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Title:      Heart of the World (1895)
Author:     H. Rider Haggard
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Edition:    1
Language:   English
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Title:      Heart of the World (1895)
Author:     H. Rider Haggard





                              DEDICATION

               I inscribe this story of the Golden City

                         "Heart of the World"

                     to my namesake and godchild

                         Henry Rider Haggard

                          of Butler, U.S.A.

  Ditchingham,
    Christmas Day, 1894.



                           PREPARER'S NOTE







                          HEART OF THE WORLD



                               PROLOGUE

                             DON IGNATIO

The circumstances under which the following pages come to be printed
are somewhat curious and worthy of record. Within the last few years a
certain English gentleman, whom we will call Jones, because it was not
his name, chanced to be employed as the manager of a mine not far from
the Usumacinto River, the upper reaches of which divide the Mexican
State of Chiapas from the Republic of Guatemala.

Now life at a mine in Chiapas, though doubtless it has some
compensations, does not altogether fulfil a European's ideal of
happiness. To begin with, the work is hard, desperately hard, and
though the climate is healthy enough among the mountains, there are
valleys where men may die of fever. Of sport, strictly speaking, there
is none, for the forests are too dense to hunt in with any comfort,
and, if they were not, the swarms of venomous insects of various
degree, that haunt them, would make this particular relaxation
impossible.

Society also, as we understand it, is conspicuous by its absence, and
should a man chance even to be married, he could not well bring his
wife into regions that are still very unsettled, across forest paths,
through rivers, and along the brinks of precipices, dangerous and
impassable enough to strike terror to the heart of the stoutest
traveller.

When Mr. Jones had dwelt for a year at the mines of La Concepcion, the
fact of his loneliness, and a desire for acquaintances more congenial
than the American clerk of the stores and his Indian labourers, came
home to him with some force. During the first months of his residence
he had attempted to make friends with the owners of some neighbouring
/fincas/ or farms. This attempt, however, he soon gave up in disgust,
for these men proved to be half-breeds of the lowest class, living in
an atmosphere of monotonous vice.

In this emergency, being a person of intelligence, Jones fell back
upon intellectual resources, and devoted himself, so far as his time
would allow, to the collection of antiquities, and to the study of
such of the numerous ruins of pre-Aztec cities and temples as lay
within his reach. The longer he pursued these researches, the more did
they fascinate his imagination. Therefore, when he chanced to hear
that, on the farther side of the mountain, at a /hacienda/ called
Santa Cruz, there dwelt an Indian, Don Ignatio by name, the owner of
the /hacienda/, who was reported to have more knowledge of the
/antiguos/, their history and relics, than anybody else in this part
of Mexico, he determined to visit him upon the first opportunity.

This, indeed, he would have done before, for Don Ignatio boasted an
excellent reputation, had it not been for the length of the journey to
his home. Now, however, the difficulty was lessened by an Indian who
offered to point out a practicable path over the mountain, which
brought the /hacienda/ of Santa Cruz to within a three-hours' ride on
mule-back from La Concepcion, in place of the ten hours that were
necessary to reach it by the more frequented road. Accordingly, one
day in the dry season, when work was slack at the mine, owing to the
water having fallen too low to turn the crushing-mill, Jones started.
This was on a Saturday, for on the Monday previous he had despatched a
runner to Don Ignatio announcing his intended visit, and received in
reply a most courteous and well-written letter, begging him to pass
the next Sunday at the /hacienda/, "where any English gentleman would
always be most welcome."

As he approached the /hacienda/, he was astonished to see the /faįade/
of an enormous white stone building of a semi-Moorish style of
architecture, having towers and ornamented doorways at either end, and
a large dome rising from the centre of its flat roof. Riding through
the /milpas/, or corn-fields, and groves of cocoa and coffee bushes,
all in a perfect state of cultivation, which covered many acres on
every side of the building, Jones came to the gateway of a large
/patio/, or courtyard, where grew several gigantic /ceiba/ trees,
throwing their grateful shade over the mouth of a well. From under
these trees an Indian appeared, who evidently had been watching for
his arrival, and, taking the horse, informed him, with many
salutations, that the Seņor Ignatio was at even-song with his people
in the chapel yonder, according to his habit, but that the prayers
would soon be finished.

Leaving his horse in charge of the Indian, Jones went to the chapel,
and, its great doors being open, he entered and sat down. So soon as
his eyes became accustomed to the dim light, he perceived that the
place was unusually beautiful, both in its proportions and its
decorations.

The worshippers also were many--perhaps they numbered three hundred,
clearly all of them Indians employed upon the estate; and so intent
were they upon their devotions that his entry was not even noticed. To
his mind, however, the most curious object in the building was a slab
of white marble, let into the wall above the altar, whereon the
following inscription was engraved in Spanish, in letters so large
that he had no difficulty in reading it:


 "Dedicated by Ignatio, the Indian, to the memory of his most
  beloved friend, James Strickland, an English gentleman, and Maya,
  Princess of the Heart, his wife, whom first he met upon this spot.
  Pray for their souls, of your charity, O passer-by."


While Jones was wondering who this James Strickland, and Maya,
Princess of the Heart, might be, and whether it was his host who had
set up the tablet to their memory, the priest pronounced his
benediction, and the congregation began to leave the church.

The first to pass its doors was an Indian gentleman, whom Jones
rightly took to be Don Ignatio himself. He was a man of about sixty
years, but one who looked much older than his age, for sorrow,
hardship, and suffering had left their marks upon him. In person he
was tall and spare, nor did a slight lameness detract from the dignity
of his bearing. His dress was very simple and quite innocent of the
finery and silver buttons which have so much attraction for the
Mexican mind, consisting as it did of a sombrero of Panama straw, with
a black ribbon in place of the usual gilt cord, a clean white jacket
and shirt, a black tie fastened in a bow, a pair of drab-coloured
trousers, and brown boots of European make.

Indeed, the only really remarkable thing about Don Ignatio was his
face. Never, thought Jones, had he beheld so beautiful a countenance,
or, to be more accurate, one that gave him such assurance of its
owner's absolute goodness and purity of nature. The features were
those of a high-bred Indian, thin and delicately cut; the nose
aquiline, the cheek-bones and brow prominent, while beneath the latter
shone a pair of large and soft black eyes, so tender and trustful in
their expression that they seemed almost out of place in the face of a
man.

He stood by the door of the chapel, in the light of the setting sun,
leaning somewhat heavily on a stick, while the Indians filed past him.
Every one of these, man, woman, and child, saluted him with the utmost
reverence as they went, some of them, especially the children, kissing
his long and finely-shaped hand when they bade him good-night in terms
of affection, such as "father," and called on the Saints to guard him.
Jones, watching them, reflected upon the difference of their attitude
from that of the crouching servility which centuries of oppression
have induced in their race towards any master of white blood, and
wondered to what his host's influence over them was due. It was at
this moment that Don Ignatio turned and saw him.

"A thousand pardons, seņor," he said in Spanish, with a shy and
singularly engaging smile as he lifted his sombrero, showing his long
hair, which, like his pointed beard, was almost white. "You must
indeed have thought me rude, but it is my custom at the end of the
week's work to attend worship with the peons--do not press round the
noble /Inglese/, my children--also I did not think that you would
arrive before the sun was down."

"Pray don't apologise, seņor," answered Jones; "I have been much
interested in watching all your servants at their devotions. What a
beautiful chapel this is! May I look at it before you shut the doors?"

"Certainly, seņor. Like the rest of the house, it is fine. The old
monks who designed it two hundred years ago--for this was a great
monastery--knew how to build, and labour was forced in those days and
cost nothing. Of course I have repaired it a great deal, for those who
lived here before me did not trouble about such things.

"You would scarcely think, seņor, that in the old days, twenty years
ago, this place was a nest of highway robbers, smugglers, and
man-slayers, and that these people whom you see to-night, or their
fathers, were slaves with no more rights than a dog.

"But so it was. Many a traveller has lost his life in this house or
its neighbourhood. I, myself, was nearly murdered here once. Look at
the carving of that altar-piece. It is fine, is it not? Those /sapote/
wood columns date from the time of the old monks. Well, I have known
Don Pedro Moreno, my predecessor, tie human beings to them in order to
brand them with red-hot irons."

"To whom does that inscription refer?" asked Jones, pointing to the
marble slab which has been described.

Don Ignatio's face grew very sad as he answered:

"It refers, seņor, to the greatest friend I ever had, the man who
saved my life at the risk of his own when I came by this limp, and one
who was dear to me with a love passing the love of woman. But there
was a woman who loved him also, an Indian woman too, and he cared for
her more than he did for me, as was right, for has not God decreed
that a man should leave his friends, yes, his father and mother even,
and cleave unto his wife?"

"He married her then?" said Jones, who was growing interested.

"Oh, yes; he married her, and in a strange place and fashion. But it
is an old story, seņor, and with your permission I will not tell it;
even to think of it revives too many painful memories, memories of
death and loss, and disappointed ambition, and high hopes unfulfilled.
Perhaps, one day, if I have the courage and live long enough, I will
write it all down. Indeed, some years ago I made a beginning, and what
I wrote seemed foolishness, so I gave up the task.

"I have lived a rough life, seņor, and met with many adventures in it,
though, thanks be to God, my last years have been spent in peace.
Well, well, it is coming to an end now, and were it not for the
thought that my people here may fall into evil hands when I am gone,
that would not trouble me.

"But come, seņor, you are hungry, and the good father, who has
promised to eat with us, must ride to-night to celebrate a mass
to-morrow at a village three leagues away, so I have ordered supper
early. The porter with your bag arrived safely; it has been placed in
your chamber, the Abbot's room it is called, and if you will follow me
I will show you a short path to it from the chapel."

Then he led the way to a little door in the wall. Unlocking this door,
they passed up some narrow stairs, at the head of which was a
landing-place with a window, or rather /grille/, so arranged that,
while it was invisible from below, an observer standing there could
hear and see all that passed in the chapel.

"This was the place," said Don Ignatio, "whence the old abbots kept
secret watch upon the monks, and it was here that once I saw a sight
which I am not likely to forget."

Then he passed on through several long and intricate passages, till he
came to a sitting-room filled with handsome old Spanish furniture.

"Your sleeping-place lies beyond, seņor," he said, opening another
door that led into a large and dreary-looking chamber, lighted by
heavily-barred windows, of which the sills were not less than ten feet
from the ground.

On the walls were frescoes of the Last Judgment, and of scenes
inspired by the bloody drama of the Inquisition, grim to look on and
somewhat injured by damp, but executed with great power and vivid, if
distorted, imagination. Below the centre window, and reaching to
within three feet of the floor, was an ancient full-length portrait of
one of the abbots of the monastery, life-size and painted in oils upon
a panel, representing a man of fierce and evil countenance, over whose
tonsured head the Holy Spirit was shown hovering in the shape of a
dove. For the rest, the room was well, if lightly, furnished, and
boasted the luxury of squares of matting laid upon the brick floor.

"I fear that you will think this but a dismal apartment, seņor," said
Don Ignatio, "still it is our guest-chamber; moreover, there is a room
attached which I thought might be useful to you to write in, should
you wish to do so. The people here say that the place is haunted, but
I know you Englishmen do not bother about such things. It is not
wonderful, however, that they talk thus, seeing that murders were done
in this chamber in the time of Don Pedro Moreno. Indeed, he laid a
plot to kill me and my friend here, and, though he did not succeed in
that instance, when I came into possession afterwards, I found several
skeletons beneath the floor--two of them, I remember, just where the
bed stands now--and gave them decent burial."

Jones, as in honour bound, declared himself to be totally indifferent
to representations of tortures of the Inquisition, memories of
departed abbots, skeletons of murdered men beneath the floor, ghosts,
and /hoc genus omne/. Still, though he never confessed it to his host,
his first night in the abbot's chamber, owing probably to the strong
coffee which he had drunk, was not altogether a pleasant experience.
In after days, however, he became well accustomed to the place, and,
indeed, preferred it to any other room in the /hacienda/.

In contrast to the rude and ill-dressed fare with which Jones was fain
to satisfy himself at the mine, Don Ignatio's supper was a feast
worthy of Epicurus, especially as it was free from the horrible
messes, compounded of oil and the inward parts of animals, that figure
so largely in Mexican cookery.

After their meal, cigars and black coffee were handed round, of which
the raw materials had been grown on the estate, and never in his life
did Jones smoke better tobacco. When the /padre/--a gentle and
well-informed man--had departed, Jones began to speak of the
antiquities of the country. Soon he found that his host's knowledge of
the subject had not been exaggerated, seeing that he was even able to
decipher hieroglyphic writings of which the key was supposed to be
lost, and to give an outline of the history of the races who built the
great temples and palaces, whereof so many ruins are to be found in
the Palenque district.

"It is sad to think," said Jones presently, "that nothing in which the
breath of life remains is left of all this civilisation. If only the
old legend of the Golden City, hidden away somewhere in the unexplored
recesses of Central America, were true, I think that I would give ten
years of my existence to visit it. It would be a glorious thing to
step back into the past, to see a system at work, and mingle with a
people of which the world has lost all count and knowledge; for, let
the imagination be active as it will, it is practically impossible to
reconstruct these things from ruins and traditions. In fact, Don
Ignatio, I do not understand how it is that you, who have never seen
the /antiguos/ in the flesh, can talk about them so certainly."

"If I had never seen them, seņor," he answered, quietly, "it would be
wonderful. Indeed, you might be justified in setting me down as a
teller of tales, but it chances that I /have/ seen the Golden City of
fable and its civilisation, and I can assure you that its wonders were
far greater than any that have been told of in legend, or even by the
Spanish romancers."

"What!" gasped Jones, "what! Have I been drinking too much of your
excellent wine? Am I asleep, or did I hear you say that you, the
gentleman sitting before me, with your own eyes had seen the secret
city of the Indians?"

"You heard me say so, seņor, though I did not in the least expect you
to believe me. Indeed, it is because I cannot bear to be thought a
liar, that I have never said anything of this story, and for this same
reason I shall not repeat it to you, since I do not wish that one whom
I hope will become my friend should hold me in contempt.

"In truth I am sorry that I have spoken so freely, but, in support of
my veracity, I will beg you to remember that among the huge forests,
wildernesses, and /sierras/ of Central America, where no white man has
set his foot, and whence the Indians vanished generations since, there
is room for many ancient cities. Why, seņor, within two hundred miles
or less of where we sit to-night, there exist tribes of /Lacandones/,
or unbaptised Indians, who have never seen a white man and who still
follow their fathers' faiths. No, seņor, that story shall never be
told, at any rate in my lifetime, for I have nothing to show in proof
of it, or at least only one thing----"

"What is it?" asked Jones, eagerly.

"You shall see if you wish, seņor," his host answered, and left the
room.

Presently he returned with a little leather bag from which he
extracted a very curious and beautiful ornament. It was a great
emerald, by far the largest that Jones had ever seen, uncut, but
highly polished. This stone, which was set in pure gold, obviously had
formed the clasp of a belt and could also be used as a seal; for on
it, cut in /intaglio/, was the mask of a solemn and death-like human
face surrounded by a hieroglyphic inscription, while on the reverse
were other hieroglyphics.

"Can you read this writing?" asked Jones, when he had examined the
ornament.

"Yes, seņor. The words in front are: 'O Eyes and Mouth, look on me,
plead for me.' And those on the back: 'Heart of Heaven, be thou my
home.'"

"It is wonderful," said Jones, restoring the relic with a sigh, for he
would have given everything that he had, down to his shoes, to possess
it. "And now will you not make an exception in my favour, and tell me
the story?"

"I fear that I cannot oblige you, seņor," Don Ignatio answered,
shaking his head.

"But," pleaded Jones, "having revealed so much, it is cruel to hide
the rest."

"Seņor," said his host, "will you take some more coffee? No. Then
shall we walk a little on the roof and look at the view; it is pretty
by moonlight, and the roofs here are wonderful, all built of solid
stone; there is a tradition that the old monks used to dine on them in
summer. They have a loop-holed wall round them whence that abbot,
whose portrait hangs in your sleeping-chamber, beat back a great
attack of the Indians whom his oppression stirred into rebellion.

"To-morrow I shall hope to show you round the lands, which have repaid
me well for my twenty years of cultivation. Everybody in Mexico runs
after mines, but its soil is the richest mine of all. I knew that,
and, seeing the capacities of the place, I sold the other emeralds
which went with this clasp--they were fine stones, but unengraved, and
therefore of no particular interest--and bought it cheap enough. Now
that the country is more settled, and I have planted so much, its
value has become great, and will be greater still when all the young
cocoa bushes are in full bearing a few years hence.

"There, thanks be to the Saints, the stair is done--of late my back
hurts me when I climb up steps. The air is sweet, is it not, seņor,
and the prospect pleasing? Look, the river shines like silver. Ah! how
beautiful is God's world! It makes me sad to think of leaving it, but
doubtless He will provide still finer places for us to work and serve
Him in, gardens where sin and grief cannot enter. Surely there is room
enough yonder," and he nodded toward the sky.



This was but the first of many nights that Jones spent under Don
Ignatio's hospitable roof, where, as the months went by, he grew more
and more welcome. Soon he conceived a great affection for the grave,
sweet-natured, kindly old Indian gentleman, whose mind seemed to be
incapable of any evil thought, and whose chief ambitions were to
improve his land and do good to all about him, more especially to his
Indian servants or peons.

In the beginning of their intimacy they made several expeditions
together to inspect ruins in the neighbourhood, and once Don Ignatio
came to stay with him at the mine of La Concepcion, where his visit
proved of the greatest use to Mr. Jones and the company he served. One
of the difficulties in working this particular mine lay in the
scarcity of labour. At a word from Don Ignatio this trouble vanished.
He sent for a /cacique/, who lived in the mountains, and spoke to him,
and lo! within a week, fifty stalwart Indians appeared to offer their
services at the mine, thus affording one of many instances that came
to Jones's knowledge, of his friend's extraordinary influence among
the natives.

As time went on, however, these excursions ceased, since Don Ignatio's
health grew too feeble to allow him to leave the /hacienda/.

At length, it was when they had been acquainted for nearly two years,
a messenger arrived at the mine one morning, saying that he was
instructed by his master, Don Ignatio, to tell the Seņor Jones that he
lay dying and would be glad to see him. He was to add, however, that
if it should be in any way inconvenient, the Seņor Jones must not
trouble himself to come for so small a matter, as his master had
written a letter which would be delivered to him after his death.

Needless to say the Seņor Jones travelled across the mountains as fast
as the best mule he owned would carry him. On arriving at the
/hacienda/ he found Don Ignatio lying in his room, almost paralysed
and very weak, but perfectly clear-headed and rejoiced to see him.

"I am about to make my last journey, friend," he said, "and I am glad,
for of late I have suffered a great deal of pain in my back, the
result of an ancient injury. Also it is time that a helpless old man
should make room for a more active one." And he looked at his visitor
strangely, and smiled.

Jones, whose feelings were touched, made the usual reply as to his
having many months to live, but Don Ignatio cut him short.

"Don't waste time like that, friend," he said, "but listen. Ever since
we knew each other you have been trying to extract from me the story
of how I came to visit the city, Heart of the World, and of my friend,
James Strickland, whom, thanks be to God, I so soon shall see again.

"Well, I never would tell it to you, though once or twice I nearly
did, so when I saw how my silence chagrined you, partly because I
pride myself upon being able to keep a secret when pressed to reveal
it, and also because I am selfish and knew that so soon as you had
heard my story, you would cease to interest yourself in a stupid,
failing old man, for who is there that cares about the rind when he
has sucked the orange?

"Also there were other reasons: for instance, I could not have related
that history without displaying unseemly emotion, and I know that you
Englishmen despise such exhibitions. Lastly, if I told it at all, I
desired to tell it fully and carefully, keeping everything in
proportion, and this it would have been difficult to do by word of
mouth. Yet I have not wished to disappoint you altogether, and I have
wished that some record of the curious things which I have seen in my
life should be preserved, though this last desire alone would not have
been sufficiently strong to move me to the task which I finished ten
days ago, before the paralysis crept into my arm.

"May I trouble you to open that cupboard near the foot of the bed, and
to give me the pile of writing that you will find in it. A thousand
thanks. Here, seņor, in these pages, if you care to take the trouble
to read them, is set out an account of how I and my English friend
came to visit the Golden City, of what we saw and suffered there, and
of some other matters which you may think superfluous, but that are
not without their bearing upon the tale. I fear that my skill in
writing is small, still perhaps it may serve its turn, and if not, it
matters nothing, seeing that you seek the spirit, not the letter, and
are not sufficient of a Spanish scholar to be too critical.

"Now take the book and put it away, for the very sight of it wearies
me, recalling the hours of labour that I have spent on it. Also I wish
to talk of something more important. Tell me, friend, do you propose
to stop in this country, or to return to England?"

"Return to England! Why, I should starve where there are no mines to
manage. No, I am too poor."

"Then would you return if you were rich?" asked the dying man
anxiously.

"I do not know; it depends. But I think that I have been too long away
to go to live in England for good."

"I am glad to hear that, friend, for I may as well tell you at once
that I have made you my heir, so that henceforth you will be a wealthy
man as we understand wealth in this country."

"You have made me your heir!" stammered Jones.

"Yes. Why should I not? I like you well, and know you to be a good and
honest man. I have no relations and no friends, and, above all, I am
sure that you will deal justly and gently by my people here, for I
have watched your bearing towards those who work under you at the
mine. Moreover, I have conditions to make which will not be the less
binding on you because they are not set out in the will, namely, that
you should live here yourself and carry on the work that I have begun,
for so long as may be possible, and that, if you are forced to sell
the place by any unforeseen circumstance, or to leave it away by
testament, you should do so to an Englishman only, and one of whom you
know something. Do you accept?"

"Indeed, yes, and I know not how to thank you."

"Do not thank me at all, thank your own character and honest face
which have led me to believe that I can make no better disposal of my
property. And now go, for I am tired, but come to see me again
to-morrow morning after the priest has left."

So Jones, who had entered that room possessed of a hard-earned eight
hundred a year, departed from it the owner of a property which, before
long, became worth as many thousands annually, as any who have visited
him at Santa Cruz can testify. Three days later Don Ignatio passed
away peacefully, and was laid to his rest in the chapel of the
/hacienda/.



This, then, was how the story of the city, Heart of the World, and of
Don Ignatio and his friend, James Strickland, who saw it, came into
the hands of him whom we have called Jones.

Here follows a translation of the manuscript.



                              CHAPTER I

                         HOW THE PLOT FAILED

I, Ignatio, the writer of this history, being now a man in my
sixty-second year, was born in a village among the mountains that lie
between the little towns of Pichaucalco and Tiapa. Of all that
district my father was the hereditary /cacique/, and the Indians there
loved him much.

When I was a lad, perhaps nine years old, troubles arose in the
country. I never quite understood them, or I may have forgotten the
circumstances, for such things were always happening, but I think that
they were caused by some tax which the government at Mexico had
imposed upon us unjustly. Anyhow, my father, a tall man with fiery
eyes, refused to pay a tax, and, after a while, a body of soldiers
arrived, mounted upon horses, who shot down a great number of the
people, and took away some of the women and children.

Of my father they made a prisoner, and next day they led him out while
my mother and I were forced to look on, and sat him by the edge of a
hole that they had dug, holding guns to his head and threatening to
shoot him unless he would tell them a secret which they were anxious
to learn. All he said, however, was that he wished that they would
kill him at once, and so free him from the torment of the mosquitoes
which hummed around him.

But they did not kill him then, and that night they put him back in a
prison, where I was brought to visit him by the /padre/, Ignatio, his
cousin and my godfather. I remember that he was shut up in a dirty
place, so hot that it was difficult even to breathe, and that there
were some drunken Mexican soldiers outside the door, who now and again
threatened to make an end of us Indian dogs.

My godfather, the priest Ignatio, confessed my father in a corner of
the cell, and took something from his hand. Then my father called me
to him and kissed me, and with his own fingers for a few moments he
hung about my neck that thing which the priest had taken from him,
only to remove it again and give it to Ignatio for safe-keeping,
saying: "See that the boy has it, and its story with it, when he comes
of age."

Now my father kissed me again, blessing me in the name of God, and as
he did so great tears ran down his face. Then the priest Ignatio took
me away, and I never saw my father any more, for the soldiers shot him
next morning, and threw his body into the hole that they had dug to
receive it.

After this, my godfather, cousin, and namesake, Ignatio, took me and
my mother to the little town of Tiapa, of which he was priest, but she
soon died there of a broken heart.

In Tiapa we lived in the best house in the place, for it was built of
stone and set upon a bank overhanging a beautiful rushing river with
water that was always clear as glass, however much it rained, which
river ran a hundred feet or more below the windows.

About Tiapa there is little to say, except that in those days the
people were for the most part thieves, and such great sinners that my
cousin, the /padre/ would not shrive some of them, even on their
death-beds. There was a church, however, whereof the roof was
overgrown with the most beautiful orchids. Also the roads were so bad
that, except in the dry season, it was difficult to travel either to
or from the town.

Here in this forgotten place I grew up, but not without education, as
might have been expected, seeing that my cousin was a good scholar,
and did all he could to keep me out of mischief.

When I was about fifteen years of age, of a sudden a desire took hold
of me to become a priest. It was in this wise: One Sunday evening I
sat in the church at Tiapa, looking now at the sprays of orchid
flowers that swung to and fro in the breeze outside the window, and
now at the votive pictures on the walls, offerings made by men and
women who had called upon their patron saints in the hour of danger
and had been rescued by them--here from fire, there from murderers,
and here again from drowning; rude and superstitious daubs, but
doubtless acceptable to God, who could see in them the piety and
gratitude of those that out of their penury had caused them to be
painted.

As I sat thus idly, my godfather, the good priest, began to preach.
Now, it chanced that two nights before there had been a dreadful
murder in Tiapa. Three travellers and a boy, the son of one of them,
passing from San Christobel to the coast, stopped to spend the night
at a house near our own. With them they brought a mule-load of
dollars, the price of the merchandise that they had sold at San
Christobel, which some of our fellow-townsmen, half-breeds of wicked
life, determined to steal.

Accordingly, to the number of ten, these assassins broke into the
house where the travellers lodged, and, meeting with resistance, they
cut down the three of them with /machetes/, and possessed themselves
of the silver. Just as they were leaving, one of the thieves perceived
the boy hiding beneath a bed, and, dragging him out, they killed him
also, lest he should bear witness against them.

Now, those who had done this deed of shame were well known in the
town; still none were arrested, for they bribed the officers with part
of their booty. But my godfather, seeing some of them present in the
church, took for his text the commandment--"Thou shalt do no murder."

Never have I heard a finer sermon; indeed, before it was finished, two
of the men rose and crept from the church conscience-stricken, and
when the preacher described the slaughter of the lad whom their wicked
hands had of a sudden hurled into eternity, many of the congregation
burst into tears.

I tell this story because it was then for the first time, as I thought
of the murdered boy, who some few days before had been as full of life
as I was myself, that I came to know what death meant, and to
understand that I also must die and depart for ever either into heaven
or hell. I shook as the thought struck me, and it seemed to me that I
saw Death standing at my elbow, as he stands to-day, and then and
there I determined that I would be a priest and do good all my life,
in order that I might find peace at the last and escape the fate of
the evil.

On the morrow I went into my godfather's room and told him of my
desire. He listened to me attentively, and answered; "I would that it
might be so, my son, holding as I do that the things of the world to
come outweigh those of this present earth ten thousandfold, but it
cannot be, for reasons that you shall learn when you are older. Then,
when my trust is ended, you may make your choice, and, if you still
wish it, become a priest."

                  *       *       *       *       *

Five more years passed away, during which time I grew strong and
active, and skilled in all manly exercises. Also I studied much under
the teaching of my godfather, who sent even to Spain to buy me books.

Among these books were many histories of my own race, the Indians, and
of their conquest by the Spaniards, all that had been published
indeed. Of such histories I never tired, although it maddened me to
read of the misfortunes and cruel oppression of my people, who to-day
were but a nation of slaves.

At length, on my twentieth birthday, my godfather, who now was grown
very old and feeble, called me into his chamber, and, having locked
the door, he spoke to me thus:

"My son, the time has come when I must deliver to you the last
messages of your beloved father, my cousin and best friend, who was
murdered by the soldiers when you were a little child, and tell you of
your descent and other matters.

"First, then, you must know that you are of royal and ancient blood,
for your forefather in the eleventh degree was none other than
Guatemoc, the last of the Aztec emperors, whom the Spaniards murdered,
which descent I can prove to you by means of old writings and
pedigrees; also it is known and attested among the Indians, who even
now do not forget the stock whence sprang their kings."

"Then by right I am Emperor of Mexico," I said proudly, for in my
folly it seemed a fine thing to be sprung from men who once had worn a
crown.

"Alas! my son," the old priest answered sadly, "in this world might is
the only right, and the Spaniards ended that of your forefathers long
ago by aid of torture and the noose. Save that it will earn you
reverence among the Indians, it is but a barren honour which you
inherit with your blood.

"Yet there is one thing that has come down to you from your ancestor,
Guatemoc, and the monarchs who ruled before him. Perchance you
remember that on the night previous to his death, your father set an
amulet upon your neck, and, removing it again, gave it to me to keep.
Here is that amulet."

Then he handed me a trinket made of the half of a heart-shaped
emerald, smooth with wear, but unpolished, that, if joined to its
missing section, would have been as large as a dove's egg. This stone
was not broken, but cut from the top to the bottom, the line of
separation being so cunningly sawn that no man, unless he had one half
before him, could imitate the other. The charm was bored through so as
to be worn upon a chain, and engraved upon its surface were some
strange hieroglyphics and the outline of half a human face.

"What is it?" I asked.

The old priest shrugged his shoulders, and answered:

"A relic which had to do with their wicked heathen magic and rites, I
suppose. I know little about it, except that your father told me it
was the most valued possession of the Aztec kings, and that the
natives believe that when the two halves of this stone come together,
the men of white blood will be driven from Central America and an
Indian emperor shall rule from sea to sea."

"And where is the other half, father?"

"How should I know," he answered testily, "who have no faith in such
stories, or in stones with the heads of idols graven upon them? I am a
priest, and therefore your father told me little of the matter, since
it is not lawful that I should belong to secret societies. Still, some
such society exists, and, in virtue of the ownership of that talisman,
you will be head of it, as your ancestors were before you, though, so
far as I can learn, the honour brought them but little luck.

"I know no more about it, but I will give you letters to a certain
Indian who lives in the district of which your father was /cacique/,
and, when you show him the stone, doubtless he will initiate you into
its mysteries, though I counsel you to have nothing to do with them.

"Listen, Ignatio, my son, you are a rich man; how rich I cannot tell
you, but for many generations your forefathers have hidden up treasure
for an object which I must explain, and the gold will be handed over
to you by those of your clan in whose keeping it is. It was because of
this treasure that your father and your great-grandfather were done to
death with many others, since the rumour of it came to the ears of
those that ruled in Mexico, who, when they failed to force the secret
from them, tormented and killed them in their rage.

"Now, this was the message of your father to you concerning the wealth
which he and his ancestors had hidden:

"'Tell my son, Ignatio, should he live to grow up, that there has
never departed from our family the desire to win back the crown that
Guatemoc lost, or at least to drive out the accursed Spaniards and
their spawn, and to establish an Indian Republic. To this end we have
heaped up wealth for generations, that it might serve us when the hour
was ripe; and because of this wealth, of which the whisper could not
altogether be hid in a land which is full of spies, some of us have
come to cruel deaths, as I am about to do to-night.

"'But I shall die keeping my secret, and when my son grows up others
may rule at Mexico, or the matter may have been forgotten: at least
the gold will be where I left it. Now, say to my son that it is my
hope that he will use it in the cause to further which it has been
amassed; that he will devote his life to the humbling of our white
masters, and to the uplifting of the race which for centuries they
have robbed, murdered, and enslaved.

"'Nevertheless, say to him that I lay no commands upon him as to these
matters, seeing that he must follow his own will about them, for I
cannot forget that, from generation to generation, those who went
before him have reaped nothing but disaster in their struggle against
the white devils, whom, because of the sins and idolatry of our
forefathers, it has pleased God to set over us.'

"Those were your father's words, my son, which he spoke to me in the
hour of his murder. And now you will understand why I said that you
must wait before you determined to be a priest. If that is still your
wish, it can be fulfilled, for your father left it to you to follow
whatever life you might desire."

When he had finished speaking I thought for a while, and answered: "So
long as my father's blood is unavenged I cannot become a priest."

"It is as I feared," said the old man with a sigh, "that cursed
talisman which lies about your neck has begun its work with you,
Ignatio, and you will tread the path that the others trod, perchance
to die in blood as they died. Oh! why cannot man be content to leave
the righting of wrongs and the destinies of nations in the hands of
the Almighty and His angels?"

"Because for good or evil the Almighty chooses men to be His
instruments," I answered.

                  *       *       *       *       *

Within a week from this day some Indians came to Tiapa disguised as
porters, whose mission it was to lead me to the mountains among which
my father had lived, and where his treasure still lay hidden.

Bidding farewell to my godparent, the priest, who wept when he parted
from me, I started upon my journey, keeping my destination secret. As
it chanced, I never saw him more, for a month later he was seized with
some kind of /calentura/, or fever, and died suddenly. The best thing
I can say of him is that, with one exception, there lives no man in
heaven above whom I so greatly desire to meet again.

On the third day of my journey we reached a narrow pass in the
mountains, beyond which lay an Indian village. Here my guides took me
to the house of one Antonio, to whom the /padre/ Ignatio had given me
letters, an old man of venerable aspect, who greeted me warmly, and
made me known to several /caciques/ who were staying with him, I knew
not why.

So soon as we were alone in the house, one of these /caciques/, after
addressing me in words which I could not understand, asked me if I had
a "Heart." To this I replied that I hoped so, whereat they all
laughed. Then the man Antonio, coming to me, unbuttoned my shirt,
revealing the talisman that had belonged to my father, and at the
sight of it the company bowed.

Next the doors were locked, and, sentries having been posted before
them, a ceremony began, which even now it is not lawful that I should
describe in detail. On this solemn occasion I was first initiated into
the mysteries of the Order of the Heart, and afterwards installed as
its hereditary chief, thus becoming, while yet a boy, the absolute
lord of a many thousand men, brethren of our Society, who were
scattered far and wide about the land.

On the day after I had taken the final oaths, Antonio handed over to
me the treasure that my ancestors hoarded in a secret place, which my
father had left in his keeping, and it was a great treasure, amounting
to more than a million dollars in value.

Now I was rich, both in men and money, still, following the counsel of
Antonio, I abode for a while in the village, receiving those who came
from every part of Mexico to visit me as Holder of the Heart, and as
first in rank among the fallen peoples of the Indians.

It was during these months that I made the great error of my life.
Some three miles from the village where I dwelt, lived two sisters,
Indian ladies of noble blood, though poor, one of them a widow, and
the other a very beautiful girl, younger than myself. It chanced that,
riding past their house upon a certain Sunday evening, when most of
the inhabitants of the valley were away at a /fiesta/, I heard screams
coming from it.

Dismounting from my horse I ran in at the door, which was open, and
saw one of the sisters, the widow, lying dead upon the ground, while
two bandits, Mexicans, were attacking the younger woman. Drawing my
/machete/, I cut down the first of them before he had time to turn,
then I fell upon the second man with such fury that I drove him back
against the wall. Seeing that his life was in danger, he called upon
me not to kill him for the sake of a low Indian girl, which insult
maddened me so that I slew him upon the spot, and caused his body,
with that of his companion, to be buried secretly.

It happened that after this the girl whose life I had saved came to
dwell in my village, where I saw much of her. So lovely was she and so
clever, that soon she won my heart, and the end of it was that, being
headstrong and in love, I married her, against the advice of Antonio
and others of my brethren of the Order. It would have been better for
the Indian people, and perhaps for me also, if I had died before I
stood at the altar with this woman, though for a while she was a good
wife, and, because of her cleverness, of great service to me at that
time.

Now, it must be stated that during all these months I had not been
idle. The more I thought on them, the more the wrongs of my
countrymen, the real owners of the land, took hold of my mind, till at
length they possessed it utterly, and I became an enthusiast and a
dreamer. This was the object of my life--to form a great conspiracy,
which should bring about a rising of the Indians in every province of
Mexico upon a given day; then, when the Spaniards and their bastards,
the Spanish Mexicans, had been stamped out, to re-establish the Empire
of the Aztecs.

It was a madness, perhaps, but the madness lurked in my blood; my
forefathers had suffered from and for it, and I think that it must
have come down to us from our ancestor, Guatemoc, the greatest and
most unfortunate Indian who ever lived. Where they failed I determined
to succeed, and, strange to say, in the end I went near to success.

For years I laboured, travelling to and fro about the land till there
was no province where I was not known as the Holder of the Heart, and
the chief by blood of the Indian tribes. Everywhere I strove to rouse
the people from their sloth, and to win the /caciques/, or head men,
to the cause, and I did not strive in vain. I used my great wealth to
buy arms, to gain over the lukewarm with bribes, and in many other
ways. When my fortune sank low I gathered more, for without gold
nothing could be done. Treasures that were buried in the old days were
given up to me as Lord of the Heart by those who had their secret;
also many brought me money, each what he could spare, and I hoarded it
against the hour of need.

For a year or more I was the greatest power in Mexico, and yet, though
hundreds were privy to my plot, it was so well hidden that no whisper
of it came to the ears of the Government. At length all was ready, and
so carefully were my plans laid that success seemed certain; but the
unforeseen happened, and I failed--thus:

That woman whose life I had saved, my own wife whom I loved and
trusted, who was bound to my cause and that of my countrymen by every
tie human and divine, betrayed me and it. Just before the time fixed
for the rising, it was agreed that she should be placed, as one of
whom we could be sure, to play the part of a servant in the house of
the man who ruled Mexico in those days, that she might spy upon him.

Instead of so doing, she, my wife, fell in love with him. It is easy
to guess the rest. One night, but a week before the appointed time, I
and some five or six others, the leaders of our party, were seized. My
companions were made away with secretly, but I was brought before the
great man, who received me alone, holding a pistol in his hand.

"I know all your plans, friend," he said, "and I congratulate you on
them, for they were cleverly managed. I know also that you have a
great treasure in gold hidden away----" and he named the sum. "That
wife of yours, whom you were fool enough to trust, has told me
everything, but she cannot tell me where the money is hidden, for this
you withheld from her, which shows that you are not altogether mad.

"Now, friend, I make you a fair offer--hand over this treasure, and
you shall go free--of course when the day of vengeance is past and
your sheep have found themselves without a shepherd--nor shall you be
molested afterwards. Refuse to do so, and you will be brought to trial
and die as you deserve."

"How can you promise for others?" I asked. "You are not the only white
man who would have fallen."

"I can promise for others, first, because I am their master, and,
secondly, because nobody but myself knows anything of this matter,
since, if I told them, I must also share your wealth with them, and
that, friend, I mean to keep. Give it up to me, and you may go and
plot against my successors and the Government of Mexico as much as
pleases you, and take your wife with you for aught I care; for,
friend, having earned so comfortable a competence, I propose to leave
a land where, as this business proves, people in authority are too apt
to have their throats cut. Now choose, and be so good as to stand
quite still while you are thinking the matter over, or I may be forced
to shoot you."

"How about my associates?" I asked.

"I believe that three or four of them have been carried off--by
typhus--within the last day or two, the prisons here are so unhealthy;
but I am sure that if the gold is forthcoming, no more will sicken."

Then I chose, for I thought to myself that I might get more gold, but
I could never get another life, and if I died many must suffer with me
and all my hopes for the future of the Indian race would come to
naught. Also I knew this villain to be a man of his word, and that
what he promised he would fulfil.

Within ten days he had the money, and I was free to begin my life
again, nor did any of those who were doomed to perish in it, learn the
tale of the plot that had threatened them.

I was free; but what a freedom was this, when I had lost everything
save the breath that God placed in my nostrils, and, perhaps, my
honour. The great house that I had builded was fallen to the ground,
the moneys I had amassed were stolen, the chief of my companions were
dead, my credit as a deliverer of the people was gone, and my cause
had become hopeless. All these things had come upon me because of a
woman, a traitress, whom I had nurtured in my bosom.

At first I was dazed, but when I came to understand I swore a great
oath before Heaven that, for her false sake, I would hate and renounce
her sex; that, whatever might be the temptation, never again would I
look kindly upon women, or have to do with one of them in word, or
thought, or deed. That oath, so far as lay in my power, I have kept to
this day, and I hope to keep through all eternity.

It may be asked what became of my wife. I do not know. I lifted no
hand against her who was flesh of my flesh, but she perished. The
story was known. I was forced to tell it to clear myself. After I
escaped from the prison I lay ill for many weeks, and when I recovered
she was gone. Others had been betrayed besides myself, and doubtless
some of them had wreaked fitting vengeance on her. What it was I never
asked.

For many years--twenty perhaps--I became a wanderer. Now as before the
Indians loved me, and, as Lord of the heart and their hereditary
/cacique/, in a sense I still was great, although but the shadow of
power dwelt with me: the substance had departed, as it departs ever
from those who fail. From time to time I strove to rebuild the plot;
but, now that I was friendless and without fortune, few would follow
me thus far.

So it came about that at length I abandoned the endeavour, and lived
as best I could. I fought in three wars, and gained honours therein,
and took my share in many adventures, all of which left me as poor as
I had entered on them. At times I remembered my desire to become a
priest, but now it was over late to study; also my hands were too much
soiled with the affairs of the world.

Wearying of the struggle, I went back to my village in the mountains
and dwelt there awhile, but this also wearied me, having nothing to
do, and I turned my attention to the management of mines.

It was while I was thus employed, as a middle-aged man, that I made
the acquaintance of James Strickland, who was destined to accompany me
to the city, Heart of the World.



                              CHAPTER II

                         THE SEŅOR STRICKLAND

Two-and-twenty years ago, I, Ignatio, visited a village in the State
of Tamaulipas, named Cumarvo, a beautiful place, half-hidden in pine
forests amongst the mountains. I came to this hamlet because a friend
of mine, one of the brethren of the Order of the Heart, wrote to me
saying that there was an Indian in the neighbourhood who had in his
possession an ancient Aztec scroll, which, being in picture-writing,
neither he nor anyone else could read.

This scroll had descended to the Indian through many generations, and
with it a tradition that it told of a very rich gold mine in the
mountains whereof the site was lost, which had been closed to save it
from the grip of Cortes, by the order of Guatemoc, my forefather, whom
the Spaniards murdered--may their souls be accursed!

Now, I had been taught the secret of the picture-writing by old
Antonio, my father's friend, when first I was initiated into the
mysteries of the Heart, though it must die with me, for I believe that
at this hour there is no other man living who can read it.

This writing the Indian was willing to give up to me as Lord of the
Heart, and accordingly, having nothing better to do, I journeyed to
Cumarvo to study it. In this matter, as in many others, I was destined
to meet with disappointment, however--at any rate for a while; for, on
my arrival at the house of my friend, I heard that the Indian had died
of a sudden sickness, and that his son could not discover where the
scroll was hidden.

Another thing I learnt also, namely, that a white man, an /Inglese/,
the first who ever visited these parts, had come to the village about
six months before, and was engaged in working some old silver mines on
behalf of a company, a task that he found difficult, for the Mexican
owners of land in the neighbourhood, being jealous of him and angry
because he paid his men a fair wage, were striving to prevent Indians
from labouring in his mine.

Now the natives of this place, from Monday morning to Saturday night,
were a gentle and industrious people, but they had this fault, that on
the Saturday night many of them were accustomed to become drunk on
/mescal/, the spirit that is distilled from the root of the aloe. Then
their natures were changed, and fierce quarrels would spring up
amongst them, for the most part about women, that ended often enough
in bloodshed.

It chanced that such a fray arose on the night of my arrival at
Cumarvo. On the morrow I saw the fruits of it as I walked down the
little street which was bordered by white, flat-roofed houses and
paved with cobble-stones, purposing to attend mass in the lime-washed
church, where the bell rang night and day to scare evil spirits back
to hell.

In the middle of the street, lying in the shade of a house, were two
dead men. A handsome Indian girl, with a sullen and unmoved
countenance, was engaged in winding a /serape/, or blanket, round one
of the bodies; but the other lay untended, certain stains upon the
clothing revealing the manner of its end. On a doorstep sat a third
man, much wounded about the head and face, while the barber of the
village, its only doctor, attempted to remove his hair with a pair of
blunt scissors, so that he might dress the cuts.

The scene was dreadful, but no one took much notice of it, for Indian
life is cheap, and in those days death by violence was even more
common in Mexico than it is now. On the opposite side of the street an
old woman chaffered with a passer-by about the price of her oranges,
while some children with shouts and laughter strove to lasso and drag
away a pig that haunted the place; and a girl on her way to mass
stepped over the uncovered body which lay so quiet in the shade, and,
recognising it as that of a friend, crossed herself as she hurried on.

"What is the cause of this, seņor?" I asked of the barber.

"I think that I have the honour of addressing Don Ignatio," the little
man answered, and, lifting his hands from their work, he made a sign
showing that he also was a member of our Brotherhood, though a humble
one.

"Ah, I thought so," he went on as I gave the countersign; "we heard
that you were going to visit us, and I am glad of it, for I weary of
dressing wounds on Sundays, and perhaps you may be able to put a stop
to these fights. The woman was the cause of it, of course, seņor;
these are not the first she has brought to their deaths," and he
nodded at the girl who was wrapping the body in a blanket.

"You see, she was going to marry this man," and he tapped the Indian
whose wounds he was dressing on the shoulder, "but she took up with
that one," pointing to the nearest body, "whereon Number One here,
being drunk with /mescal/, laid wait for Number Two and stabbed him
dead. The girl who was with him ran for Number Three yonder, Number
Two's brother, but Number One ambushed him, so he was killed also.
Then, hearing the noise, the village guard came up and cut down our
friend here with their /machetes/, but as you see, unfortunately, they
did not kill him."

I heard, and anger took hold of me. Approaching the girl, I said:

"This is your doing, woman! Are you not afraid?"

"What of it?" she answered, sullenly; "can I help it if I am pretty,
and men fight for me? Also, who are you who ask me whether I am
afraid?"

"Fool!" cried the barber from the doorstep; "do you dare to speak thus
to the Lord of the Heart?"

The girl started and replied:

"Why not? Is he then my lord?"

"Listen, girl!" I said; "others besides these have died through you."

"How do you know that?" she answered. "But what need to ask? If you
are the Lord of the Heart you have the evil eye, and can read secrets
without their being discovered to you."

"It is you that have the evil eye, woman, like many another of your
sex!" I said. "Hear me, now: you will leave this place, and you will
never return to it, for if you do, you die! Also, remember that if
harm should come to any more men on your account, wherever you go I
shall know of it, and you will die there!"

"Whoever you are, you are not the Government, and have no right to
kill me," she said, trying to hide the fear which crept into her dark
eyes.

"No, woman, I am not the Government; but among our people I am more
powerful than the Government. If you do not believe me, ask the doctor
yonder, and he will tell you that I should be obeyed, even by people
who had never seen me, where a troop of soldiers would be laughed at.
If I say that you are to die, you will die in this way or in that, for
my curse will be on you. Perhaps you may tumble over a precipice, or
you may take a fever, or be drowned in crossing a river, /quien
sabe!/"

"I know, lord, I know," she whispered, shivering, for now she was
frightened. "Do not look so terribly at me; spare me this time for the
love of God! I did not mean to do it, but when men put their hearts
into a woman's hand, how can she help squeezing them, especially if
she hates men? But I did not hate this one," and she touched the cheek
of the dead Indian caressingly; "I really meant to marry him. It is
that fellow whom I hate," pointing to her wounded lover, "and I hope
that he will be shot, else I think that I shall poison him."

"You will not poison him, woman; and, though he deserves to die, you
are worse than he. Now begone, and remember my words!"

Bending down, she touched the corpse's forehead with her lips, then,
rising, said:

"I kiss your feet, Lord of the Heart," and went away without looking
behind her, nor was she seen again in that village.

Then, with a sigh, I also was turning to go, for it saddened me to
think that when drink got hold of them, a woman should have the power
to change these men, who were my brethren, into savage beasts
thirsting for each other's blood.

"Ah!" I mused, "had it not been for that other woman who destroyed me
and my hope, by now I had begun to teach them better."

At this moment, looking up, I chanced to see a man such as I had never
before beheld, standing by my side and gazing at me. Stories are told
of how men and women, looking on each other for the first time, in
certain cases are filled with a strange passion of love, of which,
come what may, they can not again be rid.

Among many misfortunes, thanks be to my guardian angels, this fate has
never overtaken me, yet at that moment I felt something that was akin
to it--not love, indeed, but a great sense of friendship and sympathy
for and with this man, which, mastering me then, is still growing to
this hour, though its object has for many years been dead.

Perhaps it was the contrast between us that attracted me so much at
first, since human beings are ever drawn towards their opposites in
nature and appearance. I, as you, my friend, for whom I write this
history, will remember, although you have only known me in my age, am
tall, thin, and sallow, like all my race, with a sad expression
reflecting the heart within, and melancholy eyes.

Very different were the mind and appearance of James Strickland, the
Englishman. He was a fine man, over thirty years of age, short in
proportion to his width, though somewhat spare in frame and slender in
limb. His features were as clearly cut as those of an ancient god upon
a marble wall; his eyes were blue as the sea, and, though just now
they were troubled at the sight of death, merry like the eyes of a
boy; his curling hair--for he had removed his hat in the presence of
the dead--was yellow as mimosa bloom, darkening almost to red in the
short beard and about the ears, where the weather had caught it; and
beneath his shirt, which was open at the neck, his skin showed white
like milk. For the rest, his hands were long and delicate,
notwithstanding the hard work of which they bore traces; his glance
was quick, and his smile the most pleasant that ever I had seen.

"Your pardon, seņor," said this /Inglese/, in good Spanish, bowing to
me as he spoke, "but unwittingly I have overheard some of your talk
with yonder woman, and I cannot understand how it comes that you, a
stranger, have so much authority over her. I wish that you would
explain it to me in order that I might learn how to put a stop to such
murders. These dead men were two of my best workmen, and I do not know
where I shall look to replace them."

"I cannot explain it, seņor," I answered, returning his bow, "further
than to say that I have a certain rank among the Indians, on account
of which they reverence me. Still, though I have no right to ask it of
a stranger, I pray that you will forget any words of mine which may
chance to have reached your ears, since of such authority the
Government is jealous."

"By all means, seņor; they are already forgotten. Well, /adios/, this
sight is not so pleasant that I wish to study it," and replacing his
hat upon his head, he passed on.

Although my journey proved to be in vain, seeing that the scroll I
came to read had vanished, I lingered in the village of Cumarvo,
alleging as the reason of my stay a hope that it might be discovered,
but really, as I believe, because I desired to become friendly with
this white man.

As it chanced, an opportunity was soon given to me to do him a signal
service. I have stated that there dwelt men of position in this place,
Mexicans who were jealous of the Englishman, and these people stirred
up some discontented miners in his employ to make a plot to murder
him, saying that, if they did so, they would win a great treasure
which he kept hidden in his house.

This plot came to my ears through one of the Brotherhood, and I
determined to frustrate it, to which end I collected together twenty
good men and true, and, arming them with guns, bade them be silent
about the matter, above all to the /Inglese/, whom I did not wish to
alarm.

The plan of the murderers was at the hour of dawn to attack the house
where the Seņor Strickland slept with four or five servants only, and
to put all within its walls to death. Accordingly, about one o'clock
on the night fixed, I despatched my men by twos and threes,
instructing them to go round the hills at the back of the house, and,
creeping into the garden, to hide themselves there among the trees
till I appeared.

An hour later I followed them myself without being observed by the
spies of the attacking party, for rain fell and the night was very
dark. Arriving in the garden, I collected my men, and placed them in
ambush under a low wall commanding the street, up which I knew the
murderers must come. Here we waited patiently till the cocks crew and
the dawn began to break in the east.

Presently we heard a stir in the village beneath, as of men marching,
and in the gathering light we saw the murderers creeping stealthily up
the street to the number of fifty or more. So great was their fear of
the Englishman, that they thought it safer to bring many men to kill
him, also each of the villains desired that his neighbour should be a
sharer in the crime.

"Will you not wake up the /Inglese/?" asked the man next to me.

"No," I answered, "it will be time enough to wake him when the affair
is settled. Let none of you fire till I give the word."

Now, the brigands in the street below--men without shame--after
waiting a little time for the light to grow stronger, advanced towards
the gate, looking like a procession of monks, for the air was chilly
and each of them wore his /serape/ wrapped about his head. In their
hands they carried rifles and drawn /machetes/.

Within ten paces of the gate they paused for a minute to consult, and
I heard their leader, a Mexican, direct half of them to creep round to
the back of the house so as to cut off all escape. Then I whistled,
which was the signal agreed upon, at the same time covering the
Mexican with my rifle. Almost before the sound had left my lips, there
followed a report of twenty guns, and some fifteen or sixteen of the
enemy were stretched upon the ground.

For a moment they wavered, and I thought that the rest of them were
going to fly, but this they dared not do, for they knew that they had
been seen; therefore they rushed at the wall with a yell, firing as
they came. As they climbed over it we met them with pistol shots and
/machetes/, and for a few minutes the affair was sharp, for they were
desperate, and outnumbered us.

Still they lost many men in scaling the wall and forcing the gate, and
with the exception of fourteen who fled, and were for the most part
caught afterwards, the rest of them we finished amongst the flowers
and vegetables of the garden. Just as all was over, the Englishman,
who was a sound sleeper, appeared yawning, dressed in white, and
holding a pistol in his hand.

"What is this noise?" he asked, rubbing his eyes, "and why are you
people fighting in my garden? Go away, all of you, or I shall shoot at
you."

"I trust," I said, bowing, "that the seņor will pardon us for
disturbing him in his slumber, but this matter could not be settled
without some noise. May I offer the seņor my /serape/? The air is
chilly, and he will catch cold in that dress."

"Thank you," he said, putting on the /serape/. "And now perhaps you
will explain why you come to spoil my garden by making a battle-field
of it."

Then I told him, and was astonished to see that as I went on he grew
very angry.

"I suppose that I must thank you, gentlemen, for saving my life," he
said at last, "though I never asked you to do it. But, all the same, I
think it shameless that you should have had this fight in my own
garden, without giving me the opportunity of sharing it. /Caramba!/ am
I a little girl that I should be treated in such a way?" And of a
sudden he burst out laughing and shook me by the hand.

That day, when all the trouble was over, and the place had been made
tidy, the Seņor Strickland sent a man to ask if I would do him the
pleasure to dine with him. I accepted, and as we sat smoking after
dinner, having talked of the fight till we were tired of it, he spoke
thus to me:

"Don Ignatio, I owe you my life, and, believe me, I am grateful, for I
do not see why you should have risked so much for a foreign stranger."

"I did it because I like you, seņor," I answered, "also because it is
very pleasant to catch the wicked in their own toils. Those who
perished this morning were villains, every one of them. They came in
the hope of plunder, for such 'men without shame' will murder human
beings for five dollars a head; but they were set on by others who
hate you because you treat your Indian workmen fairly, and also
because they do not wish foreigners here to compete with them, and
think that you are but the first bird of the flock. Therefore they
thought that it would be good policy to kill you so as to frighten
away others who might follow. However, that danger has gone by, and
you need have no more fear, for they have learnt a lesson which they
will not forget."

"So much the better then," he answered, "for I have troubles enough to
deal with here, without being bothered to protect my life against such
contemptible vermin. And now, Don Ignatio, I hardly like to ask you,
and I daresay that you will think the offer beneath contempt, but are
you willing to accept an engagement? I am sadly in need of a
sub-manager, one who could control the Indians, and to such a man I am
prepared to pay a hundred dollars a month; the funds of the company I
represent will not allow me to offer more."

I thought for a while and answered:

"Seņor, the money is not enough to tempt me, though it will serve to
buy food, lodging, and cigars, but I accept your offer for the same
reason that I fought your battles this morning, because I like you,
and will gladly do my best to serve you and your interests. Still, I
must warn you, for aught I know, I may have to leave your service at
short notice, for my time is not altogether my own. I also am the
servant of a great company, seņor, and though now I am on leave, as it
were, and have been for these many years, I may be required at any
moment."



Thus it was, then, that I entered the service of the Seņor James
Strickland, or rather of his company, in which I continued for
something more than a year, working very hard, for the seņor did not
spare either me or himself. But as the records of those months of
fruitless labour could have little interest for you, my friend,
instead of writing of them, I will tell you in few words what was the
history of this Englishman as he told it to me.

He was of noble blood, as might be seen in his face, for he had a
right to be addressed as "honourable," which it would seem means more
in England than it does here. Nevertheless, his father was a priest of
the heretic church and quite poor, though, how this came about, you,
being an Englishman, will understand better than I, seeing that in
most countries it is the privilege of nobles to enrich themselves at
the expense of others of less rank.

At any rate, when James Strickland's father died, his son, who was
then a lad of twenty, found that he possessed in the world no more
than five thousand dollars. This sum, being of adventurous mind and
sanguine temperament, he invested in a ranch in Texas, where he
endured much danger and hardship, and lost all his money.

After this experience, having nothing to live on and no friends, he
was obliged to labour with his hands like a peon, and this he did in
many ways. He broke horses, he herded cattle; once, even, for two
months he sank so low--it makes me angry to write of it--as to be
forced to wait upon the guests in an inn at Panama.

Thence he drifted to Nicaragua, and became mixed up in mining
ventures, and when I first met him he had been a miner for ten years.
Most of this time he spent managing a mine for an American, in the
Chontales country, on the frontier of Honduras, where the fever is so
bad that few white men can live. Here it was that he learned to speak
Spanish and the Indian or Maya tongue. At length, after an attack of
fever which nearly killed him, he left Honduras, and came to Mexico,
where he accepted the management of this silver mine at Cumarvo.
Hitherto it had been worked by a Mexican on behalf of its owners, who
dismissed the rogue for stealing the ore and selling it.

This mine, though very rich, was hard to deal with profitably because
of the water gathered in it, and all the months that the Seņor
Strickland had been its captain he was employed in driving a tunnel
upwards from a lower level in the cliff, in order to drain the
workings. Shortly after I came into his service this tunnel was
finished, for now I was able to obtain plenty of labour, which before
he had lacked, and we began to bring to bank ore running as high as
two hundred ounces to the ton, so that for some months all went well.

Then of a sudden the ore body dipped straight downward, as though it
had been bent over when hot, and we followed it till the water
increased so much that we were unable to carry it out, for in those
days there were no steam pumps in Mexico, such as are now used for the
drying of mines. First we tried to strike another vein, but without
success; then we attempted to pierce a second drainage tunnel at a
still lower level, but, after more than three months' labour, the rock
became so hard that we were obliged to abandon the task.

Now there was nothing to be done except to stop work at the tunnel,
and report the matter by letter to the owners of the mine, employing
ourselves meanwhile in the smelting of such ore as we had stacked.
This, indeed, we needed to do in order to pay wages with the silver,
seeing that after the first few months the owners ceased to remit us
money.

One evening, on returning from the smelting-works to the house, I
found the Seņor Strickland, his chin resting on his hand and an
unlighted cigar in his mouth, seated at a table, on which lay an open
letter. All through our misfortunes and heavy labour he had never lost
heart, or forgotten to smile and be merry, but now he looked sad as a
man who has just buried his mother, and I asked him what evil thing
had happened.

"Nothing particular, Ignatio," he answered; "but listen here." And he
read the letter aloud.

It was from one of the owners of the mine, and this was the purport of
it: that the shaft had become choked with water because of the
incompetence and neglect of the seņor; that they, the owners, hereby
dismissed him summarily, refusing to pay him the salary due; and,
lastly, that they held him responsible in his own person for such
money as they had lost.

"Surely," I cried in wrath, when he had finished, "this letter was
written by a man without shame, and I pray that he may find his grave
in the stomachs of hogs and vultures!" for I forgot myself in my
indignation against those that could speak thus of the seņor, who had
slaved day and night in their service, giving himself no rest.

"Do not trouble, Ignatio," he said, with a little smile, "it is the
way of the world. I have failed, and must take the consequences. Had I
succeeded, there would have been a different story. Still I think
that, if ever I meet this man again, I will kick him for telling lies
about me. Do you know, Ignatio, that, with the exception of one
thousand dollars which remain to my credit in Mexico, I have spent all
my own money that I had saved upon this mine, and of that thousand
dollars, eight hundred are due to you for back pay, so, whatever trade
I take to next, I shall not begin as a rich man."

"Be silent, I beg of you, seņor," I answered, "for such words make my
ears burn. What! am I also a thief that I should rob you, you who have
already been plucked like a fowl for the good of others? Insult me
once more by such thoughts and I will never pardon you."

And I left the house to calm myself by walking among the mountains,
little knowing what I should hear before I entered it again.



                             CHAPTER III

                             THE SUMMONS

As I walked down the street of the village I met my friend, with whom
I had stayed when first I came to Cumarvo.

"Ah! lord," he said--for those who are initiated among the Indians
give me this title when none are by--"I was seeking you. The scroll
has been found."

"What scroll?"

"That picture-writing about the ancient mine which brought you here.
You remember that he who owned the document died, and his son could
not discover its whereabouts. Well, yesterday he found it by chance
while he was hunting rats in the roof of his house, and brought it to
me. Here it is," and he gave me a roll wrapped in yellow linen.

"Good," I answered, "I will study it to-night," and continued my walk,
thinking little more about the matter, for my mind was full of other
things.

The air was pleasant and the evening fine, so that I did not return to
the house till the moon rose. As I passed up the path a man stepped so
suddenly from the shelter of a bush in front of me, that I drew my
/machete/, thinking that he meant to do me a mischief.

"Stay your hand, lord," said the man, saluting me humbly, and at the
same time giving the sign of brotherhood. "It is many years since we
met, so perchance you may have forgotten me; still, you will remember
my name; I am Molas, your foster-brother."

Then I looked at him in the moonlight and knew him, though time had
changed us both, and, putting my arms round him, I embraced him,
seeing that he had been faithful when many deserted me, and I loved
him as to-day I love his memory.

"What brings you here, Molas?" I asked; "when last I heard of you, you
were dwelling far away in Chiapas."

"A strange matter: Business of the Heart, O Lord of the Heart, which I
deemed so pressing that I have journeyed over land and sea to find
you. Have you a place where I can speak with you alone?"

"Follow me," I said, wondering, and led him to my own chamber, where I
gave him food and drink, for he was weary with travel.

"Now set out this business," I said.

"First show me the token, lord. I desire to see it once more for a
purpose of my own."

I rose and closed the shutters of the window, then I bared my breast,
revealing the ancient symbol. For a while he gazed upon it, and said,
"It is enough. Tell me, lord, what is the saying that has descended
with this trinket."

"The saying is, Molas, that when this half that I wear is reunited
with the half that is wanting, then the Indians shall rule again from
sea to sea, as they did when the Heart was whole."

"That is the saying, lord. We learn it in the ritual that is called
'Opening of the Heart,' do we not? and in this ritual that half which
you wear is named 'Day' since it can be seen, and that half which is
lost is named 'Night,' since, though present, it is not seen, and it
is told to us that the 'Day' and the 'Night' together will make one
perfect circle, whereof the centre is named the 'Heart of Heaven,' of
which these things are the symbol. Is it not so?"

"It is so, Molas."

"Good. Now listen. That which was lost is found, the half which is
named 'Night' has appeared in the land, for I have seen it with my
eyes, and it is to tell you of it that I have travelled hither."

"Speak on," I said.

"Lord, yonder in Chiapas there is a ruined temple that the /antiguos/
built, and to that temple have come a man and a woman, his daughter.
The man is old and fierce-eyed, a terrible man, and the girl is
beautiful exceedingly. There in the ruins they have dwelt these four
months and more, and the man practises the art of medicine, for he is
a great doctor, and has wrought many cures, though he takes no money
in payment for his skill, but food only.

"Now it chanced, lord, that my wife, whom I married but two years ago,
was very sick--so sick that the village doctor could do nothing for
her. Therefore the fame of the old Indian who dwelt in the ruined
temple having reached me, I determined to visit him and seek his
counsel, or, if possible, to bring him to my home.

"When my wife heard of it, she said it was of no use, as she saw Death
sitting at the foot of her bed. Still I kissed her and went, leaving
her in charge of the /padre/ of the village and some women, her
sisters. With me I took a lock of her hair, and some fowls and eggs as
a present to the /Lacandone/, for they said that, though of our race,
this doctor was not a Christian.

"Starting before the dawn I travelled all day by the river and through
the forest, till at evening I came to the ruined temple which I knew,
and began to climb its broken stair. As I neared the top, a man
appeared from beneath the leaning arch that is the gateway of the
stair, and stood gazing at the ball of the setting sun. He was an aged
man, clad in a linen robe only, very light in colour, with long white
beard and hair, a nose hooked like a hawk's beak, and fierce eyes that
seemed to pierce those he looked upon and to read their most secret
thoughts.

"'Greeting, brother,' he said, speaking in our own tongue, but with a
strange accent, and using many words which are unknown to me, 'What
brings you here?'

"Then he looked at me awhile, and asked slowly:

"'Say, brother, are you sick at heart?'

"Now, lord, when I heard those words whereof you know the meaning, I
was so astounded that I almost fell backwards down the ruined stair,
but, recovering myself, I tried him with a sign, and lo, he answered
it. Then I tried him with the second sign, and the third, and the
fourth, and so on up to the twelfth, and he answered them all, though
not always as we use them. Then I paused, and he said:

"'You have passed the door of the Sanctuary, enter, brother, and draw
on to the Altar.'

"But I shook my head, for I could not. Next he tried me with various
signs and strange words that have to do with the inmost mysteries, but
I was not able to answer them, though at times I saw their drift.

"'You have some knowledge,' he said, 'yet you do but stand at the foot
of the pyramid, whereas I watch the stars from its crest, warming my
hands at the eternal fire.'

"'None of my order have more, lord,' I answered, 'save the very
highest.'

"'Then there are higher in the land?' he asked eagerly, but started
suddenly, and, looking round, went on without waiting for an answer,
'You are in sorrow, Child of the Heart, and have come from one who was
sick to the death; to your business, and perchance we will speak of
these matters afterwards.'

"'First, lord,' I said, 'I have brought an offering,' and I set down
the basket at his feet.

"'Gifts are good between brethren,' he replied; 'moreover, in this
barren place food is welcome. Come hither, daughter, and take what
this stranger brings.'

"As he spoke a lady came forward through the archway, dressed like her
father, in a white robe of fine fabric, but somewhat worn. I looked at
her, and it is truth, lord, that for the second time I went near to
falling, for so great was the loveliness of this girl that my heart
turned to water within me. Never before had I seen, or even dreamed
of, such beauty in a woman."

"To your tale, Molas, to your tale. What has the fashion of a woman's
beauty to do with the business of the Heart?" I broke in, angrily.

"I do not know, lord," he answered; "and yet I think that it has to do
with all earthly things." Then he continued:

"The lady, whose name was Maya, looked at me carelessly, and took the
basket. Following her through the archway to the terrace beyond, I set
out the matter of my wife's illness to the doctor--or rather to him
who passes as a doctor, and who is named Zibalbay, or Watcher--praying
that he would come to the village and minister to her.

"He listened in silence, then took the lock of hair that I had brought
with me, and, going to a fire that burned near by, he laid some of the
hair upon an ember and watched it as it writhed and shrivelled away.

"'It would be of little use, brother,' he said, sadly, 'seeing that
your wife is now dead. I felt her spirit pass us as we talked together
in the gateway; still, until I burnt the hair, I did not know whether
it was she who went by, or another.'

"Here I may tell you, lord, that, as I found afterwards, my wife
departed at that very hour of sunset, though whether the doctor,
Zibalbay, guessed that she must die then from the symptoms which I
described to him, or whether he has the spirit sight, and saw her, I
do not know.

"Still, it seems natural that at that moment of her passing she should
come to bid farewell to the husband whom she loved, though I think it
is a bad omen for me, and I pray that I may never see that place
again. At the least, when I heard him speak thus I did not doubt his
truth, for something within me confirmed it, but I hid my face and
groaned aloud in the bitterness of my grief.

"Then, taking my hand, Zibalbay, the Watcher, spoke great words to me
in a solemn voice that seemed to soothe me as the song of a mother
soothes a restless child, for he talked with certainty as one who has
knowledge and vision of those who have gone beyond, telling me that
this parting was not for long, and that soon I should find her whom I
had lost made glorious and folded close to the Heart of Heaven. Then
he laid his hand upon my head, and I slept awhile, to wake, sad,
indeed, but filled with a strange peace.

"'Food is ready, my brother,' said Zibalbay. 'Eat and rest here this
night; to-morrow you can return.'

"Now when we had eaten, Zibalbay spoke to me in the presence of his
daughter, who, though a woman, is also of the Order, saying:

"'You are of our Brotherhood, therefore the words I speak will be
repeated to none who are not brethren, for I speak upon the Heart.'

"'I hear with the Ears, lord,' I answered.

"'Listen!' he went on. 'I come from far with this maiden, my daughter,
and we are not what we seem, but who and what we are now is not the
hour to tell. This is the purpose of our coming--to find that which is
one, but divided; that which is not lost, but hidden. Perchance,
brother, you can point the path to it,' and he paused and looked at me
with his piercing eyes.

"Now, lord, I understood to what his words had reference, for are they
not part of the ritual of the service 'Opening of the Heart?' Still,
because I desired to be sure, and not commit myself, I picked up a
piece of burnt wood, and, as though in idleness, bent down, and, by
the light of the fire, I drew the half of a heart with a saw-like edge
upon the pavement of the chamber where we sat. Then I handed the stick
to Zibalbay, who took it and passed it on to his daughter, saying:

"'I have no skill at such arts; finish it, Maya.'

"She smiled, and, kneeling down, traced the half of a face within the
outline that I had drawn, saying:

"'Is it enough, or do you need the writing also?'

"'It is enough,' I answered. 'Now, lord, what do you desire?'

"'I desire to know where that which is hidden can be brought to light,
and if it dwells in this land, for I have journeyed far to seek it.'

"'It dwells here,' I answered, 'for I have beheld it with my eyes, and
he guards it who is its keeper.'

"'Can you lead me to him, brother?'

"'No, for I have no such commands; but perhaps I can bring him to you,
though I must journey by sea and land to find him--that is, if he
wills to come. Say, what message shall I give? That a stranger whom I
have met desires to look upon the holy symbol? It will scarcely bring
him so far.'

"'Nay, tell him that the hour is come for "Night" and "Day" to be
joined together, that a new sun may shine in a new sky.'

"'I can tell him this, but will he believe it, seeing that I have no
proof? Will he not rather think that some cunning stranger and false
brother lays a plot to trap him? Give me proofs, lord, or I do not
start upon this errand.'

"'Will he believe that which you have seen with your eyes?'

"'He will believe it, for he has trusted me from childhood.'

"'Then look!' said the man, and, opening his robe at the neck, he
kneeled down in the light of the fire.

"There, lord, upon his breast hung that which has been hidden from our
sight since the sons of Quetzal, the god, ruled in the land, the
counterpart of the severed symbol which is upon your breast. That is
all my story, lord."

                  *       *       *       *       *

Now I, Ignatio, listened amazed, for the thing was marvellous.

"Did the man send me no further message?" I asked.

"None. He said that if you were a true keeper of the mystery you would
come to learn his mission from himself, or bring him to you."

"And did you tell him anything of me and my history, Molas?"

"Nothing; I had no such command. On the morrow at dawn I left to bury
my wife, if she were dead, or to nurse her if she still were sick,
saying that so soon as might be I would travel to the city of Mexico
to seek out the Keeper of the Heart and give him this tidings, and
that within eight weeks or less I trusted to report how I had fared.
The old man asked me if I had money, and without waiting to be
answered he gave me two handfuls of lumps of melted gold from a hide
bag, whereof each lump was stamped with the symbol of the Heart."

"Let me see one," I said.

"Alas! my lord Ignatio, I have none. Not far from the ruined temple
where this Zibalbay and his daughter sojourned, is the /hacienda/ of
Santa Cruz, and there, as you may have heard, dwell a gang of men
under the leadership of one Don Pedro Moreno, who are by profession
smugglers, highway robbers, and murderers, though they pretend to earn
a living by the cultivation of coffee and cocoa.

"As it chanced, in journeying homewards, I fell into the hands of some
of these men. They searched me, and, finding the lumps of gold in my
pocket, handed them over to Don Pedro himself, who rode up when he saw
that they had the fish in their net. He examined the gold closely, and
asked me whence it came. At first I refused to answer, whereupon he
said that I should be confined in a dungeon at the /hacienda/ until
such time as I chose to speak.

"Then, being mad to get back to my village and learn the fate of my
wife, I found my tongue and spoke the truth, saying that the gold was
given in exchange for food by an old Indian doctor, who dwelt with his
daughter in a ruined temple in the forest.

"'Mother of Heaven!' said Don Pedro, 'I have heard of this man before;
but now I know the kind of merchandise in which he trades, I think
that I must pay him a visit and learn what mint it was stamped at.'

"Then, having plucked me bare as a fowl for the oven, they let me go
without hurt, but often I have sorrowed because, in my hour of haste
and need, I told them whence the gold came, since I fear lest I should
have let loose these villains upon the old wanderer and his daughter,
and in that case they may well be murdered before ever you can reach
them."

"Doubtless Heaven will protect them," I answered, "though you acted
foolishly. But tell me, Molas, how did you find me out and come here
without money?"

"I had some money at home, lord, and when I had buried my wife I
travelled to Frontera on the coast, where I found a ship bound for
Vera Cruz, and in her I sailed, giving my service as a sailor, which
is a trade that I have followed. From Vera Cruz I made my way to
Mexico, and reported myself to the head of the Brotherhood in that
city, who, as I expected, was able to give me tidings of you.

"Then I came on to this village, and arrived here to-night, having
been a month and two days on my journey. And now, lord, if you can,
give me a place to sleep in, since I am weary, who for three days have
scarcely shut my eyes. To-morrow you can let me know what answer I
must bear to the old man, Zibalbay."

                  *       *       *       *       *

I, Ignatio, sat late that night pondering over these tidings, which
filled me with a strange hope. Could it be that my hour of success was
at hand after so many years of waiting? If there were truth in
prophecies it would seem so, and yet my faith wavered. This traveller,
whom Molas had seen, might be a madman, and his symbol might be
forged. I could not tell, but at least I would put the matter to the
proof, for to-morrow, or so soon as was possible, I would journey down
to Chiapas and seek him out.

Thinking thus, I threw myself upon my bed and strove to sleep, but
could not. Then, remembering the scroll that my friend had given me, I
rose, purposing to change my thoughts in studying it and so win sleep.
It was a hard task, but at length I mastered its meaning, and found
that it dealt with a mine near Cumarvo, and described the exact
position of the mouth of the tunnel.

This mouth, it would appear, had been closed up in the reign of
Guatemoc, and the scroll was written by the /cacique/ who had charge
of the mine in those days, in order that a record might remain that
would enable his descendants to reopen it, should a time come when the
Spaniards were driven from the land. That the mine was very rich in
free gold was shown by the weights of pure metal stated in this scroll
to have been sent year by year to the Court of Montezuma by this
/cacique/, and also by the fact that it was thought worth hiding from
the Spaniards.

Early on the morrow I went to the room of the Seņor Strickland and
spoke to him with a heavy heart.

"Seņor," I said, "you will remember that when I entered your service I
told you that I might have to leave it at any moment. Now I am here to
say that the time is come, for a messenger has arrived to summon me to
the other end of Mexico upon business of which I may not speak, and
to-morrow I must start upon the journey."

"I am sorry to hear it, Ignatio," he answered, "for you have been a
good friend to me. Still, you do well to separate your fortunes from
those of an unlucky man."

"And you, seņor, do ill to speak thus to me," I answered with
indignation; "still, I forgive you because I know that at times, when
the heart is sore, the mouth utters words that are not meant. Listen,
seņor, when you have eaten your breakfast, will you take a ride with
me?"

"Certainly, if you like. But whither do you wish to ride?"

"To another mine that is, or should be, about two hours on horseback
from here, in a valley at the foot of yonder peak. I only heard of it
last night, though I came to Cumarvo to seek it, and it would seem
that it was very rich in Montezuma's day."

"In Montezuma's day?" he said.

"Yes, it was last worked then, and I propose that if we can find it,
and it looks well, that you should 'denounce' it for yourself, giving
a reward of a few dollars to the Indian from whom I had the
information, who is a poor man."

"But if it is so good, why don't /you/ denounce it, Ignatio; and how
did you come to hear about it after all these years?"

"For two reasons, seņor; first, because I wish to do you a service if
it is in my humble power, and, secondly, because I cannot look after
it and must leave you, though to do so will be a true grief to me,
for, if you will permit me to say it, never have I met a man for whom
I conceived a greater respect and affection. Perhaps, if I return
again, you will give me a share in the profits, so that we may grow
rich together. And now I will show you how I came to hear of the
mine." And I fetched the scroll, with the translation which I had
made, and read it to him.

He listened eagerly, for, like yourself, Seņor Jones, your countryman,
James Strickland, loved adventure and all things that have to do with
the past of this ancient land.

"Let us go at once," he said when I had finished. "I will order the
horses and a mule with the prospecting kit to be got ready. Shall we
take men with us?"

"I think not, seņor; the mine is not yet found, and the less talk
there is about it the better, for if the matter is noised abroad
somebody may be before you in denouncing it. The messenger who came to
see me last night is a trusty man, but he is weary with journeying,
and rests, so we will go alone."

An hour later we were riding among the mountains, I having left a
message for Molas to say that I should return before dark. The trail
which we were following was a difficult one, and ran for some miles
along the edge of a precipice till it reached the crest of the range.
Indeed, so bad was it in parts, that we were forced to dismount and
drive the horses and mule before us, while we followed, clinging to
the ferns and creepers on the rocks to keep ourselves from falling.

At length we came to the summit of the range, and turned downwards
through a forest of oak and fir trees, heading for a valley that lay
at the base of a solitary mountain peak, along which ran a stream.
Down this stream we rode a mile or more, since I was searching for a
certain pointed rock that was mentioned in the scroll as standing by
itself on the slope of a mountain where no trees grew, beneath which
should be the glen where in the days of Guatemoc was a great /ceiba/
tree that, so said the writing, overshadowed the mouth of the mine.

Riding uphill through a dense grove of oaks, we came presently to the
glen that lay just below the slope whereon stood the tall rock.

"This must be the place," I said, "but I see no /ceiba/ tree."

"Doubtless it has fallen and rotted since those days," answered the
Seņor Strickland. "Let us tether the horses and search."

This we did, and the hunt was long, for here grasses and ferns grew
thick, but at length I discovered a spot where the trunk of a very
ancient tree had decayed in the ground, so that nothing remained
except the outline of its circle and some of the larger roots.

Round about these roots we sought desperately for an hour or more, but
without avail, till at length my companion grew weary of the sport,
and went to pull up a small glossy-leaved palm that he had discovered,
purposing to take it home and set it in his garden, for he was a great
lover of plants and flowers.

While he was thus engaged, and I toiled amongst the grasses looking
for the mouth of the mine, which, as I began to think, was lost
forever, suddenly he called out, "Come here, Ignatio. Beneath the
roots of this palm is refuse rock that has been broken with hammers. I
believe that this must have been the platform in front of the mine.
One can see that the ground was flat here."

I came to him, and together we renewed our search, till at length, by
good luck, we discovered a hole immediately beneath a rock, large
enough for a man to creep into.

"Was this made by a /coyote/, or is it the mouth of the mine?" the
seņor asked.

"That we can only find out by entering it," I answered. "Doubtless
when they shut down the mine, the /antiguos/ would have left some such
place as this to ventilate the workings. Bring the pickaxe, seņor, and
we will soon see."

For ten minutes or more we laboured, working in soft ground with pick
and spade till we bared the side of a tunnel, which I examined.

"There is no need to trouble further," I said, "this rock has been cut
with copper chisels, for here is the green of the copper. Without
doubt we have found the mouth of the mine. Now give me the hammer and
candles, and bring the leather bag for samples, and we will enter."



                              CHAPTER IV

                       THE LEGEND OF THE HEART

When I had gone a few paces down the hole, it widened suddenly, so
that we were able to stand upright and light our candles. Now there
was no doubt that we were in the tunnel of an old mine, a rudely-dug
shaft that turned this way and that as it followed the windings of the
ore body.

Along this tunnel we went for thirty or forty paces, creeping over the
fallen boulders, and twisting ourselves between the brown stalactites
that in the course of ages had formed upon the roof and floor, till
presently we reached an obstacle that barred our further progress; a
huge mass of rock which at some time or other had fallen from the roof
of the tunnel and blocked it. I looked at it, and said:

"Now, seņor, I think that we shall have to go back. You remember the
writing tells us that this mine, although so rich, was unsafe because
of the rottenness of the rock. Doubtless they propped it in the old
days, but the timbers have decayed long ago."

"Yes," he answered, "we can do nothing here without help, and,
Ignatio, I don't like the look of the roof, it is full of cracks."

As these last words left his lips a piece of stone, the size of a
child's head, fell from above almost at his feet.

"Speak softly," I whispered, "the ring of your voice is bringing down
the roof."

Then I stooped to pick up the fallen stone, thinking that it might
show ore, and, as I did so, my hand touched something sharp, which I
lifted and held to the candle. It was the jawbone of a man, yellow
with age, and corroded by damp. I showed it to the seņor, and,
kneeling down, we examined the bed of the tunnel together, and not
uselessly, for there we found the remainder of the skull and some
fragments of an arm-bone, but the rest of the skeleton lay under the
great boulder in front of us.

"He was coming out of the mine when the rock fell upon him, poor
fellow," whispered the seņor. "Look here," and he pointed to a little
heap of something that gleamed in the candle-light.

It was free gold, six or seven ounces of it, almost pure, and for the
most part in small nuggets, that once were contained in a bag which
had long since rotted away.

Doubtless, after the mine was closed, some Aztec, who knew its secret,
had made a practice of working there for his own benefit, till one
day, as he was coming out, the rock fell upon him and crushed him,
leaving his spirit to haunt the place for ever.

"There is no doubt about this mine being rich," whispered the seņor;
"but all the same I think that we had better get out of it. I hear odd
noises and rumblings which frighten me. Come, Ignatio," and he turned
to lead the way towards the opening.

Two paces farther I saw him strike his ankle against a piece of rock
that stood up some six or eight inches from the floor-bed of the
tunnel, and the pain of the blow was so sharp that, forgetting where
he was, he called out loudly. The next instant there was a curious
sound above me as of something being torn, and, lo! I lay upon my face
on the rock, and upon me rested a huge mass of stone.

I say that it rested upon me, but this is not altogether true, for,
had it been so, that stone would have killed me at once, as a beetle
is killed beneath the foot of a man, instead of taking more than
two-and-twenty years to do it. The greater part of its weight was
borne by the piece of rock against which the seņor had struck his leg,
a point of the fallen boulder only pressing into my back and grinding
me against the ground. Now we were in darkness, for the seņor had been
knocked down also, and his candle extinguished, and, in the midst of
my tortures, it came into my mind that he must be dead.

Presently, however, I heard his voice, saying, "Ignatio; do you live,
Ignatio?"

Now I thought for a moment. Even in my pain I remembered that more of
the roof would surely give ere long, and that if my friend stayed here
he must die with me. Nothing could save me, I was doomed to a slow
death beneath the stone; and yet if I told him this I knew that he
would not go. Therefore I answered as strongly as I could:

"Fly, seņor, I am safe, and do but stay to light a candle. I will
follow you."

"You are lying to me," he answered; "your voice comes from the level
of the floor." And as he spoke I heard the scratching sound of a
match.

So soon as he had found his candle and lit it, he knelt down and
looked at me. Then he examined the roof above, and, following his
glance with difficulty, I saw that next to the hole whence the boulder
had fallen, hung a huge block of stone, that, surrounded by great
cracks from which water dropped, trembled like a leaf whenever he
moved or spoke.

"For the love of God, fly," I whispered. "In a few hours it will be
over with me, and you cannot help me. I am a dead man, do not stop
here to share my fate."

For a moment he seemed to hesitate, then his courage came back to him,
and he answered hoarsely:

"We entered this place together, friend, and we will go out together,
or not at all. You must be fixed by the rock and not crushed, or you
would not speak of living for hours. Let me look," and he lay upon his
breast and examined the fallen rock by the light of the candle. "Thank
God! there is hope," he said at last, "the boulder rests on the ground
and upon the stone against which I struck my leg, for only one point
of it is fixed in your back. Do you think that anything is broken,
Ignatio?"

"I cannot say, seņor, my pain is great, and I am being slowly crushed
to death; but I believe that as yet my bones are whole. Fly, I beg of
you."

"I will not," he answered sullenly, "I am going to roll this rock off
you."

Then, lifting with all his strength, he strove to move the stone, but
without avail, for it was beyond the power of mortal man to stir it,
and all the while the black mass trembled above his head.

"I must go for help," he said, presently.

"Yes, yes, seņor," I answered, "go for help;" for I knew well that
before he could return with any, more of the roof would have fallen,
shutting me in to perish by inches, or perhaps crushing the life out
of me in mercy. Then I remembered, and added:

"Stay a moment before you go; you are noble, I will give you
something. Feel here round my neck, there is a little chain--now, draw
it over my head--so. You see a token hangs to it; if ever you are in
trouble with the Indians, take their chief man apart and show him
this, and he will die for you if need be.

"Englishman, by this gift I have made you heir to the empire of the
Aztecs in the heart of every Indian, and the master of the great
brotherhood of Mexico. Molas, the messenger, will tell you all and
bring you to those who can initiate you. Bid him lead you whither he
would have led me. Farewell, and God go with you. Tell the Indians how
I died, that they may not think that you have murdered me."

To these words of mine the seņor made no answer, but thrust the token
into his pocket without looking at it, like one who dreams. Then,
taking the candle with him, he crept forward down the tunnel and
vanished, and my heart sank as I saw him go, leaving me to my dreadful
fate without a word of farewell.

"Doubtless he is too frightened to speak," I thought, "and it is right
that he should fly as quickly as possible to save his life."

Now, as I was soon to learn, I was doing the seņor a bitter wrong in
my mind, seeing that he never dreamed of deserting me, but went to
find a means of rescue. As he told me afterwards, when he reached the
mouth of the tunnel, he could think of no way by which I might be
saved, since these mountains were uninhabited, and it would take
several hours to bring men from Cumarvo.

Outside the mine he sat himself down to consider what could be done,
but no thought came, for it was impossible to use the strength of the
horses in that narrow place. Then he sprang up and looked round him in
despair. Close to him was a little ravine hollowed by water, and on
its very edge grew a small mimosa thorn of which the long roots had
been washed almost bare by a flood. He saw it, and an inspiration
entered into him. With the help of a lever he might be able to do a
feat to which his unaided strength was not equal.

Springing at the little tree, that being of so tough a wood was the
best possible for his purpose, he tore it from such root-hold as
remained to it. A few strokes with his heavy hunting-knife trimmed off
the branches and fibres, and soon he was creeping carefully up the
tunnel, dragging the trunk after him. When he had gone some twenty
paces he heard another fragment of the roof fall, and, so he said in
his story, was minded to fly.

He had but just escaped from a horrible end, the end that generations
ago overtook the poor Aztec, and it was awful to brave it again. He
knew that his chances of being able to rescue me were few indeed,
whereas those that he would perish miserably in the attempt were many.
Then he remembered what my sufferings must be if I still lived, and
how his own conscience would reproach him in the after years, should
he leave me to my fate, and he went on.

Now he could see that the half-detached mass of the roof still hung;
it was a smaller fragment which had fallen, one nearer to the
entrance. He could see also that I lay in the same position beneath
the rock, and he thought that I was dead, because I neither moved nor
spoke, though, in fact, I had but swooned under the agony of my
suffering.

"Are you dead?" he whispered, and I heard his voice through my sleep,
and, lifting my head, looked up at him astonished, for I had never
thought to see him again.

"Do I behold a spirit," I said, "or is it you come back?"

"It is I, Ignatio. and I have brought a lever. Now when I lift,
struggle forward if you can."

Then he placed the trunk of the thorn-tree in what seemed to him the
best position, and put all his strength upon it. It was in vain; even
so he could not stir the rock.

"Try a little more to the right," I said, faintly; "there is a better
hold."

He shifted the lever and dragged at it till his muscles cracked, and I
felt the stone tremble as its bulk began to rise.

"If you can help ever so little, it will come!" he gasped.

Then in my despair, though the anguish of it nearly killed me, I set
my palms upon the ground, and, contracting myself like a snake that is
held with a forked stick, thrust upwards with my back till the point
of the stone was raised to the height of eight or ten inches from the
ground.

For a moment, and one only, it hung there; next instant the lever
slipped, and down it came again. But I had taken my chance, for,
clinging to the floor with my fingers, so soon as my back was free,
with a quick movement I dragged myself a foot or more forward. Then
the point of rock that had been lifted from my spine fell again, but
this time it struck the ground between my thighs.

Now he seized me by the arms and tore me free, though I left one of my
long boots beneath the stone. I strove to rise, but could not because
of the hurt to my back.

"You must carry me, seņor," I said.

He glanced at the mass that trembled above us; then, giving me the
candle, he lifted me from the ground like an infant and staggered
forward down the tunnel. Perhaps we had gone some seven or eight
paces, not more, when there was a dreadful crash behind us. The roof
had fallen in, and the spot which we occupied some thirty seconds
before was now piled high with rocks.

"Oh!" I said; "cracks are showing in the stone above us!" and he
rushed forward till we found ourselves outside the mine.

Now I bowed my head and returned thanks for my escape; then, lifting
it, I looked my preserver in the face and said:

"I swear by the name of God, seņor, that He never made a man nobler
than yourself!"

The next instant I fell forward and fainted there among the ferns.

                  *       *       *       *       *

Ten days had passed since I was carried from the mouth of that
accursed mine back to Cumarvo in a litter, and during all this time I
had suffered much pain in my back, and been very ill--so ill, indeed,
that I was scarcely allowed to speak with anyone. Now, however, I was
much better, and one afternoon the Seņor Strickland, assisted by my
foster-brother Molas, lifted me from my bed into a hammock.

"By the way, Ignatio," said the seņor when Molas had gone, "I never
gave you back this charm of yours. What a strange trinket it is!" he
added, taking it from his neck; "and what did you mean by your talk in
the tunnel about its making me heir to the empire of the Aztecs in the
heart of every Indian, and the rest of it? I suppose that you were
delirious with pain, and did not know what you were saying."

"Is the door shut, seņor?" I asked; "and are you sure that there is no
one on the verandah? Good! Then draw your chair nearer and I will tell
you something. I am not certain that I should take this talisman back
again, still I will do so for reasons which you shall learn presently.

"Know, seņor, that this broken gem is at once the foundation-stone and
the secret symbol of a great order, of which, although you have not
been initiated into it, you are now one of the lords, seeing that the
crowning and vital ceremony of the creation of a Lord of the Heart
consists in the hanging of the symbol about his neck for the space of
a minute only by myself, who am the chief lord and Keeper of the Heart
for life, and you have worn it for ten whole days.

"Before we part I will call a chapter of the order--for even among
these mountains we have brethren--and you shall be initiated into its
ritual and raised to the rank of a chief lord, as is your right.
Meanwhile I will instruct you briefly in its mysteries, as it is my
bounden duty to do.

"Understand, seņor, that the first duty of the servant of the Heart is
silence, and that silence I demand of you. Men have died ere now,
seņor; yes, they have died on the rack in the dungeons of the
Inquisition, and shrivelled as wizards in the fires of the stake,
sooner than reveal those things that have been told them upon the
faith of the Heart, against which the confessional itself cannot
prevail--no, not with the best of Catholics."

"But suppose that a man should not keep silence, Ignatio, what then?"
he asked.

"There is a land, seņor," I answered, "where the most talkative grow
dumb, and its borders can be crossed by all, even by the Lords of the
Heart, for fearful is the doom of a false brother!"

"You mean that if I repeat anything I may hear, I shall be murdered."

"Indeed, no, seņor; but you may happen to die. I speak on the Heart;
do you hear with the Ears?"

"I hear with the Ears," he answered, catching my meaning.

"Very well, seņor, since you have now sworn secrecy to me by the most
solemn oath that can pass the lips of man, I will speak to you openly.
This is the tale of the Broken Heart, so far as I know it, though how
much of it is truth and how much is legend I cannot say:

"You have heard the story of that white man, or god, sometimes called
Quetzal by the Indians, and sometimes Cucumatz, who came to these
lands in the far past and civilised their peoples? Afterwards he
vanished away in a ship, promising that when many generations had
passed he would return again.

"When he had gone, the empire which he created fell into the hands of
two brothers, whose chief city was either at Palenque or in its
neighbourhood, and the citizens of this empire, like we Christians,
worshipped one good god, the true God, under the name of the Heart of
Heaven, and to Him they offered few sacrifices save those of fruit and
flowers. Now one of these brothers married a wife from another
country--a daughter of devils, very beautiful and a great witch.

"Soon this woman, as in the story of the wives of Solomon and their
lord, drew away the king, her husband, from the true faith to the
worship of the gods of her own land, and brought it about that he
offered human sacrifice to them. Then there arose a great confusion in
that country, and the end of it was that the people divided themselves
into two parties, the worshippers of the Heart of Heaven and the
worshippers of devils.

"They made war upon each other, till many of their chief men were
killed; then they came to an agreement whereby the nation was
sundered. Half of it, under that king who had married the woman,
marched northwards, and became the fathers of the Aztecs and other
tribes; and half, the faithful worshippers of the Heart, remained in
the Tobasco country.

"Now from that day forward evil overtook both these peoples, for
though the Aztecs flourished for a while, in the end Spaniards
despoiled them. The worshippers of the Heart also were driven from
their cities by hordes of barbarians who rolled down upon them, and
their faith perished, or seemed to perish."

"But what has this history to do with the charm about your neck,
Ignatio?" he asked.

"I will tell you. When Quetzal sailed away from his people, so says
the legend, he left the stone, that once he had worn upon his brow, of
which this is the half, to be a treasure to the kings who came after
him. Also he set this fate upon it: that while the Heart remained
unbroken, for so long should the people be one and whole; but if it
came about that it was cut or shattered, they should be divided with
it, to be no more one people until again the fragments were one stone.

"Now when these king-brethren quarrelled and parted, they sawed the
token asunder, as you see, each of them keeping a half, this half
being that of him who married the woman. For generations it was worn
by his descendants, and upon their death-beds passed on by them to
another, or at times taken from their bodies after they were dead.

"There are many stories told about the stone in the old days, and it
is certain that he who had it was the real king of the country for the
time being. At length it came into the hands of the great Guatemoc,
last of the Aztec emperors, who, before the Spaniards hung him, found
means to send it to his son, from whom it has come down to me."

"To you? What have you to do with Guatemoc?"

"I am his lineal descendant, seņor, the eleventh in the male line."

"Then you ought to be Emperor of the Indians if every man had his
rights, Ignatio."

"That is so, seņor, but of my own story I will tell you presently. Now
of this stone. Through all the ages it has never been lost, and it is
known in the land from end to end; he who wears it for his life being
called 'Keeper of the Heart,' and also 'Hope of those who wait,' since
it may happen in his day that the two halves will come together
again."

"And what if they do?"

"Then, so says the legend, the Indians will once more be a mighty
nation, and drive those who oppress them into the sea, as the wind
drives dust."

Now the seņor rose from his chair and walked up and down the room.

"Do you believe all this?" he asked, suddenly.

"Yes," I answered, "or the greater part of it. Indeed, if what I hear
is true, the lost half of the talisman that has been missing for so
many generations is in Mexico at this moment, and, so soon as I am
well enough, I go to seek him who bears it, and who has come from far
to find me. That is why we must part, seņor."

"Where has this man come from?" he asked, eagerly.

"I do not know for certain," I answered, "but I think that he has come
from the sacred city of the Indians, the hidden Golden City which the
Spaniards sought for but could not find, though it still exists among
the mountains and deserts of the far interior, whither I hope to
journey with him."

"That still exists! Ignatio, you must be mad. It never has existed
except in the imagination."

"You say so, seņor, but I think differently. At least, I knew a man
whose grandfather had seen it. He, the grandfather, was a native of
San Juan Batista, in Tobasco, and when he was young he committed some
crime and fled inland to save his life.

"All that befell him I do not know, but at length he found himself
wandering by the shores of a great lake, somewhere in or beyond the
country that is now known as Guatemala, and, being exhausted, he laid
himself down to die there and fell asleep.

"When he awoke, people were standing round him, like the Indians to
look at, but very light in colour, and beautifully dressed in white
robes, with necklaces of emeralds and feather capes. These people put
him on board a great canoe, and took him to a glorious city with a
high pyramid in the centre of it, which was named Heart of the World.

"Of this city he saw little, however, for its inhabitants kept him a
prisoner, only from time to time he was brought before their king and
elders, who sat in a hall filled with images of dead men fashioned in
gold, and there was questioned as to the country whence he came, the
tribes that dwelt in it, and more especially of the white men who
ruled the land.

"In that hall alone, so he said, there were more gold and precious
stones than are to be found in all Mexico. When he had nothing more to
tell them, the people wished to kill him, fearing lest he should
escape and bring upon them the white men who loved gold. The end of it
was that he did escape by the help of a woman, who guided him back
towards the sea, though she never came there, for she died upon the
road.

"Afterwards this man went to live in a little village near Palenque,
where he also died, having revealed nothing of what he had seen, since
he feared lest the vengeance of the People of the Heart should follow
him. When he was dying he told his son, who told his son, who told the
tale to me. Seņor, it has been the dream of my life to visit that
city, and now at last I think that I have found the clue which will
lead me to it."

"Why do you want to visit it, Ignatio?"

"To understand that, seņor, you must know my history." And I told him
of the failure of the great plot and the part that I had played in it,
all of which I have already set out, also of the secret hopes and
ambitions of my life.

"Seņor," I added, "though I am beaten I am not yet crushed, and I
still desire to build up a great Indian empire. I see by your face
that you think me foolish. You may be right or I may be right. I may
be pursuing truths or dreams, I may be sane and a redeemer, or insane
and a fool. What does it matter? I follow the light that runs before
me; will-o'-the-wisp or star, it leads to one end, and for me it is
the light that I am born to follow. If you believe nothing else, at
least believe this, seņor, that I do not seek my own good or
advancement, but rather that of my people. At the worst, I am not a
knave, I am only a fool."

"But how will you help your cause by visiting this city, supposing it
to exist, Ignatio?"

"Thus, seņor: these people--among whom without doubt the old man of
whom I have spoken, who is named Zibalbay, is a chief or king--are the
true stock and head of all the Indian races, and when they learn my
plans and whom I am, they will be glad to furnish me with means
whereby I can bring them to their former empire."

"And if they take another view of the matter, Ignatio?"

"Then I fail, that is all, and among so many failures one more will
scarcely matter. I am like a swimmer who sees, or thinks that he sees,
a single plank that may bear him to safety. Maybe he cannot reach that
plank, or, if he reach it, maybe it will sink beneath his weight. At
least, he has no other hope.

"Seņor, I have no other hope. There in the Golden City is untold
wealth, for the man saw it, and without money, great sums of money, I
am helpless, therefore I go thither to win the money. The ship has
foundered under me, and with it the cargo of my ambitions and the work
of my life; so, being desperate, I fall back upon a desperate
expedient.

"First, I will seek this man, that the two halves of the Heart may
come together, and the prophecy be fulfilled; then, if it may be, I
will travel with him to the City, Heart of the World, careless whether
I live or die, but determined, if there is need, to die fighting for
the fulfilment of the dream of an Indian empire--Christian,
regenerated, and stretching from sea to sea--that I have followed all
my days."

"The dream, Ignatio? Perhaps you name it well, yet few have such noble
dreams. And now, who goes with you on this journey?"

"Who goes with me? Molas, as far as the temple where the Indian is.
After that, if I proceed, no one. Who would accompany a man grown old
in failure, whom even those that love him deem a visionary, on such a
desperate quest? Why, if I should dare to tell my projects even, men
would mock me as children mock an idiot in the street. I go alone,
seņor, perhaps to die."

"As regards the dying, Ignatio, of course I can say nothing, since all
men must die sooner or later, and the moment and manner of their end
is in the hand of Providence. But for the rest you shall not make this
journey alone, that is, if you care to have me for a companion, for I
will accompany you."

"You, seņor, /you/. Think what it means: the certainty of every sort
of danger, the risk of every kind of death, and at the end, the
probability of failure. It is folly, seņor."

"Ignatio," he answered, "I will be frank with you. Notwithstanding all
the prophecies about the wonders that are to follow the reuniting of
the Heart, and the messages from the old man in the temple, I think
your scheme of building up an Indian empire greater than that which
Cortez destroyed, as impracticable as it is grand, since the time has
gone by when it could have been done, or perhaps it has not yet
returned.

"Before the Indians can rule again, they must forget the bitter
lessons and the degradation of ages; in short, they must be educated,
Ignatio. Still, if you think otherwise, that is your affair; you can
only fail, and there are failures more glorious than most successes.
Do you understand me?"

"Perfectly, seņor."

"Very well. And now as regards the search for this Golden City. To me
the matter seems very vague, since your hopes of finding it are based
upon a traveller's tale, told by a man who died seventy or eighty
years ago, and the chance that a certain person, whom you have not yet
seen, has come from there, and is willing to guide you back to it.

"Still, the prospect of hunting for that city pleases me, for I am an
adventurer in my heart. If ever we get further than the forest country
in Tobasco, where your friend with the token is waiting for you, our
search will probably end in the leaving of our bones to decorate some
wilderness or mountain top in the unknown regions of Guatemala.

"But what of that? I have no chick or child; my death would matter
nothing to any living soul; for years I have worked hard with small
results; why should I not follow my natural bent and become an
adventurer? I can scarcely do worse than I have done, and I think that
the way of life would suit me.

"That mine you showed me is rich enough no doubt, but I have no
capital to deal with it, and if I had, my e