The Filibusters, Charles John Cutcliffe Hyne [best book clubs .TXT] 📗

told you something about Donna Delicia’s previous connection with Sacaronduca.”

He passed a hand wearily over his face and paused. I had never seen him so knocked up before. Delicia had vanished without leaving so much as a trace behind her. She had lunched with the Carmoys; had spoken of assisting at the scene in the grand plaza in the afternoon; had gone to her room for some matter of toilette; and had not again been viewed. An instant search had been made, with every force available, and with scientific thoroughness. We could only satisfy ourselves that she was not in the city. She had been spirited away with consummate cleverness, and everything pointed to Maxillo as the kidnapper. And if it was true that he had the girl in his hands, then one could only hope that God would help her. Maxillo was a revengeful man, and one entirely ruthless, and by this time he could not be ignorant that he owed his down-throw almost entirely to Delicia alone. It made one shiver to think what he might do to her if he got her up in the Tolpec Mountains. The people were half Indians there, and he was an autocrat amongst them. She would be hopelessly in his power.

“I saw her,” the General began, ” when she first came back to this country as a widow. Her husband had died on the road out a weak creature by accounts, whom she had married for a freak but she did not pretend any deep sorrow for him. She came straight to her palace here in Dolores, and (if one may so express it) set up her court. She did not encourage any flagrant gaiety. But she by no means shut herself up. She said that to do so might be conventional, but it was entirely useless; it did that poor fellow her husband no good; and if she donned black, it was because black suited her, and was, moreover, a very fashionable wear.

“It was at this time that I first met Delicia. I did not see her often, because my business brought me seldom to the capital; and I cannot say that she showed any marked preference for me. I just stood to her a grade above the level of an ordinary acquaintance. You see I was a successful man just then, and she has a liking for success.”

He paused again, and Carew nodded at Coffin, and I exchanged glances with Davis. This creed of cultivating success was one which we were beginning to have a good strong intimacy with.

“Now you must please to remember that I speak to you from now, not as my officers, but as friends and inmates. There are things which a man does not care to bawl abroad openly, and one is the matter of love. But it is necessary for a proper understanding of what happened afterwards that you should be clearly told how the balance of feeling lay between Deliciaand myself, and one other. I, gentlemen, feel no shame in confessing that I felt the strongest affection for her from the moment of our very first meeting. You have seen her, all of you; you have felt her charm, and you will have small difficulty in understanding this. She, I may say at once, did not return this feeling in any degree whatever. She was completely wrapped up in President Maxillo.”

“What, she was sweet on that old goat?” Carew rapped out. ” Well, up till now I had credited the lady with taste.”

The General frowned. ” You are jumping at a conclusion, Sir William. A woman may be attracted to a man by other reasons than love. Maxillo was a strong man in his way, and he was the head of Sacaronduca. Delicia chose to be ambitious. She knew that she could strengthen the President’s hand and increase the power of the State if she chose to set about it; but she did not see fit to do this unless it was put in her way to share some of the resulting ‘ kudos.’ There was a way to do this which everyone saw, Maxillo amongst others. Indeed, he proposed it to her. ‘Marry me,’ he said.

“‘That is precisely what I want, with limitations,’ says she. ‘ I will take your name, help your work, and share your rewards, and that is exactly all. We must keep up two different establishments, precisely as we do at present.’

“‘That is not a thing I shall do,’ says Maxillo. ‘Either I marry you or I do not. I have never peddled in half measures yet through forty years of life, and I do not intend to begin even for the most fascinating young woman in Central America.’

“‘Yet I shall be useful to you as an ally.’

“‘Se�ora, I place the highest value on your wit and cleverness.’

“‘And possibly might prove destructive as an enemy.’

“‘Dangerous at any rate.’

“‘Well,’ says Delicia, ‘ it is curious that the only man I want as a husband refuses to marry me. A good many scores of others have asked for the post, so up till now I used to think myself rather attractive than otherwise.’

“‘Seflora,’ says Maxillo, ‘ if you were a thousand times less attractive I might do as you wish; but because you are as you are, I must either make you my wife or not marry you at all. The “so-near-and-yet-so-far ” type of existence with you would be a torment which a Dictatorship over all the Americas could not compensate. You see I am human enough to have so great an admiration for you.’

“‘Why, bless the man,’ says Delicia, ‘ how unreasonable it is. The admiration is quite as large on my side, or I shouldn’t have offered to go into any sort of partnership whatever.’

“Maxillo sighed and shook his head. ‘ Perhaps,’ he said, ‘ matters may continue to go on as they have done heretofore. Quien sabe? ‘

“‘Quien sabe?’ says Delicia. ‘I make no threats and few promises. That isn’t my way. I mostly do things and let them announce themselves. I wonder you haven’t seen that for yourself.’

“‘The bother is, I have,’ says Maxillo, thoughtfully; ‘and I know you can be dangerous if you like. I believe if I were wise, I should give my feelings a wrench, and have you deported over the boundary line.’

“‘My dear man,’ says Delicia, ‘ either have me conveniently killed out of the way and that is probably your only safe course or else do nothing. If I want to be up to mischief, it is a matter of utter indifference whether my carnal body is in Dolores or London. And if you do send me into exile, and I did take it into my head to meddle (and of course do it successfully) you’d only look ridiculous.’

“‘That is so,’ says Maxillo. ‘I won’t send you away, and as kill you I can’t, you will have an entirely free hand. But, Se�ora, I shall keep a most paternal eye over your doings.’

“‘Then,’ says Delicia, ‘I will provide a most connective set of movements for your inspection. And so, Senor et Presidente, hasta la ma�ana.’”

The General paused again. “This,” said Carew, “throws light on many things. Not a clear electric light, you understand, but a good steady glow which shows up several matters which were in the dark before.”

“If you would talk plainer English, Billy, you’d be a more popular man,” said Coffin. ” Perhaps you’d better explain. I can’t puzzle it out for myself without getting a headache. I’m not intellectual.”

“That’s true. You’re a nice little man, wee Hugh, but you don’t always have the gumption to see which side your bread’s buttered. General, we’re interrupting most rudely. I suppose you have to tell us now that Madame Delicia went about very promptly on the other tack.”

“She has not been used to reverses,” the General said drily, ” and it is not to be supposed she sat down quietly under that one. She sent me a line, and I saw her the same evening, and in two hours’ time the Revolution in Sacaronduca had been schemed and started.

“‘If you can get the men,’ she said, ‘ I can raise the funds. I know three of the Holsteins well, and one of them would do anything for me. Indeed I believe, business man though he is, the Baron would finance us without any promise of concessions at all if I made a point of it. He is wonderfully fond of me.’

“‘I can imagine that/ I said. ‘ But some people are greedier and less disinterested. They think more of themselves, and want a definite “quid pro quo.” I am one of those people. I want to know, Seflora, what I personally am to expect out of this matter.’

“‘Why the Presidency of Sacaronduca, to be sure.’

“A very good thing in its way, but I am more exorbitant in my demands. If I have to fill the chair alone, I do not care to try for it. But if you will consent to share it with me, then you may count on my not only gaining it, but making the Presidency a thing of mark which all the world will look at.’

“‘Tall words, Don Esteban. You will have to show yourself a strong man if you are to make them good.’

“‘There is only one thing that could have made me speak like that, and that is the idea of seeing you as my wife, and winning your love, but under those conditions I should know myself with certainty to be strong enough to gain any human mark you wished for.’

“‘That is what I like,’ she said. ‘ You can let me see you are confident, and that you are a likely man to force success. As to what you ask, that depends upon yourself. You have my admiration now and Seflor, nothing beyond. What they call my love you may win if you can, and I tell you that if you raise yourself to be President of Sacaronduca, and make her cease to be a petty robber state, and force her up to a niche amongst the nations, I could love you as few men have been loved before. But, on the other hand, if you fail, I shall get a hatred towards you which will leave its mark, because, you see, I shall be deeply mixed in the matter myself, and the upsetting of any of my own schemes is not a thing which I ever intend to pass over lightly.’

“‘As witness the matter of Maxillo.’

“‘Exactly. He is a case in point; the only one on the record so far. You see I am telling you plainly beforehand how your chances lie, so that whatever happens you cannot blame me for using you badly afterwards.’

“‘Sefiora, you can do no wrong. Moreover, were my chance eight times as small, I would try for the reward. So if you please, we will consider the attempt a settled thing.’ And after that,” the General concluded, ” we went on to discuss the sum which it was necessary for Holstein to lay down to properly finance the revolution, and to decide upon what concessions Delicia should dangle before their eyes to make them inclined to speculate. Holsteins really held the key to the whole situation. If Delicia could not persuade them to put down the necessary million to float us, we could not even begin to fight.”

“Speaking as a business man,” said Davis thoughtfully, ” the influence which Madame Delicia brought to bear must have been tremendously great. The Holsteins have too many safe investments before them to be easily persuaded into embarking in such a risky speculation as this must have appeared. It seems marvellous that Madame’s