The Missourian

by Eugene P. Lyle

  CHAPTER XVIII

  EL CHAPARRITO

  "Meagre were his looks, Sharp misery had worn him to the bones." --_Romeo and Juliet._

  A few days later Jacqueline and Berthe attended a performance at theTeatro de Iturbide. It was the first held there since the beginning ofthe siege, and to the place late foes were thronging eagerly in whatseemed a most inordinate thirst for amusement. The playhouse was withouta roof. Its metal covering had been widely sown in the shape of bullets,and only a canvas overhead kept out the sun. But the broiling pit wasfilled, as well as circling tier over tier of loges, and in the street agreat crowd jostled and surged, like people who stare at the dead wallsof a jail because a man is being hanged inside. If the curious cannothave both Time and Space to their liking, then the more ghoulish willgorge themselves on the coincidence of Time alone. "Now," they whisperawesomely, "his hands and feet are being strapped! What _must_ hebe thinking this very instant, and we standing here?" So those outsidethe Teatro de Iturbide sweated patiently. In all evidence it was not anordinary performance scheduled for that day.

  "Buzzards?" said Jacqueline, looking up and seeing their outspread wingsshadowed on the canvas roof, "Fi donc, _that_ effect is long sinceshabby!" But it chilled her, nevertheless.

  The curtain was up. A drop, showing fields in green and a receding roadin brown, filled the back. The actors seemed actors solely, and thisidea persisted with the Frenchwoman, as with many another, throughout.Seven military characters arranged themselves in a kind of state on theunpainted, slanting stage. They might have been supernumeraries, likethe "senators" in "Othello." At least their severe demeanor became themawkwardly. They wore uniforms, but not of appalling rank. He whopresided was only a lieutenant colonel, the other six were captains.Before them, each on a square stool, sat two generals, one with abandaged cheek. There were legal gentlemen in plain black, while guardsat stiff attention here and there completed the grouping. Beyond anydoubt, it was a trial scene. And to confirm the surmise, one of thelegal gentlemen, a very peaceable appearing youth, arose and in theRepublic's name demanded the lives of Miguel Miramon and TomasMejia--here he indicated the two generals--and with impressive cadence,also in the Republic's name, demanded likewise the life of FernandoMaximiliano de Hapsburgo. The lieutenant colonel and the captainsknitted their seven tawny brows portentously, but they were not in theleast astounded at such a very extraordinary request.

  There was no need of a theatrical production at all. Other Imperialistshad not been so unnecessarily distinguished, as for instance, GeneralMendez, that ancient enemy of Regules and executioner of Republicansunder the Black Decree. Caught the day Queretaro fell, he was shot inthe back as a traitor. Yet he met a legal death. Taken in armed defianceof the Republic, identity established, the hollow square and shootingsquad, such was the routine prescribed. But the lesser official relicsof the Empire, six hundred in all, escaped generally with a few monthsof prison. The rank and file of the betrayed army had already meltedaway. But for the three arch-culprits a trial was deemed requisite, andPresident Juarez, in San Luis Potosi, so ordered. Hence the stagesetting as above described.

  Maximilian was at first surprised. He had said to Escobedo, "I am readyto go whenever you can favor me with an escort to the coast, but first Irequire assurance that my loyal followers shall not suffer." But theRepublican chief had smiled oddly, and locked him up. Later, however,Maximilian had seemed content. A trial for his life, that would add thelast needed glamour to the prestige of his return to Europe. So heaffably humored his captors, and was rewarded with humiliation--hisjudges could hardly be more obscure. So as he was genuinely sick abed,he got himself excused from playing his part in the Teatro Iturbide.

  The soi-disant Emperor had four conscientious defenders, chosen fromRepublican jurists, two of whom were then in San Luis to do what theymight before Juarez. The other two spent eloquence and acumen on thecourt's seven tawny brows. Their first point came from Maximilianhimself. It was complacent, this point. The naivete of it was superb.

  "I am no longer Emperor," so the defense ran, "nor was I during thesiege; because, before leaving the capital, I drew up my abdication,which was then countersigned by my ministers. However, it was not totake effect until I should fall prisoner."

  When the Republic recovered her breath, she felt in her amusement awounded pride. This prince must think her very simple. So, she was torecognize the usurper's abdication after she had fought and suffered totake the usurper? A captured thief draws from his pockets a quit-claimdeed to the plunder he has stolen, and giving it to the court, wouldtherefore go free! The tragedy changed for a spell to comic opera. Andmatters were not helped greatly when next were invoked "the immunitiesand privileges which pertain under any and all circumstances to anarchduke of Austria."

  Though handicapped by their client's arrogance, counsel yet did theirutmost. They argued law and humanity, with tremulo effects. They prayedthat "the greatest of victories be crowned by the greatest of pardons."But it was of no use. The bloodthirsty stripling persisted in theRepublic's name. This Maximiliano was a Mexican. In many beautifulspeeches the said Maximiliano had said so. Hence he could not evaderesponsibility to the laws of his adopted country. And there was, forinstance, the law of 1862 concerning treason.

  Well, in a word, the three accused were straightway sentenced to death;and Escobedo, approving, named Sunday, June 16th, for the execution. Itmight be mentioned of this Escobedo that on two former occasions, whenthe circumstances were exactly reversed, Mejia had each time saved hislife. Since Queretaro, there have been comments on the vigor ofEscobedo's memory.

  "Poor pliant Prince Max," sighed Jacqueline, "he is still beinginfluenced to stay in Mexico! Come, Berthe, we must make all speed toSan Luis and see the Presidente."

  * * * * *

  In the long hall of the Palacio Municipal at San Luis Potosi, before theold-fashioned desk there, sat an Indian. He was low and squat andpock-marked, and there was an ugly scar, livid against yellow, acrossthe upper lip. He had a large mouth, high cheek-bones, and swarthy skinwith a copperish tinge. He was a pure-blooded Indian. At twelve he didnot know a word of Spanish. His race, the Zapotecas of Oaxaca, had allbut been extinguished by the Conquest. Except for the ungainly black hewore--excepting, too, his character--he might have been a peon, or stillthe servant he once had been. But the homely, heavy features of hisround head did not, in any sense, repel. On the contrary, thecountenance was frank, though yet inscrutable. The piercing black eyeswere good eyes, and indomitable, like his muscled jaw. The flat, squareforehead made one aware of intellect, and of force. So short and thick,he looked a sluggish man, but it was the phlegm of a rock, the calm ofstrength, and whatever the peril, almost inanimate. His country calledhim Benemerito de America, a title the noblest and rarest in its Spartanhint of civic virtue.

  The Indian's desk was littered with messages from the princes of theearth. Like his expiring race, he had fought their order, and they hadmade of him a wandering fugitive. But now they were imploring him forone of their number, whose surrendered sword that moment lay acrosstheir petitions. Two of the letters, but not from princes, he had readwith deep consideration. One was from the President of the UnitedStates, the other from Victor Hugo. But these also he shoved from him,though regretfully, and now he was gazing out over the Plaza, the lineof his jaw as inflexible as ever.

  But they were not many, the moments this man had to himself, and it wasnot long before a gendarme in coarse blue, serving as an orderly,disturbed him.

  "Well, show her in then," he said, frowning at the card laid on hisdesk, nor did he rise when an unusually beautiful but very grave youngwoman entered the room.

  "At your orders, Senorita de--d'Aumerle. You come, I suppose, to savehim?--But," he added with the austerity of a parent, "it is notdifficult to imagine why _you_ are interested."

  "No, Senor Presidente," he heard himself quietly contradicted, "YourExcellency can not i
magine."

  He looked up, into a pair of honest gray eyes. But her tone had alreadytold him enough. He rose to his feet in rugged courtesy. The Indian wasa wise man, and he knew now that other men had whispered falsely aboutone exquisite Parisienne.

  "Pardon me, child," he said gently. "No, I cannot imagine."

  Impulsively Jacqueline leaned over the desk and gave him her hand."Thank you," she said, in a voice that trembled unexpectedly. From thatmoment, too, she abandoned tactics. The wiles of courts would availnothing against the primitive straightforwardness of the man before her.It seemed, moreover, good and homely, to cast them aside. She took aseat near the window, since he remained standing until she did, andwaited. He should speak first, and afterward, she would accept. Forthere was nothing, she felt, that she could say. O rare tongue of woman,to so respect the leash of intuitions!

  As for Don Benito Juarez, he had not meant to speak at all. But knowingher now to be not what he had thought, he spoke as he had not to anyplenipotentiary of any crowned head.

  "You are a Frenchwoman, senorita," he began. "Tell me, your coming mustbe explained by that?"

  "Now," said Jacqueline, smiling on him cordially, "Your Excellency'simagination is getting better."

  "And you wish to save Maximilian," the Presidente stated, rather thanquestioned, "because he is a victim of France."

  "Because he will be considered so."

  The old Roman smiled. "My dear young lady," he said, "an answer toFrance is the least of my obligations. Yet you expect it, and ask forclemency, though I deny all the great nations?"

  "Oh senor, what's the use? Let him go!"

  The keen black eyes regarded her quizzically. "Do you know," he said,"this is the second time I've heard that question to-day? One of ourAmerican officers had himself put in command of the escort forMaximilian's two lawyers here, and now I believe he did it simplybecause he too wanted to know, 'What's the use?' It was anti-climax, anda wet blanket over the fervid eloquence of the two lawyers. Butnevertheless, he hit the one argument."

  "Yes, yes!"

  "In a word, why not brush aside our archduke? He's harmless, now, he'sinsignificant? Why not take from him the only dignity left, that ofdying?"

  "Of course, Senor Juarez! Of course!"

  "And at the same time win bright renown for ourselves, instead of whatwill be called harsh cruelty?"

  "Surely!"

  The smile vanished. The large mouth closed tightly.

  "No," spoke the judge of iron. "He dies! That is the truest mercy, amercy to those who might otherwise follow him here. And we, senorita, wehave already suffered enough from Europe."

  "But the other two?" pleaded Jacqueline. "They are Mexicans."

  "They are that, por Dios, and they make me proud of my race. Miramon,Mejia, they are the leaven. They redeem Lopez, they redeem Marquez, theyredeem the deserters who now so largely form my armies, who before haddeserted me for the French invasion. By the signal example of these twomen to die to-morrow, the world shall know that Mexicans are not alltraitors. And as we grow, we Mexicans, we may grow beyond the emptyloyalty of glowing Spanish words. Remembering such an example, we maycome to be, in our very hearts, breathing things of honor. We have beenshackled because of infamy during the last centuries. Can you wonder,then, that we use the treacherous weapon of the Conquistadores?--Butthat's apart. The loyalty of Miramon and Mejia has been loyalty to aninvader, a wrong their country will not forgive. But our culturedgentleman of Europe, our vain fool who would regenerate the poor Indito,he will perhaps not feel so ashamed of us, not when he has two suchcompanions in death, and not when he learns, though painfully, that therod of Mexican justice respects neither immunity nor privilege of birth.There, senorita, I've had to talk more about this one individual thanabout the hundreds of others who have been punished for much less thanhe."

  "But it must be terrible to die, senor. And _he_ doesn't realize,while a delay of only a few days----"

  "Would suffice for his escape?"

  Jacqueline reddened guiltily. "No, to prepare for his end," she said.

  The Presidente smiled tolerantly. "Never fear," he answered first herconfusion, "our justice stands committed, and to wink at escape nowwould be cowardly. Yet, whether you meant it or not, you are right, andthe execution stands postponed until the nineteenth. A doomed man maylearn much in three days to comfort him--on his way. But the criminal ofall is lacking."

  "Marquez, you mean?"

  "U'm, him also. But I was thinking of Louis Napoleon, _and_ hiswife."

  The order of postponement, being openly telegraphed to Escobedo atQueretaro, was known at once in San Luis, and caused a fury ofexcitement. For none doubted but that it meant eventual pardon. Thetender hearted rejoiced. The rabid ones muttered. The wise shook dubiousheads. And even as Jacqueline and Berthe were hurrying back to Queretaroin the canvas-covered coach, another caller was admitted roundly on thepresident's privacy, without so much as being announced. Juarez wonderedif his orderly had gone crazy, for the newcomer thus obsequiouslypresented looked to be a species of ancient vagabond.

  "Well, what is it?" the President asked, frowning heavily. He wascuriously irritated. "Stay," he interposed, "those dusty, muddy rags youhave on, that green and red, that's not a Republican uniform?"

  "It's of the Batallon del Emperador," replied the stranger, unabashed.

  "Bless me the saints! Well, well, well, I suppose you, too, want to saveyour Maximilian. But how does it happen that you're not under guardyourself?"

  For answer the old man came nearer. He limped feebly, and the while heunbuttoned his coarse red jacket. Juarez watched him sluggishly, butwith a hand upon a revolver under the papers on his desk. The stranger,however, drew forth nothing more sensational than five or six squarebits of parchment. Yet these aroused the President more than a weaponcould have done. They were blank, except at the bottom, and there thePresident read his own signature, "Benito Juarez, Libertad y Reforma."

  "Your--Your Excellency remembers?"

  "How well!" The admission came involuntarily. Juarez was laboring underan emotion that he could not at first control. He stared at his visitorin a new wonder. So gaunt, so hollow, so utterly insignificant! ThePresident's wonder grew.

  "You--you gained entrance here by one of these slips?" he questionedsharply. The old man nodded. "And it was countersigned by----"

  "Si senor, by El Chaparrito. The slip said, 'Admit bearer at once.'"

  "Then I cannot blame my orderly! But who are you?"

  "Anastasio Murguia, to serve Your Mercy."

  "Bien, Senor Murguia, and now will you explain what no other messengerfrom our unknown friend has done? Who--who is El Chaparrito?"

  But, like the wretched messengers who had gone before, Anastasio Murguiaonly shrugged his shoulders blankly. "Your Excellency does not know ElChaparrito?" he asked. "And yet you trusted him, a stranger, with yoursignature?"

  There was a crafty stress on his words.

  "Ah, senor," Juarez placidly inquired, "what if a chief magistrate didnot know when to trust? You are to be informed, then, that one year agolast October, at Chihuahua, I was saved from a French flying column byan Indito. The poor wretch had run across the desert with his warning.But he could prove nothing. He couldn't even tell who sent him, exceptthat it was a short gentleman, a senor chaparro. Yet it was well for theRepublic that I took his word and fled. Later, when I reached the RioGrande, and he wanted my signature to some blank squares of parchment,which he was to take back to his senor chaparro--well, senor, I trustedagain. That Indito in breech-clout obtained my autograph some twentytimes over."

  The President, however, might have added that every Republican officerwas advised first to test any warning on any bit of parchment signed"Benito Juarez." Yet, as a matter of fact, there came to be such magicin the name of El Chaparrito that the name of Juarez thereto was onlyneeded as a guarantee that the lesser name was genuine.

  "Now, then, Senor Emissary," said the President, "what danger hangs ove
rour Republic this time?"

  "None, senor. I return the parchment squares left over. El--ElChaparrito has no more thoughts for the Republic. He thinks," andMurguia ground his knuckles into the desk top, "he thinks of no one, ofno one--except Maximilian! And he has never thought of aught else. TheRepublic? Bah, the Republic was only his tool, Senor Presidente. Onlyhis tool, but the tool needed sharpening. They say that's the way withthe guillotine, eh, Senor Presidente?"

  "But hombre--No, our unseen friend of the Republic, our Chaparrito,would not ask for Maximilian's pardon?"

  "_Pardon!_"--It was fairly a cry of rage--"Yet you, SenorPresidente, _you_ postpone the execution! _You_ mean to pardonhim!"

  "Indeed?"

  "Yes, I--I think so. But you shall not, Senor Presidente. I come to,to----"

  "Now that's curious. Possibly I, too, am to be sharpened into a kind ofguillotine, eh, senor?"

  "All the others were," Murguia returned stubbornly. "That is, all exceptone."

  "Ha, then El Chaparrito found one man who was incorruptible?"

  "Yes. But still Your Excellency is mistaken. El Chaparrito did not usemoney to win his agents. That, senor, is the unsafest way of all."

  "You would tell me, senor, that El Chaparrito had a safe way?"

  "Yes, and it was absolute. He awakened memory, the memory, SenorPresidente, of wrongs. For example, there was Your Excellency's saviorin breech-clout. He once lived in a forest village down in the Huasteca.One night Dupin came and burned the huts, and the Indito's familyperished with other women and children there. That village alone gavethe Chaparrito many another messenger or spy, but memories left by theEmpire were plentiful enough everywhere, and cheap. The Chaparritosimply drafted them, that was all. But once his system failed. Yet--wellthe man in that case was an American, and _they_ are liable to beexceptions to any rule, to any passion. But in the end he was safeenough too, though something else, that I can't understand, made himso."

  "And what did he do, this American?"

  "He took me to Escobedo."

  "And you?"

  "I took Lopez. That same night Queretaro fell."

  "_You?_ Now--now to what particular wrong in _your_ case,senor, does the Republic stand thus indebted?"

  Juarez put the question lightly, even patronizingly. But his steadfastgaze had not once left his gaunt and battered visitor. By design, too,he had not asked a second time who the Chaparrito was, because he saw,or felt, that the old man knew, though former emissaries from thatmysterious source had not known. And Juarez meant to possess the secret.But with his casual irony he never looked for any such kindling ofmemory as then flashed deep in the cavernous sockets opposite him. Theeyes of the aged man glowed and darkened, glowed and darkened, andseemed the very breathing of some famished beast. It was a thing tostartle even Benito Juarez, who during many, many years had learned themeaning of civil war. The President leaped to his feet, pointing afinger.

  "You are," he cried, "yes, _you_ are the Chaparrito!--No?--Yes! Ha,I've struck, I've struck!"

  He had indeed. The colossal guile and intellect and will, the giant whommen in awe called El Chaparrito, was only old, withered AnastasioMurguia. But the astute Juarez _knew_ that he was right. He knew itin that one look of consuming, conquering hate. He knew the giant inthat hate. The feeble flesh, Anastasio Murguia, was an incident. Yeteven so, only the President's tenacity held him to where his instincthad leapt. For under discovery Murguia was changed to a huddled, abjectcreature, stammering denial. Yet it must be true, it must. Thestrangest, the most weird of contrasts in the same soul and body--yet itmust, it _was_ true!

  And Murguia? He might have asked for reward, and had it. But his wasrankest despair. His work was not finished, his goal not attained. Andnow his most potent instrument of all, the Chaparrito, was miserablyidentified in his own self, was taken from him.

  Juarez rose and touched his shoulder, "Come," he said, "there's much toomuch tension here. Now then, sit down, so. Let me see, you said yourname was--yes, Murguia. But--why, Dios mio, that's the Huasteca miser!Well, well, well, and so you are that rich old hacendado who never gaveeven a fanega of corn to Republic or French either, unless frightenedinto it? But hombre, we've had _big_ sums from the Chaparrito, andall unasked!"

  And yet must it still be true, yet must even this contrast accord. ElChaparrito had indeed given munificently. But in each case it was tobridge a crisis. As the shrewdest general he knew a vital campaign, andaided, if need be. But on a useless one the Republic's soldiers mightstarve, might freeze, might bleed and die, without ever the mostniggardly solace ever reaching them from El Chaparrito. Economy wasapplied to vengeance, and made it unspeakably grim.

  "Once though," Juarez pursued, "you all but lost your Maximilian? I meanlast fall when he started for the coast. He could have escaped toEurope."

  "I know," said Murguia quietly, "but I was near him. If he had notturned back, I would have done it myself."

  "It?"

  "The justice which Your Excellency has just postponed three days."

  "Dios mio, but our Chaparrito is a dangerous person! He'd have to belocked up if Maximilian were pardoned."

  "But--but Your Excellency will not pardon him!"

  "To be sure, I had forgotten. I am to be given a memory. Well?"

  "Your Excellency remembers, he remembers Zacatecas?"

  "Last February? Certainly I do. Miramon came, but a warning from ElChaparrito, from you, came first, and a last time I escaped. As it was,I was reported captured, and I sometimes wonder what Maximilian wouldhave done had that report been true."

  "If I should tell you, senor?"

  "Ah, that is beyond even you, since Maximilian has never had the chanceto decide my fate."

  "But he did decide, senor. He got word that you were taken at Zacatecas,and at once he sent orders to Miramon as to your treatment. But Miramonwas already defeated, already fleeing to Queretaro."

  "And the orders, the orders from Maximilian?"

  "They never arrived. They were intercepted. They--yes, here they are,but before reading them, will Your Excellency promise to imagine himselfin Miramon's power?"

  "I would, naturally. Come, senor, hand them over."

  It made curious reading, that weather-blotched dispatch. For Don BenitoJuarez it was reading as curious as a man may ever expect to come by. Inthe handwriting of his prisoner, he read his own death sentence.

  "Your--Your Excellency sees?" Murguia stammered hungrily.

  "H'm, what, for example?"

  "Why, that--that Maximilian would not have pardoned?"

  "On the contrary, senor mio, that is precisely what the generousMaximilian did intend. Listen--Miramon was 'to delay execution until HisMajesty should pass upon it.'"

  "No--no, Your Excellency, he would not have----"

  "O ho, so you think you've missed your last stroke! You think that thereis no memory for me in this dispatch! But don't whine so, because, man,there is, there is! It may not be the memory of my intended death, butit is the memory of--intended insult. Oh, what a patriot he must havethought me, this good, regenerating prince! He had already offered tomake me chief justice. But this time he would have saved me from his ownBlack Decree. And I would have been touched by his clemency? I wouldhave accepted, the grateful tears streaming from my eyes? And thus Iwould be regenerated? It sounds beautiful. It sounds like the chivalrousMiddle Ages, when there were Black Princes along with the Black Decrees.My liege lord _he_ would have been, but my liege Patria, what ofher?--Well, well, well, he has three days in which to understand mebetter, and to think of his own regeneration a little."

  "Then," cried Murgia, limping gleefully toward him, "then there will beno pardon?"

  "I see," said Juarez, suddenly cold and very calm, "I am now corrupted.I am now safe, like the others. Take that chair, wait!"

  Saying which the Presidente left his desk, clapped his hands for theorderly, and seated himself near the window. To the orderly he said, "Goto the diligence office across the Plaza. As
k for Colonel Driscoll, theAmerican officer who commands the escort of the two lawyers. Say that Iwish to see him here at once."

  When Driscoll appeared, Juarez put to him this question, "Colonel--I'llsay 'General' whenever you decide to be a citizen among us--Colonel, canyou reach Queretaro early to-morrow morning by riding all night?"

  "Not with my own horse, sir. He's getting old, and deserves better."

  "Then it's all right, senor. You will take any horse you want. I havetelegraphed to stop the execution, but there's been no reply. You musttherefore see General Escobedo yourself. Look on my desk. Do you find apacket there?"

  "Yes."

  "Sealed? Well, break it open. Now read the contents to my visitor here."

  Driscoll unfolded a long sheet of foolscap, and began to read. Murguiathe while fidgeted in an agony, but listening further, his limbs grewtense, and a hideous joy overspread his face.

  "'But at sunrise of the nineteenth you will execute the sentence alreadyapproved.'"

  The prisoners were not to be deceived by false hopes. There would be nofurther appeal. The last, the final decision, had been made.

  "I have signed it, I believe, Colonel Driscoll?"

  "Yes."

  "Then seal it again, and hurry! Good-bye, sir, good-bye."

  When Driscoll was gone, the Benemerito of America turned to the grinninghyena-like old man who was his visitor. His own dark features werepassionless, impenetrable.

  "You observe, senor," he said, "that Justice does not requirecorrupting, nor even a memory. So let El Chaparrito add this to hisphilosophy, that he need not boast again of an infallible spur to civicloyalty, for he will never find it, nor I. And yet--there ispatriotism."