The Treasure Trail Part 41

"Your ransom wins for you all you wish of me,--except the life of one man," he said, and with a gesture indicated that Kit help her to her feet. He did so, and saw that she was very white and trembling.

Rotil looked at Perez over her head, and Perez scowled back, with all the venom of black hate.

"You win!--but a curse walks where she walks. Ask her? Ask Marto of the men she put under witchcraft! Ask Conrad who had good luck till she hated him! If you have a love, or a child, or anything dear, let her not look hate on them, for her knife follows that look! Ask her of the knife she set in the heart of a child for jealousy of Conrad! Ai, general though you are, your whole army is not strong enough to guard you from the ill luck you will take with the gift _she_ gives! She is a woman under a curse. Ha! Look at her as I say it, for you hear the truth. Ask the padre!"

Kit realized that Perez was launching against her the direst weight of evil the Mexican or Indian mind has to face. Though saints and heaven and h.e.l.l might be denied by certain daring souls, the potency of witchcraft was seldom doubted. Men or women accused of it were shunned as pariahs, and there had been known persons who weakened and dwindled into death after accusation had been put against them.

He thought of it as she cowered under each separate count of the curse launched against her. She bent like a slender reed under the strokes of a flail, lower and lower against his arm, but when the deadly voice flung the final taunt at her, she straightened slowly and looked at Rotil.

"Yes, ask the padre--or ask me!" she said in that velvet soft voice of utter despair. "That I sent an innocent soul to death is too true. To my great sorrow I did it;--I would do it again! For that my life is indeed a curse to me,--but his every other word a lie!"

Then she took a step forward, faltered, and fell back into the outstretched arm of Kit.

"Take Senora Perez to the women, and come back," said Rotil. Kit noted that even though he moved close, and bent over the white unconscious face, he did not touch her.

"Senora Perez!" repeated Perez contemptuously. "You are generous with other men's names for your women! Her name is the Indian mother's name."

"Half Indian," corrected Rotil, "and her naming I will decide another time."

Kit returned, and without words proceeded to help replace the holy picture in its niche. In the struggle with the padre, a chunk of adobe had been knocked from the wall near the door, and he picked it up, crumbling it to a soft powder and sprinkled it lightly over the steps where foot prints were traceable in the dust.

Rotil who had gone to the door to recall the guard, halted and watched him closely.

"Good!" he said. "You also give me a thought concerning this animal; he will bark if he has listeners, and even the German should not hear--one never knows! I need a cage for a few hours. You have been a friend, and know secret things. Will you lock him in your own room and hold the key to yourself?"

"Surest thing you know," answered Kit though with the uncomfortable certainty that the knowledge of too many secret things in Mexico was not conducive to long life for the knower. "I may also a.s.sure you that Marto is keen on giving you honest service that his one fault may be atoned for."

"He will get service," stated Rotil. "You saved me a good man there, amigo."

He flung open the door of the corridor and whistled for the guard.

"Remove this man and take your orders from Capitan----" He halted, and his eyes narrowed quizzically.

"It seems we never were introduced, amigo, and we know only your joy name of the singer, but there must be another."

"Oh, yes, there's another, all right," returned Kit, knowing that Conrad would enlighten Rotil if he did not. "I'm the hombre suspected of that Granados murder committed by Conrad,--and the name is Rhodes."

"So? Then the scolding of these two comrades gives to you your freedom from suspicion, eh? That is good, but--" He looked at Kit, frowning.

"See here, I comprehend badly. You told me it was the friend of your _compadre_ who was the suspected one!"

"Sure! I've a dandy partner across the border. He's the old man you saw at Yaqui Spring, and I reckon I'm a fairly good friend of his.

He'd say so!"

Rotil's face relaxed in a grin.

"That is clever, a trick and no harm in it, but--have a care to yourself! It is easy to be too clever, and on a trail of war no one has time to learn if tricks are of harm or not. Take the warning of a friend, Capitan Rhodes!"

"You have the right of it, General. I have much to learn," agreed Kit.

"But no man goes abroad to shout the crimes he is accused of at home,--and the story of this one is very new to me. This morning I learned I was thought guilty, and tonight I learn who is the criminal, and how the job was done. This is quick work, and I owe the luck of it to you."

"May the good luck hold!" said Rotil. "And see that the men leave you alone as the guard of Perez. I want no listeners there."

CHAPTER XVII

THE STORY OF DOnA JOCASTA

Ramon Rotil stood a long minute after the clank of chains ceased along the corridor; then he bolted the outer door of the chapel, and after casting a grim satisfied smile at the screen of the faded canvas, he opened the door of the _sala_ and went in.

Valencia was kneeling beside Dona Jocasta and forcing brandy between the white lips, while Elena bustled around the padre whose head she had been bathing. A basin of water, ruby red, was evidence of the fact that Padre Andreas was not in immediate need of the services of a leech. He sat with his bandaged head held in his hands, and shrank perceptibly when the general entered the room.

Dona Jocasta swallowed some of the brandy, half strangled over it, and sat up, gasping and white. It was Tula who offered her a cup of water, while Valencia, with fervent expressions of grat.i.tude to the saints, got to her feet, eyeing Rotil with a look of fear. After the wounded priest and the fainting Jocasta emerged from the chapel door, the two women were filled with terror of the controlling spirit there.

He halted on the threshold, his eyes roving from face to face, including Tula, who stood, back against the wall, regarding him as usual with much admiration. One thing more he must know.

"Go you without," he said with a gesture towards the two women and the priest. "I will speak with this lady alone."

They all moved to the door, and after a moment of hesitation Tula was about to follow when he stopped her.

"You stay, girl. The Dona Jocasta may want a maid, but take yourself over there."

So Tula slipped silently back into the niche of the window seat where the shadows were deepest, and Rotil moved towards the center table dragging a chair. On the other side of the table was the couch on which Jocasta sat, white and startled at the dismissal of the woman and priest.

"Be composed," he said gentling his tone as one would to soothe a child. "There are some things to be said between us here, and too many ears are of no advantage."

She did not reply; only inclined her head slightly and drew herself upright against the wall, gathering the lace _rebosa_ across her bosom where Valencia had unfastened her garments and forgotten them in her fear.

"First is the matter of my debt to you. Do you know in your own mind how great that is?"

"I--count it as nothing, senor," she murmured.

"That is because you do not know the great need, and have not made count of the cases of rifles and ammunition."

"It is true, I never looked at them. Juan Gonsalvo in dying blamed Jose Perez for the shot. It was fired by another hand,--but G.o.d alone knows! So Juan sent for me, and Jose never knew. The secret of Soledad was given to me then, but I never thought to use it, until----"

She ceased, shuddering, and he knew she was thinking of the blood-stained priest whirled into her presence. Fallen though the state of the priesthood might be in Mexico, there were yet women of Jocasta's training to whom an a.s.sault on the clergy was little less than a mortal sin. He knew that, and smiled grimly at the remembrance of her own priestly father who had refused her in honest marriage to a man of her mother's cla.s.s, and was busily engaged haggling over the gift price of her with Jose Perez when death caught him. The bewildered girl was swept to the estate of Perez without either marriage or gift, unless one choose to consider as gift the shelter and food given to a younger sister and brother.

All this went through his mind as she shrank and sighed because he had tossed a priest from his way with as slight regard as he would the poorest peon. She did not even know how surely the destiny of her mother and her own destiny had been formed by a priest's craft. She would never know, because her mind would refuse to accept it. There were thousands like her because of their shadowed inheritance.

Revolution for the men grew out of that bondage of women, and Rotil had isolated moments when he dreamed of a vast and blessed freedom of the land--schools, and schools, and more schools until knowledge would belong to the people instead of to the priests!

But he knew it was no use to tell thoughts like that to women; they were afraid to let go their little wooden saints and the jargon of prayers they did not understand. The mystery of it held them!

Thus brooded Rotil, unlearned driver of burros and general of an army of the people!

"We will forget all but the ammunition," he said. "It is as food to my men, and some of them are starving there to the east; with ammunition food can be commandeered. I knew the guns were on Soledad land, but even a golden dream of angels would not have let me hope for as much as you have given me. It is packed,--that room, from floor to roof tiles. In the morning I take the trail, and there is much to be done before I go. You;--I must think of first. Will you let me be your confessor, and tell me any wish of your heart I may help you to?"