gaspar ruiz, condemned to death as a deserter, was not thinking either of his native place or of his parents, to whom he had been a good son on account of the mildness of his character and the great strength of his limbs. the practical advantage of this last was made still more valuable to his father by his obedient disposition. gaspar ruiz had an acquiescent soul.
but it was stirred now to a sort of dim revolt by his dislike to die the death of a traitor. he was not a traitor. he said again to the sergeant: “you know i did not desert, estaban. you know i remained behind amongst the trees with three others to keep the enemy back while the detachment was running away!”
lieutenant santierra, little more than a boy at the time, and unused as yet to the sanguinary imbecilities of a state of war, had lingered near by, as if fascinated by the sight of these men who were to be shot presently—“for an example”—as the commandante had said.
the sergeant, without deigning to look at the prisoner, addressed himself to the young officer with a superior smile.
“ten men would not have been enough to make him a prisoner, mi teniente. moreover, the other three rejoined the detachment after dark. why should he, unwounded and the strongest of them all, have failed to do so?”
“my strength is as nothing against a mounted man with a lasso,” gaspar ruiz protested eagerly. “he dragged me behind his horse for half a mile.”
at this excellent reason the sergeant only laughed contemptuously. the young officer hurried away after the commandante.
presently the adjutant of the castle came by. he was a truculent, raw-boned man in a ragged uniform. his spluttering voice issued out of a flat, yellow face. the sergeant learned from him that the condemned men would not be shot till sunset. he begged then to know what he was to do with them meantime.
the adjutant looked savagely round the courtyard, and, pointing to the door of a small dungeon-like guard-room, receiving light and air through one heavily-barred window, said: “drive the scoundrels in there.”
the sergeant, tightening his grip upon the stick he carried in virtue of his rank, executed this order with alacrity and zeal. he hit gaspar ruiz, whose movements were slow, over his head and shoulders. gaspar ruiz stood still for a moment under the shower of blows, biting his lip thoughtfully as if absorbed by a perplexing mental process—then followed the others without haste. the door was locked, and the adjutant carried off the key.
by noon the heat of that low vaulted place crammed to suffocation had become unbearable. the prisoners crowded towards the window, begging their guards for a drop of water; but the soldiers remained lying in indolent attitudes wherever there was a little shade under a wall, while the sentry sat with his back against the door smoking a cigarette, and raising his eyebrows philosophically from time to time. gaspar ruiz had pushed his way to the window with irresistible force. his capacious chest needed more air than the others; his big face, resting with its chin on the ledge, pressed close to the bars, seemed to support the other faces crowding up for breath. from moaned entreaties they had passed to desperate cries, and the tumultuous howling of those thirsty men obliged a young officer who was just then crossing the courtyard to shout in order to make himself heard.
“why don’t you give some water to these prisoners!”
the sergeant, with an air of surprised innocence, excused himself by the remark that all those men were condemned to die in a very few hours.
lieutenant santierra stamped his foot. “they are condemned to death, not to torture,” he shouted. “give them some water at once.”
impressed by this appearance of anger, the soldiers bestirred themselves, and the sentry, snatching up his musket, stood to attention.
but when a couple of buckets were found and filled from the well, it was discovered that they could not be passed through the bars, which were set too close. at the prospect of quenching their thirst, the shrieks of those trampled down in the struggle to get near the opening became very heartrending. but when the soldiers who had lifted the buckets towards the window put them to the ground again helplessly, the yell of disappointment was still more terrible.
the soldiers of the army of independence were not equipped with canteens. a small tin cup was found, but its approach to the opening caused such a commotion, such yells of rage and’ pain in the vague mass of limbs behind the straining faces at the window, that lieutenant santierra cried out hurriedly, “no, no—you must open the door, sergeant.”
the sergeant, shrugging his shoulders, explained that he had no right to open the door even if he had had the key. but he had not the key. the adjutant of the garrison kept the key. those men were giving much unnecessary trouble, since they had to die at sunset in any case. why they had not been shot at once early in the morning he could not understand.
lieutenant santierra kept his back studiously to the window. it was at his earnest solicitations that the commandante had delayed the execution. this favour had been granted to him in consideration of his distinguished family and of his father’s high position amongst the chiefs of the republican party. lieutenant santierra believed that the general commanding would visit the fort some time in the afternoon, and he ingenuously hoped that his naive intercession would induce that severe man to pardon some, at least, of those criminals. in the revulsion of his feeling his interference stood revealed now as guilty and futile meddling. it appeared to him obvious that the general would never even consent to listen to his petition. he could never save those men, and he had only made himself responsible for the sufferings added to the cruelty of their fate.
“then go at once and get the key from the adjutant,” said lieutenant santierra.
the sergeant shook his head with a sort of bashful smile, while his eyes glanced sideways at gaspar ruiz’s face, motionless and silent, staring through the bars at the bottom of a heap of other haggard, distorted, yelling faces.
his worship the adjutant de plaza, the sergeant murmured, was having his siesta; and supposing that he, the sergeant, would be allowed access to him, the only result he expected would be to have his soul flogged out of his body for presuming to disturb his worship’s repose. he made a deprecatory movement with his hands, and stood stock-still, looking down modestly upon his brown toes.
lieutenant santierra glared with indignation, but hesitated. his handsome oval face, as smooth as a girl’s, flushed with the shame of his perplexity. its nature humiliated his spirit. his hairless upper lip trembled; he seemed on the point of either bursting into a fit of rage or into tears of dismay.
fifty years later, general santierra, the venerable relic of revolutionary times, was well able to remember the feelings of the young lieutenant. since he had given up riding altogether, and found it difficult to walk beyond the limits of his garden, the general’s greatest delight, was to entertain in his house the officers of the foreign men-of-war visiting the harbour. for englishmen he had a preference, as for old companions in arms. english naval men of all ranks accepted his hospitality with curiosity, because he had known lord cochrane and had taken part, on board the patriot squadron commanded by that marvellous seaman, in the cutting-out and blockading operations before callao—an episode of unalloyed glory in the wars of independence and of endless honour in the fighting tradition of englishmen. he was a fair linguist, this ancient survivor of the liberating armies. a trick of smoothing his long white beard whenever he was short of a word in french or english imparted an air of leisurely dignity to the tone of his reminiscences.
