“All this is very fine,” she said, “but there is nothing to show that the Indians still sacrifice human brings.”
“How can you say that!” they exclaimed in chorus.
“Well, has anybody ever had definite proof of it?”
Aunt Agnes was not to be shaken in her convictions.
“When I was a little girl,” she declared, “I had an old nurse who belonged to one of the Lake Titicaca tribes of Quichuas. She told me that she herself had seen three Spanish girls walled up alive at three successive Interaymi fêtes.”
“Where did the girls come from?” asked Dick.
“They were Lima girls.”
“But then, any number of people must have known of it,” he answered, secretly amused by the grave airs of the two old ladies.
“It was, and is, common property,” retorted Aunt Agnes. “The names of their last two victims were known to everybody. One vanished ten years ago, and the other ten years before that.”
“Yes, yes, common property!” laughed Don Christobal.
“There is nothing to laugh about, Christobal,” said Aunt Agnes drily.
And the duenna repeated in a low voice, “No, no, nothing to laugh about.”
The Marquis was determined to have his laugh.
“Let us mourn the poor children,” he said, groaning. “Cut off from the affection of their parents at so early an age! How terrible!”
“Christobal, can you tell me what became of Amelia de Vargas and Marie Cristina de Orellana?”
“Yes, what became of them?” urged Irene.
“There we are!... the old story! I expected it!” exclaimed the Marquis.
“You might speak seriously! You knew Amelia de Vargas....”
“A charming girl... the sweetest smile in the city!... That was twenty years ago.... How time flies!... Yes, she disappeared... with a poor cousin.”
“I heard the other day that it was a toreador,” interjected Maria-Teresa. “They revive that old story every ten years, at the time of the Interaymi.”
“She disappeared outside the bull-ring,” explained Aunt Agnes. “There was a fight in the crowd, and she was separated from her parents. Nobody ever saw her again. Afterwards, some people remembered catching sight of her surrounded by a group of Indians. She died at their hands, walled up alive.”
“What a gorgeous imagination crowds have! But the fact remains that that poor cousin of hers disappeared about the same time.”
“So you are pleased to say, Christobal. But what of Maria Cristina de Orellana?”
“Oh, that was another matter... a very sad case. She was out for a walk with her father round the Cuzco, and went into one of the caves, never to reappear. She lost her way in the old subterranean passages, of course. The government had all the entrances blocked up after that.”
“And since then,” commented Aunt Agnes, “her poor father has been a madman. For the past ten years, he has haunted the Cuzco ruins, calling in vain to his daughter. He, at all events, will not believe that she was not carried off by the Indians.”
“But you yourself say he is mad.”
“He lost his reason when he acquired the certitude that she had perished in their temple. A few days before she vanished, Maria-Cristina mysteriously received a very old and very heavy gold bracelet. That bracelet had a center plaque representing the sun....”
“My dear Agnes, you know that in this country jewelers stick the sun in wherever and whenever they can.”
“That bracelet was the real one... the same one that was sent to Amelia.”
“Are you not exaggerating, Agnes? Really, really!... And with stories like these running about, they expect poor historians to be accurate!... I hope you are not taking notes of all this, Mr. Montgomery.”
“I am exaggerating nothing,” retorted Aunt Agnes obstinately. “It was the real Golden Sun bracelet.... Every ten years since Atahualpa, the last Inca king, was burned alive by Pizarro, the Inca priests have sent it to a Spanish girl they had chosen to be the Bride of the Sun. And every one of them has been walled up alive.... I remember that poor Orellana girl laughing and joking about the Golden Sun bracelet! The whole town knew about it.”
“The whole town always does have a pretty lively imagination at the time of the Interaymi,” insisted the Marquis. He turned to Mr. Montgomery. “You have no idea, my dear sir, how hard it is for our Society to get away from all these weird legends.”
“Legends are not things to be despised in research work,” disagreed Uncle Francis. “For my part, I am delighted to have found a country where they are still so living.”
At this moment a servant came in with a small parcel on a silver tray.
“A registered package, señorita,” he said. “Will the señorita sign here?”
Maria-Teresa, having signed, was turning the box over in her fingers.
“It is from Cajamarca,” she remarked. “Who from, I wonder? I know nobody there. ... Will you excuse me?”
The young girl cut the string, broke the seals and opened the little wooden box.
“A bracelet!” she exclaimed, and laughed a little nervously. “What an extraordinary coincidence!... Why, it is the Golden Sun bracelet! It is, really! The bracelet of the Bride of the Sun!”
Every person in the room had risen, with the exception of the two old ladies, who sat as if stunned. All eyes were turned on the heavy bracelet in darkened old gold, with its sun-adorned center plaque on which the rays seemed blurred out by the dust of centuries.
“Well, that is funny!” laughed Maria-Teresa.
“Of course!” exclaimed the Marquis, whose voice had changed a little. “Evidently a joke by Alonso de Cuelar. You refused him, my dear, and he has invented rather a pretty revenge. His little vengeance on the Bride of the Sun.... All the young men of the town call you that because you refuse to marry.... Well, what are we looking so blue about over there? Surely, Agnes, you are not going to make yourself ill over a harmless joke like this?”
Maria-Teresa was showing the bracelet to Uncle Francis and Dick.
“Father!” she exclaimed. “I think I shall keep it! Tell Don Alonso I shall wear it as a token of friendship.... It really is a beauty!... What do you think of it, Mr. Montgomery?”
“It seems to me at least three or four hundred years old.”
“Pieces like that are still occasionally found in excavations round royal tombs, but they are rare,” said the Marquis. “I am not surprised Don Alonso had to go to Cajamarca for that one.”
“Where is Cajamarca?” asked Dick.
“Cajamarca,” said the savant, horrified at his nephew’s ignorance, “is the Caxamarxa of the Incas, their second capital in Pizarro’s day....”
“And the city where their last king was burned at the stake!” groaned Aunt Agnes.
They rushed to her side, for she was on the point of fainting and had to be carried to her room. The old duenna followed them, as white as her lace, and crossing herself tremulously.
IV
ON THE DAY after his arrival, Uncle Francis was solemnly and officially received by the Geographical Society of Lima, the fine archeological, statistical and hydrographical work of which keenly interested him. With so much scientific enthusiasm did he express himself, that he conquered all hearts. By far the proudest and happiest man present, however, was Don Christobal, basking in the reflected glory of his distinguished guest. As they were all leaving after the ceremony — Maria-Teresa wearing her bracelet despite the protests of her aunt and the duenna — the Marquis met Don Alonso de Cuelar.
“Why, Cuelar,” he exclaimed, “I thought you were at Cajamarca!”
Don Alonso opened his eyes in surprise, evidently not understanding.
“Come, come, Cuelar, you may confess. I shall not be angry. Both Maria-Teresa and I agree that your little revenge was a very neat one.”
“My revenge?...”
“Of course! The bracelet!”
“What bracelet?”
At
this moment Maria-Teresa and Dick joined the group. Maria-Teresa, seeing her father laughing as he talked, felt quite sure that the mystery of the bracelet had already been cleared up.
“Thank you ever so much,” she said, holding out the slim hand adorned by the heavy bracelet “You see, I wear it as a token of friendship.”
“But I should never have permitted myself such a liberty,” protested the young man, looking in amazement from one to the other.
“Are you serious?... It really was not you?”
“No!... But what does it all mean?... And what a peculiar bracelet.”
“Do you not recognize it?” laughed Maria-Teresa, still unconvinced. “It is, apparently, the Golden Sun bracelet which the Indian priests always send to the Bride of the Sun at the Interaymi.... And as you, I understand, were the originator of my nickname, I naturally supposed that, in spite of everything you heard, you bore no malice to the Virgin of the Sun.”
“What a charming idea! I am only sorry,” he added, “that it was not mine. I shall never forgive myself for not having thought of it. You must attribute it, señorita, to one of those other unfortunates who, like myself, have worshiped in vain.... There is Pedro Ribera.... He looks dark enough to have done it.... Ribera!”
But Ribera knew no more of the bracelet than Don Alonso. He also admired the strange jewel, and was equally sorry he had not sent it.
Don Christobal was becoming irritated, and was sorry now that he had mentioned the matter to them. He could not, without appearing ridiculous, ask them not to speak of it, and he knew very well that within two hours every tea-table in the Plaza Mayor would be discussing the new topic. Maria-Teresa guessed his thoughts.
“As our guess was wrong, the whole thing rather loses point So we must wait until the generous donor comes and confesses. In the meantime, let it be forgotten.” And, slipping off the bracelet, she put it into her reticule.
“I wonder if it was Huascar,” suggested Dick, as the two young men left them.
“Huascar? Why Huascar?” asked the Marquis.
“Well, it’s an old Indian bracelet.... He’s the only Indian I know of, and I know he is very devoted to the family. Suppose he found the bracelet in some old ruin and didn’t know what to do with it...
“Oh, let us not talk of it any more,” interrupted Maria-Teresa, slightly troubled. “What does it matter!... Besides, we are bound to know, sooner or later.... Some day a friend of father’s, back from the Sierra, will ask me why I am not wearing his present. That is sure to happen.”
“Of course it is,” affirmed Dick.
The Marquis, far from satisfied, and still seeking a possible explanation, suddenly turned on Dick.
“You sent it!” he exclaimed, triumphant.
“I? Why, I have only just arrived in the country....”
“But you could very well have bought it when the liner put in at Guayaquil, and then sent it to some agent or other at Gajamarca to have it forwarded here.... You must have read the legend of the bracelet in one of your uncle’s books.”
“Really, Father!” protested Maria-Teresa. “Mr. Montgomery is an engineer....”
“Yes, yes, I know. Very hard-working.... Come here to try experiments with some new pump to clear the Cuzco gold-mines of water.... I know all that.... But that is no reason why he should not send you a bracelet.”
“But why should he, Father?”
“Is there not a reason why he should, my daughter?”
This time, Maria-Teresa blushed deeply and Dick tried to look unconcerned, while Don Christobal smiled at them quizzically.
“So you thought your old father was blind, eh?... You thought he guessed nothing... that he did not understand what you had left behind you in London?... Well, Dick?”
“Really, sir... I... I... hardly dared hope....”
“Didn’t you?... There, there, that’s enough.... You may put the bracelet on her arm again.... Pair of young fools.” Maria-Teresa slipped her arm through her father’s, and squeezed it.
“Dear Father!”
Then, turning to Dick and opening her reticule, she whispered rapidly:
“Say you sent it. What can it matter?” Dick, completely taken aback, clasped the bracelet on Maria-Teresa’s wrist without protest. He scarcely heard a word said by the Marquis, who was delighted to have solved the mystery.
“Well, young man, you can flatter yourself that you thoroughly mystified everybody.” And with that he hurried after Uncle Francis, who had been carried off to drink champagne by a group of admirers.
Dick and Maria-Teresa, left alone, exchanged looks. A moment later, they were brought to earth again by the advent of a horde of excited scientists.
“But what will your father say when he finds out who really sent the bracelet?”
“He will forgive you. I only made you tell the story to reassure him.... Between you and me, those old tales told by Aunt Agnes and Irene were worrying him a little.... He is rather a child in some ways.”
Carriages and motors were rapidly filling with people starting for the excavations outside the town, and then on by rail to Ancon, where Uncle Francis was to be shown the latest Inca discoveries. The Marquis and Mr. Montgomery passed them in one motor. Maria-Teresa waved to them, and walked on towards the town with Dick.
They were all to meet again that evening to dine and pass the night at the Marquis’ sea-side villa between Lima and Ancon. Uncle Francis would thus be able to begin his researches the very next morning, for Don Christobal’s villa, itself a treasure-house of antiques, stood in the very center of the excavations.
Meanwhile, the young people, less interested in things of death than the members of the Geographical and Archaeological Society, went to explore Lima. It was only after a long walk in the Pascos de Amancaes that they in their turn started by motor over an execrable road.
The approach of night could already be felt, and the great plain over which they were speeding was made even more desolate by the presence of the slow-flying gallinazos, or black vultures, overhead. These scavengers, half-starved in appearance, are the common adjuncts of scenery in Peru, tolerated and even respected, as they are, by a grateful municipality.
Here and there were haciendas, each with its group of pastures and grazing horses, kept from galloping into the surrounding waste by the four-foot mud walls. Otherwise, it was a sandy desert, at some points dotted with skeletons of a long-dead race dug up by curious scientists and then left to bleach in the sun.
“Not exactly cheerful,” commented Dick.
Maria-Teresa, intent on her driving, did not answer, but pointed with one gauntleted hand at a group of half-breeds playing bowls with human skulls at the corner of a hacienda.
They were soon in the outskirts of Ancon, and found the Marquis, Uncle Francis, and their fellow-scientists busily arguing in the center of an Inca cemetery. On all sides were opened tombs, each containing a mummy rudely drawn from its thousand-year sleep by the pick of the excavator. Dick and Maria-Teresa had left their motor, but did not join the others. Instead, they wandered silently, almost sadly, in another direction, and the car had started off again in the care of the negro chauffeur, to be garaged at Ancon.
“It is horrible,” said Maria-Teresa, pressing Dick’s hand. “Why cannot they leave them in peace?”
Seated on a little mound well out of sight of the others, they forgot their surroundings. And it was in this horrible burial-ground they exchanged their first true lovers’ kiss.
The sound of voices brought them back to reality. The president of the Society, followed by an interested retinue, was explaining the most interesting tombs.
“Walking through this necropolis,” he said, “it is no effort to evoke the shades of the Incas, and to feel for a minute as if one were living among them.... Here, six feet below ground, we first found a dog which had been sacrificed on its master’s tomb.... The dead man’s wife and chief servants also followed him to the next world.... We next found the wife’s body.... Lik
e the dog, she had been strangled, probably because she had not had the courage to take her own life.... Finally, we heard the Indian workman cry ont, ‘Aqui esta el muerto.’ (Here is the dead one)... for to the native mind, the only body worthy of notice is that of the master.... When we cut the thongs and unrolled the wrappings about him — the man had evidently been a great chief — we found the mummy in an extraordinary state of preservation, — the head was almost intact.... Gentlemen, the ancient Egyptians did no better.”
At this moment, excited ones from another part of the cemetery attracted their attention, and a workman ran up to tell them that a sensational discovery had been made — the tomb of three Inca chiefs with strange-shaped skulls. Dick and Maria-Teresa followed the others to the spot indicated.
When they reached the newly-discovered tomb, workmen were passing up to the surface little sacks full of corn, jars which had once contained chicha — all the things necessary for a long voyage. Then came golden-vases, silver amphora, goblets, hammered statuettes, jewels: — a veritable treasure brought to light by one stroke of the pick. Finally, the three mummies were brought to the surface and unrolled with every precaution. One of the scientists present bent down to uncover the faces, and there was a murmur of horror from those present.
To understand what Dick and Maria-Teresa had been among the first to see, it is necessary for the reader to know that it was customary among the Incas to shape living skulls to any form they wished. This strange custom exists even in modern days, though in a far lesser degree, among the Basque inhabitants of the Pyrenees. The skulls of babies, set in vices or bound into various molds, were gradually deformed till they took the shape of a sugar-loaf, of a squarish box, of an enormous lime, and so forth. Phrenology was evidently a science known to the Incas, who, precursors of Gall and Spezhurn, thus sought to develop abnormally the intellectual or warlike qualities of a child by compressing or enlarging such and such a part of the brain. It has been proved, though, that this practise was allowed only in the case of children of the Inca himself, called upon in afterlife to take high position in the State. The common people kept their normal skulls and normal brains.
Collected Works of Gaston Leroux Page 320