CHAPTER XXXVIII
OTOMIE'S FAREWELL
Thus then did I accomplish the vengeance that I had sworn to my
father I would wreak upon de Garcia, or rather, thus did I witness
its accomplishment, for in the end he died, terribly enough, not by
my hand but by those of his own fears. Since then I have sorrowed
for this, for, when the frozen and unnatural calm passed from my
mind, I hated him as bitterly as ever, and grieved that I let him
die otherwise than by my hand, and to this hour such is my mind
towards him. Doubtless, many may think it wicked, since we are
taught to forgive our enemies, but here I leave the forgiveness to
God, for how can I pardon one who betrayed my father to the
priests, who murdered my mother and my son, who chained me in the
slave-ship and for many hours tortured me with his own hand?
Rather, year by year, do I hate him more. I write of this at some
length, since the matter has been a trouble to me. I never could
say that I was in charity with all men living and dead, and because
of this, some years since, a worthy and learned rector of this
parish took upon himself to refuse me the rites of the church.
Then I went to the bishop and laid the story before him, and it
puzzled him somewhat.
But he was a man of large mind, and in the end he rebuked the
rector and commanded him to minister to me, for he thought with me
that the Almighty could not ask of an erring man, that he should
forgive one who had wrought such evils on him and his, even though
that enemy were dead and gone to judgment in another place.
But enough of this question of conscience.
When de Garcia was gone into the pit, I turned my steps homewards,
or rather towards the ruined city which I could see beneath me, for
I had no home left. Now I must descend the ice cap, and this I
found less easy than climbing it had been, for, my vengeance being
accomplished, I became as other men are, and a sad and weary one at
that, so sad indeed that I should not have sorrowed greatly if I
had made a false step upon the ice.
But I made none, and at length I came to the snow where the
travelling was easy. My oath was fulfilled and my vengeance was
accomplished, but as I went I reckoned up the cost. I had lost my
betrothed, the love of my youth; for twenty years I had lived a
savage chief among savages and made acquaintance with every
hardship, wedded to a woman who, although she loved me dearly, and
did not lack nobility of mind, as she had shown the other day, was
still at heart a savage or, at the least, a thrall of demon gods.
The tribe that I ruled was conquered, the beautiful city where I
dwelt was a ruin, I was homeless and a beggar, and my fortune would
be great if in the issue I escaped death or slavery. All this I
could have borne, for I had borne the like before, but the cruel
end of my last surviving son, the one true joy of my desolate life,
I could not bear. The love of those children had become the
passion of my middle age, and as I loved them so they had loved me.
I had trained them from babyhood till their hearts were English and
not Aztec, as were their speech and faith, and thus they were not
only my dear children, but companions of my own race, the only ones
I had. And now by accident, by sickness, and by the sword, they
were dead the three of them, and I was desolate.
Ah! we think much of the sorrows of our youth, and should a
sweetheart give us the go by we fill the world with moans and swear
that it holds no comfort for us. But when we bend our heads before
the shrouded shape of some lost child, then it is that for the
first time we learn how terrible grief can be. Time, they tell us,
will bring consolation, but it is false, for such sorrows time has
no salves--I say it who am old--as they are so they shall be.
There is no hope but faith, there is no comfort save in the truth
that love which might have withered on the earth grows fastest in
the tomb, to flower gloriously in heaven; that no love indeed can
be perfect till God sanctifies and completes it with His seal of
death.
I threw myself down there upon the desolate snows of Xaca, that
none had trod before, and wept such tears as a man may weep but
once in his life days.
'O my son Absalom, my son, my son Absalom! would God I had died for
thee, O Absalom, my son, my son!' I cried with the ancient king--I
whose grief was greater than his, for had I not lost three sons
within as many years? Then remembering that as this king had gone
to join his son long centuries ago, so I must one day go to join
mine, and taking such comfort from the thought as may be found in
it, I rose and crept back to the ruined City of Pines.
It was near sunset when I came thither, for the road was long and I
grew weak. By the palace I met the Captain Diaz and some of his
company, and they lifted their bonnets to me as I went by, for they
had respect for my sorrows. Only Diaz spoke, saying:
'Is the murderer dead?'
I nodded and went on. I went on to our chamber, for there I
thought that I should find Otomie.
She sat in it alone, cold and beautiful as though she had been
fashioned in marble.
'I have buried him with the bones of his brethren and his
forefathers,' she said, answering the question that my eyes asked.
'It seemed best that you should see him no more, lest your heart
should break.'
'It is well,' I answered; 'but my heart is broken already.'
'Is the murderer dead?' she said presently in the very words of
Diaz.
'He is dead.'
'How?'
I told her in few words.
'You should have slain him yourself; our son's blood is not
avenged.'
'I should have slain him, but in that hour I did not seek
vengeance, I watched it fall from heaven, and was content.
Perchance it is best so. The seeking of vengeance has brought all
my sorrows upon me; vengeance belongs to God and not to man, as I
have learned too late.'
'I do not think so,' said Otomie, and the look upon her face was
that look which I had seen when she smote the Tlascalan, when she
taunted Marina, and when she danced upon the pyramid, the leader of
the sacrifice. 'Had I been in your place, I would have killed him
by inches. When I had done with him, then the devils might begin,
not before. But it is of no account; everything is done with, all
are dead, and my heart with them. Now eat, for you are weary.'
So I ate, and afterwards I cast myself upon the bed and slept.
In the darkness I heard the voice of Otomie that said, 'Awake, I
would speak with you,' and there was that about her voice which
stirred me from my heavy sleep.
'Speak on,' I said. 'Where are you, Otomie?'
'Seated at your side. I cannot rest, so I am seated here. Listen.
Many, many years ago we met, when you were brought by Guatemoc from
Tobasco. Ah! well do I remember my first sight of you, the Teule,
in the court of my father Montezuma, at Chapoltepec. I loved you
then as I have loved you ever since. At least I have never gone
astray after strange gods,' and she laughed bitterly.
'Why do you talk of these things, Otomie?' I asked.
'Because it is my fancy to do so. Cannot you spare me one hour
from your sleep, who have spared you so many? You remember how you
scorned me--oh! I thought I should have died of shame when, after I
had caused myself to be given to you as wife, the wife of Tezcat,
you told me of the maid across the seas, that Lily maid whose token
is still set upon your finger. But I lived through it and I loved
you the better for your honesty, and then you know the rest. I won
you because I was brave and lay at your side upon the stone of
sacrifice, where you kissed me and told me that you loved me. But
you never loved me, not truly, all the while you were thinking of
the Lily maid. I knew it then, as I know it now, though I tried to
deceive myself. I was beautiful in those days and this is
something with a man. I was faithful and that is more, and once or
twice you thought that you loved me. Now I wish that those Teules
had come an hour later, and we had died together there upon the
stone, that is I wish it for my own sake, not for yours. Then we
escaped and the great struggle came. I told you then that I
understood it all. You had kissed me on the stone of sacrifice,
but in that moment you were as one dead; when you came back to
life, it was otherwise. But fortune took the game out of your
hands and you married me, and swore an oath to me, and this oath
you have kept faithfully. You married me but you did not know whom
you married; you thought me beautiful, and sweet, and true, and all
these things I was, but you did not understand that I was far apart
from you, that I was still a savage as my forefathers had been.
You thought that I had learned your ways, perchance even you
thought that I reverenced your God, as for your sake I have striven
to do, but all the while I have followed the ways of my own people
and I could not quite forget my own gods, or at the least they
would not suffer me, their servant, to escape them. For years and
years I put them from me, but at last they were avenged and my
heart mastered me, or rather they mastered me, for I knew nothing
of what I did some few nights since, when I celebrated the
sacrifice to Huitzel and you saw me at the ancient rites.
'All these years you had been true to me and I had borne you
children whom you loved; but you loved them for their own sake, not
for mine, indeed, at heart you hated the Indian blood that was
mixed in their veins with yours. Me also you loved in a certain
fashion and this half love of yours drove me well nigh mad; such as
it was, it died when you saw me distraught and celebrating the
rites of my forefathers on the teocalli yonder, and you knew me for
what I am, a savage. And now the children who linked us together
are dead--one by one they died in this way and in that, for the
curse which follows my blood descended upon them--and your love for
me is dead with them. I alone remain alive, a monument of past
days, and I die also.
'Nay, be silent; listen to me, for my time is short. When you bade
me call you "husband" no longer, then I knew that it was finished.
I obey you, I put you from me, you are no more my husband, and soon
I shall cease to be your wife; still, Teule, I pray you listen to
me. Now it seems to you in your sorrow, that your days are done
and that there is no happiness left for you. This is not so. You
are still but a man in the beginning of middle age, and you are yet
strong. You will escape from this ruined land, and when you shake
the dust of it off your feet its curse shall fall from you; you
will return to your own place, and there you will find one who has
awaited your coming for many years. There the savage woman whom
you mated with, the princess of a fallen house, will become but a
fantastic memory to you, and all these strange eventful years will
be as a midnight dream. Only your love for the dead children will
always remain, these you must always love by day and by night, and
the desire of them, that desire for the dead than which there is
nothing more terrible, shall follow you to your grave, and I am
glad that it should be so, for I was their mother and some thought
of me must go with them. This alone the Lily maid has left to me,
and there only I shall prevail against her, for, Teule, no child of
hers shall live to rob your heart of the memory of those I gave
you.
'Oh! I have watched you by day and by night: I have seen the
longing in your eyes for a face which you have lost and for the
land of your youth. Be happy, you shall gain both, for the
struggle is ended and the Lily maid has been too strong for me. I
grow weak and I have little more to say. We part, and perhaps for
ever, for what is there between us save the souls of those dead
sons of ours? Since you desire me no more, that I may make our
severance perfect, now in the hour of my death I renounce your gods
and I seek my own, though I think that I love yours and hate those
of my people. Is there any communion between them? We part, and
perchance for ever, yet I pray of you to think of me kindly, for I
have loved you and I love you; I was the mother of your children,
whom being Christian, you will meet again. I love you now and for
always. I am glad to have lived because you kissed me on the stone
of sacrifice, and afterwards I bore you sons. They are yours and
not mine; it seems to me now that I only cared for them because
they were yours, and they loved you and not me. Take them--take
their spirits as you have taken everything. You swore that death
alone should sever us, and you have kept your oath in the letter
and in the thought. But now I go to the Houses of the Sun to seek
my own people, and to you, Teule, with whom I have lived many years
and seen much sorrow, but whom I will no longer call husband, since
you forbade me so to do, I say, make no mock of me to the Lily
maid. Speak of me to her as little as you may--be happy and--
farewell!'
Now as she spoke ever more faintly, and I listened bewildered, the
light of dawn grew slowly in the chamber. It gathered on the white
shape of Otomie seated in a chair hard by the bed, and I saw that
her arms hung down and that her head was resting on the back of the
chair. Now I sprang up and peered into her face. It was white and
cold, and I could feel no breath upon her lips. I seized her hand,
that also was cold. I spoke into her ear, I kissed her brow, but
she did not move nor answer. The light grew quickly, and now I saw
all. Otomie was dead, and by her own act.
This was the manner of her death. She had drunk of a poison of
which the Indians have the secret, a poison that works slowly and
without pain, leaving the mind unclouded to the end. It was while
her life was fading from her that she had spoken to me thus sadly
and bitterly. I sat upon the bed and gazed at her. I did not
weep, for my tears were done, and as I have said, whatever I might
feel nothing could break my calm any more. And as I gazed a great
tenderness and sorrow took hold of me, and I loved Otomie better
now that she was dead before me than ever I had done in her life
days, and this is saying much. I remembered her in the glory of
her youth as she was in the court of her royal father, I remembered
the look which she had given me when she stepped to my side upon
the stone of sacrifice, and that other look when she defied
Cuitlahua the emperor, who would have slain me. Once more I seemed
to hear her cry of bitter sorrow as she uncovered the body of the
dead babe our firstborn, and to see her sword in hand standing over
the Tlascalan.
Many things came back to me in that sad hour of dawn while I
watched by the corpse of Otomie. There was truth in her words, I
had never forgotten my first love and often I desired to see her
face. But it was not true to say that I had no love for Otomie. I
loved her well and I was faithful in my oath to her, indeed, not
until she was dead did I know how dear she had grown to me. It is
true that there was a great gulf between us which widened with the
years, the gulf of blood and faith, for I knew well that she could
not altogether put away her old beliefs, and it is true that when I
saw her leading the death chant, a great horror took me and for a
while I loathed her. But these things I might have lived to
forgive, for they were part of her blood and nature, moreover, the
last and worst of them was not done by her own will, and when they
were set aside there remained much that I could honour and love in
the memory of this most royal and beautiful woman, who for so many
years was my faithful wife. So I thought in that hour and so I
think to this day. She said that we parted for ever, but I trust
and I believe that this is not so. Surely there is forgiveness for
us all, and a place where those who were near and dear to each
other on the earth may once more renew their fellowship.
At last I rose with a sigh to seek help, and as I rose I felt that
there was something set about my neck. It was the collar of great
emeralds which Guatemoc had given to me, and that I had given to
Otomie. She had set it there while I slept, and with it a lock of
her long hair. Both shall be buried with me.
I laid her in the ancient sepulchre amid the bones of her
forefathers and by the bodies of her children, and two days later I
rode to Mexico in the train of Bernal Diaz. At the mouth of the
pass I turned and looked back upon the ruins of the City of Pines,
where I had lived so many years and where all I loved were buried.
Long and earnestly I gazed, as in his hour of death a man looks
back upon his past life, till at length Diaz laid his hand upon my
shoulder:
'You are a lonely man now, comrade,' he said; 'what plans have you
for the future?'
'None,' I answered, 'except to die.'
'Never talk so,' he said; 'why, you are scarcely forty, and I who
am fifty and more do not speak of dying. Listen; you have friends
in your own country, England?'
'I had.'
'Folk live long in those quiet lands. Go seek them, I will find
you a passage to Spain.'
'I will think of it,' I answered.
In time we came to Mexico, a new and a strange city to me, for
Cortes had rebuilt it, and where the teocalli had stood, up which I
was led to sacrifice, a cathedral was building, whereof the
foundations were fitly laid with the hideous idols of the Aztecs.
The place was well enough, but it is not so beautiful as the
Tenoctitlan of Montezuma, nor ever will be. The people too were
changed; then they were warriors and free, now they are slaves.
In Mexico Diaz found me a lodging. None molested me there, for the
pardon that I had received was respected. Also I was a ruined man,
no longer to be feared, the part that I had played in the noche
triste and in the defence of the city was forgotten, and the tale
of my sorrows won me pity even from the Spaniards. I abode in
Mexico ten days, wandering sadly about the city and up to the hill
of Chapoltepec, where Montezuma's pleasure-house had been, and
where I had met Otomie. Nothing was left of its glories except
some of the ancient cedar trees. On the eighth day of my stay an
Indian stopped me in the street, saying that an old friend had
charged him to say that she wished to see me.
I followed the Indian, wondering who the friend might be, for I had
no friends, and he led me to a fine stone house in a new street.
Here I was seated in a darkened chamber and waited there a while,
till suddenly a sad and sweet voice that seemed familiar to me,
addressed me in the Aztec tongue, saying, 'Welcome, Teule.'
I looked and there before me, dressed in the Spanish fashion, stood
a lady, an Indian, still beautiful, but very feeble and much worn,
as though with sickness and sorrow.
'Do you not know Marina, Teule?' she said again, but before the
words had left her lips I knew her. 'Well, I will say this, that I
should scarcely have known YOU, Teule. Trouble and time have done
their work with both of us.'
I took her hand and kissed it.
'Where then is Cortes?' I asked.
Now a great trembling seized her.
'Cortes is in Spain, pleading his suit. He has wed a new wife
there, Teule. Many years ago he put me away, giving me in marriage
to Don Juan Xaramillo, who took me because of my possessions, for
Cortes dealt liberally with me, his discarded mistress.' And she
began to weep.
Then by degrees I learned the story, but I will not write it here,
for it is known to the world. When Marina had served his turn and
her wit was of no more service to him, the conqueror discarded her,
leaving her to wither of a broken heart. She told me all the tale
of her anguish when she learned the truth, and of how she had cried
to him that thenceforth he would never prosper. Nor indeed did he
do so.
For two hours or more we talked, and when I had heard her story I
told her mine, and she wept for me, since with all her faults
Marina's heart was ever gentle.
Then we parted never to meet again. Before I went she pressed a
gift of money on me, and I was not ashamed to take it who had none.
This then was the history of Marina, who betrayed her country for
her love's sake, and this the reward of her treason and her love.
But I shall always hold her memory sacred, for she was a good
friend to me, and twice she saved my life, nor would she desert me,
even when Otomie taunted her so cruelly.
