Captain from Castile

by Samuel Shellabarger; Internet Archive

Pedro grew aware that the attack centered more and more on him. Well-known to the Aztecs, he could hear his name shouted in a swelling volume of sound. "Xiuhtecuhtli! Fire Lord!" He was aware too that they were trying to capture, rather than kill him. Such a noted prisoner would be especially pleasing to the gods. Perhaps it was this that had preserved him. Half-blinded with sweat, exhausted, bruised, his vizor torn off, his buckler dented and warped, he could otherwise hardly have escaped the thicket of javelins and hail of blows that felled one after the other of his comrades.

  "Vivaj senores!" he gasped. "We've made the course. Look—"

  A suffocating, stinking wave of human flesh, gaudy featherwork, and animal skins surged against them. "Xiuhtecuhtli!" With head, shoulder,

  knee, foot, sword and buckler, drawing on a last unsuspected reservoir of fury, he beat it back, and, charging in turn, cleared a circle.

  "Now, cavaliers, to the water!"

  Then, as he glanced around, his heart momentarily stopped. Only four were left: Catana, Juan Ruano, of the old company, Garcia, and a Narvaez recruit who at that moment, struck in the throat by a javelin, plunged forward to the causeway.

  Turning his back to the Indians in front of him, Pedro dashed toward Catana, caught her by the waist.

  "Keep her between us," he yelled to Garcia.

  The three of them, with Ruano, hurled themselves against the thinner line of Aztecs separating them from the edge of the gap twenty yards distant, burst through, and leaped down into the water.

  He was vaguely conscious of the roar behind them; of relief when he struggled to his feet on some kind of yielding object and found the water no higher than his waist; of struggling forward, still keeping a grip on Catana, with Garcia on the other side of her; of sinking sometimes to his shoulders and rising sometimes to his knees on the cluttered bottom; of the lilt of hope on seeing the opposite embankment lined with Spanish soldiers.

  But escape would not be that easy. Pursuers were in the water behind them, and now a couple of canoes shot in from opposite ends of the gap. Pedro saw Garcia grapple with one of these and heave it over. The other sheered off, as if choosing its moment to strike. Ruano had disappeared. With bucklers gone, but with swords and daggers active, Pedro, Catana, and Garcia somehow waded, scrambled, dragged their way across, returned blows, shook off the eager hands and arms for a last time, reached the foot of the embankment..

  Lord! Why didn't that fellow in complete armor up there lend a hand ? He was evidently one of the Narvaez captains; but his vizor eas closed and Pedro did not recognize his harness. The men with him, a rear guard left to hold the embankment against the enemy, were also newcomers. They gave shouts of encouragement, but what Pedro wanted was the butt end of the lance on which the steel-clad captain was leaning. Too short of breath to speak, he stretched up an arm. At the same time, glancing back, he saw the remaining canoe manned by eight paddlers closing in.

  "Your lance," he croaked, stretching his free arm further up and holding Catana with the other.

  Then the man above him clicked back his vizor and showed the face of Diego de Silva.

  Deaf to the appeal, he continued to lean on the shaft of his lance and stared down. A blow could not have been more deadly than his inaction.

  The decisive second was up. Tawny, muscular arms closed around Pedro—this time not to be shaken off. Exhausted beyond effort, already bound, the three captives were dragged into the canoe.

  "Name of God!" called de Silva, perhaps for the benefit of his men. "What a pity! Lo siento mucho, de Vargas."

  ix

  The several hundred Spaniards and Tlascalans captured during tne night of the retreat were as surely doomed as if they had been cattle herded in a stockyard. Their hearts belonged to the gods and the rest of their flesh to their captors, who would devour them in a cannibal sacrament that was fortifying to body and soul. Like cattle, too, they were graded according to value. So it was inevitable that Pedro de Vargas should take first place in this society of death. No one else equal to him in rank had been captured. As second in command of the Spanish garrison during Cortes's absence, he was well-known, much-hated, and much admired. His Aztec name, Xiuhtecuhtli, bore witness to this, for Xiuhtecuhtli or Huehueteotl, Lord of Fire, was one of the greater gods.

  Inseparably associated with him in the minds of the Indians were Catana, whom they knew as his wife, nicknaming her Chantico, goddess of the hearth fire, and Juan Garcia, known, perhaps because of his size, as Tepeyollotl, Heart of the Mountains. That the three of them were taken together seemed logical..To the symbolically-minded priests, they formed a trio somehow connected with the Aztec god of fire and not to be separated without offending him. They must be sacrificed as a unit to the divine Xiuhtecuhtli.

  Conveyed by water to the vicinity of the great teocalli, they were marched through jeering crowds to the temple enclosure. There they were stripped, as befitted sacrificial victims, and consigned to a special cage in the line of cages where prisoners of war awaited their turn on the altars. The cell was especially distinguished by a placard in picture writing.

  Since Pedro, Catana, and Garcia were among the last to be taken, the cages were crowded to suffocation when they arrived; and doleful voices called to them, as they were brought more dead than living to

  their lockup. It was beyond them to answer even if they had heard. Numb with fatigue and despair, they were hardly conscious even of their nakedness, for what does nakedness matter to the dead? Shoved into the narrow limits of their cell, they sank to the floor in a half-stupor.

  The cages were situated toward the rear of the temple enclosure and, like everything else, were overshadowed by the square pyramid of the teocalli. As their name implies, they were a series of coops intended for the human sacrificial animals, with a latticework of thick wooden bars across the front. Here, when time allowed, prisoners were fattened before the kill for the same reason that livestock is fattened. But on this occasion the gods and their worshipers alike were too starved for blood to wait on the fattening process; the sacrifices would soon begin.

  The great drum on top of the pyramid continued to pulse and bellow. The central square gradually filled up with warriors back from the causeway and thousands of the city population out to celebrate the longed-for day of liberty and triumph. Already a coffle of Tlascalans were making the fatal ascent around the sides of the pyramid. A scream, piercing between two drum beats, announced the first victim; and a gaping, lifeless body rolled down the steps of the cu to the skilled hatchets and knives of the butchers at the foot.

  A moan from Catana roused Pedro. With a flash of horror, he saw that she was lying in a pool of blood.

  "God in heaven!" he exclaimed. "Querida mia! I didn't know you were wounded."

  She shook her head, speaking through her clenched teeth. "Do not look, senor—Juan. Both of you stand in front of the bars so that no one can see." Her voice was pinched off.

  "But Catana—"

  "No, don't look, please. It doesn't matter if I die now." She added after a moment, "I'm glad the baby died first. Stand in front of the bars, you and Juan. . . . I'm strong. It won't last— What does anything matter . . ."

  Gold with anxiety in spite of the leaden heat, Pedro and Garcia blocked the front of the cell as best they could. They stared out through the lattice of the bars at the blank stone base of the pyramid. Now and then, between the drum beats, they could hear Gatana's suppressed moans behind them. Garcia, his eyes smoldering, tapped nervously against the bars with one of his clenched fists.

  "If a fellow could do anything!" he kept muttering. "That's the hell of it!" And once he burst out: "A white man! A Castilian! Betray people of his own blood to these dogs! When, if he had only stretched out a hand—God! I wish I could rinse my mind of the thought of him and spit it out! That he should get away with it and live! Pedrito, I'm beginning to believe that there's not much justice in this world. I can understand how he could take it out on you and me, shameful as it is. But her!"

>   Pedro said nothing. AVhat he felt was too deep for words. Besides, even vengeance seemed past caring for. He realized suddenly that he hoped Catana would die. He could not face the thought of her led out to the stone of sacrifice. Rather than that, it would be better . , .

  Happening to meet Garcia's eyes, it seemed to him that he read the same thought in them. They both looked away.

  "Senor," came a wasted voice from behind, "will you bring the water . . . It is over. But don't look."

  Trung to obey her as much as he could in the narrow space, he fetched a half-jar of water from the corner of the cell.

  "If you would let me help you!"

  "No—please. I can manage."

  He returned to Garcia's side. "When do you think it will be our turn?" he muttered.

  The other shook his head. "Maybe right off, maybe tomorrow. There are a lot of us to kill. We'll probably be taken first or last—I think, last."

  At that moment, as if to contradict him, a guard of Aztecs stopped in front of the cage, and the door was slid back. In the same instant, Pedro turned on Catana, who, half-unconscious, had twisted over to her side. But for a second his heart failed him, and after that it was too late. A noose of cords fell around his arms, pinioning them, and he was jerked to the door. At first, Garcia's huge muscles surged against the rope; then he controlled himself. Two of the guards, entering, called Catana, but stopped when they saw the blood on the floor.

  "Dead?" asked one of them in Nahuatl.

  "Dying," answered Pedro, who had picked up a word or two of the language.

  The guard hesitated; then, with a shrug, he ordered Pedro and Garcia taken out and, bolting the door, marched them off toward the front of the temple enclosure.

  "Senora Nuestra" de Vargas prayed, "be good to my querida and let her now die speedily. Forgive her sins and mine. Grant that we may

  soon meet again beyond this life. Give thy blessing to my father and mother and protect them. Amen."

  The other white captives had been taken from their cages and lined up under heavy guard. Most of them were Narvaez people, whose burden of gold had made them easier to capture, but some were of the old company. Bloodstained, naked, disheveled, they were hard to recognize at first.

  Opposite them stood an array of gaudily dressed chiefs, eagle and ocelot warriors, green-plumed nobles; a line of barbaric shields, spears, and gewgaws. A number carried Christian swords taken in last night's battle. Some black-robed priests were gathering. A band of musicians prepared drums, conchs, and flutes.

  Pedro remembered the last time he had crossed the enclosure upon coming down from the victorious assault on the pyramid. He remembered it too on the day of Alvarado's massacre. The roles had changed; the shoe was on the other foot.

  As he and Garcia took their places at the end of the line of prisoners, the opposite ranks of Aztec caciques broke into jeers, pointing and laughing at him. This scoffing acted as a tonic. On the brink of death, one final duty remained: to give them as little satisfaction as possible.

  Pedro stared at them, then jerked his head and laughed, turning to Garcia.

  "Dogs' holiday, Juan."

  The hooting grew angrier.

  "Maybe we can nettle them into killing us with their spears. Give them a laugh."

  Garcia opened his big mouth in ribald defiance.

  A tall, broad-shouldered Aztec crossed over. He was young and plainly of high rank, from the royal green of his plumes and jewels. As he came nearer, Pedro recognized him as Guatemozin, Montezuma's nephew, a fanatical enemy of the Spaniards and the Aztec General-in-Chief. The young Indian's eyes blazed with hatred, but they could not outstare the banter in the green eyes that faced them.

  He made something of a speech, evidently ironic, then exultant, then menacing. In the middle of it, Pedro noticed the great gold chain around his neck. It was the famous chain of Juan Velasquez de Leon. He wore also a Castilian sword and fingered the hilt of it.

  When he had finished, Pedro yawned. "Why, you dog, it's easy for a slave to strut when his master is tied. Give me a sword, if you're man enough, and I wager my life against the chain you've stolen that, naked as I am, in five minutes I'll shave those feathers from your head, cut off

  your ears, and skewer your arse. If that isn't enough, we can go further into the matter."

  Apparently Guatemozin understood more Spanish than Pedro did Nahuatl. His eyes flashed black fire. For a moment, he seemed moved to take up the challenge. But it would not do to tempt the gods at this point. What if de Vargas made good his boast? Instead, Guatemozin struck the captive with all his strength across the face. And Pedro laughed.

  A sacrificial procession now formed: priests, caciques, guards, and some twenty Spaniards. The latter were placed at intervals between the others and driven forward at the point of spears. Drums, conchs, and flutes burst into rhythm, if not into melody, and the Hne advanced toward the flight of steps at the base of the pyramid.

  "Good-by, Redhead," called a voice. "We'll be meeting soon. Say a prayer for me."

  It was Juan Martin, nicknamed Narices or "Nosey," of the old company.

  Pedro called back: "I'll do that, comrade. Animo, Nosey! Hast a la vista!"

  Up to the first terrace of the teocalli and so around it, winding up to the summit, the white nakedness of the victims distinct from the garish costumes and black robes of the others, until at last the procession disappeared from sight on the broad top of the pyramid. Then came a wait that was hard to stand. Pedro knew that many eyes were leveled on him in a hard glee, and he kept his head up and his face expressionless; but inwardly he was praying hard for Nosey Martin and the other men up there, and for himself.

  A shriek escaped the rumble of the drum; a body, without its heart, was tossed over upon the first flight of steps. It rolled down them, gaining impetus, until it stopped on the pavement of the courtyard.

  The waiting priests worked quickly, beheading and flaying, for other bodies followed.

  De Vargas found that it steadied him to remark to Garcia: "Vaya, Juan, I wonder what Father Olmedo would have to say in defense of these Indians—or that other friar he keeps talking about, Las Casas. ... I envy the next Castilians who have the pleasure of sticking them!"

  But, getting no answer, he turned to see Garcia, staring blindly at nothing.

  "How is it with you?" he added.

  Garcia shook his head. "Funny, I keep thinking of the square in

  Jaen in front of the cathedral. Madrecita and the others. De Lora. No Indians there."

  Pedro got the point. He remembered the blackened stakes and helpless prisoners. He thought too of his sister's body in the hands of the torturers. Yes, there was a certain likeness between then and now.

  '"That was in the name of God," muttered Garcia; "this is in the name of Witchywolves. It's too deep for me, comrade. I wish I could get it out of my mind."

  It was too deep for Pedro as well. On the threshold of death, best not think of it.

  "Think of Our Lord"—the words came of themselves—"think of Our Lord, Juan. That's all we have left."

  Including the Tlascalans, some eighty victims had now been sacrificed to Huitzilopochtli. But the Feathered Serpent, the great god, Quetzalcoatl, must not be overlooked. The scene shifted to the concave stone in front of his round temple. Another procession, containing other priests and warriors, was formed; another coffle of prisoners was detached from the dwindling line.

  "You were right," Pedro said. "It looks as if we'd be the last."

  Garcia glanced at the sun. "If so, it'll be tomorrow. There're too many of us left to kill."

  Pedro half-stifled a groan.

  "Tonight then, Juan, if Catana's still living. I hope we can have the chance. She mustn't be brought out here."

  "No," agreed the other. "Do you want me to do it, comrade?"

  De Vargas shook his head. "That's up to me."

  But now the cry of "Huehueteotl! Xiuhtecuhtli!" began in the dense crowd. The prisoners were
herded in a new direction across the enclosure toward a broad, raised platform, upon which stood the shrine of the god of fire. It contained the usual monstrous image with a sacrificial stone in front; but the platform had a distinguishing characteristic, the Uving symbol of the god himself, a blazing fire, which the priests at that moment were feeding with billets of wood.

  "Pot piedad!" muttered Garcia, who caught some of the words hooted by the crowd and understood more Nahuatl than Pedro.

  "What's up?" asked de Vargas. "We're not the last after all, eh? Well, I'm not sorry. I envy our friends who have got it over with."

  "No, it isn't that," Garcia returned. "They're yelling about tomorrow. We're to be sacrificed to this particular devil. They want us to watch how it's done. Something different."

  He swallowed, staring at the fire.

  In happy excitement one of the guards struck Pedro a stinging cut across the back.

  The prisoners were ranged in a half-circle about the platform. Twenty were told off, driven forward. A shout went up, which Pedro realized was directed at him. He did not need a knowledge of the language to get the gist of it. Let the white Xiuhtecuhtli look! So he would die! A flattering, eager hatred sounded in the voices. Once again he summoned his pride to meet it with a stare and laugh.

  "Juan," he said, "I confess to you that my blood is water and I have no heart left. But by the help of Our Lord . . ."

  He caught his breath. That man who had been driven out among the doomed wventy. Either he had not seen him before in the crowd of naked prisoners, or he had not recognized him. That stoop-shouldered man with matted beard—could that be—? At the same moment Pedro heard a breathless exclamation from Garcia.

  "Ignacio de Lora!"

  Vhat difference between nakedness and clothes, the white Dominican habit, the black cape, the silver crucifix! How different he appeared in the judgment seat as compared with standing on the hot pavement, stripped and pinioned and about to die!

  He was tr'ing to control himself, but his limbs quivered and beads of sweat showed on his body. Purplish ridges, left by the stick, marked his gaunt flanks and shoulders. As he glanced helplessly about, his eyes looked vacant, and the masterful nose had lost its meaning. His lips moved; now and then he ran his tongue over them.