prison, the clear soft notes of a dove, that inimitable 
 sound that carried in it all nature, all beauty, the very 
 meaning of the morning. And the sunlight, pouring 
 through the open roof, was coming slowly down the 
 western wall. 
 
 She gasped and cleared her brain, and her old self 
 came back. 
 
 " I cannot O Holy Mother ! I cannot ! " cried 
 she. " Don Rodrigo, I could not wish you to do 
 this." 
 
 " I knew," said he, " that you could not." 
 
 " What will happen to him, Don Rodrigo? " 
 
 " It is beyond my power to decide," he replied. 
 
342 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 " I have sent a message to the governor, and the an 
 swer could not come, at earliest, before to-night. It 
 must be as the governor says." 
 
 Strangely enough, she had never thought of the 
 worst. She did not think of it now; she dreamed 
 only of some possible prison where she could come, 
 at least, and sit sometimes outside the door. 
 
 " Clarita," and he arose again and came near, " you 
 cannot love me. I would not dare to ask it. I am a 
 monster to you. But, hopeless as it is, and bound as 
 I am, I will open my heart once for all. I love you 
 as I never could love any other being. I shall love 
 you till I die." 
 
 She sobbed. 
 
 " And the other," murmured she, " she who was 
 tall and white. O Don Rodrigo ! you are blind, you 
 do not know for Clarita is little, Clarita is ignorant. 
 In your own land they call us savages. That we can 
 be true this is all we have, and this, to your people, 
 is nothing. Ask of your heart, and do not trust it, 
 but go away when all this pain is ended, and forget 
 me, or remember me only as the little brown one 
 who merely knew to follow Vicente, and stay by the 
 prison where he is " 
 
 He could endure no more. Against his will he 
 seized her in his arms and held her. 
 
 " There is another still," she sobbed, " for I have 
 not been blind Pepa is here ! " 
 
 He let her from him. He was suddenly cold. His 
 face lost color. The remorse swept back on him. 
 
 "Where? " said he. 
 
 " In the boat." 
 
 "Why did she, too, not come here? " 
 
 " She would not." Clarita was burying her face 
 again. " She sulked in the canoa." 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 343 
 
 After some time of silence he shook off the depres 
 sion Pepa s name had caused. 
 
 " You yourself must know," said he, " that there 
 can be nothing between rne and this woman. God 
 pity her I never loved her." 
 
 " But she loves you." 
 
 " For which," he replied, biting his lip, " Heaven 
 be merciful to her. I cannot speak of these, these 
 who are nothing to me. I can think only of you. 
 Yet am I a monster to you ; tell me it is so. Even 
 thus your voice must have some soothing quality 
 in it." 
 
 She broke down and sank to the ground. He 
 sprang to her, unable to restrain himself. He kneeled 
 and held her with his arms round her shoulders and 
 her head against his breast. 
 
 " Then tell me only this," he said. " If, when this 
 horror is done, there be at last, by some impossible 
 chance, a way that leaves me free and makes me not 
 the cause of your greater grief could you then, oh 
 my heart ! come to tell me that you loved me? " 
 
 She was shaking against his breast, weeping. She 
 did not struggle ; she rested there a brief moment. 
 In that moment they were united, as truly as though 
 the old days of that old chapel had come back and 
 the priests were there and the boys in white swung 
 censers that cast sweet fragrance to the vaulted roof. 
 But she did not admit it. Her sobs ceased and her 
 grief came back, and the fear of the future. She 
 arose as though frightened, wrapping the rebozo round 
 her. 
 
 " Oh ! I cannot tell ! " she cried. " We must wait. 
 I cannot speak I cannot think " 
 
 She went away, out of the church, and nearly all 
 that day she sat on the rocks in the most solitary 
 
344 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 part of the island, where the autumn sun found light 
 in her auburn locks and the water below her glistened. 
 
 Fortino, too, that great and wretched giant was 
 seated on the rocks ; but on those just outside the 
 central prison door. Fortino had not entered. When 
 they had searched him before allowing him to cross 
 the moat, he had stood and looked at the moat itself, 
 at the walls, at all the gloomy, depressing place. 
 Then they had told him he could enter. 
 
 11 Is he in there? " asked Fortino hoarsely. 
 
 " Yes." 
 
 He could not realize it. 
 
 " He is in this this hell? " muttered he. 
 
 They assured him Vicente was within. 
 
 He stood like a monolith for many minutes and 
 stared in tragedy of spirit into the place. 
 
 " Here ! " he said in a smothered growl of grief. 
 " In this in this! And I, I did it !" 
 
 They were in much wonder, watching him. His 
 face suddenly blazed red and he turned red eyes on 
 them. 
 
 " No ! " he cried, " not yet ! I cannot yet enter 
 here. Let my damned soul first grow to it ! " 
 
 He backed off some twenty yards and sat down on 
 a rock and stared at the prison s door for eleven mis 
 erable hours without food or drink, without uttering 
 a word or moving his eyes. The noon beat down 
 heat on him. The afternoon cast his shadow longer 
 and longer on the stony earth. The evening breeze 
 came and cooled some of the hot sweat from his face. 
 The sun went down in a sea of red light, and the 
 night came. They had given Vicente his supper and 
 the prisoner had retired to the last of the four cells, 
 when Fortino finally arose. 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 345 
 
 " Perhaps I can do it now," said he. 
 
 They led him across the moat and through the 
 passage into the patio, thence to the door of the first 
 cell. He fixed his eyes ahead of him. He strove 
 with prodigious effort not to see any of the ruins. 
 He halted in a profound revery at the door. 
 
 " Come in," said the guard who was to accompany 
 him, " and follow me." 
 
 He started, awakened, and plunged into the first 
 cell after his leader. The latter held a torch which 
 cast flickering light through the apartments, so that 
 shadows and flames seemed leaping and sporting 
 among the ruins like ghosts. Fortino held his breath 
 and, suffused with misery, stumbled into the second 
 cell. The guard pointed to the door. Fortino put 
 his hand on it, and it creaked and swung open. He 
 entered, followed by the other, and it emitted a dull 
 sound as it closed after them. Into the third cell from 
 the fourth came the dim light of Vicente s candle. 
 The huge man paused and feared to enter. He came 
 to the door and stumbled on a stone, and suddenly 
 burst out in a thunderous oath. 
 
 " What is it, man? " said a calm voice in the fourth 
 cell. " Come in. Defile not your mouth with 
 blasphemies. There are others more unhappy than 
 you, whoever you be." 
 
 Fortino came and stood at the door and looked. 
 The guard was with him. Vicente was seated on 
 the blankets with the light on the floor before him. 
 He was not looking at the door, he was looking into 
 the flame of the candle. His face s profile was turned 
 toward Fortino and the light cut it out of the gloom 
 as out of rock. It held a peace in its sadness. 
 Fortino could not go further. He stood and gazed. 
 The prolonged silence led Vicente to turn his head 
 
346 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 He had thought it only a guard. He saw the un 
 mistakable great form. He arose and stood as 
 still as the other, and fastened a deep eye on the 
 giant. 
 
 " Well," he began, " this is Fortino. This is he who 
 fished and fought. Thus far would my memory go. 
 I will say to myself and mayhap come to believe, that 
 after Ocotlan Fortino died. Yes, this belief will I 
 carry to my grave. It will be more satisfying. Then 
 are you, man, who come where I am a prisoner and 
 stand in the door of my cell at night, -the ghost of 
 that old Fortino who fished and fought and died, and 
 was a friend to me? Or are you that other man who 
 wielded your strength when you were dead ? " 
 
 " Oh, Body of God ! "cried the great one, coming a 
 little nearer. " You, then, too, curse me with it ! For 
 which, hear the old lime-kiln say, I blame you not 
 rather would bless you for it! What did I do? I 
 came across the lake to find you. Why? To enter 
 your prison, wherever in Purgatory it might be ! 
 What has the day been to me? I sat through it all 
 outside the door with hell-fire in me, because I dared 
 not come in. I have now come in. Why? That 
 you may trample, if you so desire, my swine s body 
 under your feet, or cut my cursed flesh in strips. I 
 am a madman, an animal, a fool. I am any one, or 
 all of these things, or any other such as have not rea 
 son or responsibility or blame. But one thing I am 
 not, so help me or so slay my soul whatever gods 
 there be or mothers or sons of gods or eternal dam 
 nations I am not a traitor ! What did they tell me? 
 That I was doing it for you. I did sweat blood with 
 that great hope. I did pour out my soul drop by 
 drop while the iron was heating. Who conceived 
 the deed? I and my soul is nlnv.dy \\-ith the devil 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 347 
 
 for it. Who put me at it and told me you were wait 
 ing in the plaza and your enemy was galloping up the 
 river road? Who but that son of the damned, Quiroz, 
 who beat me on the back and made me a maniac ? 
 Senor, I am done ; I say no more. I blame you not. 
 You were deeply wronged and your greatness is 
 ruined. Hate me si, hate me ! I long to be 
 loathed already am I damned. I shall carry away 
 with me a never dead faith in you. I shall want and 
 need no reconciliation or soothing from you. I shall 
 tramp out. Would that my big hulk could shake 
 down these walls ! May nobody ever remember this 
 bungling giant ! Good-by, sir ! " 
 
 He turned about, having been in his speech like 
 some awful engine, and made for the door. 
 
 " Stop ! " cried Vicente. He came to the other 
 with quick steps and laid his hand on his shoulder. 
 
 " What do you want?" growled Fortino in hoarse 
 ness. 
 
 " To tell you, Fortino, that I am as ready to see 
 that I judged you wrongly as you were to help me. 
 Then this great form has in it a heart as great ; and 
 this is what I had believed of you. Why, man, there 
 is a relief comes to me with this news, that, com 
 pared to my grief before, is like happiness. Forgive 
 me my bad thoughts. I am grown morbid. I seem 
 to have been, too, peculiarly blind. Nothing but the 
 sight of you yourself in the midst of the treachery 
 could have made me doubt you. Tell me not, man, 
 to forget you. Call me rather a friend who shall 
 never forget. You come in the darkest hour when 
 the world seemed rotten and traitors the inhabitants 
 of it. You walk in on my loneliness and my despair, 
 and prove to me that honesty still lives. Fortino, 
 when you can measure the worth of this to me, you 
 
348 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 can measure your own good and come to perceive 
 that you have undone the mistake you made." 
 
 The perspiration again rolled down Fortino s 
 countenance. 
 
 " But the mistake got you in," muttered he, glar 
 ing about at the walls, " and the good will not get you 
 out." 
 
 Vicente led him to the light. Fortino s desire to 
 go was overcome. The two sat down on the stone 
 floor with the candle between them casting its white 
 light up over the clear strong features of the dreamer 
 and over the coarse visage of the giant, whereon the 
 sweat glistened in beads. They talked thus for a long 
 time, the presence of the guard not hindering them. 
 And when at last, more than an hour later, they 
 separated, it was a somewhat soothed yet rather a 
 broken old giant that came out, crossed the stony 
 space to the church and, blocking its wide doorway 
 with his form, slept. 
 
CHAPTER VI 
 
 NEARLY all morning Josefa Aranja remained 
 under the thatch of the canoa. She sat on a rude 
 chair that was on the boat s bottom. She held her head 
 on her hand, and her eyes were fixed on the ends of 
 the rafters where they came down over the sides and 
 the thatch let in light by chinks. There were no sighs 
 from her; neither did her face bespeak any grief. 
 But it was a face extremely intense with other expres 
 sions. She saw little, planning to see little. Of such 
 things as there were to hear, she heard all. 
 
 She arose and walked back and forth over the 
 space of two or three steps under the thatch, without 
 coming out from either end of it. She stretched her 
 arms up over her head for exercise and dug her 
 fingers into that soft roof, and presently pulled out 
 handfuls of it and threw the material on the floor. 
 She laughed to herself. She frowned. She sat down 
 again and waited. She arose and came out from 
 under the roof and was in that part of the vessel 
 which was farthest away from land, the bow. She 
 had her back to the island and, leaning over the 
 anchor chain, gazed dreamily away across the lake 
 to Chapala s pigmy towers. She gazed thus for 
 more than half an hour, and the breeze blew over her 
 face. She still heard everything and the face was as 
 intense as before. She sang a little after a time, 
 softly to herself or to the ripples ; which ripples 
 lapped and kissed under her face and were singing a 
 
350 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 song like hers, being old ripples round an old island 
 which they lapped and kissed when Quetzalcoatl was 
 here in truth. 
 
 " When Quetzalcoatl bade the tribes farewell 
 The tog lay thick and gray o er all the sea. 
 The tide crept on o er sinking rock and shell 
 And sluggish waves beat slow and ceaselessly. 
 On the enchanted ground 
 Gathered they trembling round, 
 Where, in that god-made, glistening boat stood he ! " 
 
 Having sung all the song, slowly, softly, not 
 thinking of it, she suddenly turned her head with a 
 quick furtive movement and scanned in one sweep 
 ing glance the whole of the island, her eyes piercing 
 and deep and her face flushed. There was a soldier 
 or two whom she did not know, high up on the sum 
 mit. There was another carrying a bag of some 
 thing up the steep road. At the tower by her boat 
 two others were doing something with provisions 
 that as yet had not been removed to the top. One 
 of the sailors of the canoa in which she had come 
 (Fortino had engaged the two in Tizapan, strangers 
 to him) was seated yonder on the rocks at the shore, 
 still eating tortillas. The other was here, by the 
 boat. There was nothing else to be seen, save rocks 
 and cacti, sky and lake. A frown gathered on her 
 forehead. She pressed her teeth tightly together 
 and turned away to the water. Then she sang again 
 and at length flashed her old smile suddenly at 
 nothing. 
 
 " He will come," said she. 
 
 She waited another hour. No one came. She 
 frowned then again, blackly, and went in under the 
 thatch, where she sat down and stayed as still as rev- 
 ery itself, resting her head on her hand and looking 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 351 
 
 at the chinks of light. She was, in her heart, rest 
 less in the extreme. She was too wild for much 
 waiting. It was possible they had not told him, yet 
 she would hurt herself in the perverse way of love by 
 believing that he knew she was there. She wanted 
 to leap out and range that rocky spot and be, with 
 her life and her smile, mistress of it. But she stayed 
 doggedly in the boat. She would not go out, not 
 she, if she sat there till she died at least thus she 
 thought for a time. But Pepa s thoughts and pur 
 poses seemed ever born of her blood, not of her 
 brain. And blood flows in varying ways. 
 
 Rodrigo above, thought of her during that day, in 
 gpite of his new great thoughts of another. He even 
 felt a pity for her ; for which she would have given 
 him no thanks. She would have preferred that he 
 feel simply cold, which at times he did. He set his 
 teeth and his will. What had he to do with this 
 woman? He was then weighed suddenly with re 
 morse ; for he was the cause, though not willingly, 
 of her treachery. He struggled long between a stern 
 will against seeing her and some half morbid belief 
 that he owed her at least a meeting and a little recog 
 nition. But the latter would be useless, absolutely 
 without point. Better let it stand as it was; he could 
 do nothing for her. Yet the half morbid idea lived. 
 
 A small, material, prosaic fact decided the matter. 
 At four of the afternoon, when all the other hours 
 since the morning s middle had been passed in a 
 hard, stern silence by him, and in a half sullen bury 
 ing of herself by her, it chanced that, whether he 
 would or not, he had to descend to the ruins of the 
 pier and the tower to examine and give directions 
 concerning the last of such cargo as his two vessels 
 had brought. Possibly the half morbid idea had 
 
352 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 some weight in leading him down. But that idea 
 died as he went ; and he was as silent and as stern 
 descending as he had been above. 
 
 There lay the bungling old vessel under him with 
 the round tower standing, black, near it. The face 
 of the bay was moving from north to south with the 
 never progressive movement of countless small waves. 
 He looked only once at the boat, while he wound his 
 way down ; after that he saw it no more. At the 
 bottom he strode across the space artificially flat 
 tened by old-time convicts, and came upon the rock 
 whereon stood the tower, entering it like a gloomy 
 and haunted one, instead of with his natural lightness 
 of step. But a fierce power emanated from him ami 
 he examined the bags of food and ordered his t\\> 
 men up with them in a tone that was new. Each 
 took a load and departed, climbing the steep. Rod- 
 rigo remained in the tower till they should return, 
 feeling himself foolishly exasperated at doing so. 
 He went and sat down in the high arched southern 
 doorway. 
 
 This tower has been called round. Such is the 
 first effect on the eye. It is really octagonal, of thick 
 stone walls. In each of four of the eight sides is a 
 very large entrance, arched and leaving a good third 
 of the octagon open to the airs of the lake. There 
 are mediaeval looking slits in the other four sides. 
 The roof is round indeed, being the half of a sphere, 
 with no pillars. The rock on which this edifice 
 stands is just large enough for it, and juts into the 
 lake ; so that the doorway wherein Rodrigo sat was 
 over the water. Whereas this was the southern door 
 it was the northern one opposite and behind him that 
 gave view to the vessel lying a few yards distant. As 
 always, the occupant of that vessel had heard all that 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 353 
 
 there was to hear. Rodrigo was sitting staring at 
 the water when a girl in a red dress came and looked 
 in at the door behind him. She caught her breath, 
 raised her hands, and put them up on either side of 
 the doorway and stood. She bit her lip. She 
 flushed hot and was immediately pale. Rodrigo did 
 not move. She sighed a soft gentle sigh. Rodrigo 
 continued staring at the lake. She disappeared, 
 then, simply stepping a little to the west and, with 
 the wall between her and him, stood on the rock s 
 narrow ledge over the waves. 
 
 The two soldiers were returning. They entered, 
 and thejefe told them where to put the rest of such 
 things as were to be taken up. The two gathered up 
 the last of the cargo and went away with it. The 
 tower s floor was as bare as its time-eaten walls. 
 Rodrigo had arisen, and was standing in the middle 
 of it. There came the soft, dreamy notes of a little 
 song from outside, sung as to one s self, carelessly, as 
 might sing a maiden sewing in her room or wreathing 
 cherry blossoms idly. 
 
 " In such fair bark did Quetzalcoatl go, 
 Watching his people on the lessening shore. 
 And were they human eyes that watched them so ? 
 His face, his form, a god s resembled more ! 
 White robes clung round his frame 
 Lit like a winding flame 
 While all the winds went dancing on before ! " 
 
 He was transfixed. The song floated in so gently, 
 so purely. He could see the black-hulled vessel 
 lying a little below him, with its mast rising, slim 
 and naked, as high as his head. He set his jaws 
 hard. He would not go to her; he would stride 
 away. But it was too late. She had taken a step, a 
 careless, idle one. It chanced to bring her to the 
 
354 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 *edge of rocks just outside the door. She was indeed 
 wreathing something as she sang, some kind of green 
 branch with white flowers, whereon her eyes were 
 fastened. She halted in beautiful unconsciousness, 
 with the door framing her complete, slender figure, 
 the water and the vessel and the rocks for a back 
 ground ; and very far away were Chapala s two white 
 spires. Her profile was toward him. The color on 
 her cheek was delicate, a light flush alternating with 
 the clear white-brown of the lighter Mexicans. She 
 was bareheaded and her shining black hair was 
 smoothed back and braided to her waist. 
 
 She turned her head a little, wreathing the flowers, 
 and changed the song: 
 
 "White is the sky of dawn as white her breast; 
 Blue is the sky of noon as blue her eye ; 
 Red is the sunset in the deep red west 
 As red her cheek as the red sunset sky/ 
 
 She halted with a little jump and exclamation, 
 startled, suddenly seeing him. 
 
 " Oh ! " she cried, " you frightened me." 
 
 She went on with the flowers. It did not win him ; 
 rather it sickened him. 
 
 " Now that you are here, Pepa," said he, with 
 forced manner, after they had been silent for a little, 
 "here in this bad spot, if there is anything I can do 
 for you, let me do it and be free to ask. At least I 
 may find a place for you better than the boat. And 
 do you " he had some grim pleasure in saying this, 
 " you doubtless came also to see Vicente? " 
 
 She turned dancing eyes on him and swung the 
 wreath she had made carelessly in the air. She said 
 nothing. 
 
 " ! presume you may see him," continued Rodrigo. 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 355 
 
 " I do not want to see him," said she, lightly, like 
 a child, and coming inside. She looked at the walls. 
 :t What a good, wild old place ! " cried she, clapping 
 her hands. 
 
 " For what is the wreath? " he asked. 
 
 Then she dazzled him with that old smile, and said, 
 frankly : 
 
 " For you. I did n t think of it before." She 
 laughed a rippling laugh. " To whom should a 
 wreath be but to the victor? Don Rodrigo, if you 
 would kneel down I would make a knight out of 
 you oh, to say nothing of crowning you ! Seiior, 
 you did exceeding well. And the island is a good 
 kingdom. I have read of smaller kingdoms and 
 worse. Is it a tingling feeling to be a king? No 
 deeds ! deeds ! These are all that tingle ! Oh, senor 
 
 do you know, as I leaned over the boat and looked 
 just now at the water, the water itself was* talking 
 about the deeds ! And all last night the wind laughed 
 in the sail ! " 
 
 " The wind and the water, then, Pepa, and you as 
 well, gather more happiness from the deed than do 
 any others." 
 
 " Then is the jefe dreaming bad dreams? Don 
 Rodrigo, is there come some canker to you in the 
 midst of your victories? Away with it kill it 
 think not. This land of sun was never made for 
 thought. Feel only let the blood rush on. Ha! 
 
 you arc master of the lake. I think you could be 
 governor if you wished general king emperor. 
 Pretty dream ! No, no, Pepa is no blind one. These 
 things dazzle not the cold race of the north ; and 
 Don Rodrigo wandered into Mexico with a sigh upon 
 his lips. Peace, not battles; freedom, not power; 
 quiet and the deep life, not empire ; love and the 
 
356 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 dreams, and waters, winds, and mountains these, 
 and not ambition. Ah, there is more color in your 
 Anglo-Saxon face ! There are some can read you 
 aright. And these things are higher and better." 
 
 She paused and mused, and went on with that little 
 touch of sadness that came so much into her words. 
 
 " Yes, better and higher. Blood and the wildness, 
 action and madness, these wear away, these die. And 
 one looks for that which shall not die ; one longs for 
 that which shall live on, live on forever. And what 
 is it? Ay de mi ! who knows? Even I would find 
 it, Pepa, the mad. Even I, when the fever and the 
 restlessness are gone, shall wander on the earth seek 
 ing something, wondering what is that great, beautiful 
 thing that I want, and when will it come, white and sat 
 isfying. Don Rodrigo, you are from civilization we 
 are savages. To you, then, it may come, the great 
 white thing may be to you. To us to me who am 
 half wild, of course to me it will not come, and I shall 
 go on wandering round the borders of the lake, and 
 die, knowing it never. Ay de mi ! Strange world ! 
 To him who has shall be given so the wreath is 
 yours; and I, who have not, give it to you. This is 
 all I could do to add to your victory. This is all I 
 ever is it true ? is it all I ever gave to you ? " 
 
 " This is not all. You gave to me first, love. Let 
 me make no excuses and plead no cause. Till the 
 last day I shall hate myself that I let you give it. I 
 do not love you. This plainly, once for all. I never 
 loved you. So, even were I willing (and if I could I 
 might yet wish to repair some broken things) I could 
 give you nothing in return. You gave me, secondly, 
 your honesty and faithfulness, rather you threw 
 them away for me. For this, too, I shall ever feel re 
 morse. I should perhaps say at once, coldly, that the 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 357 
 
 deed we did together revolts me. This is all. I 
 come, then, to the iron duty. Tragedy alone can be 
 the result of communication between us. So I sever 
 our connection. Wherefore I shall go through life 
 knowing myself hated by at least one. But I see no 
 other way. And one last thing to you, you were 
 simply mistaken. You were not wicked, for you do 
 not know wickedness. I shall never blame you. I 
 shall blame myself. I shall forget that part of you 
 that mistook. I shall remember only that part that 
 loved. I have done. Pepa, I can never speak to 
 you, I can never see you again." 
 
 He turned and went toward the door. She stag 
 gered. Her face was bloodless. 
 
 " This this is the end? " she gasped. 
 
 He hesitated, suffering sharp pain, half inclined to 
 turn and soften the parting. He went on, then, out 
 of the door and down the rock. She was like a mad 
 woman. She swayed and stumbled to the door after 
 him. It swept over her in black despair all that 
 she had done for him, all that she had thrown away 
 for him, the fears she had had that there was some 
 thing in his civilization that would condemn her, the 
 secret knowledge deep in herself that she was despi 
 cable. She believed in that moment she must fall 
 and die. She cried out, stifled, after him : 
 
 " Rodrigo Rodrigo " 
 
 He began to climb. She came out, and, seeming 
 to have lost her mind, crawled slowly down the rock 
 where she might easily have walked or run. At the 
 bottom she stretched out her arms to him, and cried 
 his name again. He was half way up, sick to the 
 bottom of his soul. She sat there on the ground 
 between the tower and the boat, and watched him as 
 he went higher on the prison road, the ripples at her 
 
35 8 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 back, the rocks before her, the sun glistening on her 
 shining black hair and her red dress, her eyes raised. 
 He came at last to the summit. He did not turn or 
 pause. Going on, the crest of the island hid him ; 
 he was gone. 
 
 She crept to the boat lost. She climbed in and 
 lay down on the floor. He had been right. He 
 should be hated by one. Such was her nature. 
 When her mind somewhat regained its powers, the 
 revulsion came. As strong as her love had been, so 
 strong was the new passion ay, stronger. She lay 
 there, seemingly stupefied, till the sun went down, and 
 the night came. Her brain was a sea of fire. Her 
 blood seemed molten metal in her. And there was 
 but one thought hate hate. 
 
 The evening breeze, blowing through the old tower, 
 found the wreath of white flowers on the floor. 
 
CHAPTER VII 
 
 IN the hour in which Fortino, under the eye of the 
 guard, had conversed with the prisoner, the giant 
 had kept his tacit promise, and made no mention of 
 Clarita. But he had told Vicente, casually, of the 
 presence of Pepa. The news had startled and deeply 
 interested the hearer. He had put many questions. 
 She had wanted to come, she had seemed unhappy, 
 she had evidently wished to be where the prisoner 
 was ; she had said she would make no attempt to see 
 Vicente till Fortino should have done so. She had 
 stayed in the boat not seeming in a lively mood. 
 This was all the information Fortino advanced or 
 apparently cared about. 
 
 What light shade of doubt had come over him 
 concerning that unreadable girl, left Vicente when 
 Fortino was gone. He had not seen her in the street 
 at the time of the accident would not have had 
 sufficient cause, in that moment, to connect her defi 
 nitely with it if he had. He had blamed the men 
 only, with merely the shadow of a doubt concerning 
 her. But if she had been in Quiroz s devilish scheme, 
 plainly, thought he, she would have remained far 
 from this spot, with Quiroz. Yet she had deserted 
 that steely-eyed traitor and his machinations at the 
 first moment. She had followed Vicente with the 
 immediate, never-daunted spirit of action that charac 
 terized her. She had trusted herself on the lake at 
 night with sailors; she had braved the waves and 
 
360 A DREAM OF A THROVE 
 
 the rocks of an unknown spot, determined to find 
 him. What other purpose was possible to her? He 
 could conceive of none ; for on his infrequent visits 
 to Chapala in earlier days he had not been permitted 
 to see that the jcfc was not looked upon by Josefa 
 Aranja as an enemy. So there was, then, one other 
 faithful to him. She was daring, too, besides being 
 loyal. She was of a remarkably sharp mind, many 
 times too sharp, indeed, though neither he nor For- 
 tino knew the true degree of that acuteness. If by 
 any seemingly impossible chance there should come 
 opportunity of escape, the prisoner at least believed 
 he knew that one of his quickest witted allies was 
 at hand to help him. But he grew hopeless at 
 the thought. There could be, said he, no such 
 impossible chance. 
 
 Pepa s beauty was ever before him after that, 
 transfigured in the shadows of his cell. He recalled 
 her as she was in the old days, with her fascinating 
 personality infusing ever fresh life into him. His old 
 affection for her, grown into his present love, swept 
 over him with redoubled force. It was a love always 
 mingled with his dreams, being a part of ambition 
 and great designs and therefore like the love of an 
 older man, one who has grown with it into a condi 
 tion wherein he is not so continuously in poignant 
 consciousness of it because it is embodied with other 
 elements of his life therefore becoming more true 
 and lasting. Doubtless because of the very quality 
 of being a maturer and less fiery love, seeming to her 
 only an undercurrent to his ambitions, it had failed 
 to win anything lasting from her, failed at last utterly. 
 But he loved her. Here in his loneliness, buried in 
 these stones, the knowledge of her coming was like 
 balm. The prison was more bearable after that. 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 361 
 
 There was something half congenial in the very flame 
 of the candle. She had sent Fortino before her to 
 find him and speak to him, and prepare the way for 
 her. And he had waited all day for courage to enter. 
 So she had not come. She would try to see him, 
 doubtless, on the morrow, and they would permit it. 
 
 At midnight, after dreaming thus in a not un 
 alloyed sadness, while the candle s flame sank in 
 the wax and the wax ran slowly down to the square 
 flat stones of the floor, he blew out the light and 
 lay down in the corner on his blankets. The spot 
 was dry and had been made clean. He was accus 
 tomed to sleeping on rude beds or without beds. 
 Yet he did not fall asleep for hours. He was in one 
 of those strained moods in which one s nerves seem 
 verily to hold the body up from its resting-place, so 
 that the muscles will not relax. There was no tower 
 clock in these solitudes to mark the quarters with 
 double beat. He could not reckon the time. Even 
 with Pepa before him the hours seemed thrice their 
 real length. Wakefulness finally wore him out. He 
 sank into sleep in a darkness as absolute as the walls 
 were solid. 
 
 It was four in the morning when he stirred, 
 troubled. He turned and sighed heavily in his 
 sleep. He had dreamed of a slight noise. His 
 slumber was lighter. He dreamed of it again a 
 scraping sound. He turned still more, the mind on 
 the point of awaking. The dream was then that of a 
 dull thud, the gentle settling of a stone. He started 
 into a sitting posture broad awake. 
 
 There was a light in the cell, issuing from a candle 
 held in a man s hand. And the man himself stood 
 in the opposite corner, silently. He was dressed in 
 black from feet to neck. He was bareheaded. There 
 
362 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 was an accumulation of earth and mold over all his 
 person, staining his shirt, his hands, his face. Earth, 
 too, was mingled with his tangled black hair. The 
 prisoner knew not whether he dreamed or saw a 
 reality. He knew that face. He had not seen it 
 since he was fourteen years of age, but the mon 
 strous ugliness of it, the haunting scar, had stayed 
 with him. Hence that sudden apparition in his 
 sleep was like a recollection bursting from the haze 
 of the past. Years were blotted suddenly out, as 
 though they died and left the sense of death. He 
 was back in that other night when the only mother 
 he had known had died, and Fortino had carried her 
 away in the darkness, when they had torn him from 
 the terrified Clarita and brought him so mysteriously 
 here where his life changed. When there rises a 
 past event which was of deep significance, the sub 
 sequent years, though they sink away, leave a pale 
 halo round it, dress it in a garb that is unearthly, 
 so that the event becomes the key to a new state 
 of the heart, like music, and the event is different, 
 potent, a new event. 
 
 There was no move from either for many seconds. 
 On the face of the apparition remained the cowed slav- 
 ishncss. But there was a change in it. The forehead 
 seemed smoother, the eyes held light. There was evi 
 dent in the very awe and silence so habitual to him, 
 something new and vast. He stooped and remained 
 crouched on the floor, glaring at Vicente. The 
 latter then found his nerves and his voice. 
 
 " How did you come?" he said, slowly. " Or are 
 you real? " 
 
 The mute suddenly stood up again and, in silence, 
 threw his arms into the air with a movement of pro 
 found exultation, wherein the face was as though 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 363 
 
 bathed in fire. Then its dead color came back, ac 
 cented by earthen stains, and, seemingly crushed 
 with fear, he crept, like the insane one that he was, 
 over the floor to Vicente s side. He spread out his 
 ten fingers slowly before him. They were long and 
 covered with earth, the nails being black with it. 
 He looked at them and the scar was stretched into 
 that which may have been a smile. He took from his 
 bosom some scraps and half sheets of paper, scrawled 
 with characters. Kneeling on the floor he gave the 
 first to Vicente. 
 
 " I shall be free. The years shall be nothing. 
 The world shall be nothing. I can follow her." 
 
 " What do you mean?" said Vicente, profoundly 
 moved to hope. " These are to me but words. 
 Speak that which shall be of some comfort or some 
 meaning to me. Who are you? From where do 
 you come? As you came can I too not go and be 
 free? I know you as one who took me over the 
 water one memorable night thirteen years ago. 
 Speak, for if there is to be light in this darkness, I 
 can brook no delay. Do you come from that her 
 mit who was your master, and are there tidings? 
 Control your mind, man, and give me hope." 
 
 The mute thrust out another torn paper, fastening 
 his dull eyes on Vicente and seeming to emit some 
 of the crushed intensity of his strange being from 
 those orbs. The words were these : 
 
 " You also are as I am. For thirteen years you, 
 too, like myself, have been in this almighty power. 
 There was no other god to me. There was no other 
 hell. My soul was mastered. It wished to but it 
 could not die. It dreamed of death. Death would 
 have made it mad with joy. But he was the god 
 of it. Thus also with you. Thirteen years only 
 
364 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 with you. Twenty-seven with me. But you too 
 are a slave. We shall be free." 
 
 "Where is he?" cried Vicente, smothering his 
 voice. " Give me more meaning than this, and quick. 
 I swear to you if your coming means freedom you 
 shall have your reward. Is he here?" He shook 
 the other s shoulder fiercely, rising to his feet in sup 
 pressed excitement. " Take me to him if there be 
 a way." 
 
 The mute was unmoved. He held out another 
 paper, a larger one. It was as follows, written finely 
 and closely in the same hand. The ink was hardly 
 dry. 
 
 " In every one of the twenty-seven I would have 
 slain him. I could not. His mind was god. It 
 ground me down. It held me without speech. lie 
 has never left this island. He is here now, in the 
 other prison. When I last went for food he was ill. 
 He is old. He had not the right medicines, nor 
 food for more than two meals. I was returning with 
 these things and awaiting a wind when they cap 
 tured me. I told them he would starve. They did 
 not heed. It was horror to me. The almighty mind 
 was dragging me back. But the others held my 
 body. To starve him was terror; yet I wanted to 
 starve him and be free ; yet I dared not. I was held 
 two days and two nights before we came hi- re. 
 There was no boat or food here for him. Nor could 
 he walk for being old and ill. They would have sent 
 me on and called it being free. I dared not go. He 
 was dragging me back, so that I knew he was not 
 dead. I got out of the boat in the dark and swam 
 back. I crawled, dragged by him who was not dead, 
 under the rocks to the other end. I went into his 
 cell afraid. I fell down and fainted in the almighty 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 365 
 
 power. Afterward I heard him crawling from the 
 cot, cursing in his throat. I felt his fingers on 
 my neck. But he did not kill me. He dragged me 
 back. So I went and stole food and liquor in the 
 night from the tower. Last night. He will die. 
 His body is weak but his mind is the same. So we 
 are slaves yet. To-day I lay and thought, while he 
 groaned. To-night I wrote these to you. I knew 
 we should be free when his mind dies and I can 
 follow her. I know how I shall follow, and how 
 soon, when he is gone. I know where she will be 
 waiting. Then I began to come. I did not begin 
 soon enough. It took so long. I knew the place 
 always, but I had not come in for years. The tunnel 
 is so long and all the top has fallen, and earth. So 
 I had to dig through piles of it and crawl over 
 stones. It took me four hours. When I came under 
 the floor I went back for these papers and I am 
 adding this last about the tunnel. He does not know 
 you are here. I told him nothing. He thinks I let 
 him starve because he is weakening and losing his 
 power on me. This is why he crawled to me to 
 strangle me. But he knew he would then starve. 
 We shall be free." 
 
 The meaning of this burst on the prisoner. His 
 mind was suddenly alert. He was bent on action 
 with a haste imperious. He was down on his knees 
 at the mute with both hands on his shoulders. He 
 brought his own face close to the other s and bent 
 his powerful eyes on the insane one s. 
 
 " Come," he said in low, deep command. " Come 
 at once with me. I must see him before he dies. 
 We shall be free indeed, but take me there at once." 
 
 The other shook in his old dread. 
 
 " You are afraid I shall kill him," said Vicente, 
 
366 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 reading him and falling in with his illusions. " Fear 
 it not. I do not dare. He is dragging us he is 
 dragging me too. Come. We dare not wait." 
 
 The other s long, cold fingers closed in a grip of 
 great strength on Vicente s wrist, and, his eyes 
 always on Vicente s, he was drawn up. 
 
 " Where is the stone? Show me the way he is 
 dragging us both " The mute was stooping in the 
 corner. " He is drawing us with his almighty mind " 
 The mute was straining his back. " He will die and 
 we shall be free " A flat stone over which Vicente 
 had walked a score of times came up. " But we dare 
 not kill him. Come. Come. Go you first and lead 
 me The mute leaped into a hole and dis 
 appeared. " We shall be free." 
 
 The candle was passed to the leader and Vicente 
 lowered himself. The mute replaced the stone. 
 From the hole they descended irregular steps some 
 fifteen feet. They were then in a passage far under 
 ground, six feet in height, four feet in width, arched 
 of roof, which roof had been of stone. Some of the 
 stones had fallen; others remained jutting out of the 
 mold overhead. The candle-light cast a glare over a 
 blank wall behind them and the steps at the side, and 
 lost itself to the front in the shadows that marked the 
 passage leading into unseen regions to the south. 
 The mute cast a fearful glance back at the follouvr 
 and met the latter s compelling eye. The exultation 
 came again into the insane one s face, and the scar, a 
 thousand times more hideous buried thus in the earth, 
 shining white out of the gloom, was stretched into 
 unwonted prominence. The journey was begun 
 the mute silent and steady of foot, Vicente agitated 
 in spite of all possible self-control. 
 
 The original purpose of this tunnel, which leads 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 367 
 
 from the central prison to that on the southern head 
 land of the island, passing under both moats, has 
 been and will doubtless continue to be, a matter of 
 speculation to the few visitors to that lonely spot. It 
 may still be seen, even entered, by the lifting of the 
 stone. It could not, however, at this date, be tra 
 versed without much excavation, for more of the 
 roof and some of the earth that was over it have 
 fallen in. It seems altogether improbable that it 
 could have been dug by prisoners attempting an 
 escape, for, in addition to the difficulty of conducting 
 such a work and disposing of the earth in secrecy 
 (though such works have been done) the passage is 
 larger than one thus undertaken would be likely to 
 be. Furthermore, it was roofed with stone. It is as 
 straight as intervening rocks would permit, passing, so 
 nearly as one can judge, along the line of, and beneath 
 that surface road, which has been referred to as 
 leading from the one prison past the square tower to 
 the other. 
 
 It has been suggested that this in itself was a secret 
 prison, one compared to which other .dungeons would 
 seem cheerful. However tenable or otherwise such 
 a theory may be, it is certain that in two places there 
 are small square rooms excavated out of the earth 
 and the rocks far underground and leading into the 
 tunnel only. There are also certain places that may 
 have been other such cells. More than this, in the 
 two that remain apparent there are human bones. 
 But this latter fact in itself need not be taken as of 
 such weight as might at first appear, when are con 
 sidered the methods still in use in certain parts of the 
 republic of disposing of human remains. 
 
 The thought of that possible line of dungeons, the 
 ideas the bones suggest to the mind, are too revolt- 
 
368 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 ing. One prefers some more charitable theory. 
 Mexico shows many strange things. In Yucatan is 
 a graveyard where skeletons are exhibited in pots, 
 labelled, where skulls line the walls and bones are 
 strung on cords. In the City of Guanajuato every 
 tourist is shown the underground passage filled with 
 its ghastly array of mummified bodies. In the City 
 of Oaxaca there is a tunnel leading for a considerable 
 distance from a monastery to a church, the entrances 
 being secret, the purposes unknown. There are in 
 Mexico City itself many freaks of architecture the 
 study of which would infinitely reward the pains, 
 many a church of mysterious associations, many a 
 house long since called haunted from some peculiar 
 ity of its construction. Wherever mediaevalism 
 pushed its way it left these mysteries of the builder s 
 art, for its mind was morbid. Whatever the purpose 
 of that passage in Prison Island, whatever the scenes 
 enacted there, the passage remains and speaks not. 
 
 The mute and his follower proceeded. The ground 
 was damp with mold. Naked rocks, jutting into the 
 tunnel, looked black and gaunt in the light. The 
 leader s haste was extreme, becoming like the haste 
 of excitement. At a distance of some forty yards 
 the candle cast a gleam into one of those cells 
 already referred to. The bones flashed out of the 
 gloom to the left and a skull lay in the door. Neither 
 man seemed to see them. At sixty yards or more 
 the same sight revealed itself to the right. There 
 were places where the journeycrs crawled over heaps 
 of stone. It became apparent that the mold and 
 stains upon the mute s person were not causeless. 
 Vicente himself gathered earth as he proceeded. 
 
 They came at length to a spot where the roof was 
 intact and marked by a line of stone masonry, the 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 369 
 
 stones running transversely to the tunnel s direction. 
 It seemed to Vicente that this roofing was much 
 higher than the rest. He looked more closely and 
 perceived that that portion of the real roof had fallen 
 in (the mute was even then crawling over it with 
 difficulty) leaving this other exposed above it. He 
 peered up. There was a chink between the stones 
 and he saw the sky and a star. He was looking 
 through the bottom of the moat that cuts the island 
 in two. That faint glimpse of the freedom of skies 
 made his heart bound. He followed the mute, who 
 had crawled over the obstruction and was hastening 
 on in silence. Having traversed a distance of some 
 one hundred yards they arrived at the tunnel s end, a 
 blank wall of natural rock. There were steps here 
 and they went up. The steps led to a natural open 
 ing where two buried boulders left a chink between 
 them, the one rock protruding beyond the other 
 somewhat concealing the passage as the wings of a 
 stage conceal the entrances. The irregular steps 
 curved as they ascended, and the climbers, passing 
 between those boulders, issued of a sudden in a cell. 
 The mute was leading. There had been no light in 
 the apartment and the candle flame broke on com 
 plete darkness. They were nearer the surface and 
 the air was fresh. Once inside, the chink that had 
 admitted them between the two rocks was almost 
 invisible, owing to the lapping of one boulder over 
 the other. Vicente had no more than set foot on the 
 floor of the cell when he experienced that sudden 
 wheeling about of directions which one so often ex 
 periences when he has been in unknown quarters, 
 has become confused as to the cardinal points, and 
 finds himself again at a familiar spot. The whole 
 cell circled half round. He perceived the place he 
 
 24 
 
370 A DREAM OF A TYRONE 
 
 had seen that other night when he was a boy. Rec 
 ognition swept over him, accompanied for a moment 
 by a blinding mist of recollection. It was as though 
 this had been, in the old times, a spot of enchant 
 ment. The shelves were there the wine bottle 
 fallen empty on its side. The table and the books 
 v.cre the same the bench was there also. He 
 turned and saw the cot. 
 
 The mute was standing in the cell s middle with 
 the candle held over his head, its light falling on 
 Vicente and on the bed. That light cut a face out of 
 the gloom over the couch like the face of a cameo. 
 The body lay at full length. The face was white 
 with a distinct, unusual whiteness. It was old and 
 heavily lined but its lean features were strong, even 
 masterful, drawn though they were with pain and 
 sickness. The eyes, burning, stared at Vicente. The 
 lips were parted in excitement and the hermit s breath 
 could be heard short and fast. A long hand uncov 
 ered itself and clutched the blankets. Staring still at 
 Vicente s face the old man was suddenly half up, his 
 features distorted in a fierce joy that would scarcely 
 let him gasp : 
 
 "You you!" 
 
 He was shaking from head to foot. He put out a 
 lean limb with its foot to the floor and would have 
 come on to the unexpected visitor, tottering, arms 
 outstretched, had not Vicente prevented him. 
 
 " Lie down," said the latter firmly but gently, put 
 ting him back in bed with much difficulty. "You 
 are too weak." 
 
 " What, then," cried the hermit ravingly, "led you 
 here at last, you, my hope, my life, blood of my old 
 soul ! Have you come to see me die? " 
 
 " Heaven i.; v.ith you," said Vicente, kneeling down 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 371 
 
 beside him, conscious that death could not be far from 
 one who looked like this. " Give me your hand. 
 You should not fear death ; you do not fear it. 
 Thank God I am brought, before you leave me ! 
 Senor, your work is done done, and I am here. I 
 have felt your power and your help every moment of 
 my life since first I saw you. In the dark hour of 
 my fortunes I have come to give you thanks. You 
 shall have your reward." 
 
 The other again started up. 
 
 "Why is the hour dark?" cried he. "What have 
 you come to say? Speak! The last they told me 
 was of continuous victory. Oh death of my old torn 
 heart ! Has this, too, failed me ! " 
 
 " They captured me," said Vicente calmly, " in 
 Tizapan, through treachery. They brought me here 
 and imprisoned me in the other prison. This man 
 came to-night and showed me the tunnel, and I have 
 followed him." 
 
 "Captured you?" cried the hermit, seizing the 
 other s shoulders and fastening his fiery eyes on 
 Vicente s face. " Then what is that? Nothing! Ha! 
 ha!" wildly. "Prisoner? Who can be a prisoner 
 here but he who is captive to the mind ? The island 
 is honeycombed. You are free ! There is no prison 
 here." The speaker would sit up, in which posture 
 he swayed and shook in weakness and excitement. 
 " Victory will come back ! And they dreamed they 
 could hold the church on the church s island ! Son ! 
 Son ! The arm of the Lord is yours ! " 
 
 "Then in His name lie down and calm yourself/ 
 cried Vicente. " I will not let you die." 
 
 " I will not lie down. Death is on me and I must 
 speak before he comes. I have felt his hand. Yet, 
 I cannot die till I tell it all ; yet I must haste to tell 
 
372 A DREAHf OF A THRONE 
 
 it lest I die. This shall be my great peace. Oh ! 
 thou Blessed Mary ! Thou hast brought him here at 
 last! I longed for you. I dreamed of you night and 
 day while death was coming. Must I die, I said, and 
 he not know? Must my lips shut on the knowledge 
 and be not opened, when I have sat here or trod these 
 stones or lain on this couch so many years dreaming 
 of the day of the church s victory when at last I 
 should tell you and love should be unburdened of its 
 secret. Yet first let me show you your freedom. You 
 see this mute who stands there with the candle. He 
 shall lead you out. Look there are the steps by 
 which you first entered this place long ago. They 
 led then to a door at the end of the shaft of this prison. 
 They lead there still, but the door is barred by tons 
 of ruins. You came in with ease. You could not 
 go out were you a hundred times as strong as you 
 are. But I was ready for the event. Five years ago 
 I saw that the walls and roof about that door must 
 fall, and my entrance be perhaps cut off. I went 
 through the tunnel you have traversed to-night and 
 looked at that prison. I said to myself, These walls 
 are stronger but these too may fall and block the way. 
 To dig through earth, said I, is easier than to dig 
 through stone ; and it may fall and bury me alive. 
 So I put this slave to work. Half way up those 
 other stairs which you to-night ascended, you will 
 find another fissure in the rocks. He dug there, 
 slanting downward. This prison is over the water and 
 the distance to the shore is not great. The rocks 
 hindered him, but I made him labor on. In two 
 months he did it, alone. There is, therefore, another 
 tunnel, leading down from this cell to a spot not seen 
 from other portions of the shore. Its opening is 
 under the precipice whereon stands this prison, with 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 373 
 
 rocks guarding it and cactus hiding it. Then this 
 slave dug in the lake and made a cove for his boat. 
 I was safe ; I dared the very earthquakes ; and one 
 of them came. I was here alone one night when the 
 shock rocked these stones. I heard a crash like 
 thunder and I knew that another portion of the ruins 
 had come down, as had fallen so many, as all will fall 
 at last. I tried the door. It was blocked. I sat till 
 morning and this slave returned. He could not enter 
 in the old way, so he came up from beneath. I keep 
 always ink and paper for him to write. He told me 
 that the greater portion of the end of the prison that 
 is over us had fallen down about my door, burying it. 
 I was not sorry. I was prepared, and I was the better 
 hid. Through the way this slave has dug, you too 
 shall find freedom. Victory again ! Oh ! thou Mother 
 of God, I give thee thanks ! The mute s boat will 
 carry you." 
 
 This long speech had not been uttered thus con 
 secutively. The speaker was too weak. He paused 
 many times, gasping. At the last words there was 
 an extraordinary motion of despair from him who 
 had till then stood in absolute motionlessness, hold 
 ing the candle. He put the light on the floor, and 
 fell down before the couch. 
 
 "What is this?" muttered the hermit, turning his 
 eyes on the crouching one. " Take your pen, man, 
 and write." 
 
 The other, livid, arose and secured the necessary 
 materials from the shelf. Vicente held a candle and 
 the mute wrote : 
 
 " The boat is not there." 
 
 " How ! " cried the trembling old man, bending on 
 the writer a look that seemed to make him shrivel. 
 " What treason is this, you who have left me here to 
 
374 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 starve? O death ! this is thy hand. I have lost my 
 powers. Let me die let me die ! Where is the 
 boat?" 
 
 " On the other side," wrote the mute, scarcely able 
 to make the letters. His exultation was gone. There 
 could have been imagined no more abject creature. 
 
 The scene was one of pain to Vicente. He broke 
 in at this point, and, pitying the insane one, told such 
 of his story as he knew, showing that no blame could 
 be attached to that helpless and speechless man, who 
 seemed, in his slavery, to have believed himself cul 
 pable. The hermit sank back in despair at this news. 
 He lay meditating with his thoughts burning in the 
 orbs that never lost fire. 
 
 " But for this," continued Vicente, " there is a 
 remedy ; and the mute can yet play his part and free 
 me. There came to this island to-day rather yes 
 terday, for it must be near morning two of my 
 friends with a canoa ; the fisherman Fortino, and the 
 girl, Josefa Aranja. With them are two sailors. I 
 would trust that man with my life, and the girl s wits 
 are beyond measurement. If I leave the escape with 
 them it can be effected. Will this man carry them 
 word, and will he do it in secrecy? " 
 
 The hermit, again in excitement, partly arose, rest 
 ing on his elbow. 
 
 " It is not," said he, " that he will or will not. 
 Death as yet has none of me ! " 
 
 " Then shall I write a note," continued Vicente, 
 arising, restless, eager, absorbed in his plans, and 
 pacing the floor as he spoke, "with the details of 
 escape therein. This man shall deliver it either to 
 the girl or to Fortino. No he does not know them. 
 Then it shall be done thus. There is but one woman 
 on the island. He cannot mistake her. You will 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 375 
 
 find her, man, sleeping in the canoa" He came and 
 laid his hand on the mute s shoulder, and looked into 
 the mute s dull eyes. " I shall probably see her to 
 morrow, but so guarded that I can say nothing. 
 To-morrow night you will go and find her. You will 
 communicate with her in secret, giving her the note. 
 We need not fear. She will make the contents known 
 to the fisherman, and my orders will be obeyed. It 
 can be done ! It shall be done ! The canoa shall 
 come to the tunnel s opening, and I shall enter it and 
 sail to that point of the shore to which the wind can 
 most quickly take us. You are the man to help me. 
 Will you go?" 
 
 " He will go," said the hermit. 
 
 Whereat the mute sat down by the wall, and, draw 
 ing his hat over his face, remained still. 
 
 The hermit s manner underwent a change. He lay 
 back in an intensity of thought that made him for a 
 long time silent, while there were evidences on his 
 face of a mental struggle. He was extremely weak, 
 and breathed with difficulty, so that during his sub 
 sequent narrative he paused often to gain strength. 
 He kept his eyes always fastened on the face of Vi 
 cente who came again and stood by his side. 
 
 " Dawn is coming," said Vicente. " What medi 
 cines have you, and before I leave you, what can I 
 do?" 
 
 " Nothing," said the other, rousing himself from 
 his revery, " you can do nothing so grateful as to 
 listen to me and bear with me. Come let me 
 touch your hand Ah, it is the hand of youth. 
 Yes, I am to come to the end, if not to-night, to 
 morrow, or to-morrow night. I am as ready as I 
 should ever be. Let God judge that readiness, and, 
 if I must be punished with the fire, let the fire come 
 
376 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 quickly. I will give you a little history first, which 
 I have buried in these ruins, longing always to give 
 it to you. Boy, I am a pitiable old man, if a stern and 
 a hard one. The stern and the hard can love as 
 deeply as the tender. You, at least, for a reason you 
 shall know, will not judge me too harshly. And the 
 mute there, if he will hear, let him hear. He knows 
 it already as though it were his blood. 
 
 " I am a pure-blooded Spaniard. I was born in 
 one of the Basque Provinces. I was raised by the 
 church and for it. It is man s greatest protector 
 and his only hope. It shall yet be free and master. 
 I entered the Guadalajara monastery in 1810, while 
 Hidalgo was yet victorious. His victories fired 
 me with resentment and with a burning desire to 
 crush the rebels. As revolution bore on, and I 
 saw the Spanish power totter, I only, among all 
 my brethren, knew the greatness of the danger of 
 the church. I began to regret in bitterness that I 
 had entered the monastery. I longed for freedom 
 and action." 
 
 A fit of coughing stopped him. He choked, 
 his frame shaken. Having recovered himself, he 
 proceeded : 
 
 " I desired war, that I might fight for the church. 
 I was restless to sally out and meet those who, 
 though they carried her banner, were undermining 
 her. The thoughts and the duties of the cloister 
 could not confine my mind. Retirement, cried I, for 
 others. These walls are not for me. The desire be 
 came, with time, a purpose. I was on the point of 
 casting away my monkish habits. I had already 
 made plans for the raising of troops. I was in com 
 munication with the government. My project was 
 not altogether frowned upon by the clergy. If I was 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 377 
 
 mad enough to do it, said they, they would assist me ; 
 for they believed that my plans were far-reaching, 
 that, with their help, I could rouse this northern sec 
 tion of the land to resist the new movement. 
 
 " I was now known to the clergy throughout many 
 States. The danger to the church was grown more 
 apparent. The time was ripe. Then was it my bad 
 fortune to fall ill. I was confined to my cell s bed 
 for a full year. When I at last recovered, Hidalgo 
 had long since fallen, there was a lull in the storm of 
 revolt. The church began again to repose in a fan 
 cied safety. I longed yet to act. But the time had 
 passed. I tried to return to my former quieter pur 
 suits and to confine my mind to the duties and the 
 thoughts of religion. I doubted many times whether 
 I was meant for that life. I had in me too much of 
 the fire of youth, too unbridled a nature ; for I was 
 bold. My mind, too, possessed some unusual powers, 
 and they called my eye, in monkish jest, the demon s 
 eye. It was in my nature to be second to none. In 
 rank I was many times outclassed. But my mind 
 would dominate for itself without rank. I found by 
 the very force of my will, or my personality, or my 
 sternness I know not what to call my power that 
 I could bend the wills of those about me. Some 
 deemed me a wizard, or in league with the devil, 
 which thought was folly. Where is there a commu 
 nity or a group wherein some one mind is not the 
 leader? 
 
 " After some years I found the force of my nature 
 was really, though not nominally, the master of the 
 monastery, and thus the wielder of power that ex 
 tended far beyond its walls. You see me weak and 
 fallen. Boy, boy I was a lion in those days! At 
 my tread priests trembled. During those years I 
 
378 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 kept my eye ever fastened on the revolt. At times I 
 believed the country needed me, and I was on the 
 point of action, but the immediate danger would pass. 
 Many things, too, baffled me. Where my personality 
 could not extend its own immediate power, there 
 grew up the belief that my influence was sinister, so 
 there were machinations in the church against me. 
 Thus does she ever defeat her end, dividing against 
 herself. Oh, Mother of the world! Keep thyself 
 intact and thy parts consistent, or thy doom is 
 sealed ! 
 
 "At last, revolution growing fiercer and the danger 
 that I alone perceived in its fulness, more threaten 
 ing, I pleaded with the clergy in many parts, showing 
 them by all reason that with permanent liberty from 
 Spain on a continent of republican institutions, the 
 power of the Church must become subordinate. 
 Many saw the truth. Others were for temporizing; 
 for holding aloof till the complete success of one 
 party should warrant our support of that party. 
 Still others were for crushing both parties and estab 
 lishing an independent monarchy. I went to work, 
 then, against prodigious odds, to bring out of the chaos 
 a party to support me and an army to fight for Spain. 
 My plans were again maturing. I could brook the 
 cloister but little longer. I was ready to throw away 
 my clerical garb and take the field." 
 
 He was again forced to pause. He lay breathing 
 heavily. It was long before he could muster strength 
 to proceed. 
 
 " In the year 1818 came the great new thing into 
 my life. I have told you of your mother. She was 
 then nineteen years of age. I saw her first one 
 moonlight night in November. I was standing in 
 the door of my cell, dreaming of my coming course 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 379 
 
 of action in the world. I saw the prior crossing the 
 patio by the fountain and the book. Behind him 
 came that which was unwonted in those walls a 
 woman. Her mantilla had fallen to her shoulders, 
 leaving her head bare. The moonlight fell on her 
 masses of black hair and her young face. The last 
 thing my eyes shall behold in this world shall be that 
 scene. The prior came into the corredor and asked 
 me to admit them into my cell. I did so, and she sat 
 down, we standing. She turned her eyes to me. 
 Boy, they were deep as the sea. There was the mys 
 tery of life and death in them. I seemed to be look 
 ing into an unfathomable past, or an unfathomable 
 future. She was beautiful as no other human being 
 I had ever seen was beautiful. She called herself 
 Eulalia. 
 
 "She told us, then, with an infinite sadness, her 
 story ; why she had sought the monastery, why she 
 had persisted, through all objections, in entering. 
 She laid before us, indeed delivered to us, all the 
 proofs of her lineage. She had come from San 
 Pedro, where she had hid. Her father, through 
 whom the line descended, had died, and her mother 
 had followed him into the grave. She was the only 
 child. She had lived, then, nearly alone, having only 
 one old lady, whom she paid to stay with her. She 
 had been lonely. She had brooded and dreamed of 
 the power and the right represented in her person. 
 She had watched the revolt and the progress of 
 events, and it had seemed to her that now while the 
 country was seeking change, and old institutions were 
 breaking up, now was the time to strike. 
 
 " Her nature was deep. It had in it that peculiar 
 melancholy, fascinating sadness, that we call qualities 
 of the Aztec. She was gentle, yet great of nature. 
 
380 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 She shrank from, yet longed for power. Above all 
 else, the traditions of her family and her duty con 
 cerning them were sacred to her. She told us with 
 a memorable simplicity, that she loved no one, was 
 beloved by none ; that love alone could bring chil 
 dren to her. She had now no prospect, no wish of 
 marriage. Even did she marry, how many years 
 must pass before a son could grow to manhood and 
 fight the battles of his ancient race ! She had seen 
 the country tottering round her. She had dreaded 
 letting pass perhaps the only chance, the one mo 
 mentous time, for striking. So she had come to the 
 church, known to support monarchy, known to con 
 tain a party of no little strength who favored a new 
 and independent throne. She had come, too, to that 
 institution of the church most secret, keeping secrecy 
 most inviolable. She was weary of the world, said 
 she, weary of the burden of sorrow and exile de 
 scended through so many centuries to her, borne 
 now by her alone. She could not bear it longer; 
 she gave it to us. If we deemed it best to act, we 
 would do so ; if not, we would keep her secret for 
 her. 
 
 " I was astounded and deeply moved. We kept 
 her many days, hid her there, in the monastery till 
 the facts could be made plainer and we should have 
 no doubt. We came to believe her. There was 
 then communicated to the powers of the church in 
 many places, a hint of a royal personage ready to 
 take the throne. We did not divulge her identity or 
 her place of concealment. It was seen at once that 
 a considerable party could be brought to espouse 
 her cause, but for one thing that she was a woman. 
 Nor did they yet know the heir was a woman, for 
 this fact, she begged, should not at first, in sounding 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 381 
 
 the church, be revealed. Ah, she was a woman 
 indeed, a girl not a statesman. Had she been a 
 man there might have been hope. I had espoused 
 the cause of Spain. I had bitterly opposed independ 
 ence, either monarchical or republican. I saw now 
 plainly, indisputably, that her cause was hopeless, 
 chiefly because she was a woman and could not her 
 self act, but must leave others to act for her, which is 
 weakness in so rugged a land as this ; also because 
 I knew, saw with trembling, that the deeper current 
 of the land was then setting against monarchy. So I 
 should naturally have opposed her. 
 
 " At first I held my peace, while investigating her 
 claims. In that investigation I saw her often. Alas ! 
 my youth and my fire ! And I think it would not 
 have been necessary for me to see her often. Once, 
 surely once, were enough, even were it only as she 
 crossed to my door in the moonlight, by the fountain 
 and the book. Whatever hopes, whatever emotions 
 or passions I had till then in my life experienced 
 were as nothing, were dead, when Eulalia came to 
 me. I knew then to what fierceness of love all my 
 strange powers of heart and mind could be converted. 
 War and the church were suddenly dwarfs. Action 
 and control of men were pigmies. There towered up 
 in my life, overshadowing all, crushing all, an edifice 
 reared on a tempest, whose fall must be ruin. I 
 leaped to sustain it, to make it stable, real. I would 
 have cast away the world, only to take her and hold 
 her. What were schemes of conquest to me then, 
 parties, lineages, thrones? So my course was 
 checked and my dream of action died. 
 
 " By the power I wielded in the monastery I was 
 with her much alone in her concealment. Ay and 
 she grew to love me. My heart must then have 
 
382 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 compelled love in the coldest breast that calls itself 
 a woman. We were seized by that new force and 
 whirled away in it. We were blind to days and weeks. 
 The sweet madness ran riot and, in that one deep, 
 true, God-given union, we drank life to its dregs. 
 When we came a little to ourselves her party was 
 clamoring for action. Those who hung from me 
 were awaiting my words and wondering at my delay. 
 From that awakening her cause was mine, though I 
 was sickened for all deeds, hated the world, knew in 
 my heart s bottom that to try to raise her throne was 
 folly." 
 
 Again he paused exhausted. He stretched out a 
 thin arm and pointed to a spot on the floor. Vicente, 
 turning, found a bottle of liquor, doubtless stolen by 
 the mute. A swallow of this revived the narrator. 
 
 "I now speak of one of whom I loathe to speak, 
 one whom it has taken these many years and all that 
 old power of mind to crush, so that my life is wasted. 
 There was another monk, named Ignacio Mendez, 
 who loved her. It was he who had carried her her 
 meals since first she came. He was of a silent and 
 sinister nature, but of a manner that convinced and 
 an eye that spoke of strength and purpose. He grew 
 out of himself with love for her. Half he lost his 
 reason. He was desperate, but cunning. He told 
 her of his love, pleaded with her to go away with him 
 this before she had given her heart to me. She 
 repelled his advances. I think he dreamed of force 
 but dared not use it. He could gain no word of 
 encouragement. She shut herself from him and 
 would not be seen. Then it was she loved me, and 
 Mendez saw it. He perceived the progress of my 
 power over her, of hers over me. He burned with 
 jealousy. I have found him many times at night 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 383 
 
 stealthily creeping about her door or mine. I longed 
 to kill him. At length all the monastery could not 
 but see my position and his. Scandal was rife, 
 though it did not go beyond the walls. But my 
 power was such that no one, not those above me, 
 dared to murmur ; and my love, God be my witness, 
 was strong, mastering, constant. 
 
 "When we awoke from the first blindness and per 
 ceived that there was a party in the state clamoring 
 for action from each of us ; when we turned to each 
 other and realized that strife was not for us, that all 
 we wished was to sink out of the world we had known 
 and be at rest together; then remorse fell on her. 
 She saw the falseness of our situation. She .could 
 not bear it. In this state, believing that she had 
 been my ruin as well as her own, she suddenly disap 
 peared one night, bribing the porter to let her out. 
 That was in December, 1818. 
 
 " In the morning, when it was discovered that she was 
 gone, the monastery was searched. She was not found, 
 and the porter at last admitted the fact of the bribe. 
 There was, however, another thing discovered that 
 filled me with terror. Ignacio Mendez was not there. 
 That creeping master of cunning, always watching 
 her with jealous eye, had followed her. I was over 
 whelmed with grief and misery. I feared, for her, the 
 worst, for I believed I knew him who had followed 
 her. I know now that my fears were needless. She 
 hid herself so effectually that all his efforts were vain. 
 He did not find her. She swore to me before she 
 died, and I know the oath was sacred, that she had 
 not seen him, had hated his name. On that morning 
 of the discovery the prior found a letter from Mendez 
 to him, wherein the hypocrite pleaded forgiveness for 
 this sudden unauthorized departure, saying that in 
 
384 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 his heart he had committed a great sin by looking 
 on a woman with love, that remorse had fallen on 
 him, that fearing permission for a pilgrimage might 
 not be granted in these times of wars, he had been 
 unable to disobey the dictates of that remorse and 
 had gone to tread barefoot all the stony way to 
 Guadalupe as a penance, that the Holy Virgin might 
 perhaps grant forgiveness. 
 
 "I was infuriated. I broke all bounds and burst 
 out of the monastery. I searched the land for her 
 for months, letting ambitions and wars shift for them 
 selves, or die in such confusion as they might create. 
 I cared for nothing but to find her, save that Mendez, 
 too, in my despair and madness, I longed to seize 
 and crush. I dare not think what crime might then 
 have stained my hands had I discovered him. 
 
 "After the long weariness and the long failure I 
 returned. My power in the church was gone. I was 
 deemed a traitor, at best a broken penitent. I had 
 no heart for action, no desire for deeds. It would 
 have taken long and great labor to secure support, 
 even had I wished to act. I buried myself, exercis 
 ing none of my powers, doing nothing. The force 
 that had won me ascendency over men s minds cared 
 no more for that ascendency but lay dormant in me, 
 ready only to spring forth to rescue her, or to crush 
 Mendez. With that dream I slept, awoke, and lived, 
 to force him to the earth. Murder was no more in 
 my mind, now that days of thought were plentiful ; 
 rather would I have dominated him with my will. 
 
 " Thus the greater part of the new year passed 
 and the new republic was becoming more than a 
 name. I cursed it in my heart, but would not rouse 
 myself from my apathy to combat it. In July of 
 that year Mendez suddenly returned from his pil- 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 385 
 
 grimage. He brought relics from the sacred hill, and 
 he being obsequious, they began to believe the story 
 of his penance. He was received and made to do other 
 penance. I saw the gloom of failure in his face. 
 I believed that he too, like myself, had failed to find 
 her, and that he had gone to Guadalupe to give 
 color to his tale. I felt joy, seeing his gloom. He 
 was a changed man. He went about dull-eyed. I 
 think he was dreaming of her. I determined to give 
 myself the secret morbid happiness of crushing his 
 mind. I now believe he had already begun losing 
 his reason with grief at not finding her. What ! said 
 I, this worm dares grieve for her does he then 
 think that I, too, have had no grief ? Worst of all, 
 his constant and fixed belief now was that Eulalia had 
 loved him. This he even said to me, swore it, taking 
 a hateful comfort from it. I began to call out again 
 those mysterious powers of my mind. The long 
 days and nights, the silence and the secrecy of the 
 monastery, lent me occasion to bring about my 
 desires. I haunted him. I maddened him. I finally 
 cowed him with these old eyes, then young and 
 fierce. 
 
 "You would ask me how this could be accom 
 plished, and what was the nature of my power. I 
 answer that I know not. It was born with me. I 
 had ever found that my mind and my will were more 
 powerful than those of the majority of men. Did 
 I but exercise my influence on them I could secure 
 obedience. There is nothing supernatural in this. 
 Every man could thus influence some one. I chanced 
 to have a power that influenced many. If history 
 could but reveal it, there would be found many minds 
 like this, and certain forces that dominated great 
 events would be explained. What I might have 
 
 2 5 
 
386 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 done had my life been different God alone knows. 
 He alone can judge me for throwing the power 
 away. 
 
 " I saw the effects on Mendez. I was bending 
 him by haunting him and by willing it. Perhaps I 
 myself was half mad, so that, on his nascent, grief- 
 born insanity, I exercised a crushing fascination. 
 These things I do not know. But I was fast making 
 his life but a kind of mental dependency of mine. 
 He feared me. He was drawn by me. In silence 
 I commanded his movements, and in silence he 
 obeyed. My hatred for him never abated. I was 
 absorbed in the loathsome task, for otherwise life 
 would have been empty to me. This is one curse 
 of the cloister. If a passion or a crime or a fall 
 comes to one, there is no chance for the open, clear 
 breath of life to flow in and cure, to bring new 
 thoughts, hopes, purposes. One is left to brood on 
 the one stain till the whole course, to the brink of 
 the grave is stained. 
 
 " Before dawn on the twenty-third day of Sep 
 tember, 1819, it being still dark, there came a tapping 
 on the door of my cell. I arose and found the porter 
 of the street gate. He had long been, secretly, my 
 friend. He knew of my love for Eulalia. He came 
 in in excitement and whispered to me that she was 
 at the door. I bade him let her in and bring her to 
 me at once ; and I dressed myself in agitation. I had 
 scarcely finished when she crept in alone, out of the 
 night. She was haggard but beautiful yet with that 
 deathless beauty. She was weak and staggered. I 
 caught her in my arms, where she sank, helpless. 
 I was trembling so that I could scarcely stand, so 
 I laid her on my bed and knelt beside her. She 
 told me, in two sentences which she could hardly 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 387 
 
 speak, where she had hid from me and in what 
 loneliness. Torn with doubt I asked if Mendez had 
 found her. She swore to me with death on her lips 
 that she had not seen him, nor had she so much 
 as conversed with any other than the woman who 
 lived with her and had hidden her. One of the 
 monks understood the practice of medicine. I has 
 tened away and brought him. As we entered the 
 cell together I saw that hated Mendez crouching 
 outside by the fountain. 
 
 " When the child was born she was rendered in 
 sane with delirium and shrieked. The physician 
 sent me for certain other medicines. I was rilled with 
 horror. I ran out and across the patio. Mendez 
 was still by the fountain, and the morning light was 
 beginning to appear. When first the physician had 
 come, a knife had fallen from Eulalia s dress. I 
 picked it up and gazed at the shining blade, scarcely 
 daring to think of the deed she had doubtless be 
 lieved she might find necessary. This dagger I still 
 held in my hand as I dashed across the open court. 
 Doubtless my anguish had weakened my mind and 
 the last of Mendez s liberty and hate and cunning 
 came up in him. As I passed him he laughed an 
 exultant laugh. I turned with curses on my lips, 
 whereto he responded and swore that the child was 
 his. The black lie so maddened me that I was like 
 a demon. Slave ! I cried, Slave forever ! Utter 
 ing which, I struck at him with the knife blindly. 
 He dodged, but was too late. The blade laid open 
 a gash across his cheek and, entering his blasphem 
 ous mouth, cut his tongue so that the half of it hung 
 as by a thread. I paid no more heed but ran on, 
 secured the articles needed and returned, planting 
 myself at the door ready to defy the world. 
 
3 88 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 " All the other rooms about that /<*//<? were at that 
 rime empty, and as we had kept my door closed and 
 the walls were thick and the distances in that mon 
 astery great, no one else was yet aroused. The 
 shrieks of delirium had soon ceased, but the delirium 
 itself seemed fiercer. Once more the doctor sent me 
 away. I went, passing the figure of Mendez as he 
 crawled, dazed and bleeding, through the long cor 
 ridors to his own apartment. It was necessary on 
 this errand that I should go to the extreme opposite 
 side of the monastery. 
 
 " When at length I returned, all was silence. I 
 hastened to my cell. Its door was open. I went in 
 and stood aghast. It was empty save for the child." 
 
 At this point the speaker paused longest. His 
 breath was hoarsely audible. He lay staring up at 
 Vicente utterly unable to proceed. When at last he 
 went on his voice was weaker. 
 
 " I ran to the door and the physician was approach 
 ing. I cried to him ind he came running with water. 
 He had been only to the fountain, had left her 
 scarcely ten seconds. In that space of time she had 
 arisen in her delirium, weak as she was, and dis 
 appeared. We knew she must have taken the 
 nearest passage, else the doctor would have seen her. 
 We ran its length. It led, after some windings, to 
 the front and out. We came to the open space 
 between the buildings and their inclosing walls. The 
 great door giving exit to the street was open, and 
 the porter, stiff and motionless with fear, was staring 
 out like a mummy. The gray light of dawn was 
 slowly growing and the south wind blew over us. 
 We heard cries in the street without. She had, in 
 her sudden insanity, staggered all this distance in 
 some feverish dream that she must escape. She had 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 389 
 
 beaten on the door and seemed so like one from the 
 grave, that the porter, in horror, had let her out. 
 We were in the street at once. We were too late. 
 She had fallen dead and there were three gendarmes 
 lifting her. I learned afterward that she had cried 
 out many times that the monks had murdered her. 
 The officers would not listen to us. They were sullen 
 and seemed inclined to arrest us, but had no author 
 ity for so doing. The prior was now aroused and 
 came out with others. He recognized her and spoke 
 to the officers. At least/ said he, let the body be 
 brought into the monastery. As the gendarmes had 
 no vehicle and it was some distance to headquarters, 
 they consented, that she might not be left in the 
 street. When we were at length within and she was 
 placed upon a bed and her features composed, the 
 reality of the fact of her death broke over me with 
 crushing force. I sank down and buried my face 
 beside her. Then, knowing that she was beyond my 
 call, that the monks would see to her decent burial, 
 and that it was only a question of time till the matter 
 would be taken up by the civil authorities, the 
 monastery searched, the scandal spread far and near, 
 myself and Mendez likely arrested, even, in those 
 corrupt, revolutionary, and church-hating times, 
 accused of murder I decided at once upon flight. 
 The world was nothing to me ; let me bury myself 
 away from it, now that she was dead. But I would 
 take Mendez. My hate riveted me to him. He 
 should not remain to declare she loved him. By 
 nature was he my slave, my slave should he be. 
 
 " The purpose crystallized at once in me, and my 
 determination pushed its way morbidly to its end. I 
 took the prior to his cell. I reminded him how it 
 was that the child was heir to a throne and that the 
 
39 o A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 time would come when he would be needed. I pleaded 
 that the tenderest care should be taken of the son of 
 one who could not now expend that care himself. 
 I secured his promise, aroused his enthusiasm. I 
 told him of my prospective hiding-place, that I should 
 bury myself forever from a world that I could see 
 only to curse. I knew he would keep my secret. I 
 went then to Mendez s room. He was weak with 
 loss of blood, but, when I had bandaged his wound 
 and given him stimulants, he could obey me. He 
 seemed forever crushed. He followed me like a dog, 
 partly because I mastered him, partly because he, 
 too, sought flight. 
 
 41 There were horses kept within the monastery 
 walls. We took two, and, with some provisions, went 
 out of that rear entrance which is seldom opened. 
 Before sunrise we were out of the city. We rode 
 straight for the lake. We passed that first night in 
 the mountains over Mescala. The dumb Mendez 
 here made his last effort to break his bondage. He 
 would have left me. I had brought a pistol and he 
 had none. I told him I would kill him. They had 
 called my eye the devil s. I used it then as though 
 they had spoken truly. I bent him down and he 
 stayed and followed me. In the night we stole a boat 
 and sailed here. 
 
 11 The weeks and months that followed were a 
 silent struggle. I mastered him. I made his mind 
 only a part of my own. His tongue was useless and 
 he could not speak. His hopes were dead. His 
 brain succumbed to mine. He believed still, even 
 now believes, that she loved him. For which I hold 
 his bondage unbreakable. When the store of pro 
 visions we had brought from the monastery and 
 increased upon the way was exhausted, I ventured 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 391 
 
 to send him back. This was the test of my power. 
 Our horses we had abandoned, so he went on foot. 
 He journeyed only at night. He, too, is ever afraid 
 of capture and trial for an offence that his mind can 
 not recall. As for me, I know the danger is long 
 since passed. At the monastery he secured pro 
 visions, and wrote them certain orders I had com 
 manded him to write. As the father of the child who 
 might one day be their hope, they respected and 
 obeyed me. They made all necessary arrangements 
 for the mute s regular journeys. Mendez returned, 
 and when I heard his oars here at the shore one 
 morning of deep anxiety, I knew he was conquered 
 and the island life assured. 
 
 " I turned to that life with a longing for a peace I 
 never found. From remaining here for fear of being 
 taken, I came to remain because I did not wish to go. 
 The death of Eulalia caused an investigation and 
 trouble. I was searched for but not found. The un 
 settled condition of the country rendered a continued 
 prosecution of the inquiry impossible. The matter 
 died out of men s minds. But I hated the world. 
 This cell came to be my home. I would not go. I 
 heard of the child often. He was strong and had 
 been carefully tended. When he was one year old, 
 having in this spot matured my plans, I had them 
 bring him to the shore. I sailed with him then, the 
 mute being my only other companion, to Chapala. I 
 wanted him to be raised freely on lake and among 
 mountains, that he might know the people. I en 
 gaged that a good woman should keep him and the 
 priest should overlook his care and give me informa 
 tion of him. I had seen the independence of this 
 country become more assured. I had perceived both 
 the republican spirit and the danger to the church 
 
392 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 growing. My interest in the world thus much re 
 turned, to rear my child, my boy, son of my great 
 love, to be what his nature demands. This ab 
 sorbed me, this has been my dream, my life. And 
 now that I die I free you from this prison oh my 
 son ! my son ! And victory shall be yours. And 
 thus let these old, old eyes, buried so long in the 
 earth s rocks, weep tears of joy that, though I bo 
 dead, my one great love shall live on and rule for 
 ever ! " 
 
 Vicente had long since fallen to his knees by the 
 cot. He buried his face beside that of the hermit and 
 cried, brokenly: 
 
 "My father!" 
 
 The dawn was beginning to shed gray light over 
 the island when the prisoner, pale, changed, crept 
 back through the tunnel, issued like one dreaming in 
 his cell, lowered the stone, and threw himself down 
 on his blankets. 
 
CHAPTER VIII 
 
 ABOUT seven o clock of the previous evening the 
 wind, for the first time in three days, had 
 swerved somewhat from the west toward the north. 
 It was then that a sail went up not far from Mescala 
 where a naked mast had been waiting for the change 
 for some hours. A canoa with four men on board be 
 gan a slow journey south, in which direction stood 
 the rocks of the island. The vessel rose and fell as 
 lightly on the small waves as she had when she sailed 
 in the opposite direction. For it is worthy of note 
 that no cannon or weapon of defence other than the 
 arms of the men, weighted her. The breeze being 
 light, the traversing of the course to the island re 
 quired three hours. It was therefore about the hour 
 of ten, when, under a starlit sky and frowned on by 
 the towering half circuit of the island s promontories, 
 the canoa glided into the bay, and silently dropped 
 her sail. 
 
 The/*/*, strained almost to the limit of endurance 
 between hope and fear, had been watching for that 
 sail. Clarita was in the church. It was during the 
 intolerable hours of waiting that a new thought had 
 burst on her. It was doubtless the intense anxiety 
 and the gloomy manner of Rodrigo that had brought 
 that new, black knowledge. In her unthinking fear 
 and her simplicity she had not followed out the pos 
 sibilities of Vicente s circumstances to their revolting 
 end. But she now suddenly realized that death itself 
 
394 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 might be his punishment, that this was Rodrigo s 
 fear. The effect of that thought was to benumb her 
 mind. 
 
 The boat had been in the bay scarcely a quarter 
 of an hour when the jcfc, with the news it brought 
 sunk in his brain, stiffly climbed the ascent from the 
 pier. He carried the governor s message with him. 
 It was written informally and read thus : 
 
 " You have done well, a service that shall not die. You 
 have rid the state of a great danger. If I live and have 
 power your reward is sure. There is now but one course, 
 and I wonder that you have not already pursued it without 
 my order, knowing my faith in you. Can there be but one 
 end to a traitor and a rebel? Why do you hesitate? If 
 such men are to live, Mexico is founded on sinking sand. 
 You are to shoot the rebel with no delay. Only one thing 
 I suggest, which you are to do, if you find it practicable. 
 Let the execution take place, not on the island, but in 
 Chapala, Tizapan, Ocotlan, or at least some other place which 
 has given him followers, and is a centre of revolt. Chapala 
 itself, as his own town, is preferable. Thus will the example 
 of his death be held up before the rebels as a warning, not 
 hid in the lake s middle. The moral effect will be trebled. 
 You say his army is scattered. Remain only till you are 
 assured it will not organize under another leader. When 
 this becomes clear, return. If the contrary occur, I doubt 
 not you are capable of dealing with the situation. To pre 
 vent further trouble, a show of clemency is now our best 
 weapon. We are in no condition to inaugurate a whole 
 sale punishment. Therefore send to every town a procla 
 mation promising pardon to all such as lay down their arms. 
 God with you. There is happiness in the capital over your 
 victory. When you return flushed with your triumph, we 
 will crown your brow. Till then, in the name of the people 
 of the State of Jalisco, receive my thanks." 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 395 
 
 The jefe came alone to a point half-way between 
 the ascent s summit and the church ; and sat down 
 on a rock, dazed. The stars of the low west, where 
 to he stared, seemed burning red. To him the expe 
 rience of emotion, happy or unhappy, was bound up 
 with the desire to take it to her, as though the ex 
 perience and the desire partook of one another s 
 identity. True love becomes a mammoth endeavor 
 to absolutely unite the whole existence with that of 
 the loved one. Recalling this, the struggle that went 
 on in Rodrigo s breast as he sat there with the church 
 and her on his left and the gulf on his right, becomes 
 clear. For a new love is ever half mad. To observe 
 that to share this grief with her in anything like sym 
 pathy was impossible is not to the point. To be 
 sure, she must learn of it. This would be almost to 
 crush her. She would come thus only to bear a 
 sorrow of her own not to share his. Hence, to 
 unburden his misery to her was impossible, useless, 
 so far as relief to either was concerned. It only 
 remained to communicate the fact, letting each bear 
 the separate grief. But love does not act on such 
 principles. Rather it cuts all down and says : Let 
 us bury this terror by blindly rushing together, 
 with it. 
 
 After half an hour (which stood out like a jagged 
 rock in the course of his life ever after) he arose, 
 without reasoning or thinking, and went slowly 
 toward the church. Movement cleared his brain 
 somewhat, and a purpose began to form itself. He 
 came to the church door and paused. The first and 
 only impulse to go away came to him, and died. He 
 stepped in front of the vacant, arched entrance, be 
 side which Fortino, heavily breathing, lay wrapped 
 in his blanket. Rodrigo, longing for her and pitying 
 
396 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 her, looked in. He knew she would not be asleep. 
 She would be waiting in anguish for the news. 
 
 He had expected that he should have to call her 
 out or secure a candle and go in. He was surprised 
 to perceive that, at the church s far end where the 
 altar had been, there was a candle already lit, placed 
 on a stone. And Clarita was kneeling before it with 
 her back to him. In the hour of her need and her 
 dread, the fact that this was a church had been of 
 comfort. He knew she was praying in the silence, 
 there with the light falling on her face, and her re- 
 bozo carefully wrapped round her head and small 
 figure. He came only half-way in and could proceed 
 no further, overcome. She heard his tread among 
 the ruins, and, still kneeling, turned her head quickly 
 so that he could see her face in the candle-light, and 
 looked at him. She perceived that he was deathly 
 pale, gaunt-looking, standing thus staring at her. 
 He could not come on ; he was halted by his mission. 
 So he merely sat down slowly on a stone. That the 
 disaster had come with his entrance was plain to her. 
 She could not arise. That the last weight was falling 
 on her as she looked at him, was as plain to him. 
 So they did nothing simply remained silent at 
 some yards from one another. 
 
 It seemed to him hours that they sat thus, while 
 the candle s flame waved blue and yellow, and the 
 slow-circling stars stared through the gaping roof. 
 Doubtless the time was in reality short. Just as he 
 was beginning to feel he could bear it no more, he 
 saw her sway and fall forward. He was beside her 
 at once, lifting her. As she had been on her knees, 
 and had fallen with her arms tinder her face, she was 
 in no wise hurt. Nor did she quite faint. Perhaps 
 the very poignancy of her grief prevented her from 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 397 
 
 losing consciousness. She soon sat up. Much as he 
 longed to, he could not bring himself to hold her in 
 his arms. She herself had, perhaps unconsciously, 
 pushed him a little away. 
 
 " Clarita," he said, his voice strained. He paused, 
 and she was not looking at him. " Clarita, I cannot 
 do it I have decided. I cannot and I will not. I 
 have some little influence. I will write again. I will 
 do all in my power to change the order. But I 
 would not have you hope ; for I, I do not hope. Then, 
 at the last, if it cannot be changed, some one else 
 must do what I cannot. This shall never be mine, 
 nor any more battles and cruelties. I shall go away." 
 
 " Write it ! " she cried, seizing his hands in wild 
 eagerness. " Oh, you will ! You will beg for me 
 you will plead for me ! " 
 
 " I will do what I can," said he, without hope. 
 
 He arose from beside her. 
 
 " Oh, thank you ! thank you ! " she cried, passion 
 ately. 
 
 He conquered the impulse to take her to his heart 
 and soothe her; and went away. He had brought 
 writing materials for the purpose of sending orders to 
 his troops at Tizapan. He secured what he needed, 
 including a lantern, and descended to the shore of 
 the bay. Pepa s candle in her canoa was lit. Her 
 sailors were sleeping among the rocks. Bonavidas s 
 boat swayed near the octagonal tower, anchored a 
 little way out, its occupants seeking rest on the 
 shore. The other of ihejefe s two canoas lay farther 
 off. Rodrigo, having entered the tower, wrote the 
 following somewhat stilted reply to the governor : 
 
 " If my past services and my friendship to you may ex 
 cuse this temporary disobedience to your orders, let them. 
 
398 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 Your command to execute the prisoner is received. I do 
 not wish this to be your final decision. I do not wish this 
 man to be killed. I do not think it necessary. That his 
 nature is noble and not that of the adventurer should count 
 for something. It is my strenuous desire, greater than any 
 desire that my life has hitherto borne, to spare his life. As 
 I have broken his power and captured him, may I not, then, 
 plead for him? To execute him would be to lose to the 
 world one honest man, whereas honest men are rare. To 
 spare him will be to give life to a rare soul, which in you 
 would henceforth outshine all virtues and all deeds. He 
 can be taken to Guadalajara, if you have a prison you con 
 sider safe. If not, he can be taken to some other city, 
 many leagues away. Let him be imprisoned till you know 
 there is no danger from him. However long this be I shall 
 desire no lighter punishment. And I ask you for this 
 commutation of sentence with my every power of pleading 
 in the asking. My heart is bound up in this request. You 
 speak of reward. I want none, I can take none, but 
 this. If you can grant it, your every other order you 
 know it well will be obeyed to the letter. If you can 
 not, I am come to the point of being constrained to say 
 that, our friendship notwithstanding, I must sever our con 
 nection. If you must adhere to your order, I cannot and 
 will not execute it. I say this with deference. I cannot 
 and will not. It shall only remain to me, then, to resign my 
 position and to depart. I should leave the country. But 
 I shall be faithful to my trust till this moment come. For, 
 I shall send at once, the wind being now favorable, for all 
 my men from Tizapan. I shall meanwhile be vigilant in 
 my guarding of the prisoner. My troops shall arrive here 
 ready to carry out the dictates of your command, convey 
 the prisoner to Chapala under strong guard and execute 
 him, provided your response continues with the same deci 
 sion. Meanwhile I shall adhere thus obediently to your 
 order as it is, to wit : My men on this island shall be ever 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 399 
 
 ready to execute the prisoner. If, before your response 
 comes, there arise any danger of his rescue, he shall be 
 shot here and at once. I shall consider this much due to 
 the oath I have taken before you. Finally, understand me 
 well, if you cannot change your sentence, Jet there be 
 brought in company with the letter that informs me of that 
 fact an order conferring the power oijefe on some one here 
 who can execute that sentence ; or, if you do not choose 
 one of my men, let him whom you do choose come with 
 the order. I shall withdraw in his favor. I thank you for 
 those things you did for me. I shall remember our 
 friendship." 
 
 His consciousness that he was pleading in a man- 
 nef exactly opposite to that which had characterized 
 all his former vigorous urgings on the governor, made 
 his sentences somewhat unnatural. That the request 
 itself was abnormal and almost impossible to grant, 
 made them lack strength. As he wrote, the cool 
 night wind swept in at the wide doorways and the 
 waves came and dashed themselves in that old, eter 
 nal suicide against the rocks at the tower s foot. 
 When he had written it and read it over, he wrote an 
 order to the leader of the little force in Tizapan to 
 the effect that, provided he were not definitely en 
 gaged in the overcoming of some danger, which dan 
 ger should be immediate, he should secure canoas at 
 all costs and hazards, and sail for the island with his 
 men at the earliest hour possible. 
 
 This done, Don Rodrigo descended from the tower 
 and found Bonavidas and his men outside. To the 
 astounded lieutenant he told the governor s order and 
 his objections. He gave the last paper he had writ 
 ten, containing the order for his troops, to one of 
 Bonavidas s companions. 
 
400 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 " I am sorry," said he, stiffly, " there is no rest for 
 you to-night. The three of you must carry this order 
 to Tizapan at once, while the wind from the north 
 lasts. Make all possible speed. Bonavidas is not to 
 accompany you. He is to remain here, for I shall 
 need him with me." 
 
 Wrapped in gloom, Don Rodrigo ascended to the 
 summit, where he stood and watched the vessel go. 
 That canoa, being poled round the island to the south 
 ern end (where the prison of the two ruined, tunnel- 
 like passages reared its high and black mystery), was 
 pushed out on deeper water and sailed away toward 
 Tizapan. It has already been said that these boats 
 cannot sail save with the wind pretty well in the stern. 
 The breeze, having been found favorable for the jour 
 ney from Guadalajara to the island, was found unfa 
 vorable for a return toward that city. So the sailing 
 of the second canoa, which was to retrace that course, 
 was postponed till a change of wind. 
 
 In explaining his purpose to Bonavidas, Rodrigo 
 had led that wily lieutenant to a point some distance 
 from the shore, and had spoken in whispers, so that 
 his voice was inaudible to all but Bonavidas himself. 
 But in giving his orders for the journey to Tizapan 
 the jefe had stood not far from Pepa s vessel, and, 
 there being no cause for secrecy, had spoken in an 
 ordinary tone of voice. Pepa, as earlier in the day 
 though now it was burning hate that sharpened 
 her senses, whereas before it had been another and 
 a somewhat better passion if she saw not, heard. 
 
 It is not possible to say what course, under differ 
 ent circumstances, the hatred and vengeance of such 
 a one might have taken. She had lain for hours on 
 the boat s bottom. At times she had been weighed 
 with sorrow or pierced by pain. She had even felt 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 401 
 
 stinging remorse. She had sunk at times into stupor. 
 She had needed love, longed for, ruined herself for 
 it. She had lost that and herself. At first, even 
 with the revulsion and the hate, she wanted to die. 
 Suicide, however, was an end to which she would 
 never come. Then the hate grew, minute by minute, 
 hour by hour. Revenge was natural to her. Ordi 
 narily one would expect murder to be the end of that 
 hate. Indeed she thought of it, her heart leaped to it. 
 Fascinated and horror-stricken, she almost longed to 
 do it. The nature that could do what she had already 
 done, could not be wholly incapable of that other 
 crime. It is not to be considered unlikely that, had 
 he who had rejected her been of her own race, he 
 would have been compelled to fight for his life, or 
 more likely have been given no chance to fight, on 
 that very night, a night so hate-crazed as it was to her. 
 But it is not always possible to say that hate is all 
 hate and no love. She ^doubtless loved him still. 
 Most potent fact of all he was that white one, he 
 of the other race, he to whom all of her wildness was 
 nothing. Could the knife or the pistol conquer such 
 a one, although it kill him, and satisfy her? His 
 nature still awed her. It had ever baffled her, 
 making her feel that her different battery of powers 
 was ineffectual against that man of another race. 
 To slay, to wreak vengeance, that was associated in 
 her mind with her own personality, was therefore a 
 part of that system which had ever been powerless 
 to produce an effect on him. So she strangely 
 halted at the deed, as though it would not have in 
 it the essence to satisfy her. At all events she would 
 not be capable of any deed whatever for some hours. 
 All was too feverish. Midnight or the early morn 
 ing would suffice. She would then plan. 
 
 26 
 
402 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 She heard him come to the tower and she crept to 
 the boat s end and saw him writing. She could have 
 killed him with ease, for she had her weapon as 
 always. She turned sick and sank to the floor again. 
 After a time she heard him give the order to sail 
 for Tizapan. During the feverish hours pictures of 
 Quiroz had at times presented themselves to her 
 mind. His fierceness, his cat-like cruelty, seemed to 
 her qualities that roused answering ones in her. 
 Quiroz loved her, though she cared little for him. 
 Quiroz would kill, too, where she feared to kill. 
 The dashing, reckless, dangerous course of Quiroz 
 appealed to her, in the hours of hot blood, as the 
 only course wherein she could bury this sorrow, 
 drown or crush this great pain. Who has not felt 
 it that desire to do away with what is painful by 
 dashing into long dangers? It is possible, had 
 Quiroz been then present, he could have gotten her 
 away. At all events, whatever happened, she sud 
 denly realized that Quiroz was her only friend on 
 earth, that, after revenge or without it, a career with 
 Quiroz was the only thing that opened itself. For 
 to do nothing after these days of fire, was as impos 
 sible to her as it is impossible to sheathe a flame 
 and preserve it living. And all the world would 
 loathe her, save Quiroz. 
 
 She saw the jcfe ascend to the summit. She per 
 ceived he had left all his writing materials in the 
 tower, even left his lantern burning. He had for 
 gotten them all ; he had forgotten the tower and that 
 which had happened there. She saw an opportunity 
 to communicate with Quiroz. The vessel about to 
 depart could not come back before to-morrow night 
 at earliest probably would be away longer. She 
 did not believe Quiroz would have returned, as yet, 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 403 
 
 to Tizapan. He could come here later in another 
 vessel. She would not, could not, depart with Clarita, 
 that pure and grieving reminder of her perfidy. She 
 could not go alone. Quiroz could be duped, at least, 
 into getting her away. Beyond that she did not think. 
 Meanwhile her plans for revenge could mature or die. 
 She hated as recklessly, here with the wind blowing 
 over her, as she had on the boat s bottom. She saw 
 a plan clearly. If she should nerve herself to the 
 terrible deed, let it be done on the following night, 
 or when she should see Quiroz s sail at hand, have 
 Quiroz s canoa in which to leap and escape, and 
 Quiroz s approbation and daring to lend her firmness. 
 All this was the product of but a moment s thought. 
 She was at once in the tower. She heard the sol 
 diers preparing to embark. To do so one of them 
 must wade to the canoa y then pole it in. So she was 
 allowed a short time for her purpose. She wrote 
 thus : 
 
 " Doroteo Quiroz : As you hold my heart, so I love you. 
 You are wondering, where is this wild one? A resolve 
 came to me to try my powers on the obdurate jefe. I 
 wanted, where you had failed, to win him and his troops to 
 this our great cause. I was idle and wasting time. I cannot 
 bear to be idle. I said, I will win this other force and this 
 leader while Doroteo is away. I am on Prison Island and 
 he is here. He is weak-hearted and no man for us. He 
 will not join, though I have urged it long. And I curse 
 him as do you. So come for me. Come at once. I have 
 no other means of return. I await you, to go with you. 
 To the earth s end or to the sea s bottom Pepa is yours." 
 
 She hastened out of the tower. She could not 
 trust this letter to the soldiers. She awoke one of 
 her own sailors, one of those Fortino had picked up 
 
4 o 4 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 The man was ready to do anything for money. She 
 paid him and assured him Quiroz would pay him 
 more. He was to go to Doroteo s house and wait 
 till he should see the message in that warrior s hand. 
 The man agreed. He went to the soldiers and, with 
 some trouble, secured passage. They thought he 
 was deserting his ship. Pepa casually informed 
 them that she had given him permission to go, for 
 she did not need him. So they finally took him ; 
 and when the vessel sailed out toward Tizapan with 
 Rodrigo s eye following it into the shadows, it bore 
 Pepa s letter concealed in the sailor s loose white 
 shirt. 
 
 The night passed and the day came. It was after 
 noon before the more ordinary wind from the south 
 west came up. Three soldiers then departed with 
 theje/es other canoa for the shore and Guadalajara. 
 The boat in which Fortino and the girl had come, 
 and which Pepa had been occupying, was now the 
 only vessel at the island. 
 
 Clarita and Fortino prepared a silent and gloomy 
 breakfast, dinner, and supper on the shore by the 
 tower frijoles, a little pork, some tortillas and 
 sweet bread, and fruit. Clarita barely touched food. 
 Even Fortino had no appetite. He was wondering 
 what he should do now. If the girl would stay must 
 he, then, sail away and bring her provisions till she 
 would go? Well, he could do that. She had never 
 thought of the running short of food. The^V/i , she 
 knew, would care for her. She thought only of 
 Vicente. Pepa came to one or two of these meals, 
 and ate a little more heartily than did the others, 
 but with her eye, dark and burning, cast out over 
 the lake, seeing nothing that was real, seeing only 
 visions, the form and the import of which it was well 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 405 
 
 her companions knew not. Pepa was as she had 
 never been before, and it was as though the spirit of 
 tragedy walked with her. 
 
 All that day the prisoner paced the floor to and 
 fro. The calmness of his face had given place to a 
 strained look that had in it an unwonted sorrow. He 
 too saw visions, deeds of the long ago, crimes and 
 monastery walls. He was waiting, too, for Pepa. 
 Surely she would come to-day. Every hour he thought 
 he heard her footstep. Why did she wait why did 
 she not come to comfort him? Noon came straight 
 into the cactus-choked patio and he saw her not. 
 The afternoon wore on and he was restless and 
 oppressed, with the meaning of the coming night 
 scarcely bringing an alleviation of the weight. Even 
 ing approached and she had not come. What was 
 it, then, that she had sailed here to do ? Why did she 
 not come to him ? He argued at length that they 
 had not permitted it. He fought against the shadow 
 of his old unreasonable doubt. At nightfall, she not 
 having come, he groaned within himself and cried : 
 
 " What are my hopes what is my faith ? What 
 soul cares for me or would see me free? My birth 
 was black ; let death come to me black as my birth. 
 To whom can I trust my freedom? For she came 
 not. Yet to her I must trust it there is no other." 
 
 Again night came down on the lake. 
 
CHAPTER IX 
 
 THE unexpected had occurred on the lake s 
 southern side. This was not the first time that 
 a force so easily and quickly raised, had vanished as 
 quickly. The personal power that holds men to 
 gether and produces enthusiasm, being removed, dis 
 solution may be immediately at hand. An army 
 needs a head to hold it together. It falls to pieces 
 without it. Most fatal fact of all, it was believed 
 among that scattered band that Vicente had been 
 long since lodged in a Guadalajara prison, and that 
 nothing but storming and taking that great city 
 could rescue him. In the cavalry that had fled there 
 was not one born leader. No one of its number had 
 the genius to gather it together again for that super 
 human deed. Doroteo alone possessed that genius. 
 
 But bitter failure had met all the efforts of Quiroz. 
 He had ridden out from Tizapan reasonably sure of 
 returning with a not inconsiderable body of troops. 
 He knew almost every man of Vicente s army by 
 name. He knew the dwelling-places and the prob 
 able retreats in flight of the chief figures of that 
 scattered band. They had learned his bravery and 
 received not a few attentions from his adroit flattery. 
 They were dissatisfied with the hard life peace had 
 led them. He would give them views of bigger 
 game even than Vicente had held out. He went forth, 
 too, with the determination to promise plunder and 
 win allegiance in the old Roman fashion. 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 407 
 
 Probably the only matter in which Quiroz could 
 have fatally deceived himself was in that of other 
 men s belief in him. That ordinary minds should 
 come to suspect his sincerity was a supposition not 
 easily lodged in his brain. Perhaps this may be 
 called his greatest weakness that he was too sure of 
 his ever ready deceit. At no other point would he 
 have been vulnerable, watching all his armor with a 
 lynx eye. But there was under the smooth polite 
 ness of this gambler a vanity that was somewhat of 
 an enormity. That those churls who had fled should 
 suspect him, was therefore not considered possible 
 by him. But such was the case. 
 
 He rode from Jiquilpan to the mountains, from 
 mountains to lake, from village to village. Having oc 
 cupied some days in the search, he found the scattered 
 ones. He whispered his plans privately in many an 
 ear. He gathered a little band of those who had 
 followings and appealed to them with all his art and 
 his earnestness, and with all his lies a speech that a 
 Roman indeed might have been proud to make. He 
 found deaf ears and eyes cast askance at him. Re 
 buffed, he scoured again shore and mountain. He 
 urged, he pleaded, he called forth the full battery of 
 his powers. He found the scattered army determined 
 not to follow him. He once more secured the pres 
 ence of some of the chief men at a spot on the shore 
 and made his last mighty effort, of promise, flattery, 
 scorn, deceit. They became exasperated. They 
 broke out finally and told him the truth. The real 
 leader, said they, he who should be king, was cap 
 tured. They could not rally round Vicente. They 
 would not go wildly after another to support a base 
 less project. The army lacked its head and its pur 
 pose. They looked with little faith on a course across 
 
4 o3 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 mountains to that distant City of Mexico where the 
 central government held powers unknown. And 
 finally they told him plainly they had no faith in 
 him. The true perpetrator of that treachery in Tiza- 
 pan, was not altogether unsuspected. With that they 
 sullenly departed. 
 
 So the matter was hopeless. The game was lost. 
 Quiroz was for an instant stunned. But he rallied at 
 once. After all, these were not a notably fierce people. 
 For the most part they had lived a sufficiently quiet 
 and primitive life. It had been the particular influ 
 ences that worked for Vicente that had roused them. 
 When Vicente was captured, the blood of the enter 
 prise was let out. And if, finally, they suspected him, 
 he knew the truth of his failure. After one bad hour 
 of dismay, his natural quickness of intelligence showed 
 him how fatal was that suspicion. So, with a lasting 
 bitterness and a somewhat novel lack of his old suave 
 manner, he returned to Tizapan. 
 
 All his old desperation became sharpened and 
 invigorated. He was becoming even abnormally 
 reckless. He would risk his head on the first chance 
 and wring by sheer desperate force some kind of 
 compensation from that fortune whose wheel had 
 ever been his god. At least he had the girl. He 
 would dash away with her to the southeast. There 
 lay his arena. Let him loose his leash of devilish 
 powers in that pot of intrigues and battles called the 
 City of Mexico. He would wrench success up by the 
 roots. If he now was, in the game, down to his last 
 coin, let him gallop away with the girl, stake it on 
 the red indeed, play his last mad play yonder where 
 the great game was fiercest and win much or lose 
 all. He cast maledictions on the lake and the state 
 wherein it lay and, with them, all past associations. 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 409 
 
 He grew hotter in exasperation and eagerness as he 
 approached his home. 
 
 He entered Tizapan in the night and did not find 
 Pepa. He searched the place for her with a brutal 
 vim. Some one said she had sailed away in a canoa. 
 Then was it that rage was born in Quiroz. He would 
 then have thrown fortune itself away to grasp the 
 girl. His mother found him fierce and fearful for 
 one awful hour. That poor trembling lady deemed 
 her son gone mad, and with devout assurance (a cer 
 tainty no visitation from Heaven could have moved) 
 blamed that strange Senorita Josefa Aranja for all 
 this misery. Then Doroteo was suddenly himself 
 again he was never otherwise for long become 
 calm, cool, keen, graceful as of old. He was deter 
 mining to cut his way through all earth s powers, 
 steadily, remorselessly, and secure that vanished 
 woman who had ever been to him like strong wine. 
 He was secretly gathering his courage ; tempering, 
 for the relentless pursuit, his spirit as it were, try 
 ing its edge and ringing its metal as though it had 
 been a steel blade. 
 
 It was then that, in the early morning, Pepa s note 
 was placed in his hands. 
 
 Pepa herself, on that day, in the midst of her many 
 visions, dreamed at times of Quiroz s success. He 
 would gather up the troops. She finally decided he 
 could not return to Tizapan for several days, perhaps 
 would be occupied by his task of reorganization much 
 longer. Her time of vengeance was instinctively 
 postponed. 
 
 About noon, when the wind had changed to the 
 southwest and the canoa with the message for the 
 governor had departed, could those on the island 
 have seen the Tizapan river and its marshes they 
 
410 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 would have perceived a vessel poled thence into the 
 lake and a sail raised. But Tizapan was too far 
 away. At most the finest eye could have detected 
 only a faint spot of white, the sunlight barely glim 
 mering from it as it floated yonder on the distant 
 waters, whose vast waste, yellow in the midday sun, 
 circled it about and bore it like a still and tiny jewel. 
 
 Josefa Aranja grew, toward evening, chilled of soul. 
 For she must not be looked upon as of that proverb 
 ially heartless, murderous, Mexican-Spanish nature, 
 which kills with ease. If she should ever come to 
 the point of killing that white foreigner, it would be 
 after passing through many fires. Finally, she 
 dreaded the deed ; it sickened her. She remained 
 cold and silent. Life for her rotted. 
 
 By the afternoon s middle that tiny white spot was 
 a very little larger and a little whiter. 
 
 The night, the same Vicente had seen come with 
 despair, and yet in which he hoped to make his es 
 cape from that place of gloom, came on. The sunset 
 was one of those seldom failing ones of beauty that 
 are the lake s chief charm. The visible universe was, 
 for an hour, steeped, suffocated, drowned in red. 
 The mountains seemed melting in that deep, incarna 
 dined flood of light. The lake flowed living blood. 
 The sky was a vast dome of blazing crimson. 
 
 The tiny spot of white had reached and passed the 
 lake s centre, and was less tiny. It turned, in the 
 new light, from white to red, and flashed that color 
 back to the west like the flashing of the red wing of 
 a distant bird. 
 
 About eight o clock, when the night had come in 
 deed, Clarita, bearing with her, as always, her sor 
 row, yet with a new emotion growing in spite of all 
 deeds within her, chanced to be walking by the shore 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 411 
 
 at a point about half-way between the octagonal 
 tower and the island s southern, prison-crowned end. 
 The path was among great rocks, and well concealed. 
 The heights of the island towered over her on the 
 left, the lake s waves beat on her right. She had 
 been near the door of her brother s prison all day. 
 She had spent the hours in suspense and loneliness. 
 After trying to eat a little by the tower (the Mexican 
 supper is always late) she had wandered here, letting 
 the night breeze blow over her face, watching the 
 stars, gathering some little peace from nature, the 
 only possible source, before she should return to 
 the church for the night. 
 
 She could dimly see the forms of a few soldiers on 
 the upper crest against the sky. She believed she 
 recognized Rodrigo himself, more than a hundred 
 feet over her, walking slowly along the island s upper 
 edge and blotting out stars as he went. Only the sky 
 enabled her to see. She on the ground and so far 
 below could not have been detected by those above. 
 She watched that moving figure with pain and long 
 ing. His very vigilance was her grief. She recalled 
 that habit she had seen in him of slowly patrolling 
 the whole edge of the island thus every night, some 
 times arising from sleep to keep his own eye on his 
 realm s boundaries. The figure disappeared. 
 
 She walked on, and there was a shadow moving 
 there before her among the rocks. She stopped, 
 holding her breath. The shadow was still likewise. 
 She believed that she had imagined it. This rugged 
 way leading to nothing was surely deserted. She 
 walked on, a little afraid. The shadow suddenly came 
 out from behind a boulder, and, showing itself to be 
 the crouching figure of a man, came before her and 
 held out something white in its hand. She was so 
 
4 i2 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 frightened that she turned and ran. Running, her 
 vigilance for Vicente, her readiness for every chance 
 to help him, made her suddenly imagine (in her 
 brain that was ever imagining escape and ever seem 
 ing to receive messages from him) the very thing 
 that proved to be true. She made herself stop. She 
 turned, and the shadow was before her. Her fear in 
 creased, so that her limbs shook. But the fact that 
 there was a chance, however slight, that the message 
 came from the prisoner (her woman s mind unrea- 
 soningly and at once grasped at that chance), made 
 her determination not to run away as moveless as 
 rock. She took the paper, and the shadow was gone, 
 to be seen no more. 
 
 She ran then, terror-stricken now that the danger 
 was over, and came to the canoa. Pepa was not 
 there ; she was half-way up the ascent seated on the 
 rocks alone. Fortino was in the tower. The canoa 
 was anchored very near the ruins of the pier, so near 
 as barely to be safe when the waves dashed it toward 
 the rocks. Pepa had had it brought thus with pur 
 pose. She could then, when it floated to its chain s 
 length and was nearest land, easily leap to its stern 
 from the elevation of the pier. Yet it could not come 
 so close as to strike. Clarita, naturally timid, was 
 growing bold. She could not wait to make that long 
 ascent to the church for a light. 
 
 She came to the edge of the pier. The waves 
 dashed spray over her. The vessel came swaying 
 toward her, borne on a billow, and was brought up 
 with a jerk by the anchor chain, the stern near her. 
 She nerved herself and leaped over the narrow chasm 
 and came safely into the canoa. She found the 
 matches and the candle, made a light, and with trem 
 bling fingers opened the paper. She saw with blind- 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 413 
 
 ing joy that the writing was his. Her brain swam, 
 and she could scarcely read. The first word halted 
 her. It was " Pepa." But could she be blamed, in 
 her great love and her longing, for reading on, when 
 the words were his and she would do anything to help 
 him? She could no more have stopped at that word 
 than the breeze that lifted these billows could be 
 turned back in its course. She devoured the lines 
 with an eagerness that was pain. They were these : 
 
 PEPA, There is a means of escape. At ten o clock to 
 night bring the canoa, you and Fortino, with what secrecy 
 you can, to the southern end of the island ; anchor it as 
 near shore as possible, with the anchor ready to be imme 
 diately lifted. It must be directly under the southeastern 
 corner of the prison that stands on the southern end. If 
 my life is of value, fail me not. 
 
 VICENTE. 
 
 She realized that she must lose no time. She came 
 to the boat s end to leap out. Before she could do 
 so Pepa stepped across the chasm and was beside her. 
 The older girl had seen the light. It was suddenly 
 clear to Clarita that, though she still had that old dis 
 trust of Pepa, the boat could not be secured and re 
 moved without Pepa s knowledge. The latter, too, 
 was too shrewd that Fortino and Clarita could hope 
 to carry out so great a project and she be ignorant of 
 it. Lastly and most weighty, Pepa was wonderfully 
 cunning, bold and strong to perform. Her help 
 would be invaluable. Vicente, by this very note, 
 trusted the whole to that girl. Then she, too, could 
 and must trust her. She gave her the note, explain 
 ing how she had received it, and Pepa read it. 
 
 When she had grasped the significance of this 
 communication, for one long minute the great eyes 
 
<i 4 A DREAAf OF A THRONE 
 
 of Joscfa Aranja stared into those of Clarita, while 
 the boat rocked and the candle-flame sputtered in the 
 wind that swept under the thatch. That minute de 
 cided Pepa s course and her vengeance. The dread 
 of murder fell from her like a black and heavy cloak, 
 and her heart stood out strong and free, relieved, 
 bounding with exultation, as though she had been 
 committed to the crime, bent down by the thing she 
 must do, and was suddenly given liberty. To her 
 credit let it be remembered that her greatest joy in 
 the deed of the night was that she would not now be 
 led to do a worse one. What could have been more 
 fitting to her wishes, to her hate, than this? She had 
 sacrificed Vicente for him who had not received her. 
 Now, in the latter s fancied security of possession, to 
 revenge herself by taking away the very thing she 
 had given, and scorn his scorn and baffle his vigilance 
 and laugh her contempt to the night wind as she 
 sailed away with Don Rodrigo s prize, more than 
 this, to thus undo her treachery, repent of the deed 
 that had been loathsome to her, by the deed s undo 
 ing, and save thus some faith in herself and some 
 honor from others, oh, then did her whole life re 
 vive, and decay was no more, and the blood in her 
 veins was full of the fire of that sweet revenge ! 
 
 She bade Clarita wait till she should bring the 
 giant, and then she leaped out to the pier and was 
 gone. 
 
 That sail that had been the tiny spot of white near 
 Tizapan, and had turned to red in the lake s middle 
 when the sun set, now that the darkness had come 
 was invisible. It might have sailed on toward Cha- 
 pala s towers, or swerved a little and be now yonder 
 on the course to Ocotlan. It might be coming on, 
 too, straight toward these rocks to which no com- 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 415 
 
 merce came, and round which no fisher dipped his 
 circling net; so that, had some lightning flashed out 
 of that clear sky, it might have been seen, grown 
 larger and turned white again, sailing on, sailing on. 
 
 Scarce a minute elapsed (a minute of the deepest 
 anxiety to her who remained in the rocking canod) 
 before Pepa returned and entered the boat with the 
 giant. The three, like conspirators of old (ah, strange 
 trio ye ! with what differing hopes and fears and pur 
 poses, each borne on, like every other of the race of 
 men, by the varying waves of your hearts emotions !) 
 the three crouched down on the boat s flat and 
 heaving bottom, and out of that curious union of 
 interests the plan was born. 
 
 " The greatest danger," growled the now gleaming- 
 eyed giant, in whom the news had aroused a joy so 
 awful that his observers were astounded at it, " is 
 this : That infernal /^/fc makes the circuit of the upper 
 shores at least three times every night. You say he 
 might be absent at the moment, but I, wreck that 
 I am, believe it not. The devil that haunts Fortino 
 and drags me under his hoofs will bring Rodrigo to 
 that very end when the time comes. I know it on 
 my soul, I know it! " 
 
 Pepa, during the last of this brief and hasty discus 
 sion, had sat in a profound revery. She now looked 
 up and cast her deep eyes on each in turn. Then 
 she laid her fingers, much as Quiroz might have 
 done, on Fortino s shoulder. 
 
 " Listen, friend," said she ; " you are right. There 
 is the chance of the failure, though it be small. But 
 there shall be no chance. I shall not accompany 
 you. Go you with Clarita. Slip round the island in 
 the dark with the vessel. Do you your duty. Think 
 not of me. When the anchor is raised for the last 
 
4 i6 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 time, fear not," and a deep sadness suffused her eyes 
 with tears. Who could read that intricate mind, still 
 less the untamed but love-torn heart? "Fear not; 
 if I am not with you, I shall be where best the time 
 suits. Friend, go on. Leave this/</r politico to me." 
 
 They demurred. She was obdurate and she was 
 capable. Her help thus was needed. They agreed. 
 She leaped out to land, and disappeared. It was 
 after nine o clock when the anchor was finally raised, 
 and, with but two occupants, the boat glided in 
 silence out and thence along the shore. It was well 
 that the night was dark and that there were no soldiers 
 immediately at hand. But the chance of being seen 
 was always a living chance. For one man to pole a 
 canoa among waves is as nearly impossible as any 
 thing that might be done can be. But if any man on 
 earth could do it, Fortino could ; and he did, putting 
 out all his fisherman s skill and his great strength, 
 inspired by hopes that made every inch of his huge 
 body tingle, dreaming of this glorious redemption of 
 his great loss, this resurrection of his dead repute ; 
 dreaming most constantly of all, with homely hon 
 esty, of doing this momentous deed for the man who 
 still believed in him. 
 
 The sail that had been the white spot and the red 
 spot was still invisible. Wherever it should come to 
 land, whether it be at Chapala, or at Ocotlan, or 
 under these precipices, it would sail straight at the 
 rocks in silent boldness, appearing suddenly, looming 
 out of the night like a scudding spirit. 
 
 Rodrigo was striding to and fro in the gloom on 
 the island s top, buried in thought, passing and re- 
 passing that larger square tower that stands between 
 the two prisons. His course brought him at times 
 not far from the edge of the precipitous descent that 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 417 
 
 overlooked the western shore. He was alone among 
 boulders, cacti, and the ruins, there being no guards 
 near him. Toward ten o clock he approached that 
 western edge for the tenth time, on the point of con 
 tinuing his restless course round the island. He sud 
 denly caught a sound, other than the sighing of the 
 night breeze. It was a soft and unwonted sound, 
 such as these solitudes seldom heard, half a sob, 
 half a moan. It came from among rocks that clus 
 tered in shadows a little inward from the island s 
 upper rim. He paused in wonder, looked, and per 
 ceived a little gleam of white among the boulders. 
 He came nearer. 
 
 It seemed there was a human form lying supine 
 upon the flat surface of a stone, its face turned toward 
 him, but partly hidden by its arms. Half he recog 
 nized it, and was seized with an unreasoning dread. 
 There was a second moan. He was too much of a 
 man not to answer that distress. He came quickly 
 and silently close. He saw it was Pepa, flung down 
 there alone; her hair loose and scattered over the 
 rock ; her arms, half bare, hiding her eyes, so that it 
 seemed that she did not see him. She moved a little 
 and turned, as one in long, dull pain stupefied. Re 
 morse struck deep in his heart. He stood over her, 
 and spoke her name unsteadily : 
 
 " Pepa ! " 
 
 She threw her arms back and left her face bare, 
 staring up at him with eyes whose light the night 
 could not obscure, yet than which the night itself 
 could not have been blacker. She looked at him as 
 though she did not readily recognize him. Then, 
 with a start, she arose, ran a few steps, and stumbled 
 and fell. In real agitation he was beside her. 
 
 " Pepa ! Pepa ! What is it? You are hurt ! " 
 
 27 
 
4 i8 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 She half arose, but sank back. 
 
 " No," she said with infinite wretchedness in her 
 voice. "I I hurt? What is there, man, that could 
 hurt me? No, no ; Pepa is well happy. Why do 
 you haunt me? Why can I have not even solitude, 
 which alone is left to me?" 
 
 " I will leave you if you will," said he quickly. 
 " But you are in pain, and you have fallen. You do 
 not believe me so brutal as to be unmoved by this. 
 Come, for the last time and sincerely is there not 
 something that I can do? At least stay not here 
 and thus, or my unhappiness is grown beyond 
 endurance ! " 
 
 " Do? " said she dully. " What is the word, and 
 what does it signify? Don Rodrigo, the doing is 
 done. The crime, the throwing away, the death. 
 You, who are still alive, speak of doing say it not 
 to me. I have died, Don Rodrigo. Why did you 
 come and why have you spoken to me? me who 
 am dead dead." 
 
 The pitiable tone of the words tore his heart. He 
 believed for the moment that she was losing her mind, 
 at least was so stricken by grief that she knew not 
 what she said. 
 
 " No, no ! " he cried. "There is life and hope for 
 you. Despair, girl, is not for you. It cannot be! 
 You are too young. Rise from this blackness and 
 blot out my face from your memory." 
 
 " Senor, you speak words. It is you who are 
 young, who feel not, who love not. Do you think, 
 then, that weary old thought of all the weary world, 
 that age is measured by years? Have you, then, in 
 all your life of freedom and adventure, never, never 
 sat you down and thought, and discovered in that 
 thought that time is a lie, that there is no time; and 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 419 
 
 only the beating of the heart and the birth and the 
 death of its emotions bring age? Ha! young! 
 Then is God young ! Sefior, I am older than these 
 rocks, and the ruins of this wall, though they have 
 seen and known such pain and sorrow in the times 
 gone by as wrung tears out of stone, yet, looking on 
 me, surely must weep again. You who scorn me, 
 would call me incapable of remorse. Yet have I last 
 night and to-day burnt with it till it was as though my 
 soul staggered and fell, black ruins. Go away 
 leave me. If still there be left that in my heart that 
 can bleed, let me bleed alone." 
 
 " I will leave you," he said bowed down. " I can 
 say no more. May God be with you. May God be 
 with us both." 
 
 He turned to go. 
 
 " Yes," murmured she, " alone. Leave me with 
 that which I must do. Your way will be darkened 
 by me no more." 
 
 "What do you mean?" he cried, turning back, 
 frozen with fear. 
 
 " Then you do not leave me? Come Oh I am 
 mad ! Senor, if your mind still is whole, pity the 
 wreck of mine! Why you are still here? Did 
 you not go? I saw you last, senor, at the tower. 
 Grief has made me this poor way. I would have 
 crawled after him. I think I did I crawled over 
 the stones stunned, crying. I held out my arms 
 to him ah, I remember, it was then my mind first 
 was black." 
 
 " Pepa ! Pepa ! Oh my God ! " 
 
 "Why are you still here, senor? Will you not, 
 then, leave me? I cannot do it if you are here." 
 
 He stooped down beside her and, seizing her arms, 
 bent his eyes on hers, striving to call her to herself. 
 
420 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 " What is it," he cried with a desperate sternness, 
 " that you are going to do? Listen ! Look at me! 
 I compel you to tell me ! " 
 
 " You are so fierce with me," she moaned plain 
 tively, like a child who is cold. "Yet I under 
 stand gentleness is not for me, though I be very 
 hungry for it. Love is not for me, though my heart 
 die for it. Senor please, please go away for th<*. 
 time is coming. Please, please go away ! " 
 
 At these mad words he was wrung with a torture 
 such as he had never dreamed possible. 
 
 " Oh broken heart ! " he cried. " What can I do !" 
 
 "Do?" said she suddenly, after a moment s 
 silence. " There is nothing for you to do. Ay de mi! 
 You have done it all. Don Rodrigo, do not fear. I 
 am come to myself again. I tried to bear it. I did 
 all I could. But there was something in the black 
 ness that laughed at me and I fought with it till it 
 came and crushed me. I can feel no more. I knew 
 when it came dark I had failed at last, and must not 
 live. I cannot. So I walked away thinking I would 
 come to the water. Don Rodrigo, I gave you all, 
 my love, my faith. You were not able to give to me 
 anything. So to pay me only a little, can you 
 not do me this one favor. Leave me and let me do 
 it. I cannot go walking on in these ruins." 
 
 "You shall not," he cried, "you dare not! With 
 my soul s strength I forbid and I shall prevent it. 
 Kill me first. I am here and I give you my arms 
 and I pray you kill me. For this you must do before 
 you can kill yourself! Listen to me " 
 
 "The mad cannot listen, and I am mad. I say 
 it plainly. I have felt reason going, was happy that 
 I felt it. Oh senor, to break one s heart once is much 
 too often ; to live is to break it anew with every 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 421 
 
 thought, in every moment. This lifelong agony you 
 would decree to me. Holy Mother Mary ! thou too 
 hast gone from me! What only this man here? 
 Senor then will you not leave me? Go away 
 the last time I plead with you. If I had a heart I 
 could tear it out and cast it down and cry, Take it ; 
 trample it! but leave me! Senor, I have no heart. 
 Then for the deed s sake please, please go away ! " 
 
 It seemed to him clear with a deadly clearness that 
 this strange woman s mind was sinking under her 
 grief. He was filled with horror and a self-loathing 
 that made him panic-stricken. He leaped to seize 
 her, crying: 
 
 " You shall not ! " 
 
 She was up, seeming tall and strong. Her eyes, 
 like those of a maniac indeed, glared fire at him out 
 of darkness. That look for a second disarmed him. 
 She wrenched herself with one quick effort from his 
 grasp, and crying out crazily, brokenly, ran away, 
 leaping the stones like a wild animal. She was at 
 the edge of the precipitous descent and he came on 
 with all his speed and desperation after her. He 
 perceived that she plunged down over boulders and 
 amidst cacti. Being in that moment at the edge, he 
 could barely see the black shadow of her figure going 
 on, zigzag, leaping, disappearing, rising again, skim 
 ming over that perilous course as though wings held 
 her. 
 
 He knew the descent was full of danger even in 
 the day, but he did not pause. He went down after 
 her, crying to her. He sprang from rock to rock, 
 wounding himself but going on. Boulders loomed 
 before him and on every side. The high shadow of 
 the island itself now towered behind him. He was 
 half-way down amidst a chaos of shattered stone, 
 
422 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 plunging on where one false step would have been 
 fatal. Before him the girl s form went lightly, swiftly, 
 and the lake, unseen, beat its waves under her. He 
 saw failure before him and the night for evermore 
 gashed like a wound in his life. He called aloud 
 shrieking it : 
 
 " Pepa ! Help ! Help ! Stop her in God s name ! " 
 He dashed on blindly. Others had heard his cry 
 and came, some running along the shore from the 
 tower, others descending after him. He was near 
 the bottom. He was leaping to the last boulder 
 before reaching that narrow track that separated the 
 ascent from the water. He could just see her spring 
 from the shore with the agility of a panther over 
 a wide stretch of heaving water, to a rock that stood 
 alone in the lake. She sprang yet again from that 
 to a second farther out. She did not pause. She 
 sprang yet a third time to the last boulder far out 
 where the lake was deep. The spot was not far from 
 the island s southern end and the ruined prison of 
 tunnels looked down on the scene out of its years of 
 gloom. Rodrigo was over the first stretch of water 
 and on the first isolated rock. Others, being nearly 
 all those few soldiers who had watched the island s 
 southern end, were running to her aid behind him. 
 He jumped to the second rock and saw her figure 
 disappear. There was the sound of the fall of a body 
 in the lake. He came, and his comrades came, to 
 the high flat summit of that last boulder. The water 
 beat against it and surged in darkness about its base. 
 There was no woman there, or arm stretched up out 
 of that unspeaking flood, or hair that floated on the 
 waves. 
 
 The place was a wilderness of water to the west, 
 and a wilderness of rocks toward the shore rocks 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 423 
 
 that cut off the view in all directions, and were buried 
 in unfathomable gloom, among which the billows 
 played, retreated, advanced, hid, and shattered them 
 selves. Some of the soldiers dragged, some scanned 
 the shore and the lake, some called for a boat, and a 
 fruitless search went on. 
 
CHAPTER X 
 
 IT was not with bounding hope in spite of a will 
 to hope that the prisoner began the operations 
 of the night. It was rather with a sense of coming 
 disaster that made his mind and his manner sombre. 
 So soon as it was safe and he had no other interrup 
 tion of guards to fear, that is, a little after eight 
 o clock, he cautiously raised the lid to that unclean 
 passage. 
 
 He lowered himself, taking his candle with him, 
 and closed the opening. He traversed again the 
 tunnel, crawling in places, gathering earth upon him, 
 and seeing the white evidences of unknown miseries 
 of the past flash out of cave-like recesses as he went. 
 Whatever of agitation the events of the preceding 
 night and the news born from them had caused him, 
 there was none of it left to render him too hasty or 
 too slow, or his foot or his mind unsteady. Had one 
 seen him as he pierced that underground passage, 
 the candle light on his face, it would have seemed 
 that the dreamer had grown taller ; that his mien was 
 one of a reserve that meant power; and that some 
 unmeasured gloom was in him which rendered him 
 calm. 
 
 She had not come to see or speak to him and 
 the day was gone. He endeavored to blot this fact 
 out of his mind, but it took refuge then in his breast. 
 Having earlier pondered this, and all the circum 
 stances of his condition, he had come to the inevi- 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 425 
 
 table conclusion that in her lay his only hope. He 
 could rely on the discretion, as he could on the si 
 lence, of the mute. That messenger, ignorant of the 
 identity of all of Vicente s friends, could be directed 
 then only to deliver the message to Pepa, whom 
 Vicente believed to be the only woman on the island. 
 For her the mute could easily detect. There would 
 be no slightest chance of a mistake, and there ought 
 to be none. He could not say to the mute : " Find a 
 giant and deliver the message to him." For the night 
 would be dark, and Vicente recalled that Bonavidas 
 likewise was a large man. Hence he girded up, as 
 it were, his faith in the girl, and made his first deci 
 sion final. 
 
 He came to the steps under the southern prison and 
 mounted. Half-way up he perceived that other nar 
 row exit, a black slit among boulders, leading down 
 through similar blackness to liberty. His blood 
 leaped with no joy, nor did he tremble. He went on 
 up, calmly, and emerged in the hermit s cell. 
 
 The eyes of that death-stricken aged one were as 
 though they had been long staring at the spot where 
 Vicente s countenance appeared. The mute was 
 seated in the farthest corner on the ground, his hat 
 pulled down over his features. He made no move. 
 The fire leaped once more into the hermit s face, 
 which looked ghastly pale, having assumed that ex 
 treme of emaciation that seems often to come sud 
 denly. He stretched out his hand and cried with a 
 sickly joy: 
 
 " My son you are come at last! " 
 
 Vicente stood over him and looked down in a deep 
 meditation. He passed his hand, then, once gently 
 over the hermit s wasted features. 
 
 " Write it ! " gasped the sick man. " Write the 
 
426 A DREAM OF A THRQNE 
 
 message and send him. And tell me," clutching at 
 Vicente s arm in feeble but thirsty eagerness, " tell 
 me your hope and your energy are high. Tell me 
 you will secure this night freedom for all time and 
 the army again shall be yours ! " 
 
 " Father," replied Vicente, " to this course am I 
 committed. To this shall I cling till the end come. 
 There is nothing else in the world for me. There be 
 some not born for the world. It is possible I am one 
 of these; but let time answer. The army will follow 
 me again, as it followed me once. I can gather it up 
 where any other would fail. So, if there be truth in 
 the vision of my founding yet a government that 
 shall be strong and a power for good, fear not. I 
 shall wring that truth out of that vision, and your 
 heart, be the world or the grave its resting-place, 
 shall have peace." 
 
 " It has it," gasped the hermit. " Go write." 
 
 Vicente walked to the table, sat down on the bench, 
 and wrote with a curious leisure. He arose and went 
 to the mute. 
 
 " Get up," said he. 
 
 The mute obeyed and turned up a face wherein the 
 exultation was for a moment visible, but which, on 
 the hermit s suddenly crying out, seemed to stiffen. 
 Vicente, towering over him, laid his hand heavily on 
 the dumb man s shoulder and held the other s eyes 
 with his own. 
 
 " Go you," said he slowly, making the words clear 
 and distinct and weighting them with command, 
 " down to the lake. Follow the shore to the right 
 and keep yourself ever hid. Search for a woman. 
 If she is not there she may be in a boat, wherein 
 you are to look with all your cunning and your cau 
 tion strained to the utmost. You are hunting, under- 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 427 
 
 stand it well, a woman. There is but one here. 
 Search, man, till you find her, if you must upturn 
 every rock on this barren isle. And you are to let 
 no other see you. When she is found you are to 
 give her this in secret. That is all." 
 
 The mute took the paper and instinctively turned 
 toward his master, whose eyes had been blazing 
 through the writing of the letter and the delivery of 
 the command, and whose weak old body, even weaker 
 than on the previous night, was again half raising 
 itself. 
 
 " Go ! " cried the hermit, his voice husky and 
 breaking. " I am weak of body, but my mind is 
 your master still, you who taunted me in that old 
 time. And my mind shall follow you this night, for 
 on this mission have I set my spirit. My weakness 
 left you free two whole days, and that freedom starved 
 me so that I now die ; but, liar in your soul, I won 
 you back and you are mine still. And if on this night 
 of my great hope, you dare to think ay, so much 
 as think freedom, I will crush you down on that very 
 spot where the thought is born. Go on I will fol 
 low -I I" 
 
 A fit of coughing that seemed to rend his body, 
 suddenly attacked him, so that his weakness appeared 
 incapable of enduring more and his form, now seated, 
 swayed and rocked. Vicente seized and held him. 
 As the coughing abated and the old man gasped and 
 groped with his lean hands, that evident and striking 
 failure of his last strength bore its fruit in the mind 
 of the slave. The dumb one, looking on first in 
 terror, then with a deep and infernal cunning, let his 
 face show plainly, daringly, for the first time, his joy 
 at his master s coming dissolution, his defiance, his 
 savage sense of freedom as the master s mind sank 
 
423 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 toward death. All those emotions came out on his 
 revolting features and, as it were, stood there and 
 smiled or glared. 
 
 The hermit saw them and the fact of his now, on 
 the grave s brink, failing in his long work, seeing the 
 crushed rise up, swept in on him. It produced an 
 effect as appalling as it was sudden. Despair turned 
 to rage so great that it burst all bounds. He wrenched 
 himself from Vicente s grasp and tottered up. He 
 was convulsed and torn with that mighty anger. He 
 stood for one second tall and lean and trembling, 
 glaring at the crouching figure before him. Some 
 mad emperor, in blasting wrath about to trample his 
 people, would have looked thus and not more dread 
 ful. He staggered forward, with clenched fist and 
 flaming eyes, a demon withering the human form 
 that dared not escape. The effort was the hermit s 
 last. Its force consumed in one instant the vitality 
 that might have lasted him for hours. Vicente, 
 awed by that spectacle, had not time again to seize 
 him before his tall and emaciated body collapsed. It 
 fell with complete and final ruin, barely arrested in its 
 fall by the arms of the son who leaped to sustain it. 
 
 Its despair and its rage alike were dead as were 
 its memories and its hopes. Its powers of spirit and 
 of mind were gone. Yet, not absolutely. For the 
 force of that wrath bent the mute once more into a 
 subjection which, for a space yet after his master s 
 doom, would live; and in that last subjection, even as 
 the master fell, the slave slunk away down the stairs 
 into the bowels of the earth, on his mission. 
 
 Vicente, even now not thrown into excitement, but 
 weighed with a grief he had not anticipated, gathered 
 up the form, a strangely light form, and placed it 
 on the couch. He sought stimulants and adminis- 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 429 
 
 tered them. He chafed the body. He worked long 
 and rapidly to no purpose. He brought the 
 candle then and looked, haunted, for many long min 
 utes into the face. Behind those features had lived 
 his own source of being and his destiny. The eyes 
 he ngw closed had held that power that bent men, 
 and won his mother s wayward heart and failed 
 of all good. The face was grown calm. It was 
 absolutely white, and in its lineaments and its 
 whiteness Vicente saw himself and knew his life as 
 he had never known it before. His brain swam with 
 memories. The shadows of the cell were the figures 
 that acted out his father s tragedy. The future to 
 him was only some strong, sad force that led him 
 on, him, the helpless, the fated, to an untimely end. 
 He sank to his knees and wept, but without tears. 
 It was then that the mute returned and the prisoner 
 remembered his promised liberty. He arose and 
 bent his eyes on the messenger who had crept in 
 more awed by that last effort of his master s mind 
 than Vicente had ever seen him. 
 
 "Have you succeeded?" demanded the latter. 
 
 The other signed yes. 
 
 "Did you give it to a woman, and in secrecy?" 
 
 Yes. 
 
 " Then come. We will wait below." 
 
 Vicente took up the candle. The mute had cast a 
 glance at the couch. He had looked away as 
 though he dared not glance again. Then, a second 
 time, he had cast his eyes thither. He was like 
 a dog that scents a dead body and is fascinated, 
 yet repelled ; drawn, yet terrified ; half approaching, 
 yet slinking away; the knowledge of dread full on 
 him, yet deep under it the animal instinct to come 
 on and rend. 
 
430 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 Vicente, turning with the candle perceived that 
 canine glare. He walked to the couch and did the 
 last small offices of arranging the hands and the 
 blankets. He stood yet another moment and looked 
 for the last time at the face. 
 
 "Come," said he, and turned, walking toward the 
 exit. " We will go. This shall be his tomb." 
 
 He began the descent and the mute followed, leav 
 ing the dead man there buried, he of power and of 
 failure, of great love and greater sin. 
 
 They left the stairs at their middle and entered the 
 fissure between boulders. The descent was without 
 steps and steep, and the passage as narrow as low. 
 Vicente himself would lead, though he did not know 
 this tunnel. It was cut irregularly through earth, 
 swerving aside frequently to avoid the rocks. It went 
 ever down so that all the height of the island was 
 speedily left above. They emerged at last from the 
 black hole of the exit. That hole was so small they 
 must crawl through. On one side of it, without, and 
 extending some distance in front of it, stood one of 
 the many boulders that line this shore. On the 
 other side, and extending across so as entirely to 
 hide the tunnel, grew one of those clusters of cactus 
 that towered and spread and straggled in many direc 
 tions. Between the cactus and the irregular wall of 
 the precipice was left a narrow passage leading round 
 the island s shore under the bluff. Following this 
 path over stones and among other cacti with the 
 island s wall on the right and the lake on the left, 
 one could come at length to the bay and the tower, 
 having passed on the way the spot where Mendez 
 met Clarita, as also the spot where, a little later, 
 Rodrigo and his men looked for the body of Josefa 
 Aranja. 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 431 
 
 There was also room left or rather cut by the 
 mute, between the cactus that hid the tunnel and 
 the boulder on the left a path so hewn through the 
 prickly plant that masses of that plant still extended 
 beyond the boulder s edge, leaving the tunnel s 
 mouth invisible from the lake. The spot had evi 
 dently been selected with much cunning, there having 
 been no haste and little cause for secrecy in the hol 
 lowing out of that unsuspected way. 
 
 Vicente, halting the other, passed thus between 
 those wing-like concealments of boulder and cactus 
 and emerged with caution at the shore. The lake 
 beat up but a few yards lower than the passage s exit 
 and some ten yards distant from the island s abrupt 
 wall. There was a small cove there which rocks 
 left somewhat of a harbor. Waves coming from the 
 southeast could beat straight into it. But those 
 from the southwest, or any other direction, were 
 halted by the line of rock. As the wind came on 
 this night from the southwest (indeed it does so on 
 the majority of nights during the dry season) the 
 cove was left comparatively calm. He perceived a 
 boat could be brought without danger very near the 
 shore. Having learned the ground he crept back 
 to the tunnel s mouth. The mute was ordered to 
 remain concealed and in no wise to meddle in aught 
 that should occur. Vicente sat down in hiding and, 
 without suspense but in gloom, awaited the hour. 
 
 There was being borne in on his consciousness at 
 length some faint hint of a moving shadow, barely 
 other than the night s own shadows, yonder due 
 south on the face of the water. It wavered and rose 
 and fell, was large and then suddenly small, as 
 though a cloud glided over the waves or some spirit 
 walked there. He did not know whether his imagi- 
 
432 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 nation, rendered too alert by the strain of the night, 
 called up this unreality, or whether the shadow were 
 a thing real. He was straining his eyes to that 
 otherwise blank south and hearing the waves beat 
 up, when another sound broke on his ears the soft 
 plash, plash, of a pole near the shore. 
 
 A moment more and the great hulk of Fortino s 
 canoa appeared indistinctly, shrouded in gloom, to 
 his right. It was cutting the billows, indeed stagger 
 ing somewhat among them, as, unsteadily propelled 
 by that one strong man, it hugged the rocks and 
 rounded, in imminent danger of wrecking itself, the 
 last of the boulders. It wavered and sank and rose 
 before him who saw his freedom come thus shadow- 
 like out of shadows. It turned slightly, and turned 
 back, wheeling irregularly, refusing to enter the 
 place of calm. Fortino himself could be now indis 
 tinctly descried high up on the side near the stern, 
 his body bent far back as he strained on the pole 
 putting forth a supreme effort. He conquered the 
 waves ; the canoa came into the tiny gulf and felt the 
 heaving water grow quiet under her flat bottom. 
 
 She rode in absolute silence nearly to the shore, 
 struck without noise on sand, and stood, her pointed 
 prow high and black and sharp. For the first time 
 tingling eagerness was born in Vicente. He was ready 
 to seize that second and be gone, swallowed up in the 
 lake s night. He turned to draw the mute from his 
 concealment, not forgetting that creature whom he 
 pitied. The creature was not there. The prisoner 
 dared waste a fraction of the precious minute to 
 search the hiding-place; the dumb one was not found. 
 Vicente ran to the passage s mouth and a little way 
 up. Neither was he there. Time was too priceless. 
 There could be no more delay. It was unlikely the 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 433 
 
 mute, if later found by the soldiers, would be severely 
 dealt with. He was left to his fate unfathomable 
 product of crime and sorrow clinging to captivity. 
 Vicente crept to the shore and was at the vessel s 
 prow, raising his hands to draw himself in. It was 
 then that a girl s form leaped out and was beside 
 him. 
 
 " Pepa ! " he whispered, bewildered by this move 
 ment. 
 
 She was closer to him. She seized him round the 
 neck with both her arms. He saw and felt that she 
 was littler than Pepa, and he knew the quick smoth 
 ered sobs. He was dazed. He seized her and pressed 
 her to him in the secret darkness. 
 
 " Clarita ! Come there is not one moment to 
 lose. I will lift you back in the boat help me ! 
 What is it ! " 
 
 She was pulling back. 
 
 " Go on ! " whispered she, pushing him frantically 
 to the vessel, from which he had a step withdrawn. 
 " You are free. I have helped you. This is enough 
 for me. I cannot at last, Vicente, I cannot go. I 
 am safe ! " 
 
 "What do you mean?" cried he, feeling failure 
 close on his track. He dragged her after him, but 
 she tore away. She put her face close to his and 
 whispered, impassioned : 
 
 " Rodrigo has been good to me. You are safe. 
 Kiss me ! I shall love you always the change is 
 come Oh ! you understand my place is here. 
 And thus I can get him to let you go ! " 
 
 He comprehended that trembling confession, com 
 prehended it half with sorrow, half with joy. But he 
 had faith in Don Rodrigo, most of all, faith in Clarita; 
 and there was in him little of selfishness. 
 
 28 
 
434 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 " Then good-by ! " whispered he, pressing her to 
 his breast. " God be with you ! " 
 
 She crept away and he leaped up to the boat s 
 prow. The figure of another girl, running along the 
 shore out of the darkness, swept past the spot where 
 Clarita drew aside invisible. That other slipped in 
 between cactus and rock. She was panting barely 
 audibly. She sprang out to the water s edge at the 
 cove where Vicente, bewildered, was entering the ves 
 sel over the prow and Fortino at the rear still strained 
 on the pole. Her clothing was soaked and clung 
 to her strong young body, pouring water in a score 
 of little streams to the earth, having, indeed, dashed 
 spray from her flying person all the way as she came 
 along that hidden path under the island s bluffs. 
 Vicente was once more astounded to see that wet 
 figure coming in after him and feel the dripping arm 
 brush his face. 
 
 With a last glance, half fearful, half exultant, 
 Clarita perceived the boat begin to move. The 
 night was yet as silent as the prisons, save for the 
 lonely sound of waves. She did not see that other 
 spirit-like bulk of gloom that had stalked yonder 
 from the south. To her the change had come at 
 last, and with it tears. For the first time in all her 
 life she would not follow him. Not again would she 
 walk through the dark night to find him, or cross the 
 stormy lake unbidden to be where he was. 
 
 She waited to see no more. She ran swiftly round 
 the island s end to its western side, and traversing in 
 a kind of panic the course the dripping Pepa had 
 traversed, came to the rocks that had hidden the 
 swimmer. She ran almost fully into the arms of 
 the remorse-crazed Rodrigo, who, having failed at 
 the point of the leap, was running here, scanning the 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 435 
 
 shore. It swept over Clarita that this haste meant 
 pursuit of her brother, at least suspicion, that the 
 secret would out, that on her alone depended the 
 safety of the fugitive. She hesitated not one moment. 
 That latent spirit of deeds came up. Rodrigo had 
 declared his love her brother was free. She loved 
 this man with her whole heart; she knew it now in 
 the moment of her anxiety. Her modest timidity 
 went down in the storm. She, the gentle, was sud 
 denly as wild, as bold, as ever had been Pepa in her 
 freest times. 
 
 She cried out as he would have passed her: 
 
 " Rodrigo ! Rodrigo ! " 
 
 She cried it passionately. He turned, and she, 
 blocking his way, stretched out her arms and he 
 caught her. She held him in the embrace of des 
 peration. She wept and called his name ; she threw 
 back her face, which, thinking that some great trouble 
 had come to her, he kissed, beseeching her to tell him. 
 
 " I can bear it no more ! " cried she. " You love 
 me you said you loved me ! " 
 
 " With all my life ! " 
 
 " Then take me ! Take me ! " 
 
 Doubtless in the paroxysm of emotion that, like a 
 maelstrom, had suddenly seized her, confession of it 
 self would have broken out. She was swept away in 
 the bursting storm of that which her secret heart had 
 longed to utter. The stratagem was but the hun 
 dredth part of the moment s deed. It was merely 
 that it could fall in with the storm. Curiously did 
 stratagem and reality flow on together, the last sweep 
 ing in the first. Ah ! thou timid one, thus thy great 
 love made thee, too, that unusual deceiver, with that 
 unusual and sweet deceit that was truer than truth. 
 
 There came then, ringing through the night, the 
 
436 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 distant cry of a man s voice, " Help ! Help ! He is 
 escaping ! " and the report of a pistol. 
 
 She had detained Rodrigo one invaluable minute; 
 even she could detain him no more. He listened, 
 startled ; then broke away from her. 
 
 The canoa bearing the fugitives had begun its 
 silent gliding out as Clarita had run away. It was 
 but a few feet from the shore when the waves caught 
 its stern, whirled it, in spite of all Fortino s strength, 
 sidewise, and, for a moment, hung it motionless on 
 the rocks. The giant ground out between his teeth 
 such oaths as the night must have shuddered at, and 
 Vicente, seeing that his life hung on every second, 
 was high up beside him, his slender figure, too, 
 straining with all its power on the pole. It was then 
 that they heard the cry and the pistol, whose ball 
 struck the water under them. There were no other 
 boats at the island. Escape was yet possible. 
 
 When Rodrigo had called his men to the pursuit 
 of Pepa, Bonavidas, on the island s extreme southern 
 point, had not heard the call. Seated under the 
 prison s wall he was watching that shadow yonder 
 in the south. The sound of the grating of Fortino s 
 vessel came suddenly to him. He crept half-way 
 down the precipitous descent and the scarcely seen 
 movement below aroused his fears. He cried out 
 and fired to determine his course and raise the alarm, 
 not aiming at the vessel. His fears were confirmed 
 by the struggle beneath and, with a devilish zest, 
 the wily lieutenant plunged into the danger. When 
 nearly to the shore he hung from a rocky ledge and 
 dropped. Then he leaped at the boat, crying aloud. 
 He had seen one huge and one tall figure high up 
 against the stars on the struggling vessel. But he, 
 too, had been seen. 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 437 
 
 His descent, since the alarm, had taken but the 
 eighth of a minute. It took that frantic giant but 
 two seconds to intrust the pole to Vicente and the 
 girl and spring from boat to water, from water to 
 land. On the edge of the shore he met the charging 
 lieutenant. Fortino s only thought, mad and blind 
 as he was, seeing his great hope threatened, was to 
 crush this howling demon. He sprang on his as 
 tounded enemy before that enemy could raise his 
 weapon. They were locked in a deadly embrace. 
 Bonavidas s long and powerful arms entwined that 
 great bulk and wrenched fruitlessly. The giant s 
 muscles were in sudden and irresistible play and 
 with a dull, sickening crack the body of Bonavidas was 
 crushed against his iron breast. The time occupied 
 in this silent contest was infinitesimal. The disease 
 that had secretly gnawed the lieutenant s strength then 
 showed its works. It was as though the lungs were, 
 by that bear-like grip, mangled. Floods of clotted 
 blood burst from the victim s mouth, and he fell, 
 blood running still on the sand, and lay dead. 
 
 Cursing in his throat gutturally, the giant, now 
 inflamed with fury, ran through water straight at the 
 boat, and hurled his form against its stern. It was 
 like striking it with a boulder. It scraped and swung 
 free and circled out amidst greater waves, Fortino 
 clambering, as it went, over its side. They were 
 dashed by billows fifty feet into the lake ; they heard 
 shouts and running feet upon the shore. 
 
 " With all your strength ! " cried Vicente ; and the 
 wind caught his voice and made a hideous clangor 
 of the words. 
 
 The two swung on the pole, Pepa crouching under 
 them straining at the rudder, striving to guide the 
 vessel straight out. 
 
438 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 " Up with the sail ! " cried Vicente. 
 
 Fortino loosed the pole and the vessel tilted and 
 swayed. It was then that bullets began spattering 
 the water and they heard Rodrigo s voice crying 
 orders on the shore. The sail, hoisted by Fortino s 
 great arm, its ropes seized by Vicente, went flutter 
 ing up, caught the wind with a dull report, and 
 dragged, bulging, at its mast. The flight under the 
 white square began, round the island s eastern side 
 twenty yards from shore, toward the spot where lay 
 Ocotlan, the wind directly in the stern. 
 
 Exultation was suddenly turned to horror. The 
 thing that had been the spot of white and red in the 
 long afternoon, had been, too, that ghost-like bulk 
 that strode in darkness from the south. The three 
 fugitives, crowded together in the stern, crouching 
 to avoid the bullets that now went wild, bending 
 every effort to the management of sail and rudder, 
 beheld then a second expanse, looming out of the 
 southern darkness, towering over them, bearing 
 straight down across their bows. They cried and 
 shrieked in vain. That silent enemy sailed on. They 
 came, in spite of all effort, in front of its prow. It 
 was as though the white sail became a dazzling 
 sheet to wind them in and cast them down. The 
 prow of that new enemy, bursting in on the moment 
 of success, crashed against their vessel s side. 
 
 The phantom bore with it Doroteo Quiroz. He 
 had heard the cry and knew who alone could be 
 escaping. He had been still in his desperate mood ; 
 and the escape of him for whose capture he had 
 risked all, frenzied him. Let not that skeleton arise 
 out of the tomb to goad him. Thinking this, he had 
 heard Vicente s voice and seen the vessel rolling out 
 on to the lake s bosom. He had borne down on it 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 439 
 
 Coming very near he had heard yet another voice, 
 a voice that seemed to make every drop of blood in 
 his body stand still. It was Pepa s. She, too, was 
 escaping and with the very man they had pawned 
 their souls together to destroy. Burning thoughts of 
 treachery burst in his mind. It seemed then every 
 thing he touched fell in ruins. Crazed by that last 
 voice, he hesitated not. He crashed straight into 
 the traitor s ship, heedless of danger or death. 
 
 His vessel was the " Goddess Venus " manned by 
 three of his own sailors. She had no iron on her, 
 and she struck her opponent at a spot of the latter s 
 side most firmly braced by heavy cross timbers. So 
 she did not pierce her. The two canoas shook and 
 tottered, but remained whole. Quiroz sprang to the 
 prow and hurled his anchor into the other vessel. 
 While the fugitives struggled to prevent that disastrous 
 union, Quiroz called his willing servants to his aid, 
 seized the chain, and the vessels were drawn -together. 
 They wrapped the chain s superfluous coils round 
 a staying timber, so that those two small and tossing 
 ships were lashed like galleys of old. 
 
 Vicente was not armed. All weapons had been 
 removed from him on his capture. He had stood 
 at the point of conjunction ready to sell his freedom 
 with his life, infuriated for once by the presence of 
 this fiend of treachery. The girl, at the sound of 
 Quiroz s voice, lost her daring for the first time 
 before any save Rodrigo. She slunk into the boat s 
 farthest corner and looked on, no party in the fight. 
 Vicente s was the coolest mind of the three. It 
 would have been better had Fortino s been cooler. 
 The moment the anchor caught the ship the former 
 sprang to cast it loose. Fortino, a maniacal purpose 
 born in him, strangely prevented that separation. 
 
440 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 But what reasoning, what earthly force, could stop 
 the dread hurricane of that great man s passion 
 when, in a fury that no words can describe, he real 
 ized that this, his last struggle with his destiny, was 
 failing because of that same wretch who had brought 
 about his miseries. He cried out with so fierce and 
 so deafening a cry that it was as though some king 
 of the forests, leaping on his prey, roared in him. 
 He hurled himself across the chasm between the two 
 prows. He launched that vast weight of his straight 
 at his enemy all thoughts, all purposes, all hopes, 
 dead, save just this one, to crush the vile soul out 
 of its viler body. 
 
 He seized Quiroz in a grip of iron. He called 
 forth the sum of his powers. He was a demon from 
 the fiery pit. If breath of man could blast man 
 Quiroz must have shrivelled before that hot exhala 
 tion of supreme hate. The traitor felt his body 
 pressed till it seemed the crushing arms must cut 
 him through. His ribs seemed cracking and the 
 blood felt as though it burst from his veins and 
 flooded him. He would doubtless have gone the 
 way of Bonavidas had not his three sailors, them 
 selves strong men, been there to help him. They 
 were with one accord on Fortino. One seized a 
 club from the boat s bottom and beat the giant s 
 defenceless head unmercifully. The attack of the 
 others was not less fierce. The boat was rocking 
 under them and the other dragging at its chain, and 
 the two sails, left unguarded, surged and flapped as 
 the canoas wheeled contrary to wind. The fight 
 lasted scarce time for Vicente to perceive its nature. 
 He, too, was on the point of springing across and 
 adding his despairing strength to that of Fortino, 
 when he was pushed back from the spot where, for 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 441 
 
 an instant, he was poised on the boat s side. His 
 assailant was one of the sailors, who, knocking Vi 
 cente backward into the vessel, jumped in after him. 
 
 The struggle with Fortino was done. It is likely that 
 even four men would not have proved too many for 
 his towering strength, had not an unforeseen circum 
 stance aided them. He had grown, in the contest, 
 even more crazed than before. In the grasp of his 
 three assailants and still holding Quiroz, he had lunged 
 and tottered. The mass of men had crashed into the 
 thatch, torn that light roofing from the sides, and 
 shattered it. Even the mast itself was all but cracked. 
 The sail then united its efforts with those of Fortino s 
 enemies and caused, with their strength, his failure. 
 The wheeling of the vessel had left the canvas empty 
 of wind. It sank, flat and flapping, and wound the 
 plunging giant in its folds. He knew not what he 
 did. He loosed one arm for a moment from Quiroz, 
 to tear the cursed thing down. It confused and 
 hampered him. Its sagging end, the rope un 
 guarded, tangled his feet That loosing of the arm 
 was fatal to success. Quiroz, with the others aid, 
 jerked himself loose. With a dexterous twist the 
 canvas was more thoroughly wound about the frantic 
 combatant. 
 
 It was then the unarmed Vicente was hurled back. 
 Quiroz and the two other sailors left Fortino, who for 
 an instant could not free or collect himself. They 
 sprang into the other vessel. Vicente was in the 
 midst of the most desperate fight of his life with the 
 first of Quiroz s servants. The two following ones 
 joined it, overpowering the dreamer. Quiroz, losing 
 not a second, at once on entering that vessel and 
 before Fortino could come storming to the prow, 
 cast away the anchor that bound the two canoas. 
 
442 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 They staggered again at this release, and swung 
 apart. Fortino was charging over cross-timbers, 
 having freed himself. He was an instant too late. 
 He was baffled so ignominiously that the last of his 
 heart and its courage were wrecked. He saw the 
 other canoa, containing Quiroz and his three assist 
 ants, Vicente and the girl, tossing yonder, himself 
 here alone in Doroteo s vessel, and an impassable 
 gulf of black and heaving waves between. He sank 
 down in despair. 
 
 The other canoa was at once righted by Quiroz 
 and his men, and headed to the shore. Vicente, 
 overwhelmed by numbers, though having fought 
 with unflinching bravery, was pinioned in the prow. 
 The sail, bulging again, hid the stern from him. 
 High in that stern sat Quiroz, grown calm and steely. 
 He stared at the girl. She crept up to him, kitten- 
 like, and, resting against him, put up her face. 
 
 " Did you think I was leaving you ? " whispered 
 she, bringing her lips close, close. " I was only get 
 ting away, the sooner to come to you ! " 
 
 He tried to read her face. 
 
 " Pepa, are you telling me the truth?" said he 
 between his teeth. 
 
 " I would not lie to you," she replied plaintively, 
 bringing her lips still closer, so that he felt her breath 
 on his face. " Doroteo, I would not lie to you to 
 save my poor soul." 
 
 " Then you are mine at last ! " cried he, holding 
 her an instant with passion. She crept away and 
 crouched under the thatch. 
 
 The shore was at once neared and the vessel 
 anchored, yet not so close that those soldiers who 
 came running there could detect the identity of its 
 occupants. 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 443 
 
 " Deliver him to the jefe" whispered Quiroz to 
 his men, " and say not a word, but return here." 
 
 So the ill-fated prisoner was given over once again 
 to that chief of police in whom the escape had 
 caused a relief as great as transient. The three 
 sailors returned to the canoa, answering no queries. 
 That vessel, containing still the girl and Quiroz, was 
 poled out free of rocks, the sail was raised, and the 
 journey was continued. Its master wished to return 
 to Tizapan, but this the wind would not permit him 
 to do. He would not remain on that island. He 
 hated every man on it; he had obtained what he 
 sought. He would sail for the opposite shore and 
 return to his native town when the wind should 
 change. So that square of canvas that had been the 
 white spot and the red, and the spirit-like shadow 
 from the south, went away to the north and 
 disappeared. 
 
 The despair of Fortino was infinite. For a full 
 hour his vessel, he the lonely occupant, tossed at the 
 will of the waves. The sail caught the wind and 
 dashed the boat about, that it was nigh to sinking. 
 It lost the wind and fell and flapped in laxity. The 
 prow now cut the advancing waves, now turned and 
 ran from them. The waters flowed dark and deep, 
 and he knew death lay under them. He dreamed a 
 long bitter dream of Ocotlan, Tizapan, and the Island. 
 He was haunted by ghosts and ridden by black mor 
 bidness. The sky was a pall over him, the lake a 
 grave under him, life blacker than the grave. He 
 would have leaped in but for the profound contempt 
 of self that made him punish himself by not doing so. 
 The high rocks of the island yonder cursed him. 
 His own soul rose up in revolt and cursed him. He 
 died a hundred deaths, and felt a hundred other 
 
444 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 dooms bring their weight and mercilessly unload it 
 on him. 
 
 The night progressed and the silence of the infinite 
 was about him. In every direction lay the same un- 
 pierced gloom. He went at last to the stern. No 
 more fights, no more efforts for him. He was the 
 lowest of the low. To fish this was all merely 
 to drag helpless, tiny things out of water in a net 
 this was all that might fit the impotent Fortino. He 
 righted the sail and worked the vessel round till its 
 prow pointed as nearly toward Chapala as the wind 
 would allow. The canvas filled and bulged. The 
 breeze was thus not well in the stern and his course 
 was slow. He sat by the rudder and held his ship 
 remorselessly on its way. Seldom, seldom has a 
 sailor sailed these ships alone. He went on into the 
 very deep, blank middle of that gloom. He left the 
 island. He could see no rocks behind, no shore 
 before, no mountains to the left or right. Thus empty 
 was all time to him. He sailed in the gloom, queer 
 old Fortino, swallowed up yonder alone, seen no 
 more, lost in the waves and the night. 
 
 At midnight, or shortly after, the underground 
 passage not yet having been explored by any of the 
 soldiers, there was struck a light and lit a candle 
 deep under the prison of tunnels. The yellow flare 
 lit up the hermit s cell, the stones, the couch, the 
 body; also the revolting visage of the mute who 
 had lighted it. He had spent two long hours of 
 what trembling, what terrors, what fearful visions 
 who knows? creeping up the length of the tunnel 
 he had made, halting and sitting crouched for long 
 minutes in dread, then creeping again. Coming at 
 last into the cell s absolute darkness he went with 
 
I 
 A DREAM OF A THRONE 445 
 
 stealth and secured the candle and the match. Then 
 moisture, cold, came out over his whole body and 
 he sat down in the blackness. He bent his eyes 
 toward the spot where stood the couch and dared 
 not move. He was thus many minutes more. Then 
 the fascination drew him on and he lit the candle. 
 He crept over the floor to the couch. He stared at 
 the calm countenance. He put out his hand and 
 withdrew it. He put it out again and felt the body. 
 He passed his fingers to the face. He could not 
 believe it. There was no power there was no 
 mind. He brought his own face closer. He passed 
 his finger over every feature. He knew the truth. 
 He dropped the candle and it went out. He crept 
 to the exit and down, and came at length to the 
 shore. He went a little way along the water, arriv 
 ing at a line of boulders that extended into the lake. 
 He climbed to the first and looked once back at the 
 passage. He stepped to the second, the third, the 
 fourth, the fifth. He was far out with the billows 
 round him and deep water under him. He raised 
 his arms high in air. And he he, the mute 
 brokenly, imperfectly, the words made by but half 
 a tongue and that half long paralyzed cried out 
 in a joy diabolical : 
 
 " Free ! Free ! " 
 
 He leaped and sank, and was seen henceforth no 
 more. It was thus that he followed her. 
 
CHAPTER XI 
 
 IN the middle of a bright and hot afternoon when 
 the green and red walls of Dona Manuela s 
 home were rendered even more than ordinarily 
 luminous by the brightest and hottest of the sun s 
 rays, that anxious senora s son, with Josefa Aranja, 
 entered the street door and appeared once again in 
 the tree-shaded patio. The interior of this, his ances 
 tral home, was as peaceful, as full of quiet and 
 shadow, as could have been even that domestic life 
 for which the old lady believed him by nature fit. 
 The footfalls of the two arrivals woke sharp sounds 
 from the brick pavement. The trees barely stirred 
 and fell again into the afternoon s yellow depths of 
 sleep. The shattered door of the rear patio had 
 been removed, and there was a lack of promptness 
 or of inclination or of will in putting up another, 
 for the rear court, dusty and bare, lay visible. The 
 door of the room Pepa had occupied stood open, 
 and looking in, they could see the unseemly hole in 
 the outer wall and through it catch some gleams of 
 the sunlit street. 
 
 They traversed but a scant half of the distance to 
 the low roofed corredor before there was again the 
 wonted vision of the loose blue dress. Its occu 
 pant, with a cry that may have been joy, or only 
 anxiety, ran out of the glazed parlor to meet them. 
 
 " Doroteo, my only son ! " cried she, falling upon 
 him. " Oh ! the bitter hours that I have not slept 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 447 
 
 or eaten ! My boy, you are come at last, and this 
 time, oh surely tell me this is the last time ! " 
 
 " Aha ! " cried Ouiroz, fondling a stray lock of her 
 hair ; " you are right, little mother, this is indeed the 
 last!" 
 
 " Thanks be to Heaven ! " responded she fervently. 
 
 Josefa advanced with something of the solemnity 
 seen in her at times before, and with lines a little 
 harder about her mouth and a far-away look in her 
 eyes. She kissed Dona Manuela on both cheeks, and 
 was at the same time on both cheeks kissed by her, 
 after the elaborate Mexican custom. Then the old 
 lady, struck with a sudden thought, turned in agita 
 tion to her son and whispered : 
 
 " Are you is it Oh, Doroteo ! It is already 
 done ? Are you then really married, Doroteo ? " 
 
 Quiroz laughed a somewhat sibilant laugh and 
 went walking with his old feline air under the tiled 
 roof, where he sat down in a cane-and-leather 
 arm-chair. 
 
 " Ah, yes, Mamacita, ha ! ha ! So we are, with a 
 bond of steel. Set your heart at rest, Mamacita, we 
 are married, Josefa and I." 
 
 " And the good times," cried she, clapping her 
 hands slowly and doing it, too, with a solemn face of 
 doubt, so that the joy of that clapping of hands was 
 hollow and without merriment, " the good times 
 have come ! " 
 
 She was not able to talk much during the rest of 
 that afternoon. Her brain and her heart were ex 
 ceedingly full. She went about doing many things 
 restlessly, looking askance at the silent Josefa or 
 following her son with fearful eyes. And he was 
 himself again, graceful, full of life and suppressed 
 spirits. Dona Manuela clung to the idea he had 
 
448 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 come at last to settle down. She cherished and 
 hugged and warmed that thought, not so much as 
 daring, any more, to say anything about it, merely 
 in trepidation waiting to see. Later they ate a 
 supper which, save for Doroteo s run of comments 
 on many subjects far from the thoughts of all, would 
 have been rather a silent one. The old lady tried 
 once, during that meal, to be jocund, and said a 
 thing very full of merriment, and declared, too, that 
 Doroteo was at last, now fights and bad influences 
 being away, like her own son, the son whose nature 
 and whose needs she knew through and through. 
 After that saying the merriment pined with curious 
 rapidity and died. 
 
 The darkness had come on and was whispering 
 among the trees in the patio, and the candles cast 
 light out into the shades of night. Unusually early 
 they all agreed they were weary, and retired. Dona 
 Manuela withdrew to her room, a great depression 
 on her, not having dared ask or say more concerning 
 the subject nearest her heart, not knowing where her 
 son had been to-day and yesterday, whether he would 
 remain with her or go away on the morrow. She 
 spent the night before the crucifix. 
 
 In the morning she found Doroteo busy with 
 horses. She was struck dumb and said nothing, nor 
 expressed surprise. She summoned him to break 
 fast. He kissed her with great gallantry and called 
 her Mamacita, but said he and Pepa had had break 
 fast. The mozo brought two horses into the patio. 
 One of them bore a side saddle. Then the old lady, 
 standing motionless in the corredor, her white face 
 blank, heard Josefa singing the snatch of a tune in 
 her room. The singer came out. She was in a high- 
 strung mood. Her eyes danced and the color came 
 
A DREAM Of A THRONE 449 
 
 and went in waves on her face. She came and kissed 
 the old lady on both cheeks again. 
 
 " Good-by good-by ! " cried she, in odd and 
 feverish happiness. 
 
 " Good-by," whispered Dona Manuela. 
 
 Doroteo helped the girl to the saddle with needless 
 care. Then he turned to his mother. 
 
 " Little mother, God with you ! Fear not till Doro 
 teo comes again. We will not leave you alone for 
 ever. No, no ! Mamacita is ever in the memory ! 
 Farewell ! " and he kissed her and held his finger 
 under her chin, " till we come again to settle 
 down ! " 
 
 He mounted, and they rode out, leaving tears run 
 ning down Dona Manuela s cheeks. When the door 
 was closed she went in and stood up on the window- 
 sill from which Clarita had seen Vicente gallop up 
 the street. She watched them disappear, Doroteo 
 sitting straight and handsome as only Doroteo could 
 be, and Pepa, the proud Pepa, staring away to the 
 front and the wild future in the warring southeast. 
 It was then Dona Manuela s doubts of Josefa Aranja 
 were verified. The two were presently gone, leaving 
 the house and its swirls of red and green desolate, 
 not having so much as turned to wave a hand at 
 her. 
 
 She did not blame him. Nay, she forgave him. 
 How many times since the old sacrifice at Jerusalem 
 has the cleansing of sins been thus renewed, the 
 mother washing them away with blood from the very 
 wounds that the son inflicted ! She turned back to 
 the empty house and came at length to the parlor, 
 where the glazed bricks glistened and the broken 
 pieces of the crystal cliirimoya still lay amidst the 
 other shining fruit. She stood in a dream. 
 
 29 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 " He was never thus by nature," murmured she, 
 pitifully. " Oh, Holy Mary, thou dost know it was 
 the woman who did it ! " 
 
 And in that sweetly bitter thought the sins of 
 Doroteo Quiroz were wiped out. 
 
 The morning of the day previous to that of Qui- 
 roz s return to Tizapan a straggling fleet of some 
 twelve or fourteen canoas, gathered not without 
 trouble, went down the river amidst the waste of 
 green marsh, and issued on the lake. Those vessels 
 contained the remainder of Don Rodrigo s men, who 
 sailed out in high spirits. Scarcely was there one 
 canoa from which did not float over the dancing 
 waves the tones of some Spanish love song, or the 
 high and plaintive falsetto of some weird Indian mel 
 ody. The steady breeze of an autumn day blew this 
 company of sails ever toward the spot where, a dead 
 leaf in a sea, the island lay. The long morning and 
 the longer afternoon passed, the fleet neared the rocky 
 shore in the early evening, and the soldiers saw the 
 prison walls standing gaunt against a sky of many 
 colors. 
 
 Clarita, sunk into yet greater grief, had spent the 
 whole of the night after the great failure lying on the 
 ground outside the door of the prison, wherein a se 
 curer cell had been selected for the captive, and a 
 constant guard placed over him. They would have 
 allowed her to go in; in the morning they besought 
 her to enter. She could not. Rodrigo, nigh crushed 
 by her sorrow, held aloof; he would not break in 
 on her solitude, though she had given herself to him. 
 The two, bound together yet separated, were waiting 
 for the governor s message, each with fear, neither 
 with hope. 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 451 
 
 During the day the wind changed gradually to the 
 southwest, finally to the west, so that the approach 
 ing fleet, having come within a few hundred yards of 
 shore, could come no further. It was forced to 
 anchor where it was. The soldiers were thus com 
 pelled to remain in waiting canoas till morning. But 
 to one other vessel, a lonely vessel from another direc 
 tion, the change was advantageous. Chapala lies, as 
 has been said, on a cape. Between Mescala and the 
 former town the shore makes a turn, almost of a right 
 angle, so that Chapala lies west of the island, as 
 Mescala lies north. The messengers returning with 
 the governor s reply perceived, at Mescala, that the" 
 more usual southwest wind would likely prevail dur 
 ing the afternoon and night. They therefore did not 
 await the improbable north one. They skirted the 
 shore, leaving their canoa, and came, toward evening, 
 to Chapala. They secured there another vessel, and 
 set sail for the island. The wind changing and 
 coming at length directly from the west, and, as 
 always, rising with the night, the journey was made 
 with good speed. 
 
 At nine o clock that night Rodrigo, grown consid 
 erably calmer than he was wont to be, his teeth shut 
 and a grim determination forcing him on, came to 
 the prison doors where he had last seen Clarita. She 
 was not there. The guards told him she had gone 
 away. He came again to the church. He did not 
 look at its stones, and he kept out of his mind by a 
 mighty effort the other scenes he had been a part of 
 in it. He stared straight before him, and strode in. 
 She was kneeling again, a candle near her. He came 
 to her and spoke, standing over her and looking down. 
 She started up and turned an appealing face to him, 
 reading his expression. She had steeled herself for 
 
452 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 this moment. It was as though she held her every 
 nerve with a desperate grasp. He said : 
 
 " The message has come. I will bear your sorrow 
 with you I must. You have given yourself to me. 
 To hold aloof because I was the unwilling cause, this 
 will serve no longer. Clarita, I am come to be, 
 henceforth, always, regardless of the blot on me and 
 rising above it, the help that you need. I will take 
 you away. I shall not let this grief blast all your 
 life. For him, there is no hope. The governor, in 
 his weakness grown for once by irritation strong, will 
 not be moved. Come, oh my heart ! you, this I 
 know, have forgiven me long since. I may have 
 done wrong I do not know I did the best I 
 knew. Will you come now and give me this grief of 
 yours, as you gave me your love, and let me, now 
 that I can do no more, bear it for you ? " 
 
 She came and bowed her head to his breast, and 
 he held her. 
 
 " Go now," said he at last, " and speak to him." 
 
 She went out, slowly. The gray rebozo fell and 
 lay in the ruins. He picked it up and went out after 
 her, going down to the shore where he gave orders. 
 He called a soldier, handed him the governor s mes 
 sage, and turned over to him his own authority. He 
 saw that the canoa was ready. He returned and 
 waited at the prison door. 
 
 The girl, scarcely able to go, had crept in. The 
 guards had let her pass and she came to his cell. 
 She turned bewildered at the door and stared at the 
 cactus and the walls. She tried to go in, but she fell 
 against the ruins and stood there with her face buried 
 on her arms. She did not know whether minutes or 
 hours passed. At last she turned and entered. Vi 
 cente was standing by the candle listening, as though 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 453 
 
 he had heard her silent footstep. He saw her appear, 
 standing looking at him, agonized, her love for him 
 going out and drawing him. He sprang forward and 
 caught her. He drew her to the light and put back 
 her hair from her face, at which he stared. He read 
 her message. He did not tremble or cry out. He 
 heaved a deep sigh and stroked her hair, and then 
 smiled at her. 
 
 " I think you came to tell me there is no hope," 
 said he. 
 
 She shuddered and sank more deeply in his arms. 
 
 "Look, Clarita to me it is not this great grief. 
 Then to you it shall not be. Do not weep. That 
 which God brings is best. Death has not any terror 
 for me. This have I long seen coming. It was the 
 destiny prepared for me." 
 
 She clung to him, desperately, grief shaking her 
 frame. She could not look at him. She could not 
 raise her face. She could scarcely hear him. She 
 must hold him hold him. 
 
 " I cannot go ! " she cried in anguish. 
 
 He held her closer, pityingly, being stronger now 
 than in all his unusual course. 
 
 " You love Don Rodrigo," said he. 
 
 " He has given up," she said. " He did all to save 
 us he is going away." 
 
 He looked at her hair, in which the candle-light 
 brought out gold. He looked at her shaking 
 shoulders and put his gentle hand on them. He 
 drew her up and kissed her many times. 
 
 " Then you, too, go," said he. " Death is nothing ; 
 faith and love, these are all. And you have been 
 these. This, your life, will light the way for me to 
 the end. Go in peace ; grieve not. You have done 
 all that you could. Remember I met death with 
 
454 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 calmness and did not complain, because your faith 
 had strengthened mine." 
 
 She would not go. She clung to him with a grip 
 he could not loose. After holding her long he tried 
 to lead her to the door. She seemed overwhelmed 
 by the fear that he would make her leave him. 
 
 " I cannot ! " cried she again, turning her face up 
 to him. " So long as life lasts I shall stay with 
 you." 
 
 " Clarita, you must leave me, because I ask it. 
 This is the last you can do for me. If these sad 
 times had not come, and I, still living with you, had 
 become ill and then died you would not have been 
 crushed by grief for that; you would have trusted 
 God and gone on in the world till a better time. 
 Think of it thus now. You will walk out to-night, 
 leaving me because I pray you with my last prayers 
 to do so. It will be that you left me already dead, 
 that I have gone before you. You will not think of 
 the death and the sorrow, nor of me as living here. 
 You will think only of the future." 
 
 She had ever obeyed him his wish had been 
 unquestioned law. To do so now was a new struggle. 
 She only shook in his arms, unable to obey. 
 
 " I have followed you always ! " she cried. 
 
 " Heart of faith," said he, " this last gift I pray 
 from you. You will not refuse it. To stay would be 
 only to blacken the end for me, whereas, remembering 
 you thus as having gone away when I wished, there 
 will be light. Go in my name and for your love 
 of me. It is not desertion of me. I know you would 
 stay. It is my will. This is your last, your most 
 sacred duty. Go." 
 
 When she could realize it thus, she began to yield, 
 but not till then. He succeeded at last in getting 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 455 
 
 her away. He gave no sign of the pain of that part 
 ing, he did not so much as flinch at the wound. 
 She staggered out, held by a guard, seeing nothing, 
 unable to go alone and she left in him a loneliness 
 that seemed as if it must of itself bring death. 
 
 She was caught up outside by Rodrigo, who car 
 ried her to the shore as though she had been a child. 
 He brought her into the vessel and gave orders to 
 the sailors. To do nothing but grieve over those 
 events and that end, to feel remorse and hate himself 
 these were not worthy of him. Let him bring all 
 his emotion, now that he had done what he could, to 
 bear on caring for her. He turned his back upon 
 the island and the prison and the past. He faced 
 the future with her. 
 
 He had arranged a bed on the boat s bottom where 
 she might pass the night. She lay there all the 
 hours of the journey. He stood over her, or strode 
 to and fro, or scanned the horizon as the vessel sped 
 on. He rested not. 
 
 The island was sunk in the past blackness and the 
 lake s northern shore came near. The wind in the 
 early morning brought them to Ocotlan. 
 
 She had recovered a little and they proceeded on 
 horseback to Guadalajara, where they were married. 
 Rodrigo communicated with none of his acquaint 
 ances, merely made the arrangements for departure. 
 They took passage in one of those great, old-style 
 diligencias that, drawn by eight mules, whirled them 
 away over many stony roads to the east and north. 
 The nights were spent in inns, sometimes at towns, 
 sometimes in lonely places. They were transferred 
 to other diligencias and the days were dusty and long. 
 But his love sustained her. 
 
 There came a sunlit morning when the sluggish 
 
456 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 waters of the sand-blocked Rio Grande rolled before 
 them. They walked to the shore and some rowers 
 were coming toward them in a boat. The high bank 
 hid them and they were alone. He put his arms 
 about her and said : 
 
 " I have found all at last all. And for my many 
 mistakes you give me yourself as reward. Clarita, I 
 am going to make you happy." 
 
 44 You will," she said; "a little while longer and 
 you will ! " 
 
 The boat came and they entered and were rowed 
 across. On the way the sun came and glistened on 
 her tresses. 
 
 " I think it was your hair," said he, " that won me 
 first and the dimples." 
 
 She looked at him and smiled for the first time, a 
 sad smile. But the dimples themselves had come 
 again. 
 
CHAPTER XII 
 
 ON the afternoon following the departure of 
 Clarita, a lazy canoa dropped sail and floated 
 to the sandy shore at Chapala, poled by one very 
 lean and tall man whose bare legs as he strained 
 along the boat s sides seemed of immoderate length, 
 and by another man who was shorter and who 
 grunted as he strained. The boat came to anchor 
 near that portion of the beach where the lime-kilns 
 stand at the rear of the church. The two sat on the 
 side, then, and swung their feet over the water. 
 
 The long one made a movement as though to 
 jump in and proceed to shore, but grew of a sudden 
 so very languid that he found the movement could 
 not be completed. He yawned and retied about his 
 waist a green sash which separated the white blouse 
 of his shirt from the white rolls of his trousers. He 
 leaned against the thatch and let his eyes wander 
 over the town and the sides of St. Michael. The 
 other sat beside him, held a sandal up, and stared 
 vacantly at it as though it needed something but he 
 had forgotten what it was that it needed. He too 
 yawned. The color of his sash was magenta. The 
 two then sighed in harmony and, removing the two 
 high-peaked sombreros, let the breeze fan their faces. 
 Apparently the idea of disembarking must be given 
 time to gain ground. There was a great bulk sitting 
 yonder on the sand with its back to a hut. It did 
 
458 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 not move. Anastasio s eyes had slowly taken in the 
 place of his nativity. 
 
 " The church towers are still the same," said An- 
 astasio with sentiment, moving the large toe of the 
 left foot slowly back and forth. 
 
 The other assented only with silence. 
 
 " I see the salati is not changed," observed Fran 
 cisco after some minutes of the silence. 
 
 " The old place is doubtless lonesome," said Anas- 
 tasio. 
 
 " Run down," agreed Francisco. 
 
 They deemed it unnecessary to proceed further 
 with this line of thought. Later, when the languor 
 seemed really to approach exhaustion, Anastasio felt 
 in his bosom and drew out a rag, which, being slowly 
 untied, displayed three copper cents. Anastasio 
 appeared bored by the sight. He put the rag and 
 its contents back in his shirt. He perceived Fran 
 cisco, after some time, removing a rag likewise, and 
 opening it. There were not any cents at all in 
 Francisco s rag. This sight seemed extremely 
 fatiguing to both. 
 
 " Francisco," began Anastasio, having looked long 
 and dreamily into the water. 
 
 " Si" said Francisco. 
 
 " There was something wrong with the spoils." 
 
 " It was in the book," said Francisco in irritation. 
 "If what s in a book isn t true, then," and he gave 
 a large gesture with his hand as defying anybody to 
 answer so masterful an argument, " what in the 
 devil is?" 
 
 " Is everything in books true? " queried Anastasio. 
 
 " Why," cried Francisco, some of his old excite 
 ment reappearing, "what else would it be there 
 for?" 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 459 
 
 This proved unanswerable and Anastasio sank into 
 apathy, merely observing : 
 
 " Anyhow, there was something wrong with the 
 spoils." 
 
 "It was Fortino," said Francisco. "Fortino did n t 
 know much history, nor did he concentrate. The 
 secret of history is concentration. Fortino scattered 
 himself I mean his mind. So the strategy got him." 
 
 This not seeming particularly lucid, Anastasio let 
 it pass. He observed presently, however : 
 
 " It looks to me that he concentrated too much. 
 He concentrated the whole army. This is called 
 good strategy." 
 
 " But I tell you, fool," cried Francisco, " that it is 
 the mind. The mind rules wars ! " 
 
 " Pues, bien ; let it go. Is your rag entirely empty, 
 brother? " 
 
 Francisco spread it out flat. 
 
 " Si" said Anastasio, " there is nothing in it but 
 your honor. Wrap it up, wrap it up ; you rode hard 
 for it. Come, you and your honor, you may live 
 with me on my three coppers." 
 
 " Till the fish are drawn," assented Francisco. 
 
 " Si," said Anastasio, " we will return to them. 
 The fish are more lucrative." 
 
 The great bulk yonder on the sand moved a little 
 sluggishly, in the sun, and his sombrero fell lower 
 over his unseen face. 
 
 " Poor brother Fortino," muttered Anastasio to 
 himself. 
 
 " Si" said the other, " he failed to concentrate." 
 
 The afternoon advanced almost in silence. The 
 small waves beat up murmuringly on the yellow 
 sand. The town slept on in its primitive peace. The 
 serried line of mountains cut their eternal jagged line 
 
460 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 against the sky s blue. A dove in the old salati sent 
 her mourning notes out over beach and water and 
 the song seemed the voice of nature. St. Michael 
 lifted his mass out of the town s very centre, and 
 cactus and shrubs half hid his rocky sternness. There 
 was no sign, no thought of war. The place was almost 
 as it had been three hundred years ago. 
 
 The light on the eastern waters was suddenly in 
 tensified. The languid eye of Anastasio and the 
 alerter one of his companion perceived a dozen sails 
 or more, reflecting the sun s rays, glistening, daz 
 zling, glide one by one round the point of the cape 
 from the east. The unwonted sight moved Anas 
 tasio to curiosity, Francisco to wonder. The bulk 
 by the wall of the hut arose and stalked slowly, 
 sombre, to and fro, its eyes fastened on the ground. 
 The fleet aroused the town, and men and women in 
 crowds appeared running from the streets to the 
 beach. Brilliant blankets and fluttering rebozos 
 crowded the water s edge. But there was no laugh 
 ing, no noise. There was only awe. 
 
 The purpose of this sudden arrival began to be 
 whispered about. Already the deed had been an 
 ticipated. Francisco leaped to the water, his brown, 
 dripping legs flashed through it, and he ran along 
 the beach to the largest crowd. Anastasio still re 
 clined against the thatch. The last of the sails came 
 round the cape. The first vessel, the second, the 
 third, anchored at the beach. The sails one by one 
 fell and were furled to masts. The great Fortino 
 strode yet, slowly, ponderously, to and fro before the 
 hut like one in whom restlessness gnaws the vitals. 
 The townspeople still came running. The first canoa 
 discharged its freight of soldiers. The second, too, 
 gave forth its line of men. The third and the fourth 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 461 
 
 did likewise. The soldiers drew up in order on the 
 beach, the evening sun casting their shadows long 
 across the sand. Fortino still strode yonder. A 
 lion, the fierce life crushed in him, strides thus to 
 and fro in his cage. 
 
 Only the last sail glistened on the lake s breast. 
 It too fell and was furled. The ship under it floated 
 to the beach and the guard landed. There was a 
 double line of soldiers forming an alley, waiting for 
 its chief occupant. The crowd held a little aloof. 
 Vicente came out and stood on the beach. He was 
 straight and fearless, but the sorrow in his eyes 
 struck deep into every heart. The soldiers marched, 
 he in their midst, into the main street and through 
 the plaza, and the crowd, straggling, followed him. 
 
 Fortino strode yet upon the shore. His face was 
 dark. His hands were clenched. His eyes were the 
 eyes of despair. He would not look up. He would 
 not leave his beaten track. 
 
 Anastasio, having at length come to land, walked 
 slowly, hesitatingly, to the giant. The latter s back 
 was toward him. 
 
 " Brother," said Anastasio. 
 
 Fortino turned and cast his dull eyes on him. 
 
 "Brother, said Anastasio with odd kindness, 
 " you will still share the fish with us no ? " 
 
 The old red gleam appeared for an instant in 
 Fortino s eyes. 
 
 "The fish the fish," muttered he. "Si oh 
 my God ! We will share the fish. Fortino shall 
 draw the net till his last day come and his sun set 
 forever. Pitiable is he that he ever left. I will draw 
 fish, and to him that buys of them let wretchedness 
 come. My food shall be ashes in my mouth. Let 
 the air round about me choke him who breathes it 
 
462 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 let the waters where I row turn to blood behind me. 
 Si fish fish this is all. But I shall not fish up 
 that which is sunk forever. And let that which I 
 draw, henceforth, wherever it be sold, or wherever it 
 be eaten, turn to poison." 
 
 He stalked away toward the hut, Anastasio 
 following. 
 
 "No," muttered Anastasio after him; " this is not 
 thus. Fortino, when I taunted you in Tizapan 
 this was an ill thing to do." 
 
 Fortino went on unhearing. 
 
 " An exceedingly ill thing, Fortino," said the long 
 Anastasio, plaintively. 
 
 Fortino went into the hut and lay down on the 
 floor. Anastasio remained outside and presently 
 said, the sound penetrating the walls of reeds: 
 
 " They will not be ashes or poison. Fortino, to 
 your brethren, the fish will still taste like fish." 
 
 Fortino heard not. He lay there for hours. He 
 did not stir even when many weapons were simultane 
 ously discharged at a distance. After long days he 
 was, in the matter of deeds, like the old Fortino ; but 
 never so in manner or in heart. He was silent, 
 morose, till his death. He never left the lake. He 
 fished and ate and slept, and fished again, buried 
 here ; a man of great faith in a world that needs faith ; 
 a man of honesty that, like a rock that holds at bay the 
 sea, no force under the sun of heaven could have moved 
 one jot in a world where honesty is all too rare; 
 a man, not without genius and the spirit of creation 
 (though dulled somewhat by ancestry and his time) 
 in a world where men devoid of both rule millions ; 
 a man of no selfishness in a world that, ridden by 
 selfishness, calls most anguish-stricken for that very 
 quality which he had. 
 
A DREAM OF A THRONE 463 
 
 The march of soldiers through the plaza had been 
 prolonged beyond the plaza. It came to the narrow, 
 rocky street that leads up St. Michael. They had 
 taken the condemned one through the town s middle. 
 He was not crushed by coming death ; he thought 
 little of it, feared it not. He thought most constantly 
 of Clarita, thanking his God that he had been able to 
 prevail upon her to go. At least she, whom his soul 
 loved, was away from this. It was said of him about 
 the town that never was there seen in its poor streets 
 a face so beautiful as his. 
 
 They led him straight up the steep and rugged hill, 
 the crowd remaining at its bottom. The example 
 would be held high, in sight of all the world, that 
 revolutions might be no more. The climb was diffi 
 cult and wearying. But he never halted or seemed 
 fatigued. It was rather that he led them than that they 
 led him. He was among the first, even the first. He 
 went up steadily, strongly, his eyes raised. Cactus and 
 boulder and shrub he saw not. He seemed to run to 
 meet death, so that the soldiers scarcely could follow. 
 They emerged at last on the summit. He was already 
 there. He stood on the highest rock and swept that 
 incomparable scene with his eyes Chapala under 
 him, its red-tiled roofs lit by the setting sun ; the cape 
 and the lake s vast sweep beyond ; the island lying 
 small and black in the water s middle ; all the great 
 bosom of that inland sea casting up light to him ; 
 Tizapan invisible; blue mountains rising in the 
 eternal circle. 
 
 It was then that his last sorrow fell like a curtain on 
 him. He gazed at the sands of the beach and the 
 row of tiny huts along it. He had lived there in his 
 only happy time. Before all this wild dream he 
 had been full of life there ; he had had her, too, and 
 
464 A DREAM OF A THRONE 
 
 the love of her; and there where the sun fell yellowest 
 he had played with her in the long evenings or on 
 moonlit nights, in the sand. It swept over him 
 that there was the Eden from which some stern power 
 had driven them out. He passed his hand over his 
 eyes and was heard to say : 
 
 "That I might turn that I might retrace these 
 steps and go back my God ! my God ! then might 
 I find the cherubim and the flaming sword that 
 turneth every way, and know at last where is the tree 
 of life." 
 
 They let him stand where he was, and, the arrange 
 ments made and the word given, he was shot. It is 
 the beautiful custom of the country to erect crosses 
 at places of blood. On St. Michael s stony head one 
 may still see the cross which marks the spot where 
 he fell. 
 
A New Romance by the Author of 
 " The Shadow of the Czar " 
 
 THE VIKING S SKULL 
 
 By JOHN R. CARLING 
 
 Illustrated by Cyrus Cuneo. 350 pages. 12mo. $1.50. 
 
 MR. CARLING has written a modern story, full of 
 mystery, weird and exciting, with a plot which 
 defies solution until the final chapter. It is a romance, 
 pure and simple, in which the unexpected always 
 transpires. 
 
 There are three scenes of great interest and strength, 
 the tragedy in the prologue ; the opening of the tomb 
 containing the treasure ; and a dramatic performance 1 at 
 Favenhall, the home of the noble house of Ormsby, where 
 Lorelie, the heroine, denounces the spurious Earl. 
 
 These and many other scenes and incidents are rendered 
 with singular power, and the whole story is exceptionally 
 strong, dramatic, vivid, and interest-compelling. It is a 
 worthy successor to the author s remarkable and success 
 ful novel, "The Shadow of the Czar." 
 
 LITTLE, BROWN, & CO., PUBLISHERS, BOSTON 
 At all Booksellers 
 
A Stirring Tale of the Plains 
 
 THE RAINBOW 
 CHASERS 
 
 By JOHN H. WHITSON 
 Author of Barbara, A Woman of the West " 
 
 FULL of the atmosphere of the West, with Dick 
 Brewster, alias Jackson Blake, cowboy, land specu 
 lator, and lover, for its hero, Mr. Whitson s new novel, 
 without being in the least a copy, has many of the attrac 
 tions of Mr. Wister s hero, " The Virginian." 
 
 "The Rainbow Chasers" is a virile American novel 
 with its principal scenes laid in Western Kansas during 
 the land boom of 86. The male characters are vigorous 
 men, with red blood in their veins ; and the heroine, Elinor 
 Spencer, is a high-spirited but lovable Western girl. 
 
 The Brooklyn Eagle says : 
 
 " It is a picturesque narrative, striking in its portrayal 
 of conditions that have vanished. It is one of those works 
 of fiction which, like The Virginian, deserve to rank as 
 books of social and economic history, because of the pic 
 turing of conditions, vital while they existed, that have 
 passed away." 
 
 With 6 illustrations by Arthur E. Becher. 393 pages. 
 12rao. Decorated cloth, $1.50. 
 
 LITTLE, BROWN, & CO., PUBLISHERS, BOSTON 
 At all Booksellers 
 
TJie Story of a Mans Triumph over the Flesh 
 
 THE WOOD-CARVER 
 OF LYMPUS 
 
 By M. E. WALLER 
 
 Author of " A Daughter of the Rich," " The 
 Little Citizen, "etc. 
 
 With frontispiece. 12mo. 311 pages. $1.50. 
 
 THE hero of Miss Waller s new story is one of the 
 strongest and most original characters portrayed in 
 recent fiction. Hugh Armstrong, used to a busy out- 
 of-door life, in felling a tree meets with an accident and 
 loses the use of his limbs. At first he finds it impossible 
 to adjust himself to his shut-in life, but a friend suggests 
 wood-carving to him. 
 
 Through work and love a great change comes over him, 
 and the author has portrayed to us in a powerful manner 
 Armstrong s salvation. The scenes are laid in the Green 
 Mountains of Vermont. The reader will follow the various 
 love affairs with increasing interest. The atmosphere of 
 the book is bright and cheerful, and the whole story is out 
 of the usual run of fiction. 
 
 C. C. Emerson has drawn a capital frontispiece illustra 
 tion, representing " The Old Vermont Stage Coach." 
 
 LITTLE, BROWN, tf CO., PUBLISHERS, BOSTON 
 At all Booksellers 
 
A Story oj London Lift 
 
 ANNA 
 THE ADVENTURESS 
 
 By E. PHILLIPS OPPENHEIM 
 
 Author of " A Prince of Sinners," etc. 
 
 Illustrated. 320 pages. 12mo. $1.50. 
 
 IN his new story of London life Mr. Oppenheim takes 
 for heroines two sisters, Anna and Annabel, who look 
 almost exactly alike. Annabel "got herself talked 
 about" when the sisters were living in Paris, and then 
 calmly married Sir John Ferringhall, a prospective M. P., 
 although that astute Britisher thought he was marrying 
 Anna. The complications that follow would test the skill 
 and ingenuity of any novelist. 
 
 The subtle study of character, as shown in the two 
 sisters, is masterly. The subordinate characters, Sir John 
 Ferringhall, David Courtlaw, and others, are delineated 
 with almost as much ability. But it is for his power of 
 telling a story that Mr. Oppenheim first made a name, and 
 in none of his novels is this power more manifest. From 
 beginning to end it goes on increasing in interest as it 
 progresses, and sparkles with brilliant conversation and 
 unusual situations. It cannot fail to add greatly to Mr. 
 Oppenheim s reputation. 
 
 The book contains sixteen illustrations, including a 
 poster frontispiece of "Anna." 
 
 LITTLE, BROWN, fcf CO., PUBLISHERS, BOSTON 
 At all Booksellers 
 
I U