The Rover of the Andes: A Tale of Adventure on South America

R. M. Ballantyne

The Rover of the Andes: A Tale of Adventure on South America

Chapter One.

A Tale of Adventure in South America. At the Foot of the Mountain Range

Towards the close of a bright and warm day, between fifty and sixty years ago, a solitary man might have been seen, mounted on a mule, wending his way slowly up the western slopes of the Andes.

Although decidedly inelegant and unhandsome, this specimen of the human family was by no means uninteresting. He was so large, and his legs were so long, that the contrast between him and the little mule which he bestrode was ridiculous. He was what is sometimes styled “loosely put together;” nevertheless, the various parts of him were so massive and muscular that, however loosely he might have been built up, most men would have found it rather difficult to take him down. Although wanting in grace, he was by no means repulsive, for his face, which was ornamented with a soft flaxen beard and moustache of juvenile texture, expressed wonderful depths of the milk of human kindness.

He wore boots with the trousers tucked into them, a grey tunic, or hunting coat, belted at the waist, and a broad-brimmed straw hat, or sombrero.

Evidently the times in which he travelled were troublous, for, besides having a brace of large pistols in his belt, he wore a cavalry sabre at his side. As if to increase the eccentricity of his appearance, he carried a heavy cudgel, by way of riding-whip; but it might have been observed that, however much he flourished this whip about, he never actually applied it to his steed.

On reaching a turn of the road at the brow of an eminence the mule stopped, and, letting its head droop till almost as pendent as its tail, silently expressed a desire for repose. The cavalier stepped off. It would convey a false impression to say that he dismounted. The mule heaved a sigh.

“Poor little thing!” murmured the traveller in a soft, low voice, and in a language which even a mule might have recognised as English; “you may well sigh. I really feel ashamed of myself for asking you to carry such a mass of flesh and bone. But it’s your own fault—you know it is—for you won’t be led. I’m quite willing to walk if you will only follow. Come—let us try!”

Gently, insinuatingly, persuasively, the traveller touched the reins, and sought to lead the way. He might as well have tried to lead one of the snow-clad peaks of the mighty Cordillera which towered into the sky before him. With ears inclining to the neck, a resolute expression in the eyes, his fore-legs thrown forward and a lean slightly backward, the mule refused to move.

“Come now, do be amiable; there’s a good little thing! Come on,” said the strong youth, applying more force.

Peruvian mules are not open to flattery. The advance of the fore-legs became more decided, the lean backward more pronounced, the ears went flat down, and incipient passion gleamed in the eyes.

“Well, well, have it your own way,” exclaimed the youth, with a laugh, “but don’t blame me for riding you so much.”

He once more re-m–; no, we forgot—he once more lifted his right leg over the saddle and sat down. Fired, no doubt, with the glow of conscious victory the mule moved on and up at a more lively pace than before.

Thus the pair advanced until they gained a rocky eminence, whence the rich Peruvian plains could be seen stretching far-away toward the glowing horizon, where the sun was about to dip into the Pacific.

Here again the mule stopped, and the rider getting off sat down on a rock to take a look at the level horizon of the west—for he had reached a spot where the next turn in the road would partially shut out the plains and enclose him among the giant mountains.

As he sat there meditating, while the mule cropped the herbage at his side, he observed two riders a considerable way down the circuitous road by which he had ascended—a man and a boy, apparently.

Whether it was the fine stalwart figure of the man that influenced him, or the mere presence of wayfarers in such a solitary place, our traveller could not tell, but he certainly felt unusual interest, and not only watched the pair as they approached, but sat still until they came up. As they drew near he perceived that the smaller of the two, whom at a distance he had taken for a boy, was an Indian girl, who, according to custom, bestrode her mule like a man. Her companion was a handsome Spanish-looking man—a Peruvian or it might be a Chilian—with fine masculine features and magnificent black eyes. He was well-armed, and, to judge from his looks, seemed a little suspicious of the tall Englishman.

The hearty salutation of the latter, however, in bad Spanish, at once dissipated his suspicions. Replying in the same tongue, he then added, in good English:—

“You are a stranger in this land, I perceive.”

“In truth I am,” replied the other, while the Peruvian dismounted, “nevertheless, I ought scarcely to admit the fact, for I was born in Peru. This perhaps may seem contradictory, but it is not more so than your being apparently a native of the soil yet speaking English like an Englishman.”

“From which it follows,” returned the Peruvian, “that men ought not to judge altogether by appearances. But you are wrong in supposing me a native of the soil, and yet—I am not an Englishman. I have got a gift of language, however—at least I feel myself equally at home in English, Indian, Spanish, and Portuguese, which is not to be wondered at, seeing that I have been forced to talk in all four languages for nigh a quarter of a century.”

“Then you must have been but a boy when you came here,” returned the Englishman, “for you seem to be not yet middle-aged.”

“Right, I was indeed a mere boy when I came to this land.”

“And I was a boy of seven when I left it to be educated in Europe,” returned the Englishman. “It is sixteen years since then, and I had feared that my memory might have failed to recognise the old landmarks, but I am rejoiced to find that I remember every turn of the road as if I had left home but yesterday.”

We have said that the tall youth’s face was not handsome, but the glow of animation which rested on it when he spoke of home, seemed for a moment to transform it.

“Your home, then, cannot be far distant?” remarked the Peruvian, with a peculiar look that might have attracted the attention of the younger man if his gaze had not at the moment been directed to the Indian girl, who, during the foregoing conversation, had remained motionless on her mule with her eyes looking pensively at the ground, like a beautiful statue in bronze.

“My home is close at hand,” said the Englishman, when the question had been repeated; “unless memory plays me false, two more turns in the road will reveal it.”

The earnest look of the Peruvian deepened as he asked if the Estate of Passamanka was his home.

“Yes, you know it, then?” exclaimed the youth eagerly; “and perhaps you knew my father too?”

“Yes, indeed; there are few people within a hundred miles of the place who did not know the famous sugar-mill and its hospitable owner, Senhor Armstrong. But excuse me,” added the Peruvian, with some hesitation, “you are aware, I suppose, that your father is dead?”

“Ay, well do I know that,” returned the other in a deeper tone. “It is to take my father’s place at the mills that I have been hastily summoned from England. Alas! I know nothing of the work, and it will be sorely against the grain to attempt the carrying on of the old business in the desolate old home.”

“Of course you also know,” continued the Peruvian, “that the country is disturbed just now—that the old smouldering enmity between Chili and Peru has broken forth again in open war.”

“I could not have passed through the low country without finding that out. Indeed,” said the youth, glancing at his belt with a half-apologetic smile, “these weapons, which are so unfamiliar to my hand, and so distasteful to my spirit, are proof that I, at least, do not look for a time of peace. I accoutred myself thus on landing, at the urgent advice of a friend, though my good cudgel—which has sufficed for all my needs hitherto—is more to my mind, besides being useful as a mountain staff. But why do you ask? Is there much probability of the belligerents coming so far among the hills?”

“Wherever carrion is to be found, there you may be sure the vultures will congregate. There is booty to be got here among the hills; and whether the soldiers belong to the well-trained battalions of Chili, or the wretched levies of Peru, they are always prepared, for plunder—ready to make hay while the sun shines. I only hope, Senhor Armstrong, that—but come, let us advance and see before the sun sets.”

Turning abruptly as he spoke, the man mounted his mule and rode briskly up the winding road, followed by the Indian girl and our Englishman.

At the second turning of the road they reached a spot where an opening in the hills revealed the level country below, stretching away into illimitable distance.

As had been anticipated, they here came upon the mills they were in quest of. The Peruvian reined up abruptly and looked back.

“I feared as much,” he said in a low tone as the Englishman rode forward.

Rendered anxious by the man’s manner, Lawrence Armstrong sprang from his mule and pushed forward, but suddenly stopped and stood with clasped hands and a gaze of agony.

For there stood the ruins of his early home—where his mother had died while he was yet a child, where his father had made a fortune, which, in his desolation, he had failed to enjoy, and where he finally died, leaving his possessions to his only child.

The troops had visited the spot, fired no doubt with patriotic fervour and knowing its owner to be wealthy. They had sacked the place, feasted on the provisions, drunk the wines, smashed up, by way of pleasantry, all the valuables that were too heavy to carry away, and, finally, setting fire to the place, had marched off to other fields of “glory.”

It was a tremendous blow to poor Lawrence, coming as he did fresh from college in a peaceful land, and full of the reminiscences of childhood.

Sitting down on a broken wall, he bowed his head and wept bitterly—though silently—while the Peruvian, quietly retiring with the Indian girl, left him alone.

The first paroxysm of grief over, young Armstrong rose, and began sadly to wander about the ruins. It had been an extensive structure, fitted with all the most approved appliances of mechanism which wealth could purchase. These now helped to enhance the wild aspect of the wreck, for iron girders had been twisted by the action of fire into snake-like convolutions in some places, while, in others, their ends stuck out fantastically from the blackened walls. Beautiful furniture had been smashed up to furnish firewood for the cooking of the meal with which the heroic troops had refreshed themselves before leaving, while a number of broken wine-bottles at the side of a rosewood writing-desk with an empty bottle on the top of it and heaps of stones and pebbles around, suggested the idea that the warriors had mingled light amusement with sterner business. The roofs of most of the buildings had fallen in; the window-frames, where spared by the fire, had been torn out; and a pianoforte, which lay on its back on the grass, showed evidence of having undergone an examination of its internal arrangements, with the aid of the butt-ends of muskets.

“And this is the result of war!” muttered the young man, at last breaking silence.

“Only one phase of it,” replied a voice at his side, in tones of exceeding bitterness; “you must imagine a few corpses of slaughtered men and women and children, if you would have a perfect picture of war.”

The speaker was the Peruvian, who had quietly approached to say that if they wished to reach the next resting-place before dark it was necessary to proceed without delay.

“But perhaps,” he added, “you do not intend to go further. No doubt this was to have been the end of your journey had all been well. It can scarcely, I fear, be the end of it now. I do not wish to intrude upon your sorrows, Mr Armstrong, but my business will not admit of delay. I must push on, yet I would not do so without expressing my profound sympathy, and offering to aid you if it lies in my power.”

There was a tone and look about the man which awoke a feeling of gratitude and confidence in the forlorn youth’s heart.

“You are very kind,” he said, “but it is not in the power of man to help me. As your business is urgent you had better go and leave me. I thank you for the sympathy you express—yet stay. You cannot advance much further to-night, why not encamp here? There used to be a small hut or out-house not far-off, in which my father spent much of his leisure. Perhaps the—the—”

“Patriots!” suggested the Peruvian.

“The scoundrels,” said Lawrence, “may have spared or overlooked it. The hut would furnish shelter enough, and we have provisions with us.”

After a moment’s reflection the Peruvian assented to this proposal, and, leaving the ruins together, they returned to the road, where they found the Indian girl holding the youth’s mule as well as that of her companion.

Hastening forward, Lawrence apologised for having in the agitation of the moment allowed his mule to run loose.

“But I forgot,” he added, “of course you do not understand English.”

“Try Spanish,” suggested the Peruvian, “she knows a little of that.”

“Unfortunately I have forgotten the little that I had picked up here when a boy,” returned Lawrence, as he mounted, “if I can manage to ask for food and lodging in that tongue, it is all that I can do.”

They soon reached an opening in the bushes at the roadside, and, at the further end of a natural glade or track, observed a small wooden hut thatched with rushes. Towards this young Armstrong led the way.

He was evidently much affected, for his lips were compressed, and he gave no heed to a remark made by his companion. Entering the hut, he stood for some time looking silently round.

It was but a poor place with bare walls; a carpenter’s bench in one corner, near to it a smith’s forge, one or two chairs, and a few tools;—not much to interest a stranger but to Lawrence full of tender associations.

“It was here,” he said in tones of deepest pathos, “that my father showed me how to handle tools, and my mother taught me to read from the Word of God.”

Looking at his companions he observed that the large dark eyes of the Indian girl were fixed on him with an expression of unmistakable sympathy. He felt grateful at the moment, for to most men sympathy is sweet when unobtrusively offered whether it come from rich or poor—civilised or savage.

“Come, this will do,” said the Peruvian, looking round, “if you will kindle a fire on the forge, Senhor Armstrong, Manuela will arrange a sleeping chamber for herself in the closet I see there, while I look after the beasts.”

He spoke in cheering tones, which had the effect of rousing the poor youth somewhat from his despondency.

“Well, then,” he replied, “let us to work, and it is but just, as we are to sup together, and you know my name, that I should be put on an equal footing with yourself—”

“Impossible!” interrupted the other, with a slight curl of his moustache, “for as I am only six feet one, and you are at least six feet four, we can never be on an equal footing.”

“Nay, but I referred to names, not to inches. Pray, by what name shall I call you?”

“Pedro,” returned the Spaniard. “I am known by several names in these parts—some of them complimentary, others the reverse, according as I am referred to by friends or foes. Men often speak of me as a confirmed rover because of my wandering tendencies, but I’m not particular and will answer to any name you choose, so long as it is politely uttered. The one I prefer is Pedro.”

He went out as he spoke to look after the mules, while Lawrence set about kindling a small fire and otherwise making preparations for supper.

The Indian girl, Manuela, with that prompt and humble obedience characteristic of the race to which she belonged, had gone at once into the little closet which her companion had pointed out, and was by that time busily arranging it as a sleeping chamber for the night.

Chapter Two.

Compact with the New Friend and Discovery of an Old One

Keeping the fire low in order to prevent its being seen by any of the wandering bands of patriots—alias soldiers, alias banditti—who might chance to be in the neighbourhood, the three travellers thus thrown unexpectedly together ate their supper in comparative silence, Lawrence and Pedro exchanging a comment on the viands now and then, and the handsome Indian girl sitting opposite to them with her eyes for the most part fixed on the ground, though now and then she raised them to take a quick stealthy glance at the huge youth whose appetite did not seem to be greatly affected by his misfortunes. Perhaps she was wondering whether all Englishmen, possessed such innocent kindly faces and such ungainly though powerful frames. It may be that she was contrasting him with the handsome well-knit Pedro at his side.

Whatever her thoughts might have been, the short glances of her lustrous eyes gave no clue to them, and her tongue was silent, save when she replied by some brief monosyllable to a remark or query put in the Indian language occasionally by Pedro. Sometimes a gleam of the firelight threw her fine brown features into bold relief, but on these occasions, when Lawrence Armstrong chanced to observe them, they conveyed no expression whatever save that of profound gravity, with a touch, perhaps, of sadness.

The bench being awkwardly situated for a table, they had arranged a small box, bottom up, instead. Lawrence and his new acquaintance seated themselves on the ground, and Manuela used her saddle as a chair.

Towards the end of their meal the two men became more communicative, and when Pedro had lighted a cigarette, they began to talk of their immediate future.

“You don’t smoke?” remarked Pedro in passing.

“No,” replied Lawrence.

“Not like the most of your countrymen,” said the other.

“So much the worse,” rejoined the youth.

“The worse for them or for you—which?” asked Pedro, with a significant glance.

“No matter,” returned Lawrence with a laugh.

“Well, now,” resumed Pedro, after a few puffs, during the emission of which his countenance assumed the expression of seriousness, which seemed most natural to it, “what do you intend to do? It is well to have that point fairly settled to-night, so that there may be no uncertainty or delay in the morning. I would not urge the question were it not that in the morning we must either go on together as travelling companions, or say our final adieux and part. I am not in the habit of prying into men’s private affairs, but, to speak the bare truth, I am naturally interested in one whose father has on more than one occasion done me good service. You need not answer me unless you please, senhor,” added the man with the air of one who is prepared to retire upon his dignity at a moment’s notice.

“Thanks, thanks, Pedro,” said the Englishman, heartily, “I appreciate your kindness, and accept your sympathy with gratitude. Moreover, I am glad to find that I have been thrown at such a crisis in my fortunes into the company of one who had regard for my dear father. But I scarce know what to do. I will give you my confidence unreservedly. Perhaps you may be able to advise—”

“Stay,” interrupted the other, on whose countenance a slightly stern expression hovered. “Before you give me unreserved confidence, it is but fair that I should tell you candidly that I cannot pay you back in kind. As to private matters, I have none that would be likely to interest any one under the sun. In regard to other things—my business is not my own. Why I am here and what I mean to do I have no right to reveal. Whither I am bound, however, is not necessarily a secret, and if you choose to travel with me you undoubtedly have a right to know.”

Young Armstrong expressed himself satisfied. He might have wished to know more, but, like Pedro, he had no desire to pry into other men’s affairs, and, being of an open confiding nature, was quite ready to take his companion on trust, even though he had been less candid and engaging in manner than he was. After explaining that he had been educated in Edinburgh, and trained to the medical profession, he went on to say that he had been hastily summoned to take charge of the sugar-mill at his father’s death, and that he had expected to find an old overseer, who would have instructed him in all that he had to do in a business with which he was totally unacquainted.

“You see,” he continued, “my father always said that he meant to retire on his fortune, and did not wish me to carry on the business, but, being naturally an uncommunicative man on business matters, he never gave me any information as to details. Of course, I had expected that his manager here, and his books, would reveal all that I required to know, but the soldiers have settled that question. Mill and books have gone together, and as to manager, clerks, and servants, I know not where they are.”

“Scattered, no doubt,” said Pedro, “here, there, and everywhere—only too glad to escape from a neighbourhood which has been given up to fire and sword by way of improving its political condition!”

“I know not,” returned Lawrence, sadly. “But it would be useless, I fear, to try to ferret them out.”

“Quite useless,” said Pedro. “Besides, what would it avail to talk with any of them about the affairs of a place that is now in ashes? But if your father spoke of his fortune, he must have had at least some of it in a bank somewhere.”

“True, but I don’t know where. All I know is that he once mentioned casually in one of his letters that he was going to Buenos Ayres, where he had some property.”

“Indeed!” exclaimed Pedro. “Come, that may help you to decide, for I am myself going to Buenos Ayres, and can guide you there if disposed to go. Only, you will have to make up your mind to a pretty long and hard journey, for duty requires me to go by a devious route. You must know,” he continued, lighting another cigarette, “that I am pledged to take that girl to her father, who lives not far from Buenos Ayres.”

He pointed as he spoke to Manuela, who, having laid her head on her saddle, appeared to have fallen asleep.

“Her father must be a chief, I should think, to judge from her dignified, graceful carriage, as well as her fine features,” said Lawrence in a low tone.

“Yes, he is a chief—a great chief,” returned Pedro, gazing at his cigarette in a meditative mood—“a very great chief. You see, she happened to be living with friends on the western side of the mountains when this war between Chili and Peru broke out, and her father naturally wants to get her out of danger. The old chief once saved my life, so, you see, I am bound both by duty and gratitude to rescue his daughter.”

“Indeed you are, and a pleasant duty it must be,” returned Lawrence with an approving nod; “but don’t you think it might have been wise to have rescued some other female, a domestic for instance, to keep her company? The poor girl will feel very lonely on such a long journey as you speak of.”

Pedro again looked musingly at his cigarette, and flipped off the ash with his little finger.

“You have not had much experience of war, young man,” he said, “if you think that in cases of rescue men can always arrange things comfortably, and according to the rules of propriety. When towns and villages are in flames, when plunder and rapine run riot everywhere, and little children are spitted on the bayonets of patriots, as is often the case even in what men have agreed to term civilised warfare, one is glad to escape with the skin of one’s teeth. Yet I was not as regardless of Manuela’s comfort as you seem to think. A poor woman who had nursed her when a child volunteered to accompany us, and continued with us on the first part of our journey; but the exertion, as I had feared, was too much for her. She caught a fever and died, so that we were forced to come on alone. If you join us, however, I shall be greatly pleased, for two can always make a better fight than one, and in these unsettled times there is no saying what we may fall in with in crossing the mountains.”